Page 7 of Magic Betrayed (The Shifter of Sheridan Avenue #2)

SEVEN

We split up after that. Ryker handed over the keys to the SUV and took off with some mysterious plan of his own, while Callum called Draven. The former assassin confirmed that he could find a “surveillance professional” willing to work with us, but that the hacker would need a picture of what we were looking for.

A picture that existed only in my memory.

So while I started sketching hastily on a page torn out of one of Ari’s coloring books, Callum stepped into the next room and called our hacker. He was on the phone for a surprisingly long time, and when he returned, he wore an expression of grim satisfaction.

“You ready?”

I held up my awkward, lopsided drawing. “No, but I think I’m as close as I’m going to get.”

“It’s fine,” he promised. “I managed to secure an in-person meeting, so we can search for the van without having to wait to hear back.”

My heart sped up at the same time my stomach sank. This was good news—the best—but what had he sacrificed in exchange for the privilege? Hackers were secretive by necessity. For one of them to agree to actually meet with us, Callum had to have made it worth his while.

“Callum, what is this going to cost?”

He didn’t flinch, but met my challenge squarely. “Far less than the value of three lives. I have no regrets.”

There was nothing I could say to that. In my heart, I agreed—a life was beyond price—even as I wondered how greatly this would add to the intangible sense of debt I carried towards the shapeshifter king.

We left the apartment in silence, and I fought back a rising tide of despair as I closed the door on the remains of the new life I’d hoped to build. Like a house of cards, it had swiftly collapsed due to a single, unforeseen enemy.

If it was this easy—if our safety was still so fragile—how could we ever live in peace?

When we found where Ryker parked the SUV, Callum opened the back door and gestured me forward with a slight bow. As if there was any chance I would allow him to play chauffeur.

“Knock it off,” I muttered, stepping around him with a glare and sliding into the front passenger seat. “I’d rather walk.”

He just shrugged and grinned a little before taking the driver’s seat and pulling out onto Main. After about half a block, he took a right on Classen and headed north.

We both seemed lost in our own thoughts as our drive took us towards northwest Oklahoma City, to a largely abandoned fourteen-story apartment building just off the Northwest Expressway. A broken neon sign proclaimed it had once been the Ackerman Luxury Apartments, but from the weed-choked parking lot to the handful of shattered windows, it was clearly no longer luxurious—more like barely habitable.

“Don’t worry,” Callum said, apparently reading my dubious expression as doubt in the capability of a professional forced to live in such squalid conditions. “Draven promised me a reliable expert. Our hacker lives in the basement. Probably hijacking the electricity and piggybacking on someone else’s internet.”

“I was actually a little more worried about being lured to our deaths or hunted by renegade trolls,” I informed him, “but thanks for adding a new fear to my collection.”

He parked the car, then paused for a moment before opening the door. “If anything threatens you, I hope you won’t hesitate to fight back,” he reminded me. “With deadly force, if necessary. Whoever we’re looking for either kidnapped your family or tried to, which means they’re willing to play as dirty as it gets. But I know what you’re capable of, and thanks to Blake, so do a lot of other powerful people. If they’re smart, they’ll be terrified of getting in your way.”

His confidence was oddly satisfying, and I reminded myself that Callum wasn’t exactly helpless either. Together, we were a formidable team.

We got out of the car, and I must have shivered a little too loudly, because Callum took one look at me, rummaged around in the passenger compartment, and then threw me a coat. It was huge and heavy and smelled like Callum, and I froze for a moment with it in my arms, wondering if I dared put it on.

“Aren’t you going to need this?” I asked dubiously.

“Dragon, remember?” He offered me a slightly smug smile. “The coat is just for show. I don’t get cold very easily.”

He didn’t have to offer twice. The wind was icy and his coat—while three or four times too big for me—felt like a hug.

No. Bad Raine. No thinking about hugs, especially not now.

Trying desperately to free my hands from the sleeves, I trailed Callum around the front of the building, following a cracked sidewalk choked with overgrown weeds. On the far side, we found a set of stairs leading down, ending at a steel door.

