Jackson swore and thrust a hand through his hair. “I thought the damn fool had more sense than that.”

“Obviously not.” My tone was grim. “You want to go out and look for him?”

Jackson hesitated, then shook his head. “He could be anywhere. We need to rest and recuperate, before anyone else flings shit our way.”

I raised an eyebrow. “Rest, huh? That’s not what you were talking about a few minutes ago.”

He shucked off his jacket, then began undoing his shirt as he strode toward me. “No, it wasn’t. And right now I’m thinking shower, sex in the shower, bed, some more sex, and then sleep. How does that sound?”

“How about we reverse the last two? I really do need to sleep.”

He sighed. “The lady has no stamina.”

“Not right now she hasn’t.”

He laughed and gathered me in his arms, kissing me soundly. “Shall we go get wet?”

“Let’s.”

We did. And when we finally slept, I did so with a smile on my lips.

“I’ve Googled Wirraway,” Jackson said from the living room. “It appears it’s a street in Port Melbourne.”

I pulled my sweater over my still-wet hair, then tugged it down as I headed out of the bedroom. Jackson had obviously made use of the room service menu, because the smell of warm toast and bacon teased my nostrils, and my stomach rumbled a reminder it hadn’t eaten any food in a while.

Jackson had already tucked into his bacon and eggs, and he was currently intent on demolishing a six-stack of toast in between studying the search results on the laptop.

“Big street or small?” I sat down, took the cover off my bacon and eggs, and began eating.

“It’s on the smaller side, but it’s an industrial area, so there’re lots of warehouses.” He contemplated the screen for a moment. “I guess we could do a drive-by and see what we can find. We might get lucky and spot someone we know.”

“Hopefully that someone won’t be Man-Mountain One or Two.”

He grinned. “Oh, I don’t know—I wouldn’t mind the chance to knock out Hunt’s remaining teeth.”

“Be careful what you wish for,” I said, waving a fork filled with bacon at him. “Next time it just might be third time unlucky.”

“For them.” He grabbed another piece of toast and slathered Vegemite on it. I shuddered. I didn’t mind Vegemite, but it needed to be thinly spread rather than slapped on like butter. “I tried to call Rosen while you were in the shower. He’s not picking up.”

Which didn’t sound good. “Work or home?”

“Work and cell. His secretary said he wasn’t expected in this morning.”

“Meaning he’s been in contact with her, and that he could simply be in hiding.”

“Possibly.”

I studied him for a moment. “But you believe not.”

“I think it unlikely.” He grimaced. “If someone hasn’t snatched him, then it’s highly probable he’s either back at the tables or found a card game to join.”

“Neither of which is easy to check.” I scooped up the last bit of bacon, then grabbed a piece of toast to mop up the remaining egg. “But we could at least head to his house. He might be there and just not be answering.”

“You believe that even less than I do.”

“Yeah, but I still think it’s worth checking. Have you got his home address?”

“No, but I doubt it’s hard to find. Hang on a sec.” He used the laptop again and, after a few minutes, said, “There’re only three Rosens listed. One of them is Junior, and one lives in Bendigo. I seriously doubt Senior is the country-town type.”

“No.” I paused. “If I had to guess, I’d say he’s more the luxury apartment on Albert Road, South Bank, type.”

“I’m thinking that’s not such a guess.” His tone was dry.

“No.” I frowned. “This whole sharing-random-information-and-thoughts scenario is going to take a bit of getting used to—though it could undoubtedly be helpful if we find ourselves in the hands of the sindicati again.”

“Undoubtedly.” He grabbed the remaining bit of toast, repeated the Vegemite slathering, and rose. “What’s say we go check out Wirraway Drive? If that proves to be useless, it frees up time to concentrate on either finding Rosen or chasing the damn notes.”

“I still have one of the USBs Amanda Wilson gave me, remember?” I picked up my coat and purse, then followed him out the door. “Sam might have said there’s nothing on it, but it could still be worth checking.”

“I’d forgotten about that damn thing. We’ll do it as soon as we get back.”

“Why not now? It’s not like we have a limited time to either check out Wirraway or find Rosen or Amanda.”

He pressed the elevator call button, then shoved his hands into his pockets. “That’s the thing—I have this really weird feeling we need to get over to Wirraway.”

