wasn’t sight that had drawn her to Rick. She wouldn’t deny that he was one of the most handsome men she’d ever encountered, but it took more than a hot guy to turn Josie’s head. Rick had a presence that struck her deep within her soul, in the part of her that longed for someone both normal and extraordinary at the same time.
She’d found that with Rick, she was sure. Unfortunately, he didn’t feel the same or he never would have gone.
Still, his disappearance left too many questions for her to ignore. On the most basic level, she needed to discover where he was and why he’d put himself into the dangerous, gray and bloody area between the magical and the mundane worlds. But more deeply, she had to know if maybe, under other circumstances, their relationship might have worked out. Too bad she had no idea which question she’d tackle first.
She approached his room cautiously. She wasn’t sure exactly what she was going to find on the other side of the pocked and peeling door, but she was about certain there wouldn’t be a single scented candle or soft, romantic music. Not in this joint.
“Don’t go in there.”
Josie yanked her shaking hand away from the doorknob and spun, startled. Unable to move—to even gasp in surprise—she watched Regina St. Lyon emerge from the shadows. Relieved, Josie allowed herself a split second to breathe.
“Oh, it’s you.”
“So you’ve found him,” Regina said.
“Nice to see you, too,” Josie said with a forced smile. She’d hadn’t exactly been avoiding contact with the Guardian of Witches, but she wasn’t thrilled to see her, either. For the past six months, Rick had been causing a disruption in the division between the mundane and magical worlds. As Guardian, it was Regina’s responsibility to find and stop him. Fortunately for Josie, even Regina’s considerable magical prowess did not include the ability to find a nonmagical human who did not want to be found—not and leave him alive. So she’d recruited Josie, giving her six months to accomplish her goal before she took matters into her own hands.
Josie’s time was nearly up.
Regina gave a polite bow and grinned. The effect relaxed the deep furrow on her forehead. “You look well.”
“I was going for sexy,” she answered, tugging her tank tops down a bit lower.
Regina arched a brow. “You plan to seduce him into stopping his rampage?”
“Sounds like a win-win-win for all involved,” Josie said with a smile.
While Regina had a tendency to blow up things that annoyed her, Josie believed in a quieter form of magic, particularly since she had no real powers. What could be more peaceful than motivating a man to stop wreaking havoc in the magical world by distracting him with sex?
Regina’s smile, however, disappeared. She turned her hand palm up. A ball of pure electricity materialized just above her flesh, then spun. The color, deep purple to match her eyes, was entrancing, but Josie knew the sphere was deadly. She’d never seen Regina use her most formidable weapon, but she’d heard enough to know she couldn’t allow Regina and Rick to meet. Not until she’d convinced Rick to give up his apparent quest to destroy all the evil magical beings he could get his hands on.
Not that destroying evil was bad. When Regina had first come to her to solicit her help, Josie had wondered what the problem was. She knew that the Guardian had entire teams of witches training to do exactly what Rick was doing on his own. But he was getting sloppy and if he wasn’t stopped, he was going to expose the magical world to the mundane one. And that wouldn’t be good. The Salem witch trials might have happened a few centuries ago, but they were still incredibly fresh in the minds of anyone who practiced Wicca.
Protecting the secrecy of witches was Regina’s primary duty. She’d vowed to do whatever she had to in order to keep the magical and mundane worlds from intersecting in a violent way. But about Rick, she was wrong. Josie knew that once she caught up with him, he’d listen to reason. And to present her arguments, first she had to go inside his hotel room.
“I will help him,” Josie insisted.
“It’s too late,” Regina said, her generous lips bowed in a tragic frown.
“You said I had six months. That leaves me one more week.”
“I’m not talking about time, Josie. Rick has been dealing with demons too long. He cannot possibly be the same man you knew.”
“You don’t know that,” she argued.
“I know what he has done. His choices—”
“Have served your ultimate purpose. He’s destroying your enemies,” Josie insisted, hoping to buy a bit more time.
Regina arched a perfectly sculpted eyebrow, her mouth still curved disapprovingly. “I cannot deny that Rick’s passion for killing demons has benefited the witching community, but increasingly—” she eyed the door Josie hoped Rick was still behind “—he’s becoming a danger to himself and the secrecy of our world. Look how long it has taken you to track him down. His crimes are coming to the attention of mundane law enforcement. Sooner or later, someone will connect him to us and I cannot allow Rick’s personal vendetta to expose my Wiccan sisters and brothers, magical or mundane. From this point, you should let us deal with him.”
Josie’s heart lurched. “What? Now that I led you to New York? To him? Besides, I thought I was one of us?”
Regina’s smile was only partly reassuring. “Mundane witches are the backbone of our community.”
“Then why didn’t I know you and the others existed until six months ago?”
“Because the knowledge often does more harm than good,” Regina insisted, her gaze slashing toward the door. “Look at Rick. Look at what he’s become.”
“I can’t,” Josie said, “you’re blocking my way.”
After a long pause, Regina stepped aside.
Josie had learned about sacred witches like Regina—those who possessed real, active powers—around the same time Rick had, but the idea that such magic existed still boggled her mind. Regina could materialize from nowhere. She had the ability to produce deadly bursts of energy from the palm of her hand. It had been hard enough for Josie to swallow the fact that Lilith St. Lyon, Josie’s best friend and Regina’s younger sister, was a powerful psychic who’d recently mastered the ability to project her thoughts into the minds of others. And there were other witches out there who could conjure items from nothing, stop time, create doppelgängers and hold sway over the dead. Certainly made Josie’s skills with aromatherapy, candles and, to some degree, potions, pale in comparison.
But no matter their magic, none of the witches could find a human who did not want to be found, particularly a former cop with impressive street smarts. Luckily for her, Josie had been raised on those same streets. Her mother, a longtime con, and her various “uncles” of dubious blood relation had taught her a few tricks of her own. Together with finely honed computer skills and the ability to persuade just about anyone to talk to her and give her information they didn’t want to share, Josie had finally tracked Rick down. She wasn’t going to turn around and hand him over to Regina without giving herself a shot at bringing him home.
“Thank you,” Josie said, placing herself firmly