“Don’t step on the stairs,” Callum warned. “Only every third step is safe. I’m going to jump down and then I’ll catch you.”

Excuse me? He what ?

But it was too late to object. He’d already taken the leap and was looking back up at me expectantly.

I eyed the drop. It would probably be fine. Only about twenty steps. So I jumped, very deliberately not at him, and landed…

…with a grunt as he snatched me out of the air and set me on my feet, so quickly I didn’t even have time to protest. And even if I had, there was not a shred of repentance on his face as he turned to the door and eyed the metal sign fixed just above my eye level.

NO TRESPASSING

AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY

Eyes narrowed, he put one finger on the sign and moved it, twisting it forty-five degrees counterclockwise.

The lock clicked.

“We’re in,” he announced calmly. “Shall I say something terribly cliché and tell you to stay behind me?”

“Please do,” I grumbled. “It would give me an excellent excuse to kick you in the shins.”

“Would you prefer ladies first?”

“Thank you,” I said sweetly. “I would.”

I gripped the doorknob, twisted, and pulled.

The door swung open, but Callum grabbed me around the waist and tugged me backward, just as a series of pops sounded and about a dozen paintballs ricocheted off the concrete wall behind us.

Bright pink paintballs.

I turned to glare up at him. “Did you know that was going to happen?”

“Not exactly,” he hedged. “But I suspected there would be a few more traps than our hacker friend was admitting to.”

“Does he want to meet with us or not?”

“Probably testing our sincerity… and our desperation.”

That was fair. If we were law enforcement trying to set a trap, we might be rethinking our path forward. Heck, I was rethinking it too, but it wasn’t like I had options. Even if I got shot with a hundred paintballs, I needed the information the hacker could provide.

“Fine.” I glared at the now open door. “What’s the next obstacle?”

“Tripwires.” Callum peered into the darkened interior, his eyes glowing faintly as he scanned for threats. “But I don’t sense any.”

“Just tell me if that changes,” I requested grimly, and took my first step inside, a glowing ball of blue fae magic in my hand.

We found ourselves in the bowels of the apartment complex, surrounded by pipes and boilers and furnaces and who knew what else—a vast jumble of machinery that had once been needed to provide heat and water to the fourteen floors above us. Dust and rust were everywhere, but the floor was suspiciously clean, aside from an occasional pile of discarded boxes or crates. A few bundles of cords and wires ran past us into the dark, while somewhere ahead I could hear the steady drip, drip, drip of a leaking pipe.

“Cozy place,” I remarked, holding my light higher as I looked around. “Which way do we go?”

“Straight.” Callum’s eyes glowed brighter. “I still don’t see any wires, but let’s go slowly.”

I didn’t want to go slowly, but neither did I want to end up fried or impaled on exploding machinery, so I gritted my teeth and headed off down the narrow pathway ahead of us.

We’d gone about ten yards when I spotted a light up ahead—either a reflection of my magic or produced by some independent source. I narrowed my eyes, and sure enough, it was moving towards us, blinking in a regular pattern as it glided along the floor.

“Callum.”

He stepped up beside me, gaze intent on the approaching threat…

A puff of air ghosted against my cheek and I reacted, without much of a plan other than to not be standing in that space. I slammed into Callum, shoving him forward and sideways, where we bounced off a rusty metal tank, just as a sharp ping sounded from a few feet behind us.

Where we’d been standing only a few moments before, a needle-tipped metal dart rolled along the floor and disappeared beneath an array of valves and dials.

“Sincerity and desperation, huh?” I almost snarled the words. “The tripwires were just a feint—to make sure you wouldn’t be watching for anything else.”

Callum’s grim expression suggested he might be almost as angry as I was.

We waited there for a moment, tense with anticipation, as the blinking light finally emerged from the darkness and came to a stop at our feet…

I shot Callum a disbelieving glance. “Is this really happening?”

It was a robot vacuum. And sitting atop the vacuum was a porcelain doll with long golden ringlets, wide creepy eyes, and a folded piece of paper taped to her hand.

