Fire Brand (City of Dragons Book 6)

by Val St. Crowe

  “Like what?” said Lachlan. “Should we talk to Rowan’s friends?”

  “Maybe,” I said. “Look, if Paloma is working with Henry Gilbert or compelled by him or whatever, then she must go to see him. If we could catch her in the act, we’d have ammunition. Maybe she’d crack and tell us everything.”

  “That’s not a bad idea,” said Lachlan. “I’ll call it in and see if we can’t put some uniforms on her. Stake her out for a day or two. See where she goes, who she talks to.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  We brought home Chinese for lunch, and we had Felicity and Scott and Asia join us to eat. Asia was a sweet kid who loved the baby boys and wanted to try to help feed them. They weren’t much interested, insisting on attempting to do it themselves, but we let her try to spoon rice into their mouths and make funny faces at them. They mostly giggled and shoved the spoon out of the way.

  Asia thought it was great, though, and she said she wanted to come back sometime to play with the babies. Vivica said it was fine if Scott wanted to send her over any time.

  Scott was grateful. He said that Asia was going a little stir-crazy without anything to do. He was in touch with the school via email, getting her assignments so that she could keep up with her school work, but she was getting that done early in the day and then moping around for hours.

  After lunch, Wyatt was clingy and fussy again. Definitely teething. Damn it. I said I’d stay home with him so that I could get him down for his afternoon nap. I could tell that there was no way he’d go down for Vivica. I doubted I’d make it back to the office that day, but Lachlan said it wasn’t a big deal, because he was just going to work on paperwork and get some tails on Paloma, see what they turned up.

  Luckily, Wyatt ended up going to sleep pretty easily for me. I put him in his crib and tiptoed out of his bedroom.

  Felicity was in my living room.

  I went out to meet her. “Hey, what’s up?”

  “I just… I’m wondering what’s going on with this Eaglelinx thing,” she said. “I can’t help but feel like you guys are letting yourselves get pulled in too many directions.”

  I sat down on the couch, sighing. The truth was, I was afraid she was right. I didn’t know how we were going to stop Eaglelinx. I had been focusing on the case because it was there, and it was something to think about besides the fact that we were supposed to go up against some weird sea monsters in less than a week. “Maybe we’re going to have to push it back,” I said. “Maybe we’ll have to attack Eaglelinx next month.”

  “You can’t push it back,” said Felicity. “Asia and Scott can’t wait that long. Honestly, you can’t either. Eaglelinx will come after you. They’re mad and they’re threatened, and you opened this can of worms, Penny. You can’t put this off.”

  I rubbed my forehead. “It’s only that we have no way to attack them, Felicity.”

  “That’s not true.”

  “You can’t really expect me to put Wyatt in danger? Take off his talisman and hope the dragons can fight? What if they don’t? We don’t even know how that worked last time. Did Wyatt control the dragons? Did they attack on their own because they saw some kind of primal enemy?”

  “No, I know we can’t put Wyatt through that,” said Felicity. “But… the blood bond.”

  “No,” I said. “I already told you. After the last time, after everything. You remember what I was like.”

  “I know you’re afraid to go back there,” she said. “But you always said that if you needed to use it, you would use the blood bond.”

  “We don’t need to this time,” I said.

  “If it was Wyatt in danger, would you?”

  I didn’t answer.

  “Penny,” said Felicity.

  I got up from the couch and wandered over to the window. I moved aside the curtains. I wasn’t looking head on here, but I could see the beach stretching away. Empty and cold, the waves pounding the shore. “It’s not the same.”

  Felicity’s voice wafted over. “It is. Asia and Scott are my family.”

  I rested my forehead against the cool pane of the window’s glass.

  “I know that you don’t approve of how Scott and I got together, but don’t take that out on them,” she said. “Punish me, not them.”

  I whirled. “He’s the one who lied to you. How do you even trust him again? I don’t understand it, Felicity.”

  She squared off with me. “He’s not Alastair. You always think that every man is someone that shouldn’t be trusted, but it’s not as though you have great taste when it comes to men.”

