He cleared his throat. “I did ask if you were okay with it.”
I blinked up at his flat tone. “Not the kiss, dummy. That was…” I traced a line of condensation down the outside of the water bottle. “I meant Avril. I killed her. Snuffed her out of existence. I’m not some deity playing with the lives of mere mortals, and yet, look at me.” I scrubbed at my skin, but the stain was on the inside. “I’ve taken a lot of shitty steps on this journey and I keep swearing that this time that line isn’t going to move another inch, but it always does.”
At what point would I cross so many lines that I no longer recognized myself? Would I even like who I was at the end of all this?
“I’m going to see Rafael,” I said. “Could you send Arkady to retrieve the amulet? I don’t have the emotional bandwidth right now to focus on anything other than curing Rafael.”
“Sure, but Ash, you didn’t have a choice.”
“I told myself the same thing, but the hell of it is, Levi, that I did. Life is a series of choices and in the end we hope we come out ahead. I backslid hard today.”
“Are we still talking about Avril?” To all outward appearances, Levi was the picture of casual and relaxed—if you ignored his fingers tightening on the edge of his desk on either side of him.
If I had a time travel machine, how far back would I send myself? Two months ago? The revelation about Isaac would have happened regardless, leaving me re-living the heartbreak all over again. Hard pass. The night of the auction in Tofino before I kissed Levi for the first time? I rubbed a hand over the pang in my chest. Or the day back when I was thirteen that I picked Camp Ruach of the two options that my grandmother had presented me with?
His unscrupulous gaze didn’t waver, waiting for an answer I didn’t have.
“Your old couch was better.” I flicked a hand at the offensive furniture and left.
Chapter 19
When I got to Rafael’s cell twenty minutes later, I was a carton of mint chocolate chip ice cream and two plastic spoons richer. The regular nulling magic worked on me, but Gabriel’s Lockdown magic was specific to Rafael, preventing him from reaching through his bars.
I sat down on the cement floor next to the bars, and thrust a spoon into the cell. “Unless you’d prefer some healthy granola?”
Rafael sighed, looking miserable, folded himself cross-legged on the other side of the bars, and took the utensil. “Priya came to see me,” he said. “She offered to visit Gavriella’s grave while I’m in here.”
“That was nice of her.” I unlocked the cell with the key that Miles had given me and slid the carton in to him before resettling myself on the other side of the bars. The memory of Gavriella, tortured, broken, and dying in my arms, overwhelmed me. I had an eerie premonition that if I went to her grave, I might not ever leave. Reaching through the bars for some ice cream, I sucked on the cool mint, focusing on the chocolate chip melting on my tongue and not my premature demise. “How are you holding up?”
“Depends. How close are you to finding a way for me to get out of here?”
I told him about Lux’s hypothesis about a filter. “I just haven’t found the right one yet.”
“Then I am slowly going mad.” He dug out a giant scoop and crammed it in his mouth.
“Do you have any ideas?”
“No.”
I scraped at a solid section of the dessert. When Rafael had been upset about the effects of me using his magic as a healing boost, he’d soldiered on. He’d attempted to find another solution for my cravings, had worked on the code name, and accompanied me in hunting for the fourth scroll piece so that he could be the one to physically handle it and mitigate my symptoms.
This version of Rafael, the one who’d given up, unnerved me. First Levi, now him. Two strong, confident men of action had retreated in defeat. Levi might have turned the corner, but what was getting in Rafael’s way from bouncing back?
“Enough of the pity party,” I said. “Get your head in the game. You’re a fighter and a Seeker of answers just as much as I am, and you know the most about your magic. What could I use to separate them out?”
He rallied, but in the end, we remained as stumped as ever. Rafael dropped the spoon in the carton, his shoulders slumped.
“It’s not all bleak,” I said. “I may have found the Kiss of Death. It did belong to a Chariot member, and I got the name of another man who might be one of the Ten. Misha Ivanov.”
