by Linsey Hall
Were they sending those thoughts into my head? I squeezed my eyes shut and shook my head.
A strong hand gripped my own. Immediately, I knew that it was Lachlan. His comforting touch helped force away some of the images. I clung to it. All around, objects sat on tables. Weapons, grimoires, potions—mostly poisons, from the look of them. And a whole lot of things I didn’t recognize, and didn’t want to recognize.
Dozens of scents hit my nose. We passed a food vendor, and the savory scent actually smelled good. Which somehow made the whole situation worse, once it mixed with the nasty scent of dark magic. I didn’t want to find anything appealing about this place. Not even hot dogs.
Vendors shouted at customers as we passed, hawking their potions and spells. I ignored them all, until an old woman caught my free hand, pulling me away from Lachlan.
I looked down, startled. She wore a black cloak over her stooped frame, and her black eyes seemed to see right into my soul. “Dearie, dearie, I’ll tell your fortune!”
“No thanks.”
She gripped me harder, her dark eyes burning. “Dearie, you should listen to your elders. You’ll learn things you want to know.”
A chill ran over my spine.
Somehow, I believed her.
Maybe it was her magic, but I really believed her. I sank onto the little stool that sat in front of her tent.
“What are you doing?” Bree hissed.
“Is this safe?” Lachlan gripped my shoulder. Even his touch couldn’t shake me away from the fortune teller’s grip.
Her eyes continued to burn into mine.
“Just a moment, guys.” I could hear them grumbling, but I only had eyes for the fortune teller as she swept around the little table and sat behind it. She leaned toward me, holding out a wizened hand. For a moment, it looked smooth and young, then it flashed back to old.
“Give me your hand, dearie.”
I did as she asked, letting her grip my palm. But she didn’t study it, reading the lines and creases that I thought fortune tellers would normally go right for.
Instead, she stared hard into my eyes. My brain seemed to vibrate, and it felt like she was looking right into my soul.
“You’ll find what you seek in the circle of stones.” Her voice wrapped around me, sending a shiver across my skin.
“What do you mean?”
“Questions you want answered will be revealed to you within the circle.”
She meant the stone circle at the Protectorate. She had to. I wanted to ask more—did she know which pantheon I was from? Did she know if my mother was still around in her ghostly form?
No.
Selfish.
I was here for Arach.
“But I’m looking for Grimaldi’s,” I said.
The fortune teller’s eyes flicked to mine. Confusion, then understanding. “Of course.” She pointed behind me, and I turned.
There, at the edge of the market, was a sign high in the air. A circle of glittery red stones gleamed in the light.
I turned back to her. “That’s it?”
“That’s their symbol. Go there and you’ll find what you seek.”
“So you…you didn’t mean that I’d find answers about my past in the circle of stones?”
“Things always have more than one meaning.” She stood and held out her hand.
I pressed a wad of cash into it, and she seemed pleased. I turned to my friends, all of whom watched me with concern.
“Let’s go,” I said.
Together, we pushed through the crowded market, headed toward the casino. My mind raced over what the fortune teller had said, but as we neared the edge of the market, I shoved the thoughts away.
We’d have to be alert for this. Totally on our game. Casinos in the human realm often had tons of security, and I doubted this would be any different. It wouldn’t be nearly as easy to blend in the casino.
The stalls thinned out a bit toward the edge, and we lingered briefly near one that sold some kind of strange-smelling beverage that bubbled in an iron cauldron. The casino was one of the buildings that had been built right into the earth, and it was unmarked besides the glittering circle of red stones that were stuck into the rock wall above the door.
Two burly guards stood at the entrance, each wearing a dark green suit. They had their hands crossed in front of them and their cold stares directed out at the market.
“Twenty bucks our names aren’t on the list,” Bree muttered.
“No kidding.” I looked at Lachlan. “Think you can freeze them?”
“Definitely. Then move fast.”
“No need for the speed,” Bree said. “You freeze them, I’ll make us invisible.”
“Perfect.” We were a good team. “Lachlan will lead the way in, and we’ll go single file after him.”
Everyone nodded.
I didn’t feel Lachlan’s magic this time—no doubt, he was trying to hide his not-evil signature—but the guards froze in place. They didn’t so much as twitch. If you weren’t paying attention, though, you wouldn’t even notice.
A half second later, my friends disappeared. I started for the door to the casino, bumping into someone slightly. One by one, we filed through the door, entering a dimmed lobby. There was a hostess standing at a gold-lined table, but she was frozen solid, too.
Well done, Lachlan.
“Everyone here?” I whispered.
There was a chorus of three yeses and one aye, and we all hurried past the hostess. As soon as we’d passed her, Bree and Lachlan dropped their magic. As a group, we strode right into the casino.
I tried to act like I belonged here, but the sheer opulence of the place made my jaw drop. Literally. It was embarrassing.
The whole place was done up in gold and gems and velvets. Many of the patrons wore cloaks like ours, but others were dressed in tuxes and ball gowns. Still others wore rougher clothes, but the waitresses seemed to be just as attentive to them.
In the casino, all money was green.