Surprise rippled through me. “So Fae really do have clairvoyant tendencies?”

“We commune with nature and our elements, not idiots intent on gambling their fortune and their businesses away.” The elevator door opened, and he ushered me inside. “But you get visions. Maybe this is another side effect of sharing flame.”

“Maybe.” I shrugged. It wasn’t like I’d ever done anything like it with anyone other than Rory, so anything was possible.

We headed out to the hotel, but rather than walk to our car, he caught my elbow and led me in the opposite direction.

“The sindicati will have no doubt registered the make and plate number of the car we used yesterday. We’re getting another.”

“Three rentals is pushing it a little, isn’t it?”

His grin flashed. “The business can afford it. And we’ll return yesterday’s tonight.”

“If they continued to follow us after last night’s confrontation, they’ll be aware we’re staying at the hotel. Changing cars won’t matter.”

“No one followed us here, Em. I’m certain of that. Not in a car, anyway.”

We just had to hope he was right. It took little more than half an hour to sign all the paperwork and get another new car—this time a nondescript Ford Focus—and by then the traffic had eased up, and we were able to drive across to Port Melbourne in relatively quick time.

“Right,” Jackson said as he swung onto Wirraway Drive and slowed the car down. “Keep those pretty eyes of yours peeled for anything that screams rats or Radcliffe.”

I snorted. “It’s an industrial estate close to a major river. There’re going to be rats everywhere.”

His grin flashed. “True that.”

I smiled but scanned the nearby buildings. The street was wide and lined with gum trees, most of them fairly young. A few cars were parked on the roadside, but most people made use of the parking lots the various warehouses or businesses had available either in front or to the side of their buildings. It was a little hard to tell what any of the businesses actually were, because the only signage on most was simply a name.

The road curved left. As Jackson followed it, I spotted a row of what looked to be empty shops, at the end of which was a series of outdoor umbrellas shading white tables and randomly colored chairs.

“Didn’t Rosen mention being taken to a café?”

“He did.” He glanced at the café. “And it’s a very well-secured little café, too.”

It certainly was. There were at least two security cameras that I could see, and they were the type that was constantly moving, scanning the immediate surrounds. “It might just be worth going in there to buy a coffee.”

“I totally agree.”

He drove on. Wirraway Drive curved right one more time, then came to a dead end. Jackson swung around, drove back, and pulled into the café’s small parking lot.

“Shame we haven’t got that nurse’s uniform.” He leaned his forearms on the wheel and studied the building. “You could have gone in and gotten the drinks without raising suspicions.”

“He may know me by sight, but he doesn’t know you.” I watched several workers come out of the café, drinks and bags of food in hand. “And it may just be what it looks like—a café doing a roaring job catering to all the nearby warehouse workers.”

“Possibly.” He unclipped his belt. “What do you feel like?”

“A green tea if they have it, hot chocolate if they haven’t. And a vanilla slice wouldn’t go astray.”

“Didn’t anyone ever tell you that pastries makes you fat?”

I grinned. “Not a problem for us. We burn too hot.”

“Fae, too. I shall grab three.”

He climbed out of the car and strolled toward the café. His hands were in his pockets and his gait casual, but I had no doubt he didn’t miss a thing. I continued to watch the flow of people in and out of the place for several minutes, then shifted and studied the other buildings—and caught sight of yet more security cameras. The one on the end, closest to the parking lot, had stopped sweeping. We’d been made.

I got out and walked across, just as Jackson was coming back out.

He immediately stopped. “Trouble?”

I nodded toward the still-watching camera. “Big Brother has been watching.”

“Idiots, giving the game away like that.” He placed the drinks and the vanilla slices down on the nearest table. “Shall we go introduce ourselves more formally?”

“If there’s anyone left to introduce ourselves to, sure.”

He spun around and headed back in. I followed. It was a cheery-looking place, filled with color, warmth, and great-smelling food. There were more tables lining the right wall and several customers being served by an equal number of staff. Jackson ignored them and headed for the swing door at the rear.

“I’m sorry, sir,” one of the women said, dumping her tongs on the nearby counter and hurrying after us, “but you can’t go in there.”

