"I don't like the feel of it either," I said in a quiet voice, coming to stand beside her. "The Air magic. "
Jo-Jo passed her hand over Bria's face, forcing oxygen into all the cuts that marred her features. I watched while the gash above her eye knit itself together, and the ugly bruising faded from her skin.
Bria gritted her teeth. "It's not the most pleasant sensation, but I'll live. "
"Sometimes, it's better if you hold on to something," I said, stretching out my hand. "It helps distract your mind from the pain. "
Bria looked at my hand hovering in midair, my fingers curled up; then her blue gaze flicked up to my face. I know what she saw when she looked at me. A woman dressed in black. A woman covered in blood. A killer. A murderer. A monster. No matter how she tried to hide it, Bria couldn't forget who and what I was-and how conflicted she felt about it.
Finally, she sighed and grabbed my hand. Her palm felt cool and soothing against mine. Bria might not like my past as an assassin, might not like my being the Spider now, but she also knew that part of me would always be Genevieve Snow-the big sister she'd loved so much as a child.
"You squeeze as hard as you need to. "
Bria just nodded, her hand tightening around mine.
Besides the cuts on her face and a few cracked ribs, my sister wasn't that banged up from grappling with the bounty hunter, so it took Jo-Jo only a few minutes to heal her. Then the dwarf did the same to me, taking care of the injuries that Don had inflicted on me. Afterward, the three of us trooped into the kitchen.
Most people preferred the salon, but the kitchen was my favorite room in the house, maybe because I loved to cook so much. A long, skinny table sliced the kitchen into two pieces, while appliances done in a variety of pastel colors hugged the walls. Fat, fluffy clouds dotted the fresco-painted ceiling like marshmallows. More clouds could be found everywhere you looked, from the pot holders stacked next to the stove to the dishcloths piled beside the sink. Like other elementals, Jo-Jo also used her personal rune-a puffy cloud that symbolized her Air magic-in her decorating scheme.
Finn stood by the counter, having just finished making his thirteenth cup of coffee of the day. As always, the chicory fumes warmed me from the inside out and made me think of his father. I wished that the old man were here tonight. Fletcher would have known exactly what to do about the mess we were in-the mess I'd dragged us all into by declaring war on Mab in the first place.
Finn stared at me with his green eyes. "Any chance of getting something sweet to go with my coffee?" he asked in a hopeful voice.
I arched an eyebrow at him. "You mean all those pieces of strawberry pie that you ate for lunch weren't enough?"
"I'm a growing boy," Finn said in a sincere tone. "I need my vitamins. "
Bria snorted. "The only thing that's growing on you, Lane, is your ego. "
Finn sidled up to my sister and gave her a dazzling smile. "Well, other things of mine also tend to swell up in your presence, detective. "
I rolled my eyes at Finn's attempt at witty banter. Jo-Jo just chuckled, amused by his antics.
Bria returned Finn's smile with a syrupy sweet one of her own. "Oh, really? So it's gone from what, pencil eraser to cocktail sausage by now?"
Finn sputtered and almost spit out a mouthful of coffee. His face flushed, and he glared at Bria. He opened his mouth, probably to come up with some biting retort, but I cut him off.
"Enough," I said. "We have more important things to worry about right now than what you two think of each other and your various appendages. Like what we're going to do about the bounty on your head, Bria. "
She shrugged. "I don't see why we have to do anything about it. Now that I know about the bounty, I can protect myself. "
"No, you can't. " I opened the refrigerator to see what kind of ingredients Jo-Jo had on hand. "Not from every bounty hunter in the city. "
"Bounty hunter?" Jo-Jo asked. "What bounty hunter?"
Bria and Finn filled the dwarf in on what had happened at Northern Aggression. The meeting with the informant, the botched kidnapping attempt, what I'd learned from Lincoln Jenkins.
I let their words wash over me while I got out the ingredients for brownies. Flour, eggs, water, baking cocoa, oil. All that and more went into my mixing bowl. Ten minutes later, I slid the brownies into the oven and got started on the thick layer of cream cheese frosting that would turn the brownies from just a mere dessert into something truly spectacular. Powdered sugar, butter, almond extract, and a block of cream cheese filled another bowl. As always, the stirring, the mixing, the careful measuring of ingredients, soothed me. I couldn't control what Mab did, how she came after me, or whom she hired to do her dirty work, but I could make my family a treat to sweeten the bitter times.
Twenty minutes later, just as Finn and Bria were winding down with their story, I took the brownies out of the oven. While I was waiting for them to cool enough to frost them, I grabbed the milk from the fridge, along with several mugs out of the cabinets. One by one, I wrapped my hand around the glasses and reached for my Ice magic. Crystals spread out from my palm and ran up the side of first one mug then another until all the glasses were cold and frosty.
When everything was ready, I cut the frosted brownies, stacked them on a plate, brought the milk and mugs over to the table, and started munching on my late-night snack with the others.
"So what do you want to do, Gin?" Finn asked. "Now that we know exactly who all these crazy people are in Ashland. "
I chewed a bite of brownie. Rich and chocolatey, with an extra sugary sweet kick from the cream cheese frosting. Perfect. "See if you can find out more about them-backgrounds, skills, habits. I especially want to know about Ruth Gentry and Sydney, the girl that she has with her. Gentry seems to be the smartest of the bunch so far, which makes her the most dangerous. "
Finn nodded. He'd started digging into Gentry earlier today, but Bria's meeting with Jenkins had taken precedence and sidetracked his search.