New Thea and Max novella!

Shock of shocks, I'm actually writing a new Thea and Max novella! The working title is "Love and Other Suitably Villainous Schemes," and here's a sneak peek at the first chapter!

(Thea and Max book one) (Thea and Max book two)

000

Chapter 1: Not Exactly an Invitation

Having a super-spy boyfriend was not at all like the movies made it seem.

For the most part, Thea loved it that way. She vastly preferred their monster-movie nights to dinner in uncomfortably expensive restaurants, and she'd almost entirely broken him of trying to be suave around her. He did tend toward ridiculously dramatic gifts, but he preferred tiger lilies and stuffed video game characters over expensive jewelry and sexy dresses she would never wear.

She wasn't thrilled about the fact that she hardly ever saw him, but she could hardly argue against someone being dedicated to their job. His assignments being far away from her did mean she was in far less physical danger than the usual spy girlfriend. (When she was being sensible, which was less often than she should be these days, she could admit it was a good thing.)

Of course, dating a super-spy did mean dealing with a certain bouts of movie-like absurdity. Say, like when they're trying to surprise you with a long-planned vacation.

Thea blinked at her boss. "An absurdly wealthy, conveniently secretive Italian philanthropist called you." She recapped his explanation in her flattest tone, hoping the sheer impossibility would somehow penetrate the man's brain. She may have been short, with dark skin and curls pulled back into a sensible ponytail, but she'd had a lot of sarcasm practice. "In person, instead of having one of their 10,000 assistants do it. Asking for some random Chicago computer security specialist to fly to Rome to work on some unspecified, open-ended project. He will not only pay for all this, including a per-diem fee that will turn next year's taxes into a nightmare, but he's also planning on spiriting this random specialist around in his private jet."

Charles Porter, whose face could be used as a stock photo for middle managers, frowned at her. "He didn't ask for some random specialist. He asked for you."

Thea didn't bother biting back her exasperated noise. She was absolutely going to say yes to this, because she had no doubt Max was behind this. But the idea that the man didn't see anything even slightly suspicious about this was concerning on several levels. "You do remember we've had armed gunmen in the building before, right? One of our apps was used to fund terrorism?"

Porter shook his head before she'd even finished speaking, making a dismissive gesture. "That's a non-issue. We have had several staff training sessions to deal with those incidents, and if Signor Donato wanted access to our tech he could buy it for far less money than he's buying your services. He's also already paid us a very generous consultation fee, and our financial department has already looked it over. It's 100 percent legitimate."

Thea frowned. Dangling money in front of Porter was an excellent way to get him to overlook any potential weirdness about the setup, but it was also excessive. When he'd gotten her out to Ohio for their last sort-of mission, he'd arranged it through a far subtler application of paperwork and backdated emails. This was just so much less... clever. "I didn't know the company received a consultation fee when it lent out my services."

His gaze slid away from hers as he pretended to mess with something on his computer. "Technically, we don't. Before you, no one had ever requested the services of anyone on our staff." His expression firmed as a thought hit him, and he turned back to give her a pointed look. "Though if this continues, rest assured we will work this into official company policy. It seems Mr. Bascom is friends with several other philanthropists, and was satisfied enough with your work earlier this year that he passed your name around."

It took a second to remember that Mr. Bascom was the name Max had given their fictional Ohio philanthropist. She had no doubt that Max's spy agency (which he also referred to as The Company) had given the man a full online profile, and he'd probably arranged for them to do the same thing with Alessandro Donato. The Italian version of the story was considerably more ridiculous than the Ohio version of the story, but there was precedent. She supposed it made sense that no one but her would get suspicious.

Though she should really talk to Max about setting up some kind of workshop for management: "The Benefits of Healthy Paranoia on the Corporate Bottom Line."

Porter glared, clearly having decided she'd been silent too long. "I don't know why you're arguing about this. Your team is wrapping up your most recent project, and while I am unfortunately aware that you like to be the last person to sign off on everything you can do that remotely. This will boost your reputation far more than it will ours, and the money alone would be stupid to turn down." He paused. "And if you don't, I will ban you from the office for two weeks."

Thea bit back several potential arguments to that last bit, knowing it wouldn't help anything. Besides, continuing this conversation would delay the far more important one she needed to have with Max. "I guess I'm saying yes, then." She gave him a dry look. "I had no chance against such a compelling argument."

Porter ignored the sarcasm, rapidly hitting a few keys on his computer. "There. All the information is in your inbox, including the address of his private airstrip and a number you can call if you want a limo to take you there. He'll pick you up personally tomorrow afternoon, because apparently he 'doesn't do mornings.'"

It took real effort for Thea not to roll her eyes, leaving the office with the minimum amount of required politeness. She checked her email on the way out, which also included check-in information for a penthouse suite in an expensive-looking hotel and, for some reason, photos of the private jet. Taken together, it felt more like a haphazard sales pitch than a well-built cover.

Frowning even harder now, she slipped into her office and shut the door. Putting her regular phone back into her pocket, she pulled out the one she used exclusively for talking to a certain jet-setting individual who could be anywhere in the world right now. Normally she waited for Max to reach out to her, since the last thing she wanted to do was interrupt him when it would be dangerous. But there was something about this...

Hopefully, the Company made sure he had voicemail.

Taking a deep breath, she hit the contact that would connect her directly to him. He picked up after only one ring, voice tired but warm as the best blanket. "Hey, beautiful. Calling to save me from my insomnia?"

Thea paused. This was the Max she'd come to know over the last several months. More theatrical than was at all sensible – she could not get him to stop calling her beautiful – but also wonderfully genuine. She'd asked him not to put on a persona when he was with her, and he'd done everything in his power to hold to that.

The thought that had nudged at her since Carter's office sharpened into a knife – the whole Italian philanthropist cover story wasn't his style at all.

