Overhead a seagull cawed, the sky and waves here at Jericho Beach a melancholic gray.

I dropped my head into my hands. I'd been so blithely certain that I'd come back with Meryem and I'd failed. A million "if onlys" trumpeted through my brain. If only we'd decrypted the drive faster, if only I hadn't freaked at the auction about my magic-stealing abilities and instead gotten answers from Birthmark Man. If only. If only.

I opened up my text chain with Charlotte Rose, but I ...