what.”
“Find Ruiz. That might be enough.”
“Find him and what? Make him talk? Hand him over to someone who will? And I don’t think this guy is likely to spill his guts to the police.”
Cathal tensed, shooting a glance at Heath, then thinking, what the fuck. Eamon knew Etain intended this. He had to know by now he wasn’t going to stop her. “A few minutes with Etain, before the police show up.”
The silence was complete, breath held in a shifting of belief, a full acceptance of what the evidence had suggested to Sean. “It doesn’t matter whether they’re willing or not? Whether they’re heavily sedated or totally aware?”
“No.”
“That explains your unnatural concern for Quinn earlier today.”
“Yeah.” He left it at that. “Call me when you have something?”
Sean sighed. “Remind me to revise my rates the next time you bring me work.”
“Not in my best interests,” Cathal said, smiling until he caught sight of a car pulling onto the street a little more than a block behind them.
His heart raced at seeing a Hispanic behind the wheel despite it being a Jag. Jesus, not every person of Mexican descent was a gangbanger or mafia member. He knew that, had friends encompassing a lot of different ethnic and cultural backgrounds, as well as employees and the musicians he’d discovered.
“Talk to you later,” he said, forcing himself not to slow down so he could get the Jag’s license plate number, though he couldn’t stop himself from hitting the garage remote at the exact spot when he got in range.
Paranoid. Call him paranoid, but he cursed himself for not having gotten Mirela’s cell number, assuming she had one. He rolled down the window, waving a message that she should follow him up the driveway and into the garage. The tightness in his chest eased when she pulled up beside him, the door already rolling downward.
Heath was out of the car in a flash. Cathal followed. Mirela emerged from the rental.
The ring flared, a blinding pulse that had Heath rushing toward them, hands gripping their arms in the instant they were hit with an incendiary concussion and fierce heat. The blast so powerful it nearly knocked him to the ground.
A wall of flame encased them, trapping Mirela’s scream and his own shout of surprise. Chaos followed in a pound of debris and the choke of black smoke visible through a shimmer of red and yellow.
Sweat coursed down his neck and face. And though he wore clothes, he felt naked, exposed, as if flame touched every inch of skin except where Etain’s ink was. Cool ocean countered fire, like a buffer against the living flame they stood in.
Magic, Heath’s, though this felt a hell of a lot different than what Eamon had done in front of the shelter.
Where Eamon’s shield was a bubble deflecting whatever struck it, this was flame burning hot enough on the outside to melt the shrapnel the cars had become and counter the explosion and rage of gasoline.
Mirela’s ring dimmed. How he could tell in the maelstrom he didn’t know, but he did and that knowledge was confirmed when Heath said, “Through the house. Your survival can’t be explained out here,” his grip tightening in a message that they must remain connected. A message Cathal understood when minutes later they staggered out of the house through the front door.
Heath released them, urging them to keep moving, toward neighbors he’d had little contact with but who now rushed forward, shocked that somehow he’d made it out of the inferno his house had become.
He heard a fire engine already racing toward them. From the other direction a police car’s siren was a slashing noise that only invigorated the conversation going on around him. Discordant snippets.
Jesus. There’d be no escaping the scene, not immediately anyway. If Heath hadn’t been there and known to act…If Mirela’s ring hadn’t reacted…
He noticed her absence then and paranoia returned, that she’d set him up. He dismissed it. The wisdom of tracking down her father aside, he didn’t believe she had a death wish.
The sweat on his skin chilled. He’d asked her back to the house thinking to protect her, but if she hadn’t been with him he would have died.
Firemen jumped from their rig, a second engine was close by. The police arrived, ordering everyone farther back. Beyond them Cathal saw his father’s soldier, the man who’d let them into the house, talking on the phone. Catching Cathal’s gaze, he hung up. An instant later Cathal’s cell rang.
“Dad.” More a croak than anything else.
“I’m handling this. Come home when the police cut you free. Bring Etain. The two of you can stay here until it’s safe.”
“We’ll go to Eamon’s.”
“I’ll be in touch.”
Niall hung up, only the iron will of self-discipline keeping his hand steady.
Or his daughter?
The jury was still out on that one.
Going to the bedroom he opened the gun safe there, reaching in deep to retrieve the burn phone. There was only one number programmed in, one whose use he felt certain wasn’t being monitored by authorities or the calls recorded.
He hit speed dial. A man answered immediately, a hawk swooping on prey. Better that than a vulture on road kill.
“I’m a little surprised I didn’t hear from you yesterday,” Niall’s contact said. “You’re calling to request an intervention?”
“Yes.”
“Your son is keeping interesting company these days. How’s your niece, by the way? Well on the way to recovery?”
“Miracles happen.”
“You’re at home?”
“Yes.”
“We need to meet face-to-face to handle this. Do you have plans to visit your lady friend?”
“I could have.”
“I can be there shortly.”
“So can I.”
“Is Denis going to accompany you?”
Bastard probably knew Denis had gotten Brianna out of the country, away from news of her dead classmates and their associates. There was no way he was going to confirm it.
“I’ll be alone. My word is good with Denis.”
“Accepted.”
The call dropped. He placed the cellphone back in the safe then moved to the house phone and punched in an extension. When Brendan answered, he said, “Bring the car around.”
He slipped on his suit jacket as he stepped outside. The Mercedes slid to a halt next to him. Brendan got out, opening the back passenger door.
“Marla’s,” Niall said when Brendan returned to the driver’s seat.
