Prologue
Hunting coffee, Sandra slid into a duct-taped booth up front of Dot’s Diner. Fingers drumming against the sticky laminate, she checked for the faint threads of power that usually hung in the air out of habit.
Nothing. There was a void in the city’s rhythm around her, not too unusual. But it tracked. The headache pounding behind her eyes made more sense now. She shrugged. These things happened.
Dawn backlit the City Market outside with a ruddy glow some might consider eerie, but tricks of light didn’t unnerve her. She’d seen too much for that.
Where was her coffee?
This diner was her Sunday sanctuary—a place to recover from the night before and steel herself for the week ahead. Jasmine, the diner’s petite powerhouse of a waitress, always had a steaming cup waiting the moment Sandra sat down.
But this morning, Jasmine stood near the back, brimming coffeepot in hand, talking to a customer.
Someone beat her here? She could count on two fingers the number of times that had happened, including the homeless man who’d camped out overnight in the bathroom. These days, she checked corners by reflex. She took a closer look at Jasmine’s customer.
He was off.
It wasn’t the mismatched clothing, five o’clock shadow or hollowed-out eyes. That was downtown typical. Sandra sharpened her senses and leaned forward, and she saw it.
Everything slowed. The world behind the man warped. Walls bent inward, light twisted at unnatural angles, as if reality tried to fold around him. The air shimmered.
Then, with a sound like tearing fabric, he was yanked backward into nothing.
Gone.
No flash of light. No portal. No spell residue. Just absence.
Jasmine’s knees buckled. She grabbed the edge of the table, mouth open, eyes locked on the empty booth. The coffeepot tilted in her grip.
Sandra crossed the distance in four strides and caught it before it hit the floor. She set it down, locked the door and flipped the sign to Closed.
She opened her second sight. No trace of a spell. No shimmering after-effects.
Shit.
Sandra crouched beside the shaken server and squeezed her shoulder. “Take a breath.”
“What the hell was that?” Jasmine whispered.
Sandra stood. Shock. Maybe something worse. Either way, nothing useful yet. She’d get a full statement later.
Right now? Coffee.
Sandra grabbed a mug from behind the counter and poured. Magic or no magic, she wasn’t starting Sunday without it.
Behind her, Jasmine’s voice shook. “I don’t… I don’t believe it.”
Sandra took a slow sip, phone already in hand. “Yeah, well,” she muttered over her mug, “looks like the universe believes enough for both of us.”
It took three rings.
“Nathan speaking.”
“Director,” she said. “We just got a case.”
