by Lisa Edmonds
Bell was the head of a local cabal and the target of ongoing attacks by my grandfather, Moses Murphy, who wanted to kill Bell and take over his territory. Their war had resulted in numerous deaths and a lot of collateral damage, but things had been quiet for several weeks since my aunt Catherine had tried to kill Bell by burning down the condo where he’d been staying. I’d intervened by summoning a thunderstorm to put out the fire and then severely injuring her with a bolt of lightning. I’d been caught on camera controlling the storm but hadn’t been identified, causing news agencies to dub me “Storm Girl,” a nickname I hated.
Word on the street was Bell and Moses were both searching for Storm Girl, Bell because he wanted her as a weapon against Moses, and Moses so he could get revenge for what happened to Catherine.
“What about Bell?” I asked.
“Kyra said he’s looking for nulls,” she said quietly. “Some are going to work for him voluntarily. Others…aren’t.”
Double shit. From somewhere on my left, Malcolm muttered an expletive.
“There’s a chance Aden might have overheard us talking,” Natalie added. “When we came out of the kitchen, he was in the hallway acting like he was heading toward the bathroom, but he could have been listening.”
Well, that opened up a whole new avenue of possibilities and none of them were good. “Let’s say he did overhear you. What would a twelve-year-old kid do with that information?”
She shook her head. “I would hope it would make him even more careful not to let anyone know he’s a null, but…” She bit her lip. “Aden’s a great kid, he really is, but Jana’s told me he gets angry when he wants something other kids have and she can’t afford it. They’re not poor, but single mothers don’t have a lot of disposable income. He wants her to not have to worry about money so much, either. I really hope he didn’t overhear Kyra say that Bell is offering big money to mages who can null and decide to do something stupid.”
“If he did, we’ll probably never see him again,” Malcolm said.
“How would a twelve-year-old kid even know how to find someone from the cabal?” I wondered. “Bell’s compound is gone, and last I heard, no one knows where he’s holed up since the fire, so it’s not like Aden can go to his house and ring the doorbell.”
“It’s amazing what you can find out on the internet.” Natalie sighed. “I don’t want to send you on some wild goose chase with this.”
“You did the right thing by telling me. We have to consider all the possibilities. I’m going to talk to Aden’s father first, and then I’ll go from there. Call me if you think of anything else.”
“I will. It’s really good to see you. I’m sorry it’s under these circumstances.” She hesitated. “Can I give you a hug? I promise I won’t null you.”
I remembered all too well what it felt like to get nulled and how long it took to regenerate my magic afterward, but if she’d learned to control her ability, the danger was minimal.
“Sure,” I said after a beat.
She gave me a quick hug. I felt her fire and air magic, but they were muted. I sensed nothing of her nulling ability at all.
“You’re looking great, Natalie,” I said when she stepped back. “And you’ve learned so much about controlling and using your magic. I’m really impressed, and I’m proud of you.”
“Thanks. That means a lot, coming from you. And wherever my grandmother is, I hope she’s proud too.”
I didn’t have much good to say about Natalie’s grandmother for binding her magic instead of teaching her how to use it, but I kept my opinions to myself. “I’m sure she is. I’ll be in touch.”
Natalie returned to her house. When Malcolm and I were in my car, he went visible again. “Man, I hope this kid didn’t run off to work for Bell.”
“Me too. I hope he’s with his dad. Even if Garrett’s as much of a screw-up as Jana says, that’s still a million times better than being in the clutches of a cabal.” I took out my phone and made a call.
The phone rang twice, and then Bryan Smith, Charles Vaughan’s head of security, answered. “Miss Alice,” he rumbled, sounding surprised.
I didn’t blame him for being startled by my call. I hadn’t seen him or his vampire employer in a month. I was still furious with Charles about his scheme to obtain the magic cuff that I’d needed to save Sean’s life and trade it for drinking my blood. I’d agreed to the trade and let him bite me in return for the cuff, but my anger had been simmering ever since. And if I was mad about Charles’s plot, Sean was a pot of boiling rage that I worried might explode if they crossed paths.
