Personal Demon (35 page)

The operator then made the mistake of asking “Is this Carlos Cortez?” Perhaps she was unable to believe the subject of the intense manhunt that was jamming the circuits was actually calling in. Or perhaps she was simply following protocol, confirming his identity before passing the call along.

Her reward was a string of profanity, and a threat that she’d be jobless if she didn’t transfer the call in five seconds. As for what happened next, I’m sure there would be an inquiry into the matter, and someone might indeed become jobless, because the line went dead. Carlos may have hung up. Or the flustered operator had made a mistake. Or the overloaded circuits disconnected the call.

The operator had called Carlos back, but only got his voice mail. Then she’d phoned me.

Had the call been a clumsy attempt to provide himself with an alibi? Pretend not to know why the circuits were jammed and our father unavailable, as if his ignorance would prove he hadn’t been responsible? Or in light of my father’s survival, might Carlos be trying to betray his comrades in the conspiracy to save himself? Or perhaps Carlos was not involved at all and was, this moment, at risk himself?

For my father’s sake, I hoped for the last explanation and I hoped we would arrive in time.

THE ADDRESS TOOK
us into southern Little Haiti, to a street that seemed to be trying to edge into the adjacent Design District. The art community had claimed about one quarter of the storefronts, and the “cafes and coffees” trend consumed another. In the remaining half, family-run Haitian businesses struggled to hold on, resisting the move to gentrification.

It was a commercial area and, at this time of night, the sidewalks were empty, the stores lit only for security. Even the cafes had long since closed. We shared the road with a single sports car, cutting through on its way elsewhere.

“One block over,” Griffin said. “You want me to drive by?”

“In this monster?” Paige murmured under her breath. “Might as well have cherries on the roof.”

“The vehicle is quite distinctive,” I said. “To Carlos or anyone else associated with the Cabal. Just find a parking lot…or perhaps an empty lot will be just as obvious.”

“Will it fit in an alley or service road?” Paige asked.

“I’ll try.”

He drove half a block, and wedged into a service lane so tight that Paige had to slide over and get out my side. I closed the door quietly, but the click still seemed to ring out like a gunshot.

If there was anything more obvious than driving a massive SUV through the empty streets, it was sneaking down them trailed by a six-foot-four bodyguard.

At the end of the service road, I lifted a hand to stop, then whispered, “Paige and I will look to the north and Griffin, you can continue—”

A slow shake of his head, arms crossed.

“I’ll go north,” Paige said. “You two continue—”

Another head shake. Paige and I exchanged a look, contemplating our chance of making a run for it.

Tempting, but for a forty-year-old of his size, Griffin was surprisingly fast.

I was hoping to find a convenient alley that would lead us to our destination. Of course there wasn’t one.

As I considered the absurd problem of getting to our target, I was aware of time ticking.

“We can use blur spells,” Paige said. “Griffin can follow with his armor intact. He’ll seem to be alone, and he’s safe from anything they can throw at him.”

As we headed north, Griffin stayed close to the storefronts, hidden in shadow, his footfalls remarkably soft, his presence betrayed only by the occasional scuff on uneven pavement.

As we closed in on the GPS location, the street looked identical to the one behind us—lined with closed shops and no signs of life.

What would Carlos be doing here?

The signal had originated a half block east. I squinted in that direction.

Paige whispered, “An art gallery, a vegan restaurant and, I think, a boutique.”

Clearly it was time to consider rescheduling that optometrist appointment I’d missed last fall.

“Someone really should circle around behind,” Paige said, glancing at Griffin, standing with his back to the building so he could spot all comers. “He’ll let me leave before he’ll let you.”

Not the solution I’d prefer, but she was right.

“Go,” I said, before I could think better of it. “I’ll be—”

“—watching out for me.” She smiled. “I know.”

LUCAS: 14

THE GPS SIGNAL LED US
to a narrow passage between an art gallery and a boutique clothing store.

Halfway down, a service door stood ajar.

Paige was at the other end of the alley, hidden under a cover spell. I would have preferred to discuss that open door with her, but I was stuck with Griffin. I’d cast a cover spell over him, but it was less than perfect—

because of his size or my lesser competence with witch spells.