“I’ve had about enough of this shop of horrors,” I muttered as Callum retrieved the note and unfolded it.

“Congratulations,” he read. “You are foolish enough to meet me, but smart enough to survive. Know that this is only a fraction of my capabilities, and I can ensure your silence at any time. If you still wish to consult, proceed to the end of the path. The door is open.”

We eyed each other, and Callum raised an eyebrow. “Still don’t want me to go first?”

“Oh, I’ve definitely changed my mind.”

A laugh rumbled from his chest as he stepped around the horrifying doll and took another step. Then another. I followed close at his heels, sensing the pressure of eyes from somewhere—and really disliking the darkness behind us—but feeling like we had no choice but to keep going.

To my surprise, we arrived at our destination without further incident and found the door mentioned in the note.

“You ready?” Callum reached for the doorknob.

“Ready as I’ll ever be.”

He tugged it open.

We peered through the doorway, then stood side by side, blinking in mingled shock and disorientation.

It was as if we’d fallen through a portal and ended up in another world—a world of warm yellow light pouring out of a cozy sitting room, complete with floral chintz couches, embroidered pillows, and a startling number of lamps. The walls were lined with shelves containing china teacups, porcelain figurines, and… dolls. More dolls, in all imaginable sizes—a sea of frozen eyes that somehow seemed to be staring directly into my soul.

And on one side of this perplexing scene was a horseshoe desk overflowing with monitors. There were monitors on the wall, wires and cables taped to the floor and the ceiling, and a stack of unwashed teacups shoved to the edge of the desk. And in the rolling chair that turned slowly to face us…

“Hello, dears. Welcome to my office.”

It was… someone’s grandma.

If I could have drawn a picture of the essential nature of Grandma-ness, it would have looked exactly like this woman. She was perhaps in her early seventies, with white hair gathered in a tidy bun atop her head. Gold wire-rim glasses perched on the end of her nose, and she gazed over them out of twinkling blue eyes. Her cheeks were pink, and her hands were wrinkled, and she was wearing a cardigan embroidered with birds. A cardigan.

“Tell me you have a cat,” I blurted out.

Her sweet grandma smile widened. “Would you like tea and gingerbread cookies with your cat?”

There was no way I was eating anything this woman fed me.

“Oh, don’t look like that, dear. I only poison people on Tuesdays.”

“It’s Tuesday,” Callum noted, a slight smile curving his lips.

“Is it?” A comical expression of surprise widened those blue eyes. “How the time does fly. I suppose I was too busy raiding with my grandchildren. They live in New Zealand, so I do tend to get my days and nights mixed up from time to time.”

She bounded up from her chair with far too much energy for a woman of her age. “Come and sit. Tell me what you’re looking for, and I’ll see if I can help you.” Her sideways glance held a hint of warning. “Though the price may change based on the difficulty, legality, or the traceability of the search.”

“I would expect no less.” Callum seemed to have regained his equilibrium, while I was still floundering around looking for mine. “And thank you for agreeing to meet with us.”

“No thanks necessary at the price we agreed upon.” She winked, then indicated one of the chintz couches with a wave of her perfectly manicured hand. “And please, call me Grandma Pearl. Now, what do you have for me?”

I fumbled in the pocket of my jeans for my clumsy drawing. “We need to find this van.” I smoothed out the wrinkles and handed it to her. “A white one, no rear windows, with this logo on the side in blue and gray.”

She sat down across from us and adjusted her glasses to peer at the drawing more closely.

“We want to know who got in it and where it went.”

“Last known location?”

“Parked in front of the Sheridan Village Apartments.”

“Time?” Her tone had grown brisk and businesslike.

“Last night, around one in the morning.”

“And the apartment security cameras?” Her expression suggested she already knew.

“Someone seems to have messed with the recording.”

“Mmm.” Her eyebrows arched expressively. “How unfortunate.”

“Do you think you can find it?”

Her smile turned undeniably smug. “Oh, I can find almost anything, dear. Just don’t blame me if you don’t like what I find.”

