Ahead of him, Angie whispered, “Hallway clear. Bypassing stairway to clear first floor.”
“Copy that, hallway clear,” Villetti said over their unicoms.
“Laundry clear,” she said.
Villetti didn’t respond this time, and silence settled over them, broken by breath sounds and the soft rasp of fabric. No magic sounded, anywhere.
After the humans’ injuries, Mama had called Aunt Jane, and not told Angie. He knew this because he had snuck in and listened to part of the call. After the call to Aunt Jane, things suddenly, somehow, changed for the better.
Back at university, Angie had met Corry, a wild and free human, a girl with no restraints, no witch-fear, who adored his sister. Suddenly, Angie had a girlfriend, one who lived in a kind of tempestuous, untamed mania of joy. Through Corry, Angie met Lissa and KeeKee. And Villetti. She had blossomed overnight. Her loneliness and the fights about the bodyguard had ended.
Angie brought both Corry and Villetti home on spring break and introduced them to the family. She had been blissfully happy, a one-eighty change from Christmas break. Aunt Jane had…what? Arranged for Corry? Arranged for Villetti? He had never asked. His sister had been happy, and that was the only thing that mattered to his young teenage self.
Once again she had adapted. She had grown up. Fallen in love with Villetti.
And then the war had shredded everything. The Rus, an all-male witch-vampire coven, had opened a portal into an interdimensional space and brought out noncorporeal energy beings, what humans immediately called demons, trapping them and releasing them as weapons, first against Ukraine, Belarus, Romania, Moldova, and Poland. From there, they had swept east across Russia and south across Germany and into France.
On the day they entered Germany, they also bombarded China.
Humans had no chance.
China had killed off all their witch covens decades before. The PRC had fallen six days after a dozen ????? ? ??????? had been delivered to the underground bunker where the ruling elite had taken shelter.
Russia fell except for Moscow and Saint Petersburg.
The witches of Europe fought back. The vampires fought.
The U.S., the Emperor of Europe, NATO, and the Dark Queen had sent soldiers and magic users and had fought.
The whole world changed.
Villetti had vanished into the military as a covert operative.
EJ had quit high school and joined Section Seven, one of the magical research and development units, to design, construct, and produce antidemon weapons that witches could use. When things turned sour in the last years of the war, before he turned eighteen, he had gone into active combat situations.
In the middle of all that, the vampire Karson Marrazzo had come to Lincoln Shaddock’s court to apply for blood-family status, and had seduced Angie.
By the time the war ended, and EJ came home, Angie had walked in on her husband indulging in group sex and feeding.
She had left the bastard.
When he saw her again, she had looked like this. Cold and hard.
EJ needed to find out what she had seen and done when she walked out of the vamp lair of the nutjob Marrazzo.
There was a soft, very distant sound of chimes, clean and unbroken. “Magic in the distance,” EJ said.
“No lights,” Angie said. “So it’s behind walls. Upstairs. Something.” She glanced back, took him in and then Walter. Her eyes settled on something in the dark. “Walter—” Angie came to a halt. Her mouth closed on whatever she had been about to say. Instead she said, “Which way did you go?”
“No further than the bottom of the stairs,” Walter said.
“Fine. Wait here. Cover the stairs and the exit. I’ll clear the rest of the ground floor then we’ll take the second story. While I’m working, Walter, please check with Alex and see if the alarm control center you sent pics of indicates some sort of camera access inside the house. Hidden cameras. Ask if Alex has identified evidence of a safe room. EJ, we need lights. If any are safe, turn some on.”
Her tone was different. Commanding.
EJ almost said, “Yes, ma’am,” but changed it to “Sure.”
Walter tilted his head down, like a half bow of agreement. It was subtle, but even Walter had caught her change in tone. “Of course, Angelina,” he said. He turned his back and contacted Alex. Angie melted into the darkness.
