by Krista Walsh
Zach nodded and took one last glance around the room before stepping back into the hallway. “Can I use your phone?”
3
Daphne Heartstone stretched out on her burnt orange couch, her shoulders propped against the armrest and her legs draped over the knees of her boyfriend, Hunter Avery. It was Friday night — the first Friday Hunter had been able to book off in over a month. The curse of being a detective sergeant in the Major Crimes Unit during a freak rise in otherworldly events.
A bottle of bourbon sat open on the large square coffee table in front of them, next to a plate of mini quiches Daphne’s mother had brought upstairs an hour ago as an evening snack. Casablanca flickered on the television screen.
Daphne yawned and relaxed deeper into the couch.
“Falling asleep on me already?” Hunter asked with a grin. He gave her a gentle poke in the ribs, and she jerked away, laughing. Her magic hummed with gentle pleasure deep in her core.
“Not yet,” she said. “I’m just so relaxed. After the week I’ve had, I don’t think you could have offered me a better proposal for our evening.”
Hunter leaned forward without dislodging her legs and added another tipple of bourbon to both glasses on the table. He held one out for her, but refused to relinquish it until she sat up to give him a kiss. She went for the quick peck, but he caught the back of her neck in his hand and eased her closer. His mouth was warm and sweet with alcohol and spices, and Daphne slipped deeper into the embrace, wrapping her arm around him to hold herself up.
He broke the kiss first and finished it with a quick nip on her lip.
“Still sleepy?” he asked.
“No, I think you’ve got me for a few hours yet,” she said, and eased down against the armrest.
The bourbon was smooth as it slipped over her tongue, and she leaned her head back to stare at the ceiling.
This. This was exactly what she’d been searching for after her years of ambition and crossing lines, though she never would have guessed it. From the time she’d come into her power at ten years old, through all her years of training with her power-hungry, good-for-nothing father, she’d believed her only goal was to tap into the fullness of her bloodline. No matter the consequences, no matter who she hurt, she had to become stronger if she wanted to reach her potential.
Now, it had been over a week since she’d used her magic beyond a few simple conveniences. She’d spent all day yesterday helping her mother in the garden, and the night before that she’d taken Emmett out for a game of pool. He’d had to use his fake ID to get into the bar, but compared to the things the guy had done in his past, it was hardly an offense worth reprimanding him over.
She was enjoying this new phase of her life, and the icing on the cake was definitely Hunter Avery. Three months ago, when they’d first reconnected, she never would have imagined they’d be here, so comfortable with each other. He still had moments of hesitation whenever her fingers lit up with their golden magic, but he never pulled away. Yes, he was sometimes watchful, even wary, but she understood it wasn’t out of fear of her, but concern for her, and the realization created a warmth in her blood that not even a tight deadline at the Chronicle, her editor’s grumpiness, or her mother’s nagging could remove.
Hunter shifted just far enough to grab the last mini quiche off the plate, ate it in one bite, then gave the plate a soulful glance.
“I’m sad they’re gone.”
Daphne nudged him with her foot. “Well, maybe if you weren’t such a pig.”
“I don’t suppose…”
She chuckled and stretched her arms over her head. “I’m not moving from this spot. If you’re still hungry, you can head on downstairs and ask for more. I know two women who would love to make sure you never go hungry again.”
Hunter raised an eyebrow. “You’d better be careful. Those two women cook a lot better than you do, and they are single, after all.”
She snorted a laugh. “My mother would love to brag about the fact that she stole my man away. But, really, if I had to lose you to anyone, go for Gram. She’s the one who bakes the strudels you love so much.”
She nestled into her cushions, took another sip of bourbon, and tried to return her attention to the movie.
Her phone rang.
She groaned and reached for it on the table, careful not to disturb her bourbon. Hunter made to pause the movie, but she waved him down. She had no intention of letting anyone interrupt her perfect evening for longer than a few seconds.
“Who is it?” Hunter asked.
Daphne frowned at the unfamiliar number on the screen. “I have no idea. Hello?”
“Daphne, it’s Zach.”
At the sound of the daemelus’s voice, her stomach dropped.
“What happened?” she asked, cutting straight to the point. The last time they’d been in contact had been during the battle at the trade college, and she doubted he was calling for a bit of a gab.
This time, she didn’t stop Hunter when he grabbed the remote and hit pause.
“I’m at Molly’s house. I think someone’s taken her.”
Daphne didn’t know what she’d expected, but it certainly hadn’t been this. Molly’s wild blond curls and bright smile filled her memory, and her breath caught in her chest as she shot up and swung her legs to the floor. “Are you sure?”
“Her parents were in the kitchen and would have seen her leave if she’d gone through the front or back doors. Her mother heard a scream from Molly’s room, and when she went up, Molly was gone.”
“Shit,” Daphne said. She shoved her fingers through her short hair and sagged against the couch. The poor girl. Was she terrified? “No sign of how anyone got in?”
“Nothing. I did a tour of the house, but didn’t pick up anything. I was hoping you might come by and take a look yourself. I think we both know who’s behind this, but I need to know how they’re working it.”
