Wildfire

Chapter 2

The family sat at the dining table. I took the head spot this time. A stack of papers sat on my right, covered with a folder. I’d printed out the contents of the USB drive.

My two sisters had taken the chairs next to me, Catalina on my right, Arabella on my left. Catalina, who was a week shy of turning eighteen, was dark-haired, serious, and calm. She liked math, because it made sense to her, and would do just about anything to not be the center of attention. Arabella, still fifteen, was blond, athletic, with bigger boobs and a curvier butt, and calm wasn’t even in her vocabulary. She liked forensics and humanities. “Calling people out” was her preferred method of dealing with issues. The high school debate club, which made the fatal mistake of snubbing her because she was a freshman at the time and their roster was full, lived in mortal terror of her.

Bernard, the oldest of our two cousins, sat next to Catalina. Over six feet tall, with shoulders that had trouble fitting through narrow doorways, Bern was built like he broke people for a living. He had wrestled in high school and still went to judo a few times a week, which he claimed he was doing to balance long hours spent writing computer code. When he was a kid, his hair had been the color of straw and curly. The curls were all gone now. His hair had turned dark blond, and he kept it cut short and messy.

His brother Leon was just about his exact opposite. Lean, dark, and fast, Leon alternated between sarcasm, excitement, and total gloom as quickly as his sixteen-year-old body could produce the hormones. He hero-worshipped his brother. He also thought he himself was a dud without any magic. I knew he wasn’t, and I was doing my best to keep that knowledge to myself, because there was only one type of job open to someone with Leon’s magical talent, and it wasn’t a job any of us would’ve liked him to have. Right now, only Bug, who was Rogan’s surveillance expert, my mother, and I knew what he was capable of, and the only reason I told Mom was because his talent would explode into light sooner or later, and if I wasn’t around, someone else would have to handle it. Sooner or later I would have to tell Leon.

My mother sat at the other end of the table. She used to be a soldier, but her time as a POW left her with a permanent limp. She was softer now, her brown hair braided and pinned at the nape of her neck. Her eyes were brown like mine. When Dad got sick and after his death, Mom kept us together. I was just now beginning to understand how much it had cost her.

Grandma Frida sat beside Mom. One of my earliest memories was playing on the floor of the motor pool with little model cars, and Grandma Frida, who still had some blond in her hair back then, humming softly as she worked on some giant vehicle. Most people smelled engine oil and rubber and thought mechanic. I thought Grandma.

Family.

I loved them all so much. I had to do everything I could to keep them safe. This would be a Christmas we’d never forget.

“Victoria Tremaine knows who we are,” I said.

The words hit the table like a pile of bricks. Arabella paled. Catalina bit her lip. Bern became very still. Leon, oblivious, frowned at the pinched expressions he saw. Nobody spoke.

Truthseeker talents like mine were very rare. There were only three truthseeker Houses in the United States. House Tremaine was the smallest and the most feared. It had only one member—Victoria Tremaine. And she was coming for us.

“How sure are you?” Mom finally asked.

“She tried to purchase our mortgage.”

Mom swore.

“I thought House Montgomery owned our mortgage,” Leon said.

“House Montgomery owns the mortgage on our business,” Bernard said patiently. “The mortgage on the warehouse was held by a private bank until Rogan bought it.”

“To bring everyone up to speed,” I said before they could go off on a tangent, “Dad was Victoria’s only child. He was born without magic, and she hated him for it. He ran away after high school, met Mom, and lived quietly, so she never found him. But now she knows. She’s the only member of her family. Once she dies, House Tremaine will die with her.”

“How did I not know this?” Leon asked. “Am I the only one who didn’t know this? You guys knew and didn’t tell me?”

I raised my hand. “The point is, Victoria Tremaine desperately needs us. She’s the only surviving Prime of her House.”

“The House is everything,” Bern said quietly. “She needs you and the girls to qualify as Primes so she can keep her House alive.”

“Question!” Leon said. “If she is the only Prime, how can she still be a House?”

“Every time a new Prime is registered, the Office of Records checks to see if the family has two Primes,” Catalina said. “If there are two living Primes, the family is recertified as a House. They don’t take away the family’s rank until the last Prime alive at the last certification dies.”

My sister had been reading up on Houses.

“You know what I can do,” I said.

I could do plenty. Being able to detect a lie was the least of my talents. I could crack a human mind like a walnut and pull whatever knowledge I needed out of it. And I didn’t have to leave the mind intact.

