Bad Moon:Book One in the "I Am Chaos" series.

Chapter 15: Choices

Chapter 15: Choices

I left the apartment well before nightfall. I had a feeling that the closer it got to dark, the more I risked running into one of Sin's sorcerers.

I went out the back door and walked around the block, taking the back way to my car. There was a good chance that Vehendi was lying, and that I'd die tonight. With shaking fingers, I started the car and took a few deep breaths before putting it in drive and heading north for the second time that day.

I drove the speed limit. I stopped at a liquor store along the way and bought a few nips of Jack Daniels. Then I stopped at a Starbucks and picked up a small coffee.

Lynn, Lynn, city of Sin, I thought as I drove through. The town had done a lot over the years to change its reputation, but the old saying seemed particularly poignant today. I parked just over the border, in one of the two-hour-spaces that lined the ocean. Then I emptied the nips into the coffee, hoping that alcohol was called "liquid courage" for a reason.

Sitting there, drinking the coffee, I kept envisioning myself turning the car back on, pulling a u-ey, and speeding out of Lynn in a hurry. After the third close call, I forced myself out of the car and walked down the beach until I found a bench to sit on. I'd checked the weather before I'd headed out. Dusk would set at 6:30, and full dark would fall just a few minutes after. I wasn't going to Red Rock Park until I absolutely had to.

As I watched the water, trying to lose myself in the rhythmic crash of the waves, the sun sank slowly behind me. There was nothing comforting about the gradual darkening of the sky, its pale blue turning a deeper and deeper shade of indigo, the water darkening minute by minute.

I called my power into being, felt it thrum against my skin and pool thickly at the tips of my fingers. I tried to think up battle scenarios, but instead, I kept thinking of Granny and her hanging orbs: little bits of dried herbs used to protect her from me. And I kept thinking about Paz, the look of fear in her eye when I unleashed the hurricane. I kept thinking about Cal, who'd backed away from my touch, and Sin, eyeing me up: Do I kill you?

I held my hands up to my face and thought about Vehendi. Fear iced through my veins and my magic faded abruptly.

I had to push down the fear. Why be afraid, when you should be feared? Fear stymied my magic. Fear was going to get me killed. I reached into my pocket and palmed the silver knife. Courage, I prayed to it as if it were a god. Give me courage.

Dusk fell. It was time to go.

It took me ten minutes to walk down to Red Rock Park. The street lamps along Lynn Shore drive began to shed light in earnest. I walked beneath them, my eyes trained on my shadow, which lengthened, doubled, shortened.

I took courage from the cars still streaming by. The park was visible from the road. Vehendi wouldn't try anything in so public a place, certainly?

I reached the park, nodding to a couple that walked past as their fluffy white bichon skirting me with a wary snort.

I paused at the park's edge, but felt no humming electric power, no hint of magic. So I stepped off the sidewalk and headed onto the small isthmus of grass that cut through the park. The park jutted out into the sea, supported by a sea wall and a railing with a metal barricade that kept visitors from falling ten feet and onto the rocks below.

On the bench, the same bench I'd clung to just a week ago, someone sat waiting.

Vehendi.

My breath hitched. My stomach leapt into my throat, but a car drove past, its lights illuminating the park for a moment so that I could see the figure more clearly. Tall, lean, curling red hair.