I pushed my glasses back up, spread my hands wide, and called out, “Hello, party people! Drinks are on Terric!”
I grinned as all eyes turned to me. A lot of people had retired out of the secret magic business over the last three years. It made sense—there wasn’t much of a secret left about magic’s business, and since magic couldn’t do the big world-changing explosive sorts of spells anymore, the gig had lost a lot of financial and political influence.
Most of the people in the room I knew either well or well enough.
Zayvion Jones: tall, dark, and deadly. My best friend and a real goody-goody, though I’d never held it against him. Allie Beckstrom: tall, light, and deadly, she was Zay’s girlfriend and really, the reason we had all survived the apocalypse.
Next up: Victor Forsythe. Dressed casual, which meant no vest with his jacket today. He was one of my teachers and an old-school magic stick-in-the-mud. Clyde Turner: rocking the NY Giants jersey in extra-extra large. A down-to-earth guy who took over the position of Blood magic when my mum ran off to Alaska with her old crush.
Plenty of other people I knew too. Violet Beckstrom-Cooper, slender, but a little icy for my tastes. She used to be married to Allie’s dad and had taken over his magic and tech enterprise. Next to her was Kevin Cooper, a man with an unremarkable face, and a killer’s instincts who used to be her bodyguard.
Melba Maide looked as disheveled as always, which I’d long suspected she did to throw people off her litigious brilliance. She was talking to the Beckstrom accountant, Ethan Katz.
It did not escape my devious little mind that there were only old-timey Authority magic users in the room. No police. No Hounds who used to track illegal spells and, yeah, might still do that, but more often worked with the police as informants. No government officials.
No “normals.”
This appeared to be a magic-user-only invitation. Naughty. It wasn’t like us magic users or the Overseer to sneak around behind the law anymore. We were purely aboveboard open-book saintly types nowadays.
Well, except for when it came to the things we wanted to hide.
My grand entrance got a mixed reaction from the crowd. A little hatred and amusement, but mostly just long-suffering annoyance. Huh, I must be losing my touch. I could usually get at least one or two people riled up enough to tell me to shut up.
“Everyone.” Terric was on the other side of the room, his coat shucked and already draped over the back of a chair. He had found a microphone. Bastard.
“Thank you for coming.” He tipped his head down and gave me a look. “Shame, shut the door.”
Doorman. Really?
If I cared about the fact that I should be up there at that microphone with him, doing this job with him, I might be angry that he’d pretty much just publically demoted me from Head of the Authority to Guy Who Shuts Doors.
Luckily, I didn’t care about any of it. Right?
I turned, shut the door. Then leaned against the wall and glared at Terric through my sunglasses.
He felt the glare. Even across the room. He lifted his chin and pulled his shoulders back. Then he ignored me.
“You two still fighting?” Zayvion asked.
Zay and Allie stopped next to me. They stood there, arm in arm, Allie just an inch or two shorter than Zavyion’s six foot something. She wore a tank top that showed off those kick-ass magic-born tattoos down her arm and the bands of dusty black ringing her other wrist and elbow. Now that we weren’t on the run for our lives, both Allie and Zay had put on about ten pounds, and lost the dark circles under their eyes.
They smiled more, laughed more, and had that calm, sweet dedication to each other that meant they never walked into a room without holding hands.
I figured kids couldn’t be far off now.
Zay’s hair was buzzed short, and he had on a gray T-shirt that made his dark skin look even darker and set off the stone in the necklace he insisted on wearing. Apparently, the necklace had been an anniversary gift from Allie. Apparently, they were keeping track of those sorts of things now.
“You know how he is,” I said. “Stick up his ass.” I leaned toward Zay just a bit and pulled my glasses down. “Which he enjoys.”
Allie just rolled her eyes. Green, with a glint of mischief tempered by that lingering sadness that made a man’s heart skip a beat or two. Dark hair brushing right at her shoulders, pale skin. And yes, a beauty.
“We haven’t seen you around much lately,” she said. “What have you been doing?”
“Who. Ask me who I’ve been doing.”
“You have a girlfriend?” Didn’t sound like she believed me.
“I have a beautiful, full-bodied flaxen vixen at my side every night.”
“So, a bottle of whiskey?” Zay asked.
I grinned. “Ah, now. Do I look like a lad who’d kiss and tell?”
Zay gave me one of those looks of his that could wound a man who still had a heart. “You’re in a slump, Shamus. If you don’t pull out of it, I’m going to pull you out. By your nostrils.”
“I like how you think I’m afraid of you, Jones. What are you going to do? Throw magic at me?”
“Yes,” Allie and Zay said at the same time.
I made a tsk-tsk sound. “Listen to you two. Aren’t you just the hard-core Soul Complements now? Not only finishing, but also starting each other’s sentences. Do you still remember who pees standing up?”
Allie pulled her hand away from where she’d draped it through Zayvion’s arm. She took me down a notch with one raised eyebrow. “Don’t be an ass, Shame.”
It was unfair of me to dig at them about how fucking in sync they’d become with each other since the apocalypse. They’d both, separately, told me they were happy. Allie had given up the life of a Hound so she could restore an old house in St. Johns. She had plans of opening it up as a community center for disadvantaged kids or something. Zayvion had given up being Guardian of the gates so he could do whatever Allie was doing.
I didn’t begrudge them their happiness.
Oh, who was I kidding? I hated them for it. Hated that they’d gone through hell and back again for each other and ended up so damn happy. What had I gotten? A round-trip through hell, then a “We’re sorry, Mr. Flynn. Your happiness was lost in route through purgatory. Better luck next time.”
“By the nostrils,” Zay said with enough chill in his words I knew I’d struck a nerve.
It was good to see him rile a bit. To know he’d still threaten to wipe the floor with me—not that he could—if I made Allie frown.
I counted on him standing up and taking me down one of these days. And the way things were going, it would be sooner rather than later.
The first pangs of hunger, of the need to consume life, scraped through my belly. And there was a hell of a lot of life in this room.
I pushed my sunglasses back into place. I usually didn’t regret giving him a hard time, but Allie was right— that had been an ass move. I might hate that they had found happiness, but I didn’t hate them. They were the closest damn thing I had to a brother and sister. I thought very highly of those two crazy kids.
“Duly noted, mate.”
Zay was classy enough to take it as the apology I meant it as.
“Shh.” Allie pointed to the stage.
I tuned the world back in. Roomful of people who thought they were important, magically speaking. Terric up onstage glowing like he’d been dipped in angel shit.
Yes, angel shit glows. Never seen proof it doesn’t.
“...welcome the Overseer of the Authority, Salvatore Moretti.” Terric stepped away from the mic, and even though a normal crowd would clap, we didn’t.
Not so good at the normal, us magic users.
A man stepped up to the stage. He was just under six feet tall, I’d guess, built a little on the thick side with an impressive mop of steel gray hair and mustache to match. I’d guess he was a lady-killer in his day, but was a little heavy in the jowl now. Still, there was a wicked intensity to his dark eyes.
