A Perfect Blood

into space.
    “Shut up! Just shut up!” Jenks yelled, and I chuckled.
    The front doorbell rang, and I straightened, my untasted coffee in my hand. Great. Now Jenks’s kids would be up again. But before I could move, Jenks was headed for the hallway. “Thank God,” he muttered, a blue dust sifting from him and looking like a weird sunbeam on the floor. “I’ll get it.”
    “It’s probably Marshal,” I called after him, then looked at Ivy and shrugged. I still had six uninvoked charms to get to the FIB. If they hadn’t tracked HAPA down by now, my amulets would help. Nervous, I pulled a strand of damp hair over my collarbone.
    “I like your tattoo,” Ivy said as she noticed me trying to hide it.
    “Thanks,” I said, feeling a tingle where her eyes had been as I poured Marshal a cup of coffee in the most masculine mug we had. “Me too.”
    I heard the clump, clump, clump of Marshal’s boots, and something in me fluttered. I had liked Marshal. He was a fun man to be around. I’d never expected to ever see him again when we’d parted, and I didn’t know why I’d asked him to help me except for the fact that he was the only witch I knew on the East Coast.
    “Just don’t ask Ivy about her morning,” Jenks said as the two of them entered.
    Marshal stopped short, took off his knitted hat, showing his skull, hair clipped short for the swimming pool. Looking uncomfortable, his eyes went from me to Ivy, and then back again. “Uh, hi, Rachel. Ivy,” he said, and Jenks left Marshal’s shoulder to get a few drips of coffee from the coffeepot.
    He looked almost the same as when I’d last seen him. His waist was just as slim, and his shoulders as wide. He still carried himself with that athletic grace that had attracted me to him in the first place. Clean shaven and wearing jeans and a sweater, he stood there with most of his weight on one foot, his hands in his coat pockets. He looked like he was in his midtwenties, but I knew he’d passed that almost ten years ago. Marshal was a ley-line witch in his prime with a good job, a good life, and it showed.
    Why had I asked him to come over? Someone at the I.S. could have invoked them, even if I’d have had to stand in the lobby and beg. This had been a stupid idea. Why had he come?
    Rolling her eyes, Ivy saluted him with her empty glass. “Hi, Marshal. If you’ll excuse me, I need to wash my hair,” she said dryly. Pushing herself forward, she headed right for him.
    Marshal sidestepped, frowning as Ivy stalked into the hall and her door shut a little too hard. God, he looked good standing in my kitchen, not afraid of her. Not afraid of anything. Mostly. His hands were clenched as he glanced down the hallway after Ivy, and I remembered how they’d felt on me, the waves of sensation that crested from his touch as he drew a line through me and made me come alive.
    What are you doing, Rachel?
    Jenks’s wings clattered in warning as he landed on my shoulder. “Rache?”
    “Don’t you have something to do?” I said, then smiled at Marshal. “It’s good to see you. How are you doing?”
    Shaking himself free from his dark thoughts about Ivy, Marshal smiled and came into the kitchen. “I’m doing great,” he said, his hand out in what might have been a handshake, but it might have been half a hug, too.
    I hesitated, and after a confusing moment, he awkwardly gave me a hug. I leaned into him, breathing the chlorine/redwood scent he had mixing with the damp dead-leaf smell of a cold November morning. Why had I asked him over? I wasn’t looking for a boyfriend. They always tried to change me.
    “You look good” rumbled through me, and I pushed backward. Jenks was scowling at me from the top of the door frame to the hall, and I ignored him.
    The rims of Marshal’s ears were red, and he rocked back, his hands in a fig leaf. “I can’t tell you how glad I am you got your shunning rescinded,” he said, his words too fast, his eyes too reluctant to meet mine. “I read all about it. I knew you could.”
    Then why did you leave? But I didn’t say it. He’d left when I’d been almost at my lowest point. I didn’t blame him, but to take up where we’d left off was stupid. He’d left once; he’d leave again.
    My chest hurt, and I forced myself to keep smiling as I went to the coffeemaker. “How’s the job going?” I said, my back to him as I tried to make my voice even. This had been a mistake. A huge, friggin’ mistake.
    “Okay. I’m not in