“Probably.”
“Look, I have more work to do. I’ll stick around here for a while in case she or Davis shows.”
“Here’s my cell number.” I rattled the number off, and Jonas put it in his phone. “I’m going home in case she’s headed there already.” But Cadmus or Tessa would have called me by now. “Call me if you see her before I do.”
“Can do.”
“And Chase?” I paused, aware I might have made a mistake about the man. “Thanks.”
The minute Jonas left, I called home. “Cadmus, Aerolus, pick up,” I muttered, wishing I had Darius’ telepathy. What I wouldn’t give now to be reading Tessa’s mind, to know she was safe at home.
“Yo?” Cadmus answered.
“Is Tessa there?”
“No, why?”
“Because I’m standing in her office, and she’s not here. She’s not anywhere in Temita, and I’ve got a really bad feeling.”
“Hold on.” Cadmus bellowed for Aerolus, and suddenly my brother teleported into Tessa’s office.
“When did you last see her?” Aerolus asked calmly, while every nerve in my body screamed at me to find her.
“I saw her at noon today, but according to her boss, she’s been gone since four.”
“Two hours.” Aerolus pondered that while Cadmus swore over the phone in several languages.
“Cadmus? What’s wrong?” I asked.
“A vision,” he rasped. “It just whacked me upside the head. It’s the Djinn, Marcus. He’s got her. And he’s not alone.”
Chapter 32
Tessa
I wanted to throw up, the presence of evil around me nauseating. But I held onto a nerve of steel, knowing Marcus would sooner die than show Sin Garu a hint of fear.
If the River Prince could do it, then by God his affai could be as brave. And the hot-tempered redhead inside me refused to back down.
Besides, looking bored drove Michael Davis crazy. The stupid, egocentric Djinn.
Staring at him as he glared back at me, I superimposed this face, the pretty one, over the ugly, narcissistic, gnome-like mask I’d traded insults with for the past six months. Sin Garu had turned the ugly Davis back into this good-looking one, and I didn’t know which image to believe.
“You have no idea how much I itched wearing that short, ugly little costume of a man,” Davis said, his voice no longer nasal, but deep and commanding.
Well, that answered that question. The creep shot me an assessing leer. Handsome or not, some parts of him remained the same.
“Were it not for my lord Sin Garu, I’d have fucked you ten ways from tomorrow and made you bleed, bitch.” He laughed.
I wanted to punch the laughter from his big mouth. The weight of magic settled over me, and I turned to note the notorious Sin Garu staring at me from just a few feet away.
We sat in Davis’ cramped living room in Fremont. A normal neighborhood in Seattle, filled with normal people. Yet I got to visit with a Djinn and a sorcerer—a Dark Lord. How lucky can a girl get?
“Why not let me taste the prize, my lord?” Davis asked Sin Garu with surprising deference. “I promise to leave few scars, just enough to ensure my worthiness to the great and future king of Tanselm.”
I snorted, unable to resist. “Why don’t you just kiss his ass already and get it over with?”
Death stared at me from Michael Davis’ eyes, but his irritation soothed that piece of me needing to hurt him in any way possible. I’d disliked Davis from day one, and now I knew why.
