Griffin threw a small backpack onto the bed to join the vest. “Absolutely not. The second Keko suspects I’m there for any reason other than to stop her from throwing herself into a volcano or whatever the hell it is she thinks she’s gonna do, she’ll put up a massive fight or she’ll vanish. No soldiers, David. Just me.”

“Fuck.” David gave Griffin his back and stared out the window, arms tightly crossed.

Griffin understood David’s frustration. After all, Griffin had had David’s position once. The major difference was that Griffin had just barely tolerated the old Chairman, while David was a brother in all but blood.

Gwen came into the bedroom holding a small cardboard box. “This just came for you.” She squinted at the PO Box return address. “From Adine?”

He took the box but didn’t open it, just tossed it next to his vest.

“What is it?” Gwen had never been one to mince words. Sometimes the Ofarian woman reminded him of a diluted version of Keko.

Griffin glanced at the box, debating whether or not to say. Which was dumb because there were no two people in the world he trusted more than those in the room with him right now. “Signature sensor,” he said.

Gwen reached out and tapped his forehead. “Is yours broken?”

He ducked away from her touch. “It’s, ah, something Adine has been working on for me. Something other Secondaries might be able to use. Something that enhances our own abilities.”

Gwen glanced at the box. “What do you mean?”

“It should, if it works right, be able to track signatures long after a Secondary has left a scene. Like a trail.”

“Adine can do that?”

Griffin shrugged. “Something she’s been playing with. Mixing technology and magic. I asked her to do this for me on the side, but by the way she jumped on it, I wonder if it was something she hadn’t already been pursuing. Which might scare me if it wasn’t Adine.”

The half-Secondary woman had no magic of her own, just an otherworldly brain when it came to anything with wires or code or technology. The Ofarians had saved her life, then had got her settled on her own two feet in the Primary world, so Griffin got a pretty steep discount on her otherwise astronomical price of services.

“Kind of like what Kelsey is doing with medicine and magic,” Gwen said.

At the mention of his doctor wife, David finally turned around. He scanned the sparse items laid out on the bed: the vest and the box with the sensor, a long knife in a leather holder, packets of freeze-dried food, a small first-aid kit, sturdy boots, and a single change of clothes.

“The vest still fit?” David smirked. “You’ve been behind a desk for the past five years. Got a little soft around the middle.”

“Asshole.” Griffin pulled on the vest. Far too many emotions accompanied the drag of the lightweight mesh over his T-shirt. All those pockets that had once zippered in tools of death.

When he had to let out the side straps a notch, Gwen said, “Aw, you’re not soft. Just old.”

“Great. Thanks.” Griffin was grateful for the tiny bit of levity.

The three of them stood within a companionable silence, letting their mutual past settle into the cracks of the situation. It wasn’t the first time they’d said good-bye, but each time carried its own feeling, its own baggage. It wouldn’t be their last either.

It reminded him of another recent good-bye, and why he was doing all this in the first place, making his friends’ faces pinch that way.

David’s phone rang. Looking at the screen he said, “It’s Kelse,” and ducked out of the bedroom.

Griffin watched him go, then removed the vest and folded it into the backpack.

Gwen eased down to sit on the edge of the bed. At one time, years ago, Griffin would have given just about anything to have her sit there as a prelude of something else to come, but now it just gave him a bittersweet feeling.

“It has to be me, Gwen.”

She raised her hands. “I know. Did I say anything?”

He threw her a questioning, sidelong look.

She sighed. “I think I know a little bit about taking on something huge, something only you can do. I get it. I see all the strings dangling out there—Kekona and the Senatus and the Ofarians and the Fire Source—and I get how you’re the one person able to tie them all together.” He threw the leather-wrapped knife into the backpack. Gwen bent down, getting in his direct line of vision. “I also know how hard it is, what it feels like, to be jumping around trying to get all the ends of those strings in your hands when all they want to do is fly away.”

Griffin stilled and met her sympathetic eyes. He still loved her, but in a much, much different way than before. “Thank you,” he said.

With a slap to her knees, she stood. “So what did the cabinet say?”

He whistled and shook his head. “Exactly what you’d think they’d say. Divided along the typical lines. One loves the idea of revenge, going after the woman who tried to attack us. The guy who has been against the Senatus from the get-go now loves this idea—show them we can get things done better than they can, clean up their mess, et cetera. Others want me to just butt out. My supporters are the same.” He yanked the zipper around the pack. “But none of them know the real reason why I’m going.”

“Because you want her back.”

“What—” He blinked. Several times. Then glowered. “No.”

Gwen looked at him with her special brand of patience and authority. She had the power to stand there all day. “I don’t think you’re being honest with yourself about your relationship with her.”

“Because there is no relationship. There never was. It was just sex.”

She crossed her arms. “Really.”

“You wouldn’t understand.”

Her eyebrows shot for the ceiling. “I wouldn’t?”

With a grimace, he turned away. “It’s weird, talking to you about . . . her.”

“Try me.”

Afternoon was turning to evening, and he had to get to the airport. He didn’t have time for this, yet he continued. “I can’t sit back and watch her do something this idiotic. This selfish. I don’t want her to cause anything like Aya described. I don’t want to see her hurt. Or end up dead. Despite everything, despite how we hurt each other and what happened in Colorado and what she tried to do to us, I don’t believe she deserves this. If I can stop it, if I can help her survive, I will.”

This time he hated the sympathy in Gwen’s brown eyes, so he hurriedly added, “And then there’s the Senatus. What it could mean for the Ofarians if I bring Keko back.”

“Right.” Gwen sighed, pivoting toward the door with a roll of her eyes. “The Senatus.”

“She’s worth more,” he blurted. “More than her mistakes.”

Gwen stopped and turned back around. “I fucked up, too, Griffin. We all fuck up.”

Griffin hid his wince, because not even Gwen knew what he’d done to Makaha. And maybe it was time to admit that that had been a colossal fuckup. That he should stop trying to rationalize his way out of it.

“Thank you. I kind of needed to hear that.” He slung the backpack over one shoulder. “Are you going back to Chicago?”

“I’d rather stay here and wait for you, if you want. If you need me, it’s easier to get to Hawaii from here.”

“Stay,” he said quickly. “Please.”

“I will. I’ll have Reed fly out here, too. Just in case.”

Once upon a time Griffin would’ve hated to have heard that, but now it gave him peace. “Good.”

She laid her hand on his cheek. “It’s been a really long time since I’ve seen you smile. Or laugh.” Thought lines dashed across her forehead. “Did I do that? By pushing you into leadership after we took down the Board?”

That was Gwen, humble to the core. She’d been the one to destroy the Ofarian Board. “You didn’t push me. I could’ve said no.”

Her hand dropped. “But you didn’t. And that’s what makes you a spectacular leader. Because you took on something that scared you.”