Her companion nudged her to be quiet, clearly not remembering anything, either, but knowing enough to keep his mouth shut. Bad. This was so bad. Two illegal charms, and if Trent got to the West Coast, he’d probably try to pin them on me if I didn’t become his indentured servant. Damn it back to the Turn! I wasn’t going to play this game!

Jenks dropped from where he’d been checking on his kids. His hand was on the butt of his sword, and he looked ready to give Trent a lobotomy. “I had more to ask them, even if she didn’t.”

“You wanted to know who sent them. Now you do. It was wearing off,” Trent insisted, but I could see a hint of unease in him. “Our only other option was to kill them.”

“Our?” I barked sarcastically. “There is no ‘our.’ This is your doing, not mine.” I spun as Jill started to get up, her alarm obvious. “Park it, Jill!” I said, but it wasn’t until Ivy cleared her throat that both of them checked their upward motion and slid back down.

“My name isn’t Jill…” the woman started.

“It is today. So sit down and shut up until I tell you that you can leave. Got it?”

“Shit,” the man said sourly as he thumped his head back against the fridge and eyed me in mistrust. “I don’t know who was supposed to pay us. Do you?” Jill shook her head. She looked too confused for it to be an act. “Awww, man!” the guy added. “I don’t even know where I left my stuff. This sucks.”

“See?” Trent said confidently, but that worry wrinkle above his eyes was still there. “It worked. Now we can let them go and be on our way with their employers still thinking we are here.” He smiled, and I hated him. “They won’t be expected to check in for twenty-four hours. We could be long gone by sunset.”

Jenks’s wings hummed, and Ivy’s face lost its expression. “Sunset?” she said, and I grimaced. She wasn’t going to like this, but it didn’t matter. I wasn’t helping Trent. Not after this. He had stood in my kitchen and performed two illegal charms, one of them black. Ceri was rubbing off on him and not in a good way.

“I’m not going anywhere with you, you little shoemaker,” I said, trying to figure out what to do with these two. “Especially after that little stunt. Not in a plane, not in a car, not on a train…you’ve gone too far.” I blinked. What the hell?

“Ah, Rachel?” Ivy touched me, and I jumped. “What’s this about Trent needing your help. Help for what?”

Jenks hummed his wings for her attention, smirking at Trent as he said, “Trent wants Rachel’s help. Quen won’t do it. Trent says it’s because Quen won’t leave Ceri, but I think the little cookie maker plans to speak out against Rachel at the, uh, big meeting to get her under his thumb again, and Quen refuses to be a part of it. Trent won’t have anything on her after she nullifies his familiar mark, so he has to move fast.”