It was with a new feeling of vulnerability that I stood before the double glass doors of the Carew Tower and adjusted my hat in the murky reflection, and I jumped when the doorman leaned forward and opened it for me. A warm gust of air blew my hair back, and he smiled, tipping his hat in salute when I came in with small steps and whispered, "Thank you."

He answered me cheerfully, and I forced myself to straighten up. So I had been shunned. Edden wouldn't know. Neither would Ms. Walker unless I told her. If I walked up there looking like prey, she would chew me up and spit me out.

My jaw clenched. "Stupid department of moral and ethical standards has their head up their ass," I muttered, determined to fight this all the way to the Supreme Court-but the reality was, no one would care.

The restaurant at the top of the tower had its own dedicated elevator, and I could feel the doorman's eyes on me as I clicked and clacked my way to it, forcing myself to find a confident posture. The elevator, too, had a doorman of sorts, and I told him who I was and gave Edden's name as he checked his computer for reservations.

I hiked my bag up higher on my shoulder and read the restaurant's events sign as I waited. Apparently someone had reserved the entire restaurant for a party tomorrow.

My flagging confidence took another hit as I remembered Pierce. I was shunned, my ex-boyfriend's killer was roaming free, I was doubting my ability to stir something as complex as a locator amulet, Al was abusing our relationship...I had to start fixing things.

Jenks moved, startling me as he wiggled out and sat on my shoulder. "Your pulse just dropped," he said warily. "Is your blood sugar low?"

I shook my head, smiling thinly at the doorman when he got off the phone and pushed the button to open the elevator. "I've got a lot to do today," I said as I got in the small, opulent lift.

"And we're late," Jenks grumbled as he took off his cap and tried to arrange his hair in the reflection of the shiny walls. He had flitted to the wide banister circling the inside of the elevator, and twin pixies made an impressive display of winged physique.

I forced myself to straighten as I checked that my complexion charm was in place. Shun me, would you? "It's called arriving fashionably late, Jenks," I murmured as I took my own hat off and tucked a curl behind an ear.

"I hate being late," he complained, making faces to pop his ears as the pressure shifted.

"It's a five-star restaurant," I came back with. "They won't have a problem waiting."

The lift chimed and the doors slid open. Jenks moved to my shoulder with a huff, and together we looked out onto the revolving restaurant.

My posture relaxed in pleasure, and I stepped out, smiling, as my worries seemed to pale. Below me the river wound a slush gray ribbon through the white hills of Cincinnati. The Hollows lay beyond, peaceful in the coming dusk. The sun was nearing the horizon, painting everything with a red-and-gold sheen, and clouds reflected it all. Beautiful.

"Ma'am?" a masculine voice prompted, and I brought my gaze inside. He looked like the twin of the guy downstairs, right down to the black suit and blue eyes. "If you'll follow me?"

I'd been up here only once before, with Kisten for breakfast, and I silently walked behind the host, taking in again the rich fabrics; the Tiffany lights; and the mahogany, pre-Turn tables with carved feet. Rosemary and pink rosebuds were on every table. The sight of the booth where Kisten and I had shared morning conversation over French toast made a surprisingly soft ache in me, more fond remembrance than hurt, and I found I could smile, glad that I could think of him without heartache.

The place was empty but for the staff setting up for tonight, and after passing a small stage and dance floor, I spotted Edden at a window table with an attractive older woman. She was Ceri's size, dark where the elf was light, with very thick black hair, falling straight on her back. Her nose was small, and she had thick lips and luscious eyelashes. It wasn't a young face, but her few wrinkles made her look wise and venerable. Graceful, aged hands moved when she talked, and she wore no rings. She sat across from Edden, slim and upright in her stark white, full-length dress, not resting against the back of her chair. Ms. Walker had the view-as well as the poised presence that said she was in charge.

Jenks's wings brushed my neck, and he said, "She looks like Piscary."

"You think she's Egyptian?" I whispered, confused.