“Hello, Bryan,” I said. “Do you still have a friend or two who work at Nyx?”
I could almost see Bryan’s eyebrows go up. “I do. Are you looking for a part-time job to make some extra cash and need me to put in a good word?”
I snorted. “Hardly. I’m looking for the home address of someone who works there as a host, a guy named Preston Garrett. It’s for a case I’m working on.”
“Let me see what I can find out. Should I text you?”
“Yes, thank you.”
“You’re welcome.” He disconnected.
While I waited for him to text me Garrett’s address, I called Sean and gave him a quick outline of what we knew. I could tell he was concerned about me getting involved in a case involving unregistered mages, but he didn’t even hesitate in voicing his support for agreeing to help Jana find her missing kid.
When I mentioned the possibility Aden might have heard Kyra and Natalie talking about Bell, however, the line went silent.
“You’re already on Bell’s radar,” he said finally. “If Aden did do something idiotic like try to go to work for him, what are you going to do?”
“I don’t know,” I admitted. “This could go a lot of different ways right now. But if Bell’s got Aden, no kid deserves that.”
I had a feeling I knew what Sean was thinking: that he’d love to tell me that under no circumstances was I to go after Aden and risk capture by Bell. But he wouldn’t, because he didn’t want that kid in Bell’s clutches any more than I did, and because he knew I’d already weighed the risk and decided I’d go after Aden.
“I’m headed over to talk to Aden’s father right now,” I told him. “For all we know, Aden’s mad at his mom and ran away to his place.”
“Let’s hope so. But if not, we should talk strategy. If Bell has the kid, he’s a valuable asset and probably relatively safe for now. We might only have one shot at getting him back, assuming we can figure out where they’re holding him.”
There was no such thing as safe when it came to cabals, but I didn’t argue or tell him I knew that from my own experience. My past was still a secret I couldn’t share with him. I didn’t know if I’d ever be able to tell him I was Moses Murphy’s granddaughter.
My phone beeped with an incoming message from Bryan with Garrett’s home address and a warning that he had a reputation for being volatile. Fantastic.
I sighed. “Well, Bryan just sent me an address for Aden’s dad, so I’m heading that way with Malcolm. I’ll let you know if I find him.”
“Okay. Be careful.”
“I will.”
We disconnected. I put Garrett’s address into the GPS app on my phone and headed in that direction.
“So, what’s your plan for talking to the dad?” Malcolm asked from the passenger seat. “If the kid isn’t there, he’s going to want to know why you’re looking for him. That could get complicated.”
“It’s going to be tricky,” I said, accelerating to get through a yellow light before it turned red. “I’ve got some ruses in mind that might work. Let’s find this kid.”
3
A quick internet search informed me that Preston Garrett’s father, Preston Garrett Senior, owned a chain of sporting goods stores up and down the west coast. The Garretts were among the wealthiest families in the area, and Preston Junior had enjoyed a life of privilege up until his father disowned him twelve years ago. N
ow Preston’s younger half brother James was the CEO of the company and Preston Senior was semi-retired, spending much of his time traveling the world with his fourth wife.
Aden’s father lived in an apartment south of the river. I found a visitor’s spot in the little lot next to his apartment building and parked. Garrett lived in apartment 801, according to Bryan. If he’d worked last night, he was probably asleep, so I’d likely be waking him up with my knock.
Bryan’s warning about Garrett’s temper had me on guard, but I doubted a mundane human posed much of a threat, regardless of how much time he spent in the gym. Besides, I had Malcolm with me, so between the two of us I figured we could manage even a roided-out bouncer.
Malcolm and I took the elevator up to the eighth floor and followed the hallway to the left. Apartment 801 was on the far end, a corner unit with a balcony containing a couple of chairs, a small table, and a rack of free weights.
I plastered a big smile on my face and knocked loudly.
No answer. I hoped that meant he was asleep and not that he wasn’t home. I knocked again, louder.
