He studied me and I did not look away. No deceit. I truly did not understand why magic had marked me, nor why I could hold it in my body while others could not. But that was all I could give him, all I could tell him. I didn’t know how much Stotts knew about nonstandard things about magic. Or how much he knew about the Authority.
Nothing, my father whispered. He is not our kind.
Okay, so maybe now I did know how much Stotts knew. But here’s where the trouble started. He was the law. And I was working for him. I was also about to be trained by people who used magic illegally.
Ancient magic use is not illegal. It is only unknown.
“Have you talked to anyone about it?” he asked.
I tipped my head to the side, hoping my dad would just shut up so I could concentrate on one conversation at a time. Because I thought I was missing something here. Stotts was digging for a response from me. But I didn’t know what.
“Not really. I talked to Nola about it before the coma. Or at least she told me I talked to her about it.”
“I mean, since you’ve been back. Back in the city.”
“Is there someone I should talk to?” I asked, shifting the focus of the question so I could gain some ground. “Do you know someone who might be able to tell me more about this?” I held up my right hand, wiggled my fingers.
He didn’t look away from my face.
“The city is full of people. All kinds.” He emphasized the word kinds just like my father had, and I worked hard not to show him how that hit me. “Charlatans. Pushers, users, cons. You know the type.”
“Yes. I do.”
“I want you to know you can come to me. Anytime. For any reason. And my . . . resources will be at your disposal.”
“Even if I don’t take the job with you?”
“Even if we never work together again.”
“Thanks,” I said. “That’s nice to know.”
My father pushed somewhere behind my eyes, and I tasted leather and wintergreen at the back of my throat. I also sensed his displeasure. He didn’t like Detective Stotts. Probably didn’t trust him. And while I wasn’t sure that I trusted Stotts either, I did find myself liking the man.
Not that I was childish enough to make friends just because my dad didn’t approve of someone.
Okay, yeah, I was that childish.
“Just wondering,” I said. “Did Nola put you up to this?”
He smiled. “You don’t take anyone at face value, do you?”
“Not even a newborn baby.”
He chuckled. “That’s too bad. No, Nola didn’t ask me to do anything for you. But if she did, I probably would have done it.”
Was he telling me that he liked her? That he maybe already felt something toward her? I wasn’t sure what I thought about that. Nola lived a small-town life in a place where magic could not touch her. Stotts was in the middle of a city crawling with magical crime. Opposites might attract, but that didn’t mean they didn’t also explode on contact.
“That’s good to know too,” I said.
The sound of a car engine broke off our little heart-to-heart.
We both took a step away from each other. I, at least, was surprised we were still standing that close together.
A Mercedes-Benz drove up and parked on the side of the street, behind where Davy still stood, hunched-shouldered beneath the tree, probably soaked through anywhere his coat didn’t cover. Why didn’t the kid just get in his car and out of the rain, or come on over here and take shelter in the gazebo? That boy made no sense.
The car engine turned off, and Violet’s bodyguard, Kevin, got out of the driver’s side. Kevin had to be my height or so, but carried himself like a man who was used to getting lost in the crowd. Blond hair, brown eyes, and a face that most resembled a puppy dog, eyes too big, jaw too soft, he didn’t look like the killer he was. Nor did he look like a man who was good—very good—at using magic. He was part of the Authority, and Violet knew that because she was my father’s widow, and apparently Dad didn’t mind telling her about the secret society of magic users.
Not that I was bitter about it or anything.
Violet was just a beat behind him, sliding out of the passenger’s side, and wearing a full-length wool peacoat as blue as a stormy ocean, the wide hood pulled up. Her figure was still trim.
They walked over to the gazebo, side-by-side.
Stotts waved to them, and Violet waved back. They strolled up the gazebo steps, Violet in front, Kevin behind her.
“Hello, Detective Stotts,” she said.
“Mrs. Beckstrom, Mr. Cooper.” Stotts shook hands with both of them. “Thank you for coming out.”
