Elemental Assassin 03 - Venom

would have been wrong.
    Everybody knew Jo-Jo Deveraux was an Air elemental who used her beauty salon and magic to help folks stave off the ravages of time on their faces, breasts, legs, and asses. Pure oxygen facials could do wonders for even the most stubborn crows’ feet. But few people knew the dwarf was also the best healer in Ashland, capable of curingeverything short of death. Even then, you had a better chance of Jo-Jo finding some way to bring you back to life than with anyone else.
    Jo-Jo Deveraux had been fast friends with my mentor, Fletcher Lane. When I’d started doing the assassinating instead of the old man, Jo-Jo had transferred her healing services over to me. Of course, I always paid for her time, expertise, and magic, but the dwarf was family to me now. So was her younger sister, Sophia, who was a cook down at the Pork Pit, the barbecue restaurant Fletcher had left me upon his death. Sophia was also rather handy at disposing of the many bodies I left in my wake.
    “How are you feeling?” Jo-Jo asked in her low, easy voice that oozed like warm honey.
    “Like I got beaten by a giant.”
    Concern flashed in her pale gaze. Except for the pinprick of black at their center, the dwarf’s eyes were almost colorless, like two cloudy pieces of quartz set into her middle-aged face.
    “Sit me up, please,” I asked.
    Jo-Jo nodded. She moved behind me and hit a lever on the chair. The back tilted up, moving me into an upright, seated position. I shifted around, wiggling my fingers, toes, and jaw. I felt tired, but that was to be expected. The body could handle only so much trauma, and going from being well to being severely injured to being well again in the space of a few hours always left me feeling drained and lethargic. It took my brain a while to catch up to the fact that I was still breathing and not six feet under like I should have been.
    Dried blood still covered my clothes and hands, but everythingelse was in pain-free, working order once more. I sniffed. Jo-Jo had even fixed my drippy nose and purged the flu from my system. Humpty-Dumpty had been put back together again. Despite all of Mab Monroe’s men.
    My eyes scanned over the salon, which took up the back half of Jo-Jo’s massive, antebellum house. It looked the same as it always did. Lots of padded swivel chairs. Several old-fashioned hair dryers. Counters cluttered with hairspray, scissors, pink sponge rollers, nail polish, makeup, and gap-toothed combs. Pictures and posters of models with various hairstyles taped to the walls. Piles and piles of beauty and fashion magazines everywhere. I drew in a breath. The air smelled the same too—chemicals mixed with coconut oil from the tanning beds in the next room.
    Jo-Jo plopped down in the chair to my right. On the floor between us, Rosco actually expended enough energy to roll over, so the dwarf could rub his pudgy stomach with her bare foot.
    “You want to talk about it?” Jo-Jo asked.
    I shrugged. “Not much to talk about. Jonah McAllister got Elliot Slater and two of his giant goons to jump me at the community college. McAllister thought I might have info on his son Jake’s murder. Since I didn’t want to blow my cover, I had to let them beat me. End of story.”
    Jo-Jo stared at me, a reproachful look in her pale eyes. The dwarf had known me long enough to realize when I was fudging the truth.
    I sighed. “And Mab Monroe was there too.”
    Jo-Jo opened her mouth to ask a question, but Finn chose that moment to pop his head into the salon.
    “Is she finally awake?” he asked.
    “Finally?” I groused, looking up at the cloud-shaped clock on the wall. “It’s barely after ten. I only got the shit beat out of me a couple of hours ago. I’d say I was recovering nicely, all things considered.”
    “That’s what you think,” Finn said.
    He leaned against the door frame, a mug of chicory coffee in his hand. Finn drank the stuff at all hours of the night and day, but the caffeine seemed to have little effect on him. Or perhaps he’d just become immune to it. Fletcher Lane had drunk the same kind of coffee.
    I breathed in again, this time tasting the caffeine fumes in the air. The warm, comforting scent always reminded me of the old man. I wished Fletcher had been here tonight, to talk to me about the attack and seeing Bria again. I wished a lot of things about the old man that were never going to come to pass.
    Heavy, plodding footsteps sounded, and another person entered the