Wildfire

Chapter 11

Garen offered dessert, but I declined. He didn’t insist. He did walk me out to the parking lot and watched over me while I got into my car. He missed the three people who conveniently exited Molly’s Pub at about the same time and got into a silver Range Rover.

I pulled into traffic. “Call Bern.”

The car dialed the number.

“Here,” my cousin said.

“I survived. Where is Cornelius?”

“He just left the restaurant.”

“Did Rogan make it back?”

“Yes.” There was a hint of amusement in my cousin’s voice. “We’re all in the back, in the motor pool.”

“I’ll be there shortly. I need to make a brief detour.” Something Garen said ate at me. It was all about family. If I had a secret, a terrible secret that I didn’t want anyone to know, I would trust my family. Olivia Charles was a Prime. She would trust her family. The ransom had to be somewhere in Rynda’s house.

Traffic was surprisingly light. My escort stayed about a car length behind me the whole way until I pulled in front of Rynda’s house. I stepped out. The doors of the SUV behind me opened and three people jumped out: an Asian man in his early twenties with a faded scar on his left cheek; a dark-haired, serious-looking man in his thirties; and Melosa, Rogan’s personal aegis.

“Why aren’t you in Austin with him?” I asked her.

“Because he considers your safety a higher priority,” she said. “Why are we here?”

“I need to search Rynda’s house.”

“It’s already been searched,” the dark-haired man said.

“I know.” I headed for the door.

“Oh no, you don’t.” Melosa ran in front of me and blocked my way. “Delun?”

“On it.” The Asian man moved toward the door and punched in the code. The door swung open under the pressure of his fingertips. He moved inside, stepping lightly, and paused.

A long moment passed.

“Clear,” he said. “It’s empty.”

He turned and flipped the lights on. I walked into the house. Someone had cleaned the mess. The bloodstains were gone from the tiles and the overturned Christmas tree had disappeared.

I stopped in the living room. Bits and pieces of past conversations floated up onto the surface of my memory.

. . . She was a wonderful grandmother to my children. She loved them so much . . .

. . . It’s not in the computer. It’s somewhere in the house . . .

. . . but Olivia saw it. She adored him. She framed every painting he made . . .

. . . in the end, it’s all about family . . .

I stepped over to the nearest painting on the wall. Two trees, standing close to each other, their trunks almost touching. The lines of the painting were obviously drawn by a child, slightly shaky and basic, but the colors, the vibrant greens and rich browns, drew the eye. The sunlit crowns of the trees almost glowed. It made me want to go outside to breathe in the air and run my hand across the bark. I would hang it in my office and smile every time I looked at it.

I took it off the wall. A plain black frame, rectangular, wooden, the kind you could get in any craft or art supply store. Gently I pried it open and pulled the frame apart. No secret code, no writing on the mat, no piece of translucent rice paper hidden between the mat and the painting itself. I plucked the heavy piece of watercolor paper out and held the painting up so the light shone through it.

Paint and paper fibers. Even if I reached into left field for some improbable spy solution to this mystery, an invisible ink still left traces. A pen would’ve left scratches on the smooth dense paper. A brush would’ve left patterns as it soaked into the texture. Watercolor paint came in varying pH and posed a significant risk to reacting with the ink, not to mention that watercolor painting required a lot of water. Soaking the paper with the hidden message on it was risky. No, the painting was exactly what it pretended to be.

I knocked on the frame, looking for hollow spots. Only solid wood answered.

“What are you looking for?” Melosa asked.

“I’ll know it when I see it.”

“I’ll go see if I can find more,” the dark-haired man offered.

I laid the painting on the floor and tried the next one. A picture of the house, two adults and two children, and a ghostly outline of a dog. Was the dog dead? Was Kyle wishing for a puppy? I took the painting off the wall, just as the dark-haired man and Delun brought in four more. They moved on upstairs, while Melosa and I took the next frame apart.

Half an hour later all twenty-four paintings lay on the floor. I had gone through every inch of paper and wood with a fine-toothed comb. Nothing.

The disappointment crushed me. I had been so sure.

The paintings ticked all the right boxes, ranking right there with hollow books as a cliché hiding place: most people wouldn’t think of it, so those who did thought they were being really clever and enjoyed knowing that their valuables were hidden in plain sight. It was just the kind of thing I would’ve expected Olivia Charles to do. She framed all of Kyle’s paintings.

“Do you want to look anywhere else?” Delun asked.

“Not tonight.” I’d come back in the morning with an ultraviolet light and give it another go. “Let’s go home.”

The escort faithfully followed me all the way to the parking lot in front of the warehouse, then they veered toward Rogan’s HQ. I parked the car, got out, and walked around the warehouse. It was easier than punching the code in and going through all the doors inside.

I turned the corner. A twisted wreck that might have been a car at some point lay mangled in the street. Someone had taken a car frame, crushed and twisted it, like a piece of aluminum foil, and then tossed it onto the street. Odd.

Ahead the commerce-size garage door stood open, spilling yellow electric light onto the street and another dented wreckage. This one looked like some giant pressed the car into a ball and decided to practice soccer tricks with it.

I sped up.

The motor pool was mostly empty. Someone had conveniently moved the vehicles to the side, leaving an open space in the center. Smaller chunks of metal, wrenched and twisted, littered the concrete floor. Grandma Frida leaned against Romeo. He was Grandma Frida’s pet project. He’d started out his life as an M551 Sheridan, a light armored tank, armed with nine antitank Shillelagh missiles, and other fun things. However, Grandma Frida had made modifications, and ever since Romeo saw some action almost two weeks ago, she’d been tinkering with him nonstop.

At the far end, near the inner wall, Rogan loomed, like the living embodiment of manly darkness, by two large screens, studying the footage of Garen. On the left, Bern sat in a chair a few feet away from the screen with his keyboard on his lap. Bug had straddled a chair backwards on the right and leaned over the back of it, his chin on his forearms. My mother sat near Bug, Grandma Frida’s knitting on her lap. As I approached, she picked at it with a crochet hook and unraveled another tangled row. Two blankets lay on the floor, next to a half-finished bowl of popcorn. My sisters must’ve been in attendance.

I paused by Grandma Frida and nodded at the metal carnage.