“Victoria can do everything I do and much more, and she does it better. I’m just now figuring out the extent of my power. She’s been trained in the use of magic since she could hold chalk in her hand. She has power, money, and troops we don’t. She’ll do whatever she has to do to gain control of me and Catalina at the very least.”

Grandma Frida put her hand over her mouth.

Bernard was usually calm and steady, like a rock in a storm. But right now his eyes were full of fear. “She can do things with Catalina’s talent.”

Unspeakable, ugly things. Things that would make my thoughtful, kind sister hate herself.

“And if Arabella’s magic is discovered . . .” I didn’t finish.

I didn’t even want to go there. They would lock her away and keep her sedated for the rest of her life. She would never get to see the sun. She’d never laugh again, never love, never live.

My grandmother wouldn’t get her claws on my sisters. I wouldn’t let it happen.

Catalina leaned forward, her eyes defiant. “What are our options?”

I checked my mother’s face. She was sitting still, her expression grim.

“We can roll over,” I said. “That will likely mean that you and I will have to do whatever Victoria says. We’ll have to walk away from our business.”

Catalina winced. Our parents built Baylor Investigative Agency, and I spent seven years growing it. It wasn’t just a business. It was the future and the core of our family.

I had to keep going. “We probably won’t see Mom, Grandma Frida, or Bern and Leon again for a while.”

That got me a look of pure horror.

“We’d have to obey her and do whatever she wanted. I would be doing interrogations and lobotomizing people.” I kept my voice even. They didn’t need emotion from me right now. “Eventually Victoria will die. She’s old.”

And that didn’t sound morbid. Not at all.

I forged on. “Eventually we’d inherit House Tremaine.”

“How long?” Leon asked.

“I don’t know. She’s in her seventies. Ten years, maybe twenty.”

“Door number two, please,” Arabella said.

“I agree,” Bern said. “We’re not doing that.”

“We can fight,” I said. “Victoria has more money, more troops, and more of everything.”

“But Rogan would help us, right?” Arabella asked.

I struggled with the right words. “Yes. But we can’t always count on Rogan.”

Strictly speaking, that was a lie. Rogan would do anything and everything to help me.

“We shouldn’t always count on Rogan,” Mom said.

Everyone looked at her.

“This isn’t his problem,” she said. “It’s our problem.”

“If we let Rogan save us, we’ll be tying ourselves to him,” I said. “We’d be viewed as his vassals. We’d have his protection, but we would inherit his enemies, and he has some powerful ones.”

“And if your relationship with Rogan sours, things will get complicated,” Bern said.

“Yes.”

“So we don’t want to give up and we can’t fight the Evil Grandma. Is there a third option?” Arabella asked.

“Yes. We can become a House.”

My sisters and cousins stared at me. I’d brought up this possibility once before, but we were kind of busy at the time trying to solve a murder and accomplishing other important things like not getting killed.

“Whoa.” Leon blinked.

“No,” Mom said. “There has to be another way.”

I leaned back. “Becoming a House would grant us provisional immunity from any attacks by other Houses for three years. That’s long enough for us to establish a power base.”

“Would Victoria follow that rule?” Catalina asked.

“Rogan says she will. It’s in everyone’s best interest to protect emerging Houses, because otherwise inbreeding would become a real danger. Apparently, this is one of those rules Primes won’t break under any circumstances. It would buy us time to build up our power base and make alliances and do all the things Houses do.”

“You can’t be serious,” Mom said.

“I am.”

“She isn’t going to obey any rules. That woman is a monster. You can’t be that naive, Nevada.”

I met my mother’s gaze. “Yes, she may still attack us. But she will have to do it in a way that can’t lead back to her. Becoming a House would make it much harder for her to hit us.” And once we became a House, we could make alliances as equals.

“You’re filling their heads with visions of being a House. Why don’t you tell them what it’s really like? Tell them about Baranovsky.”

“Mom is right,” I said. “Houses are vicious. You remember that charity gala I went to in the black dress? It was very exclusive. The man who hosted it, Gabriel Baranovsky, was drinking champagne at the top of the stairs in the ballroom. David Howling froze the wine in Gabriel’s throat. He turned it into a blade that sliced Gabriel’s neck from inside out.”

“Badass,” Leon offered.

We all looked at him.

“It’s elegant,” he said. “The ice melts, and there is no evidence. There are no prints, no murder weapon, there is nothing.”

I had to tell him about his magic. There just wasn’t any escaping it. That’s the way his mind worked and there was no way to rewire him. Maybe I could just get it over with now.

