“May I help you?” she asked.
I leaned down and put my hand on the edge of her desk, which hurt, but also got me a clear shot at eye contact, something essential for Influencing. “I hope you’re having a wonderful day.” I smiled and mentally intoned a boost of magic into my words.
Her eyes were light brown and lined with green makeup that looked really nice on her. She was pretty, innocent-looking, and with that hint of Influence behind my words, she already resembled a deer caught in a floodlight. No wonder why Dad hired her. He always picked the ones who were easy to bamboozle.
“I’d like to see Mr. Daniel Beckstrom now,” I said. “Please show me in.”
“Of course. This way.” She gave me a giddy smile and practically skipped down the hallway—no easy feat in heels on carpet—eager to please under the sway of Influence.
Hells. How could I go months resisting the lure of using Influence, and as soon as I was in the same building with my father, it was the first thing I did? I swore and tried to do some damage control.
“Are you sure he has time?” I asked. “I could wait to see him.”
“Oh, no. Of course he has time for you.” She glanced over her shoulder and nodded, and I worried that she might run into a wall. “This is it.” She looked forward again, and managed not to hit her head on the wide, dark wood door of my dad’s office. She held the door open for me and smiled like I was a rock star on tour.
“Thanks,” I said.
She practically gleamed.
I stepped into my dad’s office.
Time, seven years, to be exact, can change a lot of things. The furniture, all steel, wrought iron, and smoked glass, had been upgraded, maybe the carpet had too, but there was still an acre of black marble desk spread in front of the panoramic view of the city, including the river and mountain, when it wasn’t raining so hard. And standing behind that desk, immaculate in a suit that cost more than the building I lived in, was my dad.
My height or better, my dark-hair, pale-skin looks or better, he held a cup of coffee in one hand and seemed genuinely startled to see me walking toward him. I was going to play that advantage for as long as I had it because the man hadn’t gotten to the top of the magic harvest and refinery technology business thinking slow on his feet.
“Allison,” he breathed.
“You’re killing a five-year-old kid in North Portland with an Offload the size of a small city. If you don’t pay for a doctor to mitigate a Disbursement spell, set a Siphon, and everything else, including hospital stay, rehab, and mental and emotional damage for the boy, then his family is going to drag you through court and publicly expose Beckstrom Enterprises’ reckless Offloading practices. My testimony will be in their favor.”
He blinked a couple times, then looked away from my face to the rest of me, slowly taking in my cheap clothes and bruised hands. The corner of his lips tightened like he’d just bitten into something sour.
I’d seen that look on his face ever since I turned nine and told him I wanted to play jazz tambourine when I grew up.
“What happened to her?” he asked someone behind me. I looked back, and who should stroll in through the door but my old buddy Zayvion.
“She Hounded a hit and forgot to set a Disbursement spell,” he said.
I put two and two together and shook my head in disgust. “You bastard. You work for my father?”
“One contract.” He held up his hands like maybe I was going to hit him. He had good instincts. “I did one contract for him.”
“For what? To spy on Mama?”
“To look out for you, Allison,” my dad said.
Oh.
What girl doesn’t want to hear those words? What girl doesn’t want to believe her daddy is always going to be there to look after her and keep her safe?
But I could taste the honey-sweetness of magic and Influence behind his words, could smell the bitter tang of something that was not sincerity in his tone. He wanted me to believe him. Too much.
“Really,” I said.
“I heard you had been Hounding up on the north side of town,” he said. “There have been so many cases of illegal Offloads over there, I was worried you’d get hurt.”
He sounded sincere. He looked sincere. This, from the man who had manipulated and Influenced every choice I’d ever made in my life. For all I knew, a man who still believed he could continue doing so.
“Bullshit,” I said. “Save it for the court, Mr. Beckstrom. I’ll see you there.” I intended to spin around and exit dramatically, but I hurt too much. Even the bottoms of my feet were swollen. So I settled for a long, dignified stroll toward the door.
“Allison,” my dad said gently. “It is the truth, even if you are too stubborn to believe me. It has been a very long time since you’ve seen how things work around here. Laws have been passed—you know that. There are more checks and balances and outside watchdogs Hounding the details of business and magic transactions than there ever were before. We use magic sparingly at this company—at all levels—and Proxy the Offload through approved channels, such as the penitentiaries and prisons.”
I wasn’t buying it. I just couldn’t fit the idea of a kinder, gentler man inside the skin my father owned. I kept walking.
“If it would help you to believe what I’m saying,” he said, “you have my permission to draw Truth from me.”
That sort of magic involved blood, and drawing Truth, in particular, only worked between people who carried the same bloodline. I hated blood magic. Then again, I felt a powerful need to stab somebody right about now, and a girl shouldn’t turn her back on opportunity.
“Fine.” I walked back to his desk and held my palm out for a needle. I hoped he wouldn’t have one on him because the ornate letter opener on his desk looked more my speed. He must have caught some hint of that in my gaze. He raised one eyebrow and pulled a very thin, very gold straight pin out of his lapel and dropped it onto my hand.
I held it with my fingers and intoned the mantra for Truth. I placed my other hand on the desk. The desk frame was iron and carved with the patterns that allowed access to the magic held in the building’s storage network. I intoned a mantra to call the magic up through his desk and into my hand, and felt the electric tingle of magic against my palm. I pricked my middle finger, wove a glyph in the air with my bleeding finger, careful not to let the blood fall, and said a few more words. Then I took hold of my dad’s hand and pricked his finger. He leaned across his desk and so did I. We were both tall enough that we could place our fingers together, palm to palm, blood to blood.
This was the closest to him I’d been in the last fifteen years. It was the longest he’d actually touched me too. He smelled of wintergreen and something musky and pleasant, like leather. The scent of him triggered memories and feelings from a time when I was young enough and stupid enough to believe he was a good person. A time when I thought he was my hero.
“Did you, or your company, Offload into North Portland or onto a child during the last six months?” I asked.
“No.” His gaze held mine, and that word vibrated in my chest as if I were the one who had spoken it. He was telling the truth as he believed it.
“I don’t want to believe you,” I said.
He nodded, feeling my truth as I had felt his.
“I’m sorry, Allie.” His regret, of things between us, things neither of us could find a way to speak of, filtered back through our blood. Other memories stirred within me. Memories of his infrequent and surprisingly deep laughter, of his hand briefly touching my forehead when I was sick, of the time he made pancakes on Sunday morning.
I pulled my hand away from his. The spell broke. That was as much truth as I could stomach.
I stuck my bleeding finger in my mouth and felt like I’d just lost a game of chicken.
My father pulled a soft white handkerchief out of his suit jacket. He offered it to me. I shook my head. There was no way I was going to leave any more of my blood with him. Truth was the mildest of the blood magics.