---

“Nice ass!”

I sighed. I was in no mood to be hit upon by Rodney Jackson again. It was the third time this week. Somehow, I had missed him on my walk from my car just off the Tulane campus to Dinwiddie Hall where my two o’clock Theory of Magic course met. If I had spotted the beefy linebacker instead of thinking about my readings for my class, I might have been able to dodge him.

“You look fine, Mama!” his deep voice boomed, and I instinctively realized he was close enough that I needed to push my ass forward to avoid an unwanted swat on my butt.

“What part of ‘no’ don’t you understand, Rodney?” I asked, wishing my voice didn’t sound like sweet Southern honey. It was hard to sound pissed with a voice like mine.

“Hey, babe,” he returned, scooting up next to me and flashing me a grin that had, according to current campus rumor, melted the hearts of two cheerleaders, one sociology instructor, and half of the local chapter of Alpha Kappa Alpha sorority, “I just think you need to give me a chance. What did I ever do to piss you off?”

I suppose nothing, really, if I was completely honest with myself. Rodney was just a guy trying his best to get laid. Most guys fit in that category at one time or another. Hell, I had even fit in that category myself once upon a time.

And that was the real problem: I used to be a guy just like Rodney. Well, not just like Rodney...

I had been the scion of an old, well-heeled New Orleans family–white, of course, with dark blond hair, a socially-acceptable fiancée, and a bright, promising future as an attorney and heir-apparent to my father’s position at the Federal Bureau of Magic. That had been before my father’s trusted second-in-command had conspired with Mama Juno’s gang in an attempt to use me as the cat’s paw to bring my father down. It hadn’t worked, and my father was probably going to be the next governor of the State of Louisiana, thanks in part to me, damn it!

As for me? Well, things hadn’t worked out quite so well for me. I was now black, female, and looked more like an incoming college freshman than a twenty-something graduate student. While nothing could be done about my race and sex, the Bureau had taken care of my age at least legally. I still looked like jailbait, but my ID (magically encoded and verified) showed me to be twenty-one. It still caused me more than one embarrassing moment at the bars in the French Quarter though, as diligent bartenders did everything but dissect my ID to prove it was a fake.

“Rodney...” I began slowly, trying to remember that he wasn’t really a bad guy, “I’m just not ready for a relationship right now–even a casual one. I’m trying to get a good start on the school year. You know how it is–new school and all.”

Rodney let up the pressure a little bit, trying instead to use my excuse as a way to chat me up. “Yeah, sure, girl,” he said, running his hand over his freshly-shaved head as if he were straightening non-existent hair, “I understand. You went to Harvard, right?”

“That’s right.” There was another thing the Bureau handled for me. I had been within a couple of months of graduating from Harvard, so the Bureau pulled some strings and I was awarded my degree.

“Then Tulane ought to be a piece of cake for you,” he reasoned. When I didn’t respond, he glanced at my textbook. “You working on a Magic degree?” He looked a little nervous about that. Maybe I should tell him I was and make him think I could turn him into a frog or something.

But I decided on the truth. “No, I’m working on a law degree.”

That surprised him a little. I realized he had me pegged for some impressionable little nineteen-year-old Harvard dropout instead of a graduate student.

“Theory of Magic is required since so many legal defenses include magical excuses now,” I elaborated. That was true: it was a required course, but I had wanted to take it anyway since I wanted to know everything I could about my own problems with magic. I was both a fairly strong Pusher, able to lift good-sized objects magically, and a victim of a designed spell that had made me the woman I now was, so Theory of Magic was quickly becoming my favorite class.

Rodney relaxed a little. I began to think I should have told him I was a real mojo mama who could keep him from getting it up for a few months. All I had to do was to push a blood vessel or two shut in his penis, and he’d be reaching for the Viagra. Fortunately, we had just come to Dinwiddie Hall, so I could brush him off without subterfuge or physical threats.

“Good talking with you, Rodney,” I lied, smiling. “I’ve got to go to class now.”

“Yeah, sure, girl. I’ll catch you later,” he called after me.

Not if I could avoid it, I thought, realizing he had to be watching my ass as I strolled into the old Elizabethan building. Not for the first time that day, I regretted wearing such sexy clothing. I seemed to be drawing a lot of attention. Short denim shorts, a white tank top, and wedge sandals wouldn’t have been my first choice, but October in New Orleans can be pretty hot, and since the latest hot spell wasn’t due to break until the weekend, I couldn’t exactly walk around in a sweatshirt and jeans without baking myself. I looked forward to winter when I could cover myself a bit more comfortably. Who the hell was it who declared that to stay cool in warm weather, women’s clothing had to look so damned sexy?

Sexy was the last thing I wanted to look, I brooded as I found my usual seat in the classroom. Unfortunately, I most certainly did look sexy. Hell, this new body of mine would probably have looked sexy in just about anything. And it wasn’t just the black guys who were looking. I had one of those Gabrielle Union looks that made me attractive to white guys, too.

Okay, so maybe I was just getting back a little of what I had given when I was still male. Most young white guys of good families in New Orleans had an appreciation for black women. It wasn’t the sort of thing we talked about, and most of us never acted on it–at least not in a romantic way. After all, any socially prominent white male who fell in love with a black woman would be ostracized from polite society. It was okay to treat black women as equals in the workplace or in schools or at church, but the bedroom was reserved for girls from our same food group–at least when it came to marriage.

That didn’t mean these same socially prominent white guys had never lusted after black women, though. A good number of black prostitutes in the Quarter had a significant white clientele. One just didn’t bring these working women home to meet the family. This had gone on since the founding of New Orleans, and not even the War Between the States (read ‘Civil War’ for the Yankees) had changed that.

In fact, that was almost what had brought my father’s budding political career to a screeching halt. He liked ’em black and he liked ’em young–too young as it turned out. So Mama Juno had made me both black and young to trap him literally with his pants down. Fortunately, the plot failed, or both my father and I would probably be looking at years of therapy to overcome what we nearly did with each other.

“Is anybody sitting here?” a deep voice asked, bringing me out of my reverie.

I looked up into the face of a young man about my age (my true age, that is). He was black like me, but light skinned–also like me. Even my mostly-male brain told me he was good looking, too. As for the part of my brain already soaked with female hormones, that chunk of gray matter was trying to tell me he looked downright sensational. “Uh... no,” I managed to say, looking away.

“Brett Carson,” he said with a smile, offering a hand. He was dressed in the male equivalent of the outfit I wore–denim shorts (although not nearly as short or clinging), a gray pocket T-shirt, and Tevas. His hair was cut short but not too short, giving it that kinky natural look only African-American men have. And have I mentioned he was good looking? Not that I really noticed, of course.

Instinctively I took his hand. It always felt odd for me to realize how small and dainty my hands were now when enfolded in a strong, masculine hand. “Cassandra Davis,” I managed. Then I sort of blurted out, “I haven’t seen you in this class before.”

Brett shrugged. “I’m one of Professor Winchell’s students. You heard about him?”

I nodded. Professor Winchell had suffered a near-fatal heart attack over the last weekend. In an era before magic, he would have most certainly have died, but Healers had managed to repair his heart. Still, he wouldn’t be coming back for the rest of the semester. Even magical healing sometimes required lengthy rehabilitation.

“How is Professor Sanderson?” Brett asked as he settled into his seat and pulled a notebook computer out of his briefcase.

“Pretty good,” I allowed, trying not to notice how his back muscles had rippled when he was pulling the computer out of the case. ‘Act like a man, Cassandra,’ I told myself, trying not to think about how stupid that statement sounded.

Brett looked ready to say something else, but at that moment, Professor Sanderson stepped into the room and everyone got quiet. Professor Sanderson was sort of old-fashioned. He still wore a suit to class, in spite of the heat of a Louisiana fall. Of course, given the consulting gigs he had, he could easily have just come from a meeting with some local corporation, so the suit might have been necessary. His thinning reddish hair was neatly trimmed and his slim body took on an almost military bearing.

“Today, we are going to discuss faults,” he announced without any preamble.

“Faults?” Brett leaned over to ask me.

“Yeah, just listen and you’ll understand.” Apparently Professor Winchell hadn’t discussed faults. It wasn’t surprising. It was one of Professor Sanderson’s pet theories, but not everyone bought into them.

The subject was pretty interesting, and the professor managed to keep the class riveted for the full lecture. Before I knew it, the class was over and we were all packing up our stuff.

“Can I ask you a question?” Brett asked me as most of the class filed out.

Oh-oh, here it comes, I thought. The guy is going to put the moves on me. Granted, he was a lot smoother than guys like Rodney, but he was still a guy. “Yeah?”

“Do you understand this fault stuff?”

I looked over at him. The poor guy looked genuinely confused. “Yeah, I think I’ve got it down pretty well.”

“Can I buy you a cup of coffee over at Rue and have you explain it to me?”

Okay, so it was a move–sort of. Looking into his eyes, though, I detected that he really was sincere about not understanding faults. And a cup of coffee over at Rue de la Course did sound sort of good. “Uh... sure. When?”

“How about right now?”

Well, I couldn’t think of any good reason to say no...

Rue de la Course is something of a local institution in New Orleans. With locations all over the most cultured parts of the city, it has long been a favorite for college students. When one opened in the Willow Street Residence Hall, most of the Tulane student body thought it had died and gone to heaven.

It wasn’t very crowded when Brett and I got there after a pleasant walk across part of the campus. We were able to order our coffees and stake out a small table away from the rest of the patrons.

On the way over, we had chatted about our personal lives. Of course most of mine was a carefully-crafted lie, but Brett had an impressive background. It turned out he was the son of a prominent doctor in Nashville, and like his father, he was studying Medicine at Tulane. However, like law school, modern medical practice involved a lot of interface with the magical community–hence, Brett’s presence in my Theory of Magic class.

In our short walk, I had been impressed with Brett. He hadn’t called me ‘babe’ or tried to slip his arm around me or put any more subtle moves on me (unless just being himself could be considered a subtle move). I sensed he was genuinely confused about the idea of faults, and I was prepared to help him understand them any way I could.

“So let’s see if I have all of this right,” Brett began once we had each taken a sip of our coffees. “According to Professor Sanderson, there are parallel worlds out there, and the faults are places where some meaningful and probably catastrophic event has occurred.”

“That’s it in a nutshell,” I agreed.

“So the electromagical disturbance they picked up in New York a few years ago was some sort of disaster in an alternate universe?” he asked skeptically.

“Pretty much,” I confirmed. “The disturbance has died off now, but in late 2001, it was one of the strongest electromagical disturbances ever recorded. It seemed to come from somewhere around the World Magic and Trade Center, but nobody has ever been able to figure out a reason for it. The idea of faults was developed by Professor Sanderson, so he refers to them a lot. I guess Professor Winchell never mentioned them?”

“Oh, he mentioned them,” Brett laughed. “He usually referred to them as fantasy, though. I guess he and Professor Sanderson didn’t see eye to eye on that subject.”

“Apparently not,” I laughed with him. “I guess Professor Sanderson has gotten more excited about faults since that one was detected here in New Orleans a couple of years ago. He thinks it may have been some sort of natural disaster.”

“Natural disaster?”

“Yeah, probably a hurricane or tornado.”

“But Weather Control stops storms like that before they get out of control,” he argued.

“Sure,” I agreed, really getting into the discussion, “but Weather Control is a Federal program based on magic. Imagine what might happen in a parallel world that didn’t have magic.”

I sounded so enthusiastic about magic, but given what magic had done to me, I would have gladly given up my powers as a Pusher and lived in one of those non-magical parallel worlds where I might still be male.

“A world without magic sounds pretty far-fetched,” Brett pointed out.

“Not really,” I replied. “Until Webster and Kline released the magical virus, there wasn’t much magic in this world.”

“What do you think of faults?” Brett asked, looking straight into my eyes.

Since I had become a girl, guys didn’t seem to be as interested in what I thought as they had when I had been male. It was a refreshing question. I did my best to give it a meaningful answer.

“According to Professor Sanderson’s theory, faults may someday give us a bridge into parallel worlds, but for right now, I think they’re only interesting as a mental exercise. Even if they exist, what happens in some alternate universe hardly affects us here, does it?”

“I suppose not.” Gee, he was actually listening to me and looking into my eyes instead of down at my breasts. And he had such nice eyes...

“So these faults can’t do any damage?” he asked, filling the lull in our dialogue. Just how long had I been staring at him anyway?

“Not exactly,” I replied, hoping he couldn’t see me flush with embarrassment. I suppose that was one good thing about being black–when I turned red, it wasn’t quite so obvious. “According to Professor Sanderson, a major fault could change the whole world and split it off into two entirely different tracks.

“Take the development of magic, for example. When Webster and Kline isolated the magic virus and accidentally released it on the world, the results were so overwhelming that it may have spun off our world from a non-magical world.”

“So that would mean all these faults are nothing more than events happening in the other world that is drifting away from us,” Brett offered with a sudden look of revelation.

“Exactly. And we’ve just discovered these faults in the last few years. It’s possible they’ve been there since our reality split off. Maybe in that other reality, magic was never isolated and, for example, Bill Clinton became President in 2000 instead of John McCain. The problem is that these faults are going to become harder and harder to detect as this other theoretical world moves away from us.”

“I wonder what our world would have been like if we hadn’t discovered magic,” Brett mused.

Well, for one thing, I thought to myself, we probably wouldn’t be here having coffee together. I’d be white, male and married and any thought of being black and female would have been the stuff of bad dreams.

Brett smiled that winning smile again. “Cassandra...”

“Call me Cassie.”

Whoops! I was getting just a bit too chummy there, wasn’t I?

“Cassie, I really appreciate your help.”

All of a sudden, we were both quiet. Brett knew what he had to do next–and so did I. I had been male for enough years to realize that Brett had done all the right things. The only logical next step was to thank me by asking me out to dinner. It would just be a casual meal, of course–pizza or burgers or something equally simple–but it would be the potential start of a relationship.

So how did I feel about all of that?

Nervous as hell to be honest. I had been female for about six months, which was probably enough time to acclimate to the urges my body had been signalling to me almost continuously, but I still remembered vividly my limited sexual experiences as a female. I had been forced to suck a man’s penis and nearly tricked into having sex with my own father soon after my transformation, so I was naturally suspicious of any relationship, no matter how innocuous, with any man.

But I realized deep down that I was going to have to give in to those urges sooner or later, and Brett seemed to be a nice guy.

“How about letting me buy you dinner Saturday?” he asked hopefully.

I was suddenly disappointed–more disappointed than I thought I could be. “I can’t. I’m visiting my... mom in Lafayette on Saturday.” Then I added, “But I’m free Friday.”

It was Brett’s turn to look disappointed. “Unfortunately, I’m not free Friday. One of my professors has the class lined up to observe at the Medical Center Friday evening.”

“Oh.”

Great minds think alike. Simultaneously, we said, “How about Sunday night?” and then laughed.

“Sure,” I grinned.

“I’ll pick you up at six,” Brett offered. “Where do you live?” I gave him the address of my condo, and he replied, “Nice digs.”

It was nice to be well off. “See you Sunday,” I said.

I drove out to Lafayette Saturday morning. It’s only a little over two hours west on I-90, and the road is pretty straight and boring. Lafayette is in the heart of Cajun Country, known for its unique food and entertainment. It’s also the home of the University of Louisiana where Mama Becky taught Classical Literature.

Of course Mama Becky wasn’t really my mom: she was the mother of Helen Davis, who with her brother, A.J., managed to save me from a horrible fate. Along the way, I had sort of been adopted by the Davis family.

I had been glad to have them. They had helped me get through those terrible weeks after my transformation into a girl, and since my own family, the high-and-mighty Deverauxs, had had my male identity declared officially dead, the Davis family was the only family I had.

I supposed it was for the best. Looking as I did now, I could hardly pass myself off as the eldest son of such a proud old Southern family. And to be honest, I didn’t really want to try. I wasn’t terribly comfortable around white folks for any length of time now. Yes, I know that sounds odd, given that I had spent the first twenty-odd years of my life being white. But being black had made me realize that although racial equality had come a long way in Louisiana, the majority of white folks liked to associate with other whites and the majority of black folks liked to chum around with other blacks. It didn’t mean we couldn’t be friends with each other, but it did make it harder.

Mama Becky greeted me on the porch of her neat little bungalow. She made good money as a college professor, but she insisted that since her husband had died, she didn’t need a big place. And in spite of the fact that she looked like an attractive woman in her forties instead of the sixty years she really had, she had firmly decided against ever marrying again. “Cassie, you look wonderful,” she called out. “A.J., come get Cassie’s bag!”

“I can manage, Mama,” I told her, indicating the little denim duffle bag I had packed for the overnight stay.

“Girl, when are you going to learn to pack like a woman?” she laughed, giving me a hug.

“I brought all the essentials,” I replied.

Mama grinned. “I thought Helen and I had taught you there’s more to the essentials than clean underwear and an extra top.”

“She’s still fighting all this girl stuff,” Helen called out from the doorway. Helen was dressed like me, in a pair of designer jeans and a sleeveless top, but she sported an attractive necklace and a matching bracelet, as well as a nice if inexpensive pair of dangling earrings. I, of course, wore no jewelry, so she had a point.

“How are you ever going to catch a man with no jewelry and no makeup?” Mama asked.

“I’m wearing makeup,” I countered, “just not very much.”

“She looks fine to me,” A.J. offered, looking over his sister’s shoulder. Of course, A.J. always thought I looked fine. “Hi, A.J.,” I called out. A.J. was a good kid, but he was that: just a kid. Of course, I looked to be his age or maybe a little younger, and since I had become, if I do say so myself, one hot mama, he had a bad case of the hots for me. I loved A.J. as a brother, but even though I was slowly warming to the sexual attraction to men, A.J. would never be anything more to me than an adopted sibling.

“What time are you planning on going back tomorrow?” Helen asked me.

I grinned as we went in the house. “I just got here and you want to get rid of me?”

“I drove over with A.J. and he has to go back this evening,” she explained. “And Brian has a new case we need to start tomorrow, so I need to be back fairly early. I need a ride.”

Helen had resigned from the Bureau of Magic shortly after I had been transformed, going into the private investigation business with Brian Wallace, an old colleague. Brian, another former FBM agent, had happily taken her on as a full partner. No one in the family was going to be surprised when they finally got around to announcing their engagement.

“I’ve got to be back fairly early, too,” I admitted, not ready to tell my new family that I had a date Sunday night.

Mama looked a little pained. “What’s this? My whole family is deserting me?”

“The road runs both ways, Mama,” Helen reminded her. “You could always drive into New Orleans and stay the weekend with me.”

“Or me,” I offered, “I’ve got an extra bedroom.” As Brett had pointed out, I had nice digs. Thanks to an inheritance from my grandfather, made more generous by my father who wanted to make sure I stayed quiet so as not to damage the revered Deveraux name, I had purchased a condo not far from campus. It was reasonably spacious and well-appointed. When I graduated from law school and sold it, it should bring a tidy profit.

“And the shopping is better, too,” Helen pressed. “I could take you to Maison Blanc...”

“What’s wrong with Dillard’s and Foley’s?” Mama asked, offended.

“That reminds me,” Helen said, changing the subject, “Brian and I could use your help on this case, Cassie...”

“Me?”

“It’s a case involving the son of a wealthy businessman. He’s in the process of being changed into a girl, and his father wants to know who spelled him and why.”

I shrugged. “I certainly sympathize, but why not go to the Bureau?”

“Publicity,” Helen replied simply. “William Pierre Lagrange III doesn’t want anyone knowing about this.”

I nodded. I knew William Pierre Lagrange III, but I knew his son–William IV–even better. We had prepped together. “So William IV is being changed into a girl?” I asked, not able to disguise my pleasure.

“No, it’s his younger brother, Stephen,” Helen answered, adding, “And if you don’t mind my saying so, you didn’t look too disappointed at the idea of his older brother being transformed.”

“I wasn’t,” I admitted, taking a seat on the living room sofa as the rest of my family found their own seats. “William IV is a Whisperer and an asshole.”

“That’s a bad combination,” Mama commented.

“He got an inordinate amount of sex that way,” I went on. “As you know, it’s hard to pin a rape charge on a Whisperer, but he had the reputation of using his powers to get what he wanted.”

“Now he won’t even have to leave home to get a little,” A.J. said.

“Achilles Jason Davis!” Mama snapped. “You watch that kind of talk!”

“Sorry, Mama.” Since A.J. was an Empath, he had also taken Mama’s chastisement at a mental level as well. He looked as if he wanted to find a place to hide.

“Okay, Helen, so what do you want me to do?” I asked Helen, successfully diverting Mama’s attention away from A.J.–that was one he owed me.

“You’ve been through a transformation similar to his–sexually at least. I want you to try to gain his confidence and see if he has any idea who did this to him. So far, he’s told his father he has no idea who is responsible. That may be true, or he may just be embarrassed to admit what he knows for some reason.”

I nodded. It was probable that he had been changed either by a jilted lover or by one of those feminist groups that were rumored to get their jollies out of changing randy guys into sweet young things. Of course, my own transformation had been neither of those reasons, but my case was rare. For that matter, sexual transformations were such a rarity that the FBM had done its best to downplay them entirely. It had only been in the last couple of months that much had been said about them in the media.

“Now, to how you need to dress tomorrow,” Helen went on with a determined look in her eyes. “You need to look very professional.”

Uh-oh. I knew what was coming next. Since my transformation, I had tended to avoid skirts and heels. There was no doubt that Helen planned to dress me in both. “I have a nice pants suit...” I ventured, but Helen was already shaking her head.

“You need to wear a business suit–with a skirt and heels,” she informed me. “I don’t suppose you’ve gotten around to getting one yet.”

My silence was all the answer she needed.

“Well Mama, it looks as if you’ll get your chance to show us how good Dillard’s and Foley’s really are,” Helen sighed.

I suppose I could have said no to the whole thing. If I didn’t go with Brian and Helen to meet their client, I could put off the whole feminine wardrobe thing for... I don’t know, another few months at least. But I had to admit I was interested in the case. I had never met another person like me, who had to endure an involuntary sex change. I have to admit I was curious to say the least.

And deep down, I knew that there would come a day when I’d have to give in and dress like a professional woman. Once I finished law school, I’d be held to the same dress code as other female attorneys, and it would be odd if I was late to court because I couldn’t figure out how to get my pantyhose on in a timely manner.

I’ll spare all the gory details of the shopping trip. Mama Becky dressed well as did Helen, and I should have realized that their style hadn’t come from picking the first thing off the rack that fit. But I never suspected that a college professor and her tough-as-nails former FBM agent daughter could somehow transform into a couple of super shoppers who apparently planned to use me as their personal Barbie doll.

I had gritted my teeth, determined to survive an experience I had only seen in passing with my former mother and my former fiancée. I planned on grabbing the first thing in my size off the rack and running with it. Silly me.

First of all, I learned that sizes in women’s clothing were just a starting point. The first three outfits Mama and Helen pulled off the rack at Dillard’s were poor fits. An eight was too large and a six was too small. And where were all the sevens anyway? Apparently, a woman’s size in a suit depends upon the three typical measurements (bust, waist, hips), but that’s just the starting point. A six from one manufacturer may be tighter than a six from another and so on. So everything–and I do mean everything–had to be tried on, tugged, pinched, checked, and rechecked. I think I tried on more outfits that afternoon than I had in my previous several months of womanhood.

At last, Mama and Becky agreed on a tasteful dark blue suit. It had a jacket that was loose enough to look right on my substantial (36C) chest, so apparently I was officially an 8. The skirt was of the Goldilocks variety–not too long and not too short, but just right, coming down to the top of my knees.

“We’ll take it,” Helen told the clerk.

“Do you need any shells or camis to go with this?” the clerk asked innocently. I didn’t like the gleam in my mentors’ eyes when they heard that.

“Want to see what we got Cassie?” Helen called out as we hauled the loot into Mama’s living room.

A.J. appeared uninterested in the whole exercise, stretched out on the couch watching Alabama play a closer-than-expected game with Mississippi State. I found myself wishing I had been given the opportunity to veg out and watch the game, too. While a number of women I knew appreciated football, Helen and Mama weren’t among them, and now that I was a woman, I was expected to participate in their activities whenever I came to visit.

“What kept you?” A.J. asked. “I’ve got to go back to New Orleans in about an hour.”

“I’m sure if you take that girl to the party half an hour late, the world will end,” Mama sighed.

“What girl?” I asked A.J. The question sort of spilled out of my mouth. I guess I thought A.J. was still a little smitten with me, but now it turned out there was a girl important enough for him to cut short seeing me in favor of her company. Was I actually a little jealous? Of course not. Not me.

“Samantha Brown,” A.J. told me, sitting up on the couch. “I’ve been dating her for about a month. She’s really hot.”

“Oh.”

“Then let’s have a quick dinner so you can get on your way,” Mama suggested.

I followed Mama and Helen into the kitchen to help make dinner. After all, it was expected in the Davis family that the womenfolk make the meals, allowing the men folk to sit on their butts and watch football.

I suppose that’s unfair, really. I’m sure if I had really wanted to, I could have sat with A.J. and watched the rest of the game. The truth is that I didn’t want to. Don’t ask me why: I’m not completely sure myself, but I think it had something to do with the revelation that A.J. had something going with another girl. It wasn’t that I wanted to see A.J. romantically, but given his infatuation with me right after I had been transformed, I felt almost jilted.

By the time we had dinner ready (or ‘supper’ as Mama called it), I had convinced myself that I was being silly. It had to be the damned hormones. As a man, I would have never felt rejected by A.J.’s perfectly reasonable behavior, but as a woman, it seemed to be a different matter.

I was pretty quiet over dinner, but everyone else made up for it, so my silence wasn’t particularly noticed–or so I thought. Mostly, I was trying to examine what was happening to me. Every passing day seemed to bring about some little thing that indicated I was not thinking like Robert Devereaux anymore. It was nothing terribly overt, but it was obvious that I was becoming more and more Cassandra Davis every day.