There were a half dozen types of games that I could spot off the bat, though I couldn’t have identified them. All the tables were crowded full of people. We drifted toward one of the many bars set up along the edges of the huge room.
There were two more entrances that I could see, both toward the back.
“We should split up and guard the entrances,” Lachlan said.
“You should take this one, Ana,” Bree said. “You’re the ones who got us here. You and Lachlan look for the target. The rest of us will guard the doors and keep an eye on you.”
“Thanks, guys.” I smiled at them.
They melted into the crowd, their cloaks disappearing between the tables.
“Let’s go,” Lachlan said.
I followed him out into the crowd, drifting between tables, pretending to look for a game to play. In reality, I was looking for a pale demon with blond hair and sawed-off horns. Normally, demons didn’t look very human, but there were the rare exceptions.
The longer we walked, the more I felt the prickle of eyes on the back of my neck.
“You feel that?” I asked.
“Aye. Someone is watching.”
“The guards?” I glanced around, spotting a half dozen at least.
“They’re looking for cheats. Not sure they’re worried about us.” Lachlan rubbed the back of his neck. “But someone is definitely watching.”
My skin crawled as we searched, tension ratcheting up. Whenever I caught sight of my sisters or Caro, they looked alert too. This place was definitely dangerous. For all the glitter and gleam that coated the surface of it, the underbelly was dark.
When a hand roughly grabbed my arm, I bit back a scream. My heart thundered. I couldn’t start a scene, but if management had caught us…
We were screwed.
13
I glanced back, dread uncoiling in my stomach.
My friend Claire stared back at me, shock on her face. She wore a fabulous red dress and black stilettos. So m
uch makeup covered her face that I barely recognized her. But it was definitely her.
“What are you doing here?” she asked. “You shouldn’t be here.”
“I know. What are you doing here?” And dressed like that? Normally, she only wore her fighting leathers or jeans and a T-shirt.
“Come on.” She tugged my arm. “We need to get out of the crowd.”
I followed her toward the edge of the casino, Lachlan at my back. Claire strode through the tables like she knew the place. But she wasn’t a gambler. I sniffed.
Her magic smelled different. Like rotten meat and gasoline.
I gagged slightly.
What the hell was going on?
She pulled us to the edge of the gambling hall, right between two big potted trees. A bench sat pressed against the wall, a perfect place to get away from the crowd.
I looked at Lachlan. “Can you block the sound?”
He nodded.
Claire visibly relaxed. “No one can hear?”
“No one,” Lachlan said. “You don’t have to whisper.”
“What the hell is going on?” I asked. “Does Connor know you’re here?”
“My brother doesn’t know everything,” she said. “He wouldn’t approve of this job.”
“You’re on a job?” I asked.
“Why the hell else would I be in a place like this, stinking like an old butcher shop right before an arsonist went to town?”
Okay, she had a point.
“I’m hunting a mob boss.” She tapped the black diamond necklace that hung around her neck. “This makes me blend in, though. A bit like your cloak, but prettier.”
“This place has the mob?” I asked.
She gave me a deadpan look. “It’s a casino. Of course it has the mob.”
“So the Order of the Magica knows about this place, then,” Lachlan said.
“They do.” Claire spent most of her time working as a freelance mercenary and odd-jobs-woman for the Order of the Magica. “They don’t want to take this place out entirely, but they do want to clean it up some.”
“Why don’t they want to take it out?” I asked.
“The Order’s not all good,” Claire said.
“That’s the truth.” They hunted FireSouls like Nix, and she certainly wasn’t bad. They might be the government, and they might try to take care of most supernaturals, but they didn’t always do a good job. They certainly didn’t hesitate to let their prejudice run wild.
My gaze traveled from Claire back toward the crowd of gamblers, finally landing on a mop of messy blond hair. Two sawed off-horns stuck out.
I gasped. “That’s him!”
She nodded. “I assumed you were looking for someone. Which one is it?”
I nodded toward the card table where the cards floated in midair, directed by a mage who acted as the dealer. “The blond demon. We’ve got to ask him some questions. Problem is, I don’t know if he’ll talk.”
“Oh, he’ll talk,” Claire said. “You just got to get him into the Room of Truth.”
“What’s that?” Lachlan asked.
“This is the mob, right? So they’ve got to make people talk all the time. But regular old beatings don’t work great for supernaturals. We’re used to getting the shit beat out of us. And often, we’ve got scary people on our tails anyway. So they’ve got a room that has been imbued with a truth charm. Get your guy in there, ask him some questions, and bam! You’ve got your answers.”
“Perfect.” I liked this plan. “But how do we get him in there?”
“We can’t grab him, or people will be suspicious,” Lachlan said.
“Pretend to comp him something,” Claire said.
“Comp?”
“Give him something on behalf of the casino. He’s got a major gambling problem. He’ll go anywhere if you promise him credit or a better table.”
I looked down at my cloak. “He’s not going to follow me anywhere.”
“We’ll trade clothes,” Claire said. “I’d do it for you, but he’ll recognize me. I see him here all the time, and he knows I’m not staff. But I just arrived today, so he hasn’t seen this dress. We’ll trade clothes and stinky charms, and you lure him in.”