Violet pushed her hood back and put on her glasses. “I didn’t know you’d be here, Allie.”
In the gray light, Violet’s hair seemed to have a warmth of its own, the fiery hue of autumn leaves. I found myself unable to look away from her, unable to exhale, as emotions that were not mine poured through me in a river of heat.
Images flashed behind my eyes, memories, of Violet. And with those memories came emotions.
I wanted to take her in my arms and hold her. I wanted to feel her heartbeat against my own. I wanted to touch her. Love her.
Holy shit. I took a step back, away. Away from Violet. Away from the emotions raging in me. Emotions that were not my own, but my father’s.
It was only a second, a hot, vivid second of wanting her . . . as a man, as my father wanted her, but it freaked me out.
I didn’t know if I should be sick or angry. Angry was easier.
Get the hell out of my head and leave me alone, I said.
The presence of my father did not dim, but he did something to lower the intensity of his emotions. There was some sort of curtain between us, a curtain that dampened his feelings.
My apology, he said stiffly. And here’s the weird part—I knew he meant it. Really meant it. The primary emotion that filtered through the curtain now was embarrassment. He didn’t like sharing his emotions with me—never had when he was alive, still didn’t now that he was dead.
I wasn’t overjoyed about it either.
“Allie?” Violet asked.
“Hounding,” I said, brushing right over my little melt-down by striding over to the circle of ash. “For Detective Stotts.” The sooner I got this job nailed down, the sooner I could get out to Maeve’s and get rid of my dad.
I just needed to keep my cool.
“This,” I said, “is what’s left of a Conversion spell. No trailing line, no signature, nothing but this circle.”
Violet knelt next to the circle. “Is this what you saw before on the farm?” she asked.
I assumed she was talking to me. “I don’t remember what I saw before, but I’m pretty sure this matches what Nola described to me. It is very familiar. I know I’ve seen something like it before.”
“Huh.” She pulled a small vial and something that looked like a tongue depressor out of her purse. She scooped up some of the material and tapped it into the vial. She dropped that in her purse, then walked around the circle and knelt again.
“There are no other lines in the center?” she asked.
I looked down. There clearly weren’t. But she wasn’t asking me.
“No,” Stotts said.
His gaze was unfocused, his feet spread as if he were holding up a weight. His right hand was held palm forward, in an old-fashioned “stop” motion. And though he held still, I knew, because I could smell it, that he had cast a variation of Sight.
Right. I forgot that even though he called people like me in to Hound cases, it didn’t mean he couldn’t use magic to see things himself. Hounds could just see it, taste it, smell it, and track it better than any other magic user.
“Nothing on any of the standard spectrums,” he said.
Correction. He used magic very well. My opinion of him went up a notch.
He put his hand down, releasing the spell, and shook his wrist out. “It looks like a circle of ash.
I wouldn’t think it had anything to do with magic if I hadn’t seen it fall when Allie broke the Conversion spell.”
Kevin, who had walked across the gazebo to stand with his hands harmlessly in his pockets while he stared out at where Davy stood, suddenly stiffened. His puppy dog gaze slid over to me. That was it. No other reaction. But I knew he didn’t believe Stotts.
As well he shouldn’t. It wasn’t a Conversion spell I had broken. I sucked at anything along the lines of spells traditionally meant for medical use, and breaking a spell took just as much skill as casting a spell.
“Do you have any idea who is involved in this?” Violet asked.
Stotts shook his head. “Nothing here. No one. Just the spell, reported by some dog walkers whose dogs wouldn’t get anywhere near the gazebo, and who reported getting sick the closer they came to look at it.”
Even I could tell that didn’t sound like a Conversion spell. Violet pushed on her knees to stand, and Kevin was suddenly beside her, catching her hand and helping her up. “Thank you,” she said with a smile.
He made it look like business as usual, but my dad, behind my eyes, focused on the two of them and would not look away.