“It’s okay,” he said over his shoulder. “Mr. Radcliffe is expecting us.”

“But there’s no one by that—”

She was talking to air. Jackson was already through the door. I followed, but a quick glance over my shoulder as the door swung shut behind us revealed she was now on the phone. Even if, by some miracle, Radcliffe hadn’t been aware of our presence, he surely was now.

The next room was a small kitchen. I gave the chef a nod as we passed through, but he basically ignored us. A pointer, perhaps, to the fact that we weren’t the first strangers to stroll through this place.

The next room was a storeroom. It, too, was small, and filled with shelves loaded with stock and kitchen paraphernalia. There were several personnel lockers in one corner and two more doors, one of them open. Jackson stopped in the middle of the storeroom and studied the various shelves intently. I continued on; the open door led out to the rear of the building, but there was nothing in the lane beyond the exit other than several half-filled Dumpsters. The second door led into a bathroom. It was tiny, especially with the six personnel lockers crammed into it.

“Well, this is a bust,” I said as I returned and stopped beside him.

“No, it isn’t. There’s a breeze.”

“Well, yeah, the back door is open.”

“Yes, but it’s coming from that wall, not the door.” He waved a hand to the wall in front of us. “And it’s colder than the breeze outside.”

“There’s no air-conditioning in either the café or the kitchen.” I glanced up. “There’re no vents in here, either.”

“No.” He paused. “It suddenly strikes me that the café is a whole lot wider than both the kitchen and the storeroom.”

I blinked. Even with the width of the storeroom and bathroom combined, he was right.

“Meaning,” he continued, “there just might be another room hidden behind that wall.”

“Rats do like their hiding places.” I contemplated the shelving for a second. “If there is some sort of entrance here, I can’t imagine they’d be wanting to move the shelving to get to it every time.”

“No,” he agreed. “But does it seem at all odd to you that there’re personnel lockers in a store that holds kitchen equipment and supplies? Isn’t that against all sorts of health regs?”

“I haven’t worked in the food industry in any of my recent rebirths, but I was under the impression staff facilities had to be separated.” I walked across to the lockers. They were all padlocked, but the locks weren’t particularly robust. I melted the one on the first door and opened it—only to have it continue to fold open. The lockers had all been connected and hollowed out, so they were little more than an outer shell that protected the doorway Jackson had sensed. It was heavy-duty and sporting a rather industrial-looking, key-coded locking system. I burned it out, sending sparks flying, then raised a foot and booted it open. The room beyond was brightly lit and apparently empty. I doubted it actually was, even though I could neither see nor sense anyone else near.

“I do so love the way you work,” Jackson murmured as he ducked into the lockers and stepped cautiously into the next room.

And almost immediately was sent flying by a fist to the jaw.

I grabbed the arm and slammed it back against the door frame before the man could deliver a second blow. A howl of pain followed; then the stranger’s body filled the doorway as his other fist came flying toward me. I ducked the blow, then released him, swung around, and booted him hard in the gut. He grunted and staggered several feet backward, but he didn’t fall, as I’d half hoped. Instead, he simply growled and launched straight at me.

I scrambled backward, flames flickering across my fingers and skin. The big man either didn’t see them or didn’t care, and he was on me before I could do anything else. We went down in a tumble of arms and legs and skidded across the storeroom’s floor, hitting the wall opposite hard enough to force a grunt from both the big man and me. I tried to break free, but his weight had me pinned down even as he wrapped his fingers almost lovingly around my neck. It felt as if he were trying to snap me in two.

Maybe he was.

I swore—though it came out more a garbled rasp of noise than anything actually understandable—and punched him hard in the face. As my fist mashed his nose and sent snot and blood flying, my flames hit his skin, cindering his flesh. The foul stench seared the air, and he roared—a sound that was filled with pain and fury. But he didn’t let go. He simply squeezed harder.

As lights began to dance in front of my eyes, I did the only thing I could do—become flame rather than flesh.

Energy roared through me, sweeping me from one form to another in an instant. But the flames of a phoenix burned far hotter than any regular fire, and the big man went up in an instant. He screamed again, truly screamed this time, the sound high and terrible. I wrapped a slither of flame around his neck and wrenched him off me, then simultaneously put him out and retained flesh form.

