Child of Fire

Able turned toward me. His smile was a little strained. “Absolutely,” he said. “He’s earned it.”

“How?” I asked. “I don’t mean to pry, but I’m really curious. Why did you leave New York to come to Hammer Bay, Washington?”

Able shrugged. “Four years ago I was bringing down six figures with my own marketing-and-consulting firm. We designed ad campaigns for promo toys and ran the best focus groups in the business. When I saw the Hammer Bay Toys exhibit at the toy fair, I thought they were a joke. Everything about them was wrong, according to the conventional thinking.”

Able opened the door and led us back into the main office. “I mean, fashion dolls from the seventeenth century? What little girl would buy Marie Antoinette outfits? Every toy fair has a couple of exhibitors that seem a little wacky. We were all snickering at Charles behind his back.”

We slowly walked across the office toward the elevator. Able was on a roll. There was a light in his eye and a note of desperation in his voice. He sounded like a convict who’d found Jesus and wanted you to understand why.

“But we were wrong and he was right. Those old-fashioned dolls flew off the shelves as fast as he could make them, even though the price point was too high, and the profit margin was nearly non ex is tent. I was supposed to be the expert, and as far as I knew, kids just didn’t want that sort of thing.

“By the next year, when he came out with the Eagle Riders, Robo-Zombies, and Helping Hand Trains, I didn’t know what to think. The toys were still all wrong and they were priced too high, but this time I was drawn to them. I wanted them, just like all those kids did.”

I noticed a woman walking the length of the office toward us.

“So I left New York and my six-figure job to work for someone who believes in ideas instead of focus groups. With every new line we release, I expect the company to come apart. But it doesn’t happen. Every knockoff line out of Mattel or Hasbro flops, even though their prices are lower and they can fill the shelves. I can’t explain it, but it’s been an amazing ride. And this year we’re releasing more toy lines than ever.”

He pushed the elevator button. The woman reached us. “Excuse me, Able,” she said. “Charles is ready to meet with you now.” We looked across the office. A tall, angular young man with a thick head of dark hair stood at the far end of the row of desks. He watched us, apparently waiting for Able.

It only took me a moment to recognize him as one of the four who had met with Emmett Dubois beside the van. He was the one who’d had the seizure.

Annalise turned and looked at me. Her face was blank. It was the same expression I’d seen on her face dozens of times, but at that moment goose bumps ran down my back. The elevator dinged and the door opened.

Annalise casually pushed Able and the woman aside. “Stay,” she said, and walked toward the dark-haired man.

I guessed she’d found the person she’d come to kill.

Able didn’t stay. “Excuse me,” he said. There was anger in his voice. “Excuse me, but that area is off- limits.”

He started after her. I grabbed his arms from behind. He tried to shake me off. I shoved him at a desk, and he fell into the lap of a woman with a stack of files in her hands.

“She told us to stay,” I told him. Able didn’t understand how dangerous it was to cross Annalise. The woman dropped the papers she was holding and grabbed on to him to keep him between her and me.

Annalise was halfway down the rows of desks. “Charles Hammer?” she asked.

“Yes?” he said. I couldn’t see Annalise’s face, but I guessed that something in her expression made him uneasy.

A woman at the desk at the end of the row stood and stepped in Annalise’s path. She was a big woman and she looked like she was used to getting her way. She grabbed Annalise’s shoulder. Annalise smacked the woman’s arm away. The woman gasped and grabbed her elbow, holding it as though her arm was broken.

Annalise grabbed Charles Hammer’s left hand and laid the scrap wood on his palm. A shower of dull gray sparks and a jet of black steam blasted from the design toward the ceiling.

Everyone gasped. Hammer tried to pull away, but Annalise didn’t release him. She tucked the scrap under her arm. “Your spell book,” she said. “Give it to me.”

“I’m sorry, what was that?”

Annalise sighed, then tore off his index finger with as much effort as it would take me to break a stalk of celery. She tossed the bloody digit over her shoulder.

Hammer screamed in pain. The women working in the office screamed and cringed against their desks. Hammer tried to yank his hand away, but Annalise held him as tightly as an iron vise.

She spoke to him in a clear, quiet voice. “I can ask you that question nine more times.” Hammer drew his right fist back and threw a haymaker at the side of Annalise’s face. He screamed again when he connected, then cradled his hand against his chest as though it was broken. Annalise’s face was unmarked, and she kept talking as though nothing had happened. “You’re not going to like it if I have to ask again after that. Spell book. Where?”

The sigil below my collarbone twinged. Again, there was no wave of force, but maybe that only come the first time. The room grew slightly dark, and the HBT name tags the women wore flared with yellow flames. Then the office workers dropped their arms to their sides and stood up in perfect unison.

They moved toward Annalise and Hammer like automatons. Annalise didn’t see them.

“Boss!” I called.

Annalise turned, and just as one of the women drew in a huge breath as though she was about to scream, Annalise grabbed the front of her sweater and kicked her legs out from under her. I could hear bones break from where I stood. Annalise tossed the woman over the row of desks.

I didn’t see her hit the floor, but I thought she’d survive. I hoped to God she would survive.