Grim Tidings by Caitlin Kittredge

blow, strippers, and cutting up dead bodies with power tools it’s black magic, whiny middle managers, and collecting on souls.”
    â€œWhen you put it like that . . .” I muttered, feeling the tightness in my gut relax a little.
    â€œEither way, I’m the boss now,” Leo murmured. “And what I say goes. And what I say is you’re not going anywhere.”

    â€œYou’re not going anywhere.” Jacob Gottlieb stretched out a hand to me, his slender fingers spread.
    The forest where I’d last seen him was still dark, still muffled in snow but now the fat, wet flakes didn’t touch me and Jacob’s voice echoed and buzzed like a bad connection.
    â€œPhyllis,” Jacob said to me. “Phyllis, you’re stuck. You need to forget about what’s happening there and come here.”
    â€œWhere is . . . here?” Even talking was an effort. I felt drugged, like Owen had shot me up with another dose of ketamine. Was I still in the basement? Had everything since just been a trip?
    â€œYou’re not in a k-hole!” Jacob shouted at me, and I stared at him. Granted, we hadn’t spent much time together, but I could never picture the good doctor using that phrase. “Here!” he shouted, gesturing around him. “Kansas City. Look for me!”
    â€œThis is Germany,” I slurred. “And you’re . . . you’re not . . .”
    â€œKansas City!” Jacob said again, slowly, like he was trying to order a steak in a foreign language. “Come find me! You’re stuck there. We need you here!”
    â€œWhy?” I murmured, trying to catch a few of the snowflakes and blinking as they passed right through my palm.
    â€œThe Walking Man!” Jacob bellowed as everything started to flicker and melt like the end of an old film reel. “The Walking Man is out and none of us are safe—”
    I snapped conscious, smacking my head on the dusty bed frame that was the centerpiece of the granny nightmare Viv called a bedroom. I was pinned under a number of musty afghans, Leo snoring softly beside me.
    This hadn’t felt like a dream a warlock or a demon could push into your head, quiet and subtle as a sharpened blade to the kidney. This felt more like a crazy person at the bus station screaming in my face and then hitting me with a stick when I ignored him.
    â€œWha’s goin’ on?” Leo muttered into his pillow. I lay back down and wrapped my arms around his waist, his stomach hard and warm under my hand.
    â€œI had a dream,” I said.
    â€œOh yeah?” Leo sighed. “Was it sexy?”
    â€œThey called me Phyllis,” I said.
    â€œWhy the fuck would somebody call you Phyllis?” Leo said.
    I stared at the blackness where the ceiling should be, and lied. “I have no idea.”

CHAPTER
7
    KANSAS CITY
    JANUARY 1947
    The rambling old house popped up out of the flat fields like a mushroom, looking like it had been growing there forever. The gray clapboards and mossy roof weren’t anything special—the only thing that made the house unique was that it was a stop between Kansas City and wherever customers’ next destinations lay. It was a place you’d forget as soon as you left. The girls working were equally forgettable. That was what I needed.
    I watched the frost on the windowpane recoil from the ember of my cigarette as I looked out across the highway. Traffic was light tonight—it was too cold for all but the most hard-up johns, andeven they were mostly tucked up in bed at this hour. Most of the girls, too. Even the forced laughter and tinny music from the parlor had died down. That meant it was the perfect time to go downstairs and get to work on my fourth glass of gin. Or was it the fifth? Nobody else in this place cared, I figured as I tiptoed down the stairs, my bare feet prickling against the cheap carpet runner, so why should I?
    Kathleen sat on the threadbare velvet sofa