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Chapter 26
DIANA
“Er, so that went kind of okay, I thought?” I said to Storm as we walked out.
He shot me a disbelieving look. “You thought that went like you expected?”
“Sure!” I said cheerily. “They were just posturing. One of them is going call us. I’m sure of it.”
“We have no evidence to back up your theory,” said Storm somberly. “This is not how I envisaged my career ending.”
“Look on the bright side,” I said. “We laid the best of plans. If it all comes crashing down on us, you can go to Otherworld to be an almighty Archon, the rest of us can start our own cozy detective agency. It’ll be brilliant!”
Storm did not look happy at my suggestion. We agreed to meet tomorrow in the office just before midday. That was the deadline we had given to the Ronins.
I returned home to find Beastie outside the apartment building waiting for me. I scooped her up and took her upstairs, and gave her a cuddle. “Well, Beastie my friend,” I said. “It looks like I’m going to have to kill a monstrous beast of a serial killer soon. What do you think about that?”
AngelBeastie gave a meow that sounded distinctly unimpressed.
“Don’t worry,” I said. “I have a secret weapon.”
I went to stand in front of my mirror like I had done for a good part of yesterday, and pulled my T-shirt up to take a look at my navelstone. It looked the way it always did. Just like a stone. Certainly not like the end of a sword.
I closed my eyes and remembered the moment when Marielle had tried to kill me. I envisaged every little detail. The expression on her face. The snarl that had exposed her long sharp fangs. How she had seemed to come towards me in slow motion. How my body had seemed frozen on the spot, refusing to move. And my navelstone had started fiercely vibrating, though I had been barely aware of it at the time. And there had been a sharp pain, and then the sword had been in my hand and Marielle had been screaming in pain because it had gone right through her.
I let myself focus on that moment right before the sword had appeared in my hand. The way I had felt. Had it been panic? Had my life flashed before my eyes? Had I been intensely aware of my own mortality? But the thing is I couldn’t remember what I had thought or felt, because the whole thing had happened so fast.
If I really wanted to get the damn sword out again, it looked like I was going to have to go outside and pick a fight with someone large and dangerous. Then maybe the sword would appear. The problem was what if they charged me like Marielle had, and what if I couldn’t stop myself from injuring them with it? Maybe even killing them. That was the last thing I wanted to happen.
Storm would never forgive me. My life as I knew it would be over. I’d have to go on the run, and it would be Storm’s job to track me down. That would totally suck.
I called Theo to find out if he had had any fresh thoughts about the sword, or even if he’d discovered what the hell it was in one of those ancient books of his. Perhaps there was some incantation that I could say that would make the sword appear in my hand at my command.
Theo had no such good news. He cautioned me that if I thought the sword would not appear, then perhaps it was best for me to avoid a confrontation with DCK entirely. Perhaps it would be best for me to allow the team to arrest the murderer instead. I informed Theo that I had fully prepared for the situation.
The problem was that I was not prepared. I had no idea what sort what manner of creature DCK actually was. Was he a vampire? Werewolf? Perhaps a really powerful mage? Heaven forbid that he would be a sorcerer. A full-blown sorcerer might be able to pound me into dust by uttering a mere word from his lips. It was not like I had any magical skills to counteract that sort of power.
Heck, I didn’t even know how I was going to lure DCK to my kill room, or how I was going to get him away from whatever trap Storm and the team would set to catch him.. There were so many things I did not know. I was trusting that my psychic instincts would help me to wing it. All I really had in my arsenal was a sword that might or might not appear when I needed it most.
I messaged Finch to ask him if he had made any progress towards finding Zezi. He did not respond.
There was only one thing left to do. I switched on my current favorite TV show. Unfortunately even that failed to be enough of a distraction. Several hours later I went to bed feeling thoroughly dissatisfied.
Chapter 27
STORM
It was Sunday. Crunch time. Storm had been doing his best to keep his cool ever since the meeting with the Ronins yesterday evening. All night he had told himself things would work out. He had decided to trust Diana, as had the rest of the team, and things would definitely work out. He had told himself the same thing all morning too, but right now, at 11:45 pm, fifteen minutes before the deadline that they had given the Ronins, the last thing he felt was cool.
Saskia had settled down since the dinner. She’d even made Jenny help her clean up the major mess they’d made of his apartment. One part of his life was fixing up but the rest was about to go to hell. Unless that phone rang.
The whole team had gathered at Agency Headquarters, and had been spending the morning prowling around the empty office floor liked caged beasts. Now they were all gathered inside Storm’s office, munching on the donuts that Leo had brought in for them. Leo was looking a bit pale and was quiet after the full moon yesterday. He had not expressed being worried about his job, but Storm knew he was. And so were Remi and Monroe.
Remi was doing her best to keep their spirits high. “I love Diana’s idea about a private detective agency,” she said. “We’ll be the most kick ass agency in the whole of London. We’ll have a ton of clients. So many in fact that we might even put this Agency out of business!”
She talked it up, her ideas getting more and more outrageous, until Monroe snorted with laughter.
Diana was prowling right next to Storm’s desk. She had placed her mobile phone on it, because that was the phone that they had agreed that the Romans would call them on. Every once in a while she reached out to touch it, as if she was hoping to get confirmation that a call was definitely going to come.
