They had barricaded Brian’s door against Devin’s flow of water with sheets and blankets, so it was fairly dry. “How will we ever get this mess cleaned up?” Brina wondered.
“Kemble will get a mop-up crew in today. I’ll supervise them personally.” Jane knew Brina was feeling as though everything was being taken from her: her husband, her home, her power. She had been violated. They all had. “The Breakers will be as good as new. You’ll see.”
Brian looked smaller than before being attacked by the Wand. The whoosh of the respirator was regular but hardly reassuring. Breathing shouldn’t sound mechanical. Jane pulled up a chair for Brina. “Just take his hand. He needs you,” she whispered, lowering the older woman into a chair.
Brina nodded convulsively and reached for Brian. “I’m here, Brian. I’ll always be here.”
Jane heaved a sigh. When she was sure Brina was settled, she slipped out, waded across the charred foyer into the lightening predawn air of the portico.
“I’ll come into the station tomorrow and make a full report,” Kemble was promising the grizzled cop, the one who’d come to check out the reports of Jane’s mother disturbing the peace.
“We’ll both come,” Jane promised, shivering as she slid under Kemble’s arm. She looked up into her husband’s face. It was filled with the same wonder she felt. There’d been no time to even think, let alone say anything to each other, but they both had acquired a power, and they both knew what that meant. Jane knew there was no one else, unless he had formed an attachment to Brian’s pretty doctor. His look said it wasn’t so. He loved her.
And somehow, by some trick of fate, she had the gene too. Merlin’s magic ran in her blood and lurked in her bones. Maybe that was the reason she and Drew had become fast friends when they were such different personalities. If only she could have known that about herself all those years when she loved Kemble so hopelessly, it would have made things easier. Or maybe not. Until their unlikely marriage, she’d been just a little girl or his sister’s friend to him.
She couldn’t help her smile as she looked up into the face of her lover, suffused with the same fragile hope she was feeling.
“Hey, you two, uh. . . ? I mean, since last week. . . .” The officer cleared his throat.
Had it been only a week? It seemed like a lifetime.
“My wife,” Kemble said, returning her smile with one of his own. “We got married shortly after we saw you last, officer. I’m a lucky guy.”
The officer grinned. “Yes you are. In spite of a really horrible night.”
That brought them back to reality. The house was in ruins. Mr. Edwards and Ernie and Maggie were hurt. Maybe Tris, too. Brian was one step away from death and Brina had lost her magic. Maggie and Tris were vulnerable until they could get back to the Breakers. And the Breakers wasn’t the haven it had been. Maybe nowhere was safe anymore.
“Check in at the station tomorrow afternoon,” the officer said. “In the meantime, try to get some sleep. I’d recommend a hotel. This place is a wreck.”
As the police car pulled away, Jane and Kemble turned into the house and made their way through the debris. Kemble held her hand, but they were silent. Perhaps neither knew how to broach the subject that loomed between them.
“Where is everybody?” Kemble said to Lanyon, who was wading out from the kitchen.
“We’ve set up a command post out on the back deck. Everybody is out there. Tammy made coffee on the gas grill.”
The fire department had okayed the gas being turned back on, but the fire had burned through to the kitchen before Devin doused it. It smelled like wet charcoal. They’d be cooking in the outdoor kitchen on the terrace until they could get the damage repaired. Whatever would she make for dinner?
They found the remaining family huddled on the deck with the patio heaters going. It would be light soon, but the early dawn was chilly. Everyone looked exhausted and emotionally drained. Jesse was out like a light in one of the loungers, a blanket tucked around him. Bagheera curled at his feet, and Lance lay, panting, on the flagstones next to him. Michael had his arm around Drew, as Devin did around Kee. Michael had several butterfly bandages over the cut on his head. The paramedics had patched him up when he refused a trip to the E.R.
Tammy handed Lanyon a steaming cup. “Coffee?” she asked Kemble and Jane.
“That would be wonderful,” Jane sighed, plopping onto a chaise lounge.