Daphne squeezed her eyes shut to block out the memory of the demons she’d faced alongside Zach three weeks ago. Twice she’d happened to be there when the demons had come for him, and both times she’d had to stare into the ugliness of their evil. The first fight had been easy enough — a few flung rocks and some magic bursts. The second had been more of a challenge. Whoever was behind this was sending their best, and she couldn’t guarantee that she was strong enough to win. Not if she had to hold back.
If they had Molly…
A shiver ran through her, and she tightened her hand in her lap, then stretched out her fingers to soothe the cramps in her palm. She prayed nothing had happened to the girl. Despite the fact that Molly was twelve years Daphne’s junior and human, Daphne admired her more than most people she knew.
She didn’t even want to think about what it would do to Zach if anything happened to the girl.
“Of course. Give me a few minutes, and I’ll be out the door. Before I go to the house, I’ll do a quick drive-by of your place and the roads in between, in case somehow she got it into her head to pay you an early visit. You know how she likes to climb out windows.”
Zach grunted, a familiar enough sound, but this time it struck Daphne with the full force of his worry. She could hope as much as she liked that she’d spot Molly walking down a side street, but with the scream the girl’s parents had heard, she hated to get her hopes up.
“I’ll be there as soon as I can.”
She hung up and turned to Hunter with a curdling sense of regret. His eyebrows were drawn together. “Is everything all right?”
“I don’t know. There’s a teenage girl who might have been abducted.”
Hunter’s furrowed brow collapsed into a full frown. “Why are you getting the call?”
Daphne found herself half-braced for him to pull away from her, for him to think she was crossing boundaries for her next Chronicle article, but to her relief, he didn’t move, his sincere concern never wavering. The fact that his trust in her had grown so much meant more than their interrupted evening.
<
br /> “It’s not that kind of abduction,” she said. “It might have been demons. One second the girl was in her room, the next, her parents heard her scream, then found her gone.”
At the mention of demons, Hunter’s shoulders tightened. This time he did pull away, but Daphne didn’t take it personally. Three months wasn’t a lot of time to accept that the rules you always believed about your world were arranged around false assumptions.
“Can I help?” he asked. “I can get Meg. We can go to the girl’s house and take a look around. At the very least, we can speak with the family.”
If Daphne hadn’t accepted that she was in love with him before this, his offer would have done the trick. She wondered what his partner, Meg Kealey, would think about the step he was willing to take here. So far, Meg had had more of an issue coming to terms with the otherworld’s existence than Hunter.
For now, though, their help would only confuse the situation. Daphne didn’t want Molly’s parents thinking the mundane police were the people they needed to call in an emergency like this. It would be a great way to get the otherworld on the six o’clock news.
She leaned in and caught his lips with hers, enjoying their warmth even as she regretted that she wouldn’t be able to make the most of them tonight.
“I don’t think so. Not yet, anyway. But if that changes, you’ll be the first one I call.”
Daphne kissed him again, grabbed her car keys, and headed down the stairs. As she passed the door to her mother and grandmother’s apartment, she thought about letting them know she was heading out, but decided to wait. Until she had a better understanding of the situation, it wouldn’t do to create panic by bringing in the whole sorceress circle. That could come later.
Daphne pulled up the collar of her blue spring jacket and crossed the driveway to her car. The temperature had certainly dropped over the last couple of weeks. No matter where Molly had gone, she hoped the girl was warm.
Her stomach tight with trepidation, Daphne started the car and began her search.
***
By nine o’clock, having combed the streets without success, Daphne pulled up in front of the Harris home. As soon as she stepped out of the car, a tingle passed over her skin. She closed her eyes and stretched her hand into the air to test what she was sensing.
Magic, though nothing definitive from this distance. It seemed to be coming from inside the house.
Shaking off her uneasiness, she walked up the path to the front door and rang the bell. The door opened, and Zach’s wide frame greeted her, blocking off all view of inside. At this time of night, under these circumstances, he looked more demon than usual. Too large to fit comfortably inside this family home. His black leather coat, patched and worn, clung to his shoulders over a plain black T-shirt and faded black jeans. The man was a walking shadow.
“Any sign of her yet?” she asked.
“Nothing,” Zach said, stepping aside to let her in. “I can’t figure it out. If they took her to get to me, wouldn’t they have wanted to leave some message for me?”
“Have you gone back to Peony House to check if they did? I only drove by the front of the building. They could have found a way inside.”
Zach scowled, the thick weave of scars on the right side of his face twisting downward. “Unless they’ve been following me this whole time, they shouldn’t know where I’ve ended up. If that’s their plan, it’s a stupid one.”
“Let me take a look around and see what I can find out. There’s magic around the house, but maybe if I get closer to the source, I’ll have a better idea of whose.”
Zach led the way to the stairs. As they passed through the kitchen, Daphne peered at the couple sitting at the table, who acknowledged her with nothing more than a nod, and her heart clenched. Molly’s parents looked so broken, as though their reason for living had been taken away. Her throat tightened, and she swallowed hard to clear it. How many times had she left her mother and grandmother sitting around the table with that same expression? After being the cause of so much pain and loss for others, Daphne crossed her fingers that she’d be able to relieve them for someone else.
