If I closed my eyes, I could conjure him right here next to me. I remembered his voice, his face, his scent . . . He was engraved in my memory. The relationship might have meant nothing to him, but it was my first. I hadn’t known it was necessary to guard myself against committing completely. I didn’t realize it was doomed from the start. I just fell in love.
I’d spent the last few months gluing my heart together shard by shard and seeing him stabbed me again, right into the still-raw wound. It was so easy to just rage about it, because the alternative would be to hurt. Anger was better than pain, but I couldn’t afford either. I had to be sharp.
Someone was coming down the hallway. I heard nothing, but I sensed someone moving closer. I sank into the wall niche, my back flat against the glass tiles, found the phone in my pocket, and turned it off.
Alessandro stalked into view. He moved silently; a jaguar, sleek, stealthy, an ambush predator capable of explosive power. I was being hunted.
He stopped.
The tiny hairs on the back of my neck rose. I sank deeper into the shadowy niche. The trick to staying invisible was to think of nothing at all.
Alessandro turned. A focused expression claimed his face. None of the charismatic, urbane son-of-wealth-and-privilege persona remained. He looked predatory and slightly vicious. Bright orange flames curled in his eyes, his magic smoldering just under the surface.
I breathed quietly through a barely open mouth and pulled my magic to me. It built inside me like a geyser ready to erupt.
Alessandro took a step toward the hallway.
That’s it. Come closer. Make my day. This won’t go the way you think it will.
“Prime Sagredo!” Marat called.
The orange fire vanished. Alessandro’s expression rearranged itself. His brow relaxed, his mouth curved, and his eyes lost their lethal concentration, softening. He turned around with a dazzling smile.
“Are you looking for something?” Marat asked.
“A bathroom,” Alessandro confessed, looking helpless. If I hadn’t witnessed it, I wouldn’t have believed the two were the same man.
“It’s the other way,” Marat said. “I’ll walk with you.”
“You’re too kind.”
“I want to make sure you don’t get the wrong idea about this project,” Marat started. “The profits could be sky-high, but we must play this just right.”
Alessandro opened his eyes a bit wider. “Not to worry. As we say in Italy, profit è il mio cavallo di battaglia.”
“What does that mean?”
It meant that profit was his battle horse.
“It’s my forte,” Alessandro said. “Making money is what I do.”
“Fantastic.”
The sound of their voices and steps receded.
I waited another full minute and slipped out of the niche. He would come looking for me. I would bet our family’s entire annual budget on it.
I turned left and hurried down the hallway, turning my phone on. It pinged. A text message from Linus.
I sent a car.
I walked into the waiting area. Cornelius stood by the windows, looking at the city below. Tension radiated from his posture. His shoulders were stiff, his arms crossed on his chest, and a guarded expression hardened his face. It would’ve been a grave sight, except that Rosebud perched on his head, clutching his blond hair in her adorable little hands.
I raised my phone and snapped a picture.
“Where’s Leon?” I asked.
“Calling 911.”
I almost groaned. “Audrey?”
Cornelius nodded.
“What is it this time?”
“There’s an intruder in her house,” Cornelius said. “Leon has to come and save her.”
For some reason, our family had the worst luck with women named Audrey. On the first day of kindergarten, blond Audrey, whose last name I couldn’t remember, didn’t like my backpack so she spat in my hair. In high school, Audrey Swan got together with the guy Arabella liked and the two of them posted a video mocking her on Snapchat. Grandma Frida had a nemesis, a nasty old lady with a shrill voice, who used to be her next-door neighbor. Her name was Audri Burns. The worst officer my mother ever served with was named Jenna Audreigh. Leon’s Audrey was no exception.
Audrey Duarte was an influencer. She specialized in “total look” tutorials, combining trendy fashion with the right makeup and hair, and made a lot of money promoting cosmetics and clothes labels. Her 1.2 million followers thought she walked on water.
About two months ago, she contacted our firm. She’d been receiving threatening letters promising to disfigure her. Leon had taken the case, because its “noir nature” appealed to him. Somewhere in his head a 1930s soundtrack must’ve been playing while a rich baritone announced, “A beautiful dame walked into my office. She was trouble. Dames always are.” He quickly determined that the threatening mail had come from her competitor, which was fortunate since real stalking cases were difficult to resolve. Convincing someone to let go of the object of their affection took a long time and often ended badly.
Leon closed the case and moved on. Audrey didn’t. Leon was attractive and dangerous, and she decided he should belong to her. She was used to being adored for things like curling her hair and she couldn’t understand why he wasn’t falling at her feet and promising her the world. In an ironic twist, she developed stalker tendencies. She sent him hundreds of texts a week. He blocked her number, so she went on a disposable phone spree. She showed up at our place, but security blocked her. We watched her try to charm, then pout, then scream at our guards, until they threatened to call the cops. She bought him a motorcycle and had it delivered to us, and we refused the delivery.
Her latest strategy was to bombard Leon with emergencies from her numerous burner cells. The last time it was a fire. The time before that, she heard strange noises in the garage. No matter what the emergency was, the request was always the same—her life was in danger, and Leon had to come and save her.
With the emergencies, Audrey graduated to threats of harm, in her case, to herself. Once was an isolated occurrence, twice could be coincidence, but the third time constituted “a pattern of behavior.” Stalking was a third-degree felony in the state of Texas, and she just gave us enough ammunition. Tomorrow I would authorize Sabrian Turner, our House counsel, to contact Audrey’s family and arrange for a heart-to-heart.
Cornelius looked at me. “I saw Tatyana Pierce.”
Ah. That explained his expression. House Harrison and House Pierce didn’t get along. Nevada knew more about it than I did, but she told me before that both Cornelius and his older sister Diana detested the Pierce family.
“Is she involved in this matter?” Cornelius asked.
“She is. I’ll understand if you choose to avoid this one.” Cornelius had full discretion when it came to our cases. Some he claimed, others he passed on.
Cornelius locked his jaw. “Oh no. Quite the opposite.”
Rosebud pulled on his hair and trilled at me for emphasis, clearly ready to do battle.
Well, we had a pint-size battle monkey on our side. This case was as good as solved.
Leon strode around the bend of the wall, his face annoyed. He saw me and grimaced. “I handled it.”
“Are you okay?”