Ilona Andrews: White Hot

His expression softened and for a fraction of a second I saw him looking at me with a mix of surprise and relief. Then the gaze of those furious eyes fixed on Forsberg with predatory focus. I knew that expression. It said, “Murder.”

I whipped around. Panic drowned Forsberg’s face. Magic contracted around him, compressing in on itself like a spring coiling under pressure. The hallway around me stretched back as if marble and metal suddenly became elastic.

I shoved Cornelius out of the way.

The hallway compacted like an aluminum can flattened by pressure and suddenly I was airborne. I hurtled through the air, straight at Mad Rogan.

Fate threw us at each other. I could never tell Grandma.

I crashed into Rogan. Strong arms caught me. The impact spun us around, and I landed upright on the floor to the right of him. Before my feet touched the marble, Rogan hurled a handful of quarters in the air. The coins streaked at Forsberg, flattened bullets driven by Rogan’s power, dodging random people in the hallway as they shot toward their target.

The air around Forsberg shimmered. The coins collided with the shimmer and fell to the ground, bouncing from an invincible barrier. Forsberg blurred, landing twenty yards back from where he’d been.

“Shoot him,” Rogan said, his voice clipped.

“No gun.”

Forsberg looked scared to death. People who panicked didn’t think; they ran. I dashed toward the elevator. We had to beat him to the lobby.

Forsberg jumped straight up, blurred, and then fell through the floor. I caught myself on the corner of the short hallway leading to the elevator, slid on the marble floor, and mashed the button going down. Rogan was only a step behind me.

The elevator doors slid open and we rushed inside. I hit the button for the lobby. The door began to slide closed and Cornelius squeezed through the gap at the last moment, causing them to reopen. Rogan jerked the animal mage off his feet, slamming him against the elevator wall, his forearm pressed against the blond man’s throat. Cornelius groaned, his feet above the ground, all of his weight pushing his neck against Rogan’s forearm.

“Drop my client!” I barked.

Rogan pressed harder. Cornelius’ face turned red. I’d seen what Rogan could do with his bare hands to a person. If I didn’t pry Cornelius away from him, Rogan would crush his windpipe.

“Rogan! He’s a . . . he’s a civilian!”

Rogan stepped back as if I’d thrown a switch. Cornelius dropped to the floor, gulping air. Apparently I’d said the magic word.

“Try that again and I’ll shock you into oblivion,” I ground out.

The elevator doors opened. Twelfth floor. Rogan pushed the button, forcing the doors to close, and peered at Cornelius. “Is this my replacement?”

What? “I didn’t replace you!”

“Of course not. I’m irreplaceable.”

Cornelius finally managed to squeeze out a word. “Rogan? The Butcher of Merida? Mad Rogan?”

“Yes,” Rogan and I said in unison.

“Is this the R on the dress?” Cornelius’ eyes were wide.

Think of clouds, think of bunnies, don’t think about the wedding-gown pictures . Rogan claimed he wasn’t telepathic, but he could project images, which meant he could probably pick up impressions if I concentrated on things too much.

“Dress? What dress?” Rogan asked, honing in on the word like a shark sensing blood in the water.

“Never mind,” I told him. “Cornelius, not another word or I walk.”

Rogan’s eyes narrowed. He’d recognized the name. He was involved in this thing with Forsberg up to his elbows. Just my luck.

Number two above us blinked. Almost there.

Rogan tossed the coins in the air and the quarters hung around him motionless. His magic brushed past me, a raging, terrible beast. Shivers ran down my spine. Suddenly the past two months of normal life tore apart, like fragile paper, and I was right back next to Rogan, about to charge into a fight. And it felt right. It felt like I’d been sleepwalking and had suddenly woken up.

I had to get away from him as soon as I could. He was bad for me on every level.

“Alive!” I told him. “I need Forsberg alive.”

The doors chimed and opened. We burst into the lobby to a wall of shotguns pointed in our direction. Behind the security, Forsberg lay on the floor on his back. A puddle of red slowly spread from his head. His eyes were gone. In their place two blood-filled holes gaped at the ceiling.

Rogan swore.

Normally it would’ve taken me days to extricate myself from the clutches of the Assembly’s security. With Rogan emanating menace and Cornelius explaining things in a calm, patient tone one normally used with small children, we walked out of the building in twenty minutes. They stuck to the truth: Forsberg attacked Rogan without provocation. Cornelius and I just happened to be in the way, and there were a dozen witnesses who would confirm it. When one of the security people asked if Rogan had threatened Forsberg, the Scourge of Mexico looked at him for a moment and condescended to explain that he hadn’t threatened anyone. He had been moving though the hallway with a purpose because he had someplace to be and if they had a problem identifying the difference between that and him actually threatening someone, he would be happy to demonstrate. They decided not to question him further after that.

Outside, Rogan raised his head and squinted at the sun that broke through the overcast sky. The robes were really too much. He needed some crimson banners and a glowing staff and he’d be all set.

His face was tight. He was pissed off. I was pissed off too. We’d lost Forsberg and we had no idea how he’d died, let alone any clues as to who might have helped him on his way. House Forsberg would circle the wagons and hunker down now. Everything about this investigation had just become a lot harder.

“Since when did you stop carrying your gun?” Rogan asked.

“Mr. Rogan . . .”

“Oh no.” Rogan glanced at Cornelius. “We’re back to formal ground. I’m clearly out of favor.”

“Mr. Rogan . . .”

“Why are you mad at me?”

I made a heroic effort to keep my voice calm and measured. “You panicked the witness I was interrogating, causing him to throw me around like a rag doll, hop his way through the floors, and get himself killed, which really complicates my life and robs my client of an opportunity to discover why his wife was murdered, and then you almost strangled said client in an elevator.”

“It does sound bad when you put it that way, Ms. Baylor.”

His words were meant to sound light, but his eyes remained dark and grim. Something bad had happened to Rogan. I almost reached out, then caught myself. No.

No.

The man was a disease and I couldn’t get rid of the infection as it was. I so didn’t need another outbreak of Rogan fever.

Two Range Rovers pulled up, one gunmetal grey, the other white, both with familiar thick and tinted windows. Rogan owned a fleet of VR9 armored cars. They were state-of-the-art custom vehicles, built to be armored from the ground up while looking perfectly normal and blending into traffic, and they handled like a dream. I’d ridden in one just before Adam Pierce blew it up.

An athletic man in his twenties, with short blond hair and military bearing, jumped out of the grey Range Rover and brought the keys to Rogan. “Sir. Ms. Baylor.”

“Hello, Troy.” I was there when Troy had his job interview and was hired. He was ex-military and Rogan had saved him from a foreclosure. Today Troy wore a hip holster, full and in plain view.

“How is being an evil henchman treating you?”

“Can’t complain, ma’am. It’s a good gig if you can get it.”