"release my faithful from your bonds and i shall let you live," maximus said in a deep booming voice.

he sounded really reasonable, i thought as his command echoed in my head. "hey, that's a good idea," i said, trying to open the rear door. but it wouldn't open and i realized the child safety locks were on.

"don't let his voice cloud your mind," stacey said. "bloody vampires and their mind games."

"a trick?" i asked, still trying to open the door by pressing my shoulder weakly against it.

stacey leaned across felicia and gripped my chin in her hand. her amber eyes darkened, seeming to form a vortex sucking me into their depths. i felt myself falling, falling, falling into the bliss of her gaze. reality faded in a warm fuzzy haze. then she slapped me so hard i saw stars.

"ouch!"

"sorry, my lamb, but it was the fastest way to snap you out of it."

i realized i no longer had the desire to let felicia go. in fact, i was ready to get out and beat the snot out of maximus-although extreme physical violence from my end was hardly in the cards right now since my arms had the strength of wet noodles.

"get ready to gun it," smith said to ryland.

"it'd be faster if i pushed," the lycan grumbled.

smith uttered a few nonsensical words, held a metallic-looking wand out of the car window, and then twirled it skyward. a brilliant halo of light surrounded the car, bathing everyone outside in intense white rays without affecting those of us in the car. the vampires freaked, running and screaming as red blisters formed on their skin. maximus howled and ran for the shade as well.

"maxi, don't leave me!" felicia shouted as ryland gunned the car forward.

smith leaned back in his seat and groaned. sweat glistened on his forehead.

"was that hard?" i asked.

he wiped his brow. "difficult? no. but the effort and energy of something so bright really takes it out of me. i knew i should've brought my staff. it has a stronger generator."

i turned to felicia. "maxi, huh? let me guess. he likes to take advantage of the females he 'saves'". i made air quotes in case she didn't catch the sarcasm.

she sniffed and stuck her nose in the air. "i wouldn't expect a man to understand. you saw how sexy he is. how powerful. what lucky girl wouldn't do anything for a man like him?"

"he's a user. guys like him are a dime a dozen, especially at my school." i thought about nathan spelman and his cadre of football-playing cronies. i shuddered at the thought of going back to school and seeing him again. true, nathan and i were no longer at war, but that didn't mean we were friends.

"there is no one else like maximus."

"you're delusional," i said. "ryland could kick his ass and eat him for breakfast."

ryland cast one of his wolfish grins over a shoulder and looked felicia up and down, like sizing up a piece of meat. "you're cute, vampire, but stupid."

"hey, watch it-oh never mind," smith said. "i have this instinct to protect my sister, but you're right. she is stupid." he shook his head. "such a damned shame, too. she was top of her class until..."

"thanks for piling on, jackass," felicia said.

"until your parents died?" i asked.

his head snapped around to face me. "how did you-?" he looked at felicia. "oh. i guess she told you all sorts of stuff while i was gone."

i shrugged. "some."

he rubbed a hand down his face. "just great. i hardly know you people and you already know i have a crazy sister and a crappy childhood. i hardly know a thing about you."

"i don't think any of us have a pristine past," i said, although my childhood had been pretty darned good up until my mom left, my dad went over the edge looking for her, and i found out i was demon spawn. "i know you want to be mysterious and all with your conspiracy stuff, but nobody here's gonna crucify you for your past."

"unless he's a murderer," ryland said, quirking one side of his mouth into a lopsided grin as he weaved the car through traffic.

"yeah, there is that," i said.

smith offered a wan smile. "you ever heard of the nosti family?"

i shook my head. "no."

"i believe i remember hearing of them," ryland said.

"keeping up with families is not something i do," stacey said.

smith stared out the car window and pushed his thick glasses up his nose. "my dad was kind of a big deal in the sorcery community. he was on the arcane council, he taught advanced classes at the academy, and he was well-liked. my mom was just a nom even though she was the daughter of another powerful couple in the arcane community."

"like the conroys?" i asked.

"not quite that powerful, but pretty far up the chain."

i wondered just how powerful my mother's parents were.

smith glanced at his sister, disappointment etched into his face. "felicia, believe it or not, was head of her class in a nom school. i think she was on track to pass me up when it comes to brains."

felicia gazed fondly at her brother but quickly looked down at her hands when she saw the look on his face.

