Into the Fire Read online

  “I don’t know; I can’t explain it. I’ve never seen anything like this before, have never even heard of anything like this. It’s a block—an incredibly complex ward of magic designed to keep you from ever using magic or knowing you could.”

  I blinked. “That’s a thing someone could do?”

  “No,” he said, shaking his head. “It’s not. Which is kinda the point. Only a really powerful Wizard could do this kind of magic, but if a Wizard had found you, they wouldn’t have bothered with something like this.”

  “They would’ve recruited me,” I said.

  “Exactly.” He waved his hand, and the different colored sands split apart and shot back into their respective drawers. “Or they would’ve killed you.”

  Chapter Eight

  I followed Jack Mayfair back up the narrow staircase. We walked through the office area and into what turned out to be a decent-sized, if desperately in need of a makeover, kitchen. The whole room reminded me of something out of a ’50s television show, complete with an ice box and a tiny stove, again not really matching the mansion motif. About to comment on it, I stopped to stare at the large clock on the wall, which read ten after eight.

  We really had been downstairs an awful long time.

  “Where is everyone?” I asked, sliding into a seat at the little table shoved up against the wall.

  Mayfair busied himself with trying to get the coffee pot going, arguably the most modern piece of technology I’d seen in the place thus far.

  “Kylie would’ve gone home,” he answered. “Nevil will be upstairs with his books. This thing should have a button labeled ‘push me.’”

  “Here,” I said, offering to help. Not much different from my mom’s; push the on button, flip the lid up, pour in water, flip the lid down, and replace the carafe. Men are helpless.

  “You’ve been wearing your gun all day,” Mayfair observed. “I’m beginning to think, without your gun and your phone, you think yourself naked.”

  “Yeah, right.” As much as I wanted to discuss my gun and phone, I decided it would be better to talk about the weird lady vision thing … “Shit.”

  “Shit? Did you break the coffee pot?”

  I ignored the sheer panic in Mayfair’s voice toward the end of his question, instead pulling my cell out and flipping it open. “I missed six calls.”

  “Oh. Well, tell them you were busy.”

  “No, you don’t understand. My dad called. I missed six calls from my dad!”

  Whatever Mayfair said went unheard. I stepped into the next room and hit the speed dial for my parents’ house. I’m stupid, stupid, stupid! How could I forget to call? I pushed the thought away, focusing all my willpower into my voice when the call connected and I said, “Pops, hi!” I tried to sound cheerful. He liked cheerful. Cheerful was good. I can do cheerful, even on a day like this one. For him.

  “Samantha? This is your mother.”

  “Mom, oh—hi.” Shit. Ambushed. Mom answered. My mother only answered if my father was pissed at me, pissed at the world, pissed in general … “I saw someone called, thought it was Pop. I’m at work, and I couldn’t take it. I’m sorry.”

  “There were several calls, Samantha. From your father. He’s resting on the porch now.”

  “Oh.” Shit, shit, shit! I stared at the oddly-placed fireplace across the room. Who puts a fireplace essentially in the center of the house? How did that even work? Shaking my head, I tried to focus. Pop “resting” on the porch meant he’d gone beyond pissed into the stratosphere of what an ungrateful brat I am who never has time for the family who needs her. Or it meant actually resting—hard to tell with Mom sometimes. “Okay, what’s going on?” I asked.

  “You’d think you could take one minute out of your day to accept a phone call from your father. It’s not like he means to bother you.” Mom guilt. Nothing like it in all the universe, am I right? Hits you low when you’re already down and keeps you down for the count.

  “Mom, I didn’t intentionally duck him. I’m working. I can’t always take calls at work …” And the last thing I need today of all days is one of your patented guilt trips designed to destroy my self-esteem and send me into a gallon of Ben and Jerry’s for the weekend. That’s the other side effect of Mom guilt—weight gain.

  “I think you could make an exception for your father. He’s not well, and you know that.” Ah, low blow there. Thanks, Mom.