“He was watching your date and the walls started buckling. I needed some old frames scrapped so I gave him something to do.”

“And the girls?”

“They went to bed. While you were having your adventures, we’ve been running tornado drills all day. They’re sick to death of running across the street into the basement. Don’t worry, they watched the whole thing. You’ll get an earful tomorrow.”

I rolled my eyes. That’s what was missing in my life, the teenager perspective. “What’s Mom doing?”

Grandma Frida gave me the evil eye. “That yarn cost thirty-eight dollars a skein. I want her to salvage it. I tried doing it myself, except I have frayed nerves today. I was going to set it on fire for closure, but your mother took away my blowtorch.”

I nodded and went to stand by Rogan. “Did you catch all that?”

“Yes.” The voice was glacially cold.

“I especially liked the part where he casually threatened me.”

“I caught that too,” he said.

I leaned forward to look at his face. The dragon was out in all his terrifying glory. I grinned. “What are you thinking about?”

“Nothing.”

Lie. “You can’t kill Garen Shaffer.”

“Technically, I can. I choose not to. And I wasn’t thinking of killing him.”

“If you go over to his place and break his arms in five places, it would look bad. People will be afraid to do business with me.”

“I wasn’t thinking of breaking his arms either. I was thinking of hamstringing his corporation, ripping it apart, and selling it piece by piece while he watched.”

Mad Rogan, the Scourge of Mexico. A civilized and considerate enemy. “You can’t ruin every man who threatens me.”

“Yes, I can. Besides, I would only have to ruin the first couple and the rest will get the hint. Except for the Maderos, who are particularly stupid, apparently.”

“It’s okay. I had a nice chat with Frank and Dave’s grandpa. We understand each other now.”

On screen, Garen reached out and touched my hand. The carved biceps on Rogan’s arm visibly tensed. Behind us, a chunk of metal rose in the air and crimped, contorting with a harsh screech.

I had to thaw him out. “See how he maintains eye contact. A gentle, yet firm touch, just brief enough to underscore sincerity. Reassurance that he’s on my side, he’s in charge, and he will take care of everything.”

Bug turned and looked at me, his face surprised.

I winked at him. “Garen knows how to read people. He watched them lie his entire life. It gives you a unique perspective. He knows how to obtain a confession. You do it by convincing the person you’re on their side. He started with that charming confession about being uncomfortable with choosing the wine and it only got better from there. He was sincere, disarming, and logical.”

“Is that magic?” Bug asked.

“No, it’s human nature. Shaffer is a professional interrogator. But so am I.” I gave Bug my best reassuring smile. “I can see into your brain, Bug. I know what makes you tick.”

He shuddered. “Don’t do that.”

Bern laughed in his chair. Rogan remained stoic. Still no dice.

“The good news is, Garen isn’t involved in the conspiracy, so he isn’t our problem. We can set this aside and move on.”

Rogan gave no indication he heard me.

“I have something to tell you, Rogan.”

His expression didn’t change.

“Rogan.” I touched his arm.

He came to, turned, and looked at me, his attention completely focused on me. The effect was overpowering. For this moment nothing existed in Rogan’s universe except me. I loved when he did that.

“Yes?”

“I have a strong reason to believe that Brian Sherwood is working with Alexander Sturm.”

“Fuck.”

“Yep.”

“Why?”

“He wasn’t satisfied with the way his family turned out. His daughter is an empath, which is useless as far as he’s concerned. Kyle has no magic, and it threatens Brian. His parents raised Brian as their golden child, whose only value was in his talent, which would ensure he would inherit BioCore and become a Prime of a certain standing. His entire self-worth is tied up in being Brian Sherwood, the brilliant herbamagos Prime and Head of House Sherwood. Brian knew since birth that he is special and he has grown accustomed to the world acknowledging it. He hates the idea that someone might question his ability to sire Prime children. He wanted out for a while, but as long as Olivia Charles was alive, he didn’t dare to make any waves in that placid pond. And since his wife became a social pariah, now he views her as a liability.”

He thought about it. “Olivia is dead. Why not just divorce Rynda?”

“Because Edward told him that Brian has certain responsibilities as a husband and father and if he shirked those responsibilities, Edward would retire, leaving BioCore in Brian’s hands. Brian can’t run that company. He has no idea how to do it. If Edward retires, all of Brian’s prestige evaporates. He knows he will run BioCore into the ground. He would no longer be treated with deference. Nobody would think he was important.”

Rogan’s eyes darkened, his expression harsh. “But if something happened to Rynda, and Brian became a widower, things line up rather nicely.”

“Yes. He wouldn’t hire a hit man. It’s too risky and he doesn’t even know where to look for one. He’s probably terrified that if he tried to find someone, they would turn out to be an undercover cop and he’d end up in prison. This way everything is taken care of: his new violent friends get what they want while he cools his heels in some mansion, and when the time comes to make the exchange, Rynda is tragically killed.”

Rogan nodded. “If not at the exchange, then shortly after. Perhaps the children die with her.”

“Yes. He’s then free to pursue his new life, and nobody is the wiser.”

“It’s plausible. How solid is this?”

“We know that the kidnapping occurred in view of one of only three cameras facing Memorial Drive,” Bug said.

“We can put Brian and Sturm together in a coffee shop two days before the kidnapping,” Bern said. “We also know that someone accessed his home computer that night, using Brian’s credentials, while Brian and Rynda were out.”

“We have Edward Sherwood, who told me about the conversation he had with his brother. He didn’t lie. And, the ear they sent us doesn’t belong to Brian,” I finished.

“Have you told Rynda?” Rogan asked.

“Not yet. But I will. She’s my client, and her life and the lives of her children may be in danger.”

“If she’s so empathic, how come she didn’t see this coming?” Grandma Frida asked.

“I listened to the initial interview,” I said. “She never said, ‘Brian loves me.’ She said Brian takes care of her and the kids. She talked about how much the kids miss him. I think she sensed the resentment. What I don’t understand is why the marriage happened in the first place. Rynda didn’t need his money, and as much as she craved stability, I find it hard to believe she saw something irresistible in him.”

“I can explain that,” Rogan said.

“How did you figure it out?”