Of course it was only to be expected that it would happen this way. After all, sitting to pee, having periods, being addressed as “Miss” or “Cassie,” and slipping on a bra every day would have to take a toll. Physically, I had accepted being a girl. It was either that or go crazy since there was no way that I could pass myself off as male now.

The problem was that I wasn’t sure I was ready to accept being mentally female. In the culture in which I had been raised, women were fascinated with feminine pursuits, such as shopping for clothing, bearing and tending children, and... other things. While I didn’t care much for shopping, really couldn’t see myself bearing or tending children, or... other things, I had perceived some cracks in my façade.

Taken one by one, shopping might not be something I looked forward to, but by the end of the exhausting day with Mama and Helen, I had to admit there was something entertaining about seeing how I looked in a new outfit, and the challenge of finding just the right things to go with a new outfit had not been unpleasant, and it had helped me to bond further with my new family.

As for children, I had noticed that I was much more aware of children now, and much less reluctant to interact with them. As a man, I had often noted the suspicion in a child’s eyes when facing an unfamiliar man. It was a sad fact in our society that there were perverts out there, so practically all children are warned from the time they are old enough to walk that they should look out for “bad men.” Notice I said “men.” Another sad fact: most child molesters are men.

In any case, since my transformation, children had been far less reluctant to speak with me or even to ask for my help. When I spoke with them, nearby mothers would smile at me as if, being a woman, I was somehow all right, because someday I, too would be a mother. While that had bothered me at first, now I just smiled back, often commenting on how lovely their children were.

And as for the... other things, okay I was slowly but surely coming to appreciate the physical attributes of men–the big shoulders, the angular builds, the confident smiles, and the deep voices. It hadn’t happened overnight, but it was happening. That was why I had agreed to see Brett Sunday evening.

Going back to my feelings about A.J., I had to admit that if I hadn’t known him and had met him instead of Brett earlier in the week, it would probably be A.J. that I would be seeing on Sunday evening, in spite of our actual age difference. Brett sort of reminded me of A.J.–or rather, a more mature version of my adopted brother.

“Gotta go!” A.J. said, rising from the table and wiping the last bite of chicken off his mouth.

“Drive carefully,” Mama warned him, accepting a hug.

“Be careful,” Helen warned him when it was her turn for a hug.

“Take care,” I managed, receiving my own hug while trying not to think how good it felt to be held in strong arms.

On Sunday, Helen and I drove back to New Orleans together after a leisurely breakfast with Mama. We had thrown our overnight bags in the trunk of my Focus, but the sacks from our shopping trip were piled into the back seat. I was frankly alarmed at how much Helen and Mama had convinced me to buy supposedly just for one meeting. There was the new suit, two shells and a blouse, several pairs of pantyhose, two pairs of shoes (one with a two and a half inch heel that had me a little worried–I wasn’t accustomed to heels that high), and inexpensive jewelry–earrings, a necklace and a bracelet. Mama and Helen had even talked me into new bras and panties, maintaining that the cotton stuff I wore wasn’t quite feminine enough to go under such a nice suit. So like who was going to see it besides me anyway?

“We can change at my place,” Helen suggested. “Brian is going to pick us up there, so we’ll save some time.”

I suspected the real reason was that she wanted to make sure I didn’t make a hash of getting dressed. I didn’t argue, though. Since the escapade that had included my transformation into a girl, I had done my best to not look overtly feminine–no skirts or heels, other than the one-inch block heels I often wore just to give me a little added height. Also, I didn’t wear jewelry, with the exception of a small lady’s watch and occasionally small earrings (I told myself a lot of men wore earrings, so I wasn’t being overly feminine), and only enough makeup to not appear butch.

Right after I had been transformed, I had been forced to dress like a whore–short skirts, high heels, big earrings, and lots of cleavage. I had vowed after that incident never to be dressed in such a demeaning manner again, and thus far, I had kept that promise. Yeah, I know it was silly to equate a whore’s costume with the professional attire Helen had foisted on me, but it somehow seemed like a slippery slope to me, no matter how I tried to tell myself that thinking that way was unreasonable.

Helen’s apartment was on the other side of the river in Algiers, an area close enough to the city to be convenient and urbanized, but separated from New Orleans by the Mississippi River, allowing it to have an ambiance of its own. Brian had his offices and a condo just a short distance from Helen’s apartment, so she was close to both her job and her boyfriend.

“Let me get ready first and then I’ll help you,” Helen said.

That was fine with me. It gave me a chance to catch up on a little NFL action. I stretched out on the couch and picked up an early New England game. My days at Harvard had made me into something of a Patriots fan (as long as they weren’t playing the Saints), so I was able to lose myself in the game.

It didn’t take Helen long to get ready, though. Unlike the stereotypical woman, Helen could get herself dressed and ready for anything in record time, and she always looked good. “Let’s get you ready,” she said, grabbing my hand and pulling me from the couch where I had plopped down to enjoy the game.

She had already picked out lingerie for me, and it wasn’t exactly the first time I had worn a dress. I got into the clothing quickly while she waited in the living room for me in the living room, brushed my hair and put on a little lipstick. It was all so easy that it only took me a few moments to get ready–or so I thought. I looked at my watch. “Hey, Brian isn’t supposed to pick us up for another forty-five minutes. Why did you get me ready so early?”

“You’re just starting to get ready,” she told me, grabbing a fresh towel and putting it over my white shell. “Who taught you to do makeup anyway?”

“You did.”

“No, I tried to teach you. Obviously none of my teaching stuck or you’d look better than this.”

I looked in the mirror, frowning. Everything looked fine to me. “What’s wrong with my makeup?”

She sighed, “Where do I start? This is a business meeting. Your makeup and hair have to make a statement as much as your clothing. Right now, your makeup says you don’t care how you look and aren’t very professional. Is that the image you want to convey?”

“I suppose not,” I replied, chastened.

“Here, watch what I do.”

She worked on my face for a few minutes, allowing me to see in the mirror how she did it. I didn’t like what she was doing to me, either. I had some unpleasant memories of being made up by Muriel for the abortive rendezvous with my father a few months ago, and I was afraid Helen was overdoing it just as Muriel had done. I asked her, “Do you really want my eyes to look like that? I look like a whore in the French Quarter.”

She frowned and put her hands on her hips. “Cassie, do I look like a whore?”

Uh-oh. “No, you look very nice, Helen.” And she did.

“Well I put the same shade and amount of eye shadow on your eyes. The only thing I did differently is use a little less liner on you. I’ve made you look like a young professional woman instead of a high school tomboy. Does that mean you look like a whore?”

“Well...”

“Now, let’s do something about that hair.”

My hair had been growing longer over the summer. I had planned on more than one occasion to get it cut. Maybe into one of those super-short cuts that left just some tiny naturally curled hair favored by some African American women. Call it vanity if you will, but I just couldn’t bring myself to cut my longish dark hair. It barely touched my shoulders, but it framed my face very nicely. Unfortunately, I have to admit I hadn’t taken the best care of it. It was fairly straight with just a little bit of natural wave to it. While by any reasonable standard, I would be considered African American at a glance, like many members of my new race, I obviously had evidence of significant white ancestry as well, so my hair lacked the natural curliness of many black women.

“I should have taken you in to a salon yesterday,” Helen muttered as she fussed with my hair, alternately brushing and spraying it into shape.

“Be careful with that spray,” I grumbled. “It’ll make my hair sticky.”

“Nonsense, it’s not sticky,” she replied, working on a tangle so hard I thought she was going to pull the hair right out of my scalp.

A few minutes before Brian was due to pick us up, Helen finally finished with me, and as I looked into her full-length mirror, I had to admit she had done wonders. I looked like a young professional woman–a lawyer perhaps. I suddenly realized that since I was going to law school, this was a glimpse of my future. Once I was out of school, I’d be dressed and made up like this every day. I sighed, realizing I might as well get used to it. Besides, I did look pretty damn good, if I did say so myself.

Brian picked us up exactly on time. Even as new as I was to appreciating men’s looks–especially black men–it was easy to see Brian was a handsome man whose short hair, well-trimmed moustache and conservative dark suit accented with a fashionable tie marked him as the successful businessman he was. Ten years as an FBM agent had given him the confidence and polish that had made him a successful private investigator. He grinned when I greeted him at the door. “Well, will you look at this? Little Cassie is all grown up.”

“Stuff it, Brian,” I growled, although I have to admit I was just a little pleased that he obviously liked the way I looked. One thing I had learned since my sex change: women can never get enough compliments. If I had known how much women appreciated compliments before I became one, I would have probably had a much more active sex life as a man.

“Don’t give her a hard time, Brian,” Helen said, coming over to give her boss a warm kiss. “I’m trying to get her to be more feminine.”

Brian nodded. He knew all about my past–my real past. With my permission, she had told Brian who I really was and what had happened to me. “It’s good advice, Cassie,” he told me. “A well-dressed woman can twist men around her little finger. Look what Helen has done to me.”

They both laughed together, and again I wondered when they were going to quit fooling around and get married–or at least move in together.

“Shouldn’t we get going?” I asked, becoming tired of being reminded that I should act more girly.

“In a minute,” Brian replied, all business now. He produced a file folder from his leather case. “I’ve made each of you a short summary of the particulars in this case. Read them on the way over and we’ll discuss the case before we get there.”

I had the back seat of Brian’s BMW all to myself, so I finished the summary before Helen did. That gave me a few minutes to go over the details again. By all rights, the case should have been turned over to the FBM, but as Helen had already told me, the family didn’t want the publicity.

The Lagrange family had made their money in agricultural commodities–foodstuffs, cotton and timber culled from a land empire with resources in four states. The family had been one of those canny clans that had jumped sides back in the Civil War, deserting the Confederacy once New Orleans had fallen and supplying the Union for the remainder of the war, earning themselves the friendship of such notables as General U.S. Grant who would later occupy the White House.

Later generations had managed to smooth over the rift caused by such traitorous behavior (traitorous at least in the minds of good Southerners), leaving them right up there with the Deverauxs and other noble families. Of course, it helped that the Lagrange clan had more money than almost any other family in the state.

I didn’t really know Stephen Lagrange all that well. I had met him at various functions, but he was too young to be considered one of my friends. His brother, William, by contrast was the right age to be my friend but such an insufferable boor that I had never liked him. When we had prepped together, he had wanted very badly to be my friend–but only if I was a sycophantic one. He would have loved to number the scion of the Devereaux family amongst his closest associates, but only on onerous terms. It was a shame it wasn’t William who was being transformed, I thought to myself. Let’s see how haughty he would be with a vagina between his legs. “What do you think of the case, Cassie?” Brian called out from the front seat. I was surprised that he hadn’t asked Helen first, but I realized the two of them had probably already studied and discussed the case in detail.

“I don’t see anything in here to indicate why Stephen has been singled out,” I answered.

Brian laughed, “Yeah, that’s the mystery, isn’t it? Usually in cases like this, there’s a pretty obvious motive. It usually happens either to get back at the man for some sexual reason, such as dumping a girlfriend. Sometimes, it’s done by a rival to get a guy out of the way. Stephen doesn’t seem to have any steady girlfriends or obvious rivals.”

“Neither did I,” I pointed out.

“Yes,” Brian agreed, “and your case is actually very uncommon.”

Yeah, I was changed to get at my father in a rather perverted way. But that was certainly unusual.

“How about his brother?” I ventured. “Could William be trying to get Stephen out of the way?”

“Possibly,” Helen answered, “but not likely. William is apparently his old man’s choice to take over someday, so there’d be no reason to get Stephen out of the way as there would be if things were the other way around.”

“There’s been no ransom note either,” Brian added. Sometimes, a son was changed into a daughter and a ransom demand was made, purporting to have a ‘cure’–a spell which would turn him back into a male. Those were unfortunate hoaxes, though. As I had discovered to my chagrin, it was impossible given the current level of magical science to turn a female back into a male. Magic simply couldn’t recreate the Y chromosome properly.

“Maybe Mrs. Lagrange always wanted a daughter, and this is her doing,” I suggested.

“That’s an interesting idea,” Brian commented. Then to Helen, he said, “We may want to probe on that point a little.”

I flushed with pride. One great thing about Brian was that he took me seriously. Of course, he knew who I had been and was well aware that I wasn’t the teenager I appeared to be, while most people saw me as just another teeny-bopper. Still, it was nice of him to value my opinions.

“What exactly do you want me to do?” I asked him.

“I want you to talk to Stephen and give me your opinion of him,” Brian replied. “See if you can draw him out. You know, find out if there’s a disgruntled girlfriend we don’t know about, or anything he might be willing to tell you that he wouldn’t tell us. You appear to be close to his age and you’ve been through what he’s going through. See if you can’t gain his confidence.”

I shifted uneasily. “You want me to tell him what happened to me?”

“Oh, no!” Brian assured me. “Just tell him you’ve worked on cases before with your sister where a sex change occurred. Don’t let on that it happened to you. I’d never put you in that spot, Cassie.”

I smiled. I knew Brian was serious. He treated me as if I actually were Helen’s sister, and that meant someday, he’d probably be considering me his sister-in-law. I knew he’d never do anything to hurt or embarrass me.

“Here we are,” Helen told Brian.

We followed the long, winding cobblestone driveway and pulled up in front of the stately Lagrange home, but only after we had gone through the high wrought iron gate and had a chance to be impressed with the canopy of tall oaks that peppered the neatly-manicured lawn.

“Shit,” Brian muttered, “I’ve played golf courses that weren’t this nice. Was your old home like this too, Cassie?”

“Sort of,” I admitted, hoping I didn’t sound too wistful. “Our house wasn’t this big, though, and the grounds were smaller.” I could have added ‘but not much smaller,’ but I didn’t want to show off. Besides, none of the Devereaux property was mine now.

Few houses in the South were as large as the one we approached. The Lagrange mansion was large enough to be mistaken for a hotel–three stories of 19th Century brick, accented by a row of stately Corinthian columns that supported a long porch below and an expansive veranda on each of the upper floors. Surrounding the house were neat shrubs and colorful flowers without a hint of a weed in sight.

Waiting for us as we pulled up was a butler in full livery. He was African-American, as was the favored custom among the landed gentry of Louisiana, and looked as if he had just stepped out of the pages of Gone With the Wind. I guessed him to be in his fifties, with his partially bald pate fringed with curly gray hair, but he was fit-looking, with a trim body that made him look much younger.

“Brian Wallace and associates to see Mr. Lagrange,” Brian said formally as the butler smoothly opened the passenger doors for Helen and me, gently helping us out of the car. We each rewarded him with a smile which he returned.

“Yes sir, Mr. Wallace,” the butler replied in a honeyed Southern accent that smacked of more genteel days. “Mr. Lagrange is expecting you. If you’ll all follow me.”

The inside of the mansion was easily as impressive as the outside. We were escorted into what would once have been called the drawing room. Upon looking around, I decided that there wasn’t a stick of furniture in the room that could be purchased outside of a fine antique store. It wasn’t often that a Devereaux–or a former Devereaux–could feel like poor folks, but I suspected if any member of my former family were to enter that room, that’s how they would feel.

“Can I get you something to drink?” the butler asked politely. We all declined, so he just smiled and said, “Mr. Lagrange will be with you shortly.”

When he was gone, Brian turned to Helen and me. Looking at Helen, he said, “I want you to try to get an audience with Mrs. Lagrange. See what you can find out from her while I concentrate on the father and the older son. Cassie, you need to get in to see Stephen. See if he knows of anyone who would want to do this to him.”

I nodded, thinking that if Stephen was anything like his older brother, I would be able to narrow the suspect base down to anyone who had ever met him.

“Mr. Wallace.”

We turned to see who had called out to Brian. I’ll give Mr. Lagrange credit–he could make an impressive entrance. He stood in the doorway flanked by his wife and older son. William Lagrange III was a tall, trim man with graying hair and a gray moustache. He was dressed in a suit, so Brian had been right to have us all dress professionally, although Mr. Lagrange’s suit was probably three times the cost of Brian’s, and Brian’s suit wasn’t cheap.

His wife was equally regal, looking as if she were preparing to attend an afternoon tea. Perhaps she was, in her expensive blue silk dress and matching accessories. William IV was the only one casually dressed, although his hunter green polo shirt and khaki slacks were obviously tailor-made.

While Mr. And Mrs. Lagrange focused on Brian and Helen, William IV was obviously staring at me. He looked me up and down, from my shapely legs to my partially-covered breasts, grinning when he met my eyes. I could feel my face flush. While I had become accustomed to having men stare at me, there was something absolutely predatory in his stare, and I was reminded of what a sleaze he could be.

“I’m William Lagrange,” the elder man began, offering his hand to Brian. I was impressed. There were still some older men in New Orleans society who only reluctantly greeted African-Americans so readily. “And this is my wife, Penelope,” he went on, nodding to his wife. She smiled faintly but did not offer her hand.

“And this is my son, William,” he continued.

“Charmed,” he oozed, taking my hand first. I felt as if I was being touched by a snake. Although he had said only one word, I heard in it the faint echo of a Whisper and reminded myself to stay on my toes. The younger William’s Whispering power wasn’t terribly strong, but it was discernable.

When Brian had made his introductions, we all sat down facing each other over a low antique table which probably cost more than most cars. As for the divans we sat on, I smugly told myself that as expensive as they were, they certainly weren’t as comfortable as the leather couch back in my condo.

“Has Howard offered you anything to drink?” Mr. Lagrange asked smoothly.

“Yes, but we’re fine,” Brian replied, smiling.

“Then let me bring you up to date,” our host sighed.

He spoke to us for almost half an hour, detailing everything that had transpired. Stephen had come home from prep school on Wednesday, feeling a little flushed. At first, the family passed it off as a little virus, but once the changes began, the family doctor was called in (yes, he actually made a house call), and the diagnosis was magical rather than medical. As Brian had told us, there had been no anonymous notes from spurned ex- girlfriends or offers for a ‘cure’ in return for a substantial ransom. In short, there were no clues of significance to build a solution around.

“Mr. Lagrange,” Brian began when the victim’s father had completed his story, “when we spoke on the phone about the case, you indicated that you did have one possible suspect in mind. Could you tell us now who that might be?”

Mr. Lagrange looked uncomfortable for a moment, as if he was about to tell a sordid tale. I suppose, given his attitudes regarding what was sordid and what wasn’t, that was just about the case. “A few weeks ago,” he began, “I was approached by some unsavory types who suggested I could make a considerable profit if I ‘piggybacked’ their shipments on some of my ships...”

Ships? He had his own ships? Now I was really beginning to feel like the poor folk.

“And those unsavory types were...?” Brian prompted.

“They represented a Marie Dubois,” he replied.

“Mama Juno?” I blurted out.

Mr. Lagrange studied me for a moment. “I believe that’s what you people call her,” he sneered, making me feel about a foot tall. And what was with that “you people” crap? I guessed the ready handshake was as far as he was willing to go to foster racial relations. “I have no use for voodoo or any other form of magic,” he went on haughtily. “Magic is un-Christian and the work of the Devil.”

Oh, so he was one of those–the religious nuts. Now I don’t want to make it sound as if I was some sort of heathen. I was raised a good Catholic boy, and I suppose now I was a good Catholic girl, but growing up in a church which recognized miracles on a regular basis, the concept of magic wasn’t all that much to swallow. Some religions had other ideas, though. Some of the more fundamental denominations despised magic, even eschewing magical cures and other benefits.

No wonder Mr. Lagrange wanted what had happened to his son kept quiet. In addition to the obvious embarrassment the transformation would entail, some of the really conservative denominations drummed magical victims out of the church, as if the poor people had somehow brought the work of the Devil down upon themselves.

I had wondered why he had brought Brian in on the case instead of just going to the police or the FBM. I had assumed it was just to avoid notoriety over his son’s transformation. While that may have been part of the reason, his religious concerns had probably been equally important.

“What did you tell Ma... I mean Ms. Dubois?” Helen asked.

“I want to point out that I have never met the woman,” he replied, with enough vehemence to be denying anal sex with a donkey. Somehow, I thought he was lying, though. Call it women’s intuition. “I told her representatives I would have no part in their sordid business.”

“What did they want you to smuggle for them?” Brian asked.

“They never said and I never asked,” was the blunt reply.

Brian shifted uncomfortably in his seat. “Is the presence of Ms. Dubois the reason you called us in on this case?”

“Partially,” the elder Lagrange allowed. “I felt you would be much more skilled at getting the truth from that woman than others would.”

I of course immediately understood what he was saying, even though I had only been African-American for a short time. He was indicating that since Brian was of the same race as Mama Juno, he would be more successful than a white detective. There may have been a grain of truth to that, but it somehow seemed insulting. I silently hoped that back in the days when I was white, I hadn’t made similar statements, but I had to admit that I probably had–unintentionally, of course.

“I’d like to spend a little more time with the members of your family individually,” Brian requested, somehow keeping his cool.

Mr. Lagrange looked puzzled. “Whatever for? I’ve told you everything I know. This is obviously a case of revenge since I wouldn’t smuggle something for them. There’s nothing else I or any member of my family can tell you.”

Brian’s response was measured but stern. “Mr. Lagrange, Ms. Dubois will be dealt with in due time. But we want to make sure we do a complete job for you. Now, I’d like to meet individually with your older son while Ms. Davis here...” he indicated Helen, “speaks with your wife. I would like the other Ms. Davis...” indicating me, “to meet with Stephen.”

“Out of the question!”

Brian rose. “Then I’m afraid we can’t help you. Thank you for your time, Mr. Lagrange.”

I thought the poor man was going to have a stroke. I’m sure few white men would dare speak to him in that way, let alone a mere black. I could see him wrestling with something as his eyes darted back and forth as the three of us made ready to leave. At last, he made up his mind.

“Oh, very well. I don’t want to bring anyone else into this mess. Howard!”

The butler seemed to appear from nowhere. I wondered if it was the result of some magical talent or just years of practice. It was probably a little of both, I decided. “Yes, sir?”

“Show the young lady to Stephen’s rooms...”

Rooms? As in the plural of ‘room’?

“I’ll take care of the others,” he finished.

“Yes, sir.”

“Go the fuck away!”

The voice on the other side of the door wasn’t feminine, but it wasn’t masculine either–at least not completely. Stephen was eighteen, but his voice sounded more adolescent–perhaps twelve or so–and I couldn’t help but suspect that he was doing his best to pitch it as low as possible.

“Mr. Stephen, sir,” Howard called out so calmly that such outbursts must have become typical to him, “your father wants you to meet with Ms. Davis.”

“Tell Ms. Davis to fuck herself!”

I must have blushed, for Howard looked at me sympathetically. “Ms. Davis, I think it might be best of you waited in my quarters while I talk to Mr. Lagrange.”

I just nodded. As nasty as Stephen sounded, I wasn’t sure I wanted to meet with him anyway. Besides, my mind was on other things, namely Mama Juno. I was feeling extremely fortunate. Of all the cases for Brian to bring me in on, one involving Mama Juno was an answer to my prayers. It had been Mama Juno and her son Pierre, who had been responsible for my plight in the first place. Mama Juno had seen to my transformation, and Pierre had debased me in an effort to lead me into a life of prostitution. But after their plot had failed, they had avoided the punishments they so richly deserved. They had managed to grease the right palms and stroke the right people in Louisiana’s corrupt political system, and the worst they had suffered was a few weeks out of New Orleans to allow things to cool down.

Howard showed me into his quarters–a cosy but decidedly masculine set of rooms not far from Stephen’s quarters. “You just make yourself comfortable, Ms. Davis,” he said solicitously. “I’ll talk to Mr. Lagrange straightaway.”

I looked around the room and back to the door to thank Howard, but he had already left, silently closing the door behind him.

As I sat on a comfortable couch, I noticed Howard’s small living room was furnished in expensive but well-worn pieces, probably hand-me-downs from the Lagrange family. There were few personal items in the room, limited only to a few framed photos on the small fireplace mantle. They appeared to be mostly family photos, and one in particular which caught my eye showed a smiling Howard with his arm around a pretty little girl of about ten. In the background, I could see the skyline of Chicago, a city I had visited and enjoyed greatly back in my male days.

“That’s my daughter,” Howard said, causing me to jump. I hadn’t heard him come in. “It was taken about five years ago in Chicago.”

“The two of you were on vacation?” I asked politely.

Howard sadly shook his head. “No, just me. My daughter lives in Chicago with her mother.”

“Oh.”

I felt a pang of sympathy for Howard. I, too, had been separated from my family, but unlike Howard, I had been fortunate enough to find a new family. Still, sometimes I found myself missing my old family, in spite of their many faults, and wondered if there weren’t times when they missed me.

“Mr. Lagrange has already spoken to Mr. Stephen,” Howard explained. “Mr. Stephen will see you now.”

Whatever Mr. Lagrange had said to his younger son must have left scorch marks on the wall, for it was a chagrined young man who stood before me. Actually, I use the term ‘young man’ in its broadest sense. A stranger, seeing him standing there in his dark blue tracksuit and longish curly blond hair would have probably debated with himself if this person before him was male or female.

I estimated the transformation must have been about halfway complete, although it was impossible to say how far it had progressed internally. I had expected things to be further along, but spells vary in their timing. While I had become female in a relatively short span of days, I understood from my research that the process could take weeks, depending upon the spell, the resistance of the victim, and the wishes of the spell caster.

I had met Stephen before, but not in the past couple of years, so I couldn’t be entirely certain how much he had changed, but I could tell he was going to be a very beautiful girl when he was done. His features were already delicate, complimented by smooth, fair skin. His blond hair was so curly that it appeared twice its probable length, and while I was sure he had tried to cut it, given a few unruly strands, the magic in the spell had undoubtedly restored it to a more feminine length. Even in the shapeless tracksuit, there appeared to be two small bumps on his chest which would soon blossom into impressive breasts.

