Jai slanted an unforgiving look at Ari. “I thought we were past this?”
Ari held her hands up defensively. “I said nothing. I mean, I could have. It’s not like I wouldn’t have reason to, considering you lied to me about something so huge. If you hadn’t eventually told me I could have done something terrible… say conjured a Lexus convertible and upended a cute Californian couple on the highway where a delivery truck then squashed them.”
Fallon snorted.
Jai rolled his eyes. “But I did tell you. No Lexus. No squash.”
“Luckily for you.”
Her guardian sighed and looked down at his book. “I can’t tell you how much I look forward to these mature and scintillating conversations. Still, when the old Ari returns, let me know.”
“Old Ari? I was sarcastic to you before.”
“True.” He nodded, turning the page on the paperback. “But there was this era between scared, sarcastic Ari and this new-fangled five-year-old Ari where you were actually decent to be around.”
Ouch. “Bite me.”
Jai grinned slyly and looked up at her from under his lashes. “Just tell me how hard.”
Callum, who had warmed up considerably to Ari over the last few days, stepped onto the patio and laughed as he caught the latter end of their conversation. Ari shook her head at Jai. Flirt. She felt her insides go all gooey and fought back a smile, only to fail. She tried to save it by rolling her eyes and turning her attention back to Fallon. The girl grinned knowingly at Ari. She stepped closer, lowering her voice, “Wow.”
Ari frowned. “What?”
“You and Jai,” she whispered. “It’s like verbal foreplay. It’s been going on since you got here.”
It’s been going on since we met.
“I can only imagine when you two finally have sex, it’ll be explosive.”
Feeling her cheeks heat, Ari knew there was no way to disguise her blush.
Fallon grinned. “Oooh, are you a virgin?”
Annoyance mingled with embarrassment shot through Ari. “So what if I am?” she exclaimed, bringing both Jai and Callum’s heads up. “Am I the only person left in the free world that hasn’t had sex yet?”
“If you like, I could remedy that for you.” Callum chuckled, wandering over to them.
Before he made it three steps, he inexplicably slid hard on the dry grass, losing his footing. He fell comically, his feet lifting into the air, his ass crashing down to the ground with a painful thud. They all stared at him in surprise as he scrambled to his feet, his cheeks blazing an adorable shade of red. “What the hell was that?” Callum demanded, looking around for invisible hands. “Someone did that? What the hell?”
Ari suppressed a laugh, sensing the hum of familiar energy in the air. Ms. Maggie, defending Ari’s virtue again. Ari glanced over at Jai with a secret smile and he smiled back at her, a gorgeous stretch of his perfect mouth that made it hard to not remember what it was like to kiss him.
His voice suddenly entered her head. You know I’m really starting to like Ms. Maggie.
“I appreciate you doing this,” Charlie said, his voice deep with emotion that he just couldn’t conceal.
Jack slanted him a careful look. He was overall a taciturn and very formal man, but he’d approached Charlie during a moment of solitude on their second day with the Guild and he’d asked him outright what idiotic scheme had driven him to wish to become a sorcerer. When Charlie had told him, Jack’s entire demeanor had changed. Like Charlie, Jack had lost someone he loved to the jinn. He’d lost his wife.
So Charlie hung out with the older man, asking questions about the Guild, about different jinn — in particular the labartu. Apparently, they were the worst of the female demons. Despite the Sumerians adopted belief that the labartu was one being — the daughter of the Babylonian sky god Anu — the truth was there were many labartus out devastating the world. The labartu destroyed life. They specifically targeted children. Some ate their human flesh and drank their blood; others, like the one that had killed Mike, turned it into games of chance where they created a situation that could lead to a child’s death.
You knew a labartu was in proximity because plant life died, rivers and streams turned thick with mud and the rate of miscarriages went up. Their chosen targets would often suffer nightmares days before their death. A shudder moved through Charlie when Jack told him that. Mike had nightmares that whole week. Charlie had thought something was going on with him at school and tried to get Mike to talk about it. Mike just blew up at him, telling him nothing was going on; they were just nightmares. But they hadn’t just been nightmares. They’d been omens.
“I decided you were right.” Jack sighed. “I can’t kill the thing that killed my wife because it would bring dishonor upon my guild and it’s all I have left. But if I could, I’d go after that bastard. You’re going to do this with or without my help, but at least with my help you have a fighting chance.”