Chapter 13
Ruby and Cyn walked down a long dock, searching for the right slip number. Boats—scratch that—yachts lined either side, some occupied if the lights inside the cabins were any indication. A dog barked as they passed a sailboat.
She inhaled. “The smell of the sea and lapping sound of the water brings back good memories.” Until that last hurried night when her father had gone on the run.
Cyn blended into the night with his dark hair and clothing. They’d stopped at his house to wash up and gather what they’d need in case Mr. Smith found where Cyn lived. She’d brought The Hidden to see if this Kade could resurrect that, too.
It was now a little less of a god-awful hour of the morning, nearly five o’clock.
“Here it is,” Cyn said, coming to a stop in front of a vintage beauty fully ablaze with lights. Polished chrome reflected them like starbursts.
“The Guard must pay pretty well.” It wasn’t a huge boat, maybe the size of the one her dad bought right before the accident.
“When you get to the top, a Vega, it does.” He stepped easily onto the top of the edge and jumped down, then held his hand out for her.
She could handle climbing onto a boat, but refusing would make her seem churlish. Except as his hand enveloped hers, her knees actually went weak, which put her off-balance when she stepped down and fell into him.
“Sorry,” she said, her hands automatically bracing herself on his hard chest.
His fingers tightened on her waist like an involuntary reflex.
They both froze, gazes locked. The embers in his eyes danced, and she had a feeling hers did, too.
She knew she should step back, oh, about now.
And he should be letting her go. Neither of them moved, though.
She felt dizzy, then realized she hadn’t taken a breath since his hands had gone around her.
His mouth opened, as though he was going to say something. Or lean down and kiss her.
Yes, kiss me.
Oh, jeez, that was her command, not the Dragon’s.
“Whoa, who’s getting hot and bothered on my boat?”
They spun to a man who was jumping down from the roof.
He chuckled, low and genuine. Cyn didn’t refute the fact that they were getting hot and bothered so she didn’t either.
The two did the manly kind of hug, shoulder to shoulder while patting each other’s back.
Kade was cast in silhouette, so all she could see of him was the outline of tousled wavy hair.
“Come on in.” Kade waved for them to follow him into the cabin. “Thought this might be the best place to meet for unofficial business, and I happened to be staying the night here anyway.”
Cyn looked around. “Suits you.”
“There’s nothing like being rocked to sleep. It doesn’t hurt that the chicks dig it.”
Kade assessed her the moment she stepped inside, his moss-green eyes revealing his curiosity about her role in all this subterfuge. They also revealed the swirling mist that marked him as a Deuce.
He thrust his hand at her. “I’m Kade.”
His hand was strong and calloused and didn’t give her the jolt Cyn’s hand did. “I’m—”
“Garnet,” Cyn said.
“Nice to meet you, Garnet.” Kade slid a smile to Cyn. Yeah, he got it. At least Cyn hadn’t called her Ms. Smith.
Kade didn’t need a yacht to impress the chicks.
He looked like a guy who owned a sailboat, a surfboard, and probably a Sea-Doo or two.
His sun-burnished hair even appeared wind-tossed, though that was probably because they’d roused him from sleep.
He didn’t look like a police officer, that was for sure.
Cyn chuckled, tugging on Kade’s flowered shirt. “Going Jimmy Buffett?”
“Someone was always haranguing me to get a life outside the Guard.” He raised his arms out. “This is it.”
That’s when Ruby saw the dagger tattoo on the inside of his right arm, the sharp tip at his wrist. An elongated V with curved lines at the top was incorporated into the hilt.
For Vega? More interestingly, the tattoo shimmered with magick, though it didn’t move like the Dragon did.
Her gaze went to Cyn’s forearm, realizing that the faded scar there matched the design of Kade’s V.
Cyn picked up some paperwork on the table, shaking his head as he tossed it down again. “Still working on your off time.”
“But I do have a beer while I’m reading over the case notes.”
“I appreciate you seeing us like this.” Cyn handed him the book they’d found at Brom’s. “Is there anything on these pages?”
Kade flipped through them, flattening his tanned hand on one every now and then. The fog swirled blue and gold in his eyes, and a glow emanated from his hand. “Yeah, but it’s fighting me.”
“It?” she asked, checking to see that the book was still just sitting there.
“The magick Brom used to hide his words is strong. Deciphering it is like holding quicksilver. I’ll try picking up his state of mind while he was writing.”
Kade closed the book and his eyes, his square chin lifted.
