Mercenary Magic (13 page)

“What did you do?” she asked in a harsh whisper, her head pressed close to his.

“A magic bomb. I’ve been developing them in my spare time.”

“I had everything under control. And you are risking exposure.”

“Uh, Sera. Just look around. We’re pretty well exposed already.”

She followed his gaze to the crowd of people who’d gathered all the way from the smoothie bar to the parking lot. They were gaping at the unconscious mages strewn across the asphalt battlefield—but more than that, they were gaping at her and Riley. A few of them had pulled out their phones and were taking videos. Some others were rapidly texting. Fantastic.

“Any hope of discretion died the second those mages charged across the parking lot with flaming hands,” he continued.

“You’re probably right.” Sighing, she took out her phone and dialed Mayhem.

Fred answered on the second ring. “Hey, Sera, what’s up?”

“Where’s Fiona?”

“Ladies’ room. She left me in charge,” he said, clearly excited. Sera could picture him puffing out his chest with pride. “What can I do for you?”

“I have two bodies here at Smoothie Elixir in the Presidio.”

There was a pause. All joy had died in Fred’s voice when he spoke again. “Dead or alive?”

“Alive. They’re unconscious. So I need the Extraction Team, not Disposal,” she said. “Two elemental mages, early twenties and pretty high on magic. They seem to favor fire, so tell the team to wear fire-retardant gear.”

“Ok.” His voice cracked.

“Fred?”

“Yes?”

“Do it now, please. And tell them to hurry. The mages could wake up at any moment.”

“Ok, Sera.”

She hung up, then looked at Riley. “You stay here.”

“Where are you going?”

“It will take the Extraction Team at least five minutes to get here. Probably ten.” She took two decorative ropes off the side of the smoothie building. “In the meantime, I’m going to see what I can find to restrain our friendly fire mages.”

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Pier 39

“WHAT HAPPENED TO you at Smoothie Elixir this morning?”

Sera looked across the table at Naomi. The noonday sun shone down on her, making her silver hair sparkle like the ribbons that streamed from the handlebars of a child’s bike. Behind her, bands of tourists flooded the passages of Pier 39, and cross-legged hippies sat smoking magic weeds. A light breeze slid off the bay, cool and salty.

“When you asked me to meet you here for lunch, I hadn’t expected an interrogation,” Sera replied.

“When I asked you to meet me here for lunch, you hadn’t yet been attacked by a duo of fire-hurling mages. Is it true one of them kept up a fire stream for a good two minutes?”

“It sounds like you already know everything.”

“Not everything. The attack was on the news in the Mayhem rec room.”

Sera swore under her breath.

“The details were sketchy—and probably played up by the media.”

Probably. The media was always all over supernatural events, but they cared more for the wow factor of magic than the hard, cold facts.

“So, what happened?”

“Riley and I went out for a run. We stopped for smoothies, and those bozos just attacked us.” Sera tore a corner off her sourdough bowl and dunked it into her soup. “But if you were at Mayhem today, you must have seen the Extraction Team bring in the mages.”

“They didn’t bring them in.”

The bread slipped from Sera’s fingers. “What? I waited at the scene for them to come. I saw them load those mages into the truck as Riley and I left.”

“Before they drove off, some fancy lawyer arrived,” Naomi told her. “She works for one of the big magic dynasties.”

“Which one?”

“Sage.”

Go figure.

“Anyway, she had some papers signed by the Magic Council stating that the Sage Dynasty was taking responsibility for the delinquents, and they would deal with their punishment. Our team had no choice but to hand them over.”

So Harrison Sage had sent the fire mages to…to do what? To silence Sera? He hadn’t spoken one word to her last night, and yet he’d somehow come to believe that she knew something that threatened him. Maybe he’d had her and Kai followed. Maybe he knew they were working together. Well, if he’d sent people to deal with her, he was worried. And only people who were up to something had a reason to be that worried.

But none of that bothered her like the mention of the Magic Council had. Were they a part of this too, or had they just blindly signed off on one of Harrison Sage’s projects? Kai had said that Harrison was on the Council.

“Does this attack have anything to do with your job for Drachenburg?” Naomi asked her.

