“You knew. You knew, and you didn’t say a word to me.” Lily grabbed onto her temper and yanked it back. It was not good technique to yell at a witness…even when that witness was your own stupid, thinks-she’s-at-the-center-of-the-world little sister who…deep breath, she told herself. “What do you know about Robert Friar?” Beth had to know some of it. The news had been full of the story for a week.
“You’re pissed.”
“Yes. Yes, I am.”
“I knew you’d react like this! I knew it! That’s why I didn’t tell you about Sean, because you’d leap to all kinds of conclusions before you even met him!”
Lily leaned forward. “Did you stop to think for even one moment that this might be about more than your feelings? That maybe, just maybe, I might have more on my mind where Friar is concerned than interfering in your—oh, but it isn’t a romance, is it? Your friendship with the brother of a man who tried to kill thousands, including Toby, and—”
A warm hand landed on her shoulder. “Lily.” Rule squeezed gently. “May I take this for now?”
Sure. Yes. Because if she said another word, she was going to speak it while shaking Beth so hard whatever passed for brains in her sister’s head spilled out.
Rule took her silence for assent. “Beth, Robert Friar is the man who took me and Cullen and several others captive. He attempted to set explosives off at Clanhome, which would have killed Toby and many others in my clan.”
Beth nodded seriously. “I heard about all that, of course—on the TV, since Lily refused to discuss it, but it was all over the news. Friar was with that elf, right? I can’t think of the elf guy’s name, but they were killed when the elf did some kind of big magic and brought the mountain down on them. You and Lily and Cullen escaped in the nick of time with—was it Benedict?”
“And a few others, yes.”
“That’s horrible, it’s really, deeply horrible, but”—she gave Lily a dirty look—“it had nothing to do with Sean.”
“It wouldn’t, perhaps,” Rule said, “except that we don’t think Robert Friar died.”
“What? But that—the news said—Sean thinks his brother is dead!” She bounced to her feet to glare at Lily. “You let him think his brother was dead!”
Lily kept her voice steady. “We have no concrete evidence that he survived, but no body was found, and we do know…have you heard of patterning?”
Beth shook her head impatiently. “I haven’t, and what does that have to do with Sean?”
“Patterning is the ability to manipulate possibilities. It’s a rare Gift and usually shows up in its weak form, but it’s known in some circles as the Gift of the gods. A really strong patterner can make even highly unlikely events occur—such as surviving the collapse of a mountain.”
Beth followed her meaning well enough. “Except that Sean’s brother wasn’t Gifted.”
“He didn’t start out that way, but Robert Friar is now a listener and a patterner. He received his second Gift just before the node imploded and brought down the cave system.”
“No one can give someone else a Gift.”
“Old Ones do the damnedest things,” Lily said dryly.
Beth opened her mouth. Closed it. After a moment she said quietly, “I think I need to hear a lot more than I have about what happened.”
“I think maybe you do.” Lily looked at Rule, a frown pleating her forehead. “I know you don’t like to split up.”
“I don’t, no. Tony can wait a little longer. You’re worried about leaving your sister alone.” He raised one brow slightly.
She knew what he was asking. And he was right, dammit. She couldn’t make any sense of Sean Friar’s apparent disappearance, but just because she couldn’t see what Friar was up to didn’t mean he wasn’t knee-deep in whatever was happening here. He had to be. Her sister hadn’t just happened to meet Friar’s brother, not without a push from someone who could manipulate possibilities.
Of course, Beth wasn’t entirely alone and hadn’t been since she moved here. The time had come for her to meet Murray and the others who’d been watching over her. Guarding her from a distance wasn’t a good option anymore.
Lily sighed, sure she knew how her sister was going to take that news.
TWENTY-ONE
“THAT didn’t go well,” she said, clicking her seat belt in place.
“It could have been worse.”
“I suppose.” It had helped some that it was so abundantly obvious that the guards Rule had assigned to Beth hadn’t been spying on her, reporting on her. If they had, Rule would have known about Sean Friar months ago.
Rule squeezed her hand. “At least she’s letting Murray stay in the apartment with her for now.”
“Not because she sees the need. Murray gave her puppy dog eyes, and she caved.” Lily hadn’t met Murray before, so he’d been almost as much of a surprise to her as he was to Beth, though for different reasons. She had this theory that lupi were genetically incapable of ugly. It made sense—the continuation of their species depended on them charming, seducing, and otherwise trying to impregnate as many women as possible.
Murray turned out to be the exception. Sort of. He was short and squat and looked like he’d grabbed his features at random from the bargain bin, yet somehow he was five feet, five inches of adorable. Maybe it was the so-ugly-they’re-cute deal some creatures had going, like that breed of dog that seemed to be made entirely out of wrinkles.
“Whatever works.”
“I guess.” Bergman’s agent had arrived just as they were leaving—Richard Snow, a studious-looking fellow with a competent manner. Cullen was already gone by then; he’d left with Marcus and Steve to check out Sean Friar’s house. Well, Marcus would check out the house. Cullen would let Marcus in, then wait outside with Steve, who would be keeping an eye out for trouble.
Lily drummed her fingers on her thigh. Nothing was adding up. Rule’s brother’s partner was missing, held hostage. Friar seemed to be involved. Lily’s sister’s not-a-boyfriend—who was also Friar’s brother—was missing. Fate unknown.
That had to be more than coincidence. Didn’t it?
“I see three possibilities,” she said abruptly. “One, Sean is genuinely missing—dead, injured, or held hostage by person or persons unknown for reasons unknown. Two, he’s dancing to his brother’s tune, and his absence is part of some plot. Three, he isn’t Mr. Reliability the way Beth thinks. He fell off the wagon and is on a binge or sleeping one off.”
“Alcoholism is an insidious disease,” Rule agreed in the mild way that meant he didn’t really agree. “But Beth has good people instincts.”
“She’s only known him for three months.”
Rule reached for her hand. “It didn’t take us three months.”
“We were different.” Oh, that sounded lame. “We had the mate bond.”
“Mmm. That did force us to pay attention. Perhaps Beth doesn’t need as much of a prod as we did.”
That made her grin in spite of herself. “The women in my family are pretty stubborn. The question is, where does Beth have her stubbornness dial turned? If it’s set to ‘Sean is my soul mate,’ she’d miss seeing all the signs that he isn’t.”
“How much of your attitude is professional skepticism, do you think? And how much is because you don’t want your sister involved in any way with Robert Friar’s brother?”
“I have no idea. But it’s way too much of a coincidence for Beth even to meet Friar’s brother, much less fall for him.”
“Friar is a patterner with too much power. He wouldn’t have needed his brother’s active cooperation to bring about a meeting.”