And just in time.

The door behind us crashed open, and the chef appeared. “What the fuck?” His voice trailed off as he stared at the still-smoking man near the bathroom door.

“Call an ambulance,” I said, then added, when he didn’t immediately answer, “Now!”

His gaze came to mine, eyes wide with shock and perhaps horror; then he nodded and retreated. I spun, ran back through the lockers, and dove into the other room.

One man lay on the floor to my right, groaning in pain, one leg lying at an odd angle to his body, a leg bone visible.

Jackson was still fighting two others. The smack of flesh on flesh was loud and deadly sounding, but even as I rolled to my feet and stepped toward them to help, fire flickered across Jackson’s fists, then ignited; the flames hit one man, sending him flying backward, while Jackson’s fist took care of the other.

Neither man got back up. I walked across to the flame-thrown thug, quickly dousing him, then checking his pulse. He was out cold but okay. So was the second.

I glanced at Jackson and nodded at his still flaming hands. “I’m guessing that’s another side effect of our joining.”

His expression became somewhat confused. “I can’t make flame—you know that. I can only redirect and reuse—and you set the other guy alight. I felt the sweep of ignition.”

“Yeah, but I doused him almost straight away.” I motioned down at the unconscious figure at my feet. “There was no flame active when you did this.”

“Well, don’t those side effects just get more and more interesting.” He studied his flaming hands for several more seconds, then doused them. A second later, the flames reappeared; just not as bright or strong. His grin flashed as his gaze met mine. “As a fire Fae, I cannot be unhappy about the prospect of being able to create my own flame, even if it contains only a fraction of the potency of yours.”

“For now,” I commented. “Who knows what will happen as time moves along.”

“Again, I’m not complaining.”

“No.” I swung around and studied the room. “Radcliffe’s skipped out.”

“Rats have a habit of doing that.”

He walked across to the large table that dominated the end of the long but narrow room. Papers were scattered everywhere and the chair was upturned, evidence of a hasty departure. On the wall beside the door were several small screens, one showing constantly moving views of the road and parking bays outside the café, and the other locked on the front door. We’d definitely been watched as we’d entered.

“But how did he leave?” I shoved my hands on my hips and glared at the walls around us, seeking answers they were very unhelpfully not providing. “There’re no windows in this place, and the only door is the one we came in.”

“It may be the only regular door, but I’m betting there’s a trapdoor here somewhere.” He walked around the desk and studied the floor. “He can’t have moved the desk, though—it’s bolted to the floor.”

“I don’t think I want to know why he’d do that.” My gaze swept the room again and came to rest on the small sofa at the other end of the room. One side of it was sitting slightly out from the wall. I walked over, grabbed the end, and pulled it fully away. There, on the floor, was a trapdoor. “One rat hole found.”

Jackson walked over. “I’ll go down first.”

“Just be careful this time. Your pretty face is bruised enough.”

He snorted. “We men prefer to be called handsome, my dear, not pretty.”

“But they can definitely be both.”

He rolled his eyes at me, then grabbed the trapdoor’s handle and heaved it open. The air that rushed up to greet us was thick and dank, filled with the aroma of rotting carcasses and rubbish.

“A bloody storm drain,” I groaned, wrinkling my nose in distaste. “I should have guessed.”

Sparks danced across Jackson’s hands, but they were barely bright enough to lift more than an inch or two of the darkness that hovered below. He glanced at me. “I guess the honor is yours.”

I called to my flames, formed them into a ball of fire, and tossed the ball down into the darkness. It hit the trickle of water that lay at the bottom of the drain, sizzling and spitting but not going out. The drain it revealed wasn’t a big one; in fact, I doubted I, let alone Jackson, could stand up in it. But Radcliffe didn’t need to; all he had to do was change form and run for it.

I dropped on my knees and bent to get a closer look, but Jackson stopped me. “Remember the fist that greeted me when I stuck my mug through a gap.”

He flicked a finger, and my ball of flame began to grow, expand, until it formed a wall of fire slightly wider than the circumference of the trapdoor. “Now you may look.”

I did, but there was nothing to see. The rat had well and truly fled the scene. I sighed and sat back on my haunches. “There’s probably not much chance of finding him, even if we do go after him.”