He looked at me with soft blue eyes, framed in thick, natural lashes. “All right,” he began calmly but with a superior tone. “My father says I’m to speak with you, so let’s get this over. Howard! Get out of the room.”

“But...”

“I said get out!” The order was meant to sound authoritative, but his voice cracked, causing it to sound shrilly hysterical and decidedly un-masculine.

“Be careful, Ms. Davis,” Howard muttered to me, too softly to be overheard by Stephen. “Call me if you need me.”

I hardly thought I would need Howard’s help. The figure before me was probably no stronger now than I was, and besides, I was a Pusher. If he tried anything, I could use my magic to force him away. Since becoming a woman, my own primary power had increased dramatically, and I would have no trouble keeping Stephen at bay.

In an odd way, forcing him away was the last thing I would want to do, though. Stephen was actually an attractive young man, if somewhat feminized. I could see he would have not needed his brother’s whispering talent to have young women flocking around him...

What the hell was I thinking? I wasn’t attracted to him, was I? Yet strange impulses were rising, and I couldn’t explain them.

“Ms. Davis,” he said more calmly now, “please ask your questions and go. I don’t like being put on display like this.”

“Oh... Oh! I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to...”

He waved my apology away and sighed, “Just get on with your fucking questions.”

I had never done this before, but since I was something of an unwilling expert when it came to sexual transformations, I had a pretty good idea what I needed to ask.

“Do you know anyone who would want to do this to you?”

“Sure,” he laughed ruefully, “about a hundred girls and their parents.”

“Do any of them have ties to Mama Juno?” He snorted, “You’ve been talking to my father. He’s convinced Mama Juno did this to get even with him.”

“You don’t think so?”

He tried to look intimidating, but since I was in heels, I was actually a little taller than he was. I suspected he was due to be a petite little thing. I wondered how tall he had been before his transformation had begun. “Why should somebody like Mama Juno do this to me?”

“Then why is your father so sure about it?”

He looked away. I had apparently won the battle of intent stares. “Because he turned her agents down just two days before all of this started and a day before I was at Le Chat Noir.”

I nodded. Le Chat Noir was a funky little club on the fringes of the French Quarter. It had a reputation of being a wild place and was said to be owned by Mama Juno. “Did anyone at the club look suspicious?”

“Of course!” he replied, his voice cracking as it slipped up an octave. “Everybody in that damned place looks suspicious. But if you mean did anyone slip anything in my drink or chant out a spell, no.”

“Who were you with?”

He shrugged. “I don’t know... just some girl I picked up. One of your people.”

I bristled at that, but said nothing. A strange little part of me tried to imagine that I was the girl, partying with this handsome young man at some wicked club like Le Chat Noir. I wondered again where such an odd thought was coming from and dismissed it to an unused corner of my mind.

“Could that girl have been the one who cursed you?”

“Possibly,” he allowed. Then he added, “Probably. I guess I’ll never know now. She didn’t tell me her name.”

It appeared Stephen had been in to very casual relationships. “Describe her for me.”

He slammed a decidedly delicate hand on a small table. “Describe her? What the hell is there to describe? She was young and pretty and black. But that describes you, too, along with a significant chunk of the city’s population.

“Look, why don’t you tell my father to forget this obsession with finding out who did this to me and get me the cure!”

“But there is no cure,” I reminded him, more blunt than I had intended.

“Bullshit! There’s a cure for everything.”

“Not this there isn’t,” I shot back. God knows if there were a cure, I would have already discovered it. I tried hard enough to find one until I finally reconciled myself to my fate. Of course I didn’t tell him any of that.

“I haven’t been changed completely yet,” Stephen explained with a note of desperation in his voice. “I’m still a man where it counts, and I can prove it.”

This was getting me nowhere. I suspected I had learned all I could from Stephen. Hopefully, the trail through Le Chat Noir would lead Brian back to Mama Juno and allow him to conclude the case. Now, my interrogation of Stephen had degenerated into a futile argument–and an attempt on his part to somehow prove he was still a man. “You don’t have to prove anything, Stephen...” I began, but he wasn’t listening.

What happened next was completely unexpected. An odd and unnatural desire washed over me, almost as if a strong Whisperer had suddenly assaulted me, but Stephen had not said anything which would indicate that he was a Whisperer. I found myself staring into his face, confused, but somehow drawn to his confident blue eyes. In that moment, I would have done anything for him–anything at all.

Fortunately, the moment passed. I’m not entirely sure why to this day. I think it was because I looked down at his chest and saw the outline of two budding breasts. Since becoming female, I had found that I had no sexual attraction at all to women. While I tried my best to deny my growing attraction to men, I never seriously entertained the idea of being lesbian. Somehow, I had begun to think of Stephen as a woman rather than a man, and that probably saved me from a very embarrassing incident.

“Stephen, no!” I yelled as he lunged forward and gripped my arm.

“Let her go, Stephen!” a deep voice resonated behind me. The Whisper was enough to make Stephen release me and stand back. I turned to see the elder Lagrange son standing in the doorway.

“You can’t make me do...”

“Yes I can,” William interrupted his brother. This time there was no echo of a Whisper–merely the determined voice of a man who I suspected had dominated his brother for years. He then looked at me. “Are you finished here, Ms. Davis?”

“Uh... yes.”

“Then let me escort you back to your associates.”

I dared not turn and face Stephen again. Whatever he had done to me was still affecting me. However, instead of any specific sexual urge for the younger Lagrange brother, it had transformed within me to a general longing. In short, I was very, very horny.

As I let William gently put his arm at my waist and escort me from the room, I felt my body shiver. “What... what happened in there?” I managed to ask, trying to bring my body back under control.

“Stephen can have that affect on attractive women,” was all William would say, and I was far too shaken to ask for any clarification.

“Attractive young women like you must enjoy the company of handsome young men,” William continued, “but my brother is a little young for you.”

“Yes, he is,” I agreed numbly.

“You need the company of a man who’s a little older–a little more experienced.”

“Yes... I do.”

“Mister William?” It was Howard, suddenly behind us. Again, I marvelled at how he seemed to be able to appear out of nowhere. I supposed it was possible it was some magic power I had never heard of, but I thought it was probably just his experience as a butler.

William looked disgusted, and the spell was broken. I had been so shaken, I had forgotten what a powerful Whisperer William could be. A few more moments of listening to his soothing advice and I probably would have been spreading my legs for him in some unused bedroom. Back in prep school, he demonstrated his power on numerous occasions–usually in a manner that made me distrust him all the more. Today, it seemed, would be no exception to the rule. “What is it, Howard?” he snapped.

“Your father is looking for you.”

William seemed unable to decide whether to go to his father or continue working on me. To be honest, Stephen’s efforts had already left me more vulnerable than I could ever imagine, and I knew deep within myself that it wouldn’t take much more effort on William’s part to tip me over the edge. I braced for what would surely come next, only to be saved by the insistent butler once again. As if to tip the balance, Howard added, “He said he needed to see you right away.” The way he emphasized “right away” I could see in William’s eyes that the scion of the Lagrange family realized completely that his father was not a man to be kept waiting. I seemed to be saved.

William composed himself. He addressed me with all the enticing tones of a Whisperer missing from his voice. “Ms. Davis, I’ll leave you with Howard, if you will excuse me?” Without waiting for an answer, he hurried down the hall toward his father’s study.

“Are you all right, Ms. Davis?” Howard asked.

I looked at the older man, suddenly realizing he was handsome in his own way, in spite of being old enough to be my father. I began to feel strangely attracted to him, feeling my nipples tingle and a moistness between my legs.

Howard seemed to recognize the looks I was unconsciously giving him. “Ms. Davis,” he began, “I think I’d better get you back to your friends right away.” Without waiting for a response from me, he ushered me back into the drawing room.

Brian and Helen were standing, talking to the elder Mr. Lagrange, while William IV stood uncomfortably beside his father. It appeared that his father hadn’t really needed him, but instead wanted him near to him where he could be kept out of trouble. I had no doubt that his father knew well what mischief his Whispering son was likely to get into.

I admired the older man’s style, and I couldn’t help but notice that William III was a handsome man. But then my eyes quickly turned to Brian, and I realized what a lucky girl Helen was. Brian was an absolute hunk! If Helen weren’t my adopted sister, I’d... I’d...

“Cassie, are you all right?” Helen asked, looking at me with concern.

“Yeah, sure...” Three handsome men in the room at the same time! How could I not be all right?

“Thank you again, Mr. Lagrange,” Brian was saying in that deep, sexy voice of his, “and we’ll be in touch.”

The two men shook hands, although I could see that Mr. Lagrange had accepted Brian’s hand somewhat reluctantly. Since I knew from their first meeting that Mr. Lagrange did not flinch at the prospect of shaking hands with a person of another race, then Brian must have told him something he had not wanted to hear. I didn’t know what it was and I didn’t care. Why two such handsome men couldn’t get along was a mystery to me. I’m sure Brian noticed the slight, but said nothing.

When we were back in the car, Helen turned to me as Brian drove. “Girl, what’s the matter with you?”

I took my eyes off the back of Brian’s head–he had such nice hair–and slurred, “I’m all right.”

“No you aren’t,” she retorted. “Tell me everything that happened when you went to see Stephen.”

So I did. I admit, I was a little confused, but by the time Brian had driven me home and he and Helen had helped me into my condo, I had apparently been coherent enough for Brian to form an opinion about Stephen.

“He’s an Attractor,” Brian declared.

“Oh no!” Helen exclaimed. “Does his father know?”

Brian nodded. “I tried to impress upon him how dangerous his son’s power was. Now, with his transformation, there’s no telling what the power will do to him–or those around him.”

I was sitting on my living room couch, with Brian and Helen sitting across the coffee table from me in two comfortable chairs. “Stephen’s a what?”

“An Attractor,” Brian repeated. “They’re very rare, thank God.”

Brian was so good looking when he was all concerned like that...

“An Attractor is someone who exerts a magical attraction on the opposite sex,” Helen explained. “And as Brian said, they’re very rare–and very dangerous.”

“So what’s the big deal?” I asked, my head finally clear–except when I looked at Brian. I tried to address my questions to Helen.

“It’s a magical talent sure to get its user in trouble,” Helen said. “It’s one of those talents that pre-dates Webster and Kline–or so we think. It’s possible several pre-magic serial killers had the power, although the power wasn’t as strong before the virus. In men, it manifests itself as an uncanny sexual attraction. Any girl who meets an uninhibited male Attractor will be unable to resist his sexual advances.”

“But I resisted,” I pointed out. Of course, if William hadn’t come into Stephen’s room, I had no idea how much longer I could have resisted, but I was too embarrassed to say that. Since I had told them my story, they had probably deduced that anyway.

“I doubt if he’s a full strength,” Brian mused. “After all, his body is changing. He’s probably well on his way to becoming genetically female. If he’s only about half male, the Attractor power would be at half strength–or so the theory goes. No one is really sure.”

“Will he still be an Attractor when he’s completely female?” I asked.

“Probably,” Helen replied. “Magical talents seem to follow a person even after a sex change.”

I nodded. Come to think of it, my magical talent consisted of the same powers after my transformation.

“Yes,” Brian agreed, “but the talents usually grow stronger once a male becomes female.” Again, that was true for me. “This could be worse than we thought.”

“Why worse?”

Helen responded to my question. “Male Attractors usually learn to control their powers. The ones who do just become unexplainably popular with women. They get what they want when they want, but within the bounds of normal society. The few who don’t become extremely dangerous. Since they have a strong power over women, they tend to lose respect for them. At best, they become spousal abusers. At worst, they become capable of sex crimes.

“Since Stephen doesn’t have a rap sheet, we can assume that he managed to learn how to control the Attractor powers–at least to some degree. It’s hard to say since he’s still young. Dangerous Attractors are normally a little older. Unfortunately, what he did to you seems to indicate that he’s losing that control. Few women can control the power very well. They end up becoming prostitutes, strippers, and downright nymphomaniacs. Some have even had to be institutionalized for their own protection.”

I shuddered. I tried to put myself in Stephen’s shoes. It was bad enough that I had been transformed into a girl unwillingly, but Pierre’s attempts to turn me into a whore had failed, in part because of my own resistance. But Stephen would be pressured to become a slut from within, attracting men like bees to honey, and his own sexual needs would betray him... her.

“Why haven’t I ever heard of Attractors?” I asked.

“It’s Top Secret in the FBM,” Brian explained. “Think about it–this is a power so potentially lethal that society is endangered by them. If male, an uncontrolled Attractor can become a rapist, a serial killer, or just ruin the lives of innocent women by luring them into unintended liaisons. If female, the Attractor can also lure the innocent, breaking up families, spreading diseases or spells. A couple of years ago, a female Attractor spread an impotence spell that claimed over sixty victims before she could be stopped.”

Had whoever was transforming Stephen known he was an Attractor? Maybe–or maybe not. If Mama Juno had, in fact, been behind Stephen’s transformation, his magical ability as an Attractor would just have been a bonus, making it all the harder for the elder William. Mr. Lagrange’s distaste for magic was evident, and being forced to deal with his son’s Attractor power, which would probably become stronger and more unmanageable once his sex was changed, would have been a perfect revenge for his unwillingness to smuggle for them.

Of course, the fact that Stephen was an Attractor opened up a potentially wider explanation as well. It was possible that Stephen had Attracted some innocent girl whose parents learned of her misfortune. Changing Stephen into a girl, probably doomed to be a perfect little slut, would be a fitting punishment.

Before I could bring this up, Brian said much the same thing, adding, “We’ve got to see Mama Juno right away and determine if she’s behind this or not.”

“Let’s hope she is,” Helen pointed out. “Otherwise, we’ve got a potentially long suspect list. I’d imagine Stephen has been leading an active sex life ever since puberty.”

“Mama Juno’s probably behind it,” I said confidently.

“Why do you say that?” Brian asked, curious.

I faltered a little. I really didn’t have any insight into Mama Juno’s guilt or innocence in this case, but I couldn’t help but hope will all my heart that she was the one responsible so that I would have the pleasure of putting the woman who initiated my transformation in jail where she belonged. Brian was waiting for an answer though, so I sought to justify my position. My mind was still a little fogged though, from the one-two punch of an Attractor and a Whisperer.

“Well,” I began, “we know for a fact that she uses sex change spells in her activities. I’m living proof of that. And we know the Lagrange family has been contacted by Mama Juno’s representatives. It just stands to reason that this isn’t a coincidence.”

“Well, we’ll find out tomorrow,” Brian assured me. “I’m going to pay a little visit to Le Chat Noir tomorrow morning.”

“I want to go, too!” I jumped in.

“But you have classes tomorrow,” Helen said.

“Not if you go in the afternoon. Besides, I want to be there if Brian nails her to the wall. If we’re lucky, she won’t get away with things this time.”

Brian and Helen were both sharp enough to realize that I wasn’t about to be dissuaded. Brian finally said, “Okay. Helen, you can hold down the office and I’ll pick up Cassie at one. But Cassie, you’re just there to observe–clear?”

“Crystal.”

Helen came over and put her arms on my shoulders. “Okay, now you need to get some rest. The effects of the Lagrange boys should dissipate by tomorrow morning. Just lie down after we leave and chill out. Got that?”

“Yes, Mom.”

As they left me alone, I fully intended to do exactly what Helen had ordered me to do. Then, as soon as they were gone, I suddenly remembered my date with Brett. I hadn’t wanted to discuss it with Helen earlier, knowing how she would want to give me advice and ask a million questions about the first guy I had agreed to date, so she knew nothing of my date.

Part of me thought it would be a good idea to cancel the date–or at least call Helen and talk about it. Unfortunately, that part of me wasn’t in control at that particular moment. The part that was in control told me that most of the effects would wear off if I just took a little snooze. After all, it would be a crime to cancel a date with a hunk like Brett. I practically tingled at the thought of him. I looked at my watch. I had plenty of time to take a little nap and still get ready for Brett.

I stripped out of my suit, hanging it up carefully and falling onto the unmade bed in nothing but my bra and panties. I was suddenly so tired that I don’t even remember my head hitting the pillow.

Okay, so I should have called Brett and cancelled our date. Getting hit with magic wasn’t, for the most part, like getting drunk. I still had all my mental faculties: they were just... mixed up a little. But what really put the icing on the cake was the dream I had.

I was at a party in the dream, and I was a girl. Yeah, I know–I was a girl in real life too, but my sleeping mind didn’t know that. Most of the time when I dreamed, I was male again, or at least interacted as a male. Many times, it was with extreme disappointment that I awakened to find myself trapped in my female body. Not this time though. I was a girl through and through, and I didn’t seem to be wearing very much, either.

I remember looking down at myself, wondering why I had gone to a party wearing nothing but a bra and panties. Everybody else seemed to be dressed normally, but at least no one seemed concerned about my attire (or lack of it).

“Hey, Cassie!” a voice called out. I turned around and saw Stephen Lagrange standing there, dressed comically like one of those old sideshow performers–the ones who dressed one half of their bodies as a man and the other half as a woman. In spite of his bizarre appearance, I couldn’t help but be attracted to him, sidling up to him, feeling myself smiling.

Just before we were close enough to touch each other, William Lagrange IV stepped in between us. “Why bother with him,” William’s echoing voice boomed, “when you can have me? I’m all man.”

And I wanted him even more than I wanted Stephen. I felt my breasts tingling and an insistent dampness between my legs.

“She’s with me,” another male voice challenged. I swung around to see who it was, and there was Brett, ready to take on the Lagrange brothers if need be, his chest bare and his tight trousers unable to hide an enticing bulge.

I gasped, unable to stand it any longer; I felt something tremble between my legs and... and...

And I woke up.

I was sweaty, but I was even wetter between my legs, and the whiff of female sex told me I had just come in my sleep. Embarrassed, I pulled myself out of bed, looking at my watch to make sure I had plenty of time to get cleaned up so I could be presentable for my date with Brett.

At the thought of Brett, I felt another tingling between my legs. What in hell was wrong with me? I shouldn’t be reacting so strongly to thoughts about a man I barely knew–or any man for that matter.

I don’t want it to sound as if I was completely naíve about my new sex. I had been female–adult and female–for six months, and in that time, I had managed to find out how to get myself off. I had just used my hands: I didn’t want to use a dildo. In the first place, I was still a virgin (as a woman at least). True, I had been forced into oral sex, but that wasn’t really sex, was it? At least I hadn’t been vaginally penetrated and had no plans to allow that to happen any time soon.

As pleasurable as my times fingering myself had been, I had never felt anything as intense as the orgasm I had experienced in my sleep. It was absolutely incredible, and God help me, I wanted to experience it again. I took a shower and tried to bring myself off again. I succeeded, but it was a pale imitation of my dream orgasm. I had to have something more... satisfying. As if in answer to my cravings, an image of Brett as he had appeared in my dream came into the forefront of my mind.

Now I’ll be the first to admit that by the time I stepped out of the shower, I was no longer myself. My body’s urges–specifically my unexpected sexual urges–were now firmly in control of my actions. I searched mindlessly through my closet and drawers for something sexy to wear–something Brett would find irresistible. It took some time, but I found what I was looking for.

Right after I had been effectively adopted into the Davis family, Helen had taken it upon herself to make me dress and act more girlish. To that end, she had bought a few items which would now prove useful. Out of an unused drawer, I found a pink tank top, with little thin straps and a midriff-baring length. It was perfect. I slipped off my bra, opting for a less practical but thinner model that would make my breasts appear to be held in by magic in the tight top. Once I had the top on, I looked forlornly at my belly button, wondering why I had never bothered to have it pierced. A tiny little jewel dangling from my navel would have been a real eye popper for Brett. Oh well, I’d just have to entice him in other ways.

I found some panties to match the bra, ignoring the fact that they snuggled against my sex far more insistently than my usual utilitarian cotton ones, but so much the better. I covered them with a short little white jean skit that emphasized my hips.

I debated about wearing nylons. Nylons always had excited me on a woman when I had been a man (A man? Had I really been a man? That seemed like such a strange thought...). I decided against them, though. My legs looked great without them, so I settled on a pair of sandals with a high enough wedge to give my legs wonderful definition without the help of nylons. I opted instead for a body lotion that made my legs practically shine, rubbing the lotion so near my crotch that I thought I would come again.

I was a little short in the makeup and jewelry department. My ears were pierced, so I could wear earrings: I just didn’t choose to do so very often. Tonight though, I would definitely wear earrings. I selected a pair of small gold hoops and a matching gold bracelet Helen had given me. That and a small gold chain necklace would be the sum total of my jewelry for the evening. My addled brain seem to think it would be enough.

Makeup was another issue. My brain was telling me to pour it on thick, but fortunately for me, I didn’t really know that much about makeup. Helen had convinced me to wear a little lipstick, and I had experimented a little on my eyes, but that was it. Somehow, I managed to convince my unnaturally horny little mind that it was best to go light on the makeup (which I knew how to do) and not go heavy on it (which I did not know how to do) to avoid looking like a clown.

I was still primping in front of the mirror when the doorbell rang. It had to be Brett, but I wasn’t quite satisfied with the way I looked. Oh well. It would have to do. I just couldn’t wait to see him.

“Hi,” I breathed as I answered the door, thrusting my chest forward.

“Hi yourself,” Brett gulped. He looked good enough to eat, standing there in a fresh pair of khaki Chinos and a rust red polo shirt. I honestly thought about blowing off dinner and inviting him in, but like all good hunters, I knew better than to scare off the prey.

“You look great!” he exclaimed, looking me up and down.

“Thanks,” I returned. “So do you.” And yes, I looked him up and down, too. I liked what I saw. I felt all that tingling again, and it felt good.

“Uh... where would you like to go?” he asked a little nervously.

“How about Winnie’s?” I suggested. It was all I could do not to suggest my bedroom instead. But Winnie’s was essentially a deli, so we could eat fast and get back to my place quickly. I needed quickly, because I wasn’t sure how long I’d be able to hold back from ripping all of his clothes off.

“Uh... sure, great,” he agreed.

So within a couple of minutes, we were on our way. We took his car, a nice little BMW Z-3. Apparently he wasn’t just a doctor’s son–he was a very successful doctor’s son. Cars like that didn’t come cheap. We had the top down and I enjoyed the ride, watching all the boys watching us as we drove down Magazine. I smiled as those boys watched us, convinced that I was sitting next to the best boy on Magazine right then.

Winnie’s Artsy Café turned out to be closed Sunday evenings, which I had forgotten, so Brett suggested, “How about Martinique?”

“That’s not exactly casual,” I pointed out. Also, it would mean a longer, more formal meal, and I wanted Brett right then and there.

“I think we’re dressed well enough for it,” Brett assured me.

And we were. We were early enough that we even got seated on the brick patio, amidst the flowers and fountains. The evening looked to be pleasantly warm, so the patio was a comfortable as well as romantic choice. I approved. The food was succulent, the wine superb, and the company was incredible. Somehow, I managed to keep things together during dinner. What I really wanted to do was push all the dinnerware off the table and do him right there.

It was weird. I knew intellectually that my desires were alien, but I just couldn’t stop myself from surrendering to my body’s needs. At least things didn’t get too out of hand at dinner. The most I did was hold his hand a few times, smile seductively a lot, and run my foot up his pants leg as we talked about who we were and what we wanted out of life.

I’m sorry to say I don’t remember much of that first dinner conversation. My mind was on other things, it seemed. I learned that Brett was an only child, that he was a track star in high school, and bits of family trivia, but nothing memorable. Of course since I was concentrating on his handsome face and glorious physique, I wasn’t exactly listening. I managed to add a few items from my own personal life, not mentioning of course, that I had once been every bit as male as he was. I made it sound as if I had been born and raised a girl in the Davis household.

Brett looked at me as we finished our meal, as if trying to glean something important. “What’s wrong?” I asked, stopping in the middle of what I had been saying.

“It’s nothing,” he replied casually, but I could see something was bothering him. I shrugged. I supposed it wasn’t important. What was important was when I decided we should forgo dessert and get back to my place where I could screw him blind all night.

We innocently held hands on the way back to his car, but on the ride back to my place, I let my left hand drift over the console and onto Brett’s crotch. There was nothing innocent about that move, I thought smugly.

“Hey Cassie,” he laughed a little nervously. “That’s kind of distracting.”

“It’s meant to be,” I told him in a sultry tone as we pulled up in front of my condo. “Come on in and I’ll do more than that.”

Brett and I had enjoyed a wonderful dinner together, but I had restrained myself in public. Now, we were at my place, though, and I had become much bolder. There was no reason to hold back now, was there?

Brett came around and opened my car door for me, helping me out of the Z. I used the opportunity to sidle very close to him, my hand poised at the waistband of his pants with obvious intent. He winced and said slowly, “Cassie, hold up. There’s something wrong here.”

“Nothing’s wrong,” I assured him, tugging him up the sidewalk. I looked down at his crotch. His pants were about to burst.

“Yes there is, Cassie...”

“Fuck me, Brett,” I pleaded at the front door.

“Cassie...”

“I said fuck me–now!”

I now knew what a drug addict felt like when denied a fix. I had been able to act the perfect date at the restaurant. I had over twenty years of acting properly in nice restaurants, so I had been able to hold things together, but a combination of the wine and the confrontations with both a Whisperer and an Attractor had finally destroyed what few defenses I still had. I threw open the front door, and through gritted teeth demanded, “Come in and fuck me right now!”

“Cassie... I...”

“Now, damn it!” I screamed, unable to hold back any longer. I was feeling light-headed, as if all the blood was rushing from my head. “Now!”

Brett held my wrists as I lunged for him, suddenly dizzy. Then, he released my wrists as I sagged to the floor, trying to hold me before I passed out completely...

