“Your turn. What are you involved with?”
Tiredness hit her like a sledgehammer. These last twenty-four hours had been hell, and she wasn’t out of the woods yet. She wanted to sleep and process, but Michael wouldn’t let this go, not until he knew everything. “How did you know, and don’t tell me lingerie girl – you pieced that together after the fact.”
His eyes narrowed and became cop’s eyes, questioning and searching out the truth. “A woman named Fallon came to visit me. She said you would recognize her name.”
If she lived a thousand years, Larissa was pretty sure she’d never forget Fallon. “What did she have to say?”
“She didn’t give me any details. She said she had more information about the attacks for you and your guardian, and gave me directions of where to bring you tonight if you wanted to meet.” The pacing started again. “Who does she mean, guardian? The man in your apartment?”
“Yes, he’s been protecting me.”
“And what have you needed protection from?”
She didn’t want to say it. She didn’t want Michael to become part of this nightmare. But he had told his secrets, and that was the deal. “Necromancers.”
Michael’s knees buckled before he righted himself. “Fuck no, fuck no…Necromancers, Ris? You don’t know what they can do, the horrors I’ve seen…” He grabbed her hand, pulling her closer. “You’re sure?”
His terror was bringing her own back, batting down walls she’d been using to keep it contained. She had to get away or she would be curled up on the floor. She pulled her hand from his, wiping it over her face as she nodded, the only answer he was going to receive.
He stayed still for several moments, looking lost, his hands clenching at his sides. A word floated through the air. “Why?”
She would give anything to fully know the answer to that question. “They’re going to use me to somehow rip the Human Realm and the Magic Realm apart and return the Magic Realm back to how it was before.”
If Michael was unhappily stunned at the prior mention of necromancers, he was poleaxed at this latest revelation. “Impossible,” he whispered, the slice of sound low and haunted.
She said nothing and let him come to terms with this newest revelation in his own time. When he came out of his stupor, his eyes were a laser focus on her. “This Fallon, she’s from the Guild, isn’t she? Fuck, I should have known.”
He didn’t sound happy about this new bit of knowledge. “You know of the Guild?”
“Not because I want to. I’ve been very happy that I haven’t had any run-ins with them this far in life, though I guess that’s changing now.”
“What did you think of her?”
He didn’t hesitate. “That she’s scary as hell and you’d be ten shades of stupid to mess with her.” He took a few moments then, and she saw protective older brother fade to be replaced by cool cop logic. “That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t meet up with her and see if you can learn something, as long as you have your back-up guardian – who, by the way, you haven’t fully explained yet.”
“I can’t explain him.”
Michael narrowed his eyes at her. “Larissa…”
She held up a finger in warning. “Don’t take that tone with me. I can tell you my secrets, but I won’t betray those who have been protecting me all this time. I would be dead several times over if it wasn’t for the man you saw. He’s been by my side throughout all of this.”
Michael’s hands slipped into the back pockets of his jeans. “I’m sorry you didn’t feel like you could have come to me, to the family.”
“It’s not that I couldn’t, it’s that I wouldn’t. Protection, right? If something had happened to any of you because of me…it was easier to risk myself alone.”
He came over and enveloped her in a giant hug, squeezing her so hard she was lifted a few inches off the ground. “Never again. No matter what, you come to us.”
“No.” She pushed away from him. “I still don’t want Dad to know, and I have others to protect me, people more qualified than Dad or the other bros.”
She could see the war behind his eyes at that statement, but after long moments he nodded. “Yeah. I hear you.”
“Thanks.”
He looked around the room, taking in the family photographs that lined her walls. “So what now, Miss Hear-Me-Roar?”
She smacked his arm, a giggle escaping. Gods, it felt good to laugh again, even such a small sound. “I need to see Fallon. It’s time we all laid our cards face up, because cloak-and-dagger is not my thing, and if the Guild can help, I want to meet with them.” Jason’s face flashed before her, the weird intense look in his eyes as disturbing in memory as it was in person. “This might be affecting people close to me. It needs to end, no matter how unsure I am about my possible allies.”