Page 51 of Magic Betrayed

He huffed. “Youdon’t. Luckily, you know someone who can rebuild the underlying structures that keep the water where it belongs.”

Meaning himself.

I let out a long, relieved breath. “Thank you, Faris. I’m sorry to keep causing problems for you. I swear I didn’t mean to break anything.”

“You were just trying not to die?”

I shrugged. “If it’s any consolation, I’d prefer to avoid these situations, too.”

Faris grunted again, this time in what sounded like agreement, and indicated Callum with a jerk of his chin. “Shall I remove my nephew?”

My hesitation was just long enough to produce a knowing gleam in my boss’s eyes.

“Just hang tight. We’ll get what’s left of the van onto the flatbed, and then drive you back into the city.”

He started to turn away, then reached into his pocket and tossed me a phone. “Found this on the ground. You can give it to him when he wakes up.”

Then he shut the door, and I relaxed once again, feeling the exhaustion creep back up my limbs and tug at my eyelids. Callum hadn’t been kidding about the toll healing took. Even after a nap, I didn’t feel even close to recovered.

“What time is it?”

My heart rate skyrocketed at the unexpected sound of Callum’s voice—a sleepy rumble that made me want to stroke his hair and soothe him back to sleep.

But I managed to yank my hand away, face flaming with embarrassment, before I betrayed any of the feelings currently rioting in my chest.

“No clue,” I admitted. “Were you just pretending not to be awake?”

“Still asleep,” he mumbled.

I felt my heart crack a little, and admitted to myself that Sleepy Callum was utterly adorable. Weird thing to think about the most powerful shapeshifter in North America, but I wasn’t going to take it back.

“Don’t worry,” I said quietly. “You can keep sleeping. We’ll take you home.”

His whole body shifted closer, as if to reassure himself that I was still there—that we were, indeed, safe—and then he seemed to relax again.

On the floor beside me, Callum’s phone buzzed. I almost ignored it, but then realized that it might be something urgent, so I picked it up to glance at the screen.

There was a text alert.

From Grandma Pearl.

A surge of anger momentarily pushed back my exhaustion, and I glared at the screen for a moment before coming to a decision. Normally, I wouldn’t dream of looking at someone else’s texts, but I needed to know if I was right—if she’d sold information to the mercenary crew.

So—not without a twinge of guilt—I used Callum’s fingerprint to unlock it, then tapped on the messages icon.

There were three texts, and then a slightly blurry photo.

my business is information and all information is for sale

i’m sure you understand

but i feel that a warning might have been more fair

consider this a partial refund

So I was right. And maybe Callum had expected it, but I still seethed with fury. Whatever she’d sent, it couldn’t possibly repay us for the loss of our only lead.

I tapped on the photo. It was a head on picture of the white van, before its destruction. We’d seen similar ones before, at Grandma Pearl’s, with two people sitting in the front.

---