“I hope you aren’t thinking that door being propped open is a lucky coincidence,” he said.

“In light of what’s happened tonight, does Carlos think my father himself will come to his rescue?”

“Maybe. Or that maybe you will.”

I hadn’t considered that.

The door was barely ajar, enough to look accidental, as if someone hadn’t noticed it didn’t close behind him. Inside there could be anything from a lone assassin to a small army.

“I’m going in,” Griffin said.

I caught his arm. “You might be impervious to normal harm, but you aren’t immortal.”

“Maybe not, but it’s my job.”

He tried to pull away, but I held on. “There must be another entrance.”

I was breaking my cover spell to motion to Paige when the door flew open. I quickly recast.

A dark figure stepped out and eased the door all but closed, as if he’d left something jammed at the base to prevent it from shutting.

His build matched Carlos’s, as did his dark hair.

My mind wanted to leap to the obvious conclusion and balked when I resisted. I could not make any assumptions.

Griffin had backed into the shadows. His eyes were narrowed, obviously doing the same thing I was—

studying the figure with uncertainty. All we could see from this distance was that he was dark haired and clean shaven, like Carlos.

I looked toward Paige’s end of the alley. When the man turned in the other direction, she peeked around the corner, breaking her cover spell for a look. Then she gave an exaggerated shrug, meaning she couldn’t confirm his identity either.

The man lifted a radio to his lips, seemed to think better of broadcasting in such a quiet alley and reached for the door again. Before he had it half open, Griffin flew down the alley, grabbed him by the collar and threw him against the wall, his hands pinned behind his back.

I knew immediately this wasn’t Carlos. My brother’s snarls of outrage would have echoed through the night. Instead, the figure only struggled, kicking and writhing in Griffin’s grasp. He yanked the man around to face me as I approached.

He was maybe half Carlos’s age. “Who are you?” I asked in English, then Spanish.

He only looked at me, then at Paige as she approached, and finally up at Griffin. Griffin shook his head, to tell me he didn’t recognize the young man. It was like being in a silent movie, no one saying a word, all too aware of the possibility that whoever was on the other end of the young man’s radio was close enough to hear.

“Lucas?” Paige broke the silence. “Do you know him? Does he work for your dad’s Cabal?”

Griffin glowered at her and even I wondered what she was doing…until the young man’s gaze shot to me, his lips parting in a silent “Oh, fuck.”

The first words out of the young man’s mouth were, among post-capture utterances, second in popularity only to “I didn’t do it.”

“It wasn’t my idea,” he said.

“Where’s Carlos?” I asked.

“If I knew—” His teeth clicked shut, expression closing down. “I want immunity.”

Griffin’s fist hit his jaw with a
thwack
. Paige covered a wince by looking away.

“Mr. Cortez asked you a question,” Griffin said.

“I—I want immunity.”

The demand fell into a plea, blood dripping down his chin. If he could still talk, though, the blow had been softer than it looked.

I waved for Griffin to hold back—pure theater, as he had no intention of hitting the youth again if it could be avoided. Then I nodded for the young man to continue.

“It’s all gone to hell,” he said, slumping in Griffin’s grip. “He said it would be easy, but now the girl’s dead and—”

“What girl?” Paige said before stopping herself. An apologetic look my way. “Sorry. You said the girl’s dead and…”

He shook his head.

“Where’s Carlos?” I asked.

“I don’t—”

The young man stopped short, gaping at me. Then he slumped in Griffin’s hands. Griffin jerked him upright again, but his head lolled, and when Griffin pulled back his hand, it glistened wetly in the dim light.

Something stung my shoulder. Then another blow, this one square in my back, so hard it knocked the wind out of me and sent me sprawling into the gravel.

“Down!” Griffin shouted as he shoved me.

“Paige!”

I saw her pale face, eyes wide, uncomprehending. I grabbed her legs and yanked her down. The bullet struck the ground a foot from Griffin’s boot, sending up a geyser of dirt.

I reached for the door, but Griffin already had it open. He grabbed for me, but I dove through, shouting for him to get Paige instead. I slid across a carpeted floor, the pile burning my cheek, my injured shoulder colliding with a desk chair. I threw it aside and scrambled back to Paige as Griffin slammed the door.