“He wrote this in a frenzied state. A while ago, twenty years or more. It took a few days to get it all down. I can feel his impatience, his confusion over the visions.” He opened his eyes.
“Seers get bits and pieces, at least what I’ve heard. ”
“So he’s not dead?” Ruby asked.
“Not that I can tell.”
Cyn leaned against one of the cabinets. “Can you bring out the text?”
“I haven’t done anything like this in years.
Remember the Deuce who was killing all the psychics?
He kept a diary, and he hid the entries with a similar spell.
I can unlock the spell, yes. It’s set at the beginning of the book when the Seer starts writing it.
Unlocking it reveals the text in the same timeline that it was written.
” He included her in the conversation. “The murderer killed a psychic every week, then wrote about all the juicy details. Once I unlocked the first entry, I had to wait a week for the next one to appear. It’s a wait-and-see process. You want me to start?”
“Ten minutes ago,” Cyn said.
The corners of Kade’s mouth turned up in a smile he aimed at Ruby. “Pain in the ass, isn’t he?”
“You don’t know the half of it. Well, maybe you do, if you worked with him.”
“Skip the commentary,” Cyn said, not looking amused.
Kade dropped into a chair at the tiny table and opened the cover of the book.
He closed his eyes again and pressed his hands to the exposed pages.
This time a brilliant blue glow spread out from his fingers until it covered the entire book.
He spoke words she didn’t understand, until she heard Brom’s name, and then more unintelligible words.
The whole book glowed now. She hoped it wouldn’t burst into flames.
Her heart gave a jolt to find Cyn watching her. He didn’t shift his gaze away as she’d expect a man caught to do. Of course, Cyn wasn’t just any man.
The glow dissipated, and Kade opened his eyes. The page beneath his hands was still blank.
“Didn’t it work?” she asked, coming closer.
He flipped the first page, revealing scrawly writing. She sat down at the table.
Cyn came up behind her. “If this is a vision of the future, it’s not written in stone, right?”
“No, like any foretelling, it portends the likelihood of the future given the intentions and events in motion now.”
She could feel Cyn’s tension, and his heat, as he leaned over her shoulder to study the writing. “Whatever this says is open to interpretation. Remember that.”
“Yeah, okay.” What was he so tensed up about? And why was he so close, getting her Dragon vibrating? The citrusy scent of his soap tickled her senses.
She pointed to a line. “There’s my name.”
Kade gave Cyn a sly glance. “Thought your name was Garnet.”
He met him, look for look. “It is.”
She pulled her attention back to the book. “Something about the Dragon… specifically you, Cyn, coming in and saving me. Sweeping me away at the moment of danger. Well, you didn’t do that when that orb was chasing me around.”
“Whoa. She’s the one who evaded the star orb?” Kade said, amazement in his voice now.
Her gaze went to the dagger tattoo on Kade’s arm. “When I was fighting the orb, I used a couple of daggers in Mon’s office. They felt… well, now I’d say magickal. Like a current of electricity.”
Kade nodded. “Sounds like they were charged with magick. Did they help?”
“Both times I hit the orb, it seemed to shrink.”
“Damn, you hit a star orb twice? You’re good.”
“She got lucky. Don’t encourage her,” Cyn said.
Kade assessed her with a spark of admiration in his eyes. “Why not? Give the girl some credit. Takes some skills to survive one of those.” He looked up at Cyn. “Hell, my friend, you’ve got your hands full, don’t you?”
“You don’t know the half of it.”
She wondered if Cyn did that to other people, too, mirroring their words back.
“If you’ll recall,” Cyn said, now talking to her, “I did sweep in and save your pretty little ass in the library.”
Her mouth dropped open at both his assertion and his compliment. She clamped it shut again. “Yes. Yes, you did.” She turned back to the page. “Here it says, ‘hide her away,’ or at least I think it does. And then ‘awaken.’ So far, it’s on target with what’s happened.”
“What did you save her pretty little ass from?” Kade asked.
“Demons,” they both answered at once.
Kade grimaced. “Fun.”
Cyn braced his hands on the table. “Summoned by the same Deuce son of a bitch who sent the orb, I’m guessing.” He tried to read farther down the page, pointing to the words Justin’s work. “He’s underlined it.”
She flipped the next pages but found nothing else. She looked at Kade. “We have to wait for the rest?”
“For however long it took him to write it down. There’s not a lot here, I can tell you that. A few pages.”
She got up and grabbed the larger book, setting it gingerly on the table. It reeked of smoke. “Can you bring back the words in this book? My uncle used magick to create beautiful fairy tales for me. Now they’re gone.”