Chapter 8

"We should get out of here," I suggested, containing the urge to shout it instead. My escape plans would have to wait. No way would Lienna not notice me bolting for freedom right now—plus, the way to freedom was blocked by a disturbing glowy puddle.

Rushing to my side, she scanned the spreading liquid. Two feet out from the walls and creeping toward us, it'd formed a mini lake across our path, too far to jump safely.

"Got a pen?" I asked her.

With a nervous frown at the fluid, she plucked a ballpoint pen from her satchel and passed it to me.

I tossed it into the liquid. It hit with a goopy splash—and acrid black smoke poofed upward as the plastic dissolved into a blue stain. One moment, it'd been a pen. Three seconds later, it was melted to nothing.

But that wasn't all. With the impact of the pen, a ripple had run through the liquid—and it changed. The consistency went from gooey, sticky, slow-moving melted ice cream to the viscosity of water.

And water moves a lot faster.

I yelped in alarm as the liquid rushed toward my feet. Lienna and I collided, then scrambled backward—but the yellow substance was rushing in from all directions. Whirling, I jumped onto the coffee table. She leaped up after me, her foot landing on a glossy magazine. It slid out from under her and she pitched backward.

I caught her flailing arm and yanked her upright. She flew forward and smacked into my chest. Clutching my shirt, she looked down. So did I.

The liquid—an alchemic potion of the flesh-melting variety, by my best guess—had scarcely covered the floor just moments ago. Now it was several inches deep.

And the level was rising.

"Shit!" I hissed. "Got anything in your magic bag of tricks for this?"

She looked up at me, and my relative cool threatened to break at the fear in her face. That alone was my answer: no, her abjuration sorcery was no help here.

I spun again, still holding Lienna's upper arms so she wouldn't topple off the table. The potion had climbed halfway up the table legs, and though it had dissolved the pen in seconds, it had no effect on the furniture. Were the objects that belonged in the room immune to its corrosive properties? Rigel wouldn't want his precious desk and documents eaten away—but I knew better than to assume the potion would spare our flesh.

My gaze scoured the room. Six feet of liquid between us and the door.

Guiding Lienna to the table's other end, I released her and pushed on the sofa's arm. If I could move it closer to the door, we could use it as a bridge to safety. But when I put some muscle into it, the table shifted instead. Lienna jolted, arms waving for balance.

"Damn it," I snarled. "What—"

"Kit!" She pointed. The corrosive potion was lapping at the bottom edge of the tabletop we stood on. How was it filling the room so fast? It should've been impossible without a fire-hydrant-quality pump!

She grabbed my jacket sleeve. "Onto the desk! Quickly!"

The desk. We could reach it if we jumped from the sofa's arm. This had somehow turned into the most terrifyingly real version of The Floor Is Lava ever.

"You first," I told her, kicking the magazines off the table. They sank with a faint splash, as though the yellow liquid was as harmless as water.

With a swift nod, she stepped onto the sofa. The potion was only halfway up the cushion, but when she dropped down on it, the plush foam dipped and yellow fluid flooded in. Black steam burst from her shoe.

Her shriek rang out as I wrenched her back off the sofa—and the potion breached the tabletop. Scooping her up in a bridal carry, I jumped onto the sofa arm. The padding shifted under my feet and I wobbled precariously. Lienna clutched my shoulders.

Bending forward, I coiled my legs and sprang again. I landed on the desktop in a skid, sending papers cascading over the edge. The crystal decanter with its ugly sunflower top fell off and landed with a splash.

"Are you okay?" I asked sharply.

Gulping, she nodded. "It didn't burn through my shoe. Just a little splashed my ankle."

I tipped her onto her feet but didn't let go of her waist as I skimmed the room with growing dread. The potion was two feet deep and rising—and we were even farther from the door. Would the potion keep flooding the room until it was completely filled? There were no vents in the ceiling. No gaps or escape routes. The only way out was through the door and we couldn't reach it.

Lienna's thoughts must've been racing in the same direction as mine, because her hands tightened into fists around the front of my shirt. I pulled her closer without thinking.

We clung to each other as liquid death crept toward our small island of safety.

"There must be a way to stop it," she whispered, a tremor in her voice. "What if it got triggered accidentally? Rigel would—"

"He'd need to disable it," I agreed urgently. "But how? An incantation? An emergency stop button? What?"

"I don't know!"

In almost perfect unison, we released each other, dropped into crouches, and scrabbled across the desk. I yanked open the one drawer that wasn't submerged while she felt underneath the desktop where Rigel had sat, searching for a button or switch.

The liquid continued to rise. Was it my imagination or was it gaining speed?

I shoved aside pens and staplers and whiteout bottles. Mundane office supplies filled the drawer. Nothing resembled a "stop the inevitable flood of agonizing death" trigger. I pulled out a black address book with a leather cover and tossed it on the desktop, then reached into the drawer again.

