Exit Strategy Part 50

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DIME STORE MAGIC.

Paige Winterbourne was always either too young or too rebellious to succeed her mother as leader of one of the world's most powerful elite organizations-the American Coven of Witches. Now, at twenty-three, with Paige's mother dead, the Elders can no longer deny her. But even Paige's wildest antics don't hold a candle to those of her new charge-an orphaned teenager who is all too willing to use her budding powers for evil...and evil is all too willing to claim her. For she is being pursued by a dark faction of the supernatural underworld. They are a vicious group who will do anything to woo the young, malleable, and extremely powerful neophyte, including commit murder-and frame Paige for the crime. It's an initiation into adulthood, womanhood, and the brutal side of magic, and Paige will have to do everything within her power to make sure they both survive....

Leah hadn't settled for placing an anonymous call to the station's overnight answering service. No, she'd called the local sheriff, Ted Fowler, at home, babbling hysterically about strange lights and screams coming from the woods behind my house.

Fowler had thrown on clothing that looked like it came from his bedroom floor and driven straight over. In reward for his haste, he found the smoldering remains of a Satanic altar a scant ten feet beyond my backyard.

By dawn my house and yard were crawling with cops. By disposing of the cat corpses, I'd only made things worse. When Fowler saw traces of blood and no bodies, his imagination leaped to the worst possible conclusion. Murder.

Savannah and I spent the next several hours huddled in my bedroom, alternately answering questions and listening to the sound of strangers tearing apart our home.

"Ms. Winterbourne?"

I spun to see the lead detective from the state police in my bedroom doorway.

"We found cats," he said.

"Cats?" I repeated.

"Three dead cats buried a short distance from the scene."

I motioned toward Savannah and lifted a finger to my lips, gesturing that I didn't want this discussed in front of her. The detective moved to the living room, where several officers were lounging on my sofa and chairs, muddy shoes propped on my antique coffee table. I swallowed my outrage and turned to the detective.

"So it was cat's blood?" I said.

"Apparently, though we'll run tests to be sure. Killing cats might not be on the same scale as murder, but it's still a serious offense. Very serious."

"It should be. Anyone who'd do that..." I didn't have to fake my shudder, needing only to remember the sight of those maimed bodies. "I can't believe someone would stage a Satanic altar behind my yard."

"What makes you think it was staged?"

"It looked real to me," one of the officers said, waving a cookie that looked suspiciously like the same cookies that were in my cupboard.

His wave scattered crumbs across my ivory carpet. I looked at those crumbs, looked at the muddy boot prints surrounding it, looked at the bookcase behind it, my books and photos and mementos shoved into haphazard piles, and I felt a snap. Just a small one.

"And you say that based on witnessing exactly how many Satanic altars?" I asked.

"We've seen photos," he muttered at last.

"Oh, right. The photos. There's probably one genuine photo circulating endlessly around the entire country. Attention all units: beware of Satanic cults. Do you know who builds all those so-called Satanic altars you hear about? Kids. Bored, angry teenagers trying to shock the establishment. That and the occasional homicidal moron who's already planning his defense: the devil made me do it. Satanic altar, my a.s.s. What you saw out back there is a prank. A very, very sick prank."

"You sure seem to know a lot about this stuff," one officer said.

"It's called a college education." I wheeled on the detective. "Are you charging me with anything?"

"Not yet."

"Then get the h.e.l.l out of my house so I can clean up your mess."

INDUSTRIAL MAGIC.

Now that Paige Winterbourne has broken with the elite, ultraconservative American Coven of Witches, her goal is to start a new Coven for a new generation. But while Paige is pitching her vision to uptight thirty-something witches in business suits, someone is murdering the teenage off-spring of the underworld's most influential Cabals-a circle of families that make the mob look like amateurs. And none is more powerful than the Cortez Cabal, a faction Paige is intimately acquainted with. Lucas Cortez, the rebel son and unwilling heir, is none other than her boyfriend. But for the smart young witch, love isn't blind, and Paige has her eyes wide open as she is drawn into a hunt for an unnatural-born killer in a corrupt realm of supernatural espionage. Pitted against shamans, demons, and goons, it's a battle chilling enough to make a wild young woman grow up in a hurry. If she gets the chance...