  I narrowed my eyes. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  Felicity shoved her hands in her pockets. “Nothing. Never mind.”

  “I thought you liked Lachlan.”

  “I do. I…” She shut her eyes and took a deep breath. She opened her eyes. “You hooked up with him so fast. And whatever it is that you two have with that blood bond… whatever it is he does to you…”

  “You’re begging me to use that,” I said. “And then you’re throwing it in my face?”

  “I just wonder if it’s any different,” said Felicity. “You were ‘destined’ to be with Alastair, and you felt this irrevocable draw to him, and then Lachlan shows up, and you’re pregnant with some ‘destined’ child and you guys are more powerful than god and kind of weirdly evil, and—”

  “You know, Felicity, for a speech asking for my help, you’re not doing a very good job at buttering me up.”

  “I know,” she said. “And I don’t want anything to change. I know that you and Lachlan are happy together, and I want you to be happy. But I wish you would stop throwing stones at my relationship.”

  “I have,” I said. “I did. When you came to me and said that he was your first love and that it was real for you, I let it all go. You’re the one who keeps bringing it back up.”

  She folded her arms over her chest.

  “You really think that I would purposefully withhold help for Scott and Asia, just because you cheated on Jensen? Really?”

  “I didn’t cheat on him. And you said you dropped it.”

  “I had until you brought it back up,” I said. “And fine, okay, you didn’t cheat.”

  We glared at each other.

  She dropped her gaze and looked at the carpet. “Well, if it’s not that, then why aren’t you doing anything about Eaglelinx?”

  “I’m trying,” I said. “It’s only that I don’t know what to do.”

  “You have to use the whiteflame,” she said.

  “And if we become worse monsters than the Eagle and Lynx are afterward?” I said.

  She swallowed. “Well, I had a thought…”

  I raised my eyebrows. “Yeah?”

  “You can’t do the whiteflame without Lachlan, right?”

  “No, we have to be together,” I said. “We have to be touching.”

  “And you can’t do the other stuff either, right? Control people’s minds and stuff?”

  “Well… we have to be sort of close, but not that close,” I said. “No further than about a football field away if we want to control their minds. What are you getting at?” Of course, if I drank Lachlan’s blood, sometimes I could do things independent of him and vice versa, but we weren’t planning on doing that.

  “What if you split up?” she said. “What if you used the whiteflame, killed the monsters, and then you stayed apart for days?”

  “But the next day is Thanksgiving,” I said. “Lachlan’s supposed to do the turkey.”

  She gave me a look.

  I sighed. “It might work. As long as we were separated long enough for it to all wear off.”

  * * *

  “Can you clap your hands, Wyatt?” I said, demonstrating for him.

  Wyatt just giggled at me, making no attempt whatsoever to clap his hands.

  I picked up his adorable chubby little hands and helped him clap. He wouldn’t even let me do that, clenching his hands into cute little fists.
r />   He laughed.

  I laughed. I kissed him on the forehead. “Clap,” I said.

  He let out gales of laughter.

  Man. I loved that little boy so much. We were perched on the carpet in the living room together, enjoying a lazy Saturday evening. I was focusing on Wyatt at the moment, pouring everything into my tiny son.

  That didn’t mean that underneath it all, I wasn’t an anxious mess about everything from Eaglelinx to the case, however.

  Deciding he was done with me, Wyatt crawled over to the couch and pulled himself up. Then he began a circuit around the room, babbling all the way.

  I settled back to watch him. He was getting better and better at moving. I could see that his legs were stronger than they used to be. Soon, he’d be walking on his own.

  I could hardly believe that. Part of me wanted to grab him and hold him tight and beg him to stay a little baby. I was fairly sure that he was the only baby I was going to have. I had thought I’d never have a baby, so I was grateful that I’d been able to be his mother at all. But it did mean that every moment, every stage of his life, was precious to me, because it would never come again.

