Ritual Magic

linger in the hinge between man and wolf . . . because you couldn’t bloody
think
. When you were neither one nor the other, neither way of thinking worked right.
    “What happened?” Lily repeated. “I saw this officer draw his weapon and aim where there was no visible threat.”
    Rule closed his eyes and breathed slowly. Deeply. He focused on the sound of his mate’s voice, using it to pull himself back.
    “I drew my weapon and shouted for him to stop. Officer Crown then shot Dr. Two Horses. He pivoted to aim at this end of the parking lot. Not at me. Maybe at you, maybe Karonski, maybe someone near you. I don’t know. I shot him.” Lily delivered all of that flatly, but Rule heard the shakes trying to squirm out from beneath the iron lid she’d clamped down over her feelings. “He is contaminated. It’s the same magic I felt on the body, and it’s probably why he shot Nettie, and it can transfer to anyone but me who touches him.”
    * * *
    T HE surgical waiting room was crowded. An old man sat across from Rule with what seemed to be his entire family—five adults and two teens. Two young women kept each other company. A middle-aged woman had brought her knitting. A jittery young man kept getting up to pace.
    Rule wanted them all to go away.
    Twice he’d had to work off tension by heading to the stairwell to run up and down the stairs. His guards had gone with him. They were in the hall outside the waiting room now. Some of them were, that is. He’d sent Andy back to the guard barracks.
    Andy had been assigned to Nettie. He hadn’t seen the threat. No one had except Lily, who’d been tipped off by a saint and a dead man, but when Lily called out, Andy had frozen for that first, critical second. He’d been as useless as the other three guards, but those three had been following instructions to stick with Rule.
    Scott’s instructions, but Rule could have overruled Scott. Why hadn’t he overruled Scott?
    Rule leaned forward and scrubbed his face with both hands. “They had to shave a lot of hair off. She’ll wake up halfway bald. She’s going to hate that.”
    “She was a bald baby,” Benedict said. Like Rule, he kept his voice low so the humans around them wouldn’t hear. “Bald and red-faced, with great lungs. The midwife didn’t have to spank her. She started screaming all on her own.” His mouth quirked up a fraction. “She still does, when necessary. Just doesn’t dial up the volume as high.”
    Benedict sat on Rule’s left. Arjenie sat on Benedict’s left. Arjenie Fox was pale, skinny, and freckled, with extravagant hair—red, long, and curly. She was a devout Wiccan, a near genius, and Benedict’s Chosen. Rule was damn glad his brother’s mate was here. He tried not to think about how much he wished his mate was here, too. Lily’s duty lay elsewhere for now.
    “That sounds like Nettie,” Arjenie said. “She’ll grumble about her hair, I’m sure. But maybe she already knows. Didn’t you say she woke up in the ER?”
    “So they told me.” He hadn’t gotten here in time to see her. They’d taken her to surgery so quickly . . . “She was conscious long enough to insist on Dr. Sengupta for her surgeon, anyway.”
    Arjenie nodded. “I looked him up. He’s a thoracic surgeon. Young, but with excellent credentials. Graduated at the top of his class from Harvard Medical School and served his residency at the Good Samaritan in L.A.”
    “What time did you say they took her into surgery?” Benedict asked.
    This was the third time he’d asked that. Benedict looked normal. He sounded normal. He wasn’t. “One forty.”
    “Over three hours, then. Nearly four. Should it take this long?”
    “Yes, it should,” Arjenie told him firmly. “The chest is crowded. Repairing damage there is painstaking work. You don’t want them to rush.”
    “No.” Benedict lapsed back into silence.
    Benedict and Arjenie had reached St. Margaret’s shortly after Rule did. Nettie had already been in surgery by then. After Rule passed on what little the doctors had told him, Benedict had been silent for a long moment, then said, “We shouldn’t both be here.”
    “I know,” Rule had said. Rule was heir to Nokolai; Benedict was the only other possible heir. Friar would love to take them both out. Benedict had brought additional guards, but having them both exposed was an unacceptable risk. “I’m staying anyway.”
    “Good.” Benedict had sat down. “Tell me what happened.