Jenks snorted. "How the Turn should I know? I meant she is in control. Look at her."

I nodded, disliking the banshee already. Edden hadn't noticed us, fixated on what she was saying. He looked good in his suit, having worked hard to keep his shape through the late-thirties meltdown and into his midfifties. Actually...he seemed captivated by the woman, and a warning flag went up. Anyone as self-possessed and beautiful as she was was dangerous.

As if hearing my unspoken thoughts, the woman turned. Her heavy lips closed and she stared. Evaluating me, are you? I thought, sending my eyebrows high in challenge.

Edden followed her gaze, and his demeanor brightened. Getting to his feet, I heard him say, "Here she is," and he came to greet me.

"Sorry I'm late," I said as he took my elbow to hustle me to the table. "Marshal made me get a massage to help with my aura." Yes. Blame it on Marshal, not me needing to recoup after finding out I'm shunned.

"Really?" the squat man said. "Does it help? How do you feel?"

I knew he was thinking about his son, and I set my hand atop his. "Wonderful. Jenks said my aura looks tons better, and I feel great. Don't let me leave without giving you the woman's phone number. She makes hospital calls. I asked. No extra charge for the FIB."

Jenks made a scoffing sound. "She says she feels great?" he said. "More like stinking drunk. The damned woman nearly smashed her car drifting it into a parking spot."

"How's Glenn?" I asked, ignoring Jenks as Edden helped me out of my coat.

"Ready to go home." Edden gave me a look up and down. "You look good, Rachel. I never would have guessed that you had to get an AMA."

I beamed as Jenks rolled his eyes. "Thanks."

The waiter holding out his hand for my coat was eyeing Jenks. Edden saw his gaze and moved his chin to make his mustache bunch up. "Can we get a honey pot?" he asked, trying to put Jenks at ease.

"I appreciate the offer, Edden," Jenks said. "But I'm working. Peanut butter would be good, though." His gaze went to the table in its white-and-gold perfection, and his expression became panicked, as if he'd asked for grits and pig's feet instead of the source high in protein he needed because of the cold.

The waiter, of course, picked right up on his unease. "Pe-e-e-eanut butter-r-r-r-r?" he said in a patronizing tone, and Jenks let a wisp of red dust slip.

My eyes narrowed as the man implied with those two words that Jenks was a bumpkin, or worse, not even a person. "You ha-a-ave peanut butter, don't you?" I drawled in my best Al impression. "Freshly ground, absolutely nothing out of a jar will do! Low salt. I'll have a raspberry water." I had sampled Kisten's raspberry water after finding my French toast not to my taste. It had some fancy glaze on it. Okay, maybe I was a bumpkin, but making Jenks feel like one was rude.

The man's face went blank. "Yes, ma'am." Gesturing for a second waiter to get my water and Jenks's peanut butter, he helped me with my chair, and then a menu-which I ignored since he'd given it to me. I had a view, too. Jenks hovered by my place setting as if reluctant to set down on something so fine. His flowing black outfit looked great among the china and crystal, and after I turned an empty water glass over for him, he gratefully sat on the elevated foot. Edden was to my right, the banshee to my left, and my back was presently to the door. But that would change as the hour advanced and the restaurant turned.

"Ms. Walker, this is Rachel Morgan," Edden said as he settled back in his chair. "Rachel, Ms. Walker has been adamant about meeting you. She's the administrative coordinator of banshee internal affairs west of the Mississippi."

Edden seemed unusually flustered, and another flag went up. Jenks, too, didn't seem to like that the usually levelheaded man looked almost twitterpated. But she was a banshee, beautiful and alluring in her sophistication and exotic beauty.

Shoving my increasing dislike away, I extended my hand across the corner of the table. "It's a pleasure, Ms. Walker. I'm sure you know we can use all the help we can get. Mia Harbor turning rogue has us in a tight spot." Jenks smirked, and I flushed. I was trying to be nice. So sue me. I hadn't said anything that wasn't true. It was obvious I couldn't bring Mia in if she resisted.

