A Wolf at the Door

“At last count, one hundred and twenty-three. Not to be counting our comrades within the Catholic church. I have been attempting to recruit more, in recent years, but so few believe in such things, in these modern days.”

Damn. A hundred and twenty-three champions. Way more than I’d ever dreamed. “Who else knows? You, Viljo…who else?”

“You.” He traced idle designs in the sand, just to give his hands something to do. I understood, I often did the same thing myself in uncomfortable situations. “No one else is to be knowing the whole of it. I am to be giving instructions to Viljo. Grapevine is to be wide open to you. Learn them all. It may to being important at some future day.”

I frowned. “Sounds like you’re planning a sudden retirement, Ivan.” And like he was picking me to be his replacement. Um, no? I was gonna retire after this myself, remember?

“I fought my first demon when I was to being younger than your Esteban. I have seen the best and the worst that our kind offers to others. I loved a beautiful woman, and lost her. I fathered a daughter and have seen her grow into a fine woman. I have brought men together who work to make this world a safer place. I think I am entitled to my rest, when it is to be coming. But I will not rush headlong toward it, either.” His grin was a little lopsided, and he poked me in the shoulder almost hard enough to shove me over. Either that, or I was way more tired than I realized. “You worry much, Jesse Dawson.”

With that, he heaved himself up off the sand, straightening his long coat. “Am I correct in believing that you are not to be having a safe place to retreat to?”

I stood and brushed myself off too. “Not sure. This thing, someone’s telling it our moves, someone who knows where Gretchen will be. It could be waiting for us back at the hotel.”

Ivan looked me over again, reaching out to pluck at the sleeve of my blue silk shirt. Only then did I realize that it was charred in places, revealing where the spells on my leather bracers had scorched through the cloth. “You are to be needing sleep. And weapons. I will return to this hotel with you, and we will see what may to be waiting for you.”

That actually made me feel a little better.

Luckily for us, there was nothing waiting for us at the Masurao Grand. Ivan inspected Tai’s newly set wards, declaring them remarkable. He checked over The Way and my armor, declaring them passable. In that suite, we were as safe as we could possibly be. At least until we could arrange something else, something no one could trace.

“Walk with me, Dawson.” I escorted him down the elevator to the lobby, where he stopped to hand me a folded piece of paper. “This is to being the address of a local woman. She may be able to help you translate the contract.”

I looked it over. The name said Cindy Lee. “Do you trust her?”

“Ni. And she will require payment for any work she is to be doing. But she is to being the best I could find.” He busied himself buttoning up his coat, though there was no way he needed it as nice as the day was turning out to be. “I will to be remaining in town for a few days. If you are to be needing magical assistance, call me. I understand it is to being unsafe for your Mira to be working her magics.” Christ, I was gonna kill Esteban for his big mouth.

“Yeah, I’ll give you a holler.” We clasped forearms, and I held his in my grip when he would have pulled away. “When I’m done here, Ivan, we need to talk more. I think…I think I’m done.” There, I’d said it. Saying it out loud makes it true, right? I was committed now. Whatever plans Ivan had for me, if I walked away, that was the end of it. He owed me that much.

After a moment, he nodded. “We will to be seeing.”

To my sleep-deprived eyes, the sunlight outside was garishly bright, reflecting harshly off the windows of the cars parked out front. I stood with Ivan while we waited for the valet to bring his around. Neither of us could seem to think of anything else to say.

“And he will be a king among kings…” The moment the doorman was distracted, Felix appeared, shuffling along in his brightly colored rags. His whiskey-colored eyes were fixed on Ivan, and he smiled broadly, the wrinkles in his face deep and jolly. Even his dreadlocks seemed bushier today, a reflection of his apparently jubilant mood. “He will walk with his head above other men. His arm will protect the weak, his hammer the innocent. And he will be rewarded for his duties on the happiest of days.”

Ivan looked down at the old homeless man, and I was struck by the odd juxtaposition. Towering Ivan, frost- haired and severe in his black coat, standing over stooped, wizened Felix, who seemed to walk along in his own personal rainbow. I couldn’t help but watch curiously as Felix reached out a hand to rest on the bigger man’s chest, his fingers too gnarled to lie straight. The black man’s smile faded a little, becoming a bit sad around his already worn edges. “I am sorry.”

Ivan nodded. “I am not.”

Felix patted him a few times, fidgeting with Ivan’s shirt buttons like he would tidy them right up, then shuffled away as the doorman came to hustle him off.

I raised a brow at my mentor. “What was that about?”

He didn’t answer me.

It didn’t occur to me at the time to wonder how Felix had known that in his youth, Ivan fought demons with a hammer. A maul, to be precise. And by the time I did think to wonder, I already had my answer.

16

Upstairs, I found Tai crashed out on one couch, his arm draped over his eyes, and Gretchen on the other, her head pillowed in Dante’s lap. No idea just when he’d shown up, but his presence seemed to be doing her good. He smoothed her hair gently, giving me the “don’t you dare wake her up” glare. I just held my hands up. I fully intended to find myself a horizontal position pretty damn quick too.

But first…my conversation with Ivan on the beach kept trickling through my head. A clay man will not bleed, Dawson. For my own peace of mind, I had some testing to do.