“My Gran preferred I stuck up for myself,” I said. “Especially against bullies.”

Missy pushed to her feet, using that wretched stick, her eyes on me even as she spoke to Hattie. With a bit of a hobble, she walked around the table, keeping it between us as though she didn’t want to be any closer to me than I did to her.

“I’ll ring you tomorrow, Hattie. We can finish our conversation then,” Missy said. I watched as Hattie visibly withered under her gaze.

“Of course. I’ll be here.” Hattie waited until Missy was gone before blowing out a slow breath and lowering herself into one of the folding chairs. I matched her movements, moving carefully so as to not knock over the rickety table that was holding up the pitcher of sweet tea.

“Have some.” Hattie waved a hand at the pitcher.

“Missy probably poisoned it while you were getting the door,” I said with a laugh. Hattie didn’t laugh with me.

Instead, she poured a glass for herself and then poured it onto the grass. A hiss rose through the air, smoke curling from the liquid. My jaw dropped. “I was just kidding. Hattie, you can’t let her come back!” What the hell had happened since Gran had died to put these two at such odds?

Again, she waved a hand at me. “This is not new. She wants me to agree with her, and I don’t. She’s getting desperate if she’s using . . . well, again, never mind. Tell me why you’re here. What brought you home?” Her face changed in an instant, lighting up. “I’ve missed you, more since your gran passed . . .” She closed her eyes and a tear leaked out of one, sliding down her cheek.

I sighed and tried not to get caught up in my own emotions. “I’m divorced. And I had nowhere else to go.” And it was time to come home. I didn’t say that, but I knew it in my gut.

“The city called to you.” She bobbed her head, then leaned back in her chair, which made me tense. They were the same chairs that I remembered from my last visits, over two decades ago, and they’d been cheap then. “This is home.”

I nodded. “Hattie, I’ve got a job, but I could use some guidance.”

“Tell me, darling girl,” she said. “Tell me.”

So, I did. I told her about Himself, everything he’d taken from me, and his plan to sell Gran’s house. I told her about staying with Corb, the interview with Hollows Group, and the crappy weapons.

She listened quietly through it all, letting me vent. I finally ran out of steam, and she pursed her lips, no doubt wondering just what I’d gotten myself into.

“And you want my advice?” She tipped her head to one side.

“I . . . yes, if you have advice.” Truth was I wasn’t sure that was why I’d come. Maybe I’d just needed a friend I could trust. Gran had loved Hattie like a sister.

“The Hollows Group . . . they are dangerous. Not to the world, mind you, but to their own. They tend to have short life spans.” Her eyes locked on mine. “Dangerous, Breena, and you need to think twice about getting tangled up with them. My advice would be to go, maybe to Charleston if you want to stay in the South, but don’t stay here. Something is happening to this town that makes it more of a war zone than ever before.”

I put a hand on my bag, thinking of what I’d seen and done so far, and how I felt about it. Gerry’s words came back to me. “I heard rumblings from someone else that something is going down.”

Her eyes darted away and then back to me. “Demons, girl. Someone is bringing demons to Savannah.”

The urge to vomit rolled right up through my belly to the back of my mouth. Gran and I had covered demons in a very simple manner. Do not call on them for help, do not bring them to this side of the veil, and do not make deals with them. They were the harbingers of all that was wrong with the world, infecting people with their hatred and generally piss-poor mojo.

I swallowed hard. “Why would anyone do that?”

She shook her head slowly, and touched the top of her hair, pushing it down a little. “Power. Demons can act as a battery for some spells.” She almost seemed to be talking to herself and she shook her head. “Not that you need to know that.” Hattie waved a hand at me. “You should leave. It’s not safe, and your gran would want me to tell you the same.”

I snorted. “Gran trained me for the shadow world, Hattie. You of all people know that.”

Her eyes softened with something akin to pity. “Twenty years ago, I’d have agreed with you.”

Those words were like a slap in the face, a bathtub full of ice water, or a smack from Missy’s stick. My reaction was sharp. I stood up. “I’ve been getting that garbage from a heck of a lot of people, Hattie. I’d expect better from you.”

I turned and headed out around the side of the house. No need to go through it and get that fish oil up my nose again.

“Breena, wait.” Hattie followed me. “I want you to be safe. There comes a point where you have to understand that you aren’t twenty anymore. That you can’t do it all.”