I quickly searched on my phone through some P.I. databases I had access to. There were a number of Mikhail Ivanovs, but the only one in the correct age range was recently deceased. No cause of death was given. I smacked the floor. “Damn it. If this is him, it’s a dead end. Literally.” If I had the correct Misha, had he been replaced yet? Had Deepa or Theresa?
Whatever Chariot’s number, I was too used to calling them the Ten to switch now.
“Have you checked on the library?” Rafael said.
“All is well. You think Chariot knows you’re my Attendant?”
“Of course. They knew my father was Gavriella’s and how the power is passed down.”
“Why didn’t they ever go after you for the library’s location?”
“To what end? Torture it out of me? It didn’t work with my father.” He stabbed his spoon into the carton. “We Attendants are very hard to break.”
Shit. That’s the reason Franco had been killed? I reached through the bars and squeezed his leg. “I’m so—”
“Worry about yourself,” Rafael said. “It’s your blood that’s required to gain entry to the library once they’ve found it.”
“About that…”
Rafael turned one shade short of apoplectic at my capture.
I waved a hand around his face. “Is your distinctive coloring about Theresa, the freezer, or the Queen knowing about the library?”
“You could have died, Ashira. I should have been there watching your back. The situation has become deadlier than ever and I’m nothing but a burden.”
“Is that what you think?”
“Do you see any evidence to the contrary? I underestimated the Gigis, and now I’m stuck here in a cage when you need me.” He slammed his hand against the bars.
I winged my spoon at him, hitting him on the cheek. The spoon bounced off and landed in the carton. Ten points.
Rafael wiped off the splat of ice cream with a scowl.
“First off all,” I said, “lose the offensive nickname. They’re Asherah’s Followers.”
“Getting rather chummy with the people that did this to me, are you?” he said bitterly.
“Yeah. We’re weaving friendship bracelets. I’m not condoning their actions, but Lux masterminded the whole Ba’al thing because her wife has terminal cancer and Gavriella was a dick when Lux asked for help in summoning the goddess.”
“No one knows how to summon Asherah,” Rafael said.
“Don’t be obtuse. Now, I said this before when you were all weirded out about your hard-ons from those magic boosts, but you obviously are too bone-headed to believe it. No one expects you to be infallible. If you’re setting up some standard of perfection, do you have any idea how much stress that puts on me to live up to it? Geez.”
Rafael smiled wryly. “That’s what Priya said.”
He’d discussed actual feelings with her? Interesting. “That you don’t have to be Mr. Responsibility at all times and can let others have your back?”
“That you being some paragon of perfection was impossible.”
“Ha. Ha.”
“But it’s not about perfection.” He stood up and smoothed out the blanket on his cot because apparently its hospital corners weren’t sharp enough. “It’s about choice. Our journey together hasn’t been as I envisioned, but with every step, I’ve made my choices and I stand by them. Being locked up has given me a lot of time to think, and I’ve been unable to envision any choice now that changes my situation. I feel powerless.”
“You’re angry.”
“Wouldn’t you be?” He snorted. “Isn’t that your basic setting these days?”
“It was.” I wrapped my arms around my bent knees. “Too much has happened in the past few days.”
Rafael re-tucked a corner of the blanket under the mattress. “What did you replace it with?”
“Uncertainty? Fear?” I thought about Levi. “Misguided hope? I’ll tell you when I know for sure. I chose anger for a long time, but I’m on the other side of these bars and I dunno, in some ways, I feel as powerless as you do when it comes to what to choose next. Perhaps our only choice is as simple as keep going.”
His bed made to exacting standards once more, he sat down and handed me back my spoon. “Did I really attempt to eat a deer?”
“Yeah. It was pretty, um…”
“Badass?” he said hopefully.
“Psychologically damaging.”
Rafael rubbed a hand over his jaw. “I suppose while we’re baring our hearts to each other, I also have a confession to make. The rage associated with this otherworldly interloper is getting rather hard to control. Almost impossible, in fact. Even with the cell and its warding, I fear with time I’ll be lost entirely to it.” He gave me a sad smile. “That won’t bode well for you regaining consciousness after destroying the Sefer.”
