The Witch with No Name

Trent followed my gaze to his hands and shook the tension from them. “Easy for you to say. It’s not your people who are about to flush everything back to pre-Turn chaos. If I’d known they were going to do something this boneheaded, I wouldn’t have pushed to come out of the closet.”

It was nice of him to say, but I knew I was the real reason he’d lost clout. Frankly, I didn’t care anymore. We’d make them play nice in the sandbox, and that would be that. Nervous, I leaned to look at the clock on the dash, then knelt beside Trent to look out the window for Jenks. “They’re just scared.”

“Scared,” Trent scoffed, fiddling with the ends of his ribbon. “My people want a return to power so badly they don’t care who they step on to get it.”

I slid a sideways look at him. That had sounded kind of familiar, but I wasn’t going to say anything.

A sparkle of dust caught my breath, and I lurched to open the sliding door. It was Jenks, and he was carrying something heavy, his path slowly arching to the ground. It had been only two minutes. Something had gone wrong. “What happened?” I demanded, one hand on the side of the van as I leaned out and down to catch him. “Jenks?”

“It’s a key,” Trent said, holding my shoulder so I wouldn’t fall out. “I think we’re okay.”

With a burst of silver, Jenks rose up, clearly laboring. “Someone take this, will you?” he exclaimed, and a heavy brass key fell into my hand. “Tink save me from the artists! Every other hotel is in the twenty-first century and uses card keys, but no-o-o-o-o! We have to be special. We have to be extravagant! We have to be so far behind the times that it’s considered chic! Why the hell did I volunteer to bring it out for you?”

“Is everything okay?” I glanced at the clock. They couldn’t have secured the front desk that fast.

“Yeah, we’re good.” Jenks stood on my palm, wings drooping and a sheet of red dust pouring through my fingers. “That Nina is one scary bitch. Remind me not to stare her down again. The lobby and restaurant are cleared out. We figure he’s in 612. It’s the only one with a crib, according to housekeeping.”

“Lucy?” Trent exclaimed, almost hitting the ceiling as he stood. “She’s here?”

Jenks nodded, head still bowed as he caught his breath.

Shit, this changed everything. “Okay. Trent, if we find her you take her and get out. End of story. I can do this with Jenks.” His daughter came first. I understood and supported that, even as I was scrambling to adapt.

“Ah, Landon is probably in the adjoining room,” Jenks suggested, but his soulful, almost pitying expression told me he was just saying that to try to give Trent something to pin his worry to. We could not start a firefight in a room where Lucy was.

“I can’t endanger Lucy,” Trent said, his worry lines melting into alarm. “Rachel . . .”

“If we find her, she’s a priority,” I said. “You take her and go.”

“Yeah, cookie maker,” Jenks said as he took to the air again. “We got this in a can already. We just need to put a label on it and put it on a shelf. Let’s go.”

Looking ill, Trent rolled the door open.

“Is he going to be okay?” I breathed to Jenks, turning my lips up into a smile when Trent spun to help me out.

“It’s the people holding Lucy I’m worried about,” Jenks muttered, but I thought Trent might have heard as he wiggled his fingers impatiently for me. “We’re burning daylight, people,” Jenks prompted, and I grabbed my jacket and put my hand in Trent’s. Little tingles of energy balanced between us. The lump of my new cell phone was in a back pocket, and the cool feel of steel from my splat gun that never seemed to warm up was at the small of my back. Jittery, I closed the door, making the sound echo in the small space. Trent and I hustled forward as I shoved first one arm into my jacket, then the other. The leather would give me some protection against spells, both earth and some ley line.

“Which way, Jenks?” Trent asked as we stepped over the box and crept into the back receiving room, and Jenks hummed off at head height, intentionally dusting a thick yellow that would linger. The scent of excited vampire mixed with cinnamon and wine as we followed Jenks’s glowing path through the receiving area to the warmer kitchen, and finally into the bar.

I’d been to the Cincinnatian before, and I’d always thought having the bar just off the tiny lobby sort of elegant in the tight confines a city hotel demanded. The new decor—rich with texture and color—made up for the small space. The ringing of a phone pulled my attention to the front desk. Ivy’s eyes met mine, but I couldn’t smile. Lucy was here. It changed everything.