“I asked my mother. Rynda is an NPTN WC variant.”

“What does that mean?” I asked.

“NPTN is a gene responsible for coding neuroplastin, a protein. Some variants of the NPTN gene are linked to higher intelligence,” Rogan explained. “Normally magic is passed on from parents to children, and it’s hereditary in power and type, which is why we have Houses.”

That made sense. If the parents were aquakinetics, water mages, their children likely would be water mages as well. There was some variation, but the talents didn’t vary widely. Two water mages might have a child who is psychrokinetic, able to control ice, or mistukinetic, able to control mist and fog. But they wouldn’t make a truthseeker, for example.

“People with NPTN WC variant roll the dice,” Rogan said. “WC stands for wild card. Their children may or may not be magic, and those who have power are unpredictable. If Rynda’s children have magic, it will likely be of a mental type. They might be empaths, telepaths, precogs, or harmonizers. There is no way to predict the exact nature of it. My father was willing to roll the dice with Rynda, because he was confident in our genetic line. He figured that at least one of my children would be a strong telekinetic, and if anyone could produce a telekinetic telepath, it would be Rynda.”

“But most Primes don’t want to play,” I guessed. “Rynda could jeopardize the line.”

Rogan grimaced. “Yes and no. Some Houses would jump on the chance for variation, but most of these marriages wouldn’t be to the Head of the House. Heads of the House want their children to inherit the family throne. According to my mother, Olivia wouldn’t settle for anything less for her daughter, which is why she hated me. I ruined her perfect plan by breaking the engagement.”

“Brian offered all the right things,” I thought out loud. “He was the Head of his House. He owned a thriving corporation which would secure income for the House. He was stable, focused on safety, low-key enough to not upset Rynda with wild emotional swings, and susceptible to pressure. I bet Olivia had invested in BioCore.”

“You’re thinking like a Prime again,” Rogan said, appreciation in his eyes.

I nodded. “If he stepped out of line, she could apply pressure socially and financially. She was trying to keep her daughter safe.” Olivia must’ve loved Rynda so much.

My mother sighed. “Your world is screwed up, Rogan.”

“I know,” he said quietly.

“And now my daughter is in it.” Mom put the half-unraveled scarf down. “I’ll finish in the morning.”

She left.

“It’s late for me too,” Grandma Frida declared.

“Okay, okay,” I grumbled. “We can take the hint.”

Bernard got up and shut down the equipment. The screens went black. Bug jumped off his chair and trotted outside. Rogan dipped his head to look at me. The mask slipped, and Connor was looking at me. I caught a flash of the upstairs room, with the shroud of night sky spread above us. It was quick and faint, a mere shred of projection. He must’ve crushed it the instant he thought of it, but I caught it anyway.

Come home with me.

Of course I will, Connor.

I slipped closer to him, fitting myself in his arm. “I’m tired and my feet hurt.”

He chuckled. “Want me to carry you?”

He could and probably would if I asked. “No. I have an image to maintain.”

We walked out of the motor pool. The door rumbled shut behind us.

“What image is that?”

“According to Garen, I’m a young Victoria Tremaine, terrible and glorious.”

“Would you like me to commission a golden palanquin for you?”

“Possibly.” The night sky was endless above us. “I searched Rynda’s house. I thought whatever they were looking for might be in the paintings Kyle made. It wasn’t.”

“Sorry,” he said.

“The deadline is up tomorrow at four. We still have nothing.”

“I know. One good thing came out of this mess. At least we don’t have to worry about keeping that bastard alive. They’re not going to kill him.”

“And if they do, they would be doing us a favor,” I finished.

“So vicious.”

“This is the worst betrayal. It’s worse than an affair. He’s Rynda’s husband. He didn’t even have the guts to ask for a divorce.”

“We’ll get him,” Rogan promised.

“How did it go in Austin?”

“The Ade-Afefe are thinking about it. That was the best I could do.” His voice dripped with disappointment. “You win some, you lose some.”

“Stellar day for us both, huh?”

“Yes.” He fell silent. “Shaffer is right about one thing. When it comes to assuring the hereditary stability of truthseeker talent, his genes win.”

That’s what true love looked like. Shaffer wouldn’t know it if it was staring him in the face.

“I’ll take it under advisement.”

Everything was screwed up. The deadline was almost up, and I still had nothing. Sturm wouldn’t let it go. There would be repercussions, and we had very little protection against his magic. Tomorrow I’d have to explain to Rynda that her husband most likely plotted to murder her. My evil grandmother was still trying to kidnap me. Leon still wanted to be an assassin when he grew up. The trials were growing closer.

I just wanted a break from it all. I wanted to put it away until tomorrow, because if I thought about it too much, I’d collapse like an imploded building.

We took the stairs to the second floor. I thought about the room under the night sky, and the massive bed, and him naked, his weight on me, the feel of steel-hard muscle, the way he looked at me, the intoxicating taste of his magic dripping on my skin and setting my nerves on fire . . .

“Nevada,” he said, his voice gaining a harsh edge.

“Yes?”

“Move faster.”

I let him chase me up the stairs. He caught me on the landing and kissed me. I tasted Rogan, man and coffee, inhaled the scent of sandalwood on his skin, and felt his arms around me. Magic caressed my neck, hot and velvet-soft, and then the world no longer mattered.

The morning came too soon.

“You’re lying.” Red blotches appeared on Rynda’s cheeks.

“Unfortunately, no. Everything I told you is backed up by evidence and personal accounts. Edward will verify his part in it. He didn’t lie to me.”

She looked away from me. We sat on the balcony off the second floor, as far away from any audience as we could. The raw pain on her face made me ill. I had half convinced myself that she had to have known or at least suspected that Brian was in on the whole thing. I was wrong. She had no idea. It hit her like a ton of bricks.

“Why?” she said, her voice broken. “How? How could he do this to us? To me and the kids?”

“He’s selfish and manipulative. Adults don’t run away from stress and problems. We deal with them. The first time he ran away, someone should’ve sat him down and explained to him how much he worried everyone. And then they should’ve grounded him, so he wouldn’t do it again. Instead they encouraged it and he fell into a pattern. He’s afraid of confrontations. Killing you and the kids is easier than facing Edward or dealing with the divorce. You’re the empath, Rynda. You know him better than anyone.”