I snapped the spoon in half. “That’s it!”
“What’s it?”
“The threat the Sefer poses.” I jumped to my feet. “Rafael, my brilliant Attendant, you may have given me the cure. I’ll be back soon. I promise.”
“Wait.” He banged on the bars to get my attention before I ran out of the room. “Get me a laptop. Let me investigate Theresa.” He sounded excited for the first time in ages.
“You got it.”
Miles flagged me down in the corridor. “Walk with me.”
I shivered, and handed him back the cell key. “Oooh, so commanding. Could you use your dominatrix voice for good and rustle up a laptop for Rafael?”
Miles shot me his “you are such a pain in my ass” look that I’d almost become fond of, but he also stopped to speak with the posted operative about doing as I’d asked.
The section of the basement we crossed into was also used by the Nefesh police force and Miles nodded to a number of cops. “Jackson didn’t hire your attacker, one Billy Chesterman. Olivia Dawson did.”
“Say what now? Was she buddy-buddy with a myriad of shady Nefesh?”
Miles cracked a grin. “Billy and Olivia met because she mentored him in prison. She worked with convicts teaching them basic accounting and bookkeeping skills.”
“Nefesh prisoners?” I said.
“Some. We looked into this mentorship program. It’s legit.”
“Was Billy hired for Jackson’s protection or Olivia’s?”
“Both?” Miles shrugged. “All Chesterman knew was that Olivia was scared that Luca Bianchi would come after Jackson for screwing up some business deal. If the police started investigating, it wouldn’t look good for her. Wu didn’t even know Billy was shadowing him.”
“Then Jackson really didn’t recognize Levi’s illusion of Luca. Fuck.” I pushed the call button for the elevator. “Screwed up a business deal, huh?” I scratched my head. “That means the money laundering wasn’t Jackson’s idea. Damn it. I had it all wrong.”
“Yup.” Miles smirked and I shot him the finger. “My guess,” he said, “is that Jackson learned about it after Frieden’s death and made Dawson shut it down. He’s on the level about hating Nefesh.”
Dealing with Chariot made me suspect that everyone had a hidden agenda, but Jackson was exactly who he purported to be. Unfortunately.
“There’s still Olivia’s insurance policy,” I said. “She documented something in that ledger.”
“Chesterman didn’t know anything about that either.” Miles motioned for me to step into the elevator car first.
I pressed the button for the parking lot. “Hang on. When I asked Isabel, I didn’t specifically mention money laundering, only if Olivia had documented any illegal activities of Jackson’s. If it wasn’t about the money laundering, then whatever I was shown relates to something else.”
“That something else was bad enough that Olivia wrote it in code,” Miles said.
I rubbed my hands together. This case was getting fun. “Where’s Billy now?”
“We let him go. He didn’t know much and we had nothing to keep him.”
“Have you located the ledger yet?”
“Possibly. We found the company that the Allegra Group hired to store old records, but the place is like Fort Knox. It’s also warded so we can’t transport in. We’re working on it.”
“Send me everything you have on them. A fresh pair of eyes might catch something you missed.”
The elevator bumped to a gentle stop and the door slid open.
Miles braced a hand on it to keep it from closing. “You got it.”
“In return, I need the angel feather. Stat.”
To Miles’s credit, he didn’t explode with a hell, no. “Why?”
“I need it to cure Rafael.” We didn’t need a filter, we needed a catalyst. I couldn’t destroy Rafael’s magic, but I could drain him nearly dry. If I managed that without killing him, then once his magic replenished, it should be free of the Ba’al interloper’s powers.
The only problem was that I couldn’t simply take his magic at a drop of the hat. We’d tested that about a month ago. Rafael had hoped that when it came time for me to destroy the Sefer Raziel HaMalakh, that we could do it under controlled conditions where I was calm and relaxed. The idea was for me to introduce Rafael’s magic healing into my system before tackling the Sefer to build a base that would stave off any cravings rather than starting from a point of panic and danger.
