“Search the room, find a couple bags,” I said as I slipped out the door and headed to the other side of the home. I didn’t bother to hide my steps.
Hiders were talented, but they didn’t tend to be fighters. And I had no desire to kill abnormals—weird since that was exactly what my father had trained me to do.
Anita looked up as I stepped into the kitchen, but her eyes didn’t go wide. They closed and her mouth whispered what I suspected was a prayer.
“Double-crossing me rarely goes well for anyone,” I said softly, my voice even. The dog at my side let out a low growl, picking up on my anger even though I sounded as if I were about to thank them for their hospitality.
Carlos put both hands on the round kitchen table and stared down the hall. I waited as Peter came up beside me, the kid slung over his shoulder. “Sorry, my friend, I’m with the mean one. She’ll survive this, if anyone can.”
He tossed a couple of empty bags out onto the dining room table.
“Money. Weapons. Easy food,” I said. “Fill it, Anita. Peter, go with her. Make sure no more phone calls are made.”
She opened her eyes and took in the bags. “We just want our daughter back.”
I slammed my hand against the table, making them both jump. “You think I don’t want my kid back? You think I don’t want to stop whatever the fuck is going on here? Who else is going to do it? The strong ones are gone! Who else is left? WHO? You called them down on me, the one person left who might have a fucking chance to see this through!” I was yelling and I didn’t care.
The words were out of my mouth, driven by my anger, before I could catch them. I hadn’t even realized that part of me had thought about stopping this.
“Wait, you’re going after them?” Peter sounded as shocked as Carlos and Anita looked.
Every muscle in me tightened. “No. That was not what I meant.”
“Sure sounded like it was what you meant,” Dinah muttered.
“It’s not,” I said. The mother bear in me wanted only to find my boy, to hold him in real life and not in a vision, and then spirit both of us away from the danger. I could do it. I knew I could hide us both.
Even without your abilities?
That was my own voice inside my head, not the one that had spent the past year in my skull, but I still shivered.
“They would find you, eventually. And that wouldn’t protect your son.” Carlos slumped into a chair. “Trust me, if I couldn’t keep my daughter safe, you don’t have a chance with your boy, no matter how much you love him.” His eyes locked on mine, forcing me to hear him out. “If what you say about the facilities is true, your son would end up somewhere just like Clearview, his mind wiped blank, his body nothing more than a shell. Or dead. I suppose that might be better in a way.”
I let rage pool in my eyes, washing away any emotion. “Then I suppose you are hoping that your daughter is dead?”
Anita gasped. “No.”
Carlos, though, nodded. “Yes. Better for her to be gone than to be a blank, a nothing.”
Bear . . . dead . . . or a blank, which was worse? Shivers ran through my body and my skin flushed hot. “How long before they’re here? The facility?”
“We didn’t call them yet,” Anita whispered. “We . . . weren’t sure.”
Behind me Peter slumped. “Jesus. I’m going back to bed.”
“Wait,” Carlos said. “She is the only one left, Magelore. Despite what you are, you are no Vivian.”
Vivian had been a legend in Magelore circles, old, strong, mean as a snake with a kink in its tail, and I’d killed her when she’d teamed up with my father.
Peter grunted. “Wouldn’t want to be that. But you’re right, I’m not as strong as Viv. You aren’t going to convince her.” He pointed a thumb at me. “She’s not got emotions you can manipulate like a normal person.”
Carlos and Anita shared a look. “What if . . . what if I offered to come with you?” he said. “I will be your personal Hider. You’ll move in shadows.”
I looked at him, seeing a genuine desire in his face. “If I’ll go after the big bad uglies? That’s the deal?”
“None of us are safe,” Carlos said, not begging but close. “Not you, not me, not our children, until this force that has decided to wipe us out has been dealt with. Phoenix, you could be that person.”
He was persistent, I’d give him that.
Anita was just as dogged. “Someone has to stand up against these monsters.”
I turned my gaze on her. “I’m the biggest monster of all, Anita. And I couldn’t do it. They caught me, kept me penned up, and it was a stroke of fucking luck that got us out of there. Even with a Hider it would be . . .”
No, I wasn’t even going to consider this route. I’d left Bear behind so I could tackle the beast that was my father. And I’d nearly lost my son.
I wouldn’t take that gamble again.
Peter cleared his throat. “Nobody else has had luck like that. And from what the kid said, there are other facilities that have as many or more abnormals trapped.”
Carlos and I stood across from each other while Peter talked me up. “Why do you care, Magelore?”
He looked to the floor. “I have a penance to pay. Something I shouldn’t have done, but did anyway, believing that I would be safe. I was a fool to help them.”
I sucked in a slow breath, understanding dawning, but it was Dinah who called him out.
“You motherfucking goat’s ass! You sold us out? You did, didn’t you?” She squirmed in my hand, trying to tip her
