Black Dust Mambo by Adrian Phoenix Read Free Book Online

and the perplexed paramedics stared at the Brit as he opened the case, selected a brown cigarette, and placed it between his lips.
    “He appears to be quite dead, my lord,” Mrs. Conti said finally. “His eyes . . . the blood alone . . .”
    Augustine sparked up the cigarette with a slim silver lighter. He nodded, then exhaled a plume of pale smoke into the air. The sharp smell of anise-and-vanilla-scented tobacco curled into the room.
    “The key word, Mrs. Conti, would be appears .”
    “I’m afraid I don’t understand,” the hotel manager said, a frown creasing the skin between her eyes.
    Kallie had to agree with Maria Conti. She wondered if Augustine believed himself a Jedi master using the Force on hapless bystanders.
    These aren’t the droids you’re looking for.
    “But this is carnival, and these young people are playing pranks on us, yes?” A pleasant smile crinkled the skin at the corners of the Brit’s eyes as he emphasized his words with graceful movements of his hand, the cigarette trailing sweet-scented smoke through the air.
    Tracing enchantment sigils. Crafting illusion.
    Kallie caught a hint of an earthy undertone in the smoke—frankincense, or myrrh—along with a whisper of gardenia. Power thickened in the air with each twirl of Augustine’s hand, streaming into Kallie’s lungs with every breath.
    “That’s why we didn’t want you to touch him,” Layne said, nodding at the paramedics and wading into the lie with all the ease of a longtime pro. “We knew you’d blow the whole prank otherwise.”
    Augustine glanced at the nomad, brow arched. “Indeed. The young man is only pretending to be dead. Wine stains the sheets, not blood,” he said, his tone a low and soothing singsong. A soft command. “Please look again.”
    A gray veil created by the perfumed smoke descended over Gage’s body, and it seemed even to Kallie that the nomad lifted his head and smiled a gotcha grin. Her blood chilled.
    Maria Conti studied Gage’s body, the pupils of her eyes nearly swallowing the irises. Relief restored rosy color to her cheeks. “Ah,” she breathed. “I was completely fooled.”
    The paramedics, eyes equally dilated, shook their heads, looking unhappy. “Shee-it. Our time’s been wasted,” one muttered. “Y’all can expect a bill for that time too.”
    “Of course, and please accept my apologies,” Augustine said, his voice and expression sincere. “Trust me, I’m not pleased with this little stunt either. The perpetrators will be disciplined.”
    The hotel manager nodded, and another tendril of auburn hair escaped her fraying bun. “As they should be. And we shall leave you to it, Lord Augustine.” Touching one of the paramedics on the forearm and speaking to him in low, sympathetic tones, she followed him and his partner out of the room, closing the door behind her.
    “Which one of you bloody idiots called the paramedics?” Augustine asked, stubbing his cigarette out in an empty champagne flute. The illusion of life wisped away from Gage’s body along with the snuffed smoke.
    “I’m the bloody idiot,” Kallie said, not sure who had actually called and not really caring. The Brit’s snippy tone stiffened her spine. “And as far as I know, when someone goes into cardiac arrest, doing CPR and calling the paramedics are the right things to do.”
    Augustine looked at her, his face cold as marble. “Not when you have the body of a man murdered by magic in the room, Ms. Rivière. Just how had you planned on explaining his death to the police?”
    Kallie glanced at the bed, at Gage’s body. “I don’t know,” she admitted. She caught a whiff of tobacco and musky incense as Augustine walked around the bed to stand beside her, his gaze on the black-dust hex on the mattress.
    “Looks like a hoodoo trick,” he murmured. “And you are a hoodoo, are you not, Ms. Rivière?”
    “So? I ain’t the only one here. And I had nothing to do with this.”
    “So she claims,” Mc