My mother cleared her throat and hit me with a warning stare. It’s like she was telepathic or something.

“When Baranovsky choked on his own blood and collapsed, nobody helped him,” I said. “Nobody screamed. Hundreds of Primes turned and calmly started walking toward the exit, because the mansion would be locked down and they didn’t want to be inconvenienced.”

I waited a moment to let it sink in.

“Primes won’t care that you are young. They won’t be kind. They will try to use us, manipulate us, or destroy us. You could be standing in the middle of the Assembly, and if a Prime summoned a pack of wild wolves to rip you to pieces, I’m not sure anyone would help. This would be our life.”

Their faces were grim. I was losing them. I expected that Mom wouldn’t be on my side, but I had to at least convince my sisters.

“But if we do this, we can build up our strength for three years,” I said. “Victoria is coming for us now. Right now. She’s in town. The only reason she isn’t attacking us is because Rogan’s people are fortified around us. She’d have to go through them, and she doesn’t want to start a fight with House Rogan unless she has to.”

“Pack your bags,” Mom said. “The five of you are leaving.”

“Mom?” Arabella stared at her. “We can’t leave.”

“Out of the question.” I knew she would react like this.

“I’m not quitting college,” Bern said.

“We aren’t leaving you!” Catalina’s voice spiked. “We are not abandoning you and Grandma!”

My mother put steel into her voice. “You heard me.”

“Where?” Grandma Frida asked, her voice so high, it sounded broken.

Mom turned to her.

“Where can you send them so that bitch doesn’t find them, Penelope? She knows what they look like. She knows their names. She knows their social security numbers. She can pull the truth out of anyone she meets. Where on the planet can you find a place where her money and power won’t reach?”

“Mom,” my mother said quietly, looking stunned.

“I told you twenty-six years ago that if you married him, you would pay the price. I told you to let him go. You didn’t listen. You raised them to fight. They’re not going to cut and run now.”

“They will do what I say,” Mom ground out. “I’m their mother.”

Grandma Frida squinted at her. “Aha. And how did that work out for me?”

Mom opened her mouth and clicked it shut.

“What’s involved in becoming a House?” Catalina asked.

“At least two of us will have to undergo the trials and register as Primes,” I said. “Most likely it will be you and me.”

My sister frowned. “What if I don’t qualify?”

“I’ll do it!” Arabella announced.

“No,” everyone said at the same time.

“Why not?”

“You know why not,” my mother said. “Don’t make me pull that documentary out again.”

My sister took a deep breath. Uh-oh.

“I’m not going to spend my life hiding. Nobody will ever see what I can do!” She pounded her small fist on the table. “I’m going to qualify.”

My mother’s face told me that I had to fix this fast or she would snap and try to send everyone into exile again.

“You can control your magic,” I said.

“Yes!” Arabella said.

“We know this but nobody else does. People are afraid, because the last person with your magic went crazy. The only way they’ll accept you is if all of us demonstrate that you have complete control over yourself, and we, as a family, have complete control of you. This takes time. If you give us these three years, by the end of it we’ll be established as a House. And then, at eighteen, you can qualify.”

“Nevada!” Mom snarled.

“But this also means that for the next three years all of us will be in the limelight,” I continued. “And you have to stop acting like an impulsive brat.”

“Yes,” Catalina piled on. “No more angry outbursts, no more screaming, no more punching people, or starting stupid shit on Twitter.”

Arabella crossed her arms on her chest. “Fine. But you promise me! You promise me right now that if I behave, I’ll qualify in three years.”

“I promise.”

My mother punched the table.

“So that’s where she gets it from,” Bern observed.

“What’s the alternative?” Grandma Frida asked Mom.

“Not getting locked away for life, where they would keep her constantly sedated,” Mom growled.

“There are some other formalities,” I said. “Everyone who is qualifying will have to give a DNA sample, so they can make sure we are all related. We’ll have to submit some paperwork, they will set the date for the trials, then we are tested, and if we qualify, we become a House.”

“That’s it?” Leon asked.

“Yes.” I put my hand on the stack of paperwork. “If we decide to do this, that’s it. There is no backing out.”

“What if we don’t qualify?” Catalina asked. “We’ll look like idiots who wanted to be Primes and fell short. Nobody would do business with us again.”

“We’ll qualify. I’m a Prime and so are you.”

“They might not even know what my magic is,” she insisted. “What if I permanently affect people? What if—”

“Oh shut up,” Arabella told her. “You made an army of hired killers sit on the floor and listen to your story like they were in kindergarten. And they’re all fine now.”