As I rounded the last corner, I noticed two suspicious figures standing in front of my building. Both wore suits, which in my neighborhood was extremely suspicious. I looked for Bibles or encyclopedias, but they were empty-handed. One stared up at the building, perhaps expecting it to morph into corporate headquarters.

Both men had short, dark hair and clean-shaven, chiseled faces. Both wore Ray-Bans. Both were roughly the size of redwoods. My only way of distinguis.h.i.+ng them was by tie color. One had a dark red tie, the other jade green.

As I drew closer, both men turned my way.

"Paige Winterbourne?" Red Tie said.

I slowed and mentally readied a spell.

"We're looking for Lucas Cortez," Green Tie said. "His father sent us."

My heart thumped, but I pasted on a smile. "I'm sorry, but Lucas is in court today."

"Then Mr. Cortez would like to speak to you."

He half turned, directing my gaze to a king-size black SUV idling in the no-stopping zone. So these two weren't just messengers; they were Benicio's personal half-demon bodyguards.

"I'm honored," I said. "Tell him to come on up. I'll put on the kettle."

Red Tie's mouth twisted. "He's not going up. You're going over there."

"Really? Wow, you must be one of those psychic half-demons. I'll speak to Benicio, but since I didn't request this audience, he's coming to me."

When neither moved, I cast under my breath and waved my fingers at them.

"You're messengers. I've given the message. Now deliver."

As my fingers flicked, they stumbled back. Red Tie recovered his balance and glowered, as if he'd like to launch a fireball at me, or whatever his demonic specialty might be.

I reached for the door handle. As the door swung open, a hand appeared over my head and grabbed it. I looked up to see Green Tie: I expected him to hold the door shut, but he pulled it open and followed me in.

As we waited for the elevator, my resolve faltered. I was about to get into a small, enclosed place with a half-demon literally twice my size. Yet what were my options? If I ran, I'd be exactly what they expected: a timid witch-mouse. Nothing I did in the future would ever erase that. On the other hand, I could step on the elevator and never step off. Death or dishonor? For some people, there's really no choice.

When the elevator doors opened, I walked on.

The half-demon followed. As the doors closed, he took off his sungla.s.ses. His eyes were a blue so cold they made the hairs on my arms rise. He pressed the Stop b.u.t.ton. The elevator groaned to a halt.

"You ever seen this scene in a movie?" he asked.

I looked around. "Now that you mention it, I think I have."

"Know what happens next?"

I nodded. "The hulking bad guy attacks the defenseless young heroine, who suddenly reveals heretofore unimagined powers, which she uses to not only fend off his attack but beat him to a b.l.o.o.d.y pulp. Then she escapes"-I craned my head back-"out that handy escape hatch and s.h.i.+mmies up the cables. The bad guy recovers consciousness and attacks, whereupon she's forced, against her own moral code, to sever the cable with a fireball and send him plummeting to his death."

"Is that what happens?"

"Sure. Didn't you see that one?"

HAUNTED.

Former supernatural superpower Eve Levine has broken all the rules. But she's never broken a promise-not even during the three years she's spent in the afterworld. So when the Fates call in a debt she gave her word she'd pay, she has no choice but to comply. For centuries, one of the ghost world's wickedest creatures has been loosed on humanity, thwarting every attempt to retrieve her. Now it has fallen to Eve to capture this demi-demon known as the Nix, who inhabits the bodies of would-be killers, compelling them to complete their deadly acts. It's a mission that becomes all too personal when the Nix targets those Eve loves most-including Savannah, the daughter she left on earth. But can a renegade witch succeed where a host of angels have failed?