“I stopped,” she said. Her eyes were haunted.

“You stopped what?”

“I stopped scanning him years ago, after Kyle was born. The indifference was too much to take. I couldn’t handle it. Indifference from him, derision from his parents, disappointment from my mother. I shut it out. I hadn’t used my talent in years.”

Not using magic was like cutting off a chunk of your soul. It must’ve hurt so much to know what Brian really felt for her. For their kids.

“The only people safe to scan are the children and . . . the children.”

And Edward. She’d almost said it.

“And I don’t need empathy to know what they are feeling. They’re my babies. I grew them inside me, and I gave birth to them. They are a part of me and a part of him. And he wants them dead. How do I tell them that?”

“I wouldn’t.”

“I’m a pity fuck.”

“I’m sorry?”

Rynda turned to me, her eyes red. She was on the verge of tears. “I’m the daughter with the useless magic talent, a disappointment to my mother. She loved me, but she couldn’t hide it. An abandoned bride. A match nobody wanted because of her wild genes. A wife whose husband didn’t love her. A mother who didn’t manage to pass the right DNA to her children.”

Well, that progressed into a complete catastrophe. I had no idea what to say.

Rynda sniffed.

I got up and brought her a box of Kleenex.

“You have no idea what it’s like to be an empath. People look at you like you’re some horrible freak.”

I leaned forward. “Victoria Tremaine is my grandmother.”

Rynda drew back as if I had thrown a venomous snake on the table between us.

“I don’t need to be an empath to know you’re horrified.” I smiled.

“I . . . I didn’t mean . . .”

“The first time I made a man tell me his secrets against his will, he curled up on the ground and cried. He was an experienced mercenary, but he cried like a hurt child, because I’d violated his mind. So you and I have things in common. You’re not a disappointment to anyone. You don’t need anyone’s approval.”

She closed her mouth and sat up straighter. “Does Rogan know about Brian’s betrayal?”

“Yes.”

“Who else?”

“My family, Cornelius, Bug, Edward, and Edward’s security chief. Possibly your mother-in-law.”

“What happens now?”

“We proceed as if we don’t know about Brian. We still have to find the thing they want. They’re not going to stop until we do, or until we end the whole organization permanently.”

She got up. “I’ll have to tell the children. They must know that they can’t trust their father.”

“Rynda . . .”

She walked away.

Well, that went well.

I picked myself up and went across the street to our warehouse. We had hours until the deadline was due. I could practically feel the time ticking away. It ate at me. We had to find Olivia’s secret. I had to find it. Rynda and her little family wouldn’t be safe until I did. If Sturm didn’t get what he wanted, he would retaliate. He’d probably retaliate anyway. Rogan almost killed him in the steakhouse. Sturm wouldn’t let that go.

Everything went wrong for Rynda. Everything went wrong in this investigation, period. This one thing had to go right.

Inside, Catalina’s shrill voice sliced at my eardrums. “I don’t want to talk about it!”

Whenever she got upset, her voice shot up into piercing notes.

I rounded the corner.

“Catalina!” Arabella chased her. Matilda trailed her, her fluffy white cat following her. I didn’t know she was still here.

“I don’t want to talk about it!” The door to Catalina’s room thudded shut.

“You’re being ridiculous,” Arabella growled.

“What is it?”

“She deleted her Instagram account.”

“Why?”

“Alessandro Sagredo.” Arabella put her hands on her hips.

“Did he say something to her?” If he said something mean to my sister, I’d skin him alive.

“No.”

“Then what’s the problem?”

Arabella whipped out her phone and stuck it under my nose. “He looks like that!”

The man on the phone looked about twenty and he was stunning. Square jaw; full, perfectly drawn mouth; strong nose; narrow, almost green hazel eyes under dark eyebrows. A mass of chocolate-brown hair, trimmed in an expensive haircut, framed it all, setting off the strong lines of his face that promised to become chiseled with time. Life hadn’t beaten him up yet, and there was still something fresh about his face, but the harshness had begun to break through. He looked like he was the son of a Roman gladiator about to enter the arena for the first time. And he stood leaning against a beautiful silver and blue Maserati.

“He follows like three people on Instagram,” Arabella said. “And Catalina. She woke up with six thousand followers, so she deleted the account, because she is an idiot!”

“Are you going to marry him, Catalina?” Matilda asked seriously.

The door swung open, revealing Catalina. She stabbed her finger at Arabella. “Stay out of my business, you little psycho. You too, Matilda.”

She slammed the door shut.

Matilda looked at the door, looked at me, and laughed like little silver bells ringing.

“I don’t have time for this.” I started down the hallway. It was morning, therefore Bern would be in the kitchen, eating his second or third breakfast.

“Nevada, do something!” Arabella snarled behind me.

“No time.”

“I hate this family!”

“We hate you too.”

“Hehe!” The silver bells rang.

Bern sat at the kitchen table, putting away a bowl of cereal.

“Will you please come with me to Rynda’s house? I want to look through it one more time in case I missed something. I don’t want to go by myself, and I don’t want to ask Cornelius because he’ll bring Zeus and I have trouble concentrating when he’s around. I don’t want to take Leon either, because I don’t want to be responsible for him shooting anyone. I just want to think quietly.”

Bern got up and took his bowl of cereal to the sink. “Let’s go.”

Rynda’s house stood quiet. Bern and I walked through the front entrance into the living room, our steps loud on the tiled floor. Houston decided that we really needed some rain, and the light filtering through the dense blanket of clouds was watery and dim. The air felt oppressive.

“Gloomy,” Bern observed.

“Yes.” The house felt like a crypt. “I wonder if Rynda will sell it.”

“I would,” Bern said. “Where do you want to look?”

“I’m not sure,” I said. “Divide and conquer?”

We split up. I headed for the kitchen. Rogan’s people had already swept through the place. I’d reviewed the search report. They were thorough and efficient. But they might have missed something.

I started with the pantry. An hour later I was done with the kitchen. Coffee proved to be coffee, rice turned out to be rice, and a container of sugar contained only sugar. No hidden Ziploc bags containing mysterious evidence. I shook the cans one by one. None showed any signs of tampering. No hidden spots in the dishes. Nothing taped to the inside of the cabinets. We were wasting time we didn’t have, but every instinct I had told me that whatever we were looking for was here somewhere.