The potion rippled at the drawer's edge, then spilled over, filling the bottom. I yanked my hand away as droplets splashed my fingers. Spots of burning pain erupted on my skin and I shoved back to my feet.

Lienna jumped up too, and I didn't really think about it. I just reached for her hand. She grabbed it, fingers squeezing hard. The potion lapped at the desktop. Too soon. We needed to figure this out. We needed more time. We needed something.

A trembling inhalation rushed through her lungs. Were we going to die here? What a freakin' awful way to go. Dissolved in acid from the feet up. Goddamn Rigel and his sick mind.

Jaw clenching, I grabbed Lienna by the waist. She yipped in surprise as I lifted her off the desk and up to the cabinets. Scrambling on top of them, she crawled into the low gap under the ceiling.

I stood on the desk, chest tight, lungs straining to get enough air to my panicked brain. The potion curled over the desktop's edge.

Lienna's pale face angled toward me. "Get up here, Kit!"

"I won't fit." The gap was too small. She barely fit on her own.

"Do it!" she yelled.

Potion rushed across the desktop, and I jumped for the cabinet. I hauled myself up and into the cramped space. She flattened herself down as I slid on top of her, my back against the ceiling.

Breathing hard, I peered down at her. "Why did you roll over?"

Fear hazed her brown eyes. "Huh?"

"You were lying on your stomach a second ago."

And now she was on her back, so we were pressed front to front. Her soft chest pushed against mine with each frantic breath she took, my knees on either side of hers, my elbows braced beside her shoulders.

She blinked, then scowled. "I didn't—it just happened."

"Yeah, okay."

We stared at each other, our noses inches apart, as the lethal potion climbed the cabinet.

"I'm sorry," I whispered. "I shouldn't have brought us down here."

"I'm sorry too. I shouldn't have touched anything." She swallowed. "Kit, I'm also sorry for—"

She broke off with an airless pffff as my weight came down on her. I barely noticed as I leaned sideways, my stare locked on an object bobbing in the rising potion.

The crystal decanter, filled with what I had assumed was red wine.

Nothing else in the room was floating—everything else had sunk or dissolved immediately. But even more suspect was that gaudy sunflower stopper, which was the same shade of yellow as the potion.

"That's it!" I gasped. "The decanter is full of a potion that will save us!"

"What?" she yelped. "How do you know it'll—"

"I don't know, but we need to try!" I pushed up on one elbow, straining for a better look. The decanter was bobbing in the vicinity of the submerged desk, too far for me to grab. "Shit, how will we get it?"

"Can you support me?"

It took us a minute too long to rearrange our bodies in the cramped space. The rippling potion was barely six inches below the cabinet top as she stretched out across the deadly fluid. I braced as best I could against the cabinet, her legs pinned under my stomach and my hands gripping her waist as I supported her lower body.

The only thing keeping her head and shoulders out of the potion was her own upper body strength. She stretched her arm out, the decanter floating just out of reach.

"Almost," she gasped. "A little more…"

Muscles burned in my arms, and my back was cramping from the awkward pose. She stretched farther, pushing with her legs. My hands slid from her waist to her hips.

"Lienna," I gasped.

Her fingers brushed the sunflower top. "Almost—"

"I can't hold you."

"Almost," she breathed.

She pushed farther from the cabinet and I locked every muscle in my body as her center of gravity changed. My fingers bit into her hips.

"Lienna!"

She lunged to grab the decanter and I hauled her backward—but it wasn't enough. We were pitching off the edge and I couldn't stop it. As I fell, I shoved her toward the cabinet, red liquid spilling from the decanter in her hand.

I hit the pool of yellow potion with a splash and plunged under.

Cool fluid surrounded me. No pain. No burning. No flesh melting. I flailed my limbs, found the submerged desk, and got my feet on it. I stood, my torso bursting from the potion.

My ears filled with a horrified scream.

Lienna's cry cut off a second after I reappeared from the pool. I blinked up at her, sprawled on top of the cabinet with one hand stretched out as though she'd tried to catch me. The empty decanter floated on its side a few feet away, jostled by the waves from my fall and reappearance.

"Kit?" she whispered.

I blinked again, wondering if I was imagining the tears in her eyes. "I'm okay. You dumped the antidote in here in the nick of time."

Lifting my arm out of the now harmless potion lapping at my waist, I gave a third blink. The moment my skin parted ways with the liquid, it was dry. Not a speck of lemony potion clung to my hand. My unsubmerged clothes were dry too.

Now that the potion wasn't trying to murder us, it was actually pretty nifty.

"Oh." Lienna retracted her arm in a sheepish way. "That's g-good."

It was good. In fact, it was freaking amazing—and a relief-fueled grin stretched my lips. A semi-giddy laugh escaped me.