Heavy footsteps approached the door. Locks clicked and the door opened, revealing an enormous man with dark hair and eyes, wearing an AC/DC T-shirt and basketball shorts. Tattoos covered his muscular arms.
I recognized him from the photos of his younger self, but the former scion of the Garrett Sporting Goods fortune had put on what looked like a hundred pounds of muscle since his days as a fixture on the city’s social scene. His body blocked the entire doorway, making it impossible for me to see if Aden was inside the apartment.
I sensed Malcolm moving away and guessed he was going into the apartment to see if the kid was there.
“What?” Garrett rumbled.
“Hi, I’m Alison from Kid Spaces,” I chirped. “My company is putting in a bid to construct a playground nearby, and I wondered if you had a few minutes to answer a couple of questions and maybe sign a petition showing your support for the project.” I held up a form on a clipboard. A half-dozen signatures were already scrawled on it from the last time I’d used this ruse. “Do you have children who would like a safe place to play, sir?”
“My son is too old to care about playgrounds,” he snapped. “Go bother someone else.” He started to close the door.
“Even older kids need to get outside and exercise,” I said quickly. “A playground isn’t just for little kids. There will be a basketball court and an area for other activities, like soccer. Is he here? Maybe he could tell us if he’d like something like that.”
His eyes narrowed. “What did you say your name was?”
“Alison with Kid Spaces.”
“Bullshit.” He was suddenly in my face, two hundred and fifty pounds of fatherly fury. “You’re lying. You’re not here about any playground. Why are you asking about my son?”
I raised my hands as if signaling that I didn’t want any trouble, but I spooled air magic in case he decided to get violent. “I’m just here getting signatures and talking to parents.”
“The hell you are. You better tell me what you want with my kid before I decide to shake it out of you.” He reached for my arm.
I dropped the clipboard and hit him in the chest with both palms, intending to use air magic to throw him back into the apartment.
Instead, I saw a blinding flash of bright yellow magic and every drop of magic I had in my body was sucked from me in an instant. I dropped like a sack of wet cement and hit the floor of the hallway in a heap, stunned and unable to move.
Well, now I knew where Aden had gotten his nulling ability. Unlike blood magic, which didn’t run in families, nulling was a recessive inherited trait that skipped generations and was very rare. It hadn’t surprised me that Jana wasn’t a null and Aden was; I’d just assumed the ability had skipped her and shown up in her son. Assumptions like that were the quickest way to end up sprawled on a dirty tile floor without any magic or feeling in your extremities. I should have known better, but my long, tiring weekend had apparently taken its toll on my brain as well as my body.
Preston Garrett towered over me, my stolen magic crackling on his clenched fists along with his own. “Tell the ghost to back off or I’ll blast him into his next life,” he told me.
I’d been nulled so completely that I couldn’t even sense where Malcolm was, though Garrett’s comment indicated he could feel the ghost nearby and figured out we were a team. The guy wasn’t dumb.
Garrett’s nulling and his ability to use it meant Malcolm couldn’t drop him with a sleep spell. Apparently, like Aden, Garrett could use stolen energy as a weapon. What that much power could do to Malcolm I wasn’t sure, but I knew I couldn’t risk it.
I didn’t want to use Malcolm’s name in front of a stranger. I hadn’t registered him with SPEMA as the law required, since I was hiding him from Darius Bell, so the fewer people who knew who or what he was, the better.
“Ghost, it’s okay.” I was getting some feeling back in my hands and feet, but it would be a little while before I’d be able to physically defend myself. “Mr. Garrett and I are going to have a calm conversation about Aden.”
Malcolm’s cold hand touched my shoulder. Do you want me to go tell Sean what happened and bring him here? he asked.
Not yet. Let’s see where this goes.
Sean’s reaction to me getting nulled would be full-on alpha werewolf fury, and I didn’t think that would do anything to help me get information about Aden from his father.
I looked up at Garrett. “I’m not a threat to you or your son. I’m trying to help him. Give me a chance to explain.”
