Stand Your Ground Hero (The Accidental Hero Book 2)

by Paul Duffau

  “I don’t believe in coincidence, Mr. Meriwether.”

  A chill fell on Mitch but he maintained his silence.

  “Shall I catalogue them for you?”

  Mitch broke his silence. “I’ll pass.” Sour stomach acids burned at his throat.

  Rubiera enumerated the charges against Mitch one by one on his supple fingers. “You were . . . friendly with my son.” Tick. “You interfered in a kidnapping attempt on McKenzie Graham, who is herself a pivotal figure.” More points, ticked off in a litany of charges. “You made the acquaintance of a wizard who is our mortal enemy. Miss Graham foolishly allowed her head to be turned by . . . Meat.” The word was spat out with an expression that suggested it carried a particularly unpleasant taste. The moment passed and Rubiera continued, voice dispassionate. “You somehow, while lacking any magical ability at all, managed to transfer a tremendous amount of energy to Hunter. You are involved in a nefarious plot to steal technology that would give the gift of magic to Meat. You killed one of my men—”

  “I did not. Garrett is dead because of you,” Mitch said, temper flaring.

  “Spare me your righteous indignation, young man. The man I refer to was my employee assigned to protect Miss Graham in her meeting with Lassiter.”

  Mitch’s hands began to shake. He still had nightmares of the night in Seward Park when he got shot. His hand reached and touched the scar at his brow where the bullet had grazed him. “I kicked him. That’s it.” Mitch dragged his attention up to the dominating figure in front of him. Rubiera’s eyes reflected a grim assessment.

  “Your kick broke his neck.”

  For the second time that day, Mitch wanted to puke, but he couldn’t, not here. He clenched his throat shut and straightened his shoulders. “Not that I don’t trust you, but I’ll wait to get that from someone else.” It was a desperate evasion, but he remembered hitting the car hood, sliding, and lashing out with his foot. He remembered the look in the man’s eyes, right before he got shot.

  If bringing up the death of one of his hirelings bothered him, Rubiera didn’t show it. “Now, we find ourselves in an interesting situation. You planted our computer worm as instructed. Our best programmers designed that worm to remain virtually invisible. It gained access into the networks as intended, signaled such through a prepared channel, and then, they killed the undetectable. Odd, but not unheard-of.” He paused. “What is unheard-of is the death of your coworker. Who at 3rdGen, in your opinion, can use a Fire spell to incinerate a spy? Do you see why I do not like coincidences?”

  Mitch furrowed his brows and his gaze drifted out to the water. Stuff wasn’t adding up. Rubiera had left out information, but the gaps were as informative as if he’d shouted answers to Mitch. A familiar voice broke in on his concentration.

  “I know that look.” Hunter sauntered onto the veranda. “This is why Mitch could be valuable.”

  Next to Hunter stood a tall woman with striking looks. Mitch averted his eyes to Hunter’s face and came to a snap judgment: He’s still pissed. Mitch faced the patriarch again. “You can’t use magic to get into 3rdGen, because they have already deployed detectors. That they have MAGE connects them somehow to Lassiter. That they killed your worm means they were looking for it. That a Fire spell was used to murder Garrett means a Family is involved. Since you know it isn’t yours, you suspect the Grahams. If you knew for sure, though, you’d have already launched an attack.” Mitch took a deep breath. Time for a small bluff. “Figured I’d save you the trouble of waving your hands like Hunter here to get me to blab.”

  Mr. Rubiera stared at Mitch like he was a frog due for vivisection. “How do you know that 3rdGen has the MAGE program?” he asked.

  Mitch stood taller. “If you could get in there by using your magic, you would. It is, or was, undetectable. The detector feature of the device is a game changer. Lassiter was a corporate pirate and he already had access to at least that much. How many tech companies could there be involved in that kind of research? Since you’re expending so much effort to access their systems, they have something that you want, a breakthrough, maybe. Whatever it is must be valuable, and they’ve protected it against all the threats they can conceive of, which includes the use of magic.” He shrugged. “3rdGen has something to hide.”

  “He is not telling us all that he knows,” said the woman.