Stop it, I pushed at him.
But he did not stop it. With a force of will a dead man should not have, he stared at Violet’s smile, at the softening of Kevin’s expression, then followed Kevin’s hand to where it lingered just a second too long, too gently, too damn much in love, on Violet’s hand.
My father’s hatred burned chemical hot in my brain and everything went white for a second.
Violet, strangely enough, did not seem to notice Kevin’s barely concealed attentiveness. She was all business, a scientist with her thoughts on the problem at hand, not the people around her.
“I do think it is the full discharge of magic one of the disks could carry,” she said.
“Which leaves us with several more still out there.” Stotts said.
“Several?” I asked, leaning against my dad, like he was a door in a hard wind that refused to close. I wasn’t gaining much ground against him. I—or rather Dad—could not look away from Kevin, could not see anything but the man who had touched Violet. My Violet. My wife.
Holy shit. I pushed harder.
“We are unsure how many disks were stolen,” Violet said. “There was a fire in the lab that destroyed evidence from the break-in. But we think at least one was used to cast that spell at Nola’s.”
I frowned.
“The circle you don’t remember seeing. A circle like this was left behind at Nola’s farm. This”—she pointed at the ring on the floor—“is similar to what we saw in lab tests. I’ll double-check of course, but I’m comfortable saying this is the discharge of one of the disks. And as far as we know, no one but Daniel—” She visibly swallowed, then nodded to herself, accepting her own verbal slip. “No one but me knows how to recharge the disks.”
“So they’re worthless?” I asked. “Once they’re used, no one knows how to reuse them?”
“An unloaded gun is still a gun,” Stotts said.
“Someone could crack the code,” Violet agreed. “Get lucky and correctly interpret the combination of glyphs and tech . . .” She took a couple steps along the edge of the circle. “Are you sure it was a Conversion spell?”
“Yes,” I lied.
Dad pushed harder, the pressure of his will like a dull-edged blade sinking into the back of my eyes. He wanted to say something—he wanted to make me say something more to her. I clamped my back teeth down and pressed my lips together.
“Interesting,” Violet said. I couldn’t tell if she believed me or not. “Is there anything else you need from me, Detective?”
“The test results, when you have them.”
“I’ll get that to you this afternoon.”
“Thank you,” he said.
Kevin walked forward to stand beside Violet, just slightly too close. No, he stood much, much too close. He reached out to take her hand again.
My father’s anger built to an unbearable pain. My vision flashed white again.
“I need to talk to you, Violet,” I blurted out. A flash of heat poured over my face and chest. I didn’t know if that was me or my dad talking.
Kevin frowned, his eyes suddenly narrow. Those weren’t puppy dog eyes. Those were the eyes of a bodyguard, a killer. And a well-trained member of the Authority who knew something was terribly wrong with me.
Smart man.
At his look, my father in me stilled. Not because he was afraid. No. All I felt from him was burning hatred and betrayal.
Stop it. You’re dead. You have no say over what Violet or anyone around her does. I concentrated and pushed on him mentally. Pushed him farther back in my mind.
He has no right, my father’s voice rang in my mind. Not loud, like he was yelling. Very softly, in almost a lullaby tone.
Which meant he wasn’t just mad; he was crazy, killing mad.
I rubbed my fingertips over my eyes and forehead, forcing my eyes to close so I couldn’t see Kevin, so my father couldn’t see Kevin or Violet.
“Allie?” Violet asked, concern in her voice.
“Sorry.” It came out a little shaky, but it was all me. “I’m a little tired.” I took a short breath and mentally shoved at my dad as hard as I could.
I wanted him out of my head. Away, gone. Back behind his curtain. Farther back, if I could manage it. Back where I could no longer feel him. Back until he was no longer a part of me.
Yes, I was angry. And yes, I knew magic couldn’t be used when you were in a state of high emotion. But I wasn’t using magic against my father. This was nothing more than sheer willpower, determination, and stubbornness of who wanted control of my head and body more.