“She’s coming out of it,” a familiar voice said from the bottom of the deep, dark canyon I was lying in. I hadn’t felt so out of it since coming home from Harvard for Mardi Gras during my first year of college. No, I didn’t have a headache or a sour stomach, but I just felt... fuzzy.

I opened my eyes slowly, flinching at even the dim light that framed the dark face above me. “Papa Bob?”

Robert ‘Papa Bob’ Monroe was the last person I expected to find with me at the bottom of a canyon, but as my senses returned to me, I realized I was in my own bed, still wearing the clothes I had worn on my date with Brett.

Brett! Oh my God, what had I done with Brett? Where was he? My eyes darted around until I saw him standing behind Papa Bob, concern on his face. “Will she be all right?” Brett asked.

Papa Bob patted my hand and smiled. “She’ll be fine–now. It’s a good thing you called me though.”

“Her sister asked me to call you,” Brett explained. “But I thought you were a doctor.”

Papa Bob shook his head as he put a couple of Voudon props back in his case that was resting at the foot of my bed. “A doctor couldn’t do much good here. This was magic, but you know that.”

I managed to pull myself up into a sitting position. “What happened? What...”

“Time for questions later,” Papa Bob interrupted, handing me a glass of something green. “You just drink this now. It’ll put you back together in no time.”

Obediently, I raised it to my lips and sipped it. “Yuck! This tastes awful.”

“It’s supposed to,” he said gruffly. “Now drink!”

I gulped it down, hoping I could finish it before the taste made me puke it back up. “What is this?” I gasped as I finished.

“Nothing you want to know about,” Papa Bob replied. “But you feel better now, don’t you?”

Actually, I did. My head was clear and I felt like myself again–or as much like myself as a twenty-something white man could feel in the body of an African-American girl who looked like jailbait.

Then I groaned, wondering about what Brett must think of me. “Brett, I don’t know what came over me...”

“I do,” he replied with a relieved grin. “I’m a Detector.”

We hadn’t talked about our magical abilities before. It was something most people didn’t discuss with until they got to know each other well. There was some debate as to whether or not Detectors had magical powers or were just physically sensitive to the presence of magic. Either way, they were prized in modern society. They could Detect the presence of magical spells in people or objects. It was also a handy talent for a doctor to have. It would serve him well when he finished medical school.

“Brett, I’m so sorry,” I said, my voice trembling. I had never been so embarrassed in my life. So okay, magic had caused me to act the way I did, but that didn’t make it any less shameful.

Brett shook his head. “There’s nothing to be sorry for, Cassie. Your sister told me what happened. Running into an Attractor and a Whisper in the same day... it’s amazing you could even function without Catataxin.”

“Catataxin?”

“These,” Papa Bob broke in, rattling a little orange bottle of pills.

I smiled at him. “Since when do Voudon priests use pills?” I asked softly.

“Why not?” he retorted. “Medical doctors use magic now. Catataxin has proved pretty reliable in suppressing magic. Oh by the way, I wouldn’t try using your Pusher powers for a couple of days. It also dulls your own magical abilities.”

I looked over at Brett. “Thanks.”

“It was nothing,” he chuckled.

“Nothing?” I repeated. “The condition I was in, I would have... Well, I would have done just about anything you wanted me to do. You didn’t take advantage of me, though.” I had a sudden disturbing thought: he wasn’t gay, was he? If he wasn’t, I had just found the world’s greatest gentleman. I’m not sure if I had been in his shoes if I would have been able to resist a girl as well as he did.

“I have to admit it was very tempting,” he admitted with a guilty grin. “It isn’t every day a girl as hot as you comes on to me that way.”

“Oh, you think I’m hot, do you?” I couldn’t hide the fact that I was rather pleased about that. I was also pleased to find that he wasn’t gay.

“Absolutely.” He took my hand. “Now I just want you to get some rest and let the spell wear off. We should both just forget all about this evening. I’ll see you in class Tuesday and we’ll start all over again. Okay?”

I smiled and nodded.

“I’d try to kiss you,” he added, “but your doctor here seems to think that might trigger the spell again.”

“I’ll give you a rain check.” I hoped that wasn’t the spell talking, but I didn’t think it was. I really did like Brett. I liked him before that night’s fiasco, and now I liked him even more. He was a gentleman in the truest sense of the word. Most guys would have simply said, “Yes, ma’am,” when I asked them to go to bed with me and wouldn’t have been a bit sorry for it. Brett had rescued me from a very embarrassing situation, and I wasn’t likely to forget it.

Papa Bob stayed with me after Brett left. He was waiting for Helen to show up. I tried to get Brett to stay, but I think he wanted to avoid meeting my family on such a mortifying occasion.

Helen and Brian came in together, Helen rushing to my side. “Are you okay, Cassie?” She grabbed my hand and patted it.

“I’ll be fine,” I assured her.

“I should have stayed with you this afternoon,” Helen sighed. “If I’d known you had a date...”

“I didn’t tell you because I... well, I didn’t want to make a big deal of it,” I told her.

“Where is he?” Helen asked, looking around.

“I told him to go on home,” I lied, wishing that Brett had stayed around to meet Brian and Helen. I was sure they would like him. I know I did.

“Most guys wouldn’t have thought twice about taking advantage of you,” Helen smiled. “He must be quite a guy.”

“He is,” I assured her.

Helen gave me an appraising look, as if trying to decide if I really meant what I said or was still under the influence of the Lagrange boys. I have to admit, I wondered a little bit myself. All I knew for certain was that I wanted to see Brett again. And next time, I’d do my best not to jump him. There might come a day when I was ready to jump him, but for now, I wanted to take things slowly.

“Cassie,” Brian began, “under the circumstances, I think Helen and I should go to Le Chat Noir without you tomorrow.”

“No!”

“Look, there’s probably nothing there for us to find. It’s just one more lead we have to follow to be thorough.”

“But it’s our connection with Mama Juno,” I argued. “I want to help bring her down.”

“Whoa, Cassie,” Brian chuckled nervously. “We don’t even know if Mama Juno has anything to do with this case.”

“But it’s her style,” I shot back. “Changing males into females is one of her favorite sports.” I motioned at my own body with my slender hands as if to emphasize the point.

“It’s also the favorite sport of a couple of radical feminist groups and at least one white slavery ring,” Brian countered. “Not only that, but Mama Juno isn’t the only Voudon practitioner in the state of Louisiana, and at least half of them know how to change someone’s sex. Cassie, this isn’t just National Enquirer stuff. So much of it goes on that even the FBM can’t keep a lid on it anymore.”

“Even though there’s something of a connection between the Lagrange family and Mama Juno, I don’t think she’d create a powerful enemy just because Mr. Lagrange chose not to do business with her,” Helen added.

“But you don’t have any other leads, do you?” I asked.

“No,” Brian admitted, “but this isn’t like television. Clue A doesn’t always lead to B and then C. We might get half a dozen Clue A’s before one of them pans out. Remember, Cassie, we’re working on a number of cases right now, so it takes time to check everything out. We may not get a lead that pans out on this case for weeks.”

I could see Brian and Helen weren’t going to give ground on this. From their perspective, I could see their point. They had asked me to help out by achieving a rapport with Stephen Lagrange, given that I had had the misfortune to go through the same sexual transformation he was currently experiencing. It hadn’t worked out, and I had nearly been spelled into having sex with just about anyone who would want me.

“All right,” I sighed. “You win.”

Brian and Helen looked relieved. They wouldn’t have been quite so pleased if they had known what I was thinking, though.

Helen spent the night with me. I guess she was afraid I’d have a relapse and go out for a little midnight trolling for men. Fat chance of that, though. Papa Bob had assured us that the Catataxin would suppress any unwanted sexual desires until the spell had run its course. Without reinforcement, Whisperer spells tended to wear off in no more than two days, and according to Papa Bob, an Attractor spell lasted less than a day.

In fact, I don’t think I would have been ensorcelled even without the Catataxin. Now that I knew what had been done to me, I was sure I could fend off the spells without any help. Just to be sure though, I dutifully took my Catataxin every eight hours.

Brian picked up Helen just before I left for classes. The two lovebirds had a busy case load set up for the week, and they assured me once again that the trip to Le Chat Noir would be short, sweet, and probably unproductive. It was just one more detail that had to be checked out.

I wished them well, but didn’t let on what I was planning. When Brian and Helen had cut me out of the call on Le Chat Noir, I decided to go directly to Mama Juno herself. There’d be no beating around the bush for yours truly: I intended to ask Mama Juno directly about Stephen Lagrange.

Okay, so it wasn’t the brightest thing for me to do. The last time I had tried to contact Marie Dubois, alias Mama Juno, her son Pierre, had tried to set me on the path of prostitution and nearly succeeded. The smartest course of action for me would to have avoided her and her family completely. But I just couldn’t do that. I owed Mama Juno big time, and I wasn’t going to be happy until she and her perverted offspring were cooling their heels in one of Louisiana’s finest penal institutions.

I was certain in my own mind that Mama Juno had spelled Stephen Lagrange. It just made sense to me. Just as my father stood in her way, the elder William Lagrange now had crossed her path. While I doubted that Stephen’s father would have the same sexual proclivities as my father, I had no doubt that changing the younger Lagrange son into a girl was part of one of Mama Juno’s convoluted plans. She may have even known Stephen was an Attractor. If so, he would make an excellent target for Pierre’s little whore-making operation. While there was nothing I could do to keep Stephen Lagrange out of heels and skirts, I could at least see that Mama Juno and her gang were held accountable this time.

My head was filled with visions of what Mr. Lagrange would do to her. He wasn’t running for governor as my father was, so there’d be no cover-up this time. I tried to imagine all of us in a courtroom with me smirking as the jury foreman pronounced a sullen Mama Juno and her miserable offspring to long, long prison sentences. Can you say “payback”?

I thought about taking Brett with me as sort of a bodyguard. I decided against it though, for two reasons. First of all, I didn’t want to put him in danger. I was just starting to like the guy, and exposing him to Mama Juno wasn’t something one did to someone she liked.

Also, I didn’t want Mama Juno spilling the beans about my previous life. If things got serious between Brett and me, I’d have to tell him who I had once been and let him decide if he wanted anything to do with a girl who was a former man. But the time for that was later, not now. At the moment, we didn’t exactly have a relationship, so I didn’t think it was necessary to tell him who I been. I had a funny feeling though, that the day to tell him might be sooner than I expected: it just wasn’t now.

So after classes, I struck out for the innocuous antique store on Magazine that fronted for Mama Juno’s headquarters, determined to get the goods on the woman who had so drastically changed my life.

I wasn’t a complete fool though. As I parked my car about a block away from Mama Juno’s, I called Helen to tell her what I was up to. “Hi, Helen.”

“Cassie? Are you all right?”

“How was Le Chat Noir?” I asked casually.

“Just as we feared,” she replied. “It’s a dead end. Stephen was probably spelled there, but no one seems to remember him. According to the manager, it isn’t the first time somebody has ended up getting his sex changed after a run in with the wrong girl–or guy.”

“And you believe him?”

“Cassie, I know how much you’d like to tie Mama Juno to all of this, but it’s really a reach. Sure, she owns the club. The manager was up front about that. But he said he’s free to run the club as he sees fit just as long as it makes its profit targets. He claims he only sees Mama or her son once a month or so.”

“Well, I’m going to see what Mama Juno has to say for herself.”

“What?”

“I’m there now,” I sang out. “Bye.”

Okay, so it wasn’t fair to be so cavalier with Helen, but I wasn’t about to be cut off from the case. Mama Juno, look out!

I have to admit I wasn’t quite as confident when I tried to stroll casually into the antique store that housed Mama’s offices. The last time I had approached the store, I had been thwarted by the presence of a couple of FBM agents who had staked it out looking for me. At that time, I had been in the throes of my transformation–half male and half female. I had been a frightened girl–or nearly a girl–and those memories surfaced now, causing my confidence to falter.

To the casual shopper, Mama Juno’s store was just one more store selling bits and pieces of Southern memorabilia passed off as valuable antiques. Magazine Street was littered with similar stores, some more impressive and some less. Once inside, the smell of old assaulted the senses, and dim lighting acted to prevent fading and disguise flaws in the musty furniture and accessories displayed haphazardly across the floor.

The salesman smiled when he saw me. I was dressed once again in my suit, so I must have looked like a young, affluent woman, probably looking for just the right piece to compliment the furnishings of my new condo. He was also African-American and not a lot older than me, so even if he couldn’t sell me the right piece, perhaps he could sell me on himself–or so he hoped.

“Can I help you?”

It was now or never. I sighed to compose myself and said, “My name is Cassandra Davis. I’m looking for Marie Dubois.”

He frowned. It was then that I realized his duties probably encompassed far more than the sale of old furniture. “I’m sorry... Marie Dubois?”

“Mama Juno,” I clarified. “I know this is where her office is. I want to see her.” It was hard to sound commanding when the man I was speaking to was obviously capable of physically knocking me into next week. In my favor though, was that if I handled the situation correctly, he might conclude that I actually did have valid business with Mama Juno. I was suddenly happy to be black, for I doubted if many white people ever got in to see her unless they were specifically invited. African-Americans, on the other hand, knew of Mama Juno’s powers and often sought her help for potions and spells.

Whatever criteria the man used to determine who got to see Mama Juno, I apparently passed the test. His frown softened just a bit. “Wait just a moment,” he told me, slipping behind a curtain at the rear of the store.

As I waited, my confidence eroded still further. I was alone in Mama Juno’s showroom, but I was sure I was being watched. I suddenly realized that while Mama Juno had never seen me as a complete female, her son had. If he was back behind that curtain, he might recognize me. I had considered the possibility before, but thought it was very unlikely that he would connect the young professional woman who waited in the showroom with the bedraggled creature he had forced to give him a blowjob in a cheap hotel room several months ago. But what if he did recognize me...?

“Mama Juno will see you now.”

I nearly jumped out of my skin. I hadn’t heard the salesman/guard come back into the room. I caught my breath enough to mutter a nervous thank you.

As I stepped through the curtains, I had been expecting something out of a Gothic thriller, complete with dark shadows, eerie red eyes staring out of the gloom, and maybe a couple of bats and spider webs for good measure. Imagine my disappointment (or possibly relief) as I was ushered down a subtly-lit but modern hallway, festooned with modern art and a deep pile carpet. The door to Mama Juno’s office was made from inlaid wood, but no magical symbols or totems marred its surface.

“Please come in, Ms. Davis,” a warm, husky voice called out.

Mama Juno sat confidently behind a desk which would have made the CEO of a Fortune 500 company envious. While the lighting in the room was soft and a little dark for my comfort, her desk was bathed in the warm glow of an expensive desk lamp with a translucent green shade. It bathed her face in the warm light, causing her dark brown eyes to twinkle and her white teeth to glisten.

I had only met Mama Juno once, and the memories of the meeting had been enough to force me to suppress a shudder. She was the last woman I made love to as a man, if being tied to a table and forcibly ridden by the older woman could be termed ‘making love.’ The act had been the catalyst to set me on the unwanted path to womanhood.

I had remembered her as being attractive though, and nothing I now saw changed that opinion. She wore a bright and obviously expensive green dress which dipped in front to display the beginnings of magnificent breasts. Her short hair exposed a pair of expensive earrings, dangling down from two nearly-perfect ears. Her skin was somewhat darker than mine, but her features were more Caucasian than Negroid.

“Would you like something to drink?” she asked politely as I approached her desk.

“No... no thank you,” I replied. Actually, I would have loved a glass of water, but I was very reluctant to drink or eat anything Mama Juno provided.

“Then please be seated.”

I did so, carefully crossing my legs and smoothing my skirt as Helen had taught me. I felt Mama Juno’s eyes following me as I completed my feminine pose.

Mama Juno folded her hands and stared at me, not unkindly. “Now, what can I do for you today, my dear?”

“My name is Cassie Davis,” I said as crisply as I could, “and I work with Wallace and Associates, a private investigative firm.” Notice I didn’t exactly lie, but I was hoping she’d believe I was a licensed investigator. I suppose that was too much to hope for since I looked age-wise more like a high school cheerleader.

“And what can I do for you, Ms. Davis?” Mama asked smoothly.

“We’re looking into a magical assault on Stephen Lagrange, the son of William Lagrange III,” I told her, watching her face for any reaction, but there was none.

“Aren’t magical assault cases the purview of the FBM?”

“Well, yes,” I admitted, “but Mr. Williams’ client is adverse to publicity.”

“I can well imagine,” Mama commented, leaning back and favoring me with a feline smile. “Old Billy Lagrange never did like publicity.”

Aha! “So you know him?”

“Of course I know him, girl!” she laughed. “Everybody who is anybody in New Orleans knows Billy Lagrange–and those two worthless sons of his, too. They chase after more poontang than their old man did when he was a boy.”

Since a good number of the whores in New Orleans worked either directly or indirectly for Mama Juno, she was certainly in a position to know.

“Mama... Ms. Dubois, do you know anything about the spell placed on Stephen Lagrange?” There. It was out in the open now.

“So that’s why you’re here.”

“We believe the spell was put on him at Le Chat Noir. That is one of your clubs, isn’t it?”

She leaned forward, her eyes drilling into me, and for just a moment, I felt a sudden urge to run from the room. But somehow I held my ground, staring back at her. “Isn’t it?” I managed to repeat.

Mama relaxed, leaning back again. “You know it is, girl. Is that where they placed the spell on him? Hell, somebody gets spelled in one of my clubs just about every night, but usually not by me. What did they do, child–make him so he can’t get it up anymore?”

I shifted my eyes away from her. Yeah, they had done that–and a whole lot more.

Mama laughed again. “Oh my! I can see it in your expression. They changed his sex, didn’t they? Nasty old Stephen Stay-Hard got himself a brand new cunt! Oh, that is just too, too good!”

“You... you’re saying you didn’t have anything to do with it?” I asked, just a little timidly. This wasn’t going the way I expected at all. I expected Mama Juno to deny even knowing the Lagrange family. Instead, she admitted knowing them and from her reaction had no idea until now what had happened to Stephen. Unlike a guilty person, whom I would have thought would feign shock to throw suspicion off herself, Mama was obviously delighted with what had happened to Stephen. “But your agents approached Mr. Lagrange...”

“About shipping something for us?” Mama broke in, throwing me off stride once more. “Is that why the old bastard thought we had something to do with his son? Don’t be silly, girl! Things don’t work like that. Old Billy and I have done business before and we’ll do it again. We have alternate channels of distribution already in place. I just offered Billy a piece of the business as one old friend to another.”

“Mr. Lagrange doesn’t seem like the sort of man who’d number you among his friends,” I snapped.

“Why?” Mama looked genuinely amused. “Because I deal in shady stuff? Or because I’m black? Let me tell you girl, Billy’s every bit as shady as I am: he just hides it better. As for me being black, well certainly if Billy had his way all of us darkies would be out in da fields a’picken cotton fo’ him and a’singen’ them gospels fo’ all we’s worth. But he doesn’t have his way, girl, and as long as we can make money for each other, we don’t care what color each other’s skin is. That’s just the way it is here in New Orleans, girl!”

“Uh...” I stammered, “do you have any idea who would want to do this to him?”

“Sure,” she giggled, “ask just about half the female population of New Orleans–and their husbands and boyfriends. You’ve got a case here where it might be easier to decide who didn’t have a motive to change Stephen–and his brother for that matter. Now if there’s nothing else, I need to get back to work.”

“No,” I sighed, crestfallen as I rose out of the chair. “Thank you for seeing me.” I turned to go.

“Oh, Ms. Davis?” Mama called after me.

I turned back to her. “Yes?”

She looked me over carefully. “I can see now why our plot to get at your father through you didn’t work. You’ve got a lot more balls than he does.”

I flushed, realizing she had known who I was all along. “Not anymore, thanks to you,” I mumbled, and left without another word.

Brian was on the sales floor when I stepped back through the curtain. He was nose to nose with the salesman/guard, and from the looks each man was giving the other, things were about to turn violent. I got the idea Brian had just been told that Mama Juno did not wish to be disturbed, and Brian was prepared to do a lot of disturbing.

“Cassie!” Helen called out, pulling her empty hand out of her purse. I got the distinct feel she had a gun in there and was prepared to back Brian up with it if need be.

“What’s going on?” I asked innocently.

Brian was still staring at his adversary, but he grumbled, “Let’s get out of here. We got what we came for.”

They hustled me back to the car, Helen climbing in the back seat with me. “Just what were you trying to accomplish, girl?” Helen asked as Brian pulled away from the curb.

“I thought Mama Juno was involved in this case,” I sighed. “In fact, I was sure of it.”

“But now you don’t think so?”

I shook my head. Then I related my entire conversation with Mama.

“You’re just damned lucky her son wasn’t there,” Brian called out. “He owes you for the trouble you caused him.”

“He beat the sexual assault charge, didn’t he?” I shot back bitterly. He had forced me to have oral sex with him and should have been punished for it, but a sharp lawyer and a crooked Assistant DA had gotten the charges reduced to harassment and covered by a modest fine.

“Damn it, Cassie,” Brian returned, “you just won’t rest until Mama Juno and her son are behind bars, will you?”

“No.”

“Honey,” Helen began, wiping away a couple of tears of frustration which had welled up around my eyes, “Mama Juno had nothing to do with Stephen’s transformation. We already were sure of that.”

“Then why did you let Mr. Lagrange practically accuse her of doing this to his son?” I wanted to know.

Brian looked back at Helen for a moment while she looked at him. It was as if they had communicated without speaking. I suppose it was possible that they did. Both Brian and Helen were classified as Nonspecific Omni–magical users of ‘varying’ talents, one of which could easily have been telepathy. At last Brian nodded for Helen to continue.

“William Lagrange was lying when he said he had never met Mama Juno,” Helen told me.

“I thought so before I went to see her, and she confirmed it,” I said.

“Wait, there’s more. When William Lagrange was younger, he had a mistress–a black mistress.”

I sighed, “Why is it that all these middle-aged rich Southern white guys have black mistresses?” White guys like my father, I could have added.

Helen shrugged. “I don’t know, I think it’s something of a yearning for what they see as the ‘good old days’ when African-Americans were called colored folks...”

“Or worse,” Brian broke in.

“Or worse,” Helen agreed. “In any case, it makes them feel like they’re old plantation owners with life and death power over their slaves.”

“That’s sick,” I interjected. “I was never like that.”

“No, you weren’t,” Helen nodded. “But you and your contemporaries are a new generation. You grew up without segregated schools and race riots and people like Lester Maddox and George Wallace. Your father, and a lot of fathers in New Orleans just like him, can remember the tail end of white supremacy as a way of life in the South. They feel they’ve lost the power wielded by their fathers and grandfathers.”

“And having a young black mistress will make them feel better?” I asked angrily, realizing certainly not for the first time that I was now a prime target for such men.

“Let’s just say it gives them the illusion of power,” Helen countered. “In any case, William Lagrange’s black mistress was Marie Dubois.”

“Oh God, no!”

“Why do you think her son is named Pierre?” Helen asked, and then answered her own question, “He was named for his natural father–William Pierre Lagrange III.”

I suddenly realized I had been a fool. Brian and Helen had worked on dozens of cases before and were working on dozens of others right now. They knew what they were doing and had a perfectly good reason for not going to see Mama Juno. I, on the other hand, had been asked to try to relate to Stephen–an assignment at which I had failed miserably. Then, seeking revenge of my own, I had struck out after Mama Juno, convinced that I could somehow get her to confess to transforming Stephen. I was being used as an unwitting pawn once more, but this time by one of Brian’s clients.

“Mr. Lagrange is trying to implicate Mama Juno, isn’t he?” I asked softly.

Helen nodded. “We think so. He may even believe she’s involved. Since his marriage, he’s become a real born-again type, convinced that all magic is evil and that those who practice it are capable of just about anything. But we also think he’s wrong: Mama Juno never does anything strictly out of revenge.”

I thought of my own situation. She had tried to make me believe I was being changed out of revenge, but her actions had just been part of a larger plot to discredit my father and increase her power inside the FBM.

“So why even follow up the lead at Le Chat Noir?”

“Because we believe Stephen was right about the spell being placed on him there,” Brian explained. “In the last two months, there have been seven men transformed into women after a visit to Le Chat Noir. None of the cases have been solved, though.”

“I don’t remember seeing anything about that in the papers,” I pointed out. And believe me, I looked for any articles on sexual transformations. While I had given up any hope of ever being male again, I had a morbid interest in the incidents. I suppose misery loves company after all.

“The FBM hushed them up,” Helen told me. “They can’t hide the fact that magical sexual transformation is possible anymore, but they do like to keep the stories as quiet as possible. They say it’s to protect the victims and their families, but that’s just part of it. They don’t want to start a panic. Now that AIDS has been magically cured, sex changes are the closest thing to sexually-transmitted diseases we have, and the media would have a collective orgasm if they knew how many cases there are every year.”

I suddenly remembered I had parked back on Magazine. “Hey, I need to pick up my car.”

“We’ll drop you after we visit the Lagrange family again,” Brian promised.

“Huh?”

“Brian thought it would be a good idea to let you tag along with us on this case,” Helen explained. “Once you see how things should be handled, maybe next time you help us you won’t go off half-cocked.”

I just nodded my head. I was too drained to protest, and I really wasn’t in a frame of mind to go back to my place and read tort law. Besides, I was curious as to how they would manage to solve this case. Personally, with Mama Juno out of the picture, I didn’t have any idea how they were going to catch Stephen’s assailant. There didn’t seem to be a useable clue in sight.

William Lagrange III was waiting to see us in the same room he had received us in before, and the gentleman did not look happy. I was a little taken aback by his demeanor, but Brian and Helen looked calm and collected in the face of what would likely be a verbal barrage.

“I’d like to know why you haven’t made any progress on this case,” he said bluntly. “You’ve had time to investigate Marie Dubois by now!”