  Mitch pivoted. He opened his mouth to speak, and then snapped it closed. Mitch tried to wrench his gaze from her stare, but Hunter’s mother ensnared him with eyes lit by a fire of madness. He’d seen that kind of intensity before and his whole body went cold with the deadly danger. His father got like this, burning with an inner conviction in himself that also encompassed a massive paranoia. Like prey mesmerized by a cobra, he froze, fearing the strike.

  Hunter, too, seemed to sense the holes in Mitch’s answer. “He never does,” said Hunter. “Mitch always thinks he’s the smartest guy in the room.”

  His voice broke the hold his mother had on Mitch. Even with the contempt from Hunter, Mitch felt thankful. He twisted so that his back was to all three of them. He needed space to gather himself. The shocks were coming too fast for him to process.

  “We should kill him now.” Her voice was low and feral.

  Mitch knew he had to speak and break the momentum that Mrs. Rubiera was forcing. With his back turned, he said, “Hunter tried. That’s why he had me infecting the computers with the worm. He hoped it would come back on me. If not by getting me killed, he definitely planned on screwing me over.” Mitch squared up to Mr. Rubiera. “Only a fool breaks a useful tool.”

  A quick intake of air behind him let him know that he’d scored points on Hunter’s ego. A fist crashed into the back of his head, and Mitch dropped to his knees. A pummeling was better than a spell that would kill him, and with Hunter that close, his mother was temporarily neutralized. A second blow bounced off the top of his head.

  “Stop.”

  The command stopped the torrent of fists. Mitch lowered himself to all fours and shook his head. “Thanks.”

  Footsteps approached. Mitch looked over in time to see an impeccably crafted loafer arcing toward his midsection. The kick caught him in the ribs. One rib cracked with a crunching sound. Mitch flipped over, gasping, arm wrapped protectively over the fracture. The older Rubiera stared down at him, flanked by the crazy woman and Hunter. One look at the teenager’s eyes convinced Mitch; Hunter was frickin’ nuts, too. He just hadn’t had as much practice as his mother. The comparison triggered a memory.

  “You confuse good practices with compassion,” Mr. Rubiera said. The man might as well have been an automaton for all the emotion he displayed. “You are still our best entry point, and you were correct to point out your usefulness as a tool.”

  Mitch only half-heard the words. His memory dredged up Mercury’s face from the botanical garden at U-Dub. “I called them all bastards.” He started to laugh, but pain radiated up his side, so he stopped. He gritted his teeth, rolled, and forced himself up, first to hands and knees, then to his feet. Sweat broke out on his face that had nothing to do with the afternoon temperature. Other than rapidly inhaling through his nose, he refused to give them any indication on how much that hurt.

  Hunter’s mother was speaking again. “Kill him now. He’s dangerous, both for his knowledge but also for the way he confuses minds.”

  Mitch snorted. That hurt, too. “Yeah, right, I confuse minds.” He looked right at Hunter and hoped that the iron grip that ruled the Rubiera Family would work in his favor. “Is that what you’re going to tell Kenzie? ‘He confused my mind, so I killed him’? I’d pay money to see the reaction to that, dude.” He took a shallow breath.

  White spots stood sentry on either side of Hunter’s jaw. “Kenzie and I have a duty to magic, to ensure that it continues.”

  “You should have a conversation with Mercury sometime,” Mitch shot back.

  Hunter seemed startled, but the reaction in Mrs. Rubiera was telling. Rage filled her features.
“You will not speak that name here or repeat his blasphemies. The Graham girl will take her place as first wife—”

  “First wife? What kind of crap is that?” Mitch demanded. Furious, he spoke without thinking. “Is this how Rubiera boys prove they’re alpha males, getting Mommy to help them get laid?” His whole face convulsed. “Good luck with that. Kenzie’ll never go for it.”

  In the space of a microscopically small particle of time, Mitch recognized how far he’d stepped over the line.

  Hunter’s mother hissed, and her hands flew into a tight spiral like she was stirring coffee, then ended with a flinging motion.

  Unimaginable pain burned into his arm. Jaws locked to prevent himself from shrieking in agony, he sucked in a moaning gasp. A blob of silvery metal cauterized a hole the size of a dime around and an inch deep in his bicep. The smell of burned flesh filled the air. He stood up to his full height. His eyes seemed ready to bulge out of his head, and he calculated the distance between him and the Rubieras along with the pattern of strikes to take them down. If that woman moves her hands again, Mitch thought.