“Any information is better than what I have now.”

Drawing in hand, she headed for her workstation, turning around halfway there to eye us once more. “Are you sure I can’t interest you in some tea? I have a lovely chocolate rooibos that just arrived yesterday.”

“Thank you,” I said hastily, “but I’m good. Already had coffee this morning.”

Her mouth curved downward in an expression of distaste. “Philistines.”

She could call me all the names she wanted if she would help me figure out who attacked me.

Once back in her chair, the affable grandma seemed to fall away, revealing a silver-haired shark with steely eyes and nimble fingers. Keys clacked, screens flashed, and I started with surprise when the strains of a stately classical tune filled the underground space.

“Bach for searches,” she called out over her shoulder. “Wagner for hacking, unless I need more finesse. Then I just go with the mood.”

Callum was visibly shaking with the effort of holding back laughter.

Personally, I was too busy being legitimately terrified. No idea why this little old lady raised the hackles on my neck so badly, but even Callum had never scared me the way she did. Was it my hunch magic at work? Or just my plain old lizard brain sensing a camouflaged predator?

“Aaand, here’s your boy.” She let out a cackle as she eyed the screen in front of her.

I leaped to my feet and darted across the room.

Sure enough—in the single frozen frame visible on the monitor, I could clearly make out the same logo I’d seen the night before. The letters in the middle were indeed an R and an E, but the shot was too blurry to read the words underneath.

“That’s it!” I said fiercely. “Where is this?”

“Liquor store camera near the corner of Western and Main,” she reported, a little distractedly. “They were headed north. You can go sit down again. This is going to take a bit.”

She dove back in, so I returned reluctantly to the couch, trying to avoid looking at the painted eyeballs that seemed to be watching my every move.

A flicker of movement caught the corner of my eye, and I turned, half expecting one of the dolls to start brandishing a weapon, or perhaps the almost viscerally necessary cat.

But the thing that moved casually around the end of the couch and regarded me stoically out of round, unblinking brown eyes…

“Am I seeing things?” I murmured to Callum, freezing in place as I eyed the creature with suspicion.

“Only things that are really there, I hope.”

“Perhaps it’s time for a checkup, dear,” Grandma Pearl admonished, without even turning to look at me. “That’s Reginald Cornelius Bunbridge III. He’s a pedigreed French Lop. Three time Best-of-Breed at the ARBA Convention.”

He was what now?

It was indeed a rabbit, but an enormous one—probably weighing around fifteen pounds, with soft brown fur, long floppy ears, and a sense of urgency on par with the average basset hound. As we watched, he flopped onto the worn floral carpet, stretched out his back legs, and appeared resigned to—if not thrilled about—our presence in his domain.

“I’ve had him since he was just a teeny ball of fluff,” Grandma Pearl explained, her focus still on the screens in front of her. “He watches my shows with me. Has a taste for electrical cords, the silly darling, but he’s getting better.”

I gave up, resigned to the fact that I was in some sort of alternate world and may as well resolve not to be surprised by anything until after we left again.

We might have been there for hours. Perhaps only minutes. But at some point, I could feel my eyes begin to droop, and my mind turn hazy. I shook my head rapidly, trying to hold my eyes open wider. Of all places to fall asleep, this really wasn’t one I would choose. But just as Callum had warned, the incredibly swift healing process seemed to have robbed me of energy, and even my limbs were beginning to feel heavy…

“Raine.”

I jerked awake. Turned my head to look at Callum, and saw amusement creasing the corners of his eyes. Despite our surroundings, he appeared relaxed and confident. One of the perks of being a dragon, I guess.

“You can sleep,” he said quietly. “I know you need it, and this may take a while. I promise you’ll be safe with me.”

Was it weird that even in the midst of this bizarre underground funhouse of china and chintz, I didn’t doubt that for a moment?

But I really didn’t want him to know just how warm and squishy his words made me feel, so I shot him a scowl filled with deep and terrible suspicion. “How do I know you won’t let your guard down in front of Mr. Bunbridge there? He looks like he eats fingers.”