“Nevada?” Bern called.

I walked into the living room. He stood over Kyle’s paintings. I came over to stand next to him.

“What are these?” he asked.

“Kyle’s paintings. Olivia Charles had them framed. I’ve gone through them. No hidden ink. Nothing in the frames. I was so sure that there was something hidden here.”

Bern crouched and picked up the top painting. A curving road flanked by trees.

“There is something about them,” I said. “It makes you want to keep looking at them.”

Bern wandered to the center of the room where the light from the back window shone on the carpet, and put the painting down.

“Give me the rest?” he asked.

I picked up a stack of paintings and handed him the next one, a tiny sea with a too-big pirate ship on it. He took a few steps backwards and placed the painting to the left and below the first one. “Next.”

A playground with a cute monster holding a red balloon and peering out of the bushes followed, then the curve of a road with a bright yellow sports car, then the clouds with a white, almost transparent flying ship. Another road with a knight in armor riding on his horse. Bern put it between the first painting and the yellow car. The road connected.

The tiny hairs on the back of my neck rose.

We went through the stack, Bern placing the pictures one by one into a six-by-four grid, like pieces of a puzzle clicking together. We finished and stood back. A road wound in a wide arc around a house that was part suburban home, part castle, and part magic tower. A playground lay to the right, a pond just below, mountains to the left, and in the bottom left corner, four paintings came together to form an X near a gnarled tree.

“A map,” I whispered.

“He isn’t a dud,” Bern said. “He’s Magister Examplaria. A pattern mage, like me.”

Grandma gave Kyle a treasure. He hid it and then he drew a map to it, because he couldn’t help himself. And Olivia must’ve known. I’d helped to take away the only person in Kyle’s life who understood him.

“I’m an idiot,” I said.

Bern glanced at me.

“I should’ve questioned the children. Instead I let Rynda do it, because they were traumatized by Vincent. I let it get personal, and it blinded me.” This is why Dad always cautioned about getting too involved.

“We have it now,” Bern said. “You can beat yourself up later. The sea is the pool. We’ll need a shovel. He must’ve buried it. Pirate treasure is always buried.”

I snapped a picture of the map with my phone. We found a pair of shovels in the garden shed and tracked our way through the lot down to the back of the property, where the woods stood dense. We pushed through the brush into a small clearing.

The sky broke open, sifting cold rain on us. I surveyed the clearing. On the right a big oak spread its branches, on the left two stumps and more brush. No signs of digging marked the forest floor.

If I were a little boy, where would I bury my treasure?

He’d made sure to point out the tree on the map. The tree was important.

I circled the big oak. Little round marks punctured the bark on the north side, two in a row, at about even intervals.

“What is it?” Bern asked.

“This was a climbing tree. These are nail holes. They must’ve nailed planks to it and then someone pulled them off.”

Bern took a running start and jumped. His hands caught the thick lower branch and he pulled himself up.

“Anything?”

“A hollow. Hold on.”

He jumped back down, a canvas bag in his hands. He set it on the ground, and I gently pulled the strings open. A plastic pirate chest, the kind you could get in a craft store or online, the plastic made to look like dark aged wood. A skull sat where the lid met the box, with two plastic swords thrust through the skull’s eyes. Smaller skulls decorated the surface.

Bern carefully pulled the swords free and opened the chest. I took the objects out one by one, carefully placing them on the canvas. A Swiss Army knife. A little velvet sack containing ten golden dollar coins, each with a different president. Three bullets. A yellow sports car. A flashlight. And a small cardboard jewelry box, the kind you would use to store a necklace.

Gently I opened it. A single USB stick lay on the velvet cushion. Inside the lid in a confident feminine cursive, someone had written, “Grandma’s Secret.”

I hugged the box. I felt like crying.

I drove through Houston’s traffic.

“It’s encrypted,” Bern said, his fingers flying over the keyboard of his laptop.

“Can you break it?”

“I’ll need time. It’s not one of the commercially available cyphers. This is a custom job and it’s very good.”

“Call Rogan.”

The car obediently dialed the number.

“Yes?” he answered.

“We have Olivia Charles’ USB. We can meet their demands.”

“What’s on it?”

“It’s encrypted. We’re bringing it home, but Bern’s uploading it to our home server as we speak.”

“Good. Great.”

“Okay, bye.” I hesitated for a moment. Why not? “Love you.”

There was a slight pause. “I love you too.”

I hung up and grinned. The Scourge of Mexico just told me he loved me. I never got tired of hearing it.

“What’s going to happen when this is over?” Bern asked.

“What do you mean?”

“What will happen with you and Rogan once this emergency is over?”

“Then we’ll have to do the trials.”

“You’re avoiding the question.”

“What exactly is the question, Bern?”

“Once all of these crises are over, what will happen with you and Rogan? Will you move with him into his house? Will you commute to work? Are you planning to marry him? Do you want to marry him?”

Well, that was unexpected. “You’ve been hanging out with Grandma Frida for too long. Are you worried I might take advantage of Rogan’s virtue and shack up with him?”

“No, I’m worried that you have no plan. You’re not thinking about any of these things, and you need to figure them out, not for us, but for yourself. What is it you want?”

That part was easy. I wanted to wake up next to Rogan every morning. Sometimes he would be Connor, sometimes he would be Mad Rogan, and I was good with that. I loved all of him.

“I don’t know how it will turn out. I’m taking it one day at a time.”

“We’ll be fine,” Bern said. “You don’t need to worry about us.”

“What do you mean?”

“I checked the accounts. We have enough money to survive on for about ten months. Maybe a year if we stretch. With no new cases coming in.”

“I know that.”

“You don’t need to worry about money. We can wait on things like House security. Don’t jump into something because you think that the family needs things, because we’ve become a House.”

Thank you, Garen Shaffer. “It’s not like that. I love him, Bern. I mean that.”

“I was afraid of that,” he said quietly. “I don’t want you to be hurt.”

“Thank you. Rogan won’t hurt me.”

