the car-good thing we were at a stop sign-and didn’t move through the intersection even though there was no other traffic.
He turned toward me. He was wider through the shoulder than he looked, so there wasn’t much room for him to really turn.
Images, no, memories of his body against mine-not on my father’s grave, but some other time, when the heat and strength of his body pressed against me-came back with a quick flash of fire. My stomach fluttered and I swallowed to keep from making any small sound.
Then the image-and the emotion behind it-was gone.
The man before me wasn’t the same as the lover of my memory. Blackness poured like ink through the brown of his eyes, filling his gaze with killing darkness. Then he blinked, and his eyes looked brown again- just brown-and I really, really hoped I was just imagining things.
“How?” he asked.
“Do you think I know? That’s why I’m asking you.”
“No,” he said. “How do you know his grave is empty?”
“I wanted to touch him.” Okay, that sounded creepy.
He blinked a couple more times, like either the sentimental me or creepy me wasn’t lining up.
“Physically?”
“Did you see me carrying a shovel? Of course not physically.”
“So what did you do, Allie?”
“I touched him. With magic. Because, you know, grave robbing is so last season.”
“Allie. This is serious.”
“I know. My dad is dead-or so everyone tells me. But he is not in that coffin. Nothing is. Nothing but stale air.”
Zayvion rubbed a hand over his face and scrubbed at the back of his neck. He glanced out the windshield and seemed to notice we were not moving. He straightened, took his foot off the brake, and rolled through the intersection.
“How can you be sure?” he asked. “A dead body doesn’t feel the same as a living body. Even when touched with magic.” There it was again-his casual acquaintance with dead people. And how they felt when touched with magic. Interesting.
“There would have been bacteria, not to mention bugs of all sorts, so, yes, there would have been something alive if there had been any flesh in that box. There wasn’t anything in the coffin except air.”
“People don’t bury empty coffins.”
“Someone did.”
He didn’t say anything.
“Is this a part of the whole dangerous magic going on thing?” I asked.
The image of the magic glyphs on the warehouse wall came to me. Warnings. Life magic. Death magic. All in my father’s signature.
“Does it have something to do with death magic? Was my dad involved in some sort of… dark magic?” Now that I thought about it, it wouldn’t surprise me a bit if he were involved in whatever passed as the dark arts.
And no, I didn’t know what that was. It wasn’t exactly covered in my college Business Magic 101, where you learned the proper Proxy-to-potency ratio for advertising illusions.
The line of Zayvion’s shoulders tightened. I’d hit a nerve.
“Where would you get that kind of idea?” he asked, all low and calm, like it was silly to even think there was dark magic. He totally did not fool me.
And that was when it occurred to me that he might be a part of this-whatever
It was clear Mr. Jones could be a dangerous man. He’d admitted working for powerful people dealing with “complicated” things.
Even though he remembered our relationship, and I’d asked him if we still had a chance together, I realized I didn’t know him-didn’t know enough about him to warrant trusting him so soon.
Plus, I just was so not up to fighting for my life at the moment.
“Allie?” he asked when I’d been a little too quiet a little too long.
“Never mind,” I said. “It’s just been a long day. I’m jumping at shadows.”
He took a deep breath, let it out. Okay, he wasn’t buying my bluff either.
Note to self: do not play poker with this man.
“Allie, don’t ask me about… dark… about your dad and… things. Things I’m working on. It’s being taken care of by people who want things right… good. For the city, for people. Things I want right. For you. Us.” He squeezed the steering wheel, growing more frustrated with each word of his staccato explanation. “I can’t say more without putting you in a compromising position.”
“Maybe I want you to put me in a compromising position.”
Oh, groan. What was I doing flirting with him? Hadn’t I just decided I couldn’t trust him?
He smiled, a flash of straight white teeth, curve of thick lips, and then gave me a sideways glance. “When you put it that way…”
Yes, I was blushing. Fabo.
Time to reestablish some boundaries here.
“Listen. Just tell me: do you know where my father’s body is?”
No matter how bright those tiger eyes burned, he could not lie to me. I could smell a lie as easy as I could smell other strong emotions, as easy as I could smell the lines of cast magic. I was a Hound. And good at it.
“No.”
Not a whiff of change, not a scent of a lie. He was telling the truth.
“But you have some idea?”
“Not yet. Soon.”
Okay, this honesty thing was working for me. I just needed to know one more thing before he closed up again.
“I’d like to know what kind of people I should be worried about spying on me. The police? MERC? My dad’s ex-business partners? My dad’s ex-wives? Lon Trager?”
He didn’t say anything, but his knuckles went yellow from squeezing the steering wheel.
“You don’t have to name names,” I said, “but right now it feels like everyone is after me. And before you tell me paranoia will at least keep me alive, I have a job to do, Zayvion. I’m doing some Hounding for MERC. It’s possible I’ll be putting myself out there in dangerous ways. If I know where the heat’s coming from, I will do my best to avoid it.”
Still nothing.
“If you want me to stay safe, give me the tools to keep myself safe. Tell me who I need to avoid.”
I waited. I am not a patient woman. But I knew if I pushed any harder, he’d close up for good.
“There are… magic users…” he said so quietly, I almost couldn’t hear his voice over the drone of the engine and the rhythmic swipe of the windshield wipers. “Magic users who specialize in knowing when someone is over their head with magic.”
“Like a regulatory agency?” I was thinking FBI or some sort of secret black ops.
“No. Not like that. These people know when a person is using too much or more than they can handle. Know if they’re addicted to the rush, the pain. Know if they’re… abusing magic in ways harmful to themselves or others. When that happens, these people step in. Handle things. Discreetly. Without the involvement of the police, MERC, or the law.”
Holy shit.
“There are magic users out there who decide if other magic users should… what? Be forbidden from using