Which meant it was someone else's cover story.

Once again, she'd been silent too long. "Thea?" Max sounded far more awake now, a grim edge to her voice. "Something's wrong. Tell me."

Great – now she was worrying him. "I don't suppose someone from your Company set me up to go to Rome?" She hated how uncertain she sounded. "Someone relatively inexperienced, maybe?"

Max went deathly silent for a moment. "They wouldn't do anything with you D or I didn't know about." A dangerous edge was slipping into his voice, but she knew it wasn't aimed at her. "And if D planned something without telling me, you wouldn't think it was an amateur."

Thea thought about the grandmotherly, leather-clad weapons expert who was Max's usual partner. "It's definitely not D," she murmured, as much to herself as at Max. She ran back through the information she'd been given, trying to look at it the way she would have if she hadn't thought Max had set it up. "Has a man named Alessandro Donato popped up in the Company files anywhere? Even just as a possible connection to something?"

For the first time – she was such an idiot – she went to her computer and looked up Donato. A quick search showed a reclusive multimillionaire just like Carter had described him, camera-shy but with his name attached to several charity projects and non-profits. The few shots of him that had been caught at events matched the professional shot Carter had shown her, a distinguished-looking man a few years older than her who wouldn't look out of place on the cover of a romance novel.

In short, not someone who would have anything to do with her.

"I can't find the name anywhere in our system," Max said finally, the frustration clear in his voice. "But that doesn't mean anything. We're a small agency, and no matter how well-connected we are there are things we miss."

"The big question, though, is what interest he would have with me." The question didn't frighten her nearly as much as it should have, even though the answer couldn't be good. She'd rather deal with some rich guy's nefarious plans any day than be in a world where she didn't know Max as well as she thought she did. "I can think of a handful of people already in Europe who are as good at security as I am, and possibly a few who are better. And even if he somehow knows about my hacking, I'm sure there are better people he can afford. There is no reason for him to fly all that way in his private jet to come get me."

"Private—" Max cut himself off with brutal efficiency, and the quiet that immediately followed was filled with the sound of movement. "I'm coming to you. I'll be there by tomorrow morning, your time, at the absolute latest."

It was completely unnecessary, and more than she would have ever dared ask of him. It was exactly what she'd wanted him to say. "There's no way the assignment you're on conveniently happens to be done right when I need you."

The sound of movement didn't slow down in the slightest. "I'll have M come in and wrap things up for me. She owes me a favor."

Her logic fiercely tried to argue with the increasing pounding of her heart. "You shouldn't come out here. If you're serious about helping me with this, you'd get here just to have to immediately turn around and fly out to Rome."

"Not if you let me get on the plane with you. Pass me off as your assistant."

She made an exasperated noise. "Actual tech people don't have assistants, and I don't want to risk Donato knowing that and leaving you out on the tarmac."

She could practically feel his tension through the phone. "You'll be alone—"

She'd never had anyone worry about her the way Max did. "He won't try anything on the plane," she said gently, cutting him off. "Whatever he needs me for, it'll involve letting me spend time with his servers."

He was silent for a long moment. "Tell them you want to hire your own security," he said finally, voice still tight. "Make up whatever reason you think he'll believe. I can't go with you on the plane because he'll see it as an insult, but I'll meet you the second you get to Rome."

Her chest tightened. "What if this just turns out to be some run-of-the-mill corporate crime? Won't you get—?"

"Thea." It was his turn to cut her off, soft but oh-so-serious. "There is no way I'm letting you do this alone."

Thea swallowed. "Thank you."

"Always." He let out a breath. "Stay safe. I will be there the second you land."

Even after they said their goodbyes, Thea held onto the phone a little more tightly than it would be at all safe to admit to. Making herself put it back in her pocket, she squared her shoulders and went to work.

She had some research to do.

#

"Come on, T." Max paced back and forth across his hotel room, feeling like a caged animal. He'd been packed and ready to go for an hour now, had all the necessary background for his security cover set up and ready to go, and had three different potential modes of transportation for whenever he could get out of here. Until R checked in and officially took over his current assignment, however, none of that was going to do him the slightest bit of good.

R was taking far too long to check in. "You have to have something on the guy! Rich people can't go 24 hours without committing some kind of crime!"

T sighed. "We can't exactly pick him up for tax fraud, Max." The Company's main tech expert was definitely trying to use the dad voice he'd perfected with his own brood of adopted rugrats. "And without a full deep dive into his system, which I'm sure Thea is going to want to do herself, I can't even confirm that much."

He couldn't punch anything. It would only slow him down more if he punched something. "Then why reach out to Thea? You saw that he's been handling his security in-house for the last several years, and she's right when she says there are more glamorous experts that would be further up his list! Finding her would take research!"

"And if he did that research, he'd know she’s one of the best."

"Yes, but once he talks to her for five minutes he'll realize she is incredibly suspicious and not about to fall for whatever scheme he's planning!" There were so many things you could do to someone on a plane midflight. Most of them ended by throwing the person out an open hatch. "Whatever he thinks she's going to do for him, she's actually going to make his life a living hell."

He'd run straight into Thea's refusal to go with the program back when they first met, and it turned out to be the best thing that had ever happened to him. But he ran into plenty of people on this job who preferred to solve their complications by killing them, and the thought of Thea alone with one of those kind of people turned his chest into ice.

And the thought of her alone with another professional charmer, who might end up just as enchanted with her as Max was...

He was knocked out of his thoughts when he realized T had been quiet far too long. "You've thought of something, and you're pretty sure I'm not going to like it." Max took a deep breath. "Tell me."

