but not so far from now either. You need to get your head straight before that happens.”
I sighed, leaning back against the wall. I didn’t feel the same fear here that I felt in the real world, or in my nightmares. But thinking about the tunnel in Cheyenne still hurt. It hurts when ghosts get inside your head. I’d experienced it before, but never like that.
Magic is like a muscle, though—if you don’t use your strength, it ebbs. I hadn’t been out of practice for all that long, but if I stopped using boundary magic and a moment came when I truly needed it . . . I might not be strong enough.
Goddammit.
“You don’t know what you’re asking me, Sam.”
“Actually, I might be the only one who does.” She shrugged. “Just . . . think about it, okay?” She gave me a crooked smile. “I’m not the only one in favor of you going.”
“What does that—”
I woke up with a start. My bedroom was still dark, so I automatically reached for Quinn. His side of the bed was empty, but when I stretched my arms out, yawning, I dislodged something on the pillow. I sat up and flicked on my bedside lamp.
There was a small gift box on Quinn’s pillow. I picked it up, surprised at the weight, and lifted off the lid. Inside the box was a piece of mahogany obsidian the size of my palm, so beautiful and well-formed that I gasped. “Whoa.”
I picked up the stone, feeling the heft of it. Mahogany obsidian was the crystal that prevented ghosts from getting into my head. This piece was almost twice as big as the chunk of obsidian I already owned, and judging by the weight, I was betting it was higher quality. Someone—probably Lily—had wrapped thin wire into a makeshift cage around the stone so it could be attached to a necklace.
It definitely wasn’t something Quinn could just pick up in the middle of the night. He must have been working on getting it for a while . . . even though I hadn’t talked to him about the tunnel ghosts.
There was a note underneath the crystal, which I picked up. “I was saving this for your birthday. Thought you might want it early,” was written in Quinn’s cramped, blocky handwriting.
I smiled like an idiot. God, he loved me.
Pulling my mother’s bloodstone over my head, I added the obsidian to the leather cord and checked the time. Sam had woken me up fifteen minutes before sunrise. Of course.
The vampires would be tucked into their dens for the night, but they still had their phones. I reached for my cell and called Maven.
Chapter 8
Calhoun’s daytime business manager, a woman named Maya, called an hour after sunrise to say she’d booked me on a flight out of Denver late that afternoon. Calhoun apparently didn’t want to waste any time getting me to Atlanta.
The rest of my morning was spent getting everything ready for an impromptu trip. I did laundry, tidied up the house a little, and sent my family a mass text letting them know I’d be out of town for a few days. Katia immediately responded with an offer to drive me to the airport. It was Friday, and she said she’d already worked enough during the week that she could leave a couple of hours early.
When I had worked out all my logistical arrangements, I spent some time with the herd. My last foster dog, Stitch, had been adopted a few weeks earlier—by Simon’s ex-girlfriend Tracy, of all people—so I spent a couple of hours in the backyard with the regulars, throwing grimy tennis balls and getting muddy paw prints on my jeans. Then it was time to go inside and get cleaned up for the trip.
My 5:30 flight was unpleasant but uneventful. By the time we touched down, it was just after ten o’clock, and the sun had fallen well below the horizon. I’d never been in the Atlanta airport before, but it was easy enough to follow the signs to the shuttle, and from the shuttle to the enormous baggage claim area. A mass of bleary-eyed people tried to shuffle to the exit, and for a moment there the crowd threatened to swallow me up. I had to take a few deep breaths and carefully work my way to the side before I got panicky.
I was so distracted by the need for space that I almost missed the tasteful placard with Ms. Luther written in curly