  But even though I wanted to hold onto every single stage as hard as I could, there was another part of me that was simply dazzled by his progress. I was on the edge of my seat to see what cool thing he’d do next. He was amazing.. He’d changed so much in the nine months that I’d known him. With every change, he developed more of a personality, became more and more the little boy he would grow up to be.

  I got onto my hands and knees and crawled over to him. “Mommy’s coming to get you!” I crowed.

  Wyatt giggled again, but he made no attempt to get away from me, just gazed at me with wide, adoring eyes.

  I tackled him, wrapping my arms around him and collapsing onto my back. I rolled around with him in my arms and I kissed his face and his chin and his tummy.

  He laughed and laughed.

  I could listen to him laugh all day.

  The door to my apartment opened.

  I sat up, clutching Wyatt, alert and ready. I reached for my magic, just to make sure it was there.

  But it was only Lachlan. He grinned at us. “What are you two up to? Isn’t it this guy’s bed time soon?”

  “You nearly gave me a heart attack,” I said to him.

  “Sorry,” he said. He came over and sat down on the carpet with us.

  “Dadadada,” said Wyatt.

  Lachlan beamed. “That’s me.”

  I narrowed my eyes. Maybe that was a word. Maybe Wyatt recognized his dad. Or maybe it was a coincidence.

  Lachlan held out his arms to Wyatt.

  Wyatt reached back.

  I surrendered the little bundle over to Lachlan, who proceeded to blow raspberries on Wyatt’s belly.

  “Where have you been?” I asked Lachlan. I hadn’t seen him since dinner.

  “I was trying some things with the talisman,” said Lachlan, lifting it off his chest so that I could see it. “Wanted to try to test some limits. See how far I could push things. If we’re going up against the Eagle and the Lynx, we need to know what we can do.”

  “Actually,” I said, “Felicity had an idea about that.”

  Lachlan’s phone rang. He held up a finger as he answered it. “Flint.” He paused, listening. “Got it. Excellent work. We’re on it.” He hung up the phone and turned to me. “That was the officers who are staking out Paloma. I told them to call us if she made contact with Henry Gilbert.”

  “She did?” I said.

  “Not quite,” said Lachlan. “She’s with Donovan Gilbert, though, his son. If we hurry, I bet we can catch them.”

  “Right,” I said. “But what about Wyatt? He won’t go to sleep at night for anyone but me.”

  “Well, that’s fine,” said Lachlan. “You can stay here with Wyatt and meet me as soon as he’s asleep. I’m going to dash, though, okay?”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  Luckily, Wyatt went to sleep pretty fast. Before putting him down, I called Connor to come and stay with him, and when I was coming out of Wyatt’s bedroom, Connor was there.

  “Thanks for coming on such short notice,” I said, giving him a hug.

  He hugged back. “No problem, Penny.”

  “Well, I’ve got to run,” I said. “But hopefully we’ll be back soon.”

  “This is a big break in the case, huh?”

  “I’m hoping we solved it,” I said. And I ran out the door.

  We’d cornered Paloma, now. She wouldn’t be able to keep it all in anymore. She’d have to admit that she was working with the Gilberts. She’d have to explain herself.

  But when I met up with Lachlan, he’d gotten them both taken to the station. I found Lachlan and the both of them down near the interrogation rooms. Donovan and Paloma were standing in the middle of the corridor and Lachlan was staring them down, arms crossed over his chest.

  “I’m not speaking to anyone without a lawyer present,” Donovan Gilbert was saying as I hurried down the corridor. He turned to Paloma. “And you shouldn’t either. I’m sure that my lawyer will represent you—”

  “I don’t need you to take care of me,” Paloma said to him. “I can get my own lawyer. I just don’t see why I need one.”

  Donovan wrapped his hand around Paloma’s. He addressed Lachlan. “We’re not going to say a word, and we’re not going to be separated. Don’t think you can get us all confused that way.”

  Lachlan was annoyed. I could tell, but he was covering it pretty well. “Look, you two want in the same interrogation room? Fine.” He opened a door and pointed. “Go on in.”

  “You’re not separating us?” said Donovan.

  “Didn’t you hear what I said?” Lachlan gestured again. “Go in there.”