“No.” Jackson rose, then offered me a hand, helping me up. “But I’m guessing the cops have also been called, so we might as well give this place a quick search, before the shit truly hits.”

I frowned. “It might be better to leave.”

“No. Leaving the scene of a crime will only make us the aggressors in the cops’ eyes—”

“And we were.”

“Yes, but I’ve got a swollen jaw and you’ve got bruising around your neck, so self-defense is not unreasonable.” He shrugged. “And we’re in the den of a known criminal. Trust me, I doubt they’ll come down too harshly on us.”

I hoped he was right. As he’d noted previously, neither of us would do too well in jail—even if there was actually a human jail that could hold me. Or, at least, hold my fire form.

I stepped over one of the still-unconscious men and moved to the desk. The sound of approaching sirens was now very clear, so we really didn’t have much time left to uncover anything. I picked up a couple of bits of paper and noticed the odd indents on the desktop. They weren’t big, but they were deep. It almost looked as if something had been nailed to the desk. Repeatedly. Suspecting I really didn’t need to know the reasons for that, I glanced back at the papers in my hand. They seemed to be financial records of some kind, though I didn’t recognize any of the names on them.

“Anything?” Jackson said, moving across to the filing cabinets.

“Nothing useful.” I righted the chair, then sat and began opening desk drawers. “You?”

“The cabinets are locked, and it probably wouldn’t be wise to force them.”

“No.” The first drawer was filled with basic office paraphernalia, as well as some not-so-basic items, such as long letter openers that had been filed down to really sharp points—points that would undoubtedly match the odd dents in the desktop.

Bloody images rose of body parts being nailed to the desk by an angry Radcliffe; I shivered and shoved my imagination back in its box. I’d come across far worse than Radcliffe in my time, but the lengths some people—both men and women—were willing to go to for the sake of the almighty dollar never ceased to surprise me. I slammed the drawer shut and moved on to the next one. It turned out to be a random junk drawer. I searched it anyway but didn’t find anything useful. I also didn’t find any more sharpened office implements, for which I was extremely grateful.

“You know, it’s interesting that no one from either the café or the kitchen has actually come to investigate what we’re doing or to stop us from leaving.”

I glanced up. Jackson stood in the doorway, his back to me. Studying the man who’d attacked us, I thought, as a sliver of remorse ran through me. He was going to have a long, difficult road to recovery—if he could, in fact, recover. Very few people survived such close contact with my spirit form. Jackson had, but only because he was fire Fae and really couldn’t be burned by his own element. The sheer force and power of my natural being might have killed him—probably should have killed him—but it wouldn’t have actually burned him.

“I suspect Radcliffe’s employees learned long ago that curiosity is not a good thing.” I opened the bottom drawer—and discovered not only car keys but a wallet and phone. “Guess what I just found?”

“The keys to the kingdom?” He turned to face me, a smile teasing the corners of his mouth. I held up the wallet and phone, and his smile grew. “I wasn’t that far off.”

“That depends on whether there’s anything interesting to be found on either item.” I tossed him the wallet and flicked on the phone. “It’s key coded.”

“The only thing surprising about that,” Jackson commented, “is that it’s not thumbprint coded. It’s easy enough to break numerical codes these days, and Radcliffe surely has to know that.”

“He probably does, but why do you? And does that statement imply that you’ve done it?”

“Well, not me personally. I haven’t the time nor the inclination to sit there and physically type out numbers until I crack the right one.”

“Then how?” The sound of sirens was now so close, the noise echoed through the small room. They had to be right outside the café, meaning we had a minute, if that, left. I grabbed the car keys, shoved them and the phone in my pocket, and rose.

“With the help of a forensic program capable of copying the encrypted data off a cell phone and then attacking it. Once it hits the right combination, all the data is unencrypted and can be read.”

“Without the phone being affected?”

“Exactly. The user never knows his device has been compromised. Very handy.” He shoved the wallet into the back pocket of his jeans, then added, “The ambulance and cops just arrived.”

“Yeah.” I glanced around as one of the men stirred. He did little more than groan, so I let him be and walked across to stand beside Jackson to wait for the incoming police and ambulance officers.

What I didn’t expect was to see Sam among them.