“You weren’t there when he was watching you with Garen. His face was flat. Cold. He stood there, without an expression on his face, and twisted solid metal into bows like it was Play-Doh.”

“He didn’t prevent me from going to that dinner. He never asked me not to go. When Garen walked into my office, he didn’t storm over and try to throw him out. He put himself on a chain for my benefit, because as much as he wants to wrap me in bubble wrap and kidnap me to his lair, he knows I wouldn’t stand for it. He’s trying to make sure I see all choices available to us as an emerging House. As we were walking home, after he watched me and Garen, he told me one more time that from a genetic perspective, Garen was the better choice.”

“Is Garen the better choice?”

“No. Because I don’t love him. Even if love wasn’t a factor, I would choose Rogan over him. When we were naked and freezing in David Howling’s cistern, Rogan sacrificed himself for me. He fully expected to die. If Garen and I were in danger, and only one of us could make it, Garen would rationalize why he was the better choice to survive and leave me.”

“Just be careful, Nevada.”

It was too late for that. I was all in. “I will.”

The phone rang. An unfamiliar number. I accepted. “You’ve reached Nevada Baylor.”

“You wanted to talk,” a cultured female voice said. “I will meet you at Takara in fifteen minutes. If you do not show, I’ll know where we stand.”

The call ended.

“Was that . . . ?” Bern blinked.

“That was Victoria Tremaine.” When Linus Duncan made you a promise, he kept it. She’d picked Takara, the place where I often ate. It was a dig at me. See, I know where you eat and what you like to order. I have your whole life under surveillance.

I locked my jaw and took the exit.

“You can’t be serious,” Bern said.

“She tried twice and failed both times. She wants to talk, I’ll talk to her.”

“This isn’t wise.”

“If we don’t talk, she’ll just keep trying and we can’t afford that. Eventually the girls and Leon have to go to school. We have to live normal lives. Our House status will protect us, but she’s determined. I don’t want her throwing wrenches into it.”

“How do you know it’s safe?”

“Because Linus Duncan arranged it. Do you want me to drop you off?”

“No.” Bern pulled out his phone.

“What are you doing?”

“Texting Bug. I want to know what we’re driving into. I want him to get eyes on the restaurant, and I want him to get us some backup.”

Takara served as our go-to sushi place when we wanted a treat. Its listing said Asian Fusion, which in their case meant authentic Japanese cuisine and bulgogi on the menu. A quiet place, furnished in rich tones of brown and green with elegant but comfortable décor. When Rogan invited me to our first lunch, I decided to meet him there, because Takara sat right in the middle of a large shopping plaza off I-10 that had everything from Toys “R” Us and Academy Sports, to Olive Garden and H-E-B, the trademark Texas grocery store. Nonstop traffic, lots of people, and very little privacy. The perfect place to meet someone you don’t trust.

Despite the two-thirds full parking lot, I recognized Victoria’s car immediately. It was the only Mercedes with a human Rottweiler in a suit stationed by it. I parked at the opposite end of the parking lot.

“Do you want to come in?” I asked Bern.

“No. She doesn’t want to see me. I’m going to stay here and keep the car running in case you come running out.”

I handed the keys to him and stepped out of the vehicle. Victoria’s bodyguard watched me as I crossed the parking lot. Twenty yards separated me from the door, and each step proved harder than the last. I could barely move. Finally my hand fastened around the door handle. Made it.

I took a deep breath and walked into Takara with my head held high.

The restaurant was empty, except for one patron. Victoria Tremaine sat in the back by the window. Almost the same table Rogan had chosen. She wore a beautifully tailored black suit. A stunning blue and turquoise shawl, gossamer thin and embroidered with peacock feathers, hung off her left shoulder. It gleamed, catching the light from the window, with what was probably real gold thread.

A hostess smiled at me.

“I’m with the lady in the shawl,” I told her.

Her smile faltered slightly. “Please, this way.”

“No need. I see her.”

I marched to the table and checked the floor for traces of an arcane circle, just in case.

Victoria Tremaine scoffed.

“One can never be too careful.” I sat in the chair.

A waiter approached us.

“Bring hot tea,” Victoria ordered. “Green or black, whatever is best in the house. Two cups. Leave the kettle and keep it refilled. My granddaughter and I will be talking. Don’t disturb us.”

The waiter took off at a near run.

When I thought of grandmother, I thought of Grandma Frida, with her halo of platinum curls and the comforting smell of machine grease and gun oil that seemed to follow her everywhere. To me, that word meant safety and warmth. No matter how badly I screwed things up with Mom and Dad, Grandma Frida would always be there to listen, to make me laugh.

Victoria Tremaine couldn’t be more different. She was taller and heavier than Grandma Frida, who was always bird-boned, but it was a formidable kind of heaviness. She wasn’t fat, she was solid, as if the age accreted around her. Lines crossed her face. Unlike most aging wealthy, she hadn’t bothered with either plastic surgery or illusion magic. Her hair, styled the last time I saw a recording of her, had been artfully chopped into a shorter cut that emphasized the severe lines of her face. I looked at her eyes and wished I hadn’t. They were the exact blue of my father’s. But my father’s eyes had been kind, laughing, sometimes stern. Victoria’s eyes were those of a raptor. She wasn’t an evil witch, she was the aging queen. Instead of mellowing with age, she had only grown more dangerous, ruthless, and merciless.

“You look like James,” she said.

“I also hold his values.”

“And what are those?”

“I take care of my family, and I try to be a good person.”

“A good person?” She leaned half an inch forward. “Do tell.”

If we took that exit, we’d be at it for a while. “You wanted to speak to me. I’m here.”

“I want you to drop this House Baylor nonsense. You belong to House Tremaine.”

“No. Was there anything else?”

“You have no connections. You have no finances, no workforce, and you don’t even know enough to realize how much you don’t know.”

“I’ll learn.”

The waiter brought the tea and placed it in front of us with two cups.

“At what cost? You have no idea how deep these waters are. We are related by blood. Blood is the only thing in this world you can trust.”

The waiter poured the tea and took off.