  The two shuffled into the room and Lachlan shut the door behind them, closing them into the room so that we were in the hall alone.

  “What’s going on?” I said.

  “The minute I approached them, they were defensive,” said Lachlan. “They didn’t want to answer questions. They didn’t want to cooperate. Paloma seemed pretty angry, and considering she did slap me that one time, I thought we’d do better down at the station, so I got some backup to help me bring them in.”

  “You arrested them?”

  “No, I’m just holding them for questioning,” said Lachlan. “I don’t have a warrant to arrest them.”

  “I didn’t think you did. But sometimes you make miracles happen with the captain, and he knows that judge—”

  “They’re not under arrest. We don’t have anything concrete,” he said.

  “Why’d you let them go in there together?” I said. “They’ll just be getting their story straight.”

  “What was I going to do? Bring in officers to forcibly make them stop holding hands?”

  “Um… I guess?”

  He let out a noisy breath. “Did, uh, did Wyatt go to sleep okay?”

  “Yeah, real easy, luckily. Connor’s with him.”

  “Good,” he said. “And you were saying something about Felicity before I got the call?”

  “We can talk about that later. Let’s focus on these two.”

  “Right.” He massaged the bridge of his nose. “I guess I’m just not entirely sure what’s going on here. But I’m going to figure it out.” He took a deep breath. Nodded. And then he burst through the door into the interrogation room.

  I went after him.

  Paloma and Donovan were sitting next to each other. They had their heads together. Their linked hands were sitting on top of the table.

  I shut the door behind us. “So, it wasn’t Henry Gilbert you were sleeping with. It was his son.”

  “It was Donovan’s handkerchief?” said Lachlan.

  Paloma looked up at us.

  “Don’t talk to them,” said Donovan. “We don’t have to say anything to them.”

  “You don’t,” said Lachlan, nodding. “But you’re going to be in here a long ti
me. I can hold you for quite a while without charging you with anything. You might as well set the record straight if you can.”

  Stony silence from both of them.

  Donovan squeezed Paloma’s fingers.

  I chewed on my lip. That definitely wasn’t compulsion. It seemed as though he truly cared about her. Could be an act, I supposed, but not on Paloma’s part. People under compulsion didn’t have emotions. They were robots, automatons.

  “Nothing, huh?” said Lachlan. “Because you’re guilty, and you know there’s nothing that you can say to save yourself.”

  Paloma’s lips parted.

  “No,” said Donovan. “Don’t answer.”

  Lachlan narrowed his eyes. “Maybe I should revisit my decision not to separate you.”

  Donovan sighed.

  Lachlan rested his hands on the table, leaning across to peer at both of them. “Should I tell you what I think is going on here?”

  Neither of them said anything.

  Seeming to take this as assent, Lachlan pushed off the table and settled back on his heels, crossing his arms over his chest. “So, we were wrong. See, Penny and I here, we thought there was something going with you and Henry. At first, we thought that maybe he’d gotten his hands on some pretty intense magic, and he’d compelled you to kill your uncle for him. Used you as a tool. But then you were very, very adamant that you weren’t sleeping with him, which we thought was strange, didn’t we?”

  I nodded. I had to wonder where he was going with this. Sometimes I wondered if he made these little rambles up as he went along or if he really was going somewhere. Whatever the case, he was brilliant. We were going to nail these guys.

  Well, I hoped we were going to nail them. I didn’t understand anything. I hoped Lachlan was going to dazzle me with his skills.

  “But that was hard for us to wrap our heads around. Why would he sleep with you? Why would you sleep with him?” Lachlan uncrossed his arms. He reached down to clutch the back of a chair and leaned his weight into it.

  Did he have something? Maybe he was just stalling. I waited.

  Donovan and Paloma waited too.

  Lachlan let go of the chair. He started to pace. “Your sister says that you don’t bring men home, and I’m assuming that’s because you don’t bring home gargoyle men.” He eyed Donovan. “Guessing your former owner is not really someone you’d want to bring home for dinner.”