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Informationen zum Autor Adrian Phoenix lives in Oregon with her three cats and travels to New Orleans whenever possible. Klappentext The beginning of an exciting new urban fantasy series by the author of "The Maker's Song!" about a fledgling voodoo priestess who gets caught up in murderous intrigue. Original. ONE CROSSED DEAD “C’mon, scoot your gorgeous ass over, Gage,” Kallie Rivière whispered, climbing onto the shadowed bed. “I feel like shit. How much goddamned champagne did we—” She froze when her fingers touched the hot, wet sheets. She blinked in the dawn light filtering into the New Orleans hotel room. Not shadows. She caught a faint whiff of coppery blood. Something else altogether darkened the sheets. Nausea flipped through her belly. Swallowing hard, she lifted her hand and forced herself to push the blood-soaked sheets back from the man they covered. Gage. The good-looking and hard-bodied nomad conjurer she’d hooked up with last night after the May pole dance. Playing with him had been a bendy, bouncy, naked trampoline act; a free fall into pleasure. One part Gypsy-style outlaw biker, one part pagan conjurer, and one part hot-blooded explorer—all sexy nomad. Man was beaucoup skilled. Or had been. Kallie stared at the dead man in her bed. He lay on his belly, his face turned to the side. Blood masked his fine features, glittered in his black curls. It looked like blood had poured from Gage’s eyes, nose, mouth, and—given the blood staining the sheets beneath him—from elsewhere, like a spigot turned on full blast. All color had drained from his espresso-brown skin, leaving his swirling blue-inked clan tattoos stark on his muscular back, ass, and thighs. Kneeling on the bed, Kallie reached over, intending to touch her fingers to his throat and check his pulse, but her hand stopped just a few inches above his blood-streaked neck. Just a few hours ago, he’d devoured her lips with rough and hungry kisses as they had tumbled together on the carpeted floor, her legs wrapped around his waist—so white against his dark skin. The thought of his skin cold and lifeless beneath her fingers kept her hand in the air, motionless. His empty, unblinking eyes told her he was dead. Gage was gone. She didn’t need to touch him. Kallie stared at her trembling hand, wondering if she even could. She’d seen plenty of dead things at home in Bayou Cyprès Noir, but never a dead person, let alone one she knew. Well, hey, Kallie-girl, that isn’t quite right, now is it? Shouldn’t keep lying to yourself like that. Memory tugged at Kallie, taking her back to another morning nine years ago. Mama pulls the gun’s trigger and the side of Papa’s head explodes in a spray of blood and bone. He slumps down in his chair, a bottle of Abita still in his hand. Kallie stands in her bedroom doorway, frozen—just like now. Mama turns and faces her, aims the gun carefully between her shaking hands. Her hands shake, but her face is still, resigned. “Sorry, baby. I ain’t got a choice.” Mama pulls the trigger again. Kallie touched trembling and blood-sticky fingers to the scar on her left temple. Traced the lightning stroke of the bullet’s path, just as her gaze traced the contours of Gage’s face. Pain and shock had widened his hemorrhaging eyes, had twisted his fingers into the sheets. How had he died? When had he died? While she lay curled on the bathroom floor, sick on too much wine and champagne? She hadn’t heard a goddamned thing. Kallie reached up and closed her fingers around the pendants her aunt had hung around her neck nine years ago—a tiny onyx coffin marked with a silver X and a medallion for Saint Bernadette—and closed her eyes. It was too late to call 911, but she needed to contact someone . Repor...
