I’d settled onto the couch while Logan created a list of addresses. My bare feet were tucked underneath me as I paged through the other documents when he finally sat his cell phone on the narrow coffee table.
“There are seven locations we could check, but these are our best shot.” He pointed at three blocks of text on a note pad, his writing clean and sharp, not at all like Morgan’s. “Does anything stand out to you?” he asked.
I shook my head. “I’ve only been through Stanton. The Jamison plant, didn’t that burn last year in some kind of gas leak accident?”
“Explosion,” he said, his level tone making me wonder if there was more I didn’t know, something the news hadn’t reported. “But there were a few buildings left standing.”
“Okay.” I sat up. “Let me just grab my shoes.”
He raised a brow at me. “You don’t think this should wait until morning?”
I glanced at the window, but could see nothing except our own reflection against the dark of night. “Right. I guess daylight’s probably better.” I bit my lip, remembering Emily and Aern’s warnings about getting rest. I didn’t think I could sleep at all, but they were right. Plus, I didn’t exactly want to snoop around abandoned warehouses at night with Morgan’s men gunning for me.
“Bri,” Logan said from beside me, and I turned, lip still tucked beneath my tooth.
His gaze lingered on my face and I asked, “What?”
He smiled, more to himself than for me I thought, and said, “Can I help you look for something?”
My attention fell to the documents on the table. “I suppose,” I replied, surprised at the disappointment in my voice, “we’re looking for anything else my mother’s hidden.”
Logan squeezed my arm. “It was hidden from the others, Brianna. Not you.”
The gesture was so casual it sent a momentary shock through me. I swallowed hard. I knew his words were true—she’d meant to keep us safe, Emily and I—but it still stung. We’d been lied to for so long.
“It’s no different,” I said, not believing I was admitting it out loud, “than what I’ve done to Emily.”
Logan stared at me for a long moment. “For the right reasons,” he said before finally picking up a stack of papers to search for other clues. “It will all turn out, Brianna. You’ll see.”
I huffed out a laugh. They all had faith in me. I was their savior, their prophesied hero come to light. And I was digging through paperwork for a sign. Me, the Dragon Slayer.
I woke the next morning with my face plastered to the arm of Logan’s couch. He sat reading through Morgan’s journal, my feet lying haphazardly across his lap.
I jerked to sitting, pulling them under me as a hand went to my face, but Logan didn’t flinch. “What time is it?” I asked, rubbing a cheek and sorting my hair into place.
“Early,” he said, masking a crooked smile at my attempt at composure. “You have time for more sleep if you want.”
He’d been right; I slept like the dead. But at least I was sleeping. I shook my head as I peered at the pages he had open.
He indicated the book with a nod. “This is really disturbing.”
“You have no idea,” I muttered, remembering the things Emily took out of the box she’d been searching. My voice was hoarse from disuse and my muscles ached to be stretched.
Sensing my mood, Logan laid the journal on the table. “How about you get dressed and I make breakfast,” he glanced at his watch, “and we can be on the road before sunrise.”
“Yes,” I managed. “Perfect.”
After a much needed hair brushing, and a large helping of freshly scrambled eggs, we were loaded into the black sedan and headed for the industrial parks in old downtown. Logan must have made arrangements with his team, because there were occasional beeps and blips on his various devices as we drove.
The sun came up to mostly empty streets because it was a Saturday in late October, in an area where no one really lived anymore. Vacant houses became abandoned apartment buildings, windows busted, shattered glass lining weedy sidewalks. Graffiti marked more and more brick walls, and chain link fencing sagged against broken supports and piled up trash.
A weight settled in the pit of my stomach, silently protesting the idea of my mother here, alone and trapped, causing my hand to tighten on the door grip.
“I’ve been wondering about something,” Logan said, his voice startling me back to the pristine interior of the car, the quiet hum of the engine as he idled at a stop sign.
“What’s that?” I asked.
His eyes were ahead, scanning the area before driving through the intersection. “The bond,” he said, “between Aern and Emily. Is that something unique to them?” He turned right without signaling, barely glancing at me as he did so. “Or do all of your kind have the ability to create a union?”
My kind. The words bothered me more than they should, I knew, but I couldn’t say why.