“I want to register as well,” Bern said. “Maybe not as a Prime, but the last time they tested me, I was ten. I’m stronger now.”

Leon dramatically collapsed on the back of his chair. “Rub it in, all of you. You and your magic. I’ll just sit here with my dud self.”

I opened my mouth and shut it. Now wasn’t the time to spring it on him.

“Nevada, there has to be another way,” Mom said.

“I don’t know what that is,” I told her. “And neither does Rogan. If I knew of another way, I would take it, Mom. I promise you, I would. This is the only way we can keep all of us safe.”

“If we do this, we’ll never be safe,” Mom said.

“Things will never be the same if we do this.” That wasn’t exactly a response to what she said, but I had to keep going. “Which is why we have to vote as a family. We all share responsibility for this decision. Once we make it, nobody complains and everyone has to work together. Does anyone want to add anything?”

Silence.

“Everyone for becoming a House, raise your hands.”

I held my hand up. Bern, Arabella, Leon, and Grandma.

“Everyone for running away and hiding?”

Mom raised her hand.

I looked at Catalina.

“I’m abstaining,” she said.

“You don’t get to abstain,” Arabella said. “For once in your life, make a decision!”

Catalina took a deep breath. “I vote for the House.”

“Fools,” my mother said. “I’ve raised a pack of idiots.”

“But we’re your idiots, Aunt Penelope,” Leon said.

I picked up the paperwork bristling with colored flags indicating signature lines. “I need all of you to sign.”

“Wait!” Grandma Frida grabbed her phone. “We must take a picture for posterity.”

They crowded into the shot around me. Grandma Frida set the phone on a delay and it snapped an image of all of them around me, the paperwork in front of me, a pen in my hand. Cold froze my stomach.

I loved them so much. I just hoped I made the right call.

The Office of House Records occupied a short tower of black glass on Old Spanish Trail, across the street from the Bureau of Vital Statistics. The asymmetric building leaned back, textured, its profile odd. As Rogan pulled his gunmetal-grey Range Rover into the parking lot, I saw the front of the tower. It was shaped like a feathered quill.

The setting sun played on the dark glass. Only a handful of cars waited in the parking lot.

“Are you sure he will be there?” I asked.

“Yes.”

“It’s Christmas Day.”

Rogan turned to me. “He will be there, because I called and asked.”

I gripped the zippered file so hard, my fingers went white. Last chance to back out.

Rogan reached over, his magic curling around me. He took my hand and held it in his. “Do you want me to turn around?”

“No.” I swallowed. “Let’s do this.”

We got out of the car and walked to the door. It slid open with a whisper, and we stepped into a modern lobby. Black granite sheathed the walls, grey granite shone on the floor, and in the center of the lobby, thin lines of gold traced a magic circle. A guard looked at us from behind his desk and bowed his head. Rogan led me past him to the elevators.

The folder seemed so heavy in my hands. All my doubts bubbled up and refused to disappear.

“Am I doing the right thing?”

“You’re doing the only thing that makes sense to keep your family safe.”

“What if I don’t qualify?”

“You stood toe-to-toe with Olivia Charles, a manipulator Prime, and you won.” His voice was steady. “You will qualify.”

“Thank you for coming with me.”

He didn’t answer. He’d made it clear in the past that he expected me to walk away from him the moment our family became a House. He didn’t think our magic was compatible. If we had children, they might not even be Primes. He viewed this as the beginning of our end, but he came anyway. He was also a complete idiot if he thought I’d let him get away. He was mine. My Connor.

The elevator opened. We stepped into a hallway, with a dozen doors branching off from it, all closed. At the very end of the row of doors, large double doors stood open. We walked toward those doors, then through the doorway, into a huge circular room. Books lined the walls, thousands of books on the curved wooden shelves, three stories high, each floor with its own railed balcony. A grouping of comfortable couches upholstered in dark leather occupied the center of the room. Directly in front of it, between us and the couches, a round counter rose.

An old man sat behind the counter, reading a book. His skin was a warm brown, pointing at a Latin American heritage, his hair was white, and he wore a three-piece grey suit with a tartan bow tie. He raised his head, smiled at us, and hopped off his chair. His eyes, behind large glasses, were very dark, almost black, and shiny like two pieces of obsidian.

“Ms. Baylor,” he said, his voice soft and cultured. “Finally.”

“I’m sorry to trouble you on a holiday.”