"she didn't go to an arcane school?" i asked, trying to figure out the bits and pieces of the magic community from what he was saying.

"no. besides, we all go to a more or less normal school until we're ten. it helps us fit in with the noms. then we start our arcane training. most can't tap into their abilities until around ten or eleven anyway. when i was eighteen and felicia was thirteen, our parents were found dead in an alley, supposedly mugged."

"someone mugged a sorcerer?" i asked, thinking if his father had a chance, he would've magicked his way out of it.

"not bloody likely," stacey said, an eyebrow raised in disbelief.

"my thoughts exactly," smith said. "the bodies were moved after they were killed. the arcane inquisitor's office said it was a matter for the normal authorities and refused to get involved, while the police detectives who were involved encountered only bad luck and dead ends."

"what about the templars?"

"they were prohibited from intervening by the arcane inquisitor."

"that does sound fishy," i said.

ryland grunted. "it ain't all that fishy. every major faction has its own version of the police to settle internal matters and they don't want the templars in their business if they can help it. they only call us in when one supernatural group mixes it up with another."

"but the inquisitor didn't know who killed the nostis," i said. "what if it was a vampire?"

"they were shot in the backs of their heads," smith said, a grim tone to his voice. "if another super did the job, they did it with mortal instruments to make it look like a normal crime."

a sob erupted from felicia. she bent over, hands pressed to her eyes as tears dripped down her cheeks. smith put a hand on his sister's head for a brief moment before pulling it away and sighing.

"did you ever find out anything?" i asked.

"some dead ends. i know my dad was meeting with a woman, but i never could find out her name. i sometimes wondered if he might be having an affair." smith shook his head. "but he just didn't seem like the cheating type."

"this is tragic," stacey said, resting a hand on felicia's back. "and your sister went off the deep end after the murders?"

felicia shot her a tear-stained look. "i'm not the one who went off the deep end."

"yeah," smith said, ignoring her. "i had enough inheritance to get my own place. felicia moved in with me. but i was so wrapped up in my own investigation i didn't realize what she was going through." his lips tightened and it looked like years of guilt suddenly climbed onto his shoulders. "then one of her teachers called me and asked if she was sick, because felicia hadn't been at school for a week." anger flashed on his face. "when i tracked her down, she was doing meth with some loser dropout and his buddies in a trailer park. i wanted to kill them all."

"will you shut up," felicia said, wiping away her tears. "stop talking about me like i'm not here."

"that's the problem," smith said. "it's almost like you're not here. like the felicia i knew died a long time ago."

"good god," i said, looking at felicia. "you were doing meth? how old were you?"

her bottom lip quivered and fresh tears threatened. "sixteen."

smith's lip curled up in distaste. "it got worse. i became obsessed with finding my parents' killer. and felicia just did her own thing until one day one of her boyfriends came by, banging on the door and crying like a baby. when i opened it, he had my sister in his arms." he sucked in a breath as his voice caught. "i thought she was dead."

felicia took her brother's hand in hers and gripped it. "i'm sorry, adam. i couldn't take the pain anymore. maybe it would've been better if you'd just let me die."

smith shook his head. "and lose the last family i had?" he dropped her hand and looked away. "i guess you have your own vampire family now."

"you're my brother and i still love you," felicia said, her face red and soaked with tears.

stacey handed her another tissue.

"you don't love anyone except yourself," he snapped back. "if you cared at all about me or the memory of our parents, you'd stop doing stupid crap and make something of yourself."

"well, i'm sorry i wasn't born with any useful abilities, adam! i'm sorry i was the useless nom. i wanted to be something special. why else do you think i accepted maximus's offer?" she blew her nose with all the gusto of a drama queen just as ryland took a sharp corner, rocking felicia into me.

i cringed away from the well-used tissue.

smith blew out an exasperated breath and swatted her excuse with a wave of his hand. "if even half of what justin told me is true, about vamplings and kidnapping, then the price of his 'gift' was too high. it wouldn't even be so bad if you'd done a single worthy thing with your abilities. instead, you've only made things worse."