  Disgustingly, Hunter and his mother stared at the gross wound with excited pleasure. Like emotional vampires, they fed on Mitch’s pain. Hunter’s father, though, watched his face, judging him. Mitch met his stare with quivering defiance.

  Red licked at the peripheral edges of his vision, making his eyes dart involuntarily to the right.

  What the . . . ? His head turned and tracked the progress of an intruder approaching from the woods that edged the compound. How long ago was it that he reconnoitered and noted the proximity of Magnuson Park? He obviously hadn't been the only one. The woman, a blonde in a blood-red gown, walked from the gray-green conifers to the sculpted lawn. A guard ran to defend the perimeter. He dropped, grasping at his throat after a knife-like flick of her hand.

  Her hands were assembling another spell as he watched. Mitch reacted on pure instinct and launched himself in a flat dive that he changed in midair to a cross-body block. Hunter, misunderstanding the situation, matched his action with a spell that squeezed him like an orange, but it was too late. He scythed into their legs and dropped them in a heap. A loud explosion followed and hot splinters of rocky shrapnel bit into his back as the Rubiera mansion turned into a warzone for wizards.

  Chapter 35

  Kenzie released the gate to the Glade at the same time that Jackson knocked rat-a-tat-tat on her bedroom door.

  “Kenzie?” Jackson’s voice carried his embarrassment through her door.

  She stepped to the door and opened it. “What’s up?”

  Jackson took a step backward and a rare unease creased his forehead. Kenzie sympathized. He had daughters, and strange men going to their bedrooms would be cause for digging graves. Now that the role was reversed, he fidgeted.

  He lifted his cell phone and spoke. “Here she is.” He passed the phone to Kenzie. “It’s your mother.”

  Agnes hadn’t wasted any time getting word to Sasha. Kenzie took the phone. “Why didn’t you call my phone?” she complained. Better to be on offense.

  “I did,” came Sasha’s testy voice. “You didn’t answer.”

  “I’m in my room,” said Kenzie, “and my phone is in the kitchen, I think.” She opened her eyes wide to feign innocence. “What do you want?” She glanced at Jackson to see how her act was playing to find him inspecting her feet. For the first time, Kenzie noted the beads of sweat on her skin and the dust from the Glade on her feet. She lowered the phone but spoke loud enough that Sasha could hear. “I’ll bring your phone down in a second, ’kay?” She gave him a bare shove with magic.

  He dipped his head but his hard eyes delivered his assessment of her googly-eyed bull. Nonetheless, he accepted her command. “Sure.” He left, but his head moved like he was arguing with himself.

  “I’m back.”

  “I’ll be coming home a bit early. Please be there when I arrive.”

  “Where am I going to go?”

  The fractional moment while Sasha scrambled for an answer that wouldn’t tip her hand made Kenzie smile. “The studio.”

  Kenzie rolled her eyes at the lame lie. “That’s tomorrow.”

  “Then meeting my request should pose no problem.”

  “I’ll be here, in my comfy prison.” Kenzie terminated the call before Sasha could squawk.

  Jackson was waiting at the base of the stairs as Kenzie descended. She handed back his phone. “Sorry she troubled you.”

  The bodyguard cleared his throat. “I have good hearing.” He met her eyes with an uncertain stare of his own. “Your phone was right next to me. It never rang.”

  Kenzie used a one-shoulder shrug to deflect the direction of the conversation. “She’s checking up on me, I guess.”

  “Maybe we both should,” Jackson said. “Care to explain how you got dripping wet and sweaty, with dirt on your feet, from inside your bedroom?” He gave her a moment to answer, and when she didn’t, added quietly, “Protecting you is hard enough when I only have to worry about bad guys. If I can’t trust you, this security detail is going to become very unpleasant for both of us.”

  Kenzie looked up at him. She had expected to see anger, but his face held compassion. Miserably, she shuffled her feet. Pangs of hunger alerted her to the expenditure of energy that opening the portal had cost. “I can’t tell you everything.”

  “I didn’t say tell me everything. Tell me what I need to know to keep you safe.” He hesitated, conflicted. “Did you go out your window?”

  The conversation was approaching dangerous ground. She told the truth, manipulating air with her hands. “No, and certainly not barefoot.” Then she added a compulsion spell, put it in reverse, and Jackson lost interest. “I’m going to fix a snack. You want anything?”