  “Mom! Pop knows my life. He knows I can’t always answer when I’m at work. I’ve already apologized, so please, let’s move on. What’s wrong? Why did Pop call?” I had this sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach. Maybe my father called because one of his old buddies had filled him in on the disaster known as my ex-career. In no way would I offer up a damned thing, just in case I was wrong.

  “It’s just—”

  “Mom, please! Why did Pop call?”

  “Your brother isn’t home yet, and we’re worried. He’s grounded and is supposed to come home straight from school. He’s still spending time with those boys—you know the ones I mean—and they are a bad influence. I’ve said it before, but no one listens to me.” Okay, so, not what I expected from her and Pop. I thought it would be more of a “you really screwed up your life and I know all about it” guilt trip rather than a “your bother is screwing up his life and we need you to fix it” call. The grandfather clock near the fireplace read twenty after eight. Ouch. Simon faced serious time for this. Our dad would rip him a new one. Hell, so would I. My stomach grumbled but I ignored it.

  “Which boys, Mom?” I asked, not really remembering the ones I’m supposed to know.

  “I pointed them out to you, Samantha. All black and scary.” Oh, yes, those boys. She meant the Goth kids, not African Americans, who Simon had taken to hanging with these days. He’d gotten in pretty deep, too, dressed all in black clothes and listening to the depressing music. Yay, teenagers.

  “Okay, I’ll go find him and bring him home.” Ah, the perfect end to a shitty day …

  “Thank you, dear.”

  I sighed, snapping the phone closed and tapping it against my forehead. I wanted this day to end. I wanted a tub of hot water, a long soak, and, now that I’d thought about it, that gallon of Ben and Jerry’s, and maybe a cheeseburger to wash it down with. Is a Jack Daniels float a thing? Can I make it a thing? What I did not want to do? Go searching for my little brother to drag his sorry ass back to our dad for more punishment he would most likely just ignore. He’s sixteen and pushing every boundary he can, and I get it, but it grated being the one who always had to rein him in. I did it because, well, Pop asked me to and no one else could do it, a thought that made me ill to even think. The choices were me or let him run wild, and the thought of a wild Simon off doing whatever he wanted whenever he wanted made my stomach tighten. Down that path lay anarchy and probably a stint in juvie.

  Still, the thought of chasing Simon down did feel better than the alternative of more crazy brain magic stuff.

  Returning to the kitchen, Mayfair sat at the table nursing a fresh cup of coffee.

  “I have to go,” I announced.

  He nodded.

  “What? No argument?”

  Something very akin to pain flashed across his face, gone as soon as it appeared. “Family comes first. I understand.”

  “Eavesdropping?” I asked.

  “Old house,” he replied. “Great acoustics. I want to see you back here first thing tomorrow morning. Try to get some sleep tonight. Tomorrow will be rougher on you than today. And be careful out there. The world changed overnight for you. If you hear a noise in your closet, call me before going to investigate it.”

  Gee, that’s not ominous at all, coach. Way to rally the team. There’s already some people out in the world who want me dead, apparently. Is he going to add more to the list? Rather than asking that, I asked, “How do I work the gate?”

  “It’ll let you out and close it behind you.”

  I waited for him to rise. He didn’t.
r />   “Magic stuff,” he said with a smile. He handed me a business card with a number on it. “Call me if you need anything at all.”

  “I’ll be back in the morning,” I said.

  “I know. But if you need me …”

  “Fine.” I pocketed the card.

  * * *

  As the gate closed behind me, seemingly under its own power, I wondered what sort of “magic stuff” could manage such a thing. Then I remembered automatic sensors and electric gates and decided maybe Jack Mayfair had a sense of humor after all.

  As I drove away, my mind flashed on the events of the last two days, of Vampires in suburbia and Werewolves in apartment buildings, of Jorge lying in a hospital bed and the honest-to-God possibility a dragon might swoop down at some point and reduce my insignificant little self to a burn mark on the highway. Oh, and let’s not forget the idea that Wizards exist and the term is apparently gender neutral, which I did not know. Weren’t women called witches or something?

  Women Wizards? Seriously?