“Only shoestrings, dear,” Grandma Pearl called from across the room. “He hasn’t bitten anyone in weeks.”

Callum’s smile was still more soft than teasing. “I promise not to let Reginald eat you, or your shoestrings.”

How could I say no after a promise like that?

“Okay.” I yawned. “Wake me when there’s anything to report.”

I sort of remembered laying my head back against the couch. But after that, there was nothing but oblivion until I heard the deep rumble of Callum’s voice calling my name.

My eyes cracked open. My cheek was resting on something soft, and my arm was wrapped around it like I was hugging my pillow… I lifted my head, and found myself nose to nose with a dragon.

A stupidly gorgeous dragon with wavy auburn hair, a shadow of beard on his jaw, and beautiful lips that curved in amusement as he watched me blink slowly to wakefulness…

I sat up so fast it made me dizzy. The room swooped, my cheeks heated, and I heard a cackle of laughter from Grandma Pearl.

“Naptime is over, dearie,” she said. “Come and see what I have for you.”

I couldn’t even look at Callum. Not after I’d used him as a pillow. Had I drooled on his shoulder? Please let me not have drooled on his shoulder. But I was too embarrassed to check, so I hopped up and headed purposefully across the room to where my answers—hopefully—awaited.

“Your results.” A series of windows peppered the entire bank of monitors, all with images of the van. Some were videos, some stills. “We have two people in the front, but they’re wearing dark clothing and I can’t get a good look at faces. One male, one female is my best guess. The name on the side of the van is Restoration Electric, and the logo appears to have been taken directly from a stock image site. If they are a real company, they have no web presence or phone number, and the state of Oklahoma doesn’t know they exist. The van is registered in Oklahoma, but the name on the registration is fake, and the address takes you to a vacant lot.”

My jaw almost dropped at the amount of information she’d been able to uncover, even if none of it was good.

“So, is there anything helpful at all?” I must have sounded frustrated because those eyes twinkled at me over her glasses again.

“Not so fast. As far as passengers, I have no proof one way or another whether there’s anyone in the back of the van, and you were correct that all cameras in the vicinity of the apartment building show nothing of interest around the time of the incident. However…” Her smile grew positively terrifying. “I can tell you where the van is now.”

I could have hugged her. But I didn’t, because her bunny was probably there for personal protection and would eviscerate me in seconds. Anything was possible here, and my hunch magic wasn’t letting me forget it.

“Where?” I kept my tone calm and somehow managed not to either reach out and shake her or wring my hands in desperation.

“Stinchcomb Wildlife Refuge, East Hiking Trail.” She pivoted yet another monitor to show us a shot taken from above—probably by a drone using a spotlight. And sure enough, there was our van—sitting off to the side on a dirt road, near what appeared to be a small, semi-circular parking lot. No people in sight. “This is live, of course. But I can only keep my drone on it for a few minutes longer before it will need to recharge.”

I somehow suppressed the urge to reach out and touch the screen—to forge some tenuous connection with this one bit of evidence we had.

“Is anyone in it? Has your drone picked up any people nearby?”

An arched eyebrow warned me that my tone might have been too demanding, but apparently she was in a good enough mood to answer me anyway.

“No hikers in January, dear. And the van appears to be empty. If you’re hoping for witnesses, you’re unlikely to find anyone who cared enough to notice, and the closest security camera is at the football field a quarter of a mile away.” She turned her chair towards me, a warning on her wrinkled face. “It shows them arriving around four in the morning, but that’s all I can tell you.”

So they hadn’t been met by any other cars.

“We’ve had a significant amount of rain,” Callum said thoughtfully, “and the waterways in the refuge connect to the Canadian River. They could theoretically have moved by water and been met by another vehicle.”

We were looking at a dead end. Maybe. But better than nothing if we could get to that van and look for clues.

“Thank you.” I suppressed the bizarre urge to curtsey to Grandma Pearl before I backed away. “This is helpful.”