“How do you know about that? Simmons never spills the details of the big cases. He thinks that gives them an air of mystique—and us the drive to strive to be better so we can land them.”

“Yeah, that’s what he says, but it’s all talk. He pays well, but not well enough to stop gossip,” said Naomi. “Sera,
everybody
at Mayhem knows about your big case. Especially Roberts. Cutler also, but I think he’s more jealous of Drachenburg than of you. He’s been going around telling everyone that you and he are going to celebrate at Liquid when you’re done with the case.”

“In his dreams.”

“Cutler’s kind of on his own plane.” Naomi’s eyes drifted off for a moment before she steered her gaze back to Sera. “So does this have to do with your job for Drachenburg or not?”

“Maybe. Or maybe I just pissed off someone who likes to hold a grudge. We’ve put away a lot of supernatural delinquents.”

“You could have asked the fire mages what they wanted.”

“I was pretty busy dodging fireballs, but next time I’ll be sure to make time for smalltalk,” Sera said drily.

Naomi chuckled, and her hair went blue. “How is your assignment going?”

“Well, in the last twenty-four hours, I’ve been attacked by telekinetics and elementals, teleported across the Golden Gate Bridge, had the backs of my legs turned into ground beef—”

“The Hello Kitty bandages look great, by the way.”

“Thanks.” Sera tore another piece off her bread bowl and ate it.

“The Drachenburgs are like the most famous magic dynasty—anywhere. What’s it like working with one of them?”

“You don’t work with a Drachenburg. You work
for
them. Kai is an arrogant, self-entitled control freak with enough destructive magic spilling out of him to bring on an eternal winter.”

Naomi folded her hands up into a tent and balanced her chin on them. “Oh, Kai, is he? So what did you and
Kai
do yesterday?”

Sera did her best to ignore the smirk on Naomi’s face. “We went to Magical Research Laboratories and did a little replay of our fight on Wednesday. It turns out Mr. Crazy Pants Mage is his cousin.”

“Hmm.”

Sera told her about the glyphs, and how she and Kai were shoved through them during the fight with Olivia and the other mages.

“I’ve heard of those glyphs. Fairies used to use them too.”

“Do you know how to activate them? One of the mages did it during the fight, but when Kai tried later, nothing happened, no matter what magic he threw at them.”

“My grandma once told me that the key to activating the glyphs was not to attack them, but to feed them some of your magic.”

“What’s their teleporting range?”

“It’s dependent on the power level of the mage or fairy performing the magic.”

“Interesting. Thanks.”

“No problem.” She smiled. “So then what happened?”

“By the time we got back to MRL, the mages were gone. And they’d stolen something from the vault. Ever heard of Priming Bangles?”

Naomi shook her head, her blue locks bouncing off her cheekbones. “Sorry, no.”

“After that, we drove to Illusion.”

“The super-fancy, super-exclusive, top-tier-mages-only restaurant in the Presidio?”

“Uh, yeah.”

Naomi snickered.

“What?”

“Kai Drachenburg took you on a date.”

Sera shot her an annoyed look.

“This is wild.”

“This isn’t wild. And it wasn’t a date,” Sera argued. “We were working.”

“Interrogating the gold-plated forks, I’m sure.”

“No, interrogating Harrison Sage.”

Naomi’s platinum eyebrows lifted. “And before that?”

“Before that, we ate. But it was only because we were so hungry from fighting all those mages,” she added quickly.

“Yeah, hunger is typically why people eat. What did you have?”

“Steak.”

Her brows slid higher. “Steak at Illusion is like a month’s paycheck. I hope it was good.”

“It didn’t cost that much, it was good, and Kai paid anyway.”

“Date,” Naomi’s lips popped.

“Work expense.”

“You keep telling yourself that, Sera.” She blinked, and when she opened her eyes again, they were hazel.

“Wow, you’re getting good at that. All your practice is really paying off.”

“Thanks.” She grinned. “And stop changing the subject. What happened after dinner?”

“Kai drove me home.”

“And then?”

“And then nothing.”

Naomi’s grin widened, showing off her perfect white teeth. They were flat and beautiful, not pointed and scary like some types of fairies. “You’re not a very good liar, fyi. You get really still whenever you’re trying to hide something.”

