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As he was watching, he saw Dallas sweep by on the other side of the doors, glancing about as she moved, looking very much like she had something to hide.

“Shit,” Max muttered, butting out the cigar on the armrest of the bench. He didn’t need to be a genius to figure out that whatever she was doing likely involved her father.

He got to his feet and breezed through the doors, mumbling under his breath at how slowly they spun. As soon as he was through, he took off down the corridor to his right.

Now that he was inside, he was able to read the auras in here, so it didn’t take him long to find Dallas weaving through the many interconnected rooms in the resort, all of them unoccupied save the witch who was roaming where she shouldn’t.

He kept watching her, picking up his speed, shoes thumping on the patterned carpet.

Eventually, she slowed to a stop at a corner near the entrance to a private meeting room, and he was able to catch up to her without breaking into a sprint and drawing attention to himself.

Blinking away his Sight, he watched Dallas with his regular vision as he moved down the corridor. She was pressed up against the wall just outside the meeting room, the doors barely open a crack.

“Dal,” he said softly.

She spun, pressing a hand to her throat in surprise. When she regained composure, she held a finger to her lips.

He mouthed, “What are you doing?”

“People are going missing from the Fleet.” She kept her voice low enough for only a hellseher to hear, the words barely audible. “One of them turned up dead three days ago.”

“I didn’t hear about that on the news.”

“Because someone’s got something to hide.”

“Or,” Max said sternly, working to keep his voice down, “it’s the Red Baron’s confidential business, and they don’t want the public knowing about it. Which is why we should go before he catches us listening.”

Dallas didn’t move. “Don’t you think that’s weird? I mean, the people who fight for the Fleet are some of the toughest in the world. How can they just be turning up dead like this?”

There was a prickling on the back of his neck that told him they shouldn’t be doing this. “Dallas, we should really—”

A sharp female voice came from behind them. “Dallas.”

Max spun around, Dallas whimpering a curse word when she beheld the woman standing several feet away, arms crossed.

Taega inclined her head toward the corridor at her back. “Let’s take a walk.” Her attention arrowed in on Max. “Alone.”

Dallas pushed away from the wall, moving quietly, likely hoping her father and whoever was inside that room with him wouldn’t come out to investigate. One angry parent was bad enough.

Max followed her. “I’m not going anywhere without your daughter, Mrs. Bright. Take it or leave it.”

The silver rings around Taega’s pupils flashed. “I will bar you from ever seeing my daughter again if you threaten me one more time, Mister Reacher. Take it or leave it.”

Dallas shot him a pleading glance, the kind that was desperate enough to still his feet.

What a piss-off of a night this was turning out to be. Beating back the rage that was preparing to strike, Max swallowed his retort before he could utter the wrong thing to his girlfriend’s mother—a handful of words he knew would get his ass dumped in an instant.

Taega took his silence for compliance and gestured for Dallas to follow her. They disappeared around a corner in the distance, too far away for Max’s sharp hearing to pick up on their voices.

He knew he should stay put, but he couldn’t help it, and he found his feet moving in their direction before he could stop them. Black swallowed his eyes as he walked, tracking them. They had exited the building, the spells now keeping him from seeing where they were going.

Max was through the doors before he could stop himself. It didn’t take many steps before he was able to pick up on their conversation. Their voices were faint, but at least he could hear them now—and, more importantly, he could keep an ear out for Dallas. Her parents were some of the most complicated and unpredictable people he’d ever met. After what’d happened with Taega, and she’d given them information about Erasmus Sophronia and Loren’s birth, he’d expected better from her, but it seemed he was wrong for that.

“You are not to listen in on your father’s affairs.” Taega’s voice was quiet and cool.

“I didn’t mean anything by it—”

A slap rang through the night.