“I’m okay,” she whispered. “I just—I’m sorry. I didn’t understand. A sniper?”

Griffin gave a grunt of assent and, for a moment, we all stayed there, in the dim light, our breathing the only sound. We were in a small office, with a desk, chair, filing cabinet, coffeemaker and nothing more.

Paige whispered and I moved closer to hear her, then realized she was casting a spell.

“No one’s here,” Paige said, voice still low. “Is he—? The boy. Is he dead?”

“Think so,” Griffin said.

“Can we get him in here? To check?”

Griffin looked at me.

“Please,” I said.

He waved us away from the door, peered out through a crack, then threw it open, grabbed the fallen youth’s legs and yanked him inside. He tossed aside a wedge of wood used to keep it open, slammed it shut, and turned the dead bolt with a
thunk.

Paige cast and a fiery light ball appeared over her hand. A flip of her wrist and it hovered over the boy as she examined him. He’d been shot through the chest. I pictured us in the alley again. Had Paige moved at that moment, she would have caught this bullet. Had I not pulled her down a moment later…I tried not to think of that.

The young man was dead. As Paige closed his eyes, Griffin called headquarters and ordered a SWAT team to our location, warning them of a sniper in the building to the south.

Then he gazed down at the dead youth. “How do our kids get mixed up in shit like this? Where are their parents?”

I knew Griffin was thinking of his son, Jacob, who would have been about this young man’s age. Jacob hadn’t joined a gang. His only mistake had been sneaking out on a school night when a killer had been targeting the children of Cabal employees. One would think that tragedy would have been enough to make a parent reconsider his employment, but Griffin had stayed on, his loyalty unwavering.

Paige had gone quiet and I knew she was thinking of Jacob too. She’d been the one to find his body, and had never forgotten it. She straightened, gaze turning my way.

“Your shoulder,” she said. “Let me see it.”

In the commotion, I’d almost forgotten the sting in the alley before Griffin knocked me to the ground. I lifted my hands to my shoulder. My shirt was ripped, blood trickling down my chest.

“Just a graze,” I said. “I’m fine.”

“Right. Until you need to use your arm and it gives out mid-punch.”

“We don’t have time. We need to—”

“I’m casting a healing spell, Cortez, even if I need to have Griffin restrain you to do it.”

I let her cast it as I looked around, wondering what had drawn the young man in here. The filing cabinet was locked—a thief wouldn’t relock. The trash can was empty. While there was some minor untidiness, it didn’t look as if the office had been ransacked.

Paige headed for the interior door. I bit back a “be careful.”

As she reached for the door handle, she glanced over her shoulder and whispered, “Don’t worry, I’ll be careful.”

I managed a wry smile.

She craned her head to look around, then shut the door again. “It’s the gallery.”

The young man certainly didn’t look like an art thief. What were the chances of us stumbling over supernaturals conducting a burglary unrelated to tonight’s events? In the very place Carlos had phoned from?

Griffin slipped into the gallery to search. He’d been gone for less than a minute when a crash sounded.

Paige peered through the door, but the noise hadn’t been Griffin. He stood in the middle of the room, looking up. The sound must have come from overhead.

I eased past her. The gallery was a single room with only two exits—through the office or the front door. A third door, tactfully hidden behind a partial screen, stood open, revealing a tiny bathroom.

Paige looked up. “Storage space maybe? If so, how do they get there? I don’t see a hatch and I didn’t notice any door outside. Was there even a second floor? Or just an attic?”

I mentally replayed our approach.

“It’s a complete floor, with barred windows. I believe there was a front door on the other side of this one.

Leading to apartments, I would presume.”

We looked up. If there were inhabited apartments overhead, then noises would not be unexpected.

“The question remains,” I murmured. “Why come in here?”

My gaze traveled to the bathroom.

Griffin looked at me. “To take a leak? No offense, but…”

“Highly unlikely, I know.”

The bathroom was tiny, and awkwardly set up, the toilet and sink facing one another, with barely enough room for knees. A poor design, but necessary—there was a second door directly across from the entrance. A closet with a deadbolt.