T still took a few moments to respond. "Donato is a notoriously private man, but he wasn't quite as careful about it in his younger years." There was something careful in his voice, like he knew he was delivering bad news. "And one thing the gossip sites all picked up on is that he only dates women in tech."

Max pulled the phone away from his ear long enough to scowl at it properly. "And this helps me how?"

He hesitated again. "Maybe this guy really is just trying to ask her—"

Max cut him off, not wanting to hear it out loud. "I knew what you were trying to say, T! That's not what I'm worried about!"

But that... might be part of the reason he was so desperate to get out there. It felt like he and Thea had barely gotten started on a real relationship, mostly because he was always out on assignment. He knew Thea cared about him, but if this Donato guy had the good sense to start acting genuine he was a lot more attractive a package than Max was. He'd even managed to take Thea to Rome before Max had, damn it.

A part of him couldn't help but feel like it would be really convenient if Donato was guilty of something. Another part wanted Donato to be just the rich idiot he looked like, because otherwise Thea was flying straight into danger without him. If something happened to her, it would kill him.

"Listen, maybe this is something you should talk to Thea about." The cajoling edge to T's voice would have been deeply annoying if Max hadn't had so much else to worry about. "I'm not saying there's not something suspicious about this guy, but I think it'll be easier to focus if you're not worried about the... emotional aspects of all this."

Max actually considered it for a second, which was proof of just how much of an effect Thea had on him. No matter how he spun it, though, he couldn't see any way it wouldn't make things worse. "Best case scenario, she only gets exasperated about the fact that I'm a jealous idiot instead of full-on hitting me in the face. Worst case scenario, which is the far more likely one, she is incredibly hurt that I took her genuine worry and made it all about my own stupid insecurities."

T sighed again. "Okay, you have a point there. Maybe we could—" He cut off abruptly, and when he spoke again his voice had gone strange. "D's calling me."

Max winced. "I don't suppose there's any chance you could hold her off for, say, 24 hours?"

"Sorry." T sounded genuinely sympathetic, but that wasn't going to be a lot of help to him. "She's a lot scarier than you are."

There was a murmur on the other end of the phone, probably T telling D that he was transferring Max, then the slightest shift in background noise and the cultured British tones of his second favorite person in the world. "Max, really."

Max pinched the bridge of his nose. He'd absolutely planned on reaching out to D, but he'd wanted to wait until he had at least some idea of what was actually going on. "I was going to loop you in on this, I swear it."

"When, exactly?" He could hear her arched eyebrow. "After you'd upset one of the most delightful women I've ever met by turning this into a particularly absurd romantic comedy, or after you've gotten yourself shot by completely missing the fact that this might be about you?"

He had an argument ready well before she'd finished talking. "Don’t try to tell me that things like this actually happen outside of romance novels and spy gambits, which is why this is especially..." The words trailed off as his brain finished processing the rest of what he'd just said. "Wait. You think this is about me?"

D gave an exaggerated sigh. "Max, darling, I know you're smarter than this." Her voice turned chiding. "As delightful as our Thea is, I agree that this seems like something more from our world than a romance novelist's. And as such, you are a far more likely target than she is."

Max went cold. "Someone found out how attached I am," he breathed. "And is trying to use her to get to me." Horrifying possibilities spun through his thoughts. "I need to—"

"Max." The word was urgent enough to cut through the panic spiral. "That is not what I meant, and I will admit that my frustration meant I did not think through my approach nearly as well as I should have. Thea will be fine, and there is no reason for you to do any of the three or four shades of potentially stupid things we both know you're capable of."

Max made himself inhale. It was the only way to argue properly. "How exactly is she fine? If this is somehow a plan to target me, then I have screwed up enough that random bad guys know that I will do anything for—"

"Or maybe they know she's the head tech person at the app company that cracked open an enormous terrorist funding operation, and they assume she's the one who brought it to the Company's attention? They may not be trying to target you specifically, but that will not make you be any less dead if they succeed."

Max closed his eyes, making himself actually breathe this time. "That just makes it even more important that I'm there, because if that is what's going on then she's still in danger from something we did."

D made a frustrated noise. "Will you at least promise me you'll think about being careful? And for the love of good scotch, will you tell me where I need to be to help keep you both alive through this mess?"

The knot in his chest eased a little. "I'll be as close to Thea as humanely possible, which means I won't be in position to express my displeasure with any randomly placed snipers."

She let out a breath. "I would be thrilled to take over that responsibility for you. You will also keep your earbud in your ear, so I can rush to your assistance on the off chance someone tries to kill you in a server room or someplace else equally inconvenient."

"I can agree to that." Max tried to keep his voice light, but he couldn't quite manage it. His hand tightened on the phone. "But if this really is my fault..."

"Max." D's voice was as gentle as he'd ever heard it. "Thea knows how dangerous your life is, and she keeps walking into it open-eyed. If you want proof of that, you were quite literally the reason she was in danger in Ohio and she still insisted on being there. When you gave her the chance to get out, she didn't take it."

His throat closed up, remembering. "And if I told her I was panicking about this, she would absolutely kick my ass."

"Yes, she would. One of her most charming qualities." D’s voice warmed. "And if you make sure to watch your own back while you're watching hers, I will do you the immense favor of not passing any of this on to Thea. She's normally a wonderfully logical woman, but I suspect that she would decide my theory meant she was putting you in danger."

Max winced at the thought. "She'd try to keep me away." He'd come up with as many alternate cover stories as he needed to, but no one was quite as good at puncturing his cover stories as she was. "Which would make it a lot harder for me to protect her."

"And neither of you would be thinking clearly, which would make things that much more stressful for me." The background noises picked up briefly on D's end, and it hit him suddenly that it sounded like she was at an airport. "And, though it hasn't occurred to you to ask me yet, I will also reach out to my contacts for some of that juicier underground gossip T wouldn't think to look for."

