Chapter 42 Leo
The wind tore across my shoulders as I leaned harder into the turn, throttle twisted wide open. The city blurred past in streaks of neon and shadows. My left hand gripped the phone like it was part of me, thumb tapping redial again. And again. And again.
Straight to voicemail.
No delay. No ring. Just silence.
“Come on, come on…” My voice disappeared into the roar of the engine.
I cut down a narrow back alley, barely avoiding a dumpster that jutted into the lane. Another redial. Still nothing. Her number was either blocked, or the phone was off, or—
I didn’t finish the thought.
The light ahead flashed red. I should have braked. I didn’t. My fingers twitched instead, metal around me humming.
A minivan inched through the intersection. I skimmed past its bumper with less than half a foot to spare, heard the driver scream something through the window. I didn’t turn. Couldn’t.
The sirens caught up a block later.
Blue and red strobes flickered in my mirrors. A cruiser behind me, trying to gain ground. I barely heard the loudspeaker over the wind.
I gritted my teeth and reached.
Steel. Rubber. Pressure.
With a flick of two fingers, the police car’s rims folded inward like crushed paper. The tires popped in perfect synchrony. The vehicle skidded sideways into a hydrant. A geyser shot up behind me as I blew past, already clearing the next intersection.
The Lockwood house was three turns away.
Two.
One.
I killed the engine before I even rolled into the driveway. It coasted the last few feet as I jumped off, boots hitting the pavement hard. My breath steamed in the night air, fists clenched tight at my sides.
The music was too loud.
Thudding bass that vibrated through the windows. Lights pulsing behind the curtains. Voices laughing. The kind of sound you get from a party running too long, too late.
But when I pushed open the door, the house didn’t look like a house anymore.
It was a ballroom.
Not metaphorically. Literally.
High archways. Floating crystal chandeliers. Polished marble floors that hadn’t existed twelve hours ago. Music played from nowhere, and candlelight reflected in a hundred ornate mirrors that shimmered along the walls.
Not a single person in here looked surprised.
Illusion magic. High-level. Stable.
Someone powerful was bending reality, and they were doing it casually. But I didn’t stop to admire the work. I shoved past a couple locked in some glamoured slow dance, eyes sweeping the room for her face.
Nothing.
I moved through the crowd, pushing deeper toward the staircase and into the center of the illusion. That’s where I found her—Anna Winters. Leaning back against the wall with a red cup in hand, hair pulled up, boots scuffed.
I stepped directly into her space.
“Where’s Kristen?” I asked, low but sharp.
She blinked, confused. “Do I—sorry, do I know you?”
I didn’t answer. My hand closed around her forearm. Not hard, but firm.
“Where is she?” I said again.
Anna’s expression shifted. First startled, then annoyed. “I don’t know. Last I saw she was on the floor somewhere. With people.”
“With who?”
She hesitated. “I don’t know.”
I let her go. She pulled her arm back fast, rubbing her wrist.
I didn’t waste time.
The closest speaker was hanging above the entryway. I lifted my hand, fingers curled slightly. The metal casing around the subwoofer ruptured with a sharp pop. Sound died instantly.
All around the room, other speakers failed one by one. The music stuttered, then collapsed into silence.
Gasps and voices rose.
“What the hell—”
“Who is that—”
I stepped forward into the center of the room and raised my voice.
“I’m only going to say this once more.” My tone echoed. Carved the air open. “Where is Kristen Lockwood?”
The entire party froze.
A beat of silence.
Then a boy stepped forward. Nineteen, maybe twenty. Nervous. Tall and skinny, face already flushed from alcohol or fear or both. He held up a hand like I might strike him.
“I saw her,” he said. “She went down the hall. With Caleb. I think.”
“Where?” My voice was quiet now. Deadly quiet.
He turned, pointed toward the hallway. A single door at the end.
I was already moving.
I passed through the illusion’s edges. The gold walls faded into drywall. The light flickered back to cheap bulbs. Hardwood replaced marble beneath my boots. The transformation cracked in layers, losing polish the farther I walked.
That door. Half-closed.
I lifted my hand. The doorknob shattered with a flick. The door swung open hard, crashing against the wall.
And the room—
Empty.
My body locked for a second. Scanning.
Bed unmade. Kristen’s clothes folded in a pile: top, jeans, bra. Sneakers beside the bed. Phone missing.
The window was wide open. Curtains moved gently with the wind.
I stepped inside, senses stretching outward. Every nerve strained.
Anna ran in seconds later, breath shallow, hair sticking to her temples like she’d sprinted from the other end of the house. Her eyes swept the room once, twice—and landed on the pile of clothes at the foot of the bed. The open window. The swaying curtain. The silence.
She froze.
“Oh god,” she whispered, voice cracking. “What—what happened?”
Her hands hovered uselessly in the air, like she didn’t know what to touch, what to do. She took one shaky step toward the bed and then stopped again.
I stepped forward slowly.
“I need you to think really hard about this,” I said, voice low and level.
“What do you know about Caleb Sutton?”