Stopping at a red light, she cast me an arch look. “Is your masculinity threatened by the teensy-weensy car?”

“My masculinity is threatened by this dashboard, which my knees will go right through if you hit the brakes too hard.”

“We’re keeping a low profile. We can’t have the general public knowing that ‘magic police’ exist and patrol the streets. Where am I going?”

“Kitsilano area,” I informed her. Had I refused to divulge a location until I was out of the precinct? Damn right I had.

The light turned, and Lienna accelerated just as a jackass truck blew through the intersection. Standard Vancouver driving. Lienna and three other drivers chastised the truck with honks, then we all went on our merry way.

“How do you expect to chase after bad guys in this thing?” I asked, picking up where we’d left off.

“I don’t. A low profile and car chases are also incompatible. We’re not Steve McQueen.”

I gasped dramatically. “Did you just make a classic film reference? Are you flirting with me?”

She rolled her eyes. “I’m just trying to speak your language.”

Not bothering with subtlety, I studied her. Was it my imagination, or was the stern Agent Shen looking more relaxed? Now that we were out of the precinct—and out from under Blythe’s omnipresent shadow—the tension around her mouth had softened, and the lingering hint of pink in her cheeks from my not-quite-a-striptease brightened her complexion.

Her eyes flicked to mine, deep brown and lit by a lively, mysterious glint—until they narrowed suspiciously.

“What?” she demanded.

Diversion tactics, commence. “You’re from LA, right?”

She faced the road again. “Yes.”

“Why are you still in Vancouver? Don’t you have a job to get back to? Criminal mythics in California to tackle to the floor?”

“I had a flight booked for tomorrow, but after the incident at the precinct, the captain requested I stay to provide support.”

“Captain Blythe doesn’t seem like the type to request things.”

Lienna answered with a grunt. Did I detect a note of bitterness, mayhap?

“She’s making you stay,” I guessed.

“The Vancouver MPD is critically understaffed. Captain Blythe needs the help.”

“Is that why she has you leading the manhunt for Quentin?”

Lienna flexed her jaw as though considering whether to answer. “I’m the most qualified agent available. I’m technically on the Rogue Response team in Los Angeles.”

Technically on the team? Interesting.

“Ooh, fancy,” I teased. “You must have a trophy room full of taxidermied mythic bad guys back home.”

“I can’t say I’ve ever taxidermied anyone. I’m still a rookie.”

“Don’t be so modest. How many rogues have you caught?”

“Including you?”

I nodded. “Yeah, sure.”

She held her breath as she calculated the number in her head, then exhaled. “One.”

“One?”

“Just you.”

I couldn’t hide my surprise. “What?”

“I transferred into the RR a week ago. Apprehending you at LAX was my first assignment.”

No wonder her interrogation skills were kind of green. “Well, as your very first arrest, I can say you did a lovely job.”

“Very funny.”

“I’m serious. Five stars. Best incarceration service I’ve received so far.”

All I got in response was another eye roll—but the corner of her mouth might have ticked upward. Watching her in my peripheral vision, I considered what I knew and what I’d heard. Something wasn’t adding up.

“If you’re only a week in and I was your first arrest,” I began carefully, “where does your reputation come from? Half the precinct was buzzing about the newly arrived abjuration prodigy, and that was before you went all Dirty Harry during the riot.”

She shrugged. Before I could try another angle of questioning, I had to direct her on where to turn. I navigated her through the neighborhood, and a few minutes later, she pulled the smart car up to the curb, cut the engine, and looked around curiously.

We were parked on a narrow road south of Kitsilano Beach. A mix of sleek, modern homes and old, behemoth multi-story residences hid behind towering maple trees. Across the street was a skinny, two-level house with a hand-painted sign that boasted, “Kitsilano Klairvoyant.”

“We’re here,” I announced unnecessarily, then squeezed out of the car and tugged my clothes straight. Lienna joined me, her hand buried in her satchel like an Old Western Sheriff gripping his pistol as she faced the sign. Her forehead wrinkled with skepticism.

I crossed the street and walked onto the creaky front porch, Lienna following on my heels.

Quentin came here whenever he had an important decision to make. He liked mystical confirmation before entering new, risky ventures—and he liked to rule out any mystical portents of “do that and you might die.” I’d come along a few times, and I kind of got the appeal.

It wasn’t that unreasonable to assume he’d show up fresh out of jail, seeking guidance. If I was correct, it would play right into my leniency deal with Captain Blythe. And if I was wrong? Oh well. It’d gotten me out of the precinct, away from all but a single agent, and into a magic-suppressing necklace that was far easier to remove than magic-suppressing handcuffs.

Stifling a smile, I hit the doorbell, and a chime rang through the house’s interior.

Visible through the frosted glass, the shadow of a tall, slender figure approached. The door opened, revealing Jansen Jenkins, the Kitsilano Klairvoyant. Technically speaking, Jenkins was a diviner—a mythic who used various tools and rituals to predict the future. Or as Jenkins put it, to “translate messages from the spirit world.”

A clairvoyant was something else entirely, but he called himself one as a marketing gimmick. He was one of a very few mythics who used magic in full view of the general public without revealing the true and full nature of his abilities. It was a fine line to walk, but he walked it well.

At Jenkins’s appearance, Lienna’s expression shifted to surprise. Diviner stereotypes consisted of eccentric, heavily accessorized women with an affinity for colorful silk scarves, but Jenkins was in his fifties, well over six feet tall, beanpole thin, and sported a long, pointed nose and a short, conservative haircut. With his white dress shirt, neatly tucked into his black dress pants, he resembled an English butler more than a West Coast fortune teller.

He looked us both up and down with his typical reserved expression, then offered me the faintest smile. “You’re Quentin’s friend.”

“Kit,” I reminded him.

“And you are?” he asked Lienna.

She flashed me a vaguely alarmed look as though just realizing she had no idea why we were here or what our strategy was supposed to be, then plucked her badge from her satchel and held it up like a shield. “Agent Lienna Shen.”

Should I have warned her that her badge and agent title would get her approximately nowhere with this guy? Probably—and yet, I had no regrets about failing to do so.

A sour look squeezed Jenkins’s face. “And what business does MagiPol have here? Unless you’ve come for a reading?”