“Well, like Sinthy said, once this is all over, I’ll bring you here. Maybe for our anniversary.”
“I’ll let you get back to it. Have you found Maxwell yet?”
“We’re close. Sinthy is pretty positive she’s found the building where he’s being held. We’re gonna watch it for a while and make sure it’s safe before going in.”
“All right. Be careful. I love you.”
“Love you too,” I said and tucked the phone back in my pocket.
Sinthy and I locked our arms together again, still acting the happy couple, as we circled the block. A small townhouse sat behind the office building. When Sinthy saw it, she almost skidded to a halt.
“Never mind. I was wrong. It’s not an office building. That’s it. That is most definitely it.”
“Positive?”
She nodded. “I can almost taste the spell I put on him. He’s in there.”
“That’s what you said about the office, though. We have to be totally sure.”
“Yes, that was because the magic was so strong it was radiating through that building. There’s more than my spell here. This place is crawling with magic.”
The townhouse was the most inconspicuous place I could imagine. Nothing about it screamed importance. I’d honestly been anticipating a maximum-security prison with razor wire and barking dogs. This was almost too easy.
Sinthy raised her hand toward the building for a few seconds before lowering it and clicking her tongue. “Four people inside. One is definitely Maxwell. I can see what they’ve done now. They surrounded it in a half-assed attempt at an illusion spell. See?” She pointed to an upper corner of a roof.
It took a moment, but eventually, I saw it. The corner shimmered in and out, flickering like a bad lightbulb. Had she not pointed it out, I never would have seen it.
“What illusion are they trying to put up?” I asked.
“Sound barrier, and a very crappy avoidance charm to get people to walk past the place without giving it a second look. It’s a good plan in theory, but whoever did it had no clue what theywere doing. It’ll work on humans, but any magical creature like us would spot it in a second. Like we just did.”
We walked over and leaned against the wall of the bakery. We tried to attract as little attention as possible as we talked.
“I don’t sense any other magical beings inside there. Do you want to hear?” she asked.
“Hear? Inside there? How?”
The witch held a hand up to the house, muttered a few words, then touched my ear with her other hand. Suddenly, Icouldhear some mumbled conversations going on within. I was never going to get used to this kind of magic. None of the voices were female, so Viola wasn’t there. I didn’t know if things would get much better. It might be our best shot.
“Are we ready to go in?” I asked.
“Yeah. As we walk up, I’ll remove the charms hiding the house and whatever they have protecting the entrances and exits. I’m sure they’ve tried something, but if the sound barrier and avoidance charms are any example, any other spells won’t be worth a damn.”
I looked into her eyes, then gave a terse nod. “Let’s do this.”
Without another word, Sinthy and I pushed away from the bakery wall and walked straight to the house. As we stepped off the street and up to the curb directly in front of the stoop, Sinthy waved her hand across the house, and I could feel the spells collapse and vanish. The men inside must have felt it, too, because I heard shouts and screams.
Knowing our element of surprise would only last a few seconds, I sprinted up the steps and slammed my shoulder into the door, tearing it off its hinges with my shifter strength. I fell and rolled on the floor, jumping up in a fighting stance. That’s when I saw that I’d overestimated the fear and surprise the men would feel. Two guys trained their machine guns on me.
Time seemed to slow down. I stared down the black barrels of the weapons. I’d made a terrible mistake. Their fingers twitched on the triggers, and explosions like the end of the world barked out of the guns. I could actually see the flash of the guns as they fired. My eyes focused on the bullets as they burst out of the barrels. It happened in less than a quarter of a second. Death surged toward me, and I could do nothing but watch. The automatic guns hurled over a dozen bullets toward my chest, belly, and head.
I had time to scream in my mind that I was sorry. Sorry to Maddy for being in this place and not returning to her as I’d promised. Sorry to my unborn child that they would never know me. Sorry to my family and friends who counted on me so much.
The first bullet slammed into my forehead, ripping my life away… or it should have, had it not frozen in mid-air. Every bullet shuddered to a stop less than an inch from my body. Sinthy stepped forward, hands raised, magic pulsing off her. With a flick of her wrist, the bullets vanished into a spray of metallic dust.
“Glad you brought me along?” Sinthy muttered.
The gunman gaped in abject shock, unable to fathom what had happened. There was no time for me to contemplate my mortality or how close I’d come to becoming a red splatter on the walls. I jumped forward, shifting into wolf form. My rage at what the men had tried to take away from me exploded into a fury I’d never experienced.