  I swore to God, if wooly-footed little people lived in holes bored into the side of the foothills, I would lose my mind once and for all. Was my life not complicated enough without adding the cast from a bad ’80s fantasy-inspired B-movie into the mix? A second-generation cop, that’s who I am. This Wizard stuff had to be a fluke. Maybe it wasn’t me at all; maybe the weird magical net Mayfair found hugging my brain had something to do with it.

  How the hell could someone do that to me without my even knowing about it? Could it cause the magic? Like the runes on the gate, placed there and reacting now because … what?

  The thought made me shiver. Down that road lay madness and large quantities of alcohol I couldn’t afford to drink right now because something else, someone else, needed me.

  Simon.

  My little brother. Actually, I have two little brothers and one older. In order, we Kane kids go like so: Michael Jr., me, Sean, and Simon. The Kanes had planned for three children and, as any good strategist will tell you, a plan only lasts until the battle begins. Simon surprised my Mom and Pop, who thought they were done having kids until he came along.

  Mikey is eleven years older than I am and is technically my half-brother. His mom, my dad’s first wife, died in a car accident when he was three. Dad raised him for years by himself before he met and married my mom, and then they had me. A year and a half later, my older brother walked home from his after-school job and a gangbanger shot him in the back. We lived on the south side of Chicago at the time; I have no memory of any of it, only the stories they’ve told me throughout the years. I’ve seen some pictures. Mikey worked odd jobs in the neighborhood to earn a little cash and, like the chip off the old block he is, when he witnessed a robbery happening, he called the cops. They arrived in time to break it up, pinched a few, and the rest scattered to the winds. Mikey agreed to testify as a witness; their friends tracked him down a week later and shot him three times in the back. He spent months in the hospital going through physical therapy and basically relearning how to walk. Truth told, it was nothing short of a miracle he survived at all, let alone got back on his feet again. The doctors were shocked.

  The whole thing scared our dad, a beat cop at the time, to death. A lot of kids got hurt who never made it out of the ER. He wanted something different for his children, so he moved us to Denver as soon as he could, figuring a new town would give Mikey a fresh start and the whole family a better place to be. For the most part, it has done just that. Mikey went on to join the Air Force, Sean is working on his Masters in California, and I went into the family business. But then there’s Simon.

  Fourish years after we moved to Denver, my little brother Sean came along, and a few years after, surprise! Simon.

  Sixteen years old with the emotional stability of a four-year-old. Plus, he’s surly, whiny, lazy, stinky, and loud, and not exactly in that order. Rebellion is his new and annoying hobby. I think he enjoys being a pain in my ass. Mikey lives in Colorado Springs with his family and a cushy teaching gig at the Air Force Academy, and Sean is off becoming smart, which leaves me to support the ’rents and kick my little brother’s teenage ass a couple of times a month.

  So far, trying to rein him in hasn’t gone so well.

  Maybe, just this one time, he’d make it easy on everyone.

  Chapter Nine

  By the time I got to I-25, the sky turned dark, the night cool, and I still wore a borrowed shirt and jacket smelling of cigarette smoke. At least it wasn’t the damned trench coat. The roads were shit thanks to the rain we got earlier and an inability on the part of the sewers and drainage systems to keep up with the sudden rush of water. I took it as slow as I could.

  Denver is pretty big, fairly old, and really spread out. Suburbs spiral out from the center of town all the way to the Rocky Mountains in the west and up and down the Front Range to the north, east, and south. The ’rents live in Littleton, a suburb southwest of Denver, but if I knew my little brother, and I do, he’d be in or near Lower Downtown, also known as LoDo. Dozens of clubs, but only a handful catering to an under-eighteen crowd, and none of those would necessarily appeal to him, so I made a few phone calls and found out about a new, all-ages-welcome place called Blood and Ashes. Being on Colfax near the Fillmore and brand-new made it the popular place of the moment with the underage crowd. Finding a place to park is never easy in that neighborhood, but I managed. I pocketed a set of handcuffs from the glove box and headed inside.

