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but for some reason it didn’t seem to have the same effect on me. That is, I went along, and some part of me was trying to fight it, but I couldn’t open my mouth to really say anything, to tell them to stop, that we shouldn’t go to the guys’ house. Every time I tried, I felt as if I was choking.”
    That did sound like a spell, a dark one of compliance, of control. Alex didn’t know of anyone who possessed those kinds of powers. It was the sort of spell Damon Wilcox might have cast back in the day, but he was long gone. And anyway, if anyone in the de la Paz clan had attempted to meddle in those sorts of things, his grandmother would have sniffed them out immediately.
    Well, she would have, once upon a time. Now….
    His expression must have darkened, because Caitlin asked, voice sharp with worry, “What is it?”
    “Nothing,” he said immediately. His clan had been careful to keep hidden as much as they could about the truth of his abuela ’s condition, and he didn’t think it was his place to discuss it now. “I mean, there’s no one in my clan who can do that sort of thing. Did they say they were de la Pazes?”
    “Well, no,” she admitted. “I just kind of assumed….”
    He wanted to be annoyed with her for making that assumption , but he knew he probably would have done the same thing, had he been in a similar situation. Witches and warlocks always stuck to their clans’ territories. Sure, you’d get some visiting from time to time, but always with permission. Since he wasn’t privy to all of his grandmother’s affairs, he didn’t know for sure that Caitlin and her two companions had contacted her directly, but you could be damn sure someone in her clan had reached out to her, just to make sure it was all right for the girls come visiting in de la Paz territory. For all he knew, Maya had passed the information along to his mother, since she was sort of in charge down here in Tucson.
    Which meant she was not going to be happy when she found out that a trio of unknown warlocks had been using some kind of forbidden magic right under all their noses.
    “Anyway, that doesn’t matter,” Caitlin went on, pushing at the blanket that covered her, then sliding her legs off the couch. Her mouth tightened in pain, but she went on, “We need to go find them. Goddess only knows what those bastards are doing to Danica and Roslyn right now!”
    “Hey,” Alex said, and took a step toward her. “We can’t just go charging in there if we don’t know what we’re dealing with.”
    She shot him an impatient look and got to her feet. For a second she seemed to teeter a bit, as if she wasn’t quite as steady as she’d hoped, but then she straightened. When he saw her standing like that, he realized she was taller than he’d thought, unbending and slender. Of course, the impression of strength was marred somewhat by the unsightly bloodstains that marked her blouse and jeans.
    “I left them,” she said, and her tone had shifted from impatience to a sort of desolate pleading. “I shouldn’t have done that.”
    He moved even closer, putting a hand on her arm. She tensed, and he let go. Even so, he maintained eye contact with her, hoping he could find a way to convince her that she’d done the right thing. “If you’d stayed and tried to fight them, you’d probably be dead now, Caitlin.”
    Her mouth compressed to a tight line, but she didn’t argue. Encouraged, he went on,
    “Running away was the smartest thing you could have done. You came here, got help. We’re not going to abandon your friends. We’re just waiting for reinforcements.”
    “And they’re here,” his mother said crisply, coming in through the back door, Valentina a few paces behind. Alex had been so focused on the young witch before him that he hadn’t even heard the door open.
    Neither apparently had Caitlin, since she startled, but then seemed to regain some of her composure. “Who are you?”
    “I am Luz Trujillo, Alex’s