“And we have,” Brian broke in before Mr. Lagrange got any redder in the face. “We interviewed potential witnesses at Le Chat Noir, and Ms. Davis here personally interviewed Marie Dubois.”

I flushed a little. At least something good came out of my foolish adventure. Brian was able to make it sound as if I had acted under his direction.

“And?”

Now it was Brian’s turn to look displeased. “And we ascertained that there was no reasonable connection between Ms. Dubois and what happened to your son. Mr. Lagrange, the fact that you turned down a business deal wasn’t the real reason you thought she was involved, was it?”

“What are you insinuating?”

“Isn’t it true that Marie Dubois was your mistress?” Brian pressed.

I thought Mr. Lagrange was going to have a stroke. “How dare you!”

“And,” Brian continued calmly, “that Pierre Dubois is, in fact, your son?”

I could see the conflict in our client’s mind: it didn’t take any magical power to understand what was going on in there. His first impulse was to deny Brian’s accusations, but I think he realized that Brian could not be bullied. He seemed to wilt, the anger leaving his face, replaced by deep embarrassment.

It was time for Brian to throw him a bone. “We were however, able to determine that in all likelihood, your son was spelled at Le Chat Noir as he suspected. However, there appears to be no connection to Mama–to Marie Dubois.”

“I thought she was angry with me,” Mr. Lagrange muttered, “angry enough to do this to my son.” Then the stern look returned. “But if she didn’t do this, who did?”

“Mr. Lagrange,” Helen began, “are you aware that Stephen has quite a reputation as a... ladies’ man?”

He nodded. “Of course I’m aware. He’s handsome, charming, rich... what girl wouldn’t be interested in him?”

“And you’re aware that he is an Attractor?” she asked.

“Stephen doesn’t need magic to attract girls,” he scoffed. “While I’ll grant that both of my sons do have some magical ability, they have sworn to me that they won’t use those foul powers.”

“I’d like to see Stephen,” Brian interjected.

“That’s not possible.”

As if to emphasize that the moment might be difficult, a very feminine scream emanated from the direction of Stephen’s bedroom. Moments later, a naked girl ran into the room, followed closely by William IV and a small, wiry man carrying a hypodermic needle. “I don’t want a shot!” the naked girl screamed.

“What’s going on here?” Mr. Lagrange demanded.

“Dr. Camden was about to give him a shot to calm him down,” William IV explained, catching his breath. “Then Stephen did something to him–he took off his robe and Dr. Camden just froze.”

He was frozen again, it seemed, staring with his mouth open at what had to be one of the most beautiful girls I’ve ever seen. The naked girl who had been Stephen Lagrange was perfect in every imaginable way. Long blonde curls framed a perfect face accented with the bluest eyes I had ever gazed into. Her breasts were full and perfectly formed, ending in delicate pink nipples that seemed permanently erect. Her waist and hips were magnificent, leading down to two long legs that would leave any man who saw them absolutely awestruck. She was so gorgeous that just for a moment, I remembered what it felt like to be a man. Then that feeling was replaced with something akin to jealousy as my new womanly brain kicked in. Sure, I was good looking, but the young woman who had once been Stephen Lagrange was positively stunning.

She turned her head suddenly, blonde curls brushing over those wonderful nipples. She was staring at Brian, and her mouth turned into a cunning smile as Brian seemed to freeze, his eyes locked on hers.

“Cassie, give me a hand!” Helen called out, suddenly standing between Brian and the new woman.

I too, was frozen, but for a different reason than Brian. The last time I had seen Stephen, his Attractor powers, coupled with William IV’s Whispering, had nearly caused me to sexually assault Brett. I didn’t want to fall under his spell again. But then I realized that there was no chance of that now. Stephen had become a woman, and her Attractor powers were no longer aimed at me. It was probable that whatever triggered the effect was based on pheromones, and Stephen’s pheromones had changed from male to female along with the rest of her. I was immune!

Helen and I dived for Stephen, each taking an arm and pulling her toward the doctor. We had expected him to give the shot to the distraught woman, but like Brian, he was practically frozen in place.

“Give that to me!” William IV commanded, his Whisper requiring an immediate response from the doctor. Then, with a deft move that made me wonder if William IV was a user of injected recreational drugs, he slipped the needle into Stephen’s smooth, feminine arm. Her struggles ceased quickly, starting as a quiver in her arm and ending with a tired sigh as she became limp in our grasp.

“I’ll take her now,” he said, handing the hypodermic back to the sluggish doctor.

It wasn’t a Whisper, so I continued to hold on while Helen relinquished the other arm to William. “I can handle her,” he told me.

“Let me help,” I returned. He looked at me and nodded, and between the two of us, we managed to get Stephen back into his room and lay him on the bed.

“How long has she been like this?” I asked as we looked down on her sleeping form.

“She woke us this morning, all girl,” William said dully. “At first, we didn’t realize what had happened to her power. She was upset of course, finding herself completely female, but with just family and a maid around, she seemed to be holding it together. Then Howard came in to bring her an early lunch and... things changed.”

“Changed? How?”

“Howard froze just like your friend did a few minutes ago,” William explained. “And Stephen started getting worked up.” He shuddered. “It was like watching a woman have an orgasm. She started moaning, and Howard started walking toward her, sort of like a zombie. He was starting to undo his pants when father and I stopped him.”

I felt like shuddering myself. As a male, Stephen’s Attractor power had been strong–I knew that from personal experience–but it was controlled. Growing up male, he had undoubtedly come by the power slowly and naturally. Now, changed into a female, she was no longer completely in tune with her body. Whatever sexual needs Stephen had felt as a young man had been multiplied and unleashed in this feminine form.

“But why didn’t he affect you–or your father, for that matter?” I asked.

William shrugged. “I’m not sure, but I think family members are somehow immune from his–her–power. At least that makes sense. My power doesn’t seem to affect family members.”

I noticed he didn’t admit to being a Whisperer. Few did. Once someone was alerted to a Whisperer’s power, the magical effects seemed to be negligent. It was only when a victim was unaware of a Whisperer’s power–or distracted as I had been by Stephen’s strong Attractor power–that the magical power had much influence.

“Maybe Stephen will learn to control her power,” I suggested.

William shook his head. “No, I don’t think so. I’ve done a little research since Stephen became an Attractor. The power is mild right after puberty but builds up over time. By the time an Attractor is eighteen–Stephen’s age–it’s practically autonomic. It can become more intense if the Attractor is really drawn to his or her prey, but it’s always there.”

I looked down at the sleeping girl. “I feel sorry for her.” I did, too. By all indications, Stephen had been as big an ass as his brother, but no one deserved what he, or rather now she, was going through.

“You look tired,” William said soothingly, breaking the mood. “You’d probably be more comfortable in my room.”

This time, I was ready for him. I detected the almost echoing force of his voice and was certain I would not be more comfortable in William’s room. Still I smiled sweetly at him, remembering now what an ass I had always considered him to be. “I’m on Catataxin.”

His face fell. “You are?”

“You know, William,” I went on, “you’re an ass. Here your brother lies after being changed into a girl with seemingly unquenchable urges, and all you can think about is getting me into your room. What would happen after that? Would you try to convince me that I’d be much more comfortable without my clothes on?”

He didn’t answer, but the expression on his face told me that I had hit the mark.

“So Stephen can’t control his power, but you can. I’ve never known a Whisperer yet that couldn’t control his power if he really wanted to. How many girls have you coaxed into bed with your power?”

“A damned sight fewer than Stephen!” he shot back.

“That doesn’t count,” I told him. “I thought you said he couldn’t control his power.”

“He can’t turn it on and off,” William agreed, “but he can direct it. There were plenty of girls who would have gone to bed with Stephen, but he always wanted ones who didn’t want him. He’s always been perverse like that. Ask any girl he knew. They’ll tell you that I’m right.”

“I think I need to get back to my associates now,” I said primly.

Begrudgingly, William nodded and led me out of the room.

William was silent as he escorted me back to the drawing room, for which I was very grateful. I was tired of warding off his Whispering, and his protestations of innocence were wearing thin. It did give me a few moments to think about what he had said regarding Stephen, though.

If Stephen was as William said–that is, perverse enough to only be interested in girls who were not naturally interested in him–then he was for all practical purposes a rapist. Wasn’t that, after all, essentially the definition of a rapist–someone who forces sexual attentions on an unwilling individual?

Now that I was a woman, I was much more sensitive to what constituted rape than I had been as a man. Most men define rape fairly narrowly, requiring that overt and unwilling sexual penetration be evident. As a law student, I was well aware that many judges would have essentially agreed with that narrow definition.

Women though, define rape a little more broadly, asserting that mental coercion rather than physical force could be a legitimate criteria for rape. Using that definition, what Pierre Dubois had done to me a few months earlier, forcing me to have oral sex with him, was just as much rape as the more physically overt variety. I certainly felt that I had been raped, and while I had filed charges against my assailant, many women couldn’t bring themselves to do so.

Getting back to Stephen though, any girl forced by his magical powers to have sex with him would undoubtedly consider that she had been raped once the spell had worn off, wouldn’t she? And a girl who had been raped was bound to want revenge. All we had to do was determine what girls Stephen had Attracted and look for one of them who had the means as well as the motive to change him.

I smiled to myself. I was rather proud of myself. I was thinking like a real detective now. That didn’t mean I had given up on getting my revenge on Mama Juno, but I had to admit to myself that any link she had to this case was probably circumstantial. Mama Juno would have to wait for another time though. Right now, I had a case to help solve.

“Cassie, good, you’re back,” Brian said when he spotted me. “We need your help.”

“Sure!” I chirped happily. I could hardly wait to tell him what I had deduced. I sat down on the sofa next to Helen.

“How is Stephen?” the elder Lagrange asked.

“Asleep,” William answered for me.

His father nodded.

“Cassie,” Brian began, “we’ve come to the conclusion that Stephen has... convinced a number of girls to have sex with him, using his powers.” He was choosing his words carefully so as not to set Mr. Lagrange off. With the older man’s distaste for magic and probable reluctance to admit to any wrongdoing on the part of his son, that was probably wise. “We believe one of these girl may have had the motive and the means to do this to him.”

I was a little crestfallen. Brian and Helen had come to the same conclusion. It seemed I was once more a step behind them.

“We think we may be able to lay a trap for whoever did this to Stephen,” Helen interjected.

Helen and Brian were looking intently at me. Something told me they had a part for me in their little trap. “Okay, what is it you want me to do?”

“Mr. Lagrange is having a big party here at the house Saturday evening,” Brian explained. “A number of young women Stephen knows will be in attendance with their families. It will be announced that Stephen is ill–too ill to see anyone and certainly too ill to attend the party or receive guests.”

“If one of the guests had anything to do with Stephen’s curse,” Helen went on, “he or she will probably want to see how the transformation came out. We’ll have people posted throughout the party to listen and watch for anything suspicious.”

“It’s kind of a long shot, isn’t it?” I blurted out, sorry that I said it once I noticed the pained expressions on everyone’s faces.

“Whoever did this to my son has covered his tracks well,” Mr. Lagrange sighed in resignation. As Brian started to say something, the elder Lagrange cut him off, “I’m not displeased with your work, Mr. Wallace. I doubt if anyone else would have had any better luck, given that Mama Juno doesn’t seem to be involved.”

I was surprised to hear him say that. I had a sneaky hunch he had been in touch with his old mistress, and she had somehow convinced him of her innocence in the affair before we had even showed up. I doubted if anything Brian or Helen had said would have convinced him without confirmation from Mama Juno herself.

As for Brian’s accusations regarding his mistress and possible illegitimate son, it appeared that he and Brian had come to an accommodation over that which would prevent talk of it from ever happening again.

Brian, emboldened by Mr. Lagrange’s words said, “I still think you should get professional help for Stephen.”

Mr. Lagrange cocked an eyebrow. “You mean magical help, don’t you?”

“There’s no disgrace in it,” Helen assured him. “The Morley Magical Research Center at the University of Colorado has helped many people with magical afflictions.”

“Or if you’d rather use a more private facility, the Carson Clinic in Nashville has a fine reputation,” Brian added.

Carson Clinic? Brett told me his father was a doctor in Nashville. Could it be the same Carson? I’d have to ask Brett.

“I’m not going to let some half-baked ‘wizard’ experiment on my son. He’ll get all the medical–and I emphasize ‘medical’–help he needs right here.”

Denial was a sad, sad thing to watch.

“Now,” Mr. Lagrange said gruffly, “let’s get back to Saturday’s party.”

Brian nodded and turned to me. “Cassie, we’d appreciate it if you’d be inside the party.”

“Sure,” I replied, thinking about what a pain it would be to get all dolled up as a young woman for the affair. Silly me. It only took a moment for me to realize I wasn’t going in dressed as a guest.

“The catering company will provide your uniform,” Brian went on. “It’s been arranged that you’ll be picking up empty glasses and plates. It’s the grunt job, but no one will be talking to you much or even paying attention to you and you’ll be able to listen unobserved.”

Suddenly, the idea of getting all dolled up as a woman for the party sounded like a pretty good idea. Of course, the Lagrange family wasn’t likely to have many African-American guests at one of their private parties, unless it happened to be the Mayor of New Orleans or someone of similar stature. Instead, I was supposed to be the hired help, offering a reminder of an era when black servants weren’t exactly hired.

“Thanks a lot,” I grumbled once we were back in the car. “Should I practice saying ‘yassuh, Mistah Lagrange’ as well?”

“Oh don’t take it like that,” Helen chided me. “We had to have someone inside during the party. Brian and I would be too conspicuous. The caterer hires mostly young college students.”

“Students of a certain color,” I amended.

Helen nodded. “Yes. Most if not all of them are African-American. Are you offended?”

Was I? Not exactly. It’s just that every now and then, I longed for my old life–my old male life of privilege and position. With my change of race and change of sex, I had dropped several rungs on the ladder of importance in a city where fine family history was a gateway to power and wealth. I wasn’t so much offended as I was feeling sorry for myself.

“Look, Cassie,” Brian broke into my silence, “we really appreciate all of your help.”

“I haven’t done that much,” I protested.

“Yes you have. You’ve added significant insight on this case. You’re the one I really want to have inside during the party. You’re smart, capable, and if anyone can find the perp at the party, it’s you.”

So I felt a little better as they dropped me off at my place. Although I wasn’t happy with being forced to play the maid, I was at least convinced that I would be one of if not the most important individuals covering the party.

Of course, I was still miffed with the fact that I would have to be a maid rather than one of the guests. I knew from personal experience that there were prominent families in New Orleans who would think nothing of inviting equally-prominent African-Americans to their parties. But families like the Lagranges weren’t among them. Although not as obviously prejudiced as the typical redneck mumbling about how all the black folks were taking all the good jobs and drawing too much in welfare (which had always struck me as something of a contradiction), people like William Lagrange would never be comfortable seeing anyone with dark skin as anything more than a servant or other menial worker. Hiring Brian had been necessary only because he had thought Mama Juno was involved, and in his mind, it took an African-American to catch an African-American.

I found myself wishing that someone like William Lagrange could have the experience I had been given–to be a ‘woman of color.’ It might do him good. Of course, it was difficult enough for someone like me: if someone like William Lagrange were to suddenly find himself ‘reduced’ to my sex and color, the shock would probably be fatal. I, at least, had been pretty tolerant of different racial and cultural groups. Going to Harvard had certainly broadened my perspective on those issues.

I got out of my good clothes and slipped into my pajamas–a comfortable and fairly unisex set with a short-sleeved top and short boxer bottoms. Or at least they would have been unisex if not for the white lace and pastel yellow color. Then, I heated up some soup and selected my Theory of Magic text to read the next day’s assignment. It felt good to get back to my studies, so I was quickly absorbed with the text.

Once I had finished the section and before I got into some of my legal readings for the evening, I sneaked a look at what the text had to say about Attractors. There wasn’t much, but what I did find was unsettling. It seemed being given Attractor power wasn’t so much a gift as it was a curse. The gist of it was that Attractors were almost always dangerous to themselves and others. Male Attractors invariably thought women to be nothing more than sex objects, and female Attractors were sluts at best and downright whores at worst. In other words, the text confirmed what Brian and Helen had told me about Attractors.

The text speculated that prior to the advent of magic, some sexual predators probably had latent Attractor powers. There were well-documented cases prior to measurable magical abilities of men who were inexplicably able to attract, sexually assault, and kill female victims again and again. It may have been due to a weak magical virus predating the work of Webster and Kline. Of course, such predators were usually men. Women with latent Attractor powers were usually remembered as high school sluts and the like. In any case, since the advent of strong magical powers, the text concluded that nearly all Attractors had to be eventually institutionalized, both for their own good and the good of those around them.

I tried to imagine what Stephen’s life must have been like before his transformation. By all accounts, he was a sexual predator. While he didn’t kill his victims, I suspected he used his power to coax unwilling girls–girls who under normal circumstances were not attracted to him–into his bed on a regular basis.

I tried to imagine what it must have been like for those girls. It was easier to do given that I was now a girl myself–a girl who had been forced to perform a sexual act against her will. I remembered the disgust and guilt I felt after Pierre had forced me to give him a blowjob. But Stephen wouldn’t have stopped with just blowjobs. What acts of sexual depravity had he forced young women into, and how many of them would have had ample reason to seek revenge on Stephen? The potential answer was mind-boggling.

Nothing was said in the text about Attractors whose sex had been changed. Of course, the FBM had done its best to keep any references to magical sex changes out of texts. Maybe that was the reason. Or maybe it had never happened before. After all, there were few incidents of magical sex changes, in spite of their growing numbers, and there were even fewer Attractors. Whatever the number, there seemed little doubt that Stephen’s Attractor power would increase dramatically now that she was female. It was the general rule. My own powers had certainly increased when I became a woman.

I closed the book, reluctantly selecting one of my law books for the evening’s case reading. I didn’t have any more time to speculate on Attractors, but I made a mental note to ask Professor Sanderson about them after class the next day.

I awoke the next morning with a very odd feeling in my body. Like most people, I don’t remember many of my dreams, but I did remember at least the more important parts of the one I had experienced just before waking up. The dream was strange in that I generally dreamed I was my old male self. I suppose the world could be fooled by my feminine exterior, but my subconscious remembered my male self very well. Not so in this dream, though.

Once again, I dreamed I was a woman–the woman that I had, in fact, become. I could feel my long hair–even longer in the dream, it seemed. I could see my breasts and even feel them tingle, and I could feel my vaginal area as well, dampening as a tall, handsome man entered my dreams.

It was Brett, I realized, standing before me. He was smiling and wearing only a pair of navy boxers. I could feel myself getting even damper, until...

I woke up.

Damn! I knew men could experience nocturnal emissions, but until that day, I had never realized women could have an equivalent experience. Now I had had an orgasm in my sleep twice in twenty-four hours. My boxers were, indeed, wet from where they had bunched against my crotch, and I smelled of sex. It was the image of Brett that had aroused me, I realized, and wondered if my subconscious was aware of something that had eluded me.

Oh, I liked Brett. I won’t deny that for a moment. But I didn’t think I was that intensely attracted to him. Maybe it was the aftermath of the spells I had suffered on Sunday. Yes, it had to be that.

As I got out of bed, I realized I would have to face Brett in class that afternoon. I wasn’t looking forward to it. He hadn’t called me since he had left me in Papa Bob’s care. I didn’t know if that was good or bad. Maybe he was just giving me some space, or maybe I had scared him out of his wits with my antics. Today, I’d find out.

Although I will admit men were starting to look attractive to me, I had never focused on one before. So by all rights, I shouldn’t have cared what Brett thought of me or if he ever wanted to see me again. But I did care. That didn’t mean I wanted to jump in bed with him: I was still embarrassed that I had tried to jump him while under the influence of the spells and had no desire to go to bed with Brett or any other man.

But in spite of that, I found I did want to see Brett again -and not just in the classroom. He was bright, handsome (okay, yes, I noticed), and charming. I felt safe with him as well. He was the perfect guy for me to date, given that he didn’t demand more from me than I was willing to give. Well, in just a few hours, I’d find out if my perfect guy ever wanted anything to do with me again.

I was worried he might not make it to class. It was nearly time for class to start, and Professor Sanderson was already organizing his notes and checking his PowerPoint presentation. And here I had been particularly careful getting ready for class. My hair was freshly combed, my makeup reapplied after lunch, and I was wearing a white cami and a khaki skirt that dropped demurely to just above the knee. I thought I looked pretty darned good, and I knew I never tried this hard to look good before. If Brett didn’t show up though, it would all be for naught.

I had trouble not showing how relieved I was when Brett rushed into the room, seconds before Professor Sanderson began his lecture. “How are you doing?” he asked, and I could tell from the tone of his voice that he was really concerned.

“Fine,” I whispered back to him, since I didn’t want to attract the professor’s ire by interrupting his lecture.

Brett whispered back, “I need to talk to you after class.”

My heart jumped involuntarily. I was afraid he’d never want to talk to me again. Now he wanted to talk to me after class! ‘Settle down Cassie,’ I told myself.

But I was as preoccupied in Professor Sanderson’s class as I had been in my law classes during the morning. With everything that had happened to me the last few days, I was barely prepared for any of my classes, and being preoccupied just made things worse. I spent my Theory of Magic class wondering what was happening to me. I hadn’t been particularly attracted to men since my transformation, but I found myself sneaking little glances at Brett’s strong hands and well-muscled arms. I also found myself inexplicably proud that he seemed interested in me.

Being a girl had been more bothersome than I would have expected, with the huge amount of attention I had to give with maintaining my appearance and health. From the messy things like periods and wiping after urinating to the more appearance-oriented nuisances like maintaining my hair, applying makeup, and coordinating outfits, being a girl had been a pain in my unconsciously-swivelling ass. And to make matters worse, I had to fend off half the male population of the Tulane campus, it seemed.

But for some strange reason that only my hormone-soaked body could probably understand, I was attracted to Brett. I have to stress again that my attraction wasn’t sufficient to cause me to run giggling into his bedroom and perform acts of sexual wantonness on his bed, but it was enough to make me think doing just that might not be unpleasant. For now, I would be content just talking with Brett and sharing a few non-sexual (or at least not overtly sexual) entertainments with him. Hence, I was pleased he seemed not to hold my outrageous behavior on Sunday against me.

Keep in mind that I had been raised to be an exemplary Southern gentleman. That didn’t mean that I was barred from sexual experiences, but I was expected to keep my liaisons with slutty women in private and pay for them by the hour. What I had exhibited in front of Brett Sunday evening had been sluttiness at its best, and I had been very much afraid that my behavior would have caused Brett to see me as nothing more than an enthusiastic whore. The fact that he had greeted me so casually and wanted to talk to me after class gave me hope that I hadn’t permanently damaged my relationship with him.

Of course, all of that meant that I considered Brett to be very much a gentleman. How could I think otherwise? A man who was not a gentleman would have scooped me up Sunday evening and deposited me on the nearest bed while stripping off his own clothing with reckless abandon. Instead, Brett had done the gentlemanly thing: he had taken me directly home and secured needed help for me.

As soon as the lecture ended, I told Brett, “I’ll be right out after I’ve talked with Professor Sanderson.”

“Great,” Brett agreed, joining the other students in exiting the classroom.

Professor Sanderson smiled warmly at me. I appeared to be one of his favorite students. Of course, being an attractive young woman might have been one of the reasons. “Did you have a question, Cassie?”

“Yes, Professor,” I nodded. “I wondered if you could tell me a little about Attractors?”

His face hardened. “You haven’t met one, have you?”

“Uh, no,” I lied, remembering to keep the case as confidential as possible. “But my sister ran across one in one of her investigations. I promised I ask you about them.”

“Is this Attractor institutionalized?” he asked brusquely.

“Not yet, but it’s being considered.” Or at least I hoped it was being considered. Brian and Helen had done their best to convince Mr. Lagrange that Stephen needed professional help, which would probably include institutionalization.

Professor Sanderson gazed into my eyes, concern written on his craggy face. “Cassie, I don’t think you’re telling me everything. You have come in contact with this Attractor, haven’t you?”

Reluctantly, I nodded. “I’m on Catataxin now.”

“Then the Attractor is male?”

“She used to be.”

“I see...” he said slowly.

“Professor, have you ever come across a case of a sex-changed Attractor?”

He shook his head. “No, and I never want to. I can’t imagine a more dangerous creature.”

“Dangerous?” I asked, my senses tingling. I was afraid he’d say something like that. “How?”

Professor Sanderson leaned back against the podium, as if about to go into lecture mode. “Most of us grow into our powers,” he explained. “They start when we’re very young, but they’re so weak as to be undetectable. Then, with puberty, they become stronger. We learn to manage them as we mature. Even Attractors go through this process, but they recognize very early that if discovered, they will be social pariahs, shunned by the opposite sex as likely predators.

“Even before magic became accessible again, weak Attractors were often sexual predators. Criminal law is rife with examples of men who seemed to easily gain the trust of women, who were then betrayed–raped and usually murdered.”

I nodded. That all backed up what I had heard or deduced before.

“Attractors are driven by deep and generally destructive sexual needs, but like all humans, they learn to sublimate them to some degree. However, if an Attractor’s sex were changed, I don’t believe the Attractor would be able to control her needs since she would be unfamiliar with then sensations her new sex would experience.”

That was just what I was afraid of. Unless Mr. Lagrange swallowed his pride and sought magical help for his new daughter, there would be hell to pay for his entire family. “Is there anyone you can recommend for... this person’s family to talk to about this–someone who might be able to help?”

Professor Sanderson didn’t even have to think about it. “Have her contact the Carson Clinic in Nashville. Jeremiah Carson has dealt with a significant number of sexual curses–including Attractors and sex changes, although I doubt if even he has seen a combination of the two before.”

“I’ll do that,” I assured him. “And thank you, Professor.”

I turned to go, but Professor Sanderson called after me, “Cassie, I can’t tell you how potentially volatile this situation you spoke of is. Tell the family to use extreme caution. They’re dealing with the unknown here.”

