I sighed. “You’re so right about that.” A thought occurred to me. “When we were talking to Owen this morning, before you got the text from Noah’s phone, you said you knew where the Luparii were camped out.”

He nodded. “I think so. I’m pretty sure he was talking about Sunken City. It’s this development down in San Pedro that basically fell into the ocean in a landslide around 1930. Giant chunks of concrete and piping everywhere. Technically it’s illegal to go there—they have a shitty fence around it—but it’s really popular with hikers and kids and taggers. The city is kind of stuck, because it’s both very cool and very dangerous. If they open it to the public, they open themselves up to lawsuits if people get hurt. And if they don’t open it to the public, they’ve got to deal with trespassers and activists petitioning for access.” He shrugged. “So the local government kind of ignores it. I’ve been there a couple of times just to walk around.”

“So it’s like an open secret?”

“Yeah. Hell, I’m pretty sure it’s got a Facebook page.” He pulled out his phone and tapped on the screen for a few minutes. Then he nodded to himself, reading the screen. “The hikers have been posting that the whole area has been closed off for the last three weeks, including the adjoining houses. There’s a rumor going around that another landslide is expected. And another rumor that they’re finally working on opening it as a public park.”

“Sounds like a humans-go-away spell to me.”

He pocketed the phone again. “But the Luparii aren’t stupid. They’ll have packed up and moved after Owen got away.”

“I’m sure they did, but maybe they left something behind.”

“Yeah, like a big-ass death trap.” He looked skeptical. “Promise you won’t go down there without me.”

I shifted my weight from side to side. “Jesse . . .”

“Scarlett . . .” He mimicked my tone. “It’s not safe.”

“I’ll have Shadow. And I don’t know what else I can do to help. Will’s evacuating the pack, and Kirsten and Owen are about to be neck-high in research. If I go over there and sit down in front of a huge stack of books, I’m going to pass out on it.”

“Would that be so terrible?” he replied. “You could use the rest.”

I shook my head. “If the Wild Hunt rides tonight, I need to be doing everything I can to stop them today.”

Jesse put his hands on my hips, bending his forehead to touch it against mine. “I’ll come with you then,” he said.

“Your family needs you. What if . . .” I didn’t finish the sentence. What if Noah died and Jesse wasn’t here?

A look of terrible sorrow filled his beautiful face, and I reached up and kissed his lips again, gently this time. He kissed me back with intensity, but without the fevered lust that had almost carried us away before.

Then there was a loud buzzing sound from the direction of Jesse’s pocket, and he drew a shuddering breath. “That’s probably my parents, wanting an update. They’re on their way back from a wedding in San Luis Obispo. I should call them back.”

I nodded. “Right. Yes. Right.” Why couldn’t I stop talking? “That is a thing for doing.”

A smile flashed across his gorgeous face, and it felt like something exploded in my chest. “Don’t go to Sunken City without me,” Jesse pleaded. “Please. Don’t make me choose.”

I took a deep breath. “I’ll try my best. I have other stops to make first, anyway . . . How about I promise I will call you before I go down there?”

He nodded. “Look at us, all compromising and shit. It’s like we’re in a real relationship.”

As soon as the word relationship left his mouth, a look of panic crossed his face, like he was afraid I was going to take it all back. I fought a smile. “Don’t look now,” I said seriously, “but I think we might be.”

Chapter 32

As it turned out, the phone call Jesse had ignored wasn’t from his parents. I waited while he listened to the voice mail, which turned out to be from the police, who had arrived at the hospital to interview Jesse about Noah’s attack. Jesse’s presence was requested back in the emergency waiting room.

The story he had come up with was pretty simple: Jesse had been planning to meet his brother at Griffith Park to go hiking. He was a little late, and when he arrived, he found that Noah had been attacked, probably for his car, and dumped near the parking lot. He’d decided to leave me out of the story so it wouldn’t impede my movements for the day, which I appreciated.

I made a quick call to Hayne to make sure the car would, in fact, be stolen by the time the police started investigating, and we started back toward the waiting room.

“You can duck out the other door,” Jesse said as we approached. We were holding hands. “I know you need to get to Kirsten and the others.”

“It’s not that,” I said, stopping and turning toward him. “Hayne said Kirsten is making calls to all her witch friends, and they’ll need time to do research. But I need to go talk to Jack and Juliet.” If the Luparii had come after Jesse’s brother, my own brother, his new wife, and their two kids could theoretically be in danger, too. “I do want to stay with you,” I added, laying my hand on his cheek. I hadn’t realized how much I wanted to touch him, all the time, until I was suddenly allowed to do it.

Goddamned baby hormones.

“I know,” he assured me. He smoothed my hair behind my ears. I remembered him snapping my hair tie and shivered with pleasure. “If Noah stabilizes, I’ll try to get away tonight.” He hesitated. “You don’t think the Luparii will try something here, do you?”

I considered it. It seemed really unlikely, but I could understand why he was worried. “Tell your folks that Noah’s new girlfriend is going to come to the hospital as soon as she can, probably around seven. You can come meet me then.”

“Noah doesn’t have a girlfriend,” he said, confused.

“Sure he does. Molly.” I grinned. “I’ll call her now and leave her a message to come here after sunset to keep an eye on them.”

A smile spread across his face, but he hesitated. “Don’t you need her?”

I shook my head. “I don’t have anything for her to do that would be as useful as this.”

He kissed me again, and I pulled him closer, prolonging it. It seemed obscene to have joy bursting in my chest when so many things were going wrong all around us, but I couldn’t help it. When we finally came up for air, I pushed him toward the waiting room. “Go.”

If Shadow hadn’t been waiting for me in the back of Astrid’s pickup truck, I might never have found it. I was so distracted that I was keeping an eye out for the White Whale.

She barked lightly when she saw me wandering around, and I remembered what I was driving and my name and stuff.

Jesse.

I smiled to myself.

Shadow could undoubtedly smell him all over me. Her tail wagged madly as I walked up, and I didn’t think I was imagining the playful glint in her eye. She hopped down—not waiting for me to lower the tailgate—and practically pranced over to the driver’s side door so I could let her in. I laughed. “Okay, okay,” I said. “But we’ve got to get it together. People are depending on us.”

Stop smiling, Scarlett.

Stop. Smiling.

My first stop needed to be Jack’s house, and I was brought back to earth when I realized I was going to have to think of a story to tell him. Shit. It wasn’t even ten a.m. yet, and I was operating on very little sleep. I had no idea what to say.

When I rang the doorbell of Jack’s condo in Sherman Oaks, my brother answered the door in boxer shorts and a white tee shirt, holding what looked like a bowl of Lucky Charms. His red hair was jutting up at odd angles, and his eyes were bleary. And yet the first thing out of his mouth was, “What the hell happened to you?”

“Good morning, sunshine,” I said, grinning. “Fell down in Griffith Park. And I’m pretty sure I still look better than you do right now.”