“This is Molly’s room,” Zach said. He opened the door, but remained in the hallway, shifting his weight on his feet as though he were uncomfortable being in such proximity to his friend’s personal space.
Daphne didn’t feel the same compunction — not if it meant finding Molly. As she stepped into the middle of the bedroom, a cellphone pinged on the desk. Automatically, Daphne’s gaze fell on the screen to find an incoming text message from Emmett.
Poor Emmett. He’s going to be so upset when he learns what happened.
She put that thought aside for now and returned her attention to what she sensed in the room. The magic she’d picked up outside was stronger here, but still unclear, scattered. She closed her eyes and cast out her mind to the energies surging through the air. For a small room, there were traces of more people than she would have expected, and she firmed her concentration to separate one from another.
There were two faint strictly human signatures, which she guessed belonged to Molly’s parents. A third human signature carried traces of the otherworldly, and Daphne pinpointed it as Molly.
The remaining otherworldly energies were more jumbled. She canceled out her own, and was able to eliminate Zach’s by comparing it to the source standing outside the room. That left three others.
A high number to take down one teenage girl, Daphne thought, and tamped down the angry tingle of magic that rose inside her. Breathing deeply, she refocused. The signatures were spread around the space with various intensities, suggesting two of them had moved around, while one had remained still. Deepening her concentration, Daphne could almost make out the magic in the air, like colorful specks of sparkling dust. The source came from in front of the window.
Daphne opened her eyes to see what she could make out in terms of physical clues, but there was nothing except for a few traces of dirt on the cream carpet.
“Three came for her, and however they moved in and out, it wasn’t by any human means,” she said.
“Demons?” Zach asked.
“Likely. At least one of them, if not two. It’s hard to tell. I’m picking up a hint of something else as well. It’s familiar, but I can’t place it.”
Zach growled and took a step over the threshold. His crossed arms stretched his coat tighter across his shoulders, to the point where Daphne was worried the seams might burst.
“Any way of telling where they went?” he asked.
She sighed and turned toward the window, trying hard to keep her shoulders from drooping with the weight of her discouragement.
“I don’t see how. There’s no magic trail. They came in and left through a single point, and the magic starts and stops there.”
“Just like the demons that vanished from the alley,” he said, and Daphne was struck by the thought.
Zach’s fist slammed down so fast, she only realized he’d moved when the computer desk trembled under the weight of his blow. She held up a hand to calm him down, sensing the power rising within him.
“Maybe we’re not out of options yet,” she said. “We both suspect who has her, right?”
“Karl the Coward.”
Even the mention of the Topan demon set Daphne’s teeth on edge, and he was the one she’d never had the pleasure of meeting. But from what Zach had said, he was the middle man, the one giving orders to the demons she’d fought, receiving them from some shadowy figure sitting in a black Town Car.
“Right. And we know he’s somehow connected to Mayzell Industries and whatever you found about Project Oracle.” A scrap of a blueprint and a name on a file folder. It wasn’t much to work with, and she hadn’t been able to uncover anything else so far, even with her usual thorough digging. She regretted now that she hadn’t pushed harder. “That means we need someone who’s got the contacts and knowledge to dig deeper than I can with my press pass. We need a private detective.�
� Zach’s gaze rose to meet hers, and she offered him a smile. “Fortunately, I know exactly where we can find one.”
4
Gabriel Mulligan relaxed deeper into the warm water in the claw-foot bathtub and released a contented sigh. Then his breath hitched as the naked woman leaning against him shifted to find a more comfortable position. Her long legs stretched out of the tub, her trim ankles resting on the edge. Bubbles covered her from the tops of her thighs to her chest, though from his vantage point, they didn’t do much to conserve her modesty.
He wrapped his arms around her and smeared a line of bubbles across her nose. Vera Goodall jerked her head away with a sniff, then laughed and tilted her head up to face him. Her red hair cascaded over his chest, and her gray eyes twinkled with mischief. He reached up to adjust his sunglasses, and for the umpteenth time, realized he wasn’t wearing them. Even after a month, it felt strange to leave them off when someone else was in the room.
“Do you really want to start that kind of war with me?” she asked. “The high ground will guarantee my victory.”
“How could I deprive you of that satisfaction?” he asked, kissing her brow. “I can’t think of another person in the world I would rather surrender to.”
Vera arched her back to raise her head further, and Gabe bent down to kiss her. His fingers drifted over her shoulders, her chest, and down her stomach, disappearing under the bubbles. Vera shifted her weight again, and Gabe smiled against her lips.
After thirty-four years of being alone, the last month had been a wash of love and passion — a dream he kept preparing himself to wake up from. By a roll of the Fates’ dice, he had found a woman who could survive his Gorgon stare, who was a match for his stubbornness, and who had taught him how to wrangle the chaos of his world into some form of order. When Vera had first returned to his life after they’d met nine months prior, he’d been worried that the pedestal he’d placed her on would crumble. Instead, she’d lifted him to stand there with her.
