Dark Union (The Descent Series) Read Online Free PDF Page A

McIntyre asked again, “What’s wrong, Kavanagh?”
    “Nothing,” she said, trying to blank her mind before her stress drew James’s attention again. Elise also wasn’t going to discuss the quarantine with McIntyre. Not with anyone. She changed subjects. “So you still talk to half the kopides in the hemisphere, right? What does everyone know about me? Do they know I’m back?”
    “The word is that some new kopis has taken over in Reno, but nobody knows who it is. Nobody except me. So it’s not like anybody’s going to expect to see you at the summit.”
    “What if someone does recognize me?” she asked.
    “Then we’re fucked, and we deal with it.” McIntyre finished his beer and sighed. “I should curl up with the wife for a couple hours. She gets pissy if I stay up long. I’ve got all the stuff I emailed stuck in this binder, if you want to catch up.”
    “I’ll read it.”
    “Summit check-in starts at eight, and it’s three hours out of here, so you guys should probably be out of here by five. You can take Tish’s car. Keys are on the hook.” He stood and stretched. “Good to have you back, Kavanagh.”
    McIntyre disappeared into the bedroom.
    Instead of reading the binder, she checked his refrigerator. They were short on food, but there was another six pack of beer on the shelf. She grabbed a bottle and sat on the front step with the agenda clutched in one hand.
    She kept reading the first line over and over. Each time she did, she felt queasier.
    But she wasn’t sure if it was nerves, or something else. The mobile home buzzed around her with the residue of powerful magic. That was no surprise—Leticia was a witch, after all, and her pregnancy had probably limited her to casting all her spells at home. Elise wasn’t used to being able to feel that much magic.
    In the silent darkness, Elise had nothing to distract her from James’s thoughts, so she tentatively prodded him. He would have been able to interpret the magic she was feeling. But he had somehow managed to fall asleep, and was dreaming of cabins in Colorado. She was alone.
    She got through the entire six pack before sunrise.

IV
    M orning came too soon. Elise loaded Leticia’s car before Anthony woke up, and they left with the sunrise. He read the notes on the summit as they headed north toward Silver Wells. They couldn’t pick up any radio stations in the middle of the state, and the tape deck didn’t work, so there was nothing else to do on the long drive.
    After a couple hours of driving, the sun rose, the inside of the car grew hot, and the air conditioner started to give up. Anthony’s forehead shone with sweat when he finally set down the binder. “This isn’t going to work. I’m not a kopis. You’re not a witch.”
    “Nobody needs to know that,” Elise said. Her head ached from too much beer and not enough breakfast.
    “What if they want you to cast a spell?”
    “Most witches don’t have James’s ability to do magic in a heartbeat—Leticia can’t cast spells without crystals and chanting and hours of preparation. If I need to do a spell, I’ll wave my hands and speak Latin. It’ll be fine.”
    Anthony shook the page with the schedule on it. “I have to go to meetings. I have to mediate .”
    “It’s easy,” Elise said. “You’re just there to break up fights.”
    “Fights between the most powerful angels and demons on Earth? Yeah, no way that’s going to go wrong.”
    Her response was interrupted by the car’s sputtering as they mounted a hill.
    The dashboard lights turned off. The engine died.
    Elise swore as she steered the gliding car onto the side of the road. Gravel pinged off the windshield.
    Once they stopped, she popped the hood, and Anthony got out to check the engine.
    “Nice of the McIntyre’s to send us with a lemon,” she said, leaning against the bumper beside him. The heat radiated through her jeans.
    After a moment, Anthony straightened, wiping oil onto his jeans. “I don’t know