“I know exactly how deep they are. I know that there is an organization which is attempting to destabilize Houston with the long-range goal of installing an authoritarian government based on the Roman Empire. I know that the man at the head of it calls himself Caesar. I know that this plan began with Adam Pierce. I know that Olivia Charles and David Howling were part of the same conspiracy, which also includes Vincent Harcourt and Alexander Sturm. David Howling told this to me before I snapped his neck. I know that this conspiracy repeatedly targeted my family, going as far as to hire mercenaries to assault the warehouse where we live. They had orders to kill me and my sisters. I also know that you were the one who lifted the hex on the mind of a young man to find the artifact for Adam Pierce. And that you hexed Vincent Harcourt to keep him from spilling Caesar’s secrets. You’re in this conspiracy up to your elbows.”

I took a breath. “So I’m a little confused. You tell me that I’m supposed to trust you because you and I are blood. When was blood the most important thing to you? Was it when the mercenaries arrived in the middle of the night to butcher us, when Howling iced the overpass while I was in the car behind him so I would wreck and die, or when Adam tried to burn me to death in the middle of downtown?”

Victoria narrowed her eyes. “Clever girl.”

I sipped my tea.

“You have no proof.”

“I don’t need proof. A truthseeker hexed Vincent’s mind. There are only three truthseeker Houses in the US. I met Garen Shaffer and eliminated him as a suspect.”

“You cracked Garen Shaffer?” Skepticism filled her voice.

“I didn’t have to. He wanted to play a game, and he lost.”

“He didn’t cloak?”

“He did at some point, but I picked through it. Garen Shaffer is too focused on the welfare of his family and his corporate health to become involved in a conspiracy. He’s quite content with things as they are. House Lin is up to their throats in government contracts.” Rogan had shared that handy fact with me one night, while we discussed the future of House Baylor. “Involving themselves with the conspiracy would be too risky, as they’re under heavy scrutiny. That leaves you. You fit the profile.”

“Oh, so there is a profile?”

“Yes. Everyone involved comes from an old powerful House, at least four generations deep. Everyone is dissatisfied with the status quo. Pierce wanted to burn the world free of repercussions and constraints of the law. David Howling wanted to destroy his brother and take over his House. Olivia Charles hated to see her only daughter stuck in a loveless marriage because of her genes. She had reached the apex of her social climb, but it wasn’t enough. She wanted the kind of status that would allow Rynda to pick and choose her husband among the elite of the elites, no matter her genes. Vincent Harcourt is a sadist, who is almost never given free rein by his House. Not sure what Sturm’s issues are, but he definitely has some.”

“And me?” Her voice was deceptively mild.

“Your only son ran away when he was still a teenager. You never had another child, probably because you can’t. Without heirs, House Tremaine will die with you.”

Victoria’s face showed no emotion. Nothing at all, as if she were carved from rock.

“You looked for him and terrorized everyone you thought might be connected to his disappearance. But you went too far, and you were made to stop. You wanted the freedom of looking for your son. You wanted access to every database, every information bank, every person you decided to question without such pesky limitations as criminal code or rulings of the Assembly. You wanted more power. What you did is treason. My father wouldn’t stand for it and neither will I. I want nothing to do with you.”

I got up, turned away, and took a step.

“The middle one is a siren,” Victoria said behind me. “Like her grandfather. But the youngest is neither a siren, nor truthseeker. She is something else. Something you can never let out.”

Catalina and Arabella. I spun around.

Victoria pointed at the chair. “Sit.”

I sat.

“I had twelve miscarriages. It runs in the family, something you may need to worry about in the future. We get one offspring per generation, and we count our lucky stars if the child survives. I was my mother’s ninth and final pregnancy. She died when I was twelve. My father followed her two years later. I am House Tremaine. Alone. I wanted a child. The future of the House required it, but I wanted one. And that child would need to be a strong one. A weakling would be killed. The father had to be a Prime. I tried with three different Primes, each carefully chosen, cajoled, seduced, bribed. Whatever it took.”

Her hands curled around her cup like talons. Old pain flared in her eyes.

“Why not marry?”

“Because the man I loved died three weeks into our engagement. He was a precog from the House Vidente. He never foresaw his own death. His business rival commissioned the hit. He was shot as we were walking out of the theater.” She brushed her cheek. “It took me a long time to stop seeing the blood on my skin. It went away, finally, after I killed the last of them.”

“You killed the entire rival House?”

“Yes. All of them, the husband, the wife, the children. Their dog.”

Ice claws pierced my spine.

“For me, there was only one man. But my child required a father. I tried twelve times before I finally saw the writing on the wall. It had to be an in vitro fertilization. Do you have any idea how difficult it is to convince a Prime to donate his sperm? How afraid they are that their precious DNA will grow legs and take off into the world? You can seduce a man into your bed and tell him comfortable lies about how much you desire him and how your contraception is flawless, so he comes inside you, but ask him to ejaculate into a tube and you can’t hide the true purpose of that request. They realize that you intend to have their child, and they run, because they’re cowards.”

I should have walked away, but I couldn’t now. I had to know. “What did you do?”

“In the end, I found one. Formerly of House Molpe. They call themselves something else now. I suppose Molpe was too on the nose. The Office of Records is delighted to call Catalina’s talent siren. They think they are clever and came up with something new, but the truth is, your grandfather’s family called their magic that for generations.”

“How did you convince him?”

She grimaced. “Money. They’d excised him. He was a siren, a true Prime, terrified to use his talent because it brought him nothing but misery.”

“I thought the siren talent only manifested in females.”

“They’d like you to think that, but no. Believe me, I checked. I had far too much riding on it. The father was the lesser hurdle. I also had to find a surrogate. She had to be a Prime. Anything less than a Prime, and I ran the risk of lessening the child’s magic or her failing to carry to term. I couldn’t afford either. Finding a Prime surrogate was impossible.”

Oh no. Oh my God, no. “You didn’t.”

She smiled for the first time, a quick parting of lips and a flash of teeth. “I did.”

“How?”

“Blackmail and money. Two of the oldest levers one presses when trying to move people to her purpose.”

I just stared, horrified.

“Your father wasn’t just special. He was one of a kind. There will never be another. I had them neuter her.”

“What?”

“She’s kept under constant sedation. That’s the only way they can keep her contained. She never knew the pregnancy happened. The cost was astronomical, but it was worth it.”

“That’s horrible. You are horrible.”

“I am.”

