Not quite believing that helpful click noise, I pushed on the pillar. Its front face swung inward like an obedient steel door, a dim red light emanating from the space behind it.

“Yeah!” I cheered. “That was easy.”

She eyed the opening warily. “Too easy.”

I stepped into the crimson-lit innards of the pillar and discovered a narrow staircase leading downward. “Did you expect something fancier? KCQ was a Psychica guild. Spells and shit weren’t our forte. We were more into—”

“—illegal moneymaking schemes?”

Aw, how cute. She was finishing my sentences. “Rigel called them innovative business ventures.”

She followed on my heels as I headed down the stairs. There were more than I expected, descending closer to two stories than one. At the bottom was a small landing and a door with a normal knob. I swung it open.

The room on the other side was an exquisitely furnished concrete cube about the size of a two-car garage and bathed in the same red glow. A semi-circular wooden desk, with a sloppy pile of folders and books strewn across it, sat at the far end. One wall was lined with shelves and cabinets, and in the nearest corner, a pair of leather sofas lounged across from each other with a low coffee table between them.

I peered at the monochromatic paintings of a human brain above the sofas, then down at the floor, which featured a lovely and rather eerie etching of a Celtic knot with a twist of smoke rising through it. Seemed Rigel had prioritized his swanky hideaway over the rest of the building’s renovations.

Lienna surveyed the space. “This is where Blue Smoke held their secret meetings?”

“That’s what Quentin said.”

“So, what’re we looking for?”

“You’re the detective.” I shrugged. “I’m betting Quentin’s already been here. Not only because the Jeffs mentioned it, but Jenkins’s reading for Quentin was about smoke too.”

“Did you know all along that the ‘smoke’ in the readings referred to Blue Smoke?”

“Never crossed my mind,” I claimed guilelessly.

She swept past me and into the middle of the room, where she assessed every detail as though expecting Rigel’s angry ghost to jump out from behind the cabinets.

“I assume Geoff and Jeff’s job was to prevent anyone from following Quentin from Jenkins’s place to this office,” I added, ambling over to the desk to study a crystal decanter with a big yellow daisy as a stopper. “And considering Rigel’s stick-up-the-ass tidiness, my guess is that Quentin made this mess too.”

“Don’t touch anything,” Lienna warned as I reached for the decanter.

“Why not? Afraid I’ll sully the scene with my criminal fingerprints?”

“Did Rigel always light his rooms with red?”

“No, but it suits the super-secretive mood of his underground lair, don’t you think? He had a flair for the dramatic.”

Frowning skeptically, she moved toward the cabinets. As she craned her neck, examining the doors and handles, I drifted back toward the center of the room. The open door beckoned.

This location, unlike Jenkins’s suburb, was far more suited to escape. I could flee east into the industrial complexes, or bolt west and disappear among the destitute and homeless population of the Eastside. Plenty of highly viable options within sprinting distance.

All I needed was for Lienna to get nice and distracted by a juicy piece of evidence.

Completing her study of the cabinets, she gingerly grasped the stainless steel handle, her spine rigid. When nothing happened, she relaxed her stance and pulled the door open.

I gave her back one of my almost-as-impressive eye rolls. I wasn’t allowed to touch anything, but she could—

The red light permeating the room vanished and a deep yellow glow ignited, faint and shimmering strangely. It emanated from the floor near the walls, and I angled my head to peer past the sofas.

A faintly glowing, butter-colored liquid the consistency of melted ice cream ran along the floor as though someone had spilled their lemonade. It spread quickly, creeping away from the wall. I stepped backward, then turned for the door. An equally glowing and creepy puddle flooded the floor in front of the only escape.

I didn’t know where the liquid was coming from, but whatever it was, there was no way it wasn’t a really bad thing.

Chapter Eight

“We should get out of here,” I suggested, containing the urge to shout it instead. My escape plans would have to wait. No way would Lienna not notice me bolting for freedom right now—plus, the way to freedom was blocked by a disturbing glowy puddle.

Rushing to my side, she scanned the spreading liquid. Two feet out from the walls and creeping toward us, it’d formed a mini lake across our path, too far to jump safely.

“Got a pen?” I asked her.

With a nervous frown at the fluid, she plucked a ballpoint pen from her satchel and passed it to me.

I tossed it into the liquid. It hit with a goopy splash—and acrid black smoke poofed upward as the plastic dissolved into a blue stain. One moment, it’d been a pen. Three seconds later, it was melted to nothing.

But that wasn’t all. With the impact of the pen, a ripple had run through the liquid—and it changed. The consistency went from gooey, sticky, slow-moving melted ice cream to the viscosity of water.

And water moves a lot faster.

I yelped in alarm as the liquid rushed toward my feet. Lienna and I collided, then scrambled backward—but the yellow substance was rushing in from all directions. Whirling, I jumped onto the coffee table. She leaped up after me, her foot landing on a glossy magazine. It slid out from under her and she pitched backward.

I caught her flailing arm and yanked her upright. She flew forward and smacked into my chest. Clutching my shirt, she looked down. So did I.

The liquid—an alchemic potion of the flesh-melting variety, by my best guess—had scarcely covered the floor just moments ago. Now it was several inches deep.

And the level was rising.

“Shit!” I hissed. “Got anything in your magic bag of tricks for this?”

She looked up at me, and my relative cool threatened to break at the fear in her face. That alone was my answer: no, her abjuration sorcery was no help here.

I spun again, still holding Lienna’s upper arms so she wouldn’t topple off the table. The potion had climbed halfway up the table legs, and though it had dissolved the pen in seconds, it had no effect on the furniture. Were the objects that belonged in the room immune to its corrosive properties? Rigel wouldn’t want his precious desk and documents eaten away—but I knew better than to assume the potion would spare our flesh.

My gaze scoured the room. Six feet of liquid between us and the door.

Guiding Lienna to the table’s other end, I released her and pushed on the sofa’s arm. If I could move it closer to the door, we could use it as a bridge to safety. But when I put some muscle into it, the table shifted instead. Lienna jolted, arms waving for balance.

“Damn it,” I snarled. “What—”

“Kit!” She pointed. The corrosive potion was lapping at the bottom edge of the tabletop we stood on. How was it filling the room so fast? It should’ve been impossible without a fire-hydrant-quality pump!