He smiled wider, showing white teeth. “Don’t mention it. It is, after all, my job. I would’ve done it anyway. I was in downtown Houston, in the tunnels, when the Old Justice Center fell. I owe you and Mr. Rogan my life.”

A man emerged from a shadowy alcove in the side wall, moving silently across the floor. In his mid-twenties, he wore expensive shoes and a sharp black suit, with a white shirt that looked even whiter against his light bronze skin, and a black tie. Black and grey tattoos covered his hands and neck. His dark brown hair, cut short on the sides, but longer on top of his head and slicked back, defined a long handsome face, with intelligent eyes the color of whiskey. He looked dangerous and slightly mournful, like a Prohibition-era gangster at a funeral.

“It’s not every day one gets to register an emerging House,” the Records Keeper continued. He leaned closer and smiled at me, as if sharing a secret. “Especially one with a truthseeker in it. I’m so very excited to meet you. Michael is also very excited, aren’t you, Michael?”

Michael nodded.

The Records Keeper put on a pair of linen gloves and turned around. Behind him a massive book lay on a pedestal under a glass hood. He raised the hood, picked up the heavy volume, bound in marbled leather, and placed it on the counter. An elaborate gold crest decorated the front panel.

“It’s beautiful,” I said.

“It is. Eighteenth-century Dutch binding. The Houses of Texas have been recorded in this book since before statehood.” He opened it gently and showed me an empty page. “If you pass the trials, your House will be written here.”

He turned the heavy pages to the red bookmark. Four columns of names written in beautiful calligraphy covered the page. Some were crossed out.

“Are those the people who failed the trials?”

He nodded. “Indeed. Now then, do you have the necessary paperwork?”

I passed him the folder. He opened it, scanning the pages.

“Where is the second witness?” Rogan asked.

“Running late. Given the circumstances, I wanted to make sure to select someone whose reputation is beyond contestation. Someone whose name commands respect. I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised.”

“A witness to the emergence of a House has certain obligations,” Rogan told me quietly.

“Like what?”

“We’re expected to offer advice and guidance.”

The Keeper checked the signatures and raised his head.

“You’ve presented us with a conundrum, Mr. Rogan. Finding a suitable test for a truthseeker was challenging, but identifying the younger Ms. Baylor’s magic was even more so. I must say, your sister’s power is something truly remarkable. It is, of course, a mental branch, but what subset? One would naturally lean toward a psionic, but a psionic who evokes a genuine love has never manifested. Michael and I had to dig very far through our archives and other archives. Favors were called in, access to databases had to be requested, and foreign Keepers of Records were consulted. But we persevered, didn’t we, Michael?”

Michael nodded again.

“We had to reach very far, and we finally found what we were looking for in Greece. There is a single House—just one, mind you—whose record showed the emergence of a similar talent. Only in female offspring. The last verified manifestation was in the 1940s. Apparently, there was some unpleasantness.”

“What kind of unpleasantness?” I asked.

“The lady in question fought against the Russian Imperial invasion of their small city. The legend states that she placed herself onto a rocky island a short distance from the cliffs and then called an entire battalion of the invading Russian troops to her. She drowned three motorized rifle companies before the few survivors finally managed to reach the rock. She was torn apart. Quite literally, I’m afraid.”

Oh, Catalina . . . I could picture my sister on that rock. That’s exactly what she would do.

“Dreadful business.” The Records Keeper sighed. “The House hasn’t had any female heirs since then. A very knowledgeable source has speculated that it was a matter of choice rather than chance.”

“They abort female children?” Rogan asked, his voice cold.

“Such is the rumor. The House refused our attempts to reach them for a consult. They’re a very reclusive family. Thus, we are left on our own, so after much deliberation, we are creating a new category for Ms. Catalina Baylor.” The Keeper paused. “We shall refer to her as siren.”

She would hate that.

“It is so very exciting. If this magic endures within your family, this may be the beginning of a whole new subset. The rankings of the rare magic talents may shift. We’re bringing in a powerful antistasi Prime for her trials.”

Like aegis mages who blocked bullets and physical attacks, antistasi mages specialized in defense, but against mental attacks. Well, at least that should put Catalina’s mind to rest.

“Which House?” Rogan asked. “Smith?”

“Alessandro Sagredo,” the Keeper said.

Rogan raised his eyebrows.

I glanced at him.

“The best antistasi Prime on record,” Rogan explained.

“We’re taking no chances,” the Keeper said. “Unfortunately, he is otherwise engaged at the moment, so we will have to wait a couple of days. Therefore, your trials will be set exactly one week from now, next Sunday.”