“I will,” I promised.

Brett was patiently waiting for me in the hall. The class bell had just rung, so the hall was practically empty. I was pleased, because I wanted a chance to talk to Brett in private and set things right. The only problem was that I didn’t know how to do it, so I just began with a shy “Hi.”

Brett smiled, making me feel a hundred percent better. “How are you feeling?”

“Fine,” I replied, and I added to myself that it was mostly because of his smile. “The Catataxin fixed me up.”

The smile became a grin. “No more uncontrollable impulses to jump my bones?”

I grinned back. “Not uncontrollable anyway.”

He laughed, slipping an arm around me. “Let’s go get some coffee.”

By the time we made it over to Rue, it was as if Sunday had never happened. We already had a casual dinner date planned for the evening, and this time I made Brett promise it would really be casual–just someplace we could grab a sandwich and enjoy a warm fall evening eating it at a sidewalk table.

“Okay!” he laughed. “Six okay?”

“I’ll be ready,” I replied over my coffee. “Only don’t expect me to be wearing what I wore Sunday.”

“Hmm...” he pretended to mull over, “I don’t seem to recall what you were wearing then...”

It was my turn to laugh. Then, I got serious. “Brett, is your father the Carson in the Carson Clinic?”

“Yeah,” Brett said, surprised. “How did you hear about that?”

I gave Brett the abridged version, leaving out names and a few sordid details. As a Detector, he of course, knew that I had run into both an Attractor and a Whisperer, and the question about his father’s clinic left no doubt about what I wanted to know.

“This client of your sister’s obviously needs care,” Brett began. “I don’t think dad ever ran up against a combination of an Attractor and a sex change, but I know the clinic has helped both.”

“Is it true that Attractors have to be institutionalized for life?” I asked.

Brett shook his head. “No, but the longer she goes without treatment, the more likely that will become. I would imagine dad would treat the psychological influences of the sex change first.”

I shifted uncomfortably, hoping he didn’t notice. “Such as?”

“When a man is magically changed into a woman, more than just his body is changed. According to my father, the spell does a complete job on the mind, too. A heterosexual man will become a heterosexual woman, and a homosexual man will become a lesbian. In fact, the sexual attraction is strangely compatible.”

“Compatible?”

“What I mean,” Brett explained, “is if a man who likes blonde women with big breasts is changed into a woman, she will be attracted to blonde men with big chests.”

I’m sure as far as Brett knew, all of this was new to me. Some of it was. I knew, for example, that when I was changed into a woman, my sexual orientation had gradually changed too, slowed only by my male memories which declared me to be attracted to women–white women in particular. Now, as an African-American woman, my taste in men (yes, men) leaned toward men like Brett.

“What if a heterosexual white man became a black woman?” I asked impulsively.

Brett was thoughtful. “I’m not sure it’s ever happened before.”

I smiled. At least I could claim to be unique. “But what if it happened?”

“I would suspect the new woman would find black men attractive, but that’s just a guess.”

I was tempted to tell him it was more than a guess, but I wasn’t ready to share that with him just yet. If, by some chance of fate, Brett and I became... closer, I supposed I would have to tell him the truth. Of course, it wasn’t like I had experienced a pre-magic sex change, my male organs removed and replaced or reformed into female equivalents while my DNA remained hopelessly male. No, I was a woman inside and out–I had periods, experienced a natural flow of female hormones, and could even get pregnant.

But in spite of all of that, there were still male corners in my mind. Maybe there always would be. More than once since my transformation, I had been told by someone who didn’t know of my changes that I “thought like a man.”

But it was becoming harder for me to think of being a man–or to remember what it felt like to be a man. Feminine routines of personal hygiene, periods, makeup, clothing with matching accessories, and fending off interested men had changed my thought processes in ways even magic couldn’t.

Brett interrupted my thoughts. “How did you manage to get wrapped up in this case with your sister?” he asked. “Have you helped her before?”

“A little,” I thought, thinking about my own transformation. “I don’t do much, though. I don’t really know that much about the private investigation business, except what I’ve seen in the movies. I don’t even read mystery novels.”

“Not even Sherlock Holmes?”

I shook my head and laughed. “Nope. I’ve only seen the old movies.”

“Well I love a good mystery,” Brett replied. “If you need any help, I’d be glad to pitch in just to see what a real mystery looks like.”

Brett and I parted after coffee–Brett to do a required lab session and I to go home and study before we went out for dinner. I threw myself into my law books for the next couple of hours.

Dinner that evening was, as Brett promised, far more casual than our last outing together. Of course, this time I wasn’t under the influence of an Attractor and a Whisperer, so it was much more relaxed as well. We ended up at Café Luna, a funky little place over on Nashville and Magazine where we could eat on the porch and watch the evening strollers go by. By the gourmet standards of the Crescent City, Café Luna is just another little coffee shop where the geeks can sip espresso and play around on the Internet, but the mood is relaxed, the sandwiches tasty, and the homemade soups outstanding.

We talked mostly about school, comparing the relative horrors of law school versus medical school. Strangely, each of us decided we had the easier road. Law school came naturally to me, I suppose because of my background. Likewise, Brett seemed to be sailing through medical school–an apparent product of hanging around his father’s clinic.

Talk of the clinic allowed him to segue into my sister’s case. “Cassie,” he began, “I had a chance to talk with my father about the case. As I thought, he’s never heard of an instance where an Attractor has been sex-changed. He’s very interested in the case and has asked me to look into it.”

I dropped my spoon in my bisque. “Brett, I can’t let you do that. I’ve told you too much already. My sister’s client wants this kept very confidential.”

“I understand,” he nodded. “But, Cassie, this victim is in a lot of danger. Unless she has proper medical care, it’s unlikely she’ll live very long. And her short life will not be a very pleasant one either, I’m afraid.”

“I don’t think her condition is fatal...”

“Not directly,” he admitted, “but she is an Attractor. Attractors are sexual creatures. If male, they prey on women, and if women, they seduce men. It’s in their nature. If his–her–parents weren’t probably prejudiced against magic, they should have sought counselling for their child long ago. I don’t think they have any concept of what they’re dealing with. In a few months without treatment, she’ll be pregnant or subjected to some sort of sexual curse. She might also seduce a man with a family causing untold personal tragedy. Men will mistreat her with impunity. She’s a menace to herself and others, and others are a menace to her.”

He had a good point. From what little I had seen of Stephen Lagrange in a partially male form, he had been a wilful young man, unaccustomed to controlling his malevolent power. Of course, given that his father abhorred magic–in part, I supposed because of his wife’s views, but in part to spite Mama Juno, his former lover, I believed–there was no one to demand that he control it. I also suspected he was very good at hiding the extent of his power and his abuses of it from his family. Even his brother probably thought of him as no worse than he was, but the William IV I knew was far more restrained than his brother probably was. Who could know how many young women succumbed to his power? Even at his young age, the number could be in the hundreds.

Now, as a young woman, he was transforming from incubus to succubus–an Attractor of men. But unlike the vulnerable and defenseless women her former male self had sated himself with, this new female might easily attract men with dangerous attributes–men who would be capable of taking violent action in the course of their sexual adventures.

“Look, I’ll talk to Helen and Brian,” I told him. “It’s up to them to bring it up to Mr. Lagrange. And, of course, it’s Mr.–it’s their client’s decision regarding what to do with the victim.”

“When are you seeing the victim again?”

“Not until Saturday evening. And I may not see her then,” I told him quickly about the plan to uncover the perpetrator at the party.

Brett shook his head. “Saturday is too long to wait. Every day, she’ll become more dangerous to herself and others.”

“All right,” I sighed. “I’ll see what I can do.”

I stepped off the porch onto the sidewalk and called Helen. As I suspected, Brian was with her. I didn’t know why they hadn’t just set a date and gotten married. For all practical purposes, they lived with each other now, alternating between his condo and hers. I quickly told them what Brett had said, and they agreed to contact Mr. Lagrange. Brian called me back just as Brett and I were enjoying a delicious French pastry.

“He was reluctant, but he agreed to see your boyfriend.”

“He’s not...” I began, but didn’t want to hurt Brett’s feeling by denying that he was my boyfriend. Come to think of it, I suppose he was my boyfriend in a way. Or at least I wouldn’t be too upset if he became my boyfriend. “When can Brett see him?”

“Tomorrow evening,” Brian replied. I cleared it with Brett who agreed to the time.

“I do want to see the victim,” Brett reminded me, “not just her father.”

When I passed that on to Brian, he agreed.

“Well, that’s settled,” I said, putting my cell phone back in my purse.

“What’s happening Saturday?” Brett wanted to know.

“Saturday?”

“You said there was a party. You’ll be a guest?”

I laughed. “An African-American woman at a Lagrange party? The only ones there will be serving the canapés. That’s where I’ll be.”

“Then I want to be there with you,” he insisted.

“But...”

“Look, Cassie, I may have never seen a sexually-changed Attractor, but I’ve seen Attractors. They can cause harm to those around them without even meaning to. I want to make sure you’re safe.”

“I didn’t know you cared,” I joked.

“I do,” he replied, and I could see he wasn’t joking.

A few months earlier, I would have been repulsed by the sight of a man openly declaring he had feelings for me, but that night, my heart melted. I felt all gooey inside as I looked into his big brown eyes, and my hand involuntarily reached over to grasp his. “That’s sweet.”

Now, he looked a little uncomfortable, but he did grab my hand. “Promise me you won’t get anywhere near her without me close by.”

“I promise,” I said meekly. “But wait a minute. How are you going to see her? She can Attract you.”

He smiled. “I’m the son of a doctor, remember? I’ve got Catataxin by the pound back at my place. It only takes twelve hours to reach full potency, so I’ll take some tonight after I drop you off.”

He didn’t exactly “drop me off.” He walked me to my door that night, and we spent the next few minutes in each other’s arms. It wasn’t exactly automatic. I thought a quick peck on the cheek was deserved, but I hadn’t planned anything else. But as we stood there in my doorway, just talking about inconsequential things, we seemed to be drawing closer and closer to each other. Without warning, our lips were suddenly touching.

It was the first time I had ever intentionally kissed a man. It felt odd, the roughness of his face and the tiny prick of a missed whisker on an otherwise clean-shaven face. It also felt odd to be kissed by someone bigger and stronger than me, the strength emphasized as he put his arms around me and drew me into him until I thought my breasts would be crushed. And I could feel him, hard and strong between his legs, pushing against me, wanting me...

It was all I could do to keep from asking him in, but I think we both knew where that would lead, and while I couldn’t speak for Brett, I wasn’t quite ready for that just yet. I’ll admit I was close, but not quite ready. I think he was ready, but just as when I had tried to jump him on our previous date, he seemed to sense that the time was not right.

“I’ll pick you up tomorrow evening,” he breathed when we both came up for air.

“Uh-hum,” I replied, unable to look away from his eyes.

“Well, good night.”

Before he could get away, I kissed him again.

Wednesday classes flew by, and at five-thirty, I was ready for Brett to pick me up. I was dressed again in the dark blue suit I had worn to meet Mr. Lagrange. It was the most professional outfit I owned. If this kept up, I would have to get another suit. I was sure Helen would look forward to taking me on another shopping excursion, I thought grimly. Brett was similarly dressed when he picked me up–in dark blue, that is, but his dark blue was an Armani suit that like his car told me his father’s clinic must be doing very well, indeed.

“Brian and Helen are meeting us there,” I told him once I had scooted into the car and given him a quick, impulsive peck on the cheek.

“I want to meet them before we go in,” Brett told me, “but I need to see this Stephen alone.”

I frowned, my hair fluttering in my face as the convertible picked up speed. “Are you sure that’s a good idea? She was only partially male when she Attracted me, and she’s a lot stronger now for Attracting males.” I shuddered, thinking about the glazed looks on Brian and the doctor’s faces last time I had seen her. “Will even Catataxin be enough?”

Brett just smiled. “I’m on sixty milligram tablets of Catataxin. Nothing can get through that.”

I had been given only a twenty milligram dose myself. “Are you sure that’s safe? Doesn’t Catataxin that strong do damage to the liver?”

“Only if you take it for prolonged periods. At the clinic, they monitor usage of the stuff, but I just take it in case of an emergency–like this.”

I nodded, but I hoped Brett wasn’t like others in the medical community who sometimes tended to over-treat themselves. From what I had read on the Internet since I had been given the drug, it had been magically developed, and not all the potential side effects were known since it had been rushed to the market.

“Wow!” Brett exclaimed as the Lagrange mansion came into view.

“A little bigger than your father’s place?” I probed, making it sound like a tease. I really was becoming curious as to how well-off the Carson family was.

“A lot bigger than my father’s place,” he commented, parking behind Brian’s car on the wide, circular driveway.

Brian and Helen had been waiting in the car. They stepped out when they saw us, and Brian quickly strode over to shake Brett’s hand. While that was happening, Helen shot me a wicked smile.

“What?” I asked her softly.

“He’s cute,” Helen announced, thankfully as softly as I had spoken.

“Well, yes, I guess.”

“You guess?”

I sighed. “He’s cute... But we’re just friends.”

I had seen the answering look on Helen’s face before–usually when she was very sceptical of someone’s comments.

“Well, we are,” I insisted.

Helen arched an eyebrow. “Protesting a bit much, aren’t we?”

“Thanks for coming today, Brett,” Brian said while Brett shook hands with Helen. “Hopefully, you’ll be able to convince Mr. Lagrange that he would be smart to get some real help for Stephen, instead of just hiding him in his room.”

“I’ll do what I can,” Brett replied sincerely as Howard stepped out onto the porch to show us in.

“How is Stephen today?” I asked Howard as we were ushered into the drawing room.

“Not good, I’m afraid,” he replied in a low voice. “Of course, I haven’t been able to see... her lately. While the family seems to be immune to her powers, I’m not, but the maids tell me she’s becoming quite a handful.”

“Cabin fever,” I muttered.

“I beg your pardon?” Howard said.

“It’s an expression that goes back to pioneering times,” I explained. “It referred to being cooped up in a cabin, either alone or with a few close associates, for the winter. After awhile, you start to feel like a caged animal. If it goes on long enough, it can drive you mad.”

“Just so,” Howard agreed. He then added conspiratorially in a low voice, “Although I’m afraid Mr. Stephen may have been just a little mad to begin with.”

“Howard!” Mr. Lagrange boomed from the doorway. “Have you offered our guests anything to drink?”

“We’re fine,” Brian assured him, pulling Brett over. “Mr. Lagrange, this is Brett Carson. Mr. Carson needs to make his examination as soon as possible.”

“I was under the impression that it would be ‘Doctor’ Carson,” Mr. Lagrange remarked, clearly displeased as he slowly offered his hand.

“Dr. Carson is my father,” Brett explained quickly and, I must say, smoothly, as he took the offered hand. “I’ve assisted him and his staff in a number of these evaluations. I assure you, I have my father’s full confidence in matters such as this.”

Brett hadn’t told me that before, but the confidence he exuded assured me it was true. Mr. Lagrange felt it too, nodding his head. “Very well. I’ll have Howard take you to his room.”

“I’d like to go too,” I piped up.

“Cassie...” Brett began, but I interrupted him.

“Listen, Brett, you want to be close to me at the party Saturday, right?” He nodded sheepishly, well aware of where I was going with this. “You said every day she’ll become more dangerous to herself and others. By ‘others’, doesn’t that include you? Who knows how strong her powers are now. Your Catataxin may not be enough. However, I’m immune, you know, ’cause I’m a girl.”

I surprised myself by actually sounding proud of that fact.

“Okay, but let me handle things,” Brett reluctantly agreed.

Howard walked us to within a few feet of Stephen’s room. He then removed a pocket handkerchief and mopped his balding forehead. “This is as close as I can get,” he told us, looking very uncomfortable. “Every time she sees me, she tries to latch onto me. I can start to feel her from this far away.”

“That’s okay, Howard,” I assured him. “We can take it from here.”

After we knocked, one of the maids opened the door for us. I didn’t know if Mr. Lagrange was keeping his former son under constant observation, or if the maid had just been in the room to straighten up. I suspected though, that even if there wasn’t a maid constantly watching him, they must have had orders to look in on her frequently.

When we entered, she was just standing there, looking out a window. In the dusky afternoon light, she looked oddly composed, as if she had come to grips with her transformation. I knew though, from personal experience that it would take considerably longer for her to accept what had been done to her–if she ever did.

She turned and faced us. Her blonde hair now curled gracefully over her shoulders, and I wondered why she hadn’t had it cut. Then I remembered many of the sex-change spells floating around the country caused the hair to grow to a more feminine length overnight if the victim cut it. I remembered that my own spell had included that little feature. Although I doubted if my own spell still required long hair, I tended to keep my hair longish anyway.

She wore no makeup. That was no surprise. Most transformees fought makeup from what I had learned. I know I did. The feel of it was still a little alien to me, and I still tended to go a little lighter on the stuff than most girls did. In Stephen’s case–and I suppose my own as well–it wasn’t much of an issue, as she (we) really didn’t need all that much makeup.

She wore no jewelry, and her tattersall shirt of blue and white and her blue jeans were designed to be unisex, although they couldn’t disguise the size of her breasts or the curve of her waist and hips. In her sneakers, she was no more than five four, and her hands and feet appeared to be small and dainty. I couldn’t help but picture her in something feminine and flowery. So attired, she’d drive any male to distraction even without her Attractor powers.

“Oh, it’s you again,” she snorted in a very unladylike fashion as she looked at me. Then her eyes latched onto Brett. “And who’s your friend here?”

“Brett Carson, Ms. Lagrange,” Brett said smoothly, offering his hand.

I nearly cringed when he called her by a feminine appellation. I wasn’t entirely used to being called “Ms. Davis” myself. I was sure Stephen would blow a gasket for the misstep. But to my surprise, although her eyes did seem to flare for just a moment, she smiled and grasped Brett’s offered hand.

I couldn’t help but notice the contrast between the two hands. Brett’s was not huge for a man’s hand, but it was definitely masculine and considerably larger than the dainty hand Stephen offered. I was startled to see that Stephen’s nails were manicured in a feminine fashion–not too long but most certainly feminine.

“Pleased to meet you, Brett,” she said coyly.

“And what is your name?” he asked bluntly, still holding her hand.

“That’s a good question!” she laughed. “My mother wants to call me Stephanie, but I’m not sure I want to be called that. Why don’t you just call me ‘Steve’ for now?”

Brett nodded, and I could tell what he was thinking. By refusing to accept the feminine equivalent of Stephen and insisting upon being called Steve, she was only pretending to accept her new identity. Perhaps her father had told her whom Brett represented, and she wanted to avoid being institutionalized.

At least I hoped Brett picked up on it. Maybe I had been sensitive to it because the same thing happened to me. As a former Robert, I had no desire to be called Roberta, or Bobbie. It was Helen who had come up with my name as part of a necessary disguise. Stephen had no need to disguise herself right now, so she hung onto her old name. I might have done the same in her circumstances and insisted upon being called Robert.

“Do you know why I’m here, Steve?” Brett asked casually. He was going to have a great bedside manner, I decided. He was managing to keep Steve completely calm.

“I know you’re with the Carson Clinic,” she replied, “and I know you want me to become one of your... guests.”

The way she said “guests”, there was no doubt in my mind that she understood exactly what that would entail.

“But I don’t think I need to be one of your guests, do you?” she crooned, still holding his hand and now placing her other hand over it. “I’d be very grateful if you’d just tell my father that I’m doing fine here.”

It wasn’t even a very good act, but she knew very well that her Attractor powers were intact, or possibly even enhanced. The way she was looking at Brett was enough to make a cooked noodle get hard.

I almost said something to break the spell, but then I noticed something which made me believe it wouldn’t be necessary. Brett was smiling–it wasn’t much of a smile, but it was still a smile of amusement. “Steve, I’m very heavily dosed with Catataxin.”

Stephen’s face fell, and the fire that had risen earlier for a moment in her eyes now burned with the force of an exploding sun. “You fucking bastard!” she screamed.

“Does this mean we aren’t friends anymore?” Brett quipped.

“First your incompetent girlfriend here and her friends can’t find who did this to me and now you want to take me somewhere and experiment on me!”

“We’re doing the best we can,” I interjected weakly.

“Well it’s not good enough!” she shot back.

I stood my ground. “Our investigation has shown that you used your Attractor power to lure a number of girls into having sex with you. Any one of them–or their families–could have placed the curse on you. But you don’t seem to remember any of their names. It’s a little difficult to catch someone if we don’t have some names to start with.”

“Then ask my father–or my brother,” she said. “They paid off the families whenever there was a complaint. Besides, I’ve only had sex with six or seven girls in the last three months, and all of them were by consent–in spite of what you think. I don’t remember any of the names. The relationships were very casual. It has to be one of them.”

“Not necessarily,” I replied. Her casual remark about her father and brother paying off any families affected by her indiscretions had caused her to lose sympathy points in my mind. Maybe she really deserved what had happened to her. Maybe the whole family deserved the burden Stephen had put on them with his transformation. “The sex change curse doesn’t always have to be administered by sexual activity. It’s just easier that way, and the spell can be simpler.”

“I’ve been told all that,” she sighed. I could tell she was nearly ready to burst out in tears of frustration.

It was at that moment that Brett took back control of the conversation. “Whether or not Ms. Davis and her associates can find out who did this to you or not is another issue. What concerns me right now is what happens to you now. You realize, don’t you, that there is no magic cure for this–you’re stuck as a female from now on?”

“So I’ve been told.” Her voice quavered as her lower lip trembled, and I thought I saw the glistening formation of tears in her eyes.

I realized that in spite of her earlier insistence that the curse could be reversed, she was now realizing that she would live in a female body for the rest of her life. It was an unnerving thought: I knew that from personal experience.

“We’ve come to understand,” Brett went on, “that an unfortunate side effect of your power is an unnaturally strong sex drive. As a man, promiscuous behavior was more damaging to your partners, since they risked everything from social disapproval to pregnancy and disease. You could just walk away in most instances.”

The clouded look on Stephen’s face gave me hope that Brett was getting through to her. At least she didn’t disagree with Brett’s analysis.

“As a woman though, you face all of those risks yourself. Since men are usually more sexually active with multiple partners, you have a higher risk of disease. Since your partners have been ‘casual’ as you put it, thoughtless lack of protection could lead to pregnancy. As for social disapproval, think back to your male days. A man who has sex often with multiple partners is a stud: a woman who does the same thing is a slut.”

Stephen’s expression was very pained, and her skin had become pale. “I... I can control my... urges.”

“Can you?” Brett challenged. “You didn’t handle them very well as a man–by your own admission.”

“I don’t want to be a... a slut,” she said quietly. It was the most frank statement I had heard her make.

“You don’t have to be,” Brett assured her.

“I’ll... I’ll think about what you said.”

I don’t think either Brett or I really believed that, though. She was just trying to get rid of us.

Brett pulled a brochure out of his coat pocket. “Read this, then. If you have any questions, I wrote my local number on the back–or you can call the toll-free number.”

She didn’t thank him, but she did give him a respectful nod. As we nodded ourselves and left the room, I couldn’t help but admire Brett’s style. He had managed to calm Stephen down, get her attention, and really give her something to think about–if she chose to do so. I hoped she would really read the brochure and talk her father into sending her to, if not the Carson Clinic, someplace equally qualified to get her some help.

“Do you think she’ll agree to go?” I asked Brett once we were away from Stephen’s room.

Brett shrugged. “It’s hard to say, really. She just said she’d think about it to get us out of there, but I think she’s really concerned that the spell might make her a slut.”

“Will it?”

“It can. According to my father, though, this particular combination of factors has never happened before, so we’re just guessing. Her sex drive must have remained strong though, or she wouldn’t be acting like a siren now.”

“There’s irony for you,” I giggled. Brett looked at me as if I had lost my mind, so I went on to explain, “Mama has a thing for Greek mythology–Homer in particular. That’s why my brother A.J. is really Achilles, and my sister is Helen.”

“And you’re Cassandra,” he grinned, “the woman who saw the future. And the Sirens tempted Ulysses after Troy.”

“I see you know your Greek myths, too,” I observed as we entered the drawing room.

When we got back to the drawing room, Brian and Helen were sitting on a couch, going over a document while Mr. Lagrange and his remaining son looked on.

“There are no known magical practitioners of any skill on the list,” Brian was saying.

“Of course not!” Mr. Lagrange huffed. “We don’t associate with such people.” The way he said the word “people,” it was clear he didn’t really consider magical practitioners people at all. “Oh, of course some of them have some magical powers,” he admitted, “or I would imagine they do. They certainly know better than to practice them around here, though.”

Mrs. Lagrange was sitting quietly in the corner, but it was obvious from her expression that she approved of her husband’s statement. Although she had made herself scarce during our investigation, I had formed the opinion that she was no shrinking violet. Considering the fact that Mr. Lagrange had enjoyed a relationship with Mama Juno, it was obvious that Mrs. Lagrange’s prejudice against magic determined domestic policy. She might let her husband speak for her, but I had no doubt that her opinion mattered.

“And Stephen has reviewed this list and found no one... who would have reason to do this to him?”

“That’s what I told you,” Mr. Lagrange confirmed.

“Then I have to tell you, Mr. Lagrange,” Brian said, putting the guest list down on a nearby table, “that finding anything at your party Saturday night is a long shot. If we don’t discover anything new then, I see no further reason for us to continue this investigation. We’d just be taking your money.”

For the first time since we had met him, Mr. Lagrange looked at Brian with something akin to respect. He nodded. “Very well, Mr. Wallace. That’s quite fair.” Then he turned his attention to Brett and me. “What did you learn from your meeting with Stephen, Mr. Carson?”

