Ever After. Kim Harrison

      Sneezing, I wondered if I could make it in twenty if someone from the I.S. ran vanguard.

      A man from the gatehouse came out, waving everyone back, shouting that Mr. Kalamack would make a statement in an hour, and that they were welcome to wait at the gatehouse pressroom if they liked. In pairs and groups, they parted, and the black car moved slowly through the gate and turned into the parking lot where I waited.

      Nervous, I leaned against my car, pointing Trent’s car out to Ray and telling her that one of her daddies was in it. She was still gumming that charm when the car pulled to a halt two spots down. Immediately a back door opened, Trent not waiting for the driver to get it for him. Jenks darted out, shedding encouraging silver sparkles, but Trent was a great deal slower, moving as if he was in pain. Upon closer inspection, I decided he was just tired, his jeans creased and the sleeves of his riding shirt rolled up. There was a tuft of cotton and a Band-Aid inside his elbow, and I wondered if he’d given blood.

      Squinting at the sun, he crossed the warm pavement, his hands outstretched for Ray. The little girl had begun to wiggle when she’d caught sight of him, and the smile that came over Trent caught in my heart. It didn’t matter if this child was not his blood—she was his child. And Quen’s, and Ceri’s.

      My smile faded. I had to fix this.

      “Ray,” he breathed, and suddenly I felt her absence keenly as he took her. “Your daddy is going to be okay, I think.” His eyes rose to mine. “We got him there in time. Ten more minutes and they might not have been able to stop the cascading reaction.” He blinked fast, then looked away. “That’s twice you’ve saved Quen’s life. Thank you.”

      I shifted from foot to foot, uncomfortable. “I’m sorry this happened.”

      “Me too.”

      Our eyes met for a long, silent moment. Ray jumped and wiggled as Jenks’s dust sifted over her, and I flushed when Trent noticed what she was gumming, her little fingers gripping the charm so hard they were white. I sneezed, and I shook my head at Trent’s unspoken question.

      “Ah, I’m sorry about this,” I said as the driver of his car began to move the car seat to the black Jag. “I hate coming home to find reporters in my driveway. I hadn’t heard from you and I need to talk to Al. That’s why I’m sneezing. Ray wouldn’t go down for her nap, and I figured she’d fall asleep in the car.” I hesitated. “You look tired.”

      “I napped during some of the tests,” he said, and I wondered at the incongruity of us standing in the sun and talking as other people moved Ray’s things to his car. “I didn’t want to leave until he was stable. They got his aura to stop cycling, but they don’t know why he won’t regain consciousness. Thank you for handling the press. One of the guards relayed what you said. You did pretty well.”

      My eyes dropped at his wry smile. “I’ve been dodging them the last couple of years. I know how much you have to give them for them to leave you alone.”

      Ray had fallen against him, her head tucked under his chin as she started to drift asleep, her eyes never leaving me. “Oh God,” Jenks said from my shoulder, and her eyelids flickered. “Here come the vampires.”

      Sure enough, coming up the road on a golf cart were four I.S. officers. The grit ground under Trent’s heel as he spun slowly to watch as they parked beside their cars and the one in the dress suit angled toward us.

      It was Nina, or Felix, maybe. I could tell by the grace and slightly pained motion of the living vampire as she crossed the lot. The sun normally didn’t bother living vampires, but Nina was channeling Felix by the looks of it.

      Trent seemed to shed his fatigue like an old shirt, but I could see it in the wrinkles at the corners of his eyes. “They had a warrant,” I explained, and he bobbed his head in acceptance. “The I.S. in your backyard is another thing I don’t like coming home to. They’ve been on the grounds for the last couple of hours, but your security tells me they’ve been escorting them the entire time so they wouldn’t wander. The hospital called them, probably.”

      “Thank you,” he murmured, gently patting Ray as the tallish Hispanic woman in the black dress suit put a hand up to ask us to wait. “You did exactly what Qu— What should have been done.”

      I quashed the feeling of hurt. “I used to work for them. I know your rights.”

      “Trenton!” the woman boomed out, her voice too expansive and masculine for her slight frame. Clearly Felix was in her again, and I worried about her. It wasn’t uncommon for the undead to use their “children” as moving walkie-talkies, but it was unusual that Felix kept doing it. But who tells an undead no?

      “Good to see you again,” Trent said, shaking the woman’s hand with an expansive motion that he usually only used with men. “How much longer until you are off my property?”

      The vampire smiled, setting a finger aside her nose in a gesture I hadn’t seen anyone under the age of fifty use. “Rachel, is Ivy back from Arizona yet?”

      “No.” I shook Nina’s hand, struggling with my desire to wipe it off. Her fingers had been cool and dry, but the man animating her bothered me. “Was it a demon attack?”

      “It would be a lot easier to tell if you hadn’t exploded three trees over the entire crime site.” Nina squinted uncomfortably. “Can we move this inside?”

      “No,” I said again, shifting my bag up higher on my shoulder. “Can I leave, or do you want something?”

      Jenks’s wings shifted against my neck in warning. Okay, it wasn’t smart to antagonize a vampire, especially a dead one, but Ray wasn’t the only one tired here.

      “I need a statement, if you would please. Before you leave.”

      I sneezed, my entire body contracting and the noise making Ray crack her eyes. Al was getting impatient. “I’m kind of busy right now.”

      “Then you shouldn’t have obliterated the evidence,” Felix said, Nina’s beautiful white teeth bared at me in a threat thinly disguised as a smile.

      “Oh. My. God,” Jenks said, safely parked on my shoulder but his dust shifting a bright red. “Rache, they think you did it. Do you really believe the crap that is coming out of your mouth,” the pixy added as Nina reflectively steepled her fingers as I’d seen older men do, “or do you just make shit up to see how stupid people might think you are?”

      I knew I was filling the air with my anger, a close second to a vampire’s favorite smell after fear. The wind helped, but by Nina’s smirk I knew that she was picking up on some of it.

      “You are a demon,” Nina said, making Jenks’s wings seem to hum in anger. “And yes, this has all the markings of a demon attack. It occurred in the daylight, meaning you are the only one who could accomplish it.”

      “That’s dumber than Tink’s dildo!” Jenks exclaimed, and I raised a hand to keep him from flying at her; the vampire might be quick enough to catch him. I doubted Felix truly believed I’d done this, or he would’ve had a dozen other magic users out here to bring me in. Unless he knew even that wouldn’t be enough, and I’d been moved to the level of a banshee where they’d just kill me outright with a sniper’s spell. Grea-a-a-at.

      “Then there is option number two,” Nina said brightly as I fumed, and she turned to include Trent. “Do you wish to start an investigation on the Withons?”

      “Ellasbeth didn’t do this.” Trent’s voice was soft because of Ray, but it had the sureness of wind and water. Slumped against him, Ray slept, at peace at last. Nina tilted her head as if unsure, and I agreed with Felix. Ellasbeth’s family was one of the wealthiest on the West Coast. She had motive, opportunity, and the clout to buy a demon attack. I wished it was her. It would make my life easier. But with Nick involved . . .

      Nina eyed Trent, a cruel twist to her lips. “Isn’t that what you did to her? Steal her child?” she said as she held her hair against a gust