License to Spell_An Urban Fantasy Novel

by Paige Howland

  I stared at the dead body and numbness sank into me. It didn’t last long. My gaze swung to Ryerson, who stood at the back door of the shop, his gun trained on something over my shoulder.

  “Run,” he said, then fired at something behind me.

  I ran.

  I didn’t make it far before Merrick stepped from the shadows ahead of me, flanked by four men whose guns were trained on me. The guy was everywhere.

  Merrick’s gaze shifted to something behind me, and he tsked.

  “If you want the girl to live, Agent Ryerson,” he said, nodding to the gunmen at his sides, “I wouldn’t.”

  I don’t know what he saw in Ryerson’s expression, but his confident smile slipped into a frown, and a wall of magic crashed down in front of them right before Ryerson opened fire.

  The bullets ricocheted off the shimmery, translucent wall, and I yelped and dove behind a small Nova parked in the alley. I glared at Ryerson.

  He had not just done that.

  The good news was that while Ryerson couldn’t penetrate the magic wall, neither could Merrick’s men.

  “Fine,” Merrick said, his voice warped from behind the shimmery magic wall. “Kill her.”

  The men flanking him fanned out behind the wall. Ryerson raised his gun, but gunshots rang out from inside the shop and he spun to face the new threat.

  The four men in the alley advanced on me. Soon they’d round the car. I reached for my magic but it shied away from me, burrowing deep until I could barely feel it. Great. If I ran, they’d kill me. If I stayed here, they’d kill me.

  The first man rounded the car and raised his gun.

  I closed my eyes.

  But instead of gunshots, I heard a snarl. A low, furious, animal snarl. My eyes snapped open in time to see a large wolf crouch on the ledge of the rooftop behind them. I caught a glimpse of a black bandana tied around its neck, and then it launched itself onto the men.

  It killed the first man in an instant, ripping into his throat. Before the first man hit the ground, it had leapt on the man next to him. The remaining men turned their guns from me to the wolf, but it was too fast. Too ruthless. It dispatched the last two guys with brutal efficiency, then turned its gold-rimmed eyes on me.

  “Nice wolf,” I whispered and pressed myself into the car.

  The wolf leapt at me.

  I opened my mouth to scream—fat lot of good that would do me—but the breath caught in my throat as the air around the wolf shimmered, like heat waves rising off dry pavement. The shimmery form seemed to twist and shift, and when it landed a foot in front of me, it was no longer a wolf, but a man. A very naked, very familiar man.

  The man raised his head, breathing hard, and ice-blue eyes met mine.

  “Alec?” I whispered.

  12

  It couldn’t be. Alec, my Alec, was dead.

  Yet here he was, kneeling in front of me, one palm braced on the ground as he looked at me with that slightly lopsided grin that used to make me ache with longing. And apparently, still did.

  “Hi, dove.”

  I stared at him. Numb. Unable to think. I don’t know if it was because he was alive, because he was naked, or because twelve seconds ago he’d been a wolf. Probably all three.

  Gunfire pinged off the roof of the car. Alec ducked and grabbed my hand. He felt warm. Alive. Real. “Time to go,” he said. “Come on.”

  Still naked, he pulled me to my feet. His muscles bunched, glistening with sweat, and I had the strongest urge to run my hands over them. My hormones have the worst timing.

  Alec tugged my hand and I snapped out of it. By the time we reached the end of the alley, the shock had worn off enough that I could think again, and I pulled on his hand.

  “Alec, wait.”

  He stopped and glanced back at me.

  “There’s a man back there. He’s my …” My what? Partner? Acquaintance? Annoyingly handsome and scowly shadow? “He’s with me. I can’t just leave him.”

  Even though he was willing to let me die if it meant killing Merrick. My throat felt tight, and I shoved the thought away because it didn’t matter. Even if he was a Grade A prat, I couldn’t just leave him.

  “Trust me,” Alec said. “Ryerson will be fine.”

  I blinked. “How do you know—” I stopped myself. Of course he knew Ryerson. They were both CIA. Isn’t that what I’d spent the whole drive up here pestering Ryerson about?