A man marched into the room. In his sixties, but still athletic, he wore black pants, a black T-shirt, and a black garment that could be called a sweatshirt in the same way a Porsche could be called a car. It had notched lapels like a suit, the stylish drape of a luxury trench coat, and likely cost more than our mortgage payment.

His skin was a light bronze, his hair wavy and black with a lot of white. He had bold, strong features: a broad forehead, black eyebrows, a prominent nose, and a square jaw mostly hidden by a short beard that was more grey than black. His hazel eyes, alight with intelligence, looked at the world with a touch of humor. When I saw him for the first time, I thought he looked like someone’s favorite uncle, who owned a vineyard somewhere in Greece or Spain, spent a lot of time outdoors, and laughed often. That was before I knew who he was.

“Good evening, Mr. Duncan.” The Keeper smiled.

My House formation would be witnessed by Mad Rogan, the Scourge of Mexico, and Linus Duncan, the former Speaker of the Assembly that ruled the magical families of Texas. Dear God.

“I’m late, I know, I’m sorry.” The former most powerful man in Texas hurried across the room. “Some people insist on being annoyingly difficult. What did I miss?”

“Nothing of importance,” the Keeper assured him.

Duncan nodded at Rogan. “Major.”

“Colonel,” Rogan replied.

The Keeper took out a fountain pen, cleared his throat, and glanced at me, his black eyes sparkling behind his glasses. “Michael, if you please.”

Michael stepped forward and produced a high-end camera.

“A verbal acknowledgment is required,” the Keeper told me, his tone confidential. “You must say these words to me: I, Nevada Baylor, petition the State of Texas for assessment and recognition of my family’s powers. Are you ready?”

“Yes.”

My heart was beating too fast.

The Keeper nodded at Michael. Michael tapped the camera’s digital screen.

The Keeper raised his pen and looked at me. My mouth had gone completely dry. Somehow I made my lips move.

“I, Nevada Baylor, petition the State of Texas for assessment and recognition of my family’s powers.”

“I, Linus Duncan, Head of House Duncan, so witness,” Duncan stated.

“I, Connor Rogan, Head of House Rogan, so witness,” Rogan echoed.

“So noted.” The Keeper wrote today’s date on the page and added, Nevada Baylor on behalf of herself, Catalina and Bernard Baylor. Witnessed by Linus Duncan of House Duncan and Connor Rogan of House Rogan.

“Your petition is granted,” the Keeper said.

Michael lowered the camera and set it aside.

“It is done,” the Keeper said.

“Congratulations, Ms. Baylor,” Linus Duncan told me.

“Thank you for coming to be my witness.”

“Well, if you’re going to jump into the wolf’s den, it helps to have an ally. Even if that ally is old with blunted teeth.”

A muscle in Rogan’s cheek jerked. He hadn’t said anything, but both he and Michael watched Linus Duncan like he would sprout fangs and claws any second.

“I hope you succeed,” Duncan said.

“Thank you.”

The sound of a woman coming down the hallway in high heels echoed through the room.

“Are you expecting someone?” Rogan asked.

“No,” the Keeper said.

Victoria Tremaine walked into the room, two men in suits behind her. She saw me, stopped, and stared. I stared back. I’d seen a recording of her, but we’d never met in person.

She was thin, impeccably dressed, with the kind of face that made people say, “good bones” despite wrinkled skin. High cheekbones, strong yet feminine jawline, narrow nose, large eyes. Given that set of features, most women would look beautiful. My grandmother didn’t. She looked hard and vicious, like a velociraptor in human skin. Even her platinum hair, cut in a pixie style, did nothing to soften the impact. Vulnerable or unsure weren’t even in her vocabulary. And when she turned to glower at Rogan, I saw my father in her profile. They had the same aquiline nose.

Rogan stepped forward on my left. Linus Duncan stepped forward on my right.

“This farce has gone on long enough,” Victoria announced. “That child is mine. She belongs to my House.”

“No,” I told her. “I don’t belong to you or anyone else.”

“She petitioned the State of Texas for recognition of her powers,” the Keeper said. “She’s in the book. It is done.”

“Linus?” she ground out.

“I’m a witness,” Duncan said. “I’m honor bound to protect her, Victoria. You know how this works.”

Victoria Tremaine’s eyes narrowed. “I’m taking her out of here.”

“I’m afraid I can’t allow that.” The Keeper’s eyes turned completely black. No white remained.

