Elemental Assassin 01 - Spider's Bite

salon. While she worked, I just sat there in the chair pondering her words—and the cold fear they raised in me.
    The Alexis James story played out for the next week. To say it was a circus would have been to underestimate the rabid appetite of the Ashland media. Story after story flooded the airwaves and newspapers about James and the trail of bodies in her wake. Donovan Caine must have been a better liar than I’d given him credit for, because the detective placed the blame for everything on Alexis, and nobody seemed willing to contradict him.
    Haley James might have, if she’d been able to. But her home burned to the ground with her in it the night after the incident at the rock quarry. Only the house’s stone foundation survived the blaze, along with a few of Haley’s teeth. Everything else was totally obliterated by the heat. The fire was ruled an accident, and the coroner said Haley probably died from smoke inhalation, since he didn’t actually have her body to autopsy. But I had no doubt Mab Monroe had paid Haley a visit for hiding Alexis’s activities from her. So the very thing Haley had feared came true after all. Irony. What a bitch.
    Finn made his own discreet inquiries into the matter, reaching out to his various contacts. He wanted to know if Haley had spilled her guts to Mab, if she’d said anything to the Fire elemental about Fletcher, Finn, or me. About what we did or what the James sisters had hired us to do. But evidently, Haley had never gotten the chance. Rumor had it that Mab had been so enraged at Haley’s part in the embezzlement scheme that the Fire elemental had fried her on the spot. No questions asked. And with Alexis and the rest of her men dead, there was no one else to tell the tale. Which meant that Finn and I were safe from anyone else nosing around or blowing our cover to Mab.
    A week after the incident at the rock quarry, we buried Fletcher in Blue Ridge Cemetery. Me, Finn, Jo-Jo, Sophia, the waitstaff and cooks from the Pork Pit, some of Fletcher’s buddies, who were as gnarled and old and grumpy as he’d been. Roslyn Phillips also showed up for the service, although the vampire stood off to one side by herself.
    It was another gorgeous fall day. Cerulean blue sky, bright sun, clouds that were smoother than marshmallow creme. The cemetery stood on a plateau on top of one of the mountains that ringed Ashland and offered a spectacular view of the sprawling city and countryside below. The grass gleamed like gold underfoot, while the burnt sienna and scarlet leaves painted the landscape with even more color. The mountaintops around us were smoky blue smudges against the sky.
    We ringed a plain wooden casket burnished to a high gloss. Fletcher hadn’t wanted anything fancy, he hadn’t been that kind of man, and Finn had respected his father’s wishes. The preacher had just started the graveside service, and people were already weepy. Several of the waitstaff and cooks snuffled into tissues. The old men dabbed their eyes with white handkerchiefs. Finn did the same. Jo-Jo Deveraux bawled like a baby, unashamed of her many tears, even though they were ruining her makeup. Sophia stood over her older sister, patting her back. The younger dwarf was dry-eyed, just like me. I’d cried my tears the night I’d found Fletcher’s body. Now, I just felt … empty. Hollow. Another piece of my heart was gone, and it was never coming back. Just like all the other bits I’d lost over the years.
    As the preacher spoke the traditional words of comfort, my mind drifted back to the day Fletcher had taken me in …
    My family had been gone nine weeks now. Maybe ten. Time had little meaning to me anymore. All that mattered was finding enough food for one more day and someplace that wasn’t too cold to sleep at night. Something that was getting more difficult as winter approached. My favorite spot was next to this barbecue restaurant called the Pork Pit. A crack in the alley across from the back of the restaurant was just big enough for me to squeeze into. I liked the small, tight space and the muted contentment of the stones in the surrounding buildings. Both of them made me feel safe, even though I knew it was only an illusion.
    Then there was the tall guy who ran the restaurant. Barbecue Man. That’s what I called him. He knew I hung around out back, but he didn’t yell or chase me away like the folks at the Italian and Chinese restaurants did. He even let me do odd jobs for him, like