The Searchers deposited me in the Fates' throne room, a white marble cavern with moving mosaics on the walls. A pretty girl threaded yarn onto a spinning wheel. She looked no more than five or six years old, with bright violet eyes that matched her dress.

"Okay," I said. "What did I do?"

The girl smiled. "Isn't the question: What did I do now now?"

The girl morphed into a middle-aged version of herself, with long graying hair, and light-brown skin showing the first wrinkles and roughness of time.

"We have a problem, Eve."

"Look, I promised I wouldn't use the codes for excessive excessive unauthorized travel. I never said-" unauthorized travel. I never said-"

"This isn't about unauthorized travel."

"Visiting Adena Milan for spell-swapping? No one told me she was on the blacklist."

The middle-aged Fate shook her head. "Admittedly, there might be some amus.e.m.e.nt to be had in making you recite the whole list of your infractions, but I'm afraid we don't have that much time. Some time ago, you made a deal with us."

d.a.m.n. I'd hoped they'd forgotten. Like that would happen. The Fates can remember what Noah ate for breakfast before the flood.

My first instinct, as always, was to weasel out of it. h.e.l.l, what's the worst thing that could happen? For starters, they could bring Paige and Lucas back to the ghost world. Besides, I had had been looking for a distraction. Which made this all seem very coincidental. been looking for a distraction. Which made this all seem very coincidental.

"Did Kristof put you up to this? Finding me something to do?"

The Fate morphed into her oldest sister, a hunch-backed crone with a wizened face "Kristof Nast does not 'put us up to' anything. Nor are we going to be doing favors for him. We thought that lawyer job would keep him busy." She snorted. "Keeps him busy getting into trouble."

"If you mean the Agito case, the plaintiff started lying, so he had to do something. It wasn't really really witness tampering...." witness tampering...."

"Just a means to an end," she said, fixing me with that glare. "That's how you two think. Doesn't matter how you get there, as long as you do."

The middle sister took over. "An interesting philosophy. Not one we share, but this particular job may require some of those unique skills."

I perked up. "Oh?"

"We have a spirit who's escaped from the lower realms. We need you to bring her in."

The lower realms are where they keep the seriously nasty criminals. Interesting...

"First, you need to do some research." The middle-aged Fate reached into the air and pulled out a sheet of paper. "This is a list of books-"

"Books? Look, I'm sure you guys are in a hurry, so why don't we skip this part? I'm really more the hands-on sort."

The girl appeared, grinning mischievously. "In that case, let's do it the hands-on way."

She waved a hand, and a ball of light whipped out and blinded me.

"Shhhhhh."

The light fell in a shower of sparks. I blinked, then saw only darkness. The same voice continued to shush me, a long-drawn-out monotone of a breath that, after a moment, I realized wasn't a voice at all, but the rush of air past my ears....

BROKEN.

Ever since she discovered she's pregnant, Elena Michaels has been on edge. After all, she's never heard of another living female werewolf, let alone one who's given birth. Worried about dooming her baby to a life torn between the human and supernatural worlds-and tired of being fussed over by her boyfriend, Clay-Elena needs a distraction. Thankfully, her expertise is needed to retrieve a stolen letter allegedly written by Jack the Ripper. The job seems simple enough, except for an unexpected surprise.... The letter contains a portal to Victorian London's underworld, which Elena inadvertently triggers-unleas.h.i.+ng a vicious killer and a pair of zombie thugs. Now Elena must find a way to seal the portal before the unwelcome visitors get what they're looking for-which, for some unknown reason, is Elena....

On the other side of the playground was a cl.u.s.ter of picnic tables. At one, a mother divvied up animal crackers to three howling preschoolers as she shot furtive glances over her shoulder at the lone man a few tables away. He was brown-haired and in his late thirties, with a thin scar running down his cheek and no attached kids in sight.

I snuck up behind him, then leaned into his ear.