"We did it! Take that, Rigel, you cowardly son of a bitch!" Grin widening, I raised my arms toward Lienna in offer. "Shall we?"

She hesitated, then reached out. Her hands gripped my shoulders as I pulled her off the cabinet. Her legs splashed into the liquid—and she sank like a stone because there was no desk under her.

I heaved her up and onto the desktop, and she thumped against my chest. Her wide eyes stared up at me.

When had I wrapped my arms around her? Because that's where they were now. I had no explanation.

"You saved my life," she mumbled.

"Technically not. You'd already de-acidified the potion."

"But you didn't know that."

I twitched my shoulders in a shrug. "I wasn't going to let you die if I could help it."

"But you could've escaped custody."

My eyebrows scrunched. "Seriously? I know you don't like me, but do you really think I'm that much of a heartless scumbag?"

She muttered something. All I caught was "like you."

I let my arms fall from around her. For a second, she didn't move—leaning against me, her hands resting on my chest—then jerked away from me as though only just realizing how close we were. I shifted backward and the heel of my shoe landed on something.

With a considering look at the potion's rippling surface, I ducked under. Eyes squeezed shut as the cool liquid engulfed my head, I felt blindly around my feet. My hands found a leather book, and I shot back up with a splash.

"What did you do that for?" Lienna demanded.

Smirking, I held up the small black address book I'd found in the desk drawer while searching for a way not to die. Like all of Rigel's belongings, it'd escaped its potion-dunking without damage. The booby trap had been for the sole purpose of melting trespassers and all evidence of their intrusion.

I tossed the book to her. "After all that, we shouldn't leave empty-handed."

She caught it, surprise flickering over her features, before sliding the book into her satchel. "Should we get out of here?"

"You got it," I replied—and swept her off her feet again.

"Kit!"

I stepped off the desk. We plunged down, the liquid rising to my chin. I boosted her up so her head was above mine, my arms folded under her ass and her legs around my waist.

She gripped my shoulders, her satchel bouncing against her arm. "What are you doing?"

"Did you want to swim?" I started across the room in an awkward underwater gait. "Maybe you do. This is a once in a lifetime opportunity to go diving in melted lemon gelato."

I started to loosen my hold on her—and she clamped her arms around my neck in a death grip.

Squashing a smile, I carried her across the room, through the door, and into the flooded stairwell. After stubbing my toe on the first step, I carried her up to the ground level and out into the burnt remains of the office. We emerged dry without a speck of potion on us. Crazy.

I let her slide down my front until her feet landed gently on the floor. Her hands were still on my shoulders, and as she peeked up at me through dark locks of hair tangled across her face, a pink flush tinged her cheeks, scarcely discernible in the dim light.

That faint glow transformed to a bright beam that hit our faces, and a voice called loudly, "You're back!"

Lienna sprang away from me.

Security guard Trevor Eggert and his disgruntled upper lipholstry were making a beeline for us across the rubble-strewn floor, a flashlight in one hand and his cell in the other. He waved his phone. "I've been doing some reading here, and I can't find anything about any MPD agency."

I was honestly impressed that old man Eggert knew how to use the internet. "Did you ask Siri or Alexa?"

His brow furrowed and his mustache twitched. "I Googled it. And all I can find here are conspiracies about magic."

Tugging her jacket straight, Lienna strode toward the door, radiating her usual amount of commanding agent confidence now that we were away from the secret death room. I followed on her heels, Eggert trotting after us.

"Magic, that's what this says," he reiterated, waving his phone again. "Apparently, there are real magic people here among us. And apparently, there are magic police who keep the whole thing quiet. And that got me thinking here, you see, MPD. Magic Police Department. That makes sense, doesn't it?"

I glanced over my shoulder at him. "Nothing about what you're saying makes sense, Eggsy."

"But—"

"Listen to yourself. Magic police?" We exited the building and stopped at the locked gate. "Next you're going to tell me that the Earth is flat, Kanye West is a lizard person, and Kentucky Fried Chicken's secret blend of herbs and spices is a nefarious recipe used to control the minds of the grease-eating public."

Half turning toward me, Lienna rolled her eyes. Yep, she was back to her usual self again.

"Go home, man," I told the security guard in a soothing voice. "Put on your comfy slippers, turn on the weather channel, and try not to stress about it."

"Let's go, Kit," Lienna said.

Obediently, I vaulted over the fence. She jumped over it and fell into step beside me as we walked away all casual like Riggs and Murtaugh. Eggert, standing on the other side of the fence, squinted after us.

Lienna and I crossed the rain-slicked street and got back into our trusty pocket-sized steed.

"Where to next?" I asked brightly. "Want to grab a burger to celebrate not dying? There's an awesome place down on Hastings."

She raised an eyebrow. "I'm taking you back to jail."

Damn. I'd been hoping she'd forget about that.