  I had to flash my badge to get by the bouncers and cut the line waiting to get inside. As clubs went, this qualified: poorly lit, crowded, far too hot for comfort, but the music didn’t split my ears as much as I expected. More rhythmic and depressing than thumping noise encouraging you to dance. Also, a haze hung in the air from an overabundance of incense burning, the scent of which immediately began its assault on my nose. I’ve never cared for the stuff. Tends to give me a headache. It took a few moments for my eyes to adjust, and then I noted the little bundles of incense situated on the small round tables spread throughout the club, each surrounded by low couches, creating the feel of little private alcoves. Those couches supported large groups of people in various stages of relaxed lounging. Everyone wore dark clothes and makeup and had jet-black hair.

  Seriously. Is it Goth day in Denver?

  Scanning the crowd for Simon. In a sea of black, a pale, gangly, redheaded kid should stick out. But if anyone stood out like a sore thumb, she had red hair and went by Sam. People gave me the stink-eye. On first glance, no sign of my little brother, so I moved in deeper. Ignoring the lookie-loos, I threaded my way through the few people actually walking or dancing until a woman paused in front of me, dark hair cut short and tight against her skull. Her red lips stood out against pale skin and dull gray eyes. She inhaled deeply as if capturing my scent.

  Something in my head spiked hot and sent pain down my face. The club faded from my vision, and the woman shimmered and glowed with a darkness that made all other darknesses I’d ever seen blaze like the sun. Her eyes flashed now, red and burning. With a hiss, she stepped back from me and faded into the crowd. The moment ended, and the club came back into view.

  I scanned everywhere for her, but didn’t see her. I did, however, see other sets of red eyes clear as day and all focused on me. Each pair came with the same dark glow, muted compared to the woman up close. If there were a hundred people in the club, easily half of them had the glow. The pain spiked again, but whatever caused me to see these red eyes didn’t fade. It got worse.

  Another set of red eyes passed close to me, the owner inhaling before fading back into the crowd. Then another and another, until my head swam and I reached up to find blood trickling from my nose. I had to get out of there. Now.

  I pushed through the crowd and found the bathroom. Several girls cussed at me when I forced my way past the line and locked myself inside a stall. A few slaps and kicks against the door while I sat there trying to breathe. Someone even gave me the finger over th
e top. I didn’t care. Head back, I shoved some toilet paper in my nose to stop the bleeding. What the hell had just happened? Some new magic thing?

  When the blood flow stopped, I dug out the card and called Mayfair.

  “Vampires, Sam,” he said. “You’re seeing Vampires. It’s part of your power, but I didn’t think it would manifest so quickly.”

  “Simon,” I said. “My little brother’s out there.”

  “Where are you?”

  “I have to go,” I said.

  “Wait! Where—” I flipped the phone closed, flushed the bloody toilet paper, and returned to the club. There seemed to be red eyes everywhere now, so I just went from table to table, grabbing people pulling their faces close to mine until a familiar set of dark eyes, wide as saucers, stared back at me.

  “What the hell did you do to your hair?” I asked my little brother while yanking him up off the couch. If I hadn’t been nose to nose with him, I probably never would’ve recognized him. He’d dyed his hair black, spiked it up, and sported a spiked metal collar, dark makeup on his eyes and lips, and studs in his ears, nose, and chin. All fresh and still a little red around the edges.

  My dad was going to kill him. If the infections didn’t do it first.

  I pushed him in front of me while he sputtered something incoherent at me.

  “Problem?” A pair of guys the size of the Hulk appeared in our path. They were twice the size of the bouncers at the door, but neither had red eyes or the shimmering black glow. Something about them didn’t feel right, though—something I could only identify as feral. A thin gold tinge ringed their eyes. My neck hair went stiff just being close to them.

  The club patrons retreated into the shadows, leaving us pretty much alone.

  “No,” I said.

  “Yes,” Simon spat. “This crazy woman is trying to kidnap me or something!”

  I put my hand on the collar around his neck and pulled him close to me. “Shut up, Simon,” I hissed.

  The twin Hulks took a step forward, and I brushed my coat back to put my hand on my gun.