I knew in my heart she meant well.

But I wasn’t ready to just . . . give up on life because I was too old. I grimaced. “Thanks, Hattie.”

Her hand touched my wrist, turning me back to her. “Wait . . . did your gran leave you anything? A note, something?”

I shook my head. “She left me the house, Hattie, but that rat bastard took it from me.”

Hattie sighed. “If she could, I’m sure she’d tell you to walk away. To be safe.”

“I spent the last twenty years walking away, being safe.” I pulled out of her hand, and spread my arms wide. “And look where that got me.”

A divorce.

Buckets of debt.

No job.

And a fear that I’d let my life slip by me.

My inner voice agreed with me. Being safe had done me no good. Time to get a little reckless.

Outside of Hattie’s place, I dug around in my bag until I found the card Bob-John had given me.

The Smiths

66 Factors Row

“Not ominous at all,” I muttered to myself as I headed back toward the riverfront. I turned back once to see Hattie watch me go with sorrowful eyes. I lifted a hand to her, and she blew me a kiss. So at least there were no hard feelings. I shouldn’t have been shocked that she’d tried to talk me into leaving. Of the three friends, she’d always been the most timid. It was Gran and Missy who used to butt heads over sweet tea and discussions about how best to use this herb or speak that spell.

Factors Row took me in behind the buildings on River Street. Restaurants and tourist shops filled the upper level, bridged with wide walkways and paths that created a sort of ceiling above Factors Row. The lower level, tucked beneath the boardwalk? Well, that was a different story. Needless to say, there were no nice tourist shops there. I hurried down a set of stone stairs that were narrow, steep, and probably a couple of hundred years old.

I gripped the iron railing as I went down. I was not falling.

“Hurry up!” someone barked from behind me. I came to a complete stop and looked over my shoulder at a man who was probably in his early twenties. Swarthy skin, earrings running up one side, and more tattoos than I could count.

“Hurry up, old lady,” he barked again, and this time I turned around completely.

I had no weapons per se, but let’s be honest, I didn’t need a weapon to deal with this little idiot. I took a step down, then another and another, taking my time. “Bless your heart, you aren’t from around here, are you?”

“Nope. Now move it. I’m late.”

“Lack of planning on your part does not constitute an emergency on mine,” I drawled, letting the Southern twang I’d grown up with slide back into my voice. Right where it belonged.

I smiled as I reached the bottom, and he pushed by me, using his shoulder to give me a parting shove. I braced my legs wider than necessary, and he caught a foot on one of my ankles and did a stumbling dance down the cobblestones until he couldn’t hold his balance any longer and fell flat on his ass, skidding across the stones.

“Hurrying is bad around here. Take your time, breathe it in.” I waved a hand over my shoulder as he cussed me out.

Such language. I grinned and put a few of the more creative curses aside for later usage.

But now that meant I had to focus on where I was.

The sloped cobblestone path wrapped down and around the back of the big riverfront buildings. Despite the number of people on the river road, there were very few down here.

Pretty much none. I had a feeling that “The Smiths” would not be on the usual tour guide route. If what I remembered was right, there was magic around some places to keep the unseeing away. Unseeing. The words floated to me on a cloud of memories.

Humans who couldn’t see those in the shadows were called the unseeing. Which constituted most of the population. Those who had magic in their bloodlines could have the veil lifted and the shadows would show themselves. Like me. And of course, the other recruits.

My thoughts distracted me for a moment until I let myself see Factors Row, really see it.

The bright spring day didn’t look so bright as I stared down the shadowy, wet alley that led away from the main thoroughfare. I’d been here before with my gran, but it had been a long time ago.

What had it been for? Hadn’t she needed a repair of some sort to one of her cast iron spelling pots? I vaguely remembered it as though the memory was just out of reach.

I started down the cobblestone opening that was just wide enough for a single vehicle to drive—if you were very careful—checking the numbers on the buildings when I could. Not every door was numbered, not every building had doors.

“62,” I muttered, my fingers brushing against the nearly rusted-over digits hanging crooked on the brick building. The next door was boarded up and had been for a long time. But the address after that was 67. I backed up to the boarded door. No sign, no number.

I closed my eyes, thinking back to that memory with Gran. I’d been younger than ten, and I could just see the edge of a proper door, of which this was not. Of course, a lot of things could happen in thirty years.