[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
.“I do not like this sensation of waiting for others to address a concern.I prefer to take action.”“Yeah, I kinda had that figured out.I’m not wild about the helpless shtick, either, but right now I’m not sure what else we can do.” Spar growled something under his breath and slung his leg over the bike.She shot him a look.“Getting grumpy about it isn’t going to help, you know.”He opened his mouth to retort, but shut it to glare at her hip.Ella Fitzgerald’s “Oh, Lady Be Good” played from her jeans pocket.Digging out her cell phone, she checked the screen out of habit.She already recognized her friend’s ringtone.“What’s up?” she answered.“I.Have got.News!”Fil’s heart sped up as she caught on to Ella’s excitement.“Oh, my God.Please tell me you talked to the Warden and he’s alive and an expert at removing demonic curses.”“No, sheesh, Fil.Now anything I have to say is just going to disappoint you.Did you really have to set the bar that high?”She sighed.“Just tell me it’s something more significant than finding that perfect pair of nude pumps you’ve been searching for.”“I have an address.”“For a shoe store?”“For the last known location of Jeffrey Michael Onslow, antiques dealer and member of the Guild of Wardens.”Fil nearly dropped the phone.“Why the hell aren’t you calling me from his living room?”“Because,” Ella said with exaggerated patience, “I just got my hot little hands on the info like twenty-seven seconds ago.”“That’s no—”“And,” she continued, “because the address is in Ottawa.”“That’s only a couple hours’ drive from here.”“I know.That’s why I just texted it to you.”“You’re the best.”Fil ended the call and unstrapped her helmet and spare from the back of the bike.“Put that on.” She handed the extra to Spar.“We’re going for a ride.”* * *She broke every speed limit in Canada on the way to Ottawa.As the kilometers flew by them, Spar’s warm presence behind her only urged her on.He hoped for a cure as desperately as she did.The GPS function on her phone had her slowing off the highway east of Ottawa city.The signs reported their location in Clarence-Rockland, then Rockland itself as Fil began to navigate the local roads.By the time the directions brought her to the edges of the town and sent her turning down a rural lane, it was the middle of the afternoon.Her heart pounded in her chest, and her hands had begun to sweat around the grips on the handlebars.A long drive brought them to what looked to have once been a farmhouse set before the remains of a small apple orchard.The white clapboards gleamed in the sunshine, with crisp green trim edging the windows and picked out on the gingerbread detailing of the eaves.It looked like the kind of home an antiques dealer would live in, and she could practically picture the interior crowded with Victorian settees and Arts and Crafts dining tables.Fil cut the engine and sat back on the bike for a moment just taking stock.She was having a hard time at the moment distinguishing the voice of her fears from that of her intuition, but her feeling just then couldn’t really be called positive.Spar swung off the bike and glanced down at her.“What is the matter?”She nodded to the house.“I don’t think anyone’s home.”“Let’s go see.”Fil took the hand he held out and followed him up the wide front porch to knock on the wood-framed screen door.When no one answered after a minute or two, she pulled it open and plied the brass knocker on the inner door.Still, no one answered.Before she could stop him, Spar reached out and turned the knob to find the door unlocked.He pushed it open and stepped inside while Fil dug her heels in at the threshold and yanked at the back of his shirt.“You can’t just walk into someone else’s house,” she hissed.“No one is home! We could get in trouble for this!”“Who will give us trouble? There is no one here,” he reasoned as he stepped through the foyer.“The police, as soon as one of his neighbors gives them a call!”He shrugged and passed through an open doorway.Behind him Fil groaned and squeezed her eyes shut.“The last time I committed breaking and entering, it did not go well for me.Please, please do not let this end up the same way.I can only carry so many demon marks at one time
[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]