“They’ll have instructions to maintain perimeter only.”
“Great.” Patrick hung up and peered out the windshield. They were heading east, the sky a dark wall of clouds rising over Brooklyn. “That looks ugly.”
“Weather is a mess,” Nadine agreed. “My flight in was turbulent for the last hour until we landed.”
Patrick sighed. “I was hoping we wouldn’t get a reactionary storm. Jono?”
“No one is answering,” Jono said, phone pressed to his ear.
“Keep trying.”
Nadine picked up speed to stay with their police escort as they raced down the highway. They’d both learned high-speed tactical driving while in the Mage Corps. Despite the growing traffic, Patrick had faith in Nadine’s ability to get them to Marek’s vacation home safely.
Silence fell between the three; the only sound in the SUV other than the hum of the engine was the faint ringing coming from Jono’s phone as he tried to contact Marek. Patrick monitored their route on his own phone, watching the little arrow glide across the screen.
Ten minutes later Patrick got another phone call from Casale reporting that Marek wasn’t in any of his known locations in Manhattan.
“It’s the Hamptons,” Patrick said after he hung up.
Nadine nodded silent confirmation and kept driving.
Hurry up and waithad never been his favorite way to pass the time, but even with a police escort, they could only move so fast. By the time they were five minutes out by Patrick’s calculations, someone finally answered Jono’s call.
“Marek? Marek!” Jono said in a relieved voice. “Fucking hell, mate. I’ve been ringing you like mad. Why didn’t you—what do you mean am I coming to Sage’s party? Bring a friend? Marek, wait,what? Hold on.”
Jono covered the pickup on his phone with his hand and twisted around in his seat to look at Patrick. “Did you send SOA agents to guard Marek?”
A chill ran down Patrick’s spine, and he leaned forward to grab Jono’s phone. He put it to his ear even as he hand-signaled Nadine togo faster.
“Marek, listen to me. If Rachel Andrita is on-site, I want you to say great, can’t wait to see you for the party. If she’s not, and it’s someone else, ask me to pick something up from the store,” Patrick said.
Marek kept his voice steady and unaffected when he spoke. “Great, can’t wait to see you guys at the party. The more the merrier.”
“Emma and Leon, if you can hear me, corral your people and get Tyler to shield all of you right now. ETA five minutes. Tell him to hold his shield no matter what.”
“We’ll be waiting,” Marek replied.
He hung up, and Patrick handed Jono back the phone. “Rachel Andrita is on-site with an unknown number of affiliates. We are to consider her hostile with a probable connection to the Dominion Sect.”
“Isn’t she SOA?” Jono asked.
“She stonewalled Casale for six months on this case and then demanded she have access to it after it got transferred to my division. Setsuna doesn’t trust her.”
“Setsuna needs to clean house quicker. A bullet to the head would work,” Nadine said grimly.
“I’m not arguing that.”
“Rachel is a witch?”
“Yes. Strictly civilian career tract, no military background. Whoever she brought with her to Marek’s home could be military. She might have a mage with her if the Dominion Sect really is backing her.”
Nadine smiled tightly. “Mage or not, I’d like to see them try to get through my shields.”
Nadine was a combat mage whose magic leaned toward defensive rather than offensive. The shields she could build with her own magic while tapped into a ley line were nearly impenetrable. She had shielded entire forward operating bases for hours at a time from shelling by insurgents and demons while in the Mage Corps.
Patrick was glad to have her watching his six again.
“How’s your magic?” she asked.