She sipped her tea.

“Your father was a triple carrier. His own magic failed to express, which was expected. I never held that against him. I had enough magic for us both. His real value was in the children he would produce. I always had faith that the genes would sort themselves out. But to do that, to be a successor, he had to be shaped and molded. There were lessons he had to learn. Practical, useful lessons that would keep him alive after I was gone. He hated them, and he hated me for teaching them.”

Considering what I just heard, those lessons wouldn’t have been the gentle kind. “He left.”

“He did. I underestimated him. He kept his spine so well-hidden. I pushed and pushed, expecting him to learn or break, but he did neither. He planned his escape and executed it so well that even all of my power couldn’t find him. I was so proud. My son had outsmarted me. I should’ve expected it, but I was so focused on making sure he survived. I had so much to teach and I was in a hurry.”

“You’re a monster,” I told her.

“An abomination. I believe that’s the preferred term.”

I flinched. She smiled again.

“I see you’ve run into it.”

“I can’t believe you did that.”

“I would do it again.”

“What?”

“Look how wonderful it turned out. James made not one but three—three!—children. All of them Primes. He did so well. House Tremaine will go on. All I have to do is convince you to see things my way. And we’ve just established that I can be very convincing. What will it take, Nevada?”

“The answer is still no.”

“You will do as I say.” The power of her magic clamped me. I shrugged it off.

“No, I won’t.”

Victoria laughed. She actually laughed. “You’re everything I ever wanted.”

My phone chimed. I checked it. A text from Bern. Get out of there.

I jumped to my feet.

Five men walked into the restaurant, guns drawn. “On the floor,” the lead one ordered. The hostess dropped down. On my left, the two chefs behind the sushi bar hit the floor.

“Hands where I can see them,” the leader ordered.

They hadn’t fired, so they wanted me alive. I held my hands up and glared at Victoria. “Really?”

She was looking past me at the men. “What is the meaning of this?”

“Alexander says he’s sorry,” the lead man said. “He needs the girl. This is for the cause. He said you would understand.”

“Oh no, my dears,” my grandmother said. “This isn’t about the cause. This is about family.”

Magic snapped out of her. When I clamped people with my will, my magic turned into a vise, a net that smothered and bound them. Victoria turned hers into a blade and stabbed the leader with it. He cried out, a weak fading sound, his eyes rolled back into his skull, and he collapsed.

I jerked my Baby Desert Eagle out.

In the same instant, the man to the left of the leader yelped and clawed at his eyes. The man on the right fell to his knees and hit his head on the floor.

I got off four shots before I realized the two remaining targets stood completely still. My bullets ripped into their chests. Slowly, they toppled over. Five dead bodies lay on the floor. There was nobody left to kill.

Someone shoved me from behind. I stumbled forward. The sound of shattering glass cut at my ears, impossibly loud. I swung right, toward the broken window. A man stood with his rifle up, taking another shot. A Ford Explorer exploded out of the parking lot and smashed into him. The shooter went down, a rag doll under the wheels. Bern drove over him, his face bloodless, reversed and backed over the body.

I turned to Victoria. A dark wet stain spread through Victoria’s shoulder. She’d pushed me out of the way. The bullet with my name on it had torn into her instead.

“You need an ambulance.”

She grimaced. “I’ll be fine. I have a private physician.”

“You’ll bleed out. You need paramedics now.” I grabbed my phone to dial 911. “Why did you do it?”

“Because you’re my granddaughter, you idiot.”

My phone died. What the hell, I had fully charged it in the car . . .

“Wait . . .” Victoria turned pale, looking at something past me.

I glanced over my shoulder. A darkness spread through the restaurant, expanding from the entrance, climbing over the walls, claiming the space. An ancient darkness that took me into its maw and made me still.

Michael from the Office of Records walked into the restaurant. He still wore the sharp suit and a crisp shirt, blindingly white against his tattooed neck. His hands burned with blue fire.

He didn’t look like a gangster at a funeral today. He looked like the twenty-first century Grim Reaper.

“I didn’t break the rules,” Victoria squeezed out through her clenched teeth. Sweat broke out on her forehead. She strained, locking her teeth again.

Nothing happened.

I tried to grab hold of my magic. It flowed out of me. The darkness pounced and devoured it. It hurt. The pain ripped a gasp out of me. Oh, it hurt.

Michael held up the phone. On it the Keeper of Records smiled. “But you have, twice indirectly and now in public. It is time for punishment, Victoria. So sorry.”

Michael raised his right hand. The blue fire leaped across the space and splashed onto my grandmother.

Victoria Tremaine screamed.

The blue fire poured on.

Victoria slid off the chair and dropped to the floor. They weren’t just hurting her. They were killing her.

I heard my own voice. “Stop! Please stop!”

“Michael,” the Keeper of Records said.

The blue flames ebbed. Victoria strained to breathe, her skin ashen.

“Are you asking us to stop, Ms. Baylor?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“She’s my grandmother. She saved me. I don’t want to start our House with her death.”

The Keeper of Records considered it. “Is it a formal request, Ms. Baylor?”

“Yes.”

“The Office of Records will grant it, provided you will grant us a favor in return in a place and time of our choosing.”

“Don’t take it,” Victoria squeezed out, her hand on her chest, blood dripping from her fingers.

“I agree.”

“Very well,” the Keeper said. “We will see you at trials, Ms. Baylor.”

The phone went black.

Michael opened his mouth. “A mistake.”

He turned around and walked away, taking the darkness with him.

In the distance sirens wailed, getting closer.

An ambulance shot into the parking lot and screeched to a halt. Paramedics ran out, carrying a stretcher through the broken window.

I crouched by Victoria. “If I peer under Vincent’s hex, will I find your name there?”

“Yes.”

“You should run, Grandmother. I won’t shield you from the consequences.”

She bared her teeth at me. “I’m too old to run. Do what you have to do.”

My phone flared into life and screamed at me. Bug.

I swiped my fingers across it to answer.

“Get on the freeway! Get on Katy now!” Bug screamed into the phone.

“What’s going on?”

Something thumped and Catalina’s voice filled the phone. “Vincent kidnapped Kyle and Matilda! He has Matilda!”

I sprinted to the car.