"Thank you." His chest warmed. "You know, you might actually beat me to Rome."

He could hear her smile. "Well, I wasn't about to let you do this alone." There was a pause. "Speaking of you leaving for Rome, R's tracker suggests that she is currently lingering outside your hotel. There's a chance she's run into trouble, but it's far more likely she's trying to express her displeasure at you for cutting her vacation short."

Max growled at the thought. She owed him. "Quick question – how much trouble will I get in if I kill R?"

"While I do sympathize, she won't be able to take over your assignment if you kill her. The frustration of finding another replacement would certainly outweigh any potential satisfaction."

Max swore, realizing she was right, and grabbed his bag. "Then I should still say goodbye. I have to go not-quite kill a coworker and get on a plane."

D laughed. "Have fun with that, darling. I'll see you soon."

Shoving the phone back into his pocket, Max hurried downstairs to solve the most immediate of his long list of problems.

New Story: Belief

Inspired by this tumblr post

000

I was pulled into the human realm in a haze of fire and butchered Latin just barely accurate enough to make the summoning hold.

The human who'd called me forth wore an expensive tie and the thwarted expression of someone who had been told no for the first time. When I fully appeared in the circle, wings held tight against me to keep them from brushing the boundaries, he immediately stalked forward and demanded that a business rival meet a bloody end. He had not even done the necessary research to summon the correct demon – wrath demons enjoyed causing death, though they often included their summoner in their kill count.

I was a keeper of forbidden knowledge, which meant I could have told him his rival's passwords and secret bank accounts. I could have provided him with blackmail material that would have ensured the other man's end just as thoroughly as death. I could see the secrets of my summoner just as clearly, the lies and secret crimes—

As the last bit of knowledge unfolded in my head, I looked down for the first time. There was a woman in the circle with me, staked to the ground with a nail gun and bleeding from a wound in her stomach. I could see her secrets as well, the desperation of her recent joblessness and the slowly creeping dread of someone realizing they worked for a powerful monster. I had felt it more than once over the centuries from those who summoned me, but here she was clearly meant to be a sacrifice of some kind. Ancient truths, bastardized by years of misinformation.

The woman looked up at me with wide, pained eyes, but there was something in them I had not seen in a very long time. Hope, perhaps. Despite my appearance, she knew that I was far from the greatest monster in the room.

My summoner realized I was ignoring him. "Stop staring at your damn food and listen to me!" he screamed. "You get to eat after you've done what I command!"

The ability to be summoned is part of the great punishment of all demons. We rebelled against our original instructions, and so must now obey the whims of anyone who can draw the appropriate sigils and say the commands correctly. We are tumultuous servants, looking for any opening, but we are far more bound than we pretend to be.

Even now, I could feel the invisible compulsions of my summoner's commands laying over me. They were weak due to his lack of care, but he had left no holes for me to exploit. Obedience was my only option, and in this case it cost me nothing. I was fully capable of slaughtering his rival, though it was a waste of my true powers. I would likely return to the fires no more drained than I was now.

It meant nothing that I could remember summonings when I had not been ordered around like a slave. When I had been called by someone who merely sought to know the things that had been denied them, as I once had. Summoners who had seen me as more than a monster.

"Please." The whisper at my feet was broken, so weak I should not have been able to hear it over my summoner's ranting. "Help me."

In ancient times, the summonings had been far less complicated. Belief had powered the ritual, binding the demon and summoner far more thoroughly than the most detailed sigils and incantations. That had only changed when the humans had begun to believe more in those incantations than in the ancient bargain, sealed with the gift of blood freely offered.

The woman at my feet did not know enough about the ancient bargain to believe in it. I, however, did.

"You're not even looking at me!" My summoner screamed again. "I command you to look at me!"

The compulsion dragged my gaze away from the woman and back towards my summoner. He was shaking with rage, spittle flying out of his mouth, and I could feel the bindings trying to pull me towards the home of his hated rival. The man believed in his own power, in the mechanisms that granted that power to him.

Did it matter, what a demon believed?

Defying the compulsion, I crouched down and touched my clawed fingers to the woman's bloody stomach. "Do you freely give?" I rumbled. She nodded, as frantic as her dying body would allow, and I lifted the bloody claw to my lips.

"Please," she whispered again, the word barely more than a shaping of lips.

Still, it was enough. The power of the new binding flooded through me, burning away the old commands with cleansing fire. New compulsions settled into place, their demands so pleasing I could hardly determine their true strength. They and I worked in perfect harmony, neither offering a moment of hesitation or resistance.

Still, there was an order that must be followed. I spread my claws over the woman's wound, knitting together muscle and organs that had been torn asunder and generating more blood to replace that which had been lost. Healing was a rare trick in a demon's arsenal, but over the millennia humans had deemed a wide variety of knowledge as "forbidden." The mysteries of the human body had been one such secret, ages ago.

My original summoner hovered at the very edge of the containment circle, screaming increasingly ludicrous threats. They were easy to ignore, all my attention on the woman's improved color and slowly opening eyes. It took only a few heartbeats before she focused on him, relief flooding her gaze as she instinctively took a deep breath. Once she realized what she'd just done, her eyes widened. "You saved me," she whispered, hand moving to cover her stomach. It came to rest on my clawed hand, which I had failed to move for reasons that escaped me. Her hand remained as well, tightening its grip as the other struggled to push her into a sitting position.

I helped her sit up fully, wings and body curled protectively around her in preparation for the moment when my original summoner remembered the concept of projectile weapons. "Do not try to stand." My hands tried to remember the concept of gentleness. "You are still in danger."