The older woman took my hand, and I tensed, searching for any sensation of her siphoning off my aura or emotions. Her eyes were a rich brown, and with the bone structure of a supermodel and her wrinkled but clear complexion, she was classically alluring.

"You can call me Cleo," she said, and I drew my hand away before I shuddered. Her voice was as exotic as the rest of her, a low slurry of warmth insinuating a promise of naughty but nice. God, the woman was like a vampire. Maybe that was what was putting me on edge.

That I had pulled away was not missed by Edden or Ms. Walker, and a faint, knowing smile curved the edges of her mouth up. "It's good to meet you," she said, shifting to lean forward. "I'll help find little Mia, but I'm here for you. Your reputation is worth investigating."

My fake smile faded, and Edden, hunched over and guilty, started to play with his drinking glass. Slowly I turned to him, calming my anger before the banshee noticed it. But she did anyway.

The cool woman put her elbows charmingly on the table and eyed him almost coyly. "You lied to get her here?"

Edden glanced at me, then back down to the river. "Not at all," he grumped, his neck going red. "I stressed certain things is all."

Stressed certain things, my ass. But I smiled at the woman, keeping my hands below the table, as if she'd soiled them with her touch. "Is this because I survived Holly's attack?" I asked.

"In large part, yes," she said, lacing her fingers together and propping her chin on them. "Would you mind if I felt your aura?"

I stiffened. "No. I mean yes, I would mind," I amended. "I don't trust you."

Edden winced, but Ms. Walker laughed. The comfortable sound of it made the waiters just out of earshot look up, and my stomach clenched. She was too perfect, too assured. And her eyes were dilating like a vampire's.

"Is that why you brought your pixy?" she said, the first hint of distaste wrinkling her nose as she grimaced at Jenks. "I won't be sampling your aura, Ms. Morgan. I simply want to run my fingers through it. Find out why you survived an attack from a child banshee. Most don't."

"Most don't have a black banshee tear in their pocket," I said stiffly, and the woman made a small sound of interest.

"That's why...," she said, and it was as if an until-now hidden tension slipped out of her. "The emotion went sour as she killed you, and finding a sweet source, one familiar-"

"Holly took that instead," I finished for her. Jenks's heels were tapping out a distress signal, and I twitched my fingers to acknowledge it. He had seen the woman lose her tension, too. She'd been afraid of me, and now she wasn't. Good. It would make taking her down easier if it came to that. Stop it, Rachel. You can't tag a banshee.

The woman sat upright in her chair and sipped her tea with a thousand years of grace. She and Ceri would get along famously. "Even so, your aura is extremely tight," she said as she set it down. "If I hadn't known you were recovering from an attack, I'd say you were insane."

That was just rude, and when Jenks shifted uncomfortably, Ms. Walker's eyes went from him to me, squinting softly in the bright light. "Your pixy didn't tell you a tight aura is a sign of instability?"

Knowing she was goading me, I let my anger dissipate before I smiled back. "He's my business partner, not my pixy," I said, and Edden miserably shrank into his chair while we had our polite, sophisticated catfight.

Jenks, though, couldn't help himself, and he rose with his hands on his hips. "Why should I tell Rachel what a tight aura means? She's not insane. She had a massage today and it condensed it down. Lighten up-you hag of a washerwoman."

"Jenks!" I exclaimed, but Ms. Walker took it in stride. What is up with him?

Ignoring Jenks but for a warning twitch of her fingers, she focused on me, her brown eyes going black. I clamped down on my sudden fear. This woman could probably kill me as we sat, and she would get away with it though Edden sat two feet away. "I don't care what they say you are," she said, her low voice entirely devoid of anything but scorn. "We are more powerful than you. That you survived was a fluke."

She stood amid Edden's protests, but I sat, frozen in fear. Who I am? She knew. She knew I was a proto-demon.

