Ilona Andrews

"You may call me Dr. Doolittle," he said. "I've sailed through the night and day, in and out of weeks, to where the wild things are and now I'm their private physician."

“Yeah. Rambo called, he wants his bandana back.”

“This Rambo, he a friend of yours?”

“Who’s Rambo?” Julie asked

Her face fell. “You’re not my mom. You can’t tell me what to do,” she said finally, but her tone signaled the end of the argument.

“I’m a substitute mom,” I told her.

“You’re more like a crazy aunt who only gets called when somebody needs bailing out of jail,” Derek said

Er. I was sitting atop the Beast Lord in my underwear, holding a knife to his throat. What the hell was my next move?

“When I’m with him, I can feel myself getting better. It’s like he’s picking up broken pieces of me and putting me back together, and I don’t even know how he’s doing it. We never talk about it. We don’t go to therapy. He just loves me and that’s enough.”

“He said he’s coming with us. I thought that was your idea.”

“What?”

“He said it was decided.”

“It is.” Doolittle came up the ladder. “I decided it.”

“He killed a man,” Mom said.

“He was framed,” Grandma Frida said.

“You don’t even know the story,” Mom said.

Grandma shrugged. “Framed. A man that pretty can’t be a murderer.”

Mother stared at her.

“Penelope, I’m seventy-two years old. You let me enjoy my fantasy.”

“Go Grandma.” Arabella pumped her fist in the air.

“Dear God, Connor, that was a ten-million-dollar house.”

He shrugged. “I found it cathartic. Would you like some coffee

Establish a common ground. Remind him who you are. “Where is the swing?” she asked. It had been the favorite hangout of the Rogan kids. That’s where they’d gone when he’d had to ask her advice, back when he was twelve and she’d been the cool older cousin Kelly, twenty and wise in all things teenager.

“It’s still there. The oaks grew and you can’t see it from the balcony.” Connor turned, set her cup in front of her, and sat down

If Connor decided he wanted her dead, her magic, what little of it there was, wouldn’t be enough to stop him.

Connor was the culmination of three generations of careful marriages aimed at bolstering the family’s magic and connections. He was supposed to have been a worthy successor to the fortune of House Rogan. Much like her, he hadn’t turned out the way his parents had planned