  Alec tried to pull me after him, but I dug in my heels. “We have to help him. He’s …” I frowned, struggling to put into words what had been bothering me about him since we got here. “I think he’s ready to die,” I finished slowly.

  Out loud it sounded stupid, but it felt right. Granted, I’d only known him a few hours, but he didn’t strike me as the reckless type. But that’s how he’d acted ever since we left the café. Like he didn’t care who died as long as Merrick went down too.

  Alec’s gaze had been sweeping the street for threats, but now it jerked to mine. He searched my face, his mouth a hard line. Finally, he nodded.

  “Stay right here. Don’t move.”

  And then he disappeared down the alley.

  I pressed deeper into the shadows and waited. Five minutes passed. Ten. The gunfire slowly subsided. The silence felt more ominous than the gunfire.

  Please let them be okay.

  What if I had traveled halfway around the world and found Alec alive, only to lose him ten minutes later? The thought ripped into me and stole the breath from my lungs.

  And he was a wolf. How does that even happen? I’d never met a witch or a mage who could turn into an animal, not that it mattered. Alec wasn’t a mage. I would have sensed it long before now.

  Running footsteps carried down the street and I jerked my head toward the sound. Relief crashed over me as Alec, barefoot but now dressed in the gunmen’s uniform of black cargo pants and tan t-shirt, tore up the street toward me.

  “Go!” he yelled, waving at me to run.

  Someone stumbled out of the shop behind him. I tensed, until I realized it was Ryerson. A second wave of relief swept over me.

  Then Ryerson raised his gun and aimed it at Alec’s head.

  What the—

  “No!” I threw myself out of the shadows and into the alley, startling Ryerson into jerking his aim up at the last second. The shot went wild. Alec grabbed my hand and yanked me along behind him.

  “Ainsley, no!” Ryerson yelled.

  Alec led us to Ryerson’s car parked at the edge of the village. I didn’t stop to ask how he knew it was there. He leaped into the driver’s seat and flung open the passenger door.

  “Get in!”

  I hesitated. Looked back at Ryerson. He was twenty yards back and closing in fast. His expression was grim and determined as he raised his gun to the car.

  I dove into the passenger seat. The car shot forward, fishtailing on the loose gravel until it gripped the road, and we tore out of the village.

  By the time we hit the highway, adrenaline still coursed through my veins but my heart no longer felt like it was about to explode out of my chest.

  I twisted in my seat to face Alec. “What the hex is going on?”

  “It’s complicated.”

  “Obviously.”

  He flicked me a glance, the corner of his lip curving up. “Were you always this feisty?”

  “Why did Ryerson just try to kill you? And how are you a wolf? How are you alive? And … wait.” A memory flickered through my mind. A detail that didn’t seem important at the time, but now sent a bucket of ice down my spine. When wolf Alec leapt off that rooftop, he’d been wearing a black bandana. Just like the one Merrick’s rooftop sniper had been wearing. “Do you work for Merrick?”

  He paused. It was all the answer I needed.

  “Let me out.”

  “Dove …”

  I opened the car door.

  “Shit, okay! Jesus, just don’t throw yourself out of a moving car. Your mom would kill me.”

&nb
sp; Good, because the door was heavy against the airstream, and the sight of the highway flashing mere feet below me sent waves of nausea rolling through my stomach.

  Alec guided the car off the next exit. He parked on the street next to a cemetery filled with narrow “streets” lined with above-ground tombs with colorfully painted iron doors. He cut the headlights and turned to me, but I was already out of the car.

  He cursed and jumped out of the car. “Ainsley, stop! Let me explain.”

  He caught up to me easily and grabbed my arm. I whirled around and punched him in the jaw. He let me go. I stumbled back but instead of running, I glared at him across the moon-drenched sidewalk. Alec rubbed his jaw and eyed me warily. My body trembled with the need to throttle him. Or hug him. It was a toss-up.

  I wanted to ask him why he faked his death and went to work for a terrorist. And how he’d transformed into a freaking wolf. But I didn’t say any of that.