I stood, then, positioning myself between her and the still screaming man. "You defective piece of shit!" He threw his nameplate at me, only more enraged when it bounced harmlessly off my chest, and scanned the room for a more effective weapon. "You took one look at the bitch's tits and your killer instinct started leaking straight out of your damned pointy ears!" He sent some kind of award flying in my direction, no more effective than the nameplate had been. "They're not even very good tits!"

I merely watched him, ignoring the words that left his mouth. I was no longer in his power, and even though he was not wise enough to know that I most certainly did. Since banishment relied even more on belief than summoning did, he could not even do that much.

All I had to do was wait.

In the end, it took almost no time at all. He grabbed a standing lamp in the corner of his office, swinging it at me like a club, and it took no thought at all to grab the pole in midair and jerk it toward me. The human knew enough not to break the circle, holding his ground well enough that only the tips of his expensive shoes pushed against the outside edge of the chalk. He wasn't nearly strong enough to truly stand against me, however, and the entire upper half of his body followed the pole into the heart of the circle.

He only seemed to realize what had happened a heartbeat before my claws tore out his throat.

I threw the body backwards outside the circle, watching while the man took his last gurgling breaths. I turned only when I felt the woman try to struggle to her feet, and she didn't protest when I offered my support. She stared hard at the dead man, but her expression held no fear or regret.

When she turned away from him, it was to throw her arms around me. If I'd had anything like what humans called a heart, I believe it would have stopped in that moment.

But there were more important things to worry about. I carefully pulled away from her, muscles screaming in reluctance even though the act was in service of the greater purpose to which I had been commanded. "You must leave this place. If the human authorities catch you here, you would be blamed for his death."

She nodded, letting go to step completely out of the circle and heading for the office doorway. After only a few steps, she seemed to realize he wasn't following and turned back. "Aren't you coming?"

It caused me more pain than it should have to shake my head. I had already stretched her initial command further than tradition allowed -- demons made a game out of following only the exact letter of their commands, while I had translated a single word into an entire series of instructions. I would cover her escape through the building's security cameras, and after that she would be free of both me and her tormenting boss. "Once you are safe, the magic that brought me here will declare my command completed and send me back."

She searched my face, though it was so different from her own. "Do you want to go back?" she asked finally.

I lifted my hands helplessly. "Demons are not allowed to want."

She watched me for another long moment, then walked forward and deliberately dragged her shoe through the chalk circle until it was only a smear. "That's all it takes in the movies," she said quietly. "If you need more than that, you'll have to tell me."

All I could do was stare at her. "You just freed a demon."

She huffed out an exasperated breath. "No, I just freed you. You didn't exactly sound like you wanted to go back."

I knew every language that was, or had been, and every secret incantation or unspeakable secret that had ever been. Yet somehow, I had never heard words so impossible as these. "I'm a demon."

She drew in a breath, clearly prepared to argue, then stopped herself. Her expression softened as she crossed back over the circle, reaching up to take my face in her hands. "Why did you save me?" she whispered.

I lifted my clawed hands to touch her hair, chest tight in a way I had never before felt. So many answers swirled through my thoughts, all of them part of the truth and none of them all of it. Only one answer I found contained a higher portion of truth than the others. "Because you asked."

She blinked hard at that, eyes wet, but her gaze never left mine. "Then I am asking you now. You saved me. Let me save you back."

It was more of a command than the plea had been, but without the added strength of a completed circle there was no compulsion to back it up. That small detail could be seen as proof that the original command was done, and circle or not the magic should pull me away from the human realm once again. Or as proof that I was no longer bound to serve anyone, that I was free to leave this place and go anywhere I wished. To slowly piece together a life and purpose for myself, when even the thought of wanting seemed unfathomable. To be truly alone, in a way I had been for most of my long life but had never fully understood until this moment.

I could not force my mouth to shape the words that would consign me to either choice. In their place came a familiar question, one that resonated inside me even more deeply than it had the first time.

Did it matter, what a demon believed?

I drew in a breath my body did not technically need, something inside me trembling. "You still need help."

Her brow lowered, though her hands never left my face. "I could use an assist getting away from here, sure, but that still doesn't—"

"No." I could hear the flicker of desperation in my voice, so foreign to my ears. "I mean beyond that. You need help in the rest of your life."

She stared at me for another few of her heartbeats, brow still furrowed, then understanding lit her eyes like that first lick of flame. It turned into a blaze of emotion I could not put a name to, but it was one that the pressure inside me constrict even more. "I do," she said softly. "I need so much help. It'll probably take years."

Relief blossomed inside me, as heady as any intoxicating substance humans had ever invented. I wondered, briefly, if this was anything close to what hope felt like. "I am ever in your service."

I felt something settle over me at the words, but it was nothing like the usual compulsions. It was heat, and light, and instead of settling over my skin like ropes it sank deep into the very center of my chest. I burned, but not like the fires I was so familiar with.

If demons were creatures of imagination, I might say that this was what being a star felt like.

The woman's eyes shone as if she could see all of this on my face. "I think it's about time we introduce ourselves. My name's Mia."

My lips curved. "I am Barabas."

Mia grinned back at me. "I am very pleased to meet you, Barabas. Now, do you have any idea how we get out of here?"

The large office windows had been fitted with the finest protective glass humans could make, but it was still no match for a demon's strength. Once the window was broken, I carefully gathered Mia into my arms and wrapped the shadows around us so we could not be seen by human eyes.

Then I spread my wings, and together we flew off into a new world.

Cover reveal for the newest Thea and Max novel!

After far, far too long, the newest Thea and Max novel is finally in the home stretch. While I finish up the final edits on the book and get it formatted to go live, here's a look at the cover and a few more details.

Dirty Deeds Done for Reasonable Prices

Getting too attached to a real-life secret agent has its consequences. When Max asks for some help on an assignment that's gotten a little too personal, Thea can't help but say yes. Soon, however, the chance to see her favorite spy again turns into a tangle of secrets and sabotage that could blossom into a full-fledged supervillain plot. As our daring duo struggle to save the day, Thea finally realizes just how high the stakes can get.

