For Alana Creed, blessed sleep never went uninterrupted.

Jolted upright by the blare of her phone, she fumbled around in the darkness, full of confusion. Far across the room the microwave’s digital readout indicated it was three, or so she believed through the squint of her eyes. So why in the hell was someone calling her now?

“What?” She hissed into the receiver the moment she flung it to her ear. Her head was pounding, and her tongue felt like sandpaper, so the last thing in the worlds she wanted was to be on the phone.

“You’re needed downtown immediately,” Mason demanded, this time without his usual introduction. “There was an attack on the southern mage headquarters.” Okay, that was much worse than a phone call. “It was definitely a magic-created bomb. Get down there as fast as you can.”

“Alright,” she groaned with a tangled shove of her fingers into her hair. Tossing the phone down with a thud, she tried to pull her hand free in a sweeping tug of hair, but only entangled herself further into the mess.

So much for sleeping in and taking time getting ready.

Instead, she hurriedly yanked on a pair of pants before rushing into the bathroom in a frantic search for whatever could be completed quickly. Spotting Taylor’s brush on the counter, she snatched it up and winced as she yanked it through her brightly-colored hair. Various strands clung to the bristles as she tossed it haphazardly back on the counter.

Taylor wouldn’t mind.

Stepping out of the bathroom door, she danced around the mess that had still yet to be fully cleaned up. Not that she’d entirely been any help in it. Though, sleep hadn’t really been a thing lately, either.

Patting at her pants pockets in search of her keys, the moment her palms hit the clump of metal, she knew she was set. Out the door she raced, and back into her car for another trip across the damn city. Luckily, there wasn’t much traffic at the tree in the morning.

It wasn’t difficult to find the location of the attack, given the wail of sirens and bright flash of lights atop the responding mundane firetrucks and police cars.

“Great.” That most likely meant a shitstorm of a night. Slamming the steering wheel of her parked car, Alana jumped out on the side of the mage’s building furthest from the response vehicles.

Still, there were people everywhere.

Morbid curiosity drew people from their nearby homes and apartments in droves to witness for themselves the aftermath of an explosion. The reactions were fairly normal, but it didn’t irritate Alana any less as she navigated her way around the gawking onlookers.

Luckily, a familiar face popped up near to the building.

“Nolan!”

Immediately, he spun toward the call of her voice and reached out to pull her through the crowd with a coil of fingers around her upper arm. It was a grip he didn’t loosen, not even after they crept their way into the buildings nearest untouched entrance.

“We need to hurry,” he said with great urgency before finally his hand fell away, “the cops are here, but haven’t cleared this area yet.”

“Fucking great,” Alana mumbled beneath her breath. Cops, detectives, Taylor… none of that was anything she wanted to tangle with. Not today. “Okay, what are we dealing with? Mason didn’t give me much to go on.”

“Well, we don’t have much to go on right now, either. The magic definitely seems to be from a warlock, though.”

Alana couldn’t have frowned harder had she tried. “Get me near-” She had no need for him to explain to her precisely where the bomb had gone off. Ahead, the corridor they’d been walking down simply ceased to exist. Where walls and floors had been, jagged rubble remained. The lights and call of sirens grew louder, as the building could no longer block the noise.

The essence of the magic used also lingered.

It seemed to creep beneath her skin, clinging there with a dark ferocity that couldn’t be denied. A shiver rippled down the length of her spine, drawing a single one of Nolan’s brows to a questionable rise.

“Are you alright?”

“Yeah,” she argued with a worried brow of her own, “I’m fine. Has anyone taken samples already?” It would be the only way to test with magic of their own to see if they could decipher who’d done it, to eventually find out the why.

“A few, though I’m not sure on the validity of it. The blast created so much debris, it’s tough to find a good spot for it.”

“Mm.” She could tell as much, even with it sifting across the open air. Unfortunately, it wasn’t as easy as swinging a bottle around to fill it with that same air. “Okay, let’s get out of here, there’s not much left to… see.”

They retraced their steps, back out of the building and to the back of the crowd that wanted so much to see what she just had.

“You’ll be at the meeting later this week, right?” Nolan asked in a reminder that left her lips falling into a frown.

“Yeah, I’ll be there.”

“Wow, don’t look so excited to get the chance to see me again,” he purred in a slight tease before heading back toward the building. “I’ve got more to check out. Feel free to come along if you want.”

“You know, exploded buildings at three AM aren’t really my thing, but thanks.”

Off he traipsed, leaving her to stare at the building with a great bit of unease. Warlock or not, why would someone make the explosion happen in the middle of the night? There would be less chance of casualties… unless they weren’t looking to try and kill at all.

“Lana?”

Her head snapped up from her reverie, bringing her wide-eyed focus square upon her sister. “Taylor?” She questioned with just as much confusion, until slowly the truth came into focus.

Taylor was a detective, too. They may have been two sides of a coin, but they still reflected much of the same path, even if one did include magic, warlocks, and timejumping.

“What are you doing here?” Taylor demanded with a look of utter confusion.

“Just… wrong place, wrong time, I guess.” It wasn’t as if she could tell her the truth, a truth that would land her in a straitjacket before the sun came up.

“You really shouldn’t be here.”

Alana’s gaze drifted noticeably around the crowd near to them. “And what about all of them?”

Her sister frowned heavily, and the sight of it made Alana’s heart ache. She was standing in the middle of so much more than just an exploding bomb, and there was no way she could ever make her understand.

“Look, fine,” Alana defended quickly with a raise of her hands, “I’m going.” Before Taylor could counter otherwise, she walked off down the street toward her car, “I hope you get some sleep later!”

The din of the investigation behind her quieted as she took to the next corner. Across her eyes her hand rubbed, in an effort to ease the ache from so little sleep. That very hand was wrenched away, by a rugged pull that had her opposite hand swinging in a tightly-curled fist.

It slammed, directly into the palm of Jaxon Stol, and rather than letting her jump back, his fingers curled in a hold around her fist. “You do have a way of getting yourself into trouble often, don’t you?”

She wanted to be angry, should’ve been angry, but it was so difficult when all she could think about was the strength in his hands and the heat that rolled off of his skin. “Call it a life skill,” she uttered before her brow wrinkled in question. “Are you responsible for the bomb?”

“No,” he scoffed through a breathy laugh, “if I wanted Nolan dead, he’d be dead.”

“Oh, yeah?” She pulled her hand free of his grip and took a step forward, pinning him between her and the wall at his back, “would that be because he’s a mage and heads Magique, or because he shows an interest in me?”

His eyes settled squarely on her, while the curvature of his lips pulled into a smug smirk. It was sexy as hell. “Can I say both?”

Turned on or not, Alana still rolled her eyes while taking a step back. “Okay, what are you here for, then?”

“I need your help.”

Laughter burst from her lips and was stifled only by the sudden raise of her hand. “You can’t be serious.”

“Okay, not entirely. It’s… more of an opportunity. Trust me, you’ll want to be in on this one.”