“Thanks for the tip.”

“You’re welcome. Now you can repay me by spilling the beans.”

“He drove me home.”

Naomi nodded.

“He walked me to my door.”

She leaned in.

“And then…and then he kissed me.”

The surprise flashed first across her face, but the delight stayed longer. “Oh, yes, my dear, that was a date.”

Sera couldn’t think of a clever retort, so she kept her mouth shut.

“A date with Kai Drachenburg!” Her hands buzzed with excitement. “Not that I blame you for going out with him. Did you see him on the cover of Mages Illustrated?”

“No.”

“He was topless.”

Sera rolled her eyes.

“And flexing.” Naomi began to fan herself.

“Stop that.”

“He is one gorgeous man, Sera.”

“He’s manipulative and arrogant.”

“Of course he is. Just look at who his family is: the prestigious Drachenburg Dynasty. They own the world’s largest consortium of magic companies. They have a seat on the Magic Council.”

“And who sits in that seat?”

“Your new boyfriend.”

Sera went hot and cold, all at once. “He’s not my boyfriend,” she managed to ground out—barely. Her jaw was stuck.

Naomi ignored her protest. “You didn’t know he was on the council?”

Sera shook her head. That part of her body was still working. For now. She stirred whirlpools in her soup with her spoon.

Kai was on the Magic Council. Well, of course he was. Deep down, she’d known it all along but refused to admit it to herself. And all because she was attracted to him. Stupid, stupid, stupid.

This ended now. Things could never work out for them, even assuming he wasn’t stringing her along for kicks, which she wasn’t all that convinced of. The fact of the matter was, he was on the Magic Council, and she was the abomination the Magic Council had sentenced to death. That sort of relationship was as doomed as an ice sculpture in the desert.

She ate her lunch in silence, promising herself that she wouldn’t let him kiss her again. When he kissed her, she lost all sense. In fact, she needed to figure out a way to block out his magic asap because it was just as bad. It felt so good that she didn’t even care that the sweet song it sang was all a big, fat lie.

“What are you thinking about, Sera?” Naomi asked her.

About Kai naked. About sliding her hands over his hard abs. Wait, no. Not about that. Nothing about him. She kept quiet.

Naomi’s young, wise eyes met hers. “You’re thinking about Kai Drachenburg, aren’t you?”

“Yes.”

“Good.”

Sera didn’t turn when the familiar voice spoke. Not right away. And when she finally did, she wished she hadn’t. Kai stood behind her chair, looking as good as ever in his signature fitted t-shirt and rugged jeans, his hair just messy enough to make him look relaxed but not sloppy. As she met his gaze, his magic—which he’d coiled so tightly around himself that she hadn’t even sensed his presence—flared out, hitting her like a shockwave. Naomi let out a soft gasp.

“I’ve been trying to reach you all day, Sera. You’d better have a damn good reason for ignoring my calls,” the dragon said.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

The Mystic Palace

HE’D FOUND HER. Somehow. Sera gave him a hard, long stare, all the while wondering how much he’d overheard.

“Sera, we have to move. I’ve had a lead on the case.”

“Ok.” She set some money on the table, then pushed back her chair. “See you later, Naomi.”

Naomi bobbed her head, her gaze still locked on Kai. Maybe she’d never seen a dragon before. Kai just marched off, leaving Sera scrambling to catch up. They walked in silence along the water, passing docks, restaurants, and boatloads of tourists. On one of the water platforms, a herd of selkies were bathing in the sun. They were one of the area’s biggest tourist attractions, and sure enough, a crowd stood nearby, clicking photos with their cameras.

“I tried calling you,” Kai finally said, his words as hard as granite. “Multiple times.”

“I know. I was ignoring you.”

He stopped suddenly and spun around to face her. “You will tell me why.”

“No.” She crossed her arms and stared back. “I won’t.”

“Woman, you must have a death wish. No one can be this foolish.”

“We’ve discussed this before. I’m a dumb brute who runs after monsters.”

“So you say.”

“How did you even find me?” she asked. “Did you have someone track my phone or something?”

“After I heard about the attack on you this morning, I tried calling you again.”

“Ah, you were worried. How cute.”

Smoke started rising from his hair.