“I feel so vulnerable here,” Drew muttered shaking her head, probably to chase away her visions. “I’m not even sure why they left. They had us dead to rights. Morgan had the Wand.”
“She didn’t have enough power to use the Wand in the face of Jane’s darkness and Tris’s heat,” Kemble said thoughtfully. “Otherwise, Michael and Tris would be dead.”
“We killed a lot of their guys,” Lanyon said. “Devin got two. Michael got three, right?”
“They won’t stay dead for long,” Kee said glumly.
Jane sat forward. “What are you saying?”
“We saw her bring one of her henchmen back to life up at Pendragon’s castle just before she stole the Wand. That’s her power. She can bring the dead to life.”
So they hadn’t made a dent in the Clan’s strength in spite of the toll the night had taken on them. Expressions around the circle echoed her depression.
She felt a big, steadying hand on her shoulder. “I’ve got the security up. At least they can’t get in again.”
“How did they get in the first time, then?” Lanyon asked.
Uh-oh. Jane knew what was coming next. She looked up to see Kemble’s expression harden. He was looking to Michael. Michael just nodded and got up.
“We’ll be back shortly,” Michael said to Drew. Drew would stop them, Jane was sure.
But Drew’s eyes flickered this way and that. She muttered, “Funeral. Still the funeral.” Jane had almost forgotten that a funeral still hung over the family’s future. Drew was lost in a cascade of visions, now that all the excitement was over. She wouldn’t take the situation in hand.
Michael and Kemble headed out toward the damp and charred foyer. Jane followed. It was up to her not to let them do anything foolish. By now the water had drained mostly away, probably into other parts of the house, unfortunately. The sunken living room was going to take some work. The two men didn’t seem to realize she was there as they stalked purposefully across the circular drive to the garages and up the stairs to the apartments over it. Jane was afraid. But she might be the only thing between Michael and Kemble and an act they would regret.
They passed the apartment Tris and Maggie shared and strode along the balcony hall to Mr. Nakamura’s apartment. They didn’t knock, but just turned the handle on the wooden door and pushed inside.
Peeking around their broad shoulders, Jane saw Mr. Nakamura sitting on the couch in his navy blue cardigan sweater, his neatly tied red necktie over a white shirt and his gray slacks. His stare was calm—too calm. His face was almost serene. His cell phone sat on the coffee table in front of him. And in his lap, his hand curled loosely around the grip, was a gun.
Just what Jane had feared.
His serene look stopped Michael and Kemble in their tracks.
“I would say I’m sorry,” he said, as though from a distance. “But that is so inadequate for such betrayal.” He shook his head philosophically. “No, there is only one atonement for such an act.” Jane saw with alarm that his hand tightened on the gun. Kemble and Michael exchanged looks of shock and confusion. He had admitted his crime so easily.
That was a bad sign. Jane looked up at the two men and knew they couldn’t handle the situation. It was up to her to try to salvage this. She’d known Mr. Nakamura since she was eleven. He was the kind factotum who was always in control, part butler, part clairvoyant purveyor of whatever the family needed, part uncle.
“I have no right to ask it,” he said in that voice that was somehow beyond ordinary calm. “But will you take care of Elaine? She had no part in
this.”
Jane weaseled her way through the two big men. “You can take care of her yourself, Mr. Nakamura.” Kemble and Michael looked surprised to see Jane, and then relieved.
“No.” Mr. Nakamura shook his head slowly and looked down at the gun in his lap. “No. I must atone. As soon as I know she’s all right, it will be time.” He glanced to the phone.
Jane saw it all. Poor, poor Mr. Nakamura. “Morgan took Elaine, didn’t she? That’s why Elaine didn’t come home to the Breakers when her term was out.”
“They’ll let her go now, though,” he said, from that distant place where his soul had already retreated. “I bought her freedom. The price was my honor and your suffering.”