Garrett crouched next to me. It was strange to feel my own magic sizzling on someone else’s skin. “Tell me right now why you’re here and then I’ll decide whether to talk to you or throw your lying ass out on the sidewalk.”
Ruses had gotten me exactly nowhere, so I decided to try honesty. “I just came from talking with Jana. Aden’s been missing since this morning. I was hoping he was with you, or that you knew where he was. I’m a private investigator. Jana hired me to find him.”
Shock left him speechless for a moment. “Why the hell didn’t she call the police?” he demanded finally.
“Because Aden has magic, same as you, and calling the police about him is a dangerous proposition. Do you really want to have the rest of this conversation in the middle of the hallway?”
He looked at me, his expression cold. “Can you walk?”
“Maybe.” I gritted my teeth and sat up. Nulling didn’t just suck all the magic out of your body; it also left you feeling like you’d been up for three days and then fallen down the side of a mountain.
Malcolm touched my shoulder again. Do you want to siphon some magic and energy from me?
I thought about it, then decided against it. I’ll be all right. One of us needs to be at full power in case this goes south.
Farther south, you mean, Malcolm griped.
It took a minute, but I managed to get on my feet. My legs were rubbery and my fingers were still numb. When I was upright and more or less walking, Garrett led the way into his apartment. I shuffled in behind him with Malcolm at my side.
The front room had a large sofa and a recliner. Garrett sat in the recliner. I made it to the couch and fell into the seat.
“Let’s hear it,” he said.
I told him about Aden’s disappearance and the note he’d left saying he was going to the library. Jana’s secrets were her own, so I didn’t mention that Aden’s mother had magic.
“Did you never tell Jana that you have magic?” I asked.
Garrett shook his head. “I’ve never told anyone. My mother had magic. She died when I was five. My father arranged for me to have lessons so I could learn how to control and hide my magic. He never wanted anyone to know about it. He made sure none of his other wives had it before he married them, and neither of my half brothers have magic as far as I know. I had no idea my son had inherited it from me.” He paused. “But if J
ana didn’t think I had magic, where did she think it came from?”
I didn’t reply, but he answered his own question. “She must have magic too. She never told me.” The last part sounded like an accusation.
“You never told her,” I pointed out. “Look, I’m not here to play mediator between you and Jana. I’m looking for your kid. Jana told me you have very little contact with him.”
“Up until about a year ago, that was true. I’m sure she told you what a piece of shit I am and that I’m liable to be a bad influence on Aden.”
“Pretty much.” No sense pretending otherwise.
“Well, I was a piece of shit when Aden was born, and for most of his life. I’ll admit that. My dad was a piece of shit too, but I’m not going to blame him for me being a deadbeat.” He gestured at the apartment. “I’ve been clean for nineteen months. I’ve got a nice place and I work forty hours a week. Yeah, at a vamp club, but it’s an honest paycheck. I’ve even got benefits. Jana doesn’t want to hear about any of that. She doesn’t believe I’ve changed. She thinks I’m trash and I’ll drag Aden down with me. And I’m pissed about it.”
“Pissed enough to get Aden to run away?”
“And risk her calling the cops? Hell no. I’m not registered. And I guess neither is Aden, or Jana either, though I didn’t know about any of that until now.” He swore.
“He doesn’t seem to be with any of his friends. I know you haven’t had much contact with him, but—”
“We talk or text almost every day,” he told me.
I blinked.
He gave me a savage smile. “About a year ago, I got tired of Jana hanging up on me. I gave Aden a prepaid phone so he and I could talk to each other.”
“Can you try calling that phone?”
He got his phone from the bedroom and was already calling when he returned. “It went straight to voice mail,” he told me. After a moment, he said into the phone, “Aden, this is your father. Call me ASAP to let me know you’re safe. If you need help, tell me where you are. I’ll come get you. You won’t be in any trouble. Your mother and I are worried about you.” He paused. “Call me, son.” He ended the call.