Brett was silent for a moment, collecting his thoughts and determining how best to break the bad news to the concerned parents. At last, he began, “Your... son is concerned at the idea of being institutionalized. I can understand Stephen’s concern, but my father’s clinic is determined to return as many of our patients as possible to normal, active lives...”

“Spare me the sales brochure,” Mr. Lagrange growled with a disdainful wave of his hand. “Should Stephen be sent to a clinic such as your father’s? Tell me yes or no.”

“Yes,” was Brett’s blunt reply.

Mrs. Lagrange gasped and began to cry softly, but Mr. Lagrange continued to look sternly at Brett. “And what can you do to cure him?”

“He can’t be cured,” Brett replied. “He will, of course, be female for the rest of his life. No magical spell can change that. What the clinic will do is teach him how to live with his... changes. He must learn how to control his Attractor powers...”

“My son has no magical powers!” Mrs. Lagrange broke in, rising to her feet and standing in front of her husband. “How dare you insinuate such nonsense?”

“Mrs. Lagrange,” Brett began, stepping back on the defense, “I...”

“My dear,” Mr. Lagrange said, gently placing his hands on his wife’s shoulders to calm her down, “you know he does have a power, even though he has promised us he would never use it.”

I wondered if he actually believed his son didn’t use his Attractor powers, or if he was just saying it to placate his wife. I suspected the latter was the case, especially given the families he had paid off. Surely he didn’t think his son was such a heartthrob that he could entice so many women without magical help. But his wife’s distaste for magic bordered on hysteria. I wondered if she even knew her older son had a Whispering power–a power which was much easier to hide.

Mrs. Lagrange was not to be thwarted, though. “Stephen can handle his curse.”

I wasn’t sure if she meant the curse of the sex change or the curse of having an Attractor’s powers.

“I don’t want to hear anything more of sending him away,” she said finally, storming out of the room.

“I apologize for my wife,” Mr. Lagrange sighed once she was out of hearing range. “As you can see, her mind is made up. We will just have to depend upon Dr. Camden, our family physician.”

“Forgive me for saying this,” Brett warned, “but general practitioners just aren’t equipped to handle magical problems like this. From what I was told, he was carelessly affected by Stephen’s Attractor power a few days ago.”

“An accident which is not likely to reoccur,” Mr. Lagrange countered. “I’m sorry, Mr. Carson, but we’ll just have to deal with Stephen’s problem ourselves. Thank you all for coming.”

As if by magic, Howard was at the drawing room door, ready to show us out. I could tell by the expression on his face that he disapproved of the decision. To be completely fair, I think Mr. Lagrange could have been convinced of the necessity of sending Stephen to the Carson Clinic, but he was obviously under his wife’s thumb when it came to that–even to the point of refusing to acknowledge his son’s new sex, still referring to the troubled girl as “he.”

“Thanks for coming, Brett,” Brian said once we were left alone by our cars.

“I’m afraid I didn’t accomplish anything,” he sighed.

“You planted some seeds,” Helen assured him. “Eventually he’ll have to see it your way and seek professional help for her.”

“I hope so,” Brett replied, “because Stephen is bound to get herself in trouble before this is done. Her mother’s denial isn’t helping matters.”

“Okay,” Brian began, changing the subject, “we have one last crack at solving this. After the party, if we don’t have any solid leads, we’ll be off the case.”

“That’s Mr. Lagrange’s desire,” Helen added.

“And mine,” Brian added.

“So you get nothing for all your efforts?” I asked.

Brian shook his head, smiling. “No, Cassie. He’s a fair man. He’s agreed to pay us for what we’ve already done. Actually, as I said, I agree with the decision. We’re getting nowhere on this case. Helen and I have interviewed the household staff and checked Stephen’s hangouts, but we’ve come up empty. Stephen was an overbearing young man who was disliked by a lot of people. A great number of them seem to have a strong enough motive to do this to him. But there’s no smoking gun.”

“But aren’t these sex change spells pretty common?” Brett asked.

“Sure,” Brian agreed, “but they’re still expensive. They cost about fifteen thousand on the underground market.”

“Cheap if your daughter was one of his victims,” I pointed out.

“True,” Brian admitted, “but virginity spells are less than ten thousand and a selective memory wipe to remove the memories of Stephen’s actions are only a couple grand. And the victim is restored completely. Which is better–revenge or restoration?”

“I see your point,” I conceded.

“Well, until Saturday,” Brian said at last.

“I’ll be here, too,” Brett suddenly offered.

Brian and Helen looked at Brett and then back to me. I was a little uncomfortable as they quickly realized the reason Brett wanted to come along. I suppose I was a little embarrassed, but I was also a little proud. It was sort of nice to have someone who wanted to keep me safe. I even felt myself getting a little damp just thinking about Brett’s gentlemanly motives. I had a sudden hunch that Brett and I were going to get a lot closer much sooner than I would have ever imagined a few days earlier.

“Your sister’s very nice,” Brett told me as we drove away from the Lagrange mansion. Brett had offered to take me home and I had gladly accepted. Then he added, “Brian seems nice, too. I assume they’re together?”

“Oh yes,” I laughed, feeling the evening breeze cool my face as we rode with the top down. “How could you tell? They usually try to act all professional in front of clients.”

Brett smiled. “I’ve been helping my father since high school. He taught me a long time ago that if you want to know what’s going through a person’s mind, watch their eyes–windows to the soul and all that.”

“Sounds like you’d make a good detective,” I commented.

“Actually, that’s sort of what a doctor does. Patients often don’t have a clue what’s wrong with them. You have to learn to ask the right questions, sure, but you also have to watch the patient–see how he moves and how he acts–to determine what the problem is.”

“And what do you think of Stephen’s situation?” I asked.

“Pretty much what I said back there. She needs help.”

“But does she know that?”

Brett thought for a moment. “Good question. Yes, I think she knows. Or at least I think she realizes the combination of sex change and an Attractor’s power is going to be hard to handle without help. It’s a cinch her mother isn’t going to be any help: she’s in denial–and her husband won’t cross her. Funny, isn’t it? William Lagrange impresses me as a strong man who wouldn’t hesitate to make a decision, but the prejudices his wife has against magic will probably keep him from doing the right thing and sending Stephen to a clinic where she can get help.”

I just grunted. I had come to the same conclusion.

“You want to get dinner?” he asked.

“You’ve been spending too much on my meals,” I told him. Then on a whim, I asked, “Why don’t we go back to my place? I can whip up a salad and we can save you money and me calories.”

“I’d like that.”

Holy shit! I suddenly thought. I’ve just asked a man back to my place. And unlike our first disastrous night out together, this time I had asked him without the influences of either an Attractor or a Whisperer. What was I thinking, anyway?

At least my place was neat. Even as a man, I hadn’t been a slob. I liked things neat and got all itchy when things were in disarray. I suppose that’s how I had always lived my life as well–neat and orderly. Maybe that’s why I had had so much trouble adapting to my new life. It wasn’t... neat. I had had to reconcile a change of sex, race, and even age, since in spite of what my ID said, my biological age was probably eighteen or so. That meant I had the hormones of a teenage girl, with all of the turmoil that entailed.

Turmoil was exactly what I was feeling as I ushered Brett into my condo. While my mind saw him as a friend, my body saw him as a hot guy. I still had the memories of putting the moves on him Sunday night, and although I was intellectually embarrassed at what had happened, a small part of my mind and a substantial part of my body wondered what might have happened if Brett hadn’t said no.

“Can I give you a hand in the kitchen?” Brett asked.

I remembered offering girls some help in the kitchen back in my male days. The girls always appreciated the help, and I think the cooperative effort assured the girls that I wasn’t a dominating male. Often they’d refuse, telling me to just get comfortable while they made dinner. I’d then insist that I be given the opportunity to help, which was always accepted. I saw no reason to go through that dance though, so I just smiled and said, “Sure, you can help me chop up some veggies for the salad.”

It was fun to work together on the salad, and I realized what a talented chef Brett probably was. He cut and diced with the moves of a Japanese sushi master, and while I got out a bowl big enough to toss the salad, he searched the refrigerator for ingredients to make a dressing.

“The way you handle a knife, maybe you should be a surgeon?” I suggested, grinning.

Brett shook his head. “Not me. It’s too messy being a surgeon. Besides, with all the advances in medical science combined with magic, surgery may soon be a thing of the past. I’ll just stick to using a knife to cut up veggies.”

“I’ve got some bottled dressing in the refrigerator,” I told him. “You don’t have to go to all the trouble of making dressing.”

Brett comically turned up his nose. “And you call yourself a resident of New Orleans? Have you no shame, woman? A salad this fine deserves a dressing to match.”

I just laughed at him and pulled a bottle of decent chardonnay from my wine chiller. By the time I had it open (with a little help from my Pusher power since the cork was really tight), Brett had a simple vinaigrette whipped up in a small bowl and was proceeding to pour it into the salad as he tossed it gingerly.

“It’s a shame we don’t have a good bread to go with it,” he sighed.

I gave him a grin as I pulled something from the breadbox. “How about a loaf of fresh bread from La Spiga?”

He grinned back. “I take it back. You are a New Orleans resident after all.”

Most of my meals at home had been solitary, with only Helen and A.J. occasionally joining me. Like most law students, I ate quickly and not always well, followed by a long session with my law books. Having a simple but intimate dinner with a friend–and a male friend at that–was a new experience for me. I was a little nervous since our meals before had been in public, but a glass or two of wine took the edge off.

I had begun to realize I really enjoyed Brett’s company, and the thought even crossed my mind that there was a chance–a slim chance mind you, but still a chance–that I might someday be gazing at Brett across my table on a much more permanent basis.

I had known for some time that eventually, I would have to settle down and get serious about a relationship with a man. As a man, I had been entirely heterosexual, the thought of becoming romantically attracted to a man being too far-fetched even to consider. Even now, I could appreciate an attractive woman, but it was from a far more detached perspective than before: I could admire them, but they simply didn’t turn me on.

Sexual attraction is something the brain and body, swimming in the appropriate hormones, impresses upon our consciousness. Finding my consciousness now ensconced in a female form had meant that men, over time, had become very attractive to me. The only thing stopping me in the past from acting upon that attraction had been my previous male experiences telling me how wrong it would be.

Now don’t misunderstand: I wasn’t ready to drag Brett off to the bedroom and try out all the female equipment I now possessed, but I was at least able to fantasize about it without thinking of it as being perverted. Come to think of it though, what was wrong with wanting to drag him off to the bedroom? I felt strangely stimulated at the thought.

“You look pensive,” Brett commented as he finished his salad and buttered another slice of the wonderful bread.

“I was just thinking about...” I started before realizing I couldn’t tell him exactly what I had been thinking. However, there was a way to discuss it without involving my own situation. “I was just thinking about Stephen. The first time I saw him, he was fixated on me, but today, she seemed to be concentrating on you.”

Brett chuckled. “Jealous?”

I flushed. “Of course not. I was just wondering about sexual attraction. I thought when a man is changed into a woman, his–her–attraction for men would develop more slowly.”

“I noticed that too,” Brett replied. “You’re right. At my father’s clinic, most of the patients slowly develop an attraction for men. Many times, they’re able to deal with it only after intensive counselling. Some adapt more quickly than others, and some never adapt at all, becoming lesbians. I’ll talk to my father about it, but I’ve never heard of a situation where the change in sexual orientation happens so quickly. It may have something to do with the Attractor power.”

“How so?” I asked, forgetting my own situation and focusing on Stephen’s problems.

“Well,” Brett explained, “Attractors usually have a very strong sense of attraction to a certain type of man or woman. Attractors can even be gay, by the way. In short, if an Attractor male prefers girls who are athletic, blonde, and have blue eyes, the theory suggests that after a sex change, she will prefer blonde, blue-eyed men. The power dictates that the reorientation will occur almost immediately.

“Of course, this is the first known case of an Attractor sex change, so other theories abound. One of the most common theories is that an Attractor who experiences a sex change will lose all interest in sex, since the object of their attraction is no longer practical. In fact, that’s the most common theory.”

“The way she was looking at you, I think we can throw that theory out the window,” I said wryly.

Brett shook his head. “Not necessarily. Stephen might have just been using newfound feminine wiles to influence my behavior–to avoid being institutionalized. The only uses of her power against men so far have been to avoid unwanted consequences, such as when she used her Attractor power on her doctor.”

I mulled that over. It was possible, I supposed, that Stephen was faking sexual attraction to Brett, but I doubted it. She had looked at him hungrily, and while it was true that she was trying to use him, I was sure she was interested in him as well.

I know that sounds all clinical, and if I’m to be completely honest, the thought of Stephen getting her mitts onto Brett made me... well, jealous.

I hadn’t intended to get interested in any man for a long, long time. First, there was law school to complete, and then the struggle to get established as a female attorney–and an African-American one at that–so I really didn’t have time to get serious about any man. But the more I was around Brett, the more I wanted to be around him. While I wasn’t ready to set up housekeeping with him, I did enjoy his company.

I looked up from my plate to sneak an appreciative glance at my dinner partner, only to catch him doing the same thing to me. We both were a little embarrassed, I think. I know I was. Brett broke the ice first. “This is a terrific salad.”

I grinned nervously. “It ought to be to your liking. You made most of it.”

That flustered him. He had been searching for a compliment and forgotten his extensive part in making the meal. It made him, I realized suddenly, look as if he were bragging rather than complimenting. It was really sort of funny, but I didn’t want him too flustered. I just giggled and reached over the table to pat his hand, to let him know it was all right.

And our hands touched...

And he looked up at me, grinning sheepishly as he rose slowly from the table, now holding my hand.

I rose, too. I hadn’t expected to, but I did. Then suddenly I was holding both of his hands and we were still drawing closer...

And closer...

We had kissed before, when had dropped me off, but it had been a pale shadow of this kiss. I tasted the wine on his tongue as it reached into my open mouth. My breasts tingled as they pressed against him, and against my abdomen, I could feel something hard pushing outward, making me suddenly very damp.

I could stop what was about to happen. All I had to do was push him away and he would let me go. He had proven himself to be a gentleman, and gentlemen didn’t force their attentions on women. I should do just that, I told myself. I should push him away. After all, I wasn’t really a girl–not in my mind at least. I hadn’t been a girl long enough to think like a girl, had I? Then why wasn’t I pushing him away?

My hands had released his and instinctively wrapped around his body. His body felt nice. Then I pulled my hands away, ready to push him back, but instead, I found myself unbuttoning his shirt. His own hands were at the buttons of my blouse, and within moments, I could feel his wiry chest hair against my exposed skin. I could also feel his hands moving up from the small of my back toward my bra clasps.

“We could stop this now,” he reminded me, speaking low into my ear.

I was thinking back to my episode with him on our first date, and how I had practically raped him. This wasn’t like that though. This was soothing and paced more slowly. I was passive now, but I still had the power to stop him–if I wanted to. I realized at that moment that I didn’t want him to. My answer to his words of caution was to press my lips against his.

We didn’t exactly run to the bedroom, but by the time my skirt and his pants had dropped to the floor, we were there. I had a last minute epiphany, realizing that in a few minutes, it wouldn’t matter that I hadn’t fully resolved thinking of myself as an attractive young woman, for I would have, by my actions, embraced my new sex willingly. If there were to be any regrets, they would have to wait.

Brett had brought protection. I was glad since I was already so far into arousal that I had forgotten about it completely. I even helped him put it on, since his own hands were trembling as he tried. To be honest, mine were too, but I wanted to touch him there before he entered me. I wanted to assure myself that I could really do this willingly for a man. For just a split second, I thought back to the time Pierre had forced me to give him a blowjob, and how horrible the idea of touching another man’s penis had been. This wasn’t terrible at all I thought, reclining onto the bed as Brett loomed over me. This was...

...wonderful.

As we lay there together in the afterglow of some very good sex, two thoughts ran through my head. The first was: ‘What in God’s name have I done?’ After months of resisting the attraction to men that my new femininity had thrust upon me, I had succumbed enthusiastically into sex with a man I had known for only a few days. It was bizarre. What had I been thinking?

The other thought that rushed through my head was far more wanton: ‘Why have I waited so long to do this?’ I had thought since my transformation that I had lost something very valuable when I lost the ability to penetrate a woman and enjoy that supreme moment of male climax. And while it was true that I had indeed, lost something of value, I had gained something even more precious, for sex as a woman was far more enjoyable. The feeling of being penetrated was momentarily troublesome as my hymen was torn, but to be honest, I scarcely noticed it. Instead, I had revelled in the feeling of being filled, and by the time I felt Brett’s penis erupting inside me, I was so far gone in a mind-blowing climax that I could only whimper and hold him tighter.

Now, as we lay together, snuggling in that half-dream state lovers cherish, I realized I had absolutely no regrets–other than the regret that I had waited so long to try this. But trying it with anyone less satisfying than Brett would have been unfortunate. Brett had shown me just what I had been missing.

It made sense I realized, that I should be attracted to Brett. He was after all, the exact complement to the women I had been attracted to as a man. I liked women who were bright, self-assured, and cultured. Brett was all of those things as well. And while I had been strongly heterosexual and preferred white women when I had been a white male, as an African-American woman, I remained heterosexual, preferring men of my own race like Brett.

“You okay, baby?” Brett murmured.

“Never better,” I whispered back. I meant it, too.

“I’m sorry,” he apologized. “I didn’t realize you were a...”

“Virgin?” I said softly. I hadn’t given it much thought. I knew I was a virgin–Helen had examined me and found my hymen in place months ago. While I knew using Tampax can sometimes rupture the hymen, in my case, it had remained intact. Brett had broken through it moments before, causing me to give a small cry of pain, but after that brief sting, he had felt fantastic inside my body.

“Yeah... a virgin.”

“It’s okay,” I assured him. “I wanted you to do it.”

“You should have told me.”

I laughed softly. I had been in his position before, but there was no way he could know that. Had I been so concerned about my partner then? I was chagrined to realize I had not been. Brett was more sensitive than I had been as a man, and I found I appreciated him for it. “It’s just a symbol,” I told him. “I can’t think of anyone I’ve ever known who I would rather have given it to.”

Brett hugged me tighter, and I felt something hard against my thigh. “I should probably go,” he offered.

I reached down and gently caressed his growing erection. “Must you?”

He rolled me over on my back, reaching over me to get another rubber from the nightstand. “Well, maybe I can stay for a little while longer...”

Brett didn’t stay the night. We both had classes the next day we needed to prepare for. I know that doesn’t sound very romantic. In a perfect–or at least a perfectly romantic–world, we would have spent the night in each other’s arms. Then, we would awaken to a new day and make love until late in the morning, after which I would make breakfast for him while he showered and shaved. Would that it were so, but he was a medical student and I was a law student, and neither of us could afford to go traipsing off into a romantic interlude at the cost of our chosen professional lives.

Besides, neither of us had planned on making love that evening anyway. Maybe Brett had high hopes, since he had remembered to bring along protection, but I remembered from my own male days that it was a good idea for a man to carry a package around just in case. More than once as a man, I had ended up in bed with a woman unexpectedly. Things sometimes just happened that way, even when it wasn’t planned.

Although neither of us had exactly planned it, I think it’s fair to say both of us had wanted it. Yes, I admitted to myself, I had most certainly wanted it. And to think, I realized as I opened one of my law books, a few short months ago, right after my transformation, I would never have dreamed I could be sexually attracted enough to bed a man just a few days after meeting him.

Of course I hadn’t bedded just a man: I had bedded Brett. I think I could have said no to every other man on the Tulane campus–black, white, or other–but I couldn’t say no to Brett. I had never been so attracted to anyone in my life–not even my near-fiancée in my previously male life.

It was funny, but I hadn’t thought of Alexandra Pierpont, the woman I had nearly been betrothed to, in some time. Alex and I had planned to announce our engagement, and then my transformation had occurred, ruining any chance of that union. At first after I had changed, I felt robbed of an imagined ideal life with Alex, but over the summer, I had come to realize I had never really loved her. Our families had expected us to wed, and we had succumbed to family pressure. Sure, we had made love, but we hadn’t really been in love. Come to think of it, I had never really been in love with a woman in my life.

So now I was a woman. Was I just attracted to Brett–or did I love him? Would we go to bed with each other as Alex and I had done, only to discover later that it was merely infatuation instead of love? To be completely honest, I wasn’t sure. Besides, I still had a lot of law school to go through, and Brett had a lot of medical school to complete. It was probably far too early for either of us to sanctify this evening’s tryst as anything more than an impulsive fling–or so I tried to tell myself.

But a true romance with Brett certainly had some interesting possibilities...

Brett and I didn’t see much of each other for the next couple of days, limiting our contacts to class and a few phone calls. To be honest, between the Lagrange case and our rapidly-developing romantic relationship, both of us had neglected our studies, and it was starting to show in our class work.

Brett had done poorly on an Anatomy quiz–or so he said. I later learned that he considered anything less than being in the top ten percent of any class ‘poor.’ Still, it was enough to scare him into hitting the books with a vengeance.

I had a similar experience, getting a rather nasty admonishment from my Torts professor for not being entirely prepared for class. Since like Brett, I was used to being near the top in my classes, I was forced to bear down on some extensive case readings to get back in stride.

It was a tough couple of days for both of us. I could tell from Brett’s calls that he wanted more than anything else to have an encore of our last evening together. I had been a guy long enough to know what he was going through–it probably consisted of a few cold showers and an occasional date with his hand just to relieve the pressure.

As I said though, it was rough for both of us. While I no longer had to worry about unwanted stiffies, I found to my chagrin that a woman’s need for sexual gratification was no less demanding–just different. Every little thing that rubbed against my slit or my breasts seemed to stimulate me–showers, twisted panties, the material of my bra, everything! Even my dreams were filled with sex, visions of Brett and a few hunky African-American TV and movie stars populating them. I would wake up wet enough that I would have to change my panties.

I have to admit that I resorted to a little self-stimulation in the shower too. While I had experimented with masturbation a few times before, I had been driven mostly by curiosity. Now though, I was driven by need. My night with Brett had shown me how wonderful sex as a woman could be, and now I longed to repeat the experience. Unfortunately, my hands were no adequate replacement for Brett’s equipment.

I remembered something Helen had once told me shortly after my transformation. She had informed me that most women feel an increasing need for sex as their period approaches. Mine was due in about a week. If that was what was causing me to be so damned horny, I had a few miserable days to look forward to–unless Brett and I did it again.

All in all, my first sexual experience with a man had done more than just make me want another go-around with Brett. It had made me truly feel like a woman for the first time. Before, I had felt just a little like a man pretending to be a woman. Oh sure, I knew I was completely female: I could hardly deny that. But inside, in my heart and mind, I was still a man pretending to be a woman. That was no longer true. Now, I really felt like a woman and was starting to think of myself as one.

The best example of this was the sensations I felt when I walked across campus. Before, when I unwillingly caught some man’s eye, I almost wanted to run and hide in embarrassment. Now, I actually grinned to myself and gave my admirers a little extra swing of the hips to accentuate my ass and legs. I even indulged in harmless little fantasies about what it might be like to be on the arm of one of them–or in the bedroom with them.

Before, I had dressed femininely to blend in. I didn’t want to be seen as a nonconformist, subjecting myself to negative notice. Now though, I found myself taking even more care in my mode of dress to appear as attractive as possible. I wanted to be noticed now, but in a good way. I wanted to be seen as a normal, healthy, happy woman–which was exactly what I was.

In the past, I had entertained fantasies of some advancement in magical science which would allow me to change back into the white man I had been. As a white man of good family, I had been given respect I no longer enjoyed as an African-American woman, and on numerous occasions, I had been forced to reflect upon what I had lost. Now, though, I realized that there were things that I had gained which would somewhat balance out what I no longer possessed. Before finding Brett, I would have jumped at the chance to become a white male once again. Now, I wasn’t quite so sure. It was confusing, but it felt good.

On Saturday, Brian had all of us involved in the surveillance of the Lagrange party show up at the mansion early. A couple of his employees set up tiny spy cameras in the hallway outside Stephanie’s room. No, her family hadn’t started calling Stephen that, but one of our team said it and the name sort of stuck. Helen and Brian set up a command post in the carriage house. As for Brett and me, since we were to be on the floor as employees of the caterer, we were inside the house where we were issued our uniforms and given instruction on our duties for the party.

Brett, it turned out, had done a little bartending back in his senior year of college, so he was stationed as an assistant to one of the more experienced bartenders near the door so he could see anyone who might be heading upstairs to catch a glimpse of the transformed Stephen. As for me, I would be bussing the main rooms, collecting used glasses and dirty plates and hustling them back to the kitchen.

We all knew this was a long shot. Whoever had engineered Stephen’s transformation would probably be too smart to sneak into her room just to gloat. That stuff about criminals returning to the scene of the crime (or at least to where the victim was) was just so much bunk according to Brian. The sentences for things like causing an unwanted transformation were long–starting at fifteen years and escalating to thirty years. No one was going to risk such a sentence just to get in a little gloating.

In spite of that, Helen had pointed out that criminals were not, as a general rule, the smartest breed of humans. While common sense dictated that whoever had changed Stephen remain as far away as possible, human emotions sometimes caused people to do things that didn’t make sense. Dropping in on Stephen to gloat over his seemingly well-deserved transformation might be worth a stiff prison sentence to the perpetrator.

Stephanie actually left her rooms to watch the preparations for the party. She was even dressed in feminine fashion, including a rather short green skirt and white tank top. I noticed she was even wearing a little makeup and a silver necklace that dropped down low enough to draw attention to her large breasts. She seemed to have her Attractor power under control now, or at least no men were staring at her with glazed eyes. Instead, the men in the room were watching her with typical male appreciation, and she seemed to be revelling in their attention. She was even flirting with a couple of the caterers but avoided Brett, saving a scowl for him from across the room.

She did however, decide to grace me with her presence. “My, don’t you look nice today,” she remarked snidely.