  “I thought you were dead, Alec.” I sank seven months’ worth of sorrow and frustration into the words as I relived the worst moment of my life. My brother’s voice on the phone, telling me Alec was dead. The ringing in my head as I collapsed on the floor.

  Alec’s face changed. “Hey, don’t cry, dove. I’m sorry, okay?”

  I sniffled and something in my gut twisted. “And now you’re what, a terrorist?”

  “No. I know how it looks. Merrick has something I need, so I hired myself out to him as a mercenary until I could figure out where it is.” His expression darkened. “Then I overheard his plans for this cloaking spell he’s trying to create. I still have a few friends at the agency, so I called them and told them where he was hiding. Thirty minutes later, Merrick cast a spell on the villagers to make them leave. Every last one of them.”

  “Why?”

  “Merrick doesn’t want to kill innocent people if he doesn’t have to.”

  I blinked. “He’s a terrorist.”

  Alec shrugged. “Anyway, someone at the agency must have tipped him off. Merrick would have known that one of his people ratted him out. It was only a matter of time before he figured out it was me. I planned to stick close to him for a few more days, find what I needed, but then I saw you standing in that street …” He pulled in a deep breath and shook his head. “What are you doing here, dove?”

  “The CIA needed a witch.”

  Alec’s eyebrows climbed up his forehead. “You’re a witch?”

  Now it was my turn to shrug.

  “Wow. Okay, but why you?” It didn’t feel like he was talking to me anymore. His brows knitted, like he was thinking.

  “Alec?”

  “Hmm?”

  “How did you become a wolf?”

  He smiled, but it was tight. “That, dove, is a long story for another day.” Then his gaze flicked to my arm and he frowned. “You’re bleeding.”

  I looked down, surprised to see he was right. Blood stained my short sleeve and slicked my bicep. Now that I knew something was wrong, pain flared through my arm and dizziness swept over me.

  “Whoa, hey.” Alec stepped into me, easing me back against the cool iron rails of the cemetery fence.

  “I don’t like blood.”

  “I remember. Wait here and try not to pass out on me, okay?”

  He walked back to the car and returned a minute later with a first aid kit. He dipped a cotton swab into a bottle of antiseptic.

  “This might sting a little.”

  He pressed the swab against my arm, and I sucked air through my teeth. The sharp sting cleared my head, until I realized how close he was standing. Close enough to feel the heat radiating off him as he cradled my arm. He stood very still, the cotton swab forgotten between his fingers. He stared at my wrist.

  “Is that …” he said quietly. I followed the direction of his gaze, to his shoelace braided around my wrist.

  I shrugged even as a hundred emotions tumbled through me. “You said you’d come back for it.” I tried for nonchalance, but my voice came out a whisper.

  He ran his thumb over the worn leather, like he was mesmerized by it. Then, with effort, he pulled himself back to the present. He rolled a Band-Aid over my scratch, smoothing down the ends with gentle strokes of his thumb and sending shivers through me. He was bigger than I remembered. He’d always been toned but on the lean side. Now his muscles were more defined, straining against his dark t-shirt. My gaze wandered from his arms to his broad chest to his ribs … and stayed there. I frowned. Was that …

  I touched a spot on his shirt that looked darker and shinier than the rest, and he sucked in a breath. My fingertips came away wet with blood. Without thinking, I yanked up his shirt.

  “You’ve been shot,” I said numbly.

  His lips tipped upward, but they were strained. “’Tis a flesh wound.”

  I scowled at him, grateful for the distraction from all that blood. “You can’t just quote Monty Python and expect me to forgive you.”

  “It’s your favorite movie, right?”

  It was, when I was twelve. “You need a hospital.”

  “I’ll be fine.” His hand moved down my arm, sending electricity zinging through me. My knees went weak.

  “Dove?” he murmured, suddenly so close that his mouth brushed the hair at my ear.

  “Hmm?”

  “I’m sorry about this.”

  “Sorry about wh—”

  Something cold and hard snapped over my wrist. I jerked reflexively and heard the clang of metal on metal. I looked down, at the handcuff locking me to the cemetery fence. Then I turned an incredulous glare on Alec, who was backing away.