Darkness shivered in the alcoves between the books and grew, slithering across the walls, swallowing the light, a living terrible darkness. An ancient primal thing. Every hair on the back of my neck rose.

Blue fire sheathed Michael’s hands, burning bright against the rising black tide that smothered the ceiling.

“You know the rules, Victoria,” the Keeper said, his voice pure magic. “You will have no contact with any member of the Baylor family. You’ll make no effort to disrupt these trials. We wouldn’t want any unpleasantness.”

Rage shivered in the corners of my grandmother’s mouth. She glared at me. “You’re an idiot. You will regret this.”

Her gaze stabbed at Rogan. “You should’ve returned my calls. You think you have her, but you’ll never keep her. She’ll dump you the moment the Scroll gets a request.”

She turned around and marched out, her human Rottweilers in tow.

“Well, that was tense,” Linus Duncan said. He opened a billfold, took a card out of his wallet, and offered it to me. It had no name, only a phone number. “In case you need help or advice. Call any time.”

“Thank you.” I took the card.

The darkness vanished. The Keeper smiled at me. “It was a pleasure to meet you, Ms. Baylor. We’ll be watching you. We’ll be there in case of any problems, won’t we, Michael?”

Michael nodded.

Rogan and I didn’t speak the whole way to the car. Outside, the sun had set and the bottomless Texas sky spread above us, an upside-down black ocean studded with stars. We got into the car, and Rogan drove out of the parking lot.

The night city slid past my window while the whole scene kept replaying in my head over and over: petitioning, my name in calligraphy on the page of an ancient book, the raptor stare of my grandmother, the living darkness on the ceiling . . . It didn’t seem real, as if it had happened to someone else.

I glanced at Rogan. There was this odd distance between us. He was there, in the car with me, but he seemed contained, as if I were a stranger.

“She called you?” I asked finally.

“She left a message,” he said.

I waited but he didn’t elaborate. “What did she say?”

“That if I helped her bring you into House Tremaine, she would give you to me.”

“Nice. And was I just supposed to go along with that plan?”

“You would if she had your sisters. Or your mother.” His voice was casual. “Holding a knife to your mother’s throat would make you very agreeable.”

Connor was gone, and I got Mad Rogan instead: cold, calculating, cruel when he had to be.

“And the Scroll?”

“The Scroll is one of the three main DNA databases,” he said. “You will be required to submit a sample to the Keeper to prove that you and Catalina are sisters. Once the sample is submitted, you must choose a database. They will sequence your entire family.”

“Is it used for genetic matches for future spouses?”

“Primarily, yes. Also in cases when paternity is in doubt.”

The gulf between us was getting wider. He was pulling back from me. He was still thinking about children and matches. Was he trying to give me an out?

“Please pull over,” I said.

He guided the car onto the shoulder. I unbuckled my seat belt, reached over, and kissed him. His lips were like fire. He didn’t respond, but I tried harder, licking his lips with the tip of my tongue, wanting to taste him.

His seat belt snapped free. He caught the back of my head with his hand and claimed my mouth. His magic wrapped around me, mixing with mine. The taste of Connor, the heady intoxicating taste that burned with lust, power, and need, filled me, and I drank it in, melting into it. The strokes of his tongue turned possessive, his fingers tangled in my hair, holding me to him. There was a hint of menace in the way he kissed that warned me that when I tasted dragon fire, I’d get burned and then I would never be the same. It made me want to strip and climb naked on top of him.

Magic slid over the back of my neck, like molten honey, sizzling pleasure on my skin. I gasped into his mouth.

“You’re mine,” he said, his voice rough. “I’m not letting you go.”

“I’m glad we cleared that up.”

“Do you understand me, Nevada? I’m not walking away. I thought I could, but I can’t and I don’t want to.”

I brushed his cheek with my fingertips. “What makes you think I would let you go?”

He pulled me to him, and I climbed over, onto his lap. He kissed my neck. Magic swirled along my spine, a heated bliss. I wanted him between my legs. I wanted him inside . . .

There were blue and red lights behind us.

Rogan growled.

A cop was walking toward us, a flashlight in his hand.

I crawled back into my seat and put my hand over my face.

Rogan rolled down the window. “Yes, Officer?”

“Is your vehicle disabled, Mr. Rogan?”

“No,” Rogan growled.

“Then you should move along. The road is dark, and you’re presenting a safety hazard.”

Wow. Apparently we’d run into the one cop in Houston who wasn’t intimidated by the Butcher of Merida.

“Ms. Baylor,” the cop said. “DA Jordan says hello.”