I was dressed in my uniform–a maid’s outfit really, consisting of a black dress and a white apron as well as a pair of practical black shoes and stockings smoky enough to darken my already dark legs. “I thought it might blend in better than a business suit,” I replied blandly.

“Oh, it does!” she laughed. “Although if I were still male, I think I’d prefer you in a French maid’s uniform–without panties of course.”

I hoped my blush didn’t show. Yes, I was sure if she had been her old self that was exactly how he would like to see me. And my original introduction to Stephanie when she was still mostly male had provided unpleasant evidence of how the old Stephen had treated African-American women. “You’re a real shit, Stephanie,” I growled, intentionally emphasizing the name we had all dubbed her with.

Her blue eyes narrowed. “I’ll be glad when we’re finally rid of all of you.”

“Why?” I asked, genuinely curious. “It would seem to me that you would want us to find out who did this to you.”

To my surprise, she laughed. “Haven’t you figured it out yet? I’ve been fucking girls since I was fourteen. As you know, I really was irresistible. There must be hundreds of girls and their families who would have loved to do this to me. But the joke’s on them. An irresistible man can have all the sex he wants, but an irresistible woman can have it all–sex, power, money.”

“But you’ll probably have to spread your legs to do it.”

“You talk as if you were the one whose sex was changed,” she shot back. “Yeah, I was upset about that at first, but not now. Maybe it’s my power, but as far as I’m concerned, sex is sex, no matter if you’re on the top or the bottom. And I figure since I’ve got it, I’m going to flaunt it.” She gave me a fake smile and sashayed off, purposefully brushing a little too close to a young African-American waiter who was struggling with the bowtie of his tuxedo. I thought the poor guy was going to come in his pants.

Brett was watching her go too, as he came up to me. “She seems to be handling her transformation pretty well,” he commented with a hint of understatement.

“I’m not so sure,” I replied, telling him what had just transpired between us.

Brett nodded. “Yeah. I see what you mean. Do you think her attitude is part of the spell?”

“Maybe,” I allowed, “but I don’t think so. According to Helen, female Attractors don’t have a lot of control.”

“That’s true,” Brett confirmed. “I guess the problem is we’ve never had a former male Attractor at the clinic, so I assumed Stephen’s male control had migrated with her sex change.”

“I don’t think she is controlling the power,” I said. “I think the power is controlling her. She seems to be accepting her new sex more to accommodate her Attractor power than out of any rational thought.”

“If you’re right, she’s potentially the most dangerous person in the house.”

I couldn’t disagree with that statement.

While Brett was stocking the bar, I tried to keep an eye on Stephanie, but it wasn’t easy to do. The caterers had been told to treat us like the rest of their employees, and that’s just what they did. They kept me busy setting up the rooms for the party. In short, I lost track of her a few times. In my own defense, I suppose I should point out that my job wasn’t to nursemaid Stephanie, but rather to learn my job well enough to blend in at the party where we would be on the lookout for whoever had done this to her. I don’t think anyone really realized how closely we should have been watching her. After all, she was the victim in all of this.

By the time the party started at seven, Stephanie had returned to her rooms, and I was sent back to the kitchen to help there until the guests arrived. In typical New Orleans fashion, the first guests didn’t arrive until nearly seven thirty.

I was a little shocked when I realized that the first guests were old friends of my parents. I suppose I should have realized that my parents and the Lagrange family moved in similar enough social circles that there would be mutual friends. It slowly dawned on me that my own parents might be among the guests. My worst fears were confirmed half an hour later when my estranged parents entered the front hall, accompanied by my two younger brothers.

A little angry that I hadn’t been warned, I hissed at Helen in the hidden microphone buried inside the top of my dress, “You saw the guest list. Why didn’t you tell me my family was going to be here?”

Helen’s voice came back in my ear, “I thought I was your family now.” When I said nothing, she continued, “To be honest, I didn’t really notice them. When Brian and I went over the guest list, we were looking for people who might have sufficient magical powers to transform Stephen. I guess it just didn’t register when we reached the Devereauxs, since none of your family seems to have much power except you. Can you handle it?”

“I think so,” I sighed. ‘I hope so,’ I thought to myself.

Helen was right about who my family now was. My parents certainly wanted nothing to do with an African-American girl who claimed to be the rightful heir to the Devereaux name and fortune. And frankly, my brothers were happy I was gone, since they had moved up a notch in the family pecking order. Helen, her mother and brother, had indeed become my family. I would just have to steel myself to treat my former family as the strangers they wanted to be. I only hoped they didn’t blow my cover.

I needn’t have worried. My mother (or should I say former mother?) paid no more attention to me than she would have one of her own maids. I might as well have been invisible. She certainly didn’t pay enough attention to me to recognize me. As for my former father and his predilection for young girls of color, he did give me an admiring glance, but with my hair up and far less makeup than I had worn the last time I saw him, he didn’t seem to recognize me. Maybe to him, we all look the same.

As for my two former brothers, Paul, the elder of the two, barely noticed me at all, but then again, he had always preferred white girls with blonde hair–the only trait we had seemed to share as brothers. Also, neither of my brothers had seen me since my transformation had been completed. Lance, my younger former sibling, did take a long, lecherous look at me, leading me to believe he was developing the same sexual tastes as our father.

Both of them were quickly drawn into the growing crowd by two young girls who seemed to know them and have an interest in them. Given their body language, I would say the two young men were not equally smitten, but they allowed themselves to be wooed, probably forgetting all about me in that instant. I breathed a sigh of relief loud enough to be picked up on the mike.

“Are you okay, Cassie?” Helen asked with concern.

“Yeah,” I whispered back. “They didn’t recognize me.”

By nine, the party was in full swing. I was quickly developing a new appreciation for the men and women who worked for the caterers. They were hustling, and I was hustling right along with them. As a man, I had been a guest at countless parties just like this one, and I had never noticed or appreciated the hard work of the serving staff. It seemed no matter how hard we tried to keep food and drink fully stocked, or how efficiently we swooped down on the dirty plates and glasses, we were always just a little bit behind where we needed to be. And of course, it didn’t exactly help our work flow when a careless guest spilled a glass or a plate on the carpet, causing someone from the staff to rush into the kitchen and get something to clean up the mess with.

“Anything going on?” Helen’s voice asked in my ear.

“Everything is going on,” I grumbled, “but nobody has headed for her room yet.”

“Has anybody said anything about Stephen’s absence?”

“I overheard a couple of people talking about it,” I told her. “Nothing suspicious, though–just idle curiosity.” The official story was that Stephen was up north touring college campuses in preparation for the fall term. Yes, he had been ill, the official story went, but he was being tutored at home and would graduate with his class.

I managed to swing by Brett’s bar during a momentary lull. “Anything suspicious happening?” I asked him.

He shook his head. “Not a thing. The other bartender said somebody delivered some food for her about half an hour ago, but that was it.”

“Okay,” I said. I would have liked to have stayed and chatted with Brett, but one of the guests was ambling over for another drink, and I noticed three empty glasses resting on a lamp table and to keep in character rushed over to retrieve them.

When I got back to the kitchen with a full tray of empties, the glasses were quickly taken from me and whisked into the dishwasher. I noticed the man loading the dishwasher was one of the owners of the catering firm. “Is it always so chaotic?” I asked him as I wiped off my empty tray.

“This is pretty normal,” he responded. Then over his shoulder, he yelled, “Has anyone seen that worthless Cullen?”

“I think he took something up to one of the bedrooms,” one of the waiters yelled back.

“I didn’t contract for room service,” the caterer growled. “When was this?”

“About twenty minutes ago,” came the reply.

Uh-oh, I thought, realizing just where this Cullen must have gone. Brett would have known to raise the alarm if he had seen any male delivering food, but he had the information second hand. It was the other bartender who told him someone had delivered food to one of the upstairs rooms. Hadn’t anyone warned the caterer to avoid sending a man into her room? Yes, I distinctly remembered Brian telling the catering staff, but it had apparently not registered with the bartender. Unless this Cullen had just sneaked out of the house for a smoke, he might very well have spent the last twenty minutes in the presence of a dangerous Attractor. I had to check this out.

“Hey, don’t forget your tray!” the caterer called to me, but I was already flying out of the kitchen.

“Helen, we may have a problem,” I called into the mike as I rushed toward Stephanie’s room. I quickly explained what had happened.

“Yeah,” Helen replied, “the camera covering her door didn’t pick him up.”

“No wonder,” I told her as I approached Stephanie’s room. I peered carefully at the tiny camera attached to a picture frame down the hall. “The camera has been shifted to cover the next door down the hall instead of hers.”

“Damn!”

Stephanie must have moved the camera while she was wandering around watching us set up. The little slut had something planned all along. This Cullen must have been the guy I had seen her talking to earlier. Damn! I should have realized something wasn’t right.

I didn’t wait for Brian or Helen to come into the house. I threw the door open and found the suite of rooms dark, but from the bedroom, I heard what I first thought to be a struggle. Without thinking, I shot into the bedroom with Brett right behind me and saw...

In the darkness, lit only by pale moonlight, I could see Stephanie’s newly-feminized legs, slender and supple legs wrapped around a broad black back as two figures moved together on top of a tangle of sheets. “Oh God!” she moaned, completely oblivious to our presence. Just then, her partner moaned in the unmistakable throes of a male climax.

“What is going on in here?” Mr. Lagrange roared from behind us. I hadn’t even realized he was there. He must have seen me rushing up the stairs.

I was standing too close to the entwined couple. The man, whom I assumed to be the missing Cullen leaped off Stephanie so quickly, he actually ran into me, knocking me to the ground. On the way down, I bumped my head on a nearby table, making a ‘thunk’ sound which must have been louder than I realized, because the next thing I knew, Brett was holding on to me calling, “She’s hurt! Get a doctor.”

“Let me see,” a voice called out. It was Howard, who must have come into the room with Mr. Lagrange. His gentle hands examined my throbbing forehead in the moonlight. “I don’t see any blood. Let me take her to my room.” With that, Howard showed himself to be stronger than I had imagined, picking me up and carrying me off.

“You bitch!” Stephanie was screaming. “What the hell do you think you’re doing barging in here?” I was too dazed to care, though.

Brett was set to follow me, but Mr. Lagrange pulled him back. “I need to speak with you,” he said grimly.

As I was carried from the room, Brian rushed past us, followed by Helen. “Cassie!” she cried. “Are you okay?”

“I’ll be fine,” I assured her. And I would be if the jackhammer in my head ever let up. “Stay with Brian. I’ll be fine.”

Howard whisked me back to his rooms with an occasional glance over his shoulder to make sure no one from the party was watching. As nearly as I could tell, we had gotten lucky about that. The party, although consisting of well-mannered folk, had gotten loud enough on its own to mask the chaos going on upstairs in the back of the house. I imagined Brian would be able to keep any gawkers away.

“Are you feeling all right, Ms. Davis?” Howard asked, concerned.

“I’ll live,” I sighed, shifting in his arms as he managed to open his apartment door. “I don’t think it’s a concussion.”

“I’ll put a cold compress on it,” Howard told me, laying me on the comfortable couch I had seated myself on several days earlier. While Howard went into the kitchen, I stared up at the photos on the mantle in an attempt to force my eyes back into focus.

I thought about Stephen–or Stephanie as I preferred to think of her now. She must have latched on to Cullen earlier in the day. I hadn’t realized her Attractor power had lingering effects sufficient to bring Cullen to her rooms that evening. Maybe it didn’t. Stephanie was now a very attractive girl, and Attractors usually had high sex drives. Put the two together and she wouldn’t have had to use her power to Attract him. She could have lured him in without any magical effort at all.

It stood to reason that she would be attracted to someone like Cullen. The change of sex nearly always produced an equal but opposite attraction for the transformee. Who had told me that? Brett? Yeah, I thought so. Anyhow, I had been attracted to white women as a white man and now found myself attracted to black men as a black woman. Stephen had apparently been attracted to black women as a white man and now he was attracted to...

...black men?

Equal and opposite.

“Here we go,” Howard said softly as he gently laid the compress on my forehead. It did feel good, but my headache was already subsiding as I gazed again at the photos on the mantle. There was something about one of the pictures, I suddenly realized, that was bothersome.

Stephen was a white man attracted to black women...

“Howard,” I began, “didn’t you tell me that picture of your daughter was taken about five years ago.”

He looked at the picture and smiled. “Yes. She was eleven then.”

I had guessed ten. “So she’s–what–sixteen now?”

“Just,” he said proudly.

My mind was racing now, putting the pieces together. “It must be hard for you with her living in Chicago. Does she ever get to come down here for a visit?”

“Not since...” Howard began, but stopped suddenly.

The look on his face told me I had guessed right. “Not since she was old enough to catch Stephen’s interest?”

I suspect butlers learn early in their careers to hide their emotions. Howard was a master at it, but his sudden change from proud father to wary suspect was too much to hide completely. He said nothing.

“Did she come down here–when–last year? She would have been fifteen then. I’ll bet she’s very pretty.”

Howard didn’t say anything, but he knew where I was going. He rose from my side and stood in a formal pose over me. I decided to press on. “Stephen would have been attracted to her, wouldn’t he?” This time, I decided I had to have an answer. Howard must have seen it in my eyes, because he sighed and began to speak, not willing to look directly at me when he did.

“She came down a year ago in June–right after school was out,” he started out, his voice soft but punctuated with emotion. “She was supposed to stay the whole summer, but she only stayed three days.”

I nodded for him to continue.

“You’re right, Stephen has always liked black women–and girls. Or I guess I should say African-American now to be politically correct,” he said, obviously no more enamored by the latest euphemism than I was. “He started sniffing around her the moment she arrived. I guess I hadn’t realized that my little girl was growing up, or I would have tried to do something to keep him at bay before she arrived. But Master Stephen was always...”

“A sneaky little weasel?” I prompted.

Howard didn’t respond to that, but I could see he was near tears now. I had to ask him the obvious question before he broke down completely. “Did he use his power on her to have sex?”

“Oh, he tried,” Howard laughed, but it was a grim laugh. “Lord knows he tried. But Mr. Lagrange stopped him... just in time. He had my little girl in his rooms–on the bed when Mr. Lagrange and I went in. I think Mr. Lagrange knew what was going on when I had asked if he had seen Samantha–that’s my daughter’s name–Samantha.”

“It’s a pretty name,” I assured him, rising from the couch and patting his trembling hand.

“She was just looking up at him from the bed,” Howard went on, his eyes expressing pain, as if he was actually seeing the scene as he spoke. “She was looking at him like a little puppy dog would look at its master. I think if Mr. Lagrange hadn’t held me back, I would have killed Stephen right then and there.”

“What happened then?” I prompted.

“Not much to tell, really. Mr. Lagrange made Stephen apologize and swear he’d never do it again, but I could see from the look in his eyes that he wasn’t finished with her yet. The next day, I put her on a plane back to her mother in Chicago.”

“Does her mother know what happened?” I asked.

Howard shook his head. “Not all of it. She knows I sent her home because Stephen couldn’t be trusted, but she has no idea how far things nearly went.”

“So now she wants assurances her daughter will be safe before she allow her to visit again,” I added, pretty sure I was right.

“Her lawyer sent me a certified letter to that effect. A judge in Chicago issued an ...”

He was at a loss for words, so I decided to help him. “An injunction?”

He nodded. “Yes, that’s it. I can’t receive visits from my daughter until the... threat from an Attractor is abated to the judge’s satisfaction.”

“In other words,” I sighed, “Stephen has to be out of the way–or changed so as to no longer be a threat. How did you do it, Howard?”

Howard’s expression turned to one of pride. “Mama Juno isn’t the only Voudon woman in New Orleans. I know a couple of others. It wasn’t hard to find one, and when I told her what Mister Stephen was doing to our girls, she was happy to do it. She still charged me a hefty price, but it was worth it if it means I can have my daughter back with me again.”

“What I don’t understand,” I mused, “is why Mr. Lagrange hasn’t figured any of this out.”

“I don’t exactly know,” Howard admitted. “I think maybe it’s because there have been so many girls involved–more than he’s let on to you or your friends. Most of the families of the girls got bought off, and a few got threatened if they didn’t take what he offered them. He didn’t know about the injunction, so he offered me the same settlement as he’d offered all the other families to keep quiet. I took the money from him. He was very generous too, and the money helped me pay for the curse on him.”

I smiled a little at that. It was fitting irony that Mr. Lagrange’s hush money had gone to help pay for the curse laid on Stephen.

There was silence between us for a few moments. Then, at last, Howard looked me in the eye and asked, “Are you going to turn me in?”

It was something I had been wondering myself. Howard had broken the law, and that law carried a serious penalty for unwanted transformation. If I turned him in, his daughter would be nearing middle age before he got out of jail.

I couldn’t help but compare Howard to my own father. Howard had risked everything to protect his daughter–and in the process, he had probably saved the virtue of a large number of women–mostly African-American from the way it sounded. Of course, he had kept quiet about Stephen’s activities until his own daughter was affected, out of loyalty to the Lagrange family I supposed.

My own father, on the other hand, had done nothing to help me. His only thoughts were on how to salvage his reputation and his political career at the lowest possible cost. In his own way, his taste for young African-American girls was worse than Stephen’s. Stephen was at least young and had the excuse of a power that was essentially a curse in its own right. I found myself wishing my father had been even half as interested in my welfare as Howard was in his daughter’s well-being.

Of course, Howard’s motives were selfish. His daughter would have remained safe in Chicago, so Stephen was no further threat. Howard did what he did so he could continue to see more of his daughter than an occasional trip to Chicago would have offered. I couldn’t say that I blamed him for doing what he did.

Maybe it was a rationalization, but I couldn’t help but think even Stephen was better off as Stephanie–or whatever she chose to call herself. As a man, he would have eventually stepped too far over the line. Maybe he would never be a serial killer or rapist, but eventually, someone would either drag him into a criminal court or–more likely–simply kill him in revenge. As a girl, she might stumble into something as seamy as prostitution, but I doubted it. Her family had too much money to allow that to happen. The question was whether or not she would get the help she needed to control her affliction.

Howard was still waiting for an answer from me, and I owed him one. I wondered if the old me would have been as sympathetic. Probably not, but the new me knew what I had to do–or rather, not do.

“No, Howard, I’m not going to turn you in. This is just between you and me for now. But I can’t swear that Helen or Brian won’t come up with this on their own.”

He nodded slowly. “I understand.” He helped me to my feet. “Will you be all right now, Miss Cassie?”

I smiled. It was meaningful that he had not called me “ma’am” or “Ms. Davis.” Instead, he had used a form of address normally reserved for someone close to him. “I’ll be fine now, Howard.” I even gave him a little peck on the cheek for good measure. “Thank you.”

Howard smiled back at me. “No Miss Cassie, thank you.”

Brett, Helen and I piled into Brian’s car. I expected it to be a long ride home with Brian pissed about being removed from the case, in spite of the fact that Brian had agreed to be off the case if no suspect was identified at the party. Brett told me that Mr. Lagrange had ushered Brian and Helen into a private room and formally dismissed them. So it was with surprise that I saw both Helen and Brian looked rather happy.

As for me, I was happy to be sitting in the back seat, holding Brett’s hand, but I was feeling a little guilty about holding out on my sister and Brian since I held the answer they had been hired to find. Brian and Helen were chatting happily, so at last I had to ask, “Why are you two so upbeat? I thought you just got sacked.”

“Not exactly,” Helen laughed. “Actually, Mr. Lagrange decided we had done everything possible and paid our fees in full.”

“I don’t understand...”

“It’s like this, Cassie,” Brian began. “When he hired us, he was sure he knew what had happened. He knew his son was an Attractor, but never dreamed the extent of Stephen’s use of the power. For every girl whose family he paid off, Stephen had lured several others to his bed. They were just too distraught or too frightened to come forward.”

“He was a bastard all right,” Helen agreed. “Even his father knew it, but he thought he had the situation under control. That’s why he thought the transformation had to be related to something else–something Mama Juno had her hands in.”

“You put that suspicion to rest,” Brian told me. “And after that, it was just a matter of time until we all realized what a sexual predator Stephen had become. It slowly became obvious to his father that the list of suspects could fill the phone directory of a small town. We were able to determine that without turning the whole affair into a public circus. If you’ll remember, that was one of the reasons he hired us in the first place instead of going to the FBM.”

“Then you brought Brett into the picture,” Helen went on. “Mr. Lagrange’s primary interest slowly turned from finding out who had done this to his son to figuring out what to do to get his new daughter cured.”

Brett broke in, “According to my father, it’s likely that if Stephen isn’t treated, she’ll become just as much of a sexual predator as she was as a male. I tried to convince her father of this, but he still held out hope that he could control the situation–especially with his wife in denial about Stephen’s powers. Tonight, after Stephen lured that boy into her room, Mr. Lagrange finally agreed professional help was needed. Stephen leaves Monday–under guard–for my father’s clinic.”

“That’s why Mr. Lagrange paid us off in full,” Brian explained. “We may not have found out who did this to Stephen, but we did focus a spotlight on the real problem, and through an introduction to Brett, we provided him with a solution.”

“It’s funny,” Helen mused, “but this transformation might turn out to be a good thing for Stephen. As a man, it’s likely that he would have become even more of a sexual predator–or even getting his thrills raping and killing his victims. He was a strong Attractor, and Attractors that strong often turn to violence.”

“So you’re saying whoever did this may have done Stephen a favor?” I asked, pleased that what Helen was saying completely confirmed my own analysis.

“Maybe,” Brian allowed, “but whoever did this still committed a crime. Only I don’t think we’ll ever know who did it, even though we probably know why they did it.”

I decided it would be best to say nothing to Brian or Helen about what I knew. As private investigators and former law officers, they would be forced by their own ethics to turn Howard over to the police. Howard’s motives were selfish, but Brian and Helen had just reinforced my belief that what he had done had unwittingly saved the world–and his family–an incredible amount of pain and suffering.

Brett’s car was at my house, and when Helen offered to stay with me for the night to make sure I didn’t have a concussion, Brett quickly volunteered to watch me instead. The amused look on Helen’s face as she turned to give me a goodnight hug told me that she knew Brett intended to watch quite a bit of me very closely. “He’s a keeper, honey,” she whispered in my ear.

“I know,” I whispered back.

Once inside, Brett grabbed me and kissed me. “God, I was worried about you.”

“I’m fine,” I assured him, hugging him tightly. I could feel a need rising within me as I looked up at him.

“Maybe so, but that’s quite a knot on your forehead.”

I let go of him and rushed over to a mirror. “What knot?”

Brett laughed, “Don’t worry. You look beautiful even with it.”

I was glad he thought so. I certainly didn’t. It was a pretty noticeable knot, and even though my skin was dark, it wasn’t dark enough to hide the bruise. “Maybe I can put some makeup on it,” I murmured.

“Just like a woman,” Brett said. “You’re more worried about how it looks than how it feels.”

“Well, it really doesn’t hurt much,” I assured him as I turned back to him with what I hoped was a coy smile.

Brett made no move toward me, and I suddenly realized I really wanted him to. I decided to be a little less subtle, reaching around to unbutton my dress. “I can hardly wait to get out of this maid outfit,” I sighed.

Brett looked nervous. “Do you want me to leave the room?”

I smiled at him. “You’ve seen me naked before, haven’t you?”

“Yes,” he managed, “but your injury...”

“Damn it, Brett!” I exclaimed in frustration, pointing at my forehead. “My injury is up here...” as I shifted my finger to my crotch, “...not down here.”

Brett was a fast learner. He smiled back. “Here, let me help you with that dress...”

I couldn’t have imagined it a few days earlier, I thought to myself as Brett and I lay there in post-coital bliss, but sex as a woman really was great. Once again (or rather twice again to be accurate), Brett had proven himself to be a capable lover. I was even thinking that when he was up to it, a third demonstration for the evening might be in order.

“Are you awake?” he asked, kissing the top of my head. He couldn’t see my eyes since I was resting my head on his strong chest.

“I’m awake,” I told him, raising my head to give him a kiss.

“I was just thinking about Stephen...” he began.

“Don’t you mean Stephanie?” I teased as I ran my fingers through the wiry hair on his chest.

“Okay... Stephanie. I was just thinking about what your sister said about her–about how she was probably better off as a woman than a man. I wonder if her assailant–or whoever hired her assailant–realized the same thing. Maybe that’s why no one came forward to torment her regarding her change.”

“Do you think what happened to her was a good thing?” I asked. I really wanted to think that this was so, to further assure me that I had done the right thing. Also, I was practically ready to burst with the secret. I might not be able to tell Brian and Helen, but I desperately wanted to tell Brett what I had discovered.

Brett looked into my eyes, and I could see his, all serious in the moonlight. “Yes I do,” he said confidently. “My father’s clinic is just what Stephen–or Stephanie needs. She needed it even before her transformation, but as nearly as I can tell, the Lagrange family was too proud to accept that. It took the catalyst of the transformation and tonight’s little... incident to make them all see reason. She has a tough road ahead of her, trying to bring that dangerous Attractor power under control. In another year or two, probably nothing would have helped, but at least now, she has a chance. I wish I could meet whoever did this to her and thank her for saving her life.”

Brett said that with such passion, I felt I had to share what I had learned with him. I knew in my heart he would never repeat it to anyone, and although I had told Howard I wouldn’t tell anyone else, telling Brett was almost like telling another part of myself. “Brett honey,” I began, “you’ve already met him.”

“What?”

As we lay there together, gently touching each other, I told Brett everything. From his silence and the look in his eyes, I could see he believed every word of it. When I finished, he asked, “And you figured this out by yourself?”

“Yes.”

He began to chuckle as he brought his lips close to mine, ready to start another round of sex, I hoped. “You know, for someone who doesn’t read mysteries, you managed to invoke the ultimate mystery cliché.”

“What are you talking about?” I asked, perplexed. Then I realized what he meant. We grinned at each other just before kissing and said together, “The butler did it!”

The End