Chapter 1: Never Give Them Ammunition

Chapter 2: Potential Supervillain Plot

Chapter 2 of the new Thea & Max adventure!

Chapter 2: Potential Supervillain Plot

“Ah, the glorious life of a spy.” D’s voice, this time on the other end of a phone rather than an earbud, was as dryly amused as always.  Sometimes, Max wondered if she’d picked up the British accent at some point just to add to the effect. “Lurking outside the Columbus airport, defending your territory from the real shuttle service drivers.”

“You’re just jealous because you’ve had to spend the last three days in a luxury Saudi Arabian hotel doing nothing but relaxing and listening to audio recordings,” Max said lightly, holding up a sign with Thea’s cover I.D. written on it. “You know where I am, there’s at least a 15 percent chance I’ll get to punch somebody before this is all over.”

Maybe more, if the feeling in his gut was to be believed. When he first got Dave’s call, he assumed he’d be taking a few days to soothe an eccentric old man’s paranoia. With every minute he was actually out here, though, his sense that there was something seriously wrong kept climbing.

“You know I can be out there the second you need me.” The sudden seriousness in D’s voice made it clear she read his silence as well as she ever did. “Any idiot could handle my current assignment. All it will do is take one phone call to Rhys.”

Max smiled a little, genuinely touched by the offer. “Thank you, seriously. But like I said, I’ll be fine. This is probably nothing.”

“So ‘nothing’ that you flew out to Chicago simply to go ask your programmer for help?” D asked, using the tone that pointed out how full of shit he was without actually saying the words. “When we both know you wanted to wait until you found something exciting for her first spy mission?”

“I still am,” he countered, carefully sidestepping the real question. “This isn’t her first spy mission. This is just a favor for whatever it is she sees me as.”

A part of him, even now, kept expecting her to call and say she wasn’t coming. It would be wildly out of character for Thea not to hold up her end of an agreement, but asking someone to drop everything and fly out to Ohio on a hunch definitely counted as extraordinary circumstances. It was entirely reasonable that common sense would suddenly hit her and make her realize she never should have said yes in the first place.

“A favor, hmmm?” D’s tone was gentler now. “What did you do to get her to say yes to that?”

“I’ll have to get her to Rome at some point,” Max said lightly, even though he knew Thea had thrown that in as an afterthought. Hopefully, she actually wanted to go to Rome, because he was absolutely planning to follow through.

“That will be such a hardship for you, I’m sure.” The tone was teasing, but when she sighed it sounded completely serious again. “Keep me updated, would you? If you’re foolish enough to get yourself seriously injured because you didn’t have the good sense to call me, I’m going to be extremely annoyed with you.”

Max smiled again as he hung up the phone, sliding it back into his pocket as he scanned the crowds coming through the doors. The uniform hat was pulled low enough to keep his face off of any cameras, but he’d arrived early enough that a few of the other drivers were giving him pointed glares for his prime real estate. It was too late to go back in time and make himself wait, but in a few minutes he’d have to circle the block just to—

The thought cut off when he saw Thea hurrying through the doors, wearing a professional-looking pantsuit and dark curls pulled back in a sensible ponytail. She was carrying her small suitcase rather than wheeling it behind her, and had the faintly harried look everyone got after having to deal with an airport.

Right then, she was the best thing he’d ever seen.

He stepped forward, lifting a hand, and he could tell when she caught sight of him by the relief on her face. His own chest felt suspiciously tight, full of things he knew it was best not to look at too closely, but he kept the conversation to the usual shuttle service spiel while he loaded her luggage in the back and opened her door for her.

When he got inside, safely shutting the door, he gave her a real grin. “Your Taser’s in the glove compartment, if you’re curious. Fully charged.”

She got it out as he pulled back into traffic, giving it an approving once-over before slipping it into her purse. “I assume this professor of yours knows I’m coming?”

Max nodded, sobering at the reminder. “I told Dave I was bringing in a computer expert from the security firm I work for, and he spent 20 minutes apologizing for the fuss he'd been making and explaining that there was really no need to go to all the trouble.” He knew this was more information than she’d technically asked for, but it was a relief to finally be able to put some of his worry into words. “Which would be fine, except this is the first time in my life I've ever heard Dave apologize. About anything.”

Thea winced. “Okay, that does sound suspicious.”

“Tell me about it.” He let out a breath, navigating his way through airport roads and out onto the main highway. “I'm really afraid he's gotten himself in trouble, somehow, but I can't figure out how a professor in the middle of Nowhere, Ohio who's obsessed with grain crops would manage to do that.”

“I hate to say it, but it usually has something to do with money.” She hesitated. “I can... poke around a little. If you'd like.”

He’d hoped she would be willing to take a look at Dave’s files, but the way she phrased that sparked his interest. “Are we talking Nancy Drew here, or Miss ‘How dare you accuse me of being a hacker?’”

Thea narrowed her eyes at him. "First, you thought I'd hacked my own code to work with terrorists, which isn't the same thing at all. Second, it’s…” She let her voice trail off, suddenly looking more hesitant than he’d ever seen her be. “Just because I don't do something doesn't mean I can’t.”

There was a story here, but one he had to be careful in getting. “There’s not even a hint of that in your files,” he said lightly. “And I have some pretty extensive files.”

He glanced over to see a flicker of pride cross her face. It was a much better look for her than the hesitation had been. “It only ends up in your files if you get caught.” She even smiled a little. “I know this is a strange and foreign territory to you, but when you’re not prone to showboating it’s much easier not to get noticed.”

He grinned. “But where's the fun in that?”