Standing above me, Ms. Walker closed her eyes and breathed deep, sucking in my fear like a drug. Jenks rose up in a clattering of wings.

"Stop," he intoned as he hovered between us, and the woman's eyes flashed open. "Leave Rachel's aura alone or I will kill you."

Ms. Walker's eyes went even blacker, and my fear slid deeper and twisted. She had Ivy's eyes, full of an unsated hunger. She was a predator chained by her own will, and she didn't mind letting herself off the leash once in a while. But not me. She wouldn't have me. I wasn't prey. I was a hunter.

While Edden winced, the woman gathered up her small handbag. Today's paper was folded up next to it, and my gut clenched. Great, she knew I'd been shunned, too. As she looked at Jenks, her disgust poured forth. "Bug," she said simply, hiding her eyes behind a pair of dark glasses. "Shouldn't you be sleeping in a hole in the ground?"

"Shouldn't you be extinct, like the rest of the dinosaurs?" he snarled back. "Want some help getting there?" he added, and I cleared my throat even as I bristled at her racial slur.

"Ms. Walker," Edden was saying, having stood up and moved to her side of the table. "Please. The FIB could really use your help, and we would be most grateful. Ms. Morgan and her associate's opinions aside, one of your own is accused of murder."

The elegant woman stopped two steps from the edge of the revolving ring, her eyes hidden. "I've seen what I've come to see, but I'll look for little Mia tonight. It's unlikely she's left her city, and I'll inform you when I've dealt with her."

Dealt with her? I didn't like the sound of that. By his expression neither did Jenks.

"In return, any assistance you can give me in streamlining the adoption process will be appreciated," she finished, turning away and accepting the hand of a nearby waiter to make the step to the unmoving core of the building.

Adoption? Alarmed, I stood up. "Whoa, wait up," I said caustically, and the woman turned back with cheeks flushed in anger. "Adoption? You mean Holly? Holly has a mother."

Edden's hands went loose at his sides, his posture becoming threatening without his making one overt move. "Ms. Walker, we never discussed you taking the child."

The woman sighed before she stepped back down to our level, moving with crisp, precise motions. "The child can't be held by anyone other than another banshee until she gains control," she said with a wave of her hand, as if we were simpletons. "Almost five years. What are you going to do, put her in a bubble?"

"You are underestimating the child's control," Edden said. "Her father holds her."

Interest arched her eyebrows, and she took her sunglasses off. "Does he really?"

Great. Now she really wanted Holly. It was almost impossible to engender a child under the laws of humanity, and now Ms. Walker thought Holly was special. Mia wasn't going to live out the week, and Remus would probably die defending them if we didn't find them first.

"It's not Holly," I said quickly. "It's her dad. There's a wish involved."

Edden turned to me with accusation in his expression, and I shrugged. "I found out yesterday. I was going to tell you."

Ms. Walker's eyes squinted in the glare, making wrinkles at the corners, and Jenks smiled wickedly as a flash of worry crossed the banshee's face before she hid it away. "Your own son hospitalized, Captain Edden," she said, as if it might make us want to give the child to her. "You yourself, Ms. Morgan, attacked and nearly killed. How many lives will you sacrifice before you accept it? I can control her. You can't. In return, I will give the child a home."

"Temporarily," I said, and Ms. Walker's smile twitched.

"If Mia is cooperative."

Like I believe that would happen?

"Ms. Walker," Edden said, his earlier fluster washed away, leaving his usual hard-assed self. "We all want what's best for Holly, but neither Mia nor Remus has had due process yet."

The woman made a huff, clearly thinking that due process wasn't going to enter into it if she found Mia alone. "Of course," she said, her voice and posture regaining their earlier grace and self-assurance. "Good afternoon, Ms. Morgan, Captain Edden. I'll send word when I have Mia contained." Giving us an icy smile, she turned and walked sedately to the elevator, two waiters trailing behind her.

