“But Kristof … ? You don’t live with … ?” I paused. “No, wait. That’s why Jaime says you’re on walkabout—when you’re deployed. She can’t contact you and he can’t contact you.”

She nodded. “Three months on, three months off. They started with six and six, but I’ve renegotiated.”

“And that’s the part you’re not okay with. Being separated from him.”

“We’ve learned to deal with it. I’ve learned to stop bitching about it. I like the job. Love it, though I hope the Fates aren’t eavesdropping on me admitting that. As for your father … Let’s just say I go AWOL more than any other ascended. Fortunately, my partner and I have the best soul-skewering record around, so as long as I don’t flaunt it, the Fates look the other way.”

I leaned forward. “Tell me a story.”

She stopped sipping her coffee. “Hmm?”

“You used to tell me bedtime stories. Wild adventures of yours—suitably cleaned up, I’m sure. Tell me one now. From the afterlife. You don’t have to clean it up anymore.”

She laughed. “Actually, I might, since the one I have in mind involves your father. All right, then. An afterlife story. Once upon a time, your dad was in court, defending a half-demon who …”

As she told me the story, I leaned back in my chair, coffee in one hand, cupcake in the other, and the rest of the world seemed to swirl away. The details of what she was telling me didn’t matter. I was ten again, curled up in bed, listening to my mother’s voice. Whatever happened after this didn’t matter either. For these few minutes, I had her back. Not Eve Levine, notorious dark witch. Not Eve Levine, daughter of Balaam. Not even Eve Levine, ascended angel. Just my mother. Me and my mom.

After that, we got down to business. I wasn’t familiar with Roberts’s older-model smartphone, but figured it out easily enough. Contacts, recent calls, e-mails, and calendar. Those were the things we wanted. Sadly, none of his contacts were marked “evil confederates in a plot to destroy life as we know it.”

“There are a few possibilities in the calendar,” I said. “Seems he put in a lot of gym time. He didn’t look like a body builder to you, did he?”

“Nope. Just your garden variety office drone, makes a pit stop at the gym once or twice a week to keep his spare tire at bay.”

“He seems to have been meeting people at the gym. Which would be more helpful if he didn’t refer to them by a single initial. And if he wasn’t a salesman.”

“Huge contact list?”

“Bigger than mine.”

She smiled. “If yours is anything like mine, that’s big. Okay”—another slug of coffee. Another blissful shiver—“let’s start going through that list. We’ll—”

My cell phone—well, Jaime’s phone—rang. Some god-awful eighties tune.

Mom winced. “I can change that, right? After three years of listening to it, please tell me I can finally change it.”

“You can. Right after this call. It’s Lucas.”

I answered with, “So how angry is Jaime?”

“Has she called you?”

There was a tightness to his tone that told me this wasn’t a casual question.

“She’s okay, right?” I said quickly. “We checked the guy’s ID, got the passcode, watched him knock on the door. I mean, we didn’t stick around to make sure he went in, but—”

Mom was leaning forward, frowning. I pulled the phone away a bit and turned up the volume so she could hear.

Lucas said, “Jeremy had to speak to Jaime to get her to open up, but she did. The operative was supposed to take her to a hotel and call for further instructions. After an hour, Jeremy grew concerned. I’d told the operative to make sure Jaime got everything she needed, though, so I presumed they were …”

“Shopping.”

“Yes. After another thirty minutes, Jeremy insisted I call our man. Jaime may like to shop, but under the circumstances, she’d only pick up what she needed for a brief hotel stay. So I called. The operative didn’t answer. I left a message. It’s been twenty minutes since.”

Not exactly time to call in the National Guard. I suspected Jeremy was applying pressure, in his quiet but inescapable way.

“Give me the hotel address,” I said. “We can pop by and see … No, you’d have already called. She hasn’t checked in.”

“Correct. Paige is running Jaime’s credit cards now. I’m having the security department pull GPS records for the operative’s vehicle. In the meantime, Jeremy would like you to return to the motel.”

TEN

Lucas had us pick up a rental car. All the paperwork was filled out in the Cortez Corporation name, so I just had to flash ID. I drove. We really didn’t want anyone pulling over my mother and asking for her license.

“Shit,” she whispered as we pulled into the motel lot.

A dark blue Toyota was parked in front of our room. The same dark blue Toyota that the operative had been driving.

Mom was out of the car before I stopped. She left her sword in the trunk and raced inside. The motel room door was unlocked.

I was getting out when the car lurched, the back end rising. It thumped down so hard my teeth rattled. I hit the trunk release before the damned thing ripped through the metal. The sword flew—case and all—through the motel room door.

I tore after it. When I got inside—

Blood. Oh, God, there was so much blood.

The operative lay on his back, arms raised to ward off something. His clothing was shredded, exposed skin mangled and torn, like he’d been attacked by …

I had no idea what he’d been attacked by.

I dropped to look under the bed.

“Already checked,” Mom said. She stood in the middle of the room now, turning slowly.

I ran into the bathroom.

“Checked there, too,” Mom called.

I still looked. There was nowhere else to search. The bathroom was empty, but there were bloody footprints on the floor.

Small sneaker prints.

“Mom …?”

She came in. I pointed at the prints.

“Jaime must have put those sneakers back on,” she said.