  “No, thanks,” he said, his thoughts apparently drifting. He wandered back to his station in the living room.

  In the kitchen, Kenzie fished around in the refrigerator. Finding some leftover meatloaf, she sliced it down to thick slabs. Two slices of bread, some mayo, salt, and pepper gave her a stout sandwich, which she put on a small plate. She wolfed it down, leaving nothing but crumbs behind. Still hungry, Kenzie devoured a bag of potato chips and two bottles of pop next.

  The hunger relented but her stomach was still a mess, waiting for her mother. There was going to be a confrontation, and there was no way that Kenzie could win it. She briefly considered radical honesty, telling Sasha about creating the portal, and dismissed the idea as stupid.

  Kenzie padded across the floor to carry her plate to the sink. She needed to get a shower in to knock off the telltale sweat and dirt before Sasha got home.

  A ferocious pain burned into her right bicep before she got to the counter. She shrieked, dropping the plate, and grabbing at her arm. The plate hit the ground and exploded like a bomb, with a million razor-sharp shards flying in all directions. Their bite into her legs drew blood. Kenzie barely noticed. Everything turned red with pain, layered with a simultaneous picture of Mitch in matching agony. She sank toward her knees, tears coursing down her cheeks, feeling like a coward.

  “Son of a bitch!” Jackson caught her under the armpits and lifted her off the floor before she impaled her knees on the remains of the plate. He carried her away from the wreckage and put her down gently on the living room couch. “What happened?”

  His worry reached through the pain.

  “M-my arm,” she whimpered. “Burns, it burns so bad.”

  Jackson pushed up her sleeve. “Nothing there, kiddo.” He stood. “Stay put. I’ll get some first-aid supplies. Let’s get those legs patched up and figure out what’s wrong with your arm.” He crossed the room in three long strides, picked up his work bag, and returned to her side in seconds. “Focus, Kenzie. What’s happening with your arm?” He took out a kit, unzipped it, and removed a variety of bandages, ointments, and alcohol wipes.

  Kenzie moaned. “Like . . . it’s . . . on . . . fire,” she managed to get out between gri
tted teeth. The weird connection that she seemed to share with Mitch consumed her. It made no sense but allowed her to distract her brain from the immediacy of abused nerve endings.

  “Some of the splinters are buried in your legs.” He cleaned the blood from the cuts on her legs with the wipes. “A torn muscle?” Jackson asked.

  The pain receded more. “N-no. Like someone is stabbing me with a hot poker.”

  The noise of the garage door opening rattled from behind her. Kenzie’s heart leapt. Sasha must have left work and sped to get here so fast. She struggled to get up. Jackson was in the way.

  The bodyguard rocked back on his haunches. “I heard. Stay put and let me get this last splinter out.”

  The door from the garage to the kitchen opened.

  “What is going on?” Sasha asked. Broken pieces of the plate crunched as she crossed the kitchen. “Mr. Jackson, an explanation, please?” She used a curt gesture that abbreviated the usual spell.

  Jackson stood to face Sasha. “I honestly don’t know, Mrs. Graham. She screamed and dropped her plate at the same time. She says her arm is burning but I can’t find anything there. McKenzie cut her legs when the plate hit and I was cleaning them up.”

  “I will deal with it from this point, Mr. Jackson.” She made another movement. “You are dismissed for the day. Thank you.”

  Not a word to me. Kenzie stood shakily. Might as well be furniture. The agony dwelled at the back of her mind. Ruthlessly, Kenzie suppressed it, but the reaction left her body shaking. She watched Jackson pack his gear in jerky movements.

  “Her arm?” he asked, fighting against Sasha’s magic.

  “I will attend to McKenzie, Mr. Jackson,” Sasha answered crossly. Disgruntled, she overwhelmed his defenses with stronger blast of magic.

  In thirty seconds, the man was out the door, lobbing a worry-filled expression to Kenzie. Kenzie responded with a wan smile, masking her pain.

  “Now, what have you done?”

  “Nothing,” Kenzie replied. Her breathing was fast and shallow. She met Sasha’s eyes with a steady gaze even as her chin quivered at the effort to avoid moaning. She’d show no weakness to this woman. Dampness at the corners of her eyes infuriated her.