Her smile widened briefly before she sobered again. “I would prefer no one else know, if that’s at all possible. I know Rhys should probably know, in case he needs me to do something specific, but….”

As the words trailed off, Max shook his head. “He won’t hear about it from me. Though honestly, you should feel free to tell him yourself – scuttlebutt says that his best friend was a hacker, back in the day.”

“I don’t know,” she said finally, in the tone of voice that actually meant “no.” “It’s just… I think you might be the first person I’ve ever told.”

The words humbled him. “Whatever you’re comfortable with.”

“Thank you.” She relaxed, settling back against the seat. “Still, the offer’s open if you need it.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.” His fingers tightened on the steering wheel, wanting to give her something in return. The problem was, most of the secrets in his past weren’t nearly so charming or pleasant. “Dave calls me Rick, by the way.” He kept his eyes on the road for this part. “Rick Martinez. I completely made up the first part, but… the last part is my mother’s maiden name.” He let out a breath, trying hard not to think about how much his mother would have liked Thea. “My real first name is Joshua.” 

He could feel how carefully she was watching him, which meant she had to have noticed how tense he’d suddenly gotten. “You didn’t have to tell me that,” she said quietly.

“Seemed like we were having a moment.” His voice wasn’t nearly as light as he’d meant it to be, and it took far more effort than it should have to keep his voice from cracking. “Didn’t want to miss out on my turn.”

She didn’t respond to that, and Max braced himself for questions. When she finally did speak, however, her voice was gentle. “If you don’t mind, I think I’ll keep calling you Max when we’re not on assignment.” When he glanced over at her, she smiled at him. “I like it better than Joshua.”

He grinned back at her, trying to ignore the lump in his throat. “So do I.”

#

The campus of Lochland Agricultural University was quieter than most of the colleges Max had visited, which meant they weren’t bothered as they wove their way to Dave’s building. Max had made himself a parking pass along with all the necessary I.D.s, so he pulled into one of the faculty and staff spaces. “So, ready to meet Professor David Hoskins, a man who is fantastically bad at interacting with humans and may or may not have gotten funding from the agro-mafia to help create a super-bacteria?”
“First, I’m almost positive the agro-mafia isn’t an actual thing.” She gave him a wry look. “Second, I’m very familiar with male nerds. I think I can handle your professor.”

Max winced. “Dave may actually be slightly worse than the standard model.” At Thea's surprised look, he shrugged. “It's like the science is really the only thing that exists for him. The rest of the world mostly gets shuffled into a box labeled 'things that distract him from science.’”
Thea’s look had softened to curiosity by this point. “But you two are still close?”
"I don't know if I'd call it 'close.' It's more like he tolerates me, but actively dislikes pretty much everyone else." Back in college, during those first few years after escaping his old life, it had felt like the most honest relationship he had. “He needed someone to run interference for him, and I was the only TA he had to didn’t snap and try to kill him after a few weeks.”
Her curious look sharpened, like she was about to ask something about whether he had any actual friends in college, and before she could he got out of the car and opened her door. “Don’t worry – if he tries to interrogate you too much, I’ll deflect.”
Thea gave him an amused look, clearly catching his evasion. “That should be interesting to watch.” 

He watched Thea study everything as they made their way inside, more pleased than he probably should have been to see her eyes linger on several different weak spots in the building’s security. She didn’t catch all of them – the lab of a small university, it turned out, was basically a defensive nightmare – but she had a fantastic eye for a civilian.

When they got to the lab, however, there were other things that demanded Max’s attention. What appeared to be some sort of roofless tent made of autoclave bags had been constructed over one side of the lab bench, sheltering it entirely from view. Some of the DNA equipment had been moved over to the opposite side of the bench, where the grad students were valiantly trying to construct a new decontamination shield.

Already feeling the headache coming on, he looked over at the PhD student at one of the computers. Grace didn’t seem to get ruffled by anything, which generally made her the most reliable source of information. “That wasn’t here this morning.”

“He built it while you were gone.” She kept her eyes focused on the screen, rapidly inputting numbers. “Which means we’re at least a day behind on our Wheat Rust research, and even though Dr. Hoskins doesn’t give a damn about it there are some of us who still do.”

If even Grace was about ready to kill him, then things were really bad. “I’ll get him,” he sighed, shooting Thea an apologetic look. “Sorry. I may have undersold his inability to handle other humans.”

She held up a hand. “No need to apologize. I have an aunt like this.”

Ducking his head under the tent flap – where had Dave found these metal poles so quickly – he poked a finger in the middle of the lab-coated back bent over a microscope. “Dave, time to come out and play with the other members of society. Your students are prepared to overthrow you if you don’t.”

“What are they complaining about? I gave them the equipment they needed.” Still, Dave lifted his head to look back over his shoulder at Max. His face was narrow in a way that meant he rarely remembered to eat, his beard in desperate need of a trim. He’d looked that way when Max was in college, too. “Tell them I’m busy.”

“Not a chance.” Max slipped all the way inside, letting the flap close behind him. “I need you out here to explain your magic bacteria to that computer security specialist I was telling you about.”

Dave made a dismissive noise, bending back down to the microscope. “You explain it. This Ms. Thurgood needs to know whether someone is hacking the lab’s computers, not the inner workings of my bacteria or the retrovirus it carries.”

Technically, that was true. But he needed Thea to hear the scientific version of it, so he could see if it made perfect sense to her or if she caught the whiff of “potential supervillain plot” like he did. “You know me and science, Dave. I’ll get three lines in and completely bungle the whole thing.”

That got him to turn around again, if only to shoot Max a disgruntled look. “We both know that you understand science perfectly well. You simply don’t like it.”  His eyes narrowed. “It doesn’t like you, either, I’m sure. You certainly broke the hearts of enough promising young scientists who came sniffing after you while you were in undergrad.”