Jane glanced back to Kemble and saw him exchange a look with Michael that said neither of them thought Elaine was coming home. Nor could they forgive Mr. Nakamura. She suppressed the little sound of protest that gurgled in her throat. Of course Morgan wouldn’t honor any agreement she made with Mr. Nakamura. Elaine’s usefulness was over. “You protected your daughter. Any father would do what you did. This is Morgan’s fault, and the Clan’s,” Jane said, trying hard to keep any hint of desperation out of her voice.
But Mr. Nakamura just stroked the gun, almost fondling it. Jane realized he might not even be hearing her, that he was talking to himself more than to them.
Kemble turned to Michael. “Morgan can bring the dead to life,” he whispered.
“And I can tell you how seductive that promise can be,” Michael rumbled. Pain moved across his face. Jane remembered that Morgan got him to Find the Sword by promising to bring his first wife back to life.
The two men stared at each other as the implications of that sank in. Jane blinked. They thought Morgan would kill Elaine, if she wasn’t already dead. But she could make Mr. Nakamura betray the family again by promising to bring Elaine back to life.
In the silence, the opening notes of the aria from Madame Butterfly coming from the phone made all but Mr. Nakamura jump. Mr. Nakamura smiled, knowing it was the call he was expecting to say that Elaine had been set free. He reached with his left hand to the phone and swiped to answer. Not a call, but a text. He tapped to access messages. Looking at his phone, his eyes got big. He gave a cry that seemed wrenched from his belly or his loins. He gripped the pistol and raised it.
Kemble and Michael both lunged for him. A shot exploded and plaster dust rained down. Kemble twisted the gun from his hand and threw it against the far wall of the small living room. Mr. Nakamura struggled up, hitting at Kemble’s shoulders and chest. Kemble thrust him back onto the couch and held his arms. Jane ran to the older man as he arched his back and gave a keening wail. Michael snatched up the phone. His brow creased as he stared at it. Jane put her arms around Mr. Nakamura. She didn’t have to ask him what was wrong.
“I know,” she said. “I know.”
Mr. Nakamura collapsed into sobs. “Why? I did what they asked. All of it. I did what they asked. My girl.” His shoulders heaved under Jane’s arms. “My beautiful girl.”
Michael tossed the phone to Kemble. Kemble glanced at it and his expression went flat. He stood. Jane made shushing sounds to the sobbing Mr. Nakamura. She didn’t want to see what was on the phone. She didn’t have to. Her imagination was working overtime already.
“We can’t let him stay,” Michael said as Kemble took him aside.
“We exile him and Elaine stays dead. He’s no use unless he’s in a position to betray us again.” Kemble’s mouth was set in a grim line.
Jane was horrified. Hobson’s Choice. What were they to do?
Michael sighed. “Should you bring the dead to life? I wanted to at one point, more than just about anything. In the end, I thought it was a bad idea.”
Kemble ran his hands through his hair. “Damn her.”
“Most men I know would kill him,” Michael said flatly.
“I’m not doing that.”
Jane was proud of Kemble. He didn’t even think about what Brian would have done. He was finding his own centerline now. She saw him make a decision. His mouth set. He punched in a response to the text message.
The notes of Madam Butterfly sounded immediately as a new text came in.
“We’d better tell the police,” Kemble muttered. “She just told us where to retrieve the body.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Kemble didn’t let Jane accompany him to the police station after all. Jane was a horrible liar and Elaine Nakamura’s death complicated matters. The last thing the family, or Mr. Nakamura, wanted was the police probing their entire existence. There was Pendragon’s estate obliterated in a mudslide, a fire in a skyscraper in Chicago with a body count, and two deaths under suspicious circumstances in Nevada in the family’s past. The police couldn’t bring Morgan and her Clan to justice. The end result would just be dead policemen. So Kemble arranged through a disposable cell phone (which he then disposed of) for an anonymous tip about Elaine’s body, and he repeated the robbery-gone-wrong story for about four hours.
When he finally trudged into the house, past several workmen’s vans in the circular drive, it was filled with big wet-vacs and a hoard of people. God, did I even check these people out? Panic filled him. How could he have been so careless after what had just happened? He was so not up to protecting the family. But with Senior out of action, what were the options? He’ll be back to his old self soon. He will. This is just for a little while.