Oh.

“Please move your vehicle for the safety of the public.” The cop stepped back. He showed no signs of leaving.

Rogan rolled the window up, we both put our seat belts on, and we pulled back into traffic.

Lenora Jordan, the Harris County District Attorney. When I was in high school, she was my hero. Incorruptible, uncompromising, she served as the last line of the public’s defense against crime, especially when committed by the Houses. The first time I saw her was on TV, years ago; she walked down the steps of the courthouse, where a raging fulgurkinetic Prime wrapped in a web of lightning refused to be arraigned on charges of child molestation. Lenora strode right up to him, summoned chains from thin air, and bound him, right there, in front of all the cameras. And then she dragged him into court.

I never thought I would meet her, but I did. She was everything she seemed, and she scared the living daylights out of me. Even Rogan treated her with the kind of respect one affords to a hungry tiger.

“Was that a love tap on the shoulder?” I asked. “To tell me she knows we’re filing?”

“Yes. Come home with me tonight.”

“I can’t. A lot has happened and I need to be with my family. They’ll have questions.”

“I’ll wait.”

“I don’t know how long it will take.”

“I’ll wait,” he repeated.

I would give almost anything to go with him. He would take me to his bedroom, strip off my clothes, and love me until I couldn’t even think anymore. I would fall asleep wrapped in him, with his muscular arm around me, and his hot hard chest pressing against my back, and in the morning we’d wake up and make love again. Saying no hurt. Physically hurt. “Rogan . . .”

“Nevada?” My name rolling off his lips was a caress.

“I just turned my family’s life upside down. Everything is in shambles. I need to be there tonight. If one of my sisters knocks on my door at two in the morning, I want to be there to reassure her. If my mom isn’t able to go to sleep and comes checking on me in the middle of the night, I want to be there. And I can’t do that if I’m over at your place, and you can’t be at mine, because you make me moan and scream, and that’s not what my family needs to hear.”

His face told me he didn’t like it.

“What are you thinking?”

“I’m planning to kidnap you until the trials,” he said.

“We’ve tried that, remember?”

“I had the air-conditioning fixed in the basement,” he said.

“Is there a nice chain waiting for me?”

“No,” he said. “But I do have some handcuffs.”

“No,” I told him. “Okay, maybe. Who’ll be wearing the handcuffs?”

He grinned.

We reached the warehouse.

“I have to go,” I told him. I didn’t want to.

He opened his mouth and I put my finger on his lips. “Please don’t say my name. If you say my name, I won’t be able to get out of the car.”

He smiled against my finger. It was a wicked male smile, and it made him look both handsome and evil, like a demon.

“I mean it, Rogan. Don’t say my name, don’t kiss me good night, and don’t look at me . . . yes, like that. Don’t look at me like that. I have to go investigate your ex-fiancée’s husband’s disappearance tomorrow, and I need sleep.”

I still couldn’t move from the seat. He pulled at me like a magnet. It wasn’t the spectacular sex and it wasn’t his looks, although both helped. It was the way he looked at me when he thought I wasn’t watching him. Like I was the center of his universe. When he looked at me like that, I would do anything for him. It scared me that I could love someone that much, so I fought like crazy to keep every shred of independence I had left.

“I see Caesar’s shadow,” he said.

I did too. But until we had some evidence, jumping to conclusions did no good. “It does seem like a big coincidence—Rynda’s mother dies, then, within weeks, her husband disappears. But, apparently, he has a history of taking off when things get rough, and things are rough for her right now.”

He fixed me with his Mad Rogan stare. “If you find the connection between Brian’s disappearance and the conspiracy, I want to know about it. Not eventually, not when it’s convenient, but immediately.”

“Yes, sir. I was going to kiss you good night, but now I can’t. It’s against the rules to fraternize with my superior officer.”

“Hilarious,” he said.

I opened the door and climbed out.

“Nevada,” he called after me, sinking a world of promise into one word.

I kept walking.

His voice caressed me like a touch. “Come back and let me kiss you good night.”

“I can’t hear you.” I sprinted to my door, got inside, and closed it. It was a big thick door. I couldn’t possibly have heard him laughing behind me. I must’ve imagined it. Yes, that was it.

I walked through the house. The light in the kitchen was on. Voices floated to me. Everyone was still awake and waiting for me.

Tomorrow I would have to go to BioCore and start looking for Rynda’s husband. Tomorrow I would see Rogan again. But first, I had to get through tonight. I sighed, squared my shoulders, and went to talk to my family.