The first tattoo Rosita ever received was the one she kept hidden from onlookers: the words “My Immortals” etched in cursive writing on the inside of her upper arm. “I got it in honor of my mother and my baby girl. They died within a year of each other,” she had told Piper in confidence. Continue reading
Hanging upside down on a wooden perch was an animal that Louise had never seen before. It looked like a silver fox with demon wings. Piper hastily opened the locked and reached into the cage.
“Be careful!” Louise warned. “You don’t know what that thing is!”
“I know exactly what it is,” the girl replied. The animal’s clawed feet embraced her hand tenderly as she wrested it from its prison. “The one I know is much older.”
Suddenly a door on the back wall smashed open. A man in his late fifties wearing a safari helmet and khaki clothes leaped into the arena. He was holding a shotgun in one hand and a whip in the other. Continue reading
Houdini smiled at his wife with undisguised adoration. He had just finished a three-day run at the Providence Opera House and was still a bit wired. Howard Lovecraft had attended the show as his guest and then joined him for dinner to discuss their book about the roots of superstition.
“Right you are, my love,” Houdini said as the waiter set a plate of shrimp in garlic wine sauce before him. “But I can already tell that it will never measure up to one of your sumptuous feasts.”
“Oh, posh,” Bess said as the waiter presented her with a sizzling sirloin steeped in a Cognac flamed peppercorn cream.
Howard, who loved his Italian food, got the tagliatelle with meat sauce. The waiter bowed to each of them and left.
Houdini narrowed his eyes. It wasn’t the same waiter who had brought their appetizers. Though he was wearing a white shirt, black vest, and apron like the other waiters, his scalp was covered with a skullcap that was knotted in the back.
Something about the man bothered him. Maybe it was simply the incongruence of a Japanese man working in an Italian restaurant. Continue reading
Piper and Bess had grown even closer since Houdini had left to dazzle Chicago with his feats of daring and wonder. On Easter Sunday, Bess had taken her into Manhattan where she and two hundred-thousand other people flaunted their new spring clothing in the parade along Fifth Avenue. Seated in his customary chair as though he’d never been gone, Houdini lowered the paper and smiled.
“Come give your uncle a big birthday hug,” he said, opening his arms wide. When they embraced, she couldn’t tell if she sensed tension between them or if it was just her imagination. After all, how could he have known for sure that it had been her in Margery’s parlor? The only thing he could possibly have seen was a pair of glowing stars, which wouldn’t be out of the ordinary in a weird room like that.
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For a limited time, when you write a review for one of the Piper Houdini novels at Amazon.com, you will get a free copy of Marvel’s Beavis and Butt-Head (1994) signed by editor Glenn Herdling and color artist Bob Sharen. $10 value–limited supply! Continue reading
