No Talia. But then, Layla guessed she already knew what Adam was going to say.
When Adam strode in, the group quieted. He dropped a load of files on the long conference table. “We’ve got a bad one here, people. Listen up.”
He projected on the ballroom wall side-by-side images of a woman. One was a screen capture of the assault on the soldiers at the front gate. The woman’s brown hair was flying midmovement. She seemed to be holding a fat stick with short, pointy branches. Or, no, maybe that was her arm. Or her hand. Weird.
In the other photo she was laughing as she posed with an ice-cream cone in front of the Statue of Liberty, a green foam liberty crown on her head. The woman was petite and pretty. Happy blue eyes, a lopsided quirk to a sweet smile, brown hair curling gently around a heart-shaped face. Girl next door. Never in a million years would Layla have feared her.
“Everyone meet Rose Anne Petty, born June nineteenth, nineteen sixty-five, died November twelfth, nineteen ninety-nine. She was murdered in her sleep by her husband, Mickey Alan Petty, who is now serving a life sentence in Georgia State Prison. He claimed during his trial that Rose was a psychopath, had planned and executed the grisly murders of a dozen people over the course of three years, to which he was an unwilling party. The only proof that surfaced to support his claims was an old police report that detailed the torture of neighborhood animals when she was a teen. Rose had exhibited no remorse for her actions but had complied with the community service terms of her conviction.”
Adam made eye contact with someone in the back. “Dr. James?”
Layla looked around.
Dr. James had lifted his pen. “Then do we have a new breed on our hands?”
“A devil.”
“Ah.” The old man’s eyes lit with interest. He actually seemed to dig this little development.
“And do our friends in The Order have anything to say about it?”
Adam shrugged. “Just that she’s mean and mortal. Enough firepower, and she’ll die a second death.”
“What is she doing at our front gate?”
Adam grinned. “Admiring our architecture and history.”
Layla flushed, remembering that she had given Adam that very same answer when he’d asked why she was lurking in his woods. And she knew it was the closest he would get to identifying her as Rose’s target to the people assembled.
“Until Rose Petty is apprehended or killed, Segue will remain in lockdown. You all know that drill by now. In the meantime, we’re working to deliver her husband here. He might be able to anticipate her movements or talk her into a vulnerable position.”
“He’s about to get the shock of his life,” Patel said.
The group gave a reluctant chuckle.
“Or if he’s very smart, a shot at an appeal to his sentence,” Dr. James said. “If she’s walking on this fair Earth, he could claim she never died.”
“Damn wife just won’t stay dead,” another added.
“And I thought my ex-wife was psycho,” someone else joked.
They laughed as a group now, if a little restrained, and Layla marveled at their response. The meeting broke up, and she waited until she was alone with Adam again.
He spoke before she had a chance to ask her question. “Some of them have been at this for going on ten years. Without a little humor they’d be cracked by now.”
“Oh, they’re cracked all right.”
He cocked his head. “We all are.”
She was about to leave when he stopped her with a hand to her elbow. “Hey, I don’t suppose you had a chance to ask Khan about your photo, did you?”
Layla blushed. “Um . . . no. He, uh . . .”
“It’s fine.” Adam shook his head as he lifted a hand. “No details or complicated explanations necessary. I get the idea. Tonight, though, will you? Shadow is a mixed bag, good and bad. Talia’s comfortable using it, and Khan’s basically made out of it, but I’d still like to be absolutely certain that we don’t have an additional problem on our hands.”
“’Kay. Sure. Next time I see him.”
“Look, Talia’s tied up with the kids for a bit, but if nothing happens in the next two hours”—he scratched the back of his head—“I promised her that I’d show you the wraith holding facility. You can take pictures if you’d like, though if you’re going to publish something, I’d like to know beforehand.”
He couldn’t be serious. “Don’t you have stuff to do? Wraiths? Devils?”
“There’s always stuff to do, and lately always something new and dangerous to watch out for, but I have been informed in no uncertain terms that you are my first priority. Life goes on.”
Had to be Talia bossing the boss.
Adam squeezed her shoulder. “You okay?”
Layla nodded. “I’m going to set myself up in the library with Talia’s homework.”