The Breaker's Promise (YA Urban Fantasy) (Fixed Points Book 2) by Conner Kressley Page B

sat in her waste paper basket; it all tried to tell me something. It was as though these items had been trained to give their secrets up, and they didn’t intend on disappointing.  I stumble a bit as we entered.
    “Are you okay?” Flora asked, holding steady to my hand.
    “I’m fine. I just wasn’t expecting so much blowback,” I answered.
    “Is it too much?” Flora asked. “Should we get out of here?”
    “No!” I said too loudly. Yes, there was a lot of energy to bat about in this room, but we had come this far, and I wasn’t about to give up without even really trying. “I’ve got it. Don’t worry.”
    Dahlia’s office was neater than Echo’s. There were no boxes lined up against the wall. The trashcans weren’t filled to capacity, and the desk was free of strewn paper and folders. This was the space of a woman who had everything in order, everything under control.  There was something about the neatness here that worried me; like even the smallest change- say, bumping into a table, would have been instantly noticeable to Dahlia. I pushed back against the shade as we made our way to Dahlia’s file cabinets. Flora’s hands were overly sweaty and her arm seemed to be shaking nervously.
    “We’re gonna be fine,” I told her. “In and out, I promise.” She didn’t respond. Well, maybe she nodded or something but, since I couldn’t see her, I had no way of knowing.  We pulled at the file cabinets with our free hands, ripping into Dahlia’s marked folders.
    “This would be easier if we knew what we were looking for,” Flora said.
    I was pushing back a particularly large wave of shade, so I tried not to grunt as I answered. “Well, in the dram, Wendy called him ‘Mother’s man’, so maybe it has to do with Dahlia’s own family.”
    Flora jerked me toward the left end of the file cabinets. “Here family name is Adamas. They’re an old name. Not as old as mine, but there should be plenty to look through.”
    She wasn’t wrong. It turned out three entire shelves were filled with Adamas family dossiers. Flora and I went through them as fast as we could, scanning for pictures and buzzwords, but found nothing.
    “We don’t have time to look much longer. Dahlia will be back soon,” Flora said. Instinctively, I looked toward the clock. We had been in this office for almost twenty five minutes, and if anything, I was more confused than ever.
    The shade kept pushing at us. It wanted to touch us, to record our activity so that it deliver it to Dahlia like a faithful dog giving its master his slippers. But I kept pushing, keeping it at bay. Still, I knew I wouldn’t be able to do that for much longer. The constant pushback was wearing on me. “We have to keep looking,” I said. My teeth were gritted.
    “Looking where?” Flora asked. “We have nothing to go on. It would take us days to search through all of these records. “
    I turned, hoping to see something in the open files that might spark an idea. What I saw was much more telling than that. The shade in Dahlia’s office moved in circles. It both radiated from, and protected, every inch of this space-every inch but one. I noticed that there was absolutely no shade radiating from the portrait hanging behind Dahlia’s desk, behind the file cabinets. It was a messy, almost abstract, rendition of a ship that had set sail onto stormy seas. The captain was on dock, pressing forward. His men were behind him, quivering cold and scared.
    “Help me move this painting,” I said, and pulled Flora toward it.
    “We don’t have time for this,” she warned.
    “Just help me, okay,” I said. Pulling at either end, we set the picture on the floor, revealing a safe behind it.
    “Fine, but how are we going to get into it?” Flora asked. But I already knew. The numbers had already started speaking to me, yielding their secret combination. I followed their instructions and the safe popped open with ease. Inside it sat a stack of letters. As I took