Page 11

“Or someone else’s cause?” Morrow asked. “I’d like to think that you’re only trading information with me and Frost. Unless you’re cheating on the two of us with someone else.”

Angelica and Houston exchanged glances, then laughed.

“Promiscuity has its perks. But no. It’s a square dance. Our professional polycule begins and ends here.” Houston adjusted his hat and winked directly at me.

I tugged on my collar and tried not to blush. Morrow twisted his foot against the tiled floor, adjusting his posture so that part of his body blocked me from view. It was a subtle shift in his body language, but I definitely wasn’t imagining it this time. Big guy definitely was getting a little jealous.

“Very vulgar of you, Houston.” Angelica stepped forward, producing her own Happy Links drawstring bag from her pocket. “A trade. If you agree to exchange some charms with us, then we may consider spilling some proverbial tea. We have duplicates, between me and Houston, and I’m unhappy with that.”

I tried not to laugh. “Are you serious? Like we’re trading Pokémon cards?”

Angelica cocked an eyebrow. “Pokey — mans? What gibberish is this? Houston. What is he talking about?”

“They’re trading cards with cute little monsters on them,” Houston explained. “Emphasis on ‘trading.’ We’re all trying to complete our own sets. Frost? You won’t be so smug when you find out why we’re trying to pick up unique charms instead of duplicates.”

Okay, this was intriguing, and it was yet another side to the Happy Links business model that I hadn’t even considered. These drawstring giveaways, the prizes at the mini-carnival’s booths, even the random blind bags that the stores sold created a community component for the brand.

The mundanes would trade, reinforcing their fascination with the charms and spreading their influence even further, a kind of self-oiling marketing machine. It would be kind of brilliant if I didn’t know there was some sinister bullshit going on behind the scenes.

“We’d love to trade with you guys, too,” said a dreamy voice from the end of the corridor.

The speaker was a wispy young woman in a tank top, jeans, and chunky sneakers. I thought I recognized her from the line outside the mall, but I couldn’t be sure. Two similarly dressed ladies flanked her, and — were they teenagers? College students, maybe?

I could at least tell that they weren’t magical. I didn’t sense the thrum of spell residue that surrounded a magic user like radiation, and she didn’t dress like one of us freaks from the arcane underground.

I don’t know what it is about magical people that predisposes them to walking around like they were attending a cosplay convention. Houston with his cowboy getups, Angelica with her combination priestess-dominatrix outfits, and Morrow with his — well, it was usually the suit and tie. I wasn’t used to being the most normal one in the group, but here we were.

“Sorry, ladies,” Houston said with an especially syrupy drawl. “Private engagement. We’d prefer to keep this trade between ourselves. We probably don’t have anything you want, anyway.”

“Oh, you have plenty of what we want,” the girl in the center said, again in that same dreamy, distant monotone.

“Trade with us,” the girl on the left said, just as the girl on the right echoed her. “Trade with us.”

All in the same drone, too. I didn’t need to check their wrists to know that they were wearing those Happy Links charms themselves.

I spoke out of the side of my mouth. “Umm, guys? I think they’re charmed. This doesn’t look good.”

Angelica scoffed. “Doesn’t look good in what way? We just ignore them and carry on with our business. Actually, I’ll do you one better. We’ll go somewhere else. Gentlemen? Follow me.”

Angelica swept down the corridor with all the majesty of someone wearing a cloak and crown, only to be stopped short when the girls spread themselves out to block her. Uh-oh.

“Ladies?” Angelica said. “Stand aside. This has nothing to do with — ”

“You’re not playing very nice,” the girl in the middle said. “That makes us very unhappy.”

They lunged without warning. Angelica sidestepped at the last moment as one of the girls fell upon her with fingers tipped with wicked acrylic nails. She stumbled, the soles of her chunky sneakers squeaking against the tiles.

“Final warning,” Angelica boomed. “I will not hesitate to slap the nonsense out of each and every one of you.”

“You see what I mean?” Morrow whispered to me. “Angelica thinks so, too. Slapping you would have probably worked.”

“Time and place, Morrow,” I hissed, watching the corridor for signs of spellwork I could copy, carefully ignoring how the thought of Morrow manhandling me was an uncomfortable turn-on.

Chunky Sneakers lunged again. Angelica darted backward, teeth clenched as she gestured with her fingers, weaving a celestial spell.

The other girls ignored them, racing down the corridor toward us.

“Frost!” Morrow shouted. “Heads up. Class Delta threats.”