Like hell it was.
He felt Jane out in the back of the house. He couldn’t help the little smile. He’d always know where Jane was now. The little frisson of happiness that coursed through him brought a barb of pain. How could he be happy with Senior in a coma, his mother’s powers gone, Maggie and Tris at the hospital, Drew crazy with visions, and the house violated?
A guy in overalls held up his hand. “Electrical’s all clear,” he yelled over the noise of the wet-vacs.
Kemble gave him a salute. Yelling was beyond him just now.
Dr. Tanet came storming out of the Bay of Pigs like a blond avenging angel. “You’re just who I want to see,” she shouted.
Ominous. He pulled her into the office wing. They couldn’t have this conversation shouted in public.
“Mr. Tremaine cannot stay in a house which has been compromised with fire and flooding. The power was off twice today.”
Kemble drew himself up and scraped together his courage. “Then the backup generator kicked on. Did the new monitors I ordered arrive?”
“Yes,” the doctor sputtered. “But. . . .”
“Look, Doctor. We’re not moving him to a hospital. It’s too dangerous.” He had to take a chance here. Let’s hope Dr. Tanet could keep a secret. And that he could bring her around.
“This is not dangerous?” Her brows arched in incredulity.
“He’d be dead now if we all hadn’t been here to protect him.”
“Hire guards,” she said, but her voice had grown less certain.
“There were ten men, all ex-FBI or CIA, on the property at the time the house was . . . compromised. We had top-flight security, far better than we could achieve at a hospital, and the attackers still got in.”
“I thought it was a robbery. . . .”
“Of course. The first thing robbers would do is smash the monitors in a hospital room and unplug Senior’s life support.” He must be tired. He wasn’t usually that sarcastic.
“The police?” Dr. Tanet had grown thoughtful.
“The Palos Verdes Police department isn’t up to this and you know it. We know how the intruders got in this morning and we’ve plugged that hole. He’s safer here now.”
Dr. Tanet cast a doubtful look back out through the big, tiled foyer to where the workers were dragging their machines into the living room.
“It will be all cleaned up by tomorrow,” Kemble promised. “Painted on Wednesday. The electrical is back in action and you can see that the water main has been repaired.”
“And how did a water main break
just in time to save the house from burning down?” she asked. Her very blue eyes were suspicious now.
“I’ll tell you that story another time, Doctor. I’ve had a long day.”
She looked at him narrowly and seemed to soften. “Hmmm,” she grunted.
Jane came running into the office wing, and only stopped herself from launching into his arm when she realized Dr. Tanet was there. “Oh,” she gasped. “I didn’t see you, Doctor.” She cleared her throat. “Tris is bringing Maggie home. Looks like the baby’s okay, and he’s feeling better. They wanted to keep her in the hospital, but. . . .”
Dr. Tanet threw up her hands. “Doesn’t anyone in this family follow medical advice?” She turned to stalk back to Senior’s room. “I’ll check them both out when she gets here.”
Jane looked after her. “I like her,” she said.
“So do I.” He pulled his wife into his arms. “You look tired.”
“So do you. I definitely had a harder time of it than you did today though.” She ran her hands up his back.
“You don’t know what four hours of grilling by a cranky lieutenant is like after you’ve been up all night fighting bad people with magic, and then spent all morning arranging to put the house back together.”
“I spent all day avoiding your family’s questions about us, while I was trying to keep the contractors and the cleaners from killing each other and the security crew focused on putting their command center back together instead of going out in some kind of a commando raid after the Clan. Oh, and I had Rory take Mr. Nakamura to the house of a friend from his church.”
“Hmmm. You win. I didn’t know Mr. Nakamura had a church.”
Jane rolled her eyes as he pulled her against him. Jane was soft everywhere he was hard. And one place was suddenly harder than it had been since before his father was hurt. “I know. You talked to him. I’m not sure how you can forgive him, Jane. He lost us the Cup. The family was hurt. The Breakers almost burnt down.”
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