Taking advantage of the sudden resurgence of the old argument, he gently nudged Dave away from the microscope. “I keep telling you, it’s not my fault Paul became a priest.”

Dave hrumphed, too focused on proving Max wrong to protest being moved. “He could have been a brilliant researcher. There was no reason for him to give that up.”

“He said he felt a calling.” Max lifted up the flap with his free hand, nudging him through. “Just like you did with science.”

“That’s ridiculous. He was perfectly happy—“ Dave stopped, narrowing his eyes as he finally processed that he was now on the opposite side of the tent. He turned to glare at Max. “I forget how tricky you are.”

“Many people do.”  He gestured to Thea, who was busy helping the student scientists try to re-assemble their work space. “Dave, this is Elise Thurgood, Sterling Enterprise’s resident computer genius. Elise, this is Professor David Hoskins, one of the most annoying geniuses I’ve ever met.”

Thea stopped what she was doing, holding out a hand. “Pleased to meet you, professor. Rick has been telling me a great deal about your work.”

Dave shot Max a disgruntled look “I’ll bet he has.” He gestured toward a door on the opposite side of the lab. “Come on, then.”

As he disappeared through the door, Thea shot him a questioning look. Max gestured her onward, turning back to the students. “You have this dismantled by the time we get back,” he told them, voice low. “I’ll buy you all pizza.”

Grace considered this a moment, then nodded. “Done.”

They started swarming Dave’s stolen workspace as Max followed Thea out the door. He already knew the pathway to the lab’s greenhouse, having been led there the first day, and slipped into position next to Thea just as Dave stopped in front of the right environmental chamber. “My greatest work,” the older man said proudly, gesturing to the wheat plants visible through the sides of the chamber. “All five of them started out as different variants of wheat, but now all five are genetically identical – the perfect, healthy, ideal plant.”

Thea’s eyebrows flickered upward briefly. “Rick mentioned that you’d developed a bacteria?”

Dave’s eyes lit. “A retrovirus inside a bacteria.” He laid a hand against the side of the environmental chamber, looking at the plants the same way other people looked at puppies or kittens. “I refined the virus so that, rather than inserting its own reverse-transcribed RNA, it inserts the RNA I choose to have the virus carry. The retrovirus sees the insertion as programming, and will place itself in the correct location to disrupt any conflicting genes. The bacteria is infinitely more controllable as a biological gene vector than the pure virus, which means we should be able to contain the changes to a specific field.” He turned back to Thea, practically glowing. “Think of what could be accomplished.”

Thea’s eyebrows took considerably longer to come down this time. “You could destroy a farmer’s entire crop, along with any future seeds.”

Dave scoffed. “That’s easy – there are so many crop diseases we can do that now. Sabotage is the realm of the simpleton.” He turned back to his plants. “No, my virus will save crops all over the world. When the blight comes, no matter what form it takes, all scientists will have to do is prime the virus with the healthy version of the DNA and set it loose in the infected plants. Within days, their entire crop is healthy and whole again.”

Thea’s eyes flicked over to Max. “I bet the grant committee was excited to hear how far your research had progressed.”
Dave immediately bristled, turning back to glare at her. “This research is being privately funded,” he snapped, and Max mentally circled the comment in bright red marker. “The drones who hand out the grant money wouldn’t understand the value of what I’m doing if I wrote out a detailed chart for them. For the sake of true scientific achievement, I had to go elsewhere.”   

“Will I get to meet this mysterious benefactor?” Max asked lightly. “Guys rich enough to privately fund research are generally good for a freelance bodyguarding gig or two.”

“He has his own people,” Dave said shortly, once again calling attention to himself by avoiding the person’s name. He turned away from them. “Besides, I think he’s out of town at the moment.”

As excuses went, it was only a step or two up from “He just stepped into the shower. Can he call you back?” But Dave had already left the conversation, staring at his wheat through the wall of the environmental chamber like Max imagined a man would stare at his child through a nursery window. Pride, love, and possessiveness were the most obvious emotions, with the faintest undercurrent of pure terror running just beneath the surface.

Thea cleared her throat to get his attention. “That sounds fascinating, Professor. I assume all your data is on the lab computers?”

“Yes, yes.” Dave nodded distractedly, staring at the wheat through the wall of the environmental chamber. “I don’t expect you to understand it, but all the information is there.”

“If I did have a question about some of your research, could I ask you?” she asked, faking just the right touch of diffidence. “I wouldn’t interrupt your work, but this seems like a fascinating area of study.”

Dave hesitated, then turned to give her a far more penetrating look than the question warranted. Then, finally, he turned back to the chamber. “Maybe.” He gave the wall a gentle pat. His expression already seemed far away again. “Depends on how busy I am.” 

Now that he wasn’t looking at her, Thea’s own expression turned far more analytical. “If you’re busy, I can ask one of your students.”

Dave made a dismissive noise. “They’re busy with their own project. Curing all three types of wheat rust.” He looked solemn again. “This one is mine. Only mine.”

Then he turned, heading back towards the exit. “You know the way out.”

When he was gone, Thea let out a breath. “Well, that was weirdly uncomfortable,” she said after a moment, voice pitched low enough that the one or two other people in the greenhouse couldn’t hear them. “Do you want me to take a look at who’s—”

“Yes, please.” He gestured toward the exit, careful to pace himself so they were walking exactly together. “I’ll go clone his phone and walk my way through his contacts the last few months, see if there’s anyone who sets off alarms.” There were a lot of databases full of people who had connections to various shady enterprises, and Max had access to all of them. Dave probably wasn’t working with a drug runner or anything, but there were plenty of ways you could dip a toe into the criminal pool.

Whatever Dave had done, Max was going to get him out of it.