Page 35 of Encore
Beyla
We couldn’t get Marsden to say a damned thing that would help us with this curse before. But, now that I’d figured out his secret, he wanted to spill his guts over lunch. It was kind of sad. It had been one hundred and fifty years and several murders later, and Selena was still it for him.
He'd dated and tried again, but that spark and passion were never there. None of us said a damned thing about the fact that he probably should have moved on from Ivory and Bellatrix way before that fateful day in rehearsal. He cared for Bellatrix in his own way, but not the same as Selena. Marsden seemed to think he could save Bellatrix from the worst parts of herself.
I didn’t think I wanted this at all, but he started sharing memories of Selena from back in Mexico and how things were when they first got to the states. All I knew about her after I got here was that she was the witch that started all of this. What she did seemed like a pretty fucking extreme reaction this entire time, then Bellatrix tried to shoot me.
Now I knew we were related. Witches didn’t have foresight, but she knew eventually, one of her ancestors would get called to ballet. Call me curious about what she was like. Did I get my love of ballet from her? Were there other dancers in our family we didn’t know about because of the adoption? How did Marsden even get those records when my family hadn’t been able to?
Oh yeah. He probably offered dirt on the Unseelie.
Marsden promised to keep us in the loop about everything involving this curse by the time we left. We were right about Damita’s death triggering the curse. We would be the first people he called if he started feeling a little murdery.
By the time I got home, I needed to make some phone calls. This needed to be explained to Kaine very carefully, so no one got set on fire. I also needed to have a ‘what the fuck, witch’ moment with Ripley and Ravyn because seriously, what the fuck?
I knew everyone wanted to talk when we got back, but technically, I was still here on a job, and I needed to report to Kaine. So, I excused myself and flopped on my bed. Kaine picked up on the first ring like he always did.
“Hey, kid. Getting info on your ballet boss for a profile is proving tough. Some high up people are protecting him.”
“Marsden is Santiago Suarez, the cursed Unseelie who has been killing people this entire time. I figured it out, cornered him at this apartment, and made him tell me.”
“Please tell me you hit him at least once.”
“Well, yeah. You raised me right.”
“That’s my girl. If I set him on fire, he can’t kill anyone this time.”
“I don’t think that’s necessary, but I’ll keep it in mind. He was married to the witch who cursed him. Before she met him, she was raped and gave the baby up for adoption. I’m apparently descended from both of them. I think I’ve been the missing ingredient to breaking this curse the entire time.”
“Fuck that, Beyla. You aren’t an ingredient. You’re a twenty-five-year-old witch who shouldn’t be on this assignment without backup. I still think I should set someone on fire.”
“They might not be bureau trained, but I have back up. They’ve been helping me this entire time. I wouldn’t have figured out Marsden was Santiago this soon without them.”
“Setting stupid people on fire makes me feel good,” Kaine sulked.
“I know, but he’s offered me a place in the company when this is over, and I kind of want to take him up on it. But, once the curse is removed, Marsden is just annoying.”
“Kid, you have no idea how happy that makes me. You were always meant to be performing in those tutus instead of flashing a badge in some asshole’s face. I know you can do this. I’ll be there opening night like always.”
“I know. I always dance better opening night when I know you’re there.”
“And I don’t care how famous you get or how far away you are. I willalwaysbe there.”
“That’s because you’re amazing. Anyway, I know you’re worried about me being here. Marsden told me all of his Unseelie stuff led him to me when I was a teenager. He stepped away to take a phone call, or he would have stopped Derek from hurting me. He was the one that called for help. He’s also the one that called the night I tried to overdose. So, in his own way, he’s been looking out for me.”
“You might want to ask him how far that protection extends, Beyla. You’re clearly important to him if he was creeping around the shadows when you were a teenager. Derek was a threat. He showed he had no problem taking your dance career away. Derek was facing assault charges. He would have doneanythingto make them go away.
“I haven’t been able to find out what happened to that boy. It’s pretty fucking expensive to keep hiring private investigators this long if you’re trying to pretend you don’t know where your crotch demon is. Human police have asked around, and so have I. It makes a whole lot of fucking sense that no one who knows you had any idea what happened to Derek if it was Marsden his entire time.”
“That bastard! I had things to say, and a whole hex prepared. He’d better not have.”
“I know you did, and I would have held him down while you did it. If it makes you feel any better, Unseelie revenge killings are so brutal they are against the law outside the Unseelie Court. They give any other supernatural a pass for that kind of thing. If you couldn’t have your say and I didn’t have the honor of burning him alive, I’m not mad he went out the Unseelie way for what he did to you.”
“If it was Marsden, I’m furious he took that away from me.”
“It’s not what you wanted, kid, but if he admits it, you finally know what happened to him. There’s nothing technically keeping you from a ballet career once you have an answer about what happened to that piece of bear-shifter excrement.”
“I guess.”