Rafael had run through some meditation techniques with me in the library and when I was good and relaxed, he’d cut his arm for me to partake of his magic. He’d intended to then lower the pillars and release the scent of the four scrolls in our possession and see how well I fared.
We never got to the final part of the plan. I couldn’t grab hold of his magic. It simply held mine at bay.
Rafael had concluded that the threat to the Jezebel was precisely what allowed this particular healing process to work. Thus, I required the angel feather for my plan now.
Miles dismissed a call on his phone. “Are you positive this will work?”
I stepped out of the elevator. “Given the solid scientific evidence and massive precedents for this procedure? Sure.”
“I can’t get the feather before Saturday,” Miles said. “Security protocols.”
“I’ll take what I can get.”
Chapter 20
Miles delivered a couple of banker’s boxes full of information about the Allegra Group to my office, bright and early Friday morning. He also released Priya from House duties to go through it all with me, since she already had a working knowledge of the company.
Priya lifted out a stack of folders. “Adding to your collection?”
“Hmm?” I lifted the lid off a box, glancing over at the wall of framed Sherlock Holmes covers. Under the grid of the original framed covers hung a new addition: “The Final Problem.”
The story where Sherlock Holmes dies. I dropped the lid. Chariot had been in the office and sent me this message.
Priya raised an eyebrow. “Was this a surprise?” she teased.
“No,” I lied. I pulled the print off the wall and shoved it in a drawer. “I thought it would work with the others, but I don’t like it.”
Mrs. Hudson was hanging out with Bryan, who’d bought her affection with a steady stream of expensive doggie treats. He didn’t mind playing Fetch Pinky and generally returned Mrs. Hudson all tired out, so I let him have her. Besides, his office was ten feet from mine in case my puppy needed me.
Tedious didn’t begin to cover this work. I mainlined so much coffee trying to stay awake while we waded through everything that my leg was stuck in a permanent jitt
er. I was putting drops into my poor dry eyeballs when Priya said we’d covered all the business interests, but could move on to the charitable donations if I wanted.
I shrugged and said sure. Big shock, Allegra supported causes that served the Mundane community and only the Mundane community.
“Then there’s the Sunshine Youth Shelter,” Priya said.
The bottle of eyedrops hit my desk and I grabbed them before they rolled off.
“Are you sure?”
“I’m positive. What’s the big deal?” She handed me the paper with the information.
I tapped the sheet. “This is the shelter that Meryem used.”
Meryem Orfali had been my first case after my magic manifested. She’d gone missing, abducted by Chariot as a marginalized teen who they’d hoped to steal magic from.
Priya frowned. “The Allegra Group doesn’t support organizations benefitting Nefesh.”
“They supported this one.” I was already dialing a number in my contacts. “Hello, Meryem, this is your favorite P.I. calling.”
“I wouldn’t say favorite,” the teen said, “but for ten bucks you can be in the top three.”
I smiled, thrilled to hear that she was well enough to give me attitude. “How’s life, kid? Still living with Charlotte Rose and Victoria?”
“Yup. It’s all good. I’ve got class in five minutes, so get to the point.”
“The Sunshine Youth Shelter. Why’d you choose it over others? Did they know you were Nefesh?”
“Like I could hide it. Yeah. I went there because it was nicer than the other places. They’d upped their game, kept it really clean, decent food. Church people running it, doing their good deeds and shit. Why do you care?”
“One of their donors doesn’t like Nefesh so I’m wondering why they’d fund them.”
“Could be they didn’t know about the change. Hang on.” She spoke to someone with her for a moment.
“What change?” I clenched the phone like I could reach through the line and hurry up her explanation.
Revenge & Rapture: A Snarky Urban Fantasy Detective Series (The Jezebel Files Book 4) Page 19