Believe me, it was me.
“Do you need to sit?” Violet asked.
I still had my eyes closed, my fingers rubbing at my forehead. I knew I had to answer, knew this shoving match with Dad was taking too long. Fine, if I couldn’t push him away, I’d shut him out. I willed a wall between my father and me, a black, thick wall of granite to replace the curtain between us.
For a brief moment, I saw him, dressed in a business suit like he was always dressed, but younger and stronger than I remembered him. His hair was black with no hint of gray, the lines on his face smooth. Death, apparently, did good things for one’s complexion. He scowled at me and raised his hand, as if to cast a spell—
I mentally took a step back, thinking, Wall, wall, wall, I really need a wall between us.
“Allie?” A touch on my arm. I opened my eyes.
Stotts raised his eyebrows but didn’t take his hand off of my arm. “Are you sick?”
“Tired,” I said. Wait, I’d already said that. Great. “Sorry. It’s the Hounding. Proxy headache,” I lied again. I had to stop living the kind of life where it was better to lie to the secret magic police than to tell the truth. “Are we done?” I nodded toward the circle of ash.
“I’ll need your report on what you Hounded.”
“Right.” I stepped back, and he let go of my arm. The wall in my head sat like a real weight, as if I’d put on a hat made out of concrete. But the good thing was I couldn’t hear my father’s voice, couldn’t see him, and he wasn’t pushing at me. I could feel his emotions, but they were not nearly as strong. He was still angry, still betrayed, but with the Mt. Everest of don’t-give-a-damn between us, his motions were only a whisper of what they had been just a moment ago.
I took a breath and tried to get my feet under me again.
“Do you want me to come down to the station to give my statement?” I asked Stotts.
“Yes. But we need to wait until the cleanup team arrives.”
“How long is that going to take?”
“Ten minutes. Are you in a hurry to get somewhere?”
“Maybe.” I braced myself to look over at Violet, to be ready to fight my dad’s reactions to seeing her and Kevin again.
At least he didn?
??t know she was pregnant. And if I had anything to do with it, I wouldn’t think about that any time that he could hear my thoughts. Like when I was dreaming. Or when he was trying to mutiny in my brain.
Violet stood next to Kevin, staring pensively at the circle as if she was trying to get the right answer out of an ink blot test. She and Kevin weren’t touching, but Kevin radiated that overly protective bodyguard vibe.
Dad didn’t do anything. Or at least nothing I could feel.
“Violet?”
She looked up.
“I do need to talk to you. About the business.”
“Now?” she asked.
Frankly, here, in the rain, hell, in the driving ice and snow, would be fine with me, because at this moment, I had control over my dad and could tell her I wanted her to run the company instead of me without him getting all grabby with my brain.
As if on cue, the wind picked up, whipping rain into the gazebo, and stirring the ashes that refused to blow away.
“Is now good?” I said.
“I’d really like to get this sample back to my lab,” she said. “How about dinner tonight instead?”
“Sure,” I said. “When? Where?”
“If you don’t mind coming over to our—to my place, maybe around eight?”
I had to see Maeve today, but it wasn’t even noon yet. And I didn’t have anything else to do other than catching up with Nola to try to help her with Cody, which I still might be able to swing. I didn’t know how I was going to fit it all in, but I’d try. And if Maeve helped me get rid of my father, I wouldn’t have to deal with him in my head while I was around Violet.
“I can do that,” I said.
“Then I’ll see you tonight.” She smiled. “Kevin?”
They walked together, step in step, past me.
I caught a hint of her perfume, and sadness filled me.
Bought in France, an anniversary gift. She laughed when I gave it to her, telling me it was too much, too good. I never told her what she meant to me. I pushed that unwanted thought and the ghost of a life I had not lived back behind the wall in my head.
“You sure you’re okay?” Stotts asked.