“You’re a lifesaver.”
She grinned. “The boss isn’t here tonight, so my plan was a bust anyway.” She grabbed my hand and pulled me away from the wall. “We’ll find a bathroom and get changed.”
Ten minutes later, I teetered out of the bathroom on Claire’s stiletto heels. We were the same size, but heels had not been a part of my life in…well, ever.
I liked them; I’d just never had time to wear them. It wasn’t easy to run for your life in heels. Now I was suffering for that inexperience.
Before we’d gone to the bathroom, Claire had shown me where the Room of Truth was located, and I’d used my comms charm to alert the others. They’d act as guards, and once we’d gotten our target into the room, we’d make quick work of questioning him.
If Arach’s heart really was for sale in this awful place, I didn’t want to give anyone enough time to make an offer on it.
I turned the corner and met Lachlan’s gaze. His eyes traveled halfway down my body, heating as he took in the tight dress. Warmth flowed through me. Then he stiffened, as if realizing what he was doing, and jerked his gaze to mine.
“You look lovely.” His voice was slightly rough.
“Thanks.” I passed him. “Meet me at the room?”
“I’ll be there. Be safe.”
“You too.” I walked past him, heading out into the main room. I tried to put some swagger into my step and almost fell over.
Right. No swagger until I’d had more practice. Right now, I’d focus on getting to the demon’s table in one piece.
But when I neared the table, I realized he wasn’t there.
Crap.
I spun in a circle, heart thundering. He had to still be here.
Finally, my gaze landed on the bar on the side of the room. My target stood there, leaning over the gleaming wood and trying to get the bartender’s attention. I walked toward him, choosing the empty spot to his left.
My heart thundered as I got ready for my charade, hoping that he’d buy it.
“Excuse me, Mr. Karth?” Claire had told me his name, and I tried to keep my voice pleasantly modulated, channeling a fancy woman at a salon. I’d never been to a salon, but those ladies had always struck me as the height of fancy.
He turned, his gaze raking up and down my body. This felt nothing like Lachlan’s warm gaze, and I tried to control the shudder. Karth had the aura of a snake-oil salesman. “What’s up, pretty lady?”
Ew. “Management would like me to guide you to a special table. You’ve been such a loyal customer that they want to upgrade you.”
He grinned, tugging on his red jacket. The slime practically oozed off of him. “Why, that’s mighty kind of them. Do you come with the deal?”
Double ew. I flattened my features and forced my mouth to move. “Perhaps we can arrange something.”
The words almost made me gag, but they did get him to follow me. My heart pounded as I led him from the main casino floor to the hallway.
“What’s this now?” he asked.
“The table isn’t on the main floor. Our highest rollers don’t gamble there.”
“I wouldn’t call myself a high roller.” Nerves echoed in his voice.
“Oh, but you will be.”
His eyes brightened at that.
Moron.
I picked up the pace, my heels clacking on the tile floor. There was no one in this part of the hall, but it was still opulently decorated, so he shouldn’t be suspicious. Yet.
When his hand landed on my butt, I almost elbowed him in the nose. My arm twitched, and it took everything I had not to crush his face. I clenched my teeth and sucked in a deep breath. With a shaking hand, I gripped his wrist gently and removed it.
“Later.” I smiled, knowing it looked more like a dog bar
ing its teeth, but he didn’t seem to notice. Mostly because his gaze was glued to my butt.
Ick.
It reminded me of my job waitressing back in Death Valley, before we’d gotten the buggy up and running. I’d been real determined to find any work besides that.
Near the end of the hall, I turned toward a large wooden door that gleamed in the light, pushing it open and leading him inside.
This was where it would get tricky, since this hallway had way less frills. Anyone with a clue in their head would realize that the high rollers wouldn’t be gambling in a room that was connected to a hallway as ugly as this one.
But Karth the Moron had eyes only for my ass, so he followed me in. We were a full ten feet down the hall before he noticed that the environment had changed substantially.
“Hey, what is this place?” he demanded.
“We’re nearly there.”
“But—” He grabbed my arm.
I spun and punched him in the throat, having no more patience for this shit. We were out of the public spaces, anyway.
Karth gasped, and his eyes bugged out. He gripped his throat, betrayal flashing in his gaze.
What did he expect from the woman whose ass he had grabbed?
“You’re a moron, Karth,” I said.
His face twisted, and he reached for me.
Lachlan appeared through a doorway. He was on Karth in seconds, dragging the guy away from me.
“Hey, he was mine!” I said.
“Don’t play with your prey.” He grinned at me. “Anyway, I don’t think his ego could handle being beaten by a woman.”
“I don’t care what his ego can handle.” I glared at Karth, who was currently shrieking his head off. No sound came out, though, no doubt due to Lachlan’s magic. “Let’s go.”
Lachlan dragged Karth down the hall.
Bree peeked her head out of a door, then grinned. “Come on.”
I hurried into the room, shivering as the magic washed over me.
Oh boy. Lachlan had better not ask me how I really felt about him while I was in here, or I was going to embarrass myself.
Lachlan threw Karth into the chair in the middle of the room. Bree was the only one here besides us.
“The others are on guard,” she said.