Jenks's wings clattered as he exhaled and flew back to the table. Red sparkles sifted from him as he stomped from where he'd landed to a small dish of peanut butter that had magically appeared while we argued. Sitting cross-legged on the rim of the plate, he reached over and helped himself with the pair of pixy-size chopsticks he had somewhere on his person. "Damned banshees," he muttered. "Worse than fairies in your out-house."

Edden put a hand to the small of my back and directed me back to my chair. "Why do I have the feeling we need to find Mia before Ms. Walker does?" he said worriedly.

Someone had set a glass of rose-tinted water by my plate, and I sat down. Slouching, I took a sip, almost getting a lap of water when the ice shifted. "Because banshee babies are rare and precious," I said, then wondered if they'd laugh at me if I asked for a straw. "Giving Holly to that woman would be a mistake, banshee or not. I don't trust her."

Edden snorted. "I think the feeling was mutual."

"Yeah, but according to her, I don't matter." Maybe it was better to not matter to a banshee. "We have to find Mia before that woman does. She's going to kill her to get Holly."

Edden looked at me sharply. "That's a strong accusation."

I reached for the bread basket, hoping we still got to eat even if our Most Important Guest had left. "You can wait until Mia is dead, or you can believe me now. But ask yourself who you'd rather have Holly grow up with." I pointed at him with my pinkie, and he frowned.

"You think so?

Tearing a bit of bread from the loaf, I ate it, thinking it was too dry. "I know so."

Edden's eyes shifted to the elevator, then back to me. "It would be easier if we had a locator amulet. Any progress on them?"

I nearly choked, and as I scrambled for words, Jenks chimed up with a cheerful "Yeah-"

My knee smacked the underside of the table, and his wings burst into motion. "I just have to finish them up," I said. Edden looked from my hot cheeks to the pixy, now silently staring at me. Grunting, the man pushed away from the table, his thick fingers looking out of place on the white linen.

"I'll send a car to pick them up as soon as you have them done," he said as he stood. "I know you don't have the license to sell them, but let me know how much it cost you, and I'll add it to your check. We're having a devil of a time finding her. They keep slipping past us." He rocked back, looking at the elevator again. "I'll be right back."

"Okay," I said, helping the dry bread down with a sip of raspberry water, but my thoughts were elsewhere as the squat man tried to catch up with Ms. Walker.

Jenks snickered, settling in and looking more relaxed. "Want me to tell you what he says to her?" he asked, and I shook my head. "Then you want to tell me why you don't want him to find Mia?" he added.

I brought my gaze back from the elevator. "Excuse me?"

"The amulets?" Jenks licked his fingers free of the peanut butter. "Duh? Marshal invoked them."

Grimacing, I started brushing the crumbs I had made into a pile. "They're duds. I screwed up. They don't work."

Jenks's eyes went wide, and his heels swung back and forth. "Uh, yes, they do."

I didn't look up from brushing the crumbs off in my napkin. "Uh, no, they don't," I mimicked him. "I tried one at the mall, and it was just a hunk of wood."

But Jenks was shaking his head, dipping for another clump of peanut butter with his chopsticks. "I was there when Marshal invoked them. They smelled okay to me."

Exhaling, I leaned back in my chair and shook my napkin out under the table. Either the tear Edden had given me was from another banshee, or the amulet I put the potion into was bad. "It smelled like redwood?"

"Absolutely. The amulets even turned green for a second."

The elevator dinged, and I pulled myself closer to the table. "Maybe the one I invoked was a bad amulet," I said softly as Edden said good-bye to Ms. Walker, and Jenks nodded, satisfied.

But a faint sense of unease wouldn't let go as we waited for Edden to rejoin us. There was a third possibility I didn't even want to think about. My blood wasn't entirely witch blood, but proto-demon. It was possible that there were some earth charms I couldn't invoke. And if that was true, then that was one more mark that said I wasn't a witch, but a demon.

Better and better.

P/S: Copyright -->www_novelfreereadonline_Com

***