Solatium (Emanations, an urban fantasy series Book 2) by Becca Mills Page B

I’d want to work for, that is.
    Plus, Cordus couldn’t be dead. Not really. Investigating the thing with Limu and Eye of the Heavens just had him really tied up. If the others knew about that, they wouldn’t have lost hope.
    For a moment, I wanted to tell them. Then I remembered the oath I’d taken. It was a pain-of-death kind of thing.
    Kara gave me a tissue, and I blew my nose.
    “So who’s waiting for us at the motel?” I asked Gwen.
    “Dunno. Hopefully someone with a lot of juice.”
    “Or a lot of someones with a lot of juice,” Kara said.
     
    The Blue Schooner Motel was something off a 1950s postcard: a long, one-story building with a flat roof and a massive sign topped with a sailing ship made of blue neon. A lighted placard assured passersby that the rooms were air-conditioned and contained not only color TVs but also telephones. A red “no vacancy” light glowed in the office window.
    There was a building across the parking lot that might’ve once been an associated restaurant, but it looked to have gone out of business.
    Surprisingly, Gwen drove past the hotel and pulled in behind the restaurant. We got out and headed for a small back door that was just visible behind a tumble of old trashcans.
    “What’s this place?”
    “Motel restaurant,” she said. “It’s sort of an unofficial meeting place.”
    “Like neutral ground?”
    “No such thing,” Williams said from right behind me.
    I jumped about a mile.
    Jesus, where the hell did he come from?
    As I looked around, more people seemed to appear from thin air. After a few seconds, all fourteen of us were there.
    Of course. The others had already arrived and put invisibility barriers around their cars.
    Gwen stepped aside and let Williams lead us into the restaurant.
    The back door opened onto a dark, low-ceilinged cave of a bar area. Forest-green vinyl banquettes lined the walls, and dark wooden tables filled the floor space. The walls were decorated with ship paintings and mounted fish.
    Several dining rooms opened off the bar. From what I could see, the nautical theme continued throughout.
    It looked like any number of old-timey Wisconsin supper clubs I’d eaten in. Smelled like them, too — like steak and blue-cheese salad dressing and slightly musty carpet. The craving for a brandy old-fashioned set in.
    Gwen and Williams walked off into one of the dining rooms. Zion headed over to talk to one of the women I didn’t know. I looked at Kara. She shrugged.
    We slid into a banquette in the corner.
    “Do you know these people?”
    “Most of them. That tall blond guy is Rudolph Tanner. He’s in charge of the northeast.”
    “The way Graham was in charge of the Midwest?”
    “Yeah.” Kara’s face darkened. She hated Graham. “ Ese hijo de puta . I hope something in that isolate’s eaten him by now.”
    I shivered. Quite possibly, something had. I hoped not, though. Graham was a bad guy, but I suspected he wasn’t all bad.
    I turned my attention back to Rudolph. His expression looked unpleasant, like he’d just smelled something awful.
    “His name is really Rudolph?”
    “Yup, as in the red-nosed you-know-what. But don’t mess with him about it. He’s sort of an asshole.”
    “How about the others?”
    “Those guys are Samson and Beans. Beans is the small one. The women are Liz, Sua, and … um … Natasha, maybe? I’ve worked with Rudolph before. I’ve only met the others once, and it was a few years ago. They’re all stationed in Phoenix.”
    “What do they do?”
    “Rudolph’s a time-twister. I don’t know what Beans does. Liz, the blonde, she’s a tracker. Sua’s a water-worker. I forget about Natasha. Metals? Telekinesis? Something cool. Samson can change solids into fluids.”
    “What’s a time-twister?”
    “Someone who works time. Rudolph can push it back locally about twenty seconds. Oh, and he can work fire, too.”
    “Sounds dangerous.”
    “Yup. One of the best fighters we have.”
    “I bet.”
    Wonder