“Even if it wasn’t, I don’t do refunds.” She removed her glasses and let them hang from the cord around her neck. “And don’t thank me, dearie, thank your wealthy benefactor over there.”

I wondered anew just how much this had cost Callum.

“Then we’ll be going,” I said, with what I hoped was a polite smile and not a terrified grimace. “That is…”

“Oh, never fear,” Grandma Pearl assured me with a cheeky wink. “I never maim a lucrative client. Bad for business. You’ve been quite lovely to work with, so you’ll find that all security measures have been disabled on your way out. I hope you’ll consider me again should you have any tracking or surveillance needs.”

“Of course,” Callum agreed, coming up behind me and nudging me surreptitiously towards the door. “A pleasure doing business with you as well.”

We retreated, with an itch between my shoulder blades that made me want to move faster, but I didn’t want Grandma to know how nervous I was. And we were almost to the door before she spoke again.

“I don’t normally do this, but I’m feeling quite generous today.”

I turned to see her regarding us over the gold rim of her glasses, the faintest hint of a smirk on her lips.

“It appears you have a friend hoping to discuss something with you in the parking lot.”

The dragon beside me reacted in an instant, his frame shifting to hover closer to me, every muscle coiled in anticipation. “I see. And is this friend here because he followed us, or because he happened to learn of our whereabouts in some other way?”

Those genial blue eyes turned to flint in the space of a heartbeat. “I live by my reputation, Dragon King, just as you do. And I do not care for the implication that I would betray a contract.”

So she knew who he was.

“Then you also know that I needed to ask.”

Her nod was slow to come. “As do I.”

“We value your services,” he stated promptly. “There is no benefit to us in betraying your location.”

“I agree,” she replied unexpectedly, followed by a toothy smile. “If I did not, you would find that the way out can be considerably more difficult than the way in.”

I was so ready to be out of this scary old lady’s underground lair, even if it meant confronting more enemies above ground.

“Then, until next time.” Callum tilted his head respectfully, opened the door, and pulled me through it into the darkened basement.

The moment the door closed behind us, he stopped abruptly, and I collided with his warm bulk. It was a measure of how freaked out I was that I didn’t step away immediately.

“You okay?”

“I may never sleep again,” I admitted, producing a flare of fae light and holding it aloft. “Does Draven know his hacker friend is a horror movie grandma with an attack bunny and a teacup obsession?”

“If not, then I’m not going to tell him,” Callum said, in a dark tone that promised eventual retribution. “He deserves to find out the same way we did.”

Fair enough. “So who do we think is waiting outside? Also, what time is it and how long was I asleep? I feel like we stumbled into an alternate dimension.”

He consulted his phone. “It’s a little after six-thirty. Which means it’s already dark. No idea who’s out there, but they will have had time to set up a trap, and we won’t be able to see them easily.”

My heart sank as I realized we might have to fight our way out of here. Grandma Pearl’s magnanimity hadn’t extended to telling us who or what might be lurking in the parking lot. She was probably inside right now, watching her monitors, petting her bunny, and drinking tea while waiting for the show to start.

“Do you have a plan?”

“No,” he said. “How do you feel about improvising?”

I hesitated only for a moment. “I trust you.”

“You really do, don’t you?” he murmured oddly. “Then I guess let’s see who’s out there.”

Despite my fear of whatever remaining traps Grandma Pearl might have set, we made our way to the exit without incident, but just before we reached the door, Callum’s phone buzzed.

He pulled it out and glanced at the screen, and I watched as his expression froze.

“What’s up?”

“Text from Kira. Just says ‘Come to the bookstore.’”

“Is that good or bad?”

“I think,” he guessed, “she has information. And she wants us to hear it in person. Which means…”

It probably wasn’t good news.

He looked at me, amber eyes hard and direct, his entire posture shifting to something focused and predatory. The dragon was awake, and it was not feeling patient.

“Change of plans.”

“I thought we didn’t have one.”

“We do now.”

“Don’t forget we have people outside who might want to kill us.”

“They’re welcome to try,” he said, and pulled open the door.