  “Seriously?” I said.

  “I’m sorry,” he said again. “It’s better for you if they believe I kidnapped you.”

  “They who? What are you … is that my phone?”

  Alec gave me an apologetic look and then punched in a number and lifted the phone to his ear.

  A torrent of tinny expletives erupted from the speaker and Alec winced. “Calm down. She’s fine. She’s at the cemetery de Castelo off exit 72.” A pause, and then his eyes narrowed. “No, I didn’t kill her. Jesus, Ry, of all the stupid … look, just come get her.”

  He hung up and looked at me. “I have to go.”

  My heart sank. “Go where?”

  “Make sure you tell them I forced you to go with me.” He pushed a hand through his hair. “I shouldn’t have taken you with me at all, but I wanted to talk to you. It was selfish, and I’m sorry. And tell Ryerson I’m sorry, just not for what he thinks.”

  He turned and headed down the street.

  “Alec!”

  He glanced back.

  “What does Merrick have that you want?”

  He grinned, but it didn’t reach his eyes. “Try to stay out of trouble, dove.”

  And then he was gone.

  13

  The good news is I was only handcuffed to the creepy cemetery fence for another ten minutes. The bad news is now I was handcuffed in the back of Ryerson’s car while Ryerson and Tiago stood outside, talking to the local police.

  It wasn’t so bad. It gave me time to think.

  Alec was alive and well. He was also alone, hurt, and being hunted by the good guys and the bad guys. Maybe “well” was the wrong word for it.

  Alec wasn’t a traitor. Of that, I was sure. If I had time to think it through earlier, I never would have accused him of siding with Merrick, no matter what it looked like. I had spent years watching Alec. From a distance, from right next to him, from trees …

  Anyway, the point is I knew him, probably better than anyone. He was the guy who had carried me all the way home after my bike accident when I was ten years old. And the guy who ripped into my brother when he stole a bottle of Jack from the corner store, then returned it and took the blame and the month-long grounding.

  He’s also the guy who joined the CIA when you were sixteen years old, said that little voice in my head. People change.

  No. They don’t change that much. So what
had happened to take him from all-American spy to werewolf and international criminal?

  My deal with Director Abrams was that I would help Ryerson with this mission, and he would tell me what happened to Alec. Now I wanted to get my hands on that file more than ever. There had to be something I could do to help him, but not unless I knew what happened.

  Then again, I couldn’t read the file if I was dead. So far today I’d been nearly blown up, shot at, and handcuffed to a fence. I don’t know how spy work usually went, but so far it felt like this mission was going poorly.

  The driver’s door swung open. Ryerson slid into the seat, then twisted to glare at me. His face was streaked with dirt, his dark hair mussed, and he was bleeding from a dozen scratches.

  “Where is Alec headed?” he demanded.

  “I already told you, I don’t know.”

  He glared harder.

  “He said to tell you he’s sorry but not for what you think,” I added helpfully. I wondered if he knew about the werewolf thing. I thought about telling him, and then Ryerson’s scowl deepened and I decided against it. The last time Ryerson almost caught him, he tried to kill him. No sense making it easier for him.

  “I’m going to ask you one last time,” Ryerson said through gritted teeth. “Where is Alec headed?”

  “I. Don’t. Know.”

  “Why are you protecting him?” he demanded.

  “Why are you being such a plonker?”

  “Damn it, Ainsley …”

  “I saved your life today, you know,” I said, because he seemed like he needed reminding of that fact.

  “Maybe you shouldn’t have!”

  There was so much wrong with that statement I didn’t know where to start. We were still glaring at each other when the front passenger door opened and Tiago climbed inside. He glanced between us and raised an eyebrow.

  “Am I interrupting something?”

  “Yes,” Ryerson said at the same time I said, “No.”

  “Right. Public police are canvassing the town, and highway patrol has set up checkpoints on all the major highways, but I doubt we’ll find him,” he said. “He’s in the wind.”

  Ryerson’s head jerked in what was either a nod or a mini-seizure. He started the car and pulled away from the curb.