Before she had a chance to decide, however, Tina pushed herself off from the wall and started slowly, casually, toward the bench. Lily let out a sigh of relief, suddenly realizing how tense her whole body had been. She rounded the edge of the line of bushes, keeping them between her and Tina, and waiting so she could come up behind the witch as she puzzled over the purse on the bench. Sir Kipling slunk off to find a good ambush spot in case Tina made a dash for it.
Tina came to a stop in front of the bench, looking around carefully before she turned to the clueless woman still sitting there, eyes glued to her phone. Picking up the pace, Lily hurried to get behind Tina while she was distracted, and just caught Tina’s last few words to the unsuspecting mundane, who responded in complete confusion.
Now directly behind her target and only a few paces away, Lily spoke. “I’m the one you're looking for.”
The witch whirled, eyes wary and fists rising in a defensive gesture. When she spotted Lily, however, she dropped her hands in disgust, lips forming a sneer. “Well if it isn't Little Miss Perfect. I should have known it would be you.”
“Yes, you should have, after you abandoned Sebastian.” Lily said, eyes flashing and suddenly feeling dangerously confident. This good-for-nothing had caused her enough trouble already. It was time to stop being nervous and get the job done.
She stepped forward and took Tina's upper arm in a not-quite-threatening grip, towing her away from the bench and into the shade of some trees. Tina resisted at first, but Lily tightened her hold and hissed a word of warning, sounding almost like Sir Kipling, who had emerged from the bushes and was trotting behind them. Lily was a good head taller than the petite witch, and while she might not have had much bulk or muscle strength, she had plenty of practice frightening careless students who mistreated her books. Where her precious library was concerned, she was as fierce as a she-tiger. Now she focused on channeling that feeling, filling herself with righteous indignation that squelched her timid embarrassment.
Finally spinning the smaller woman to face her, Lily glared down at that pixie face, which was glaring back up at her stubbornly.
“Sebastian needs you, and you are going to get off your sorry butt and help him.” Lily declared, arms crossed.
“That idiot friend of yours got into trouble all by himself, and he can get out by himself, too. He already owes me for the investigation I did. There's nothing more in this for me and there's no way I’m sticking out my neck for him without some kind of guarantee. No way, José.”
Her ears perked at Tina’s choice of words. The witch was willing to help, if only for the right price. But first things first. “Sebastian said you got the whole incident on camera. Is that true?”
“Yeah,” Tina shrugged. “I haven’t gone back and looked at it or anything. Things got real crazy, real fast”—she shivered in disgust at the memory—“so I don’t know what all it caught. But I’ve still got the camcorder.”
A knot of tension inside Lily eased at the news. There was hope. “Then it’s simple. Just bring the video in and testify that Sebastian didn’t murder that woman and everything will be fine. We have a”—she was going to say initiate, but realized Tina might not understand the subtleties of wizard sub-culture, so chose to fudge the details for the sake of simplicity—“wizard lawyer. She’s there to explain away any ‘irregularities.’ If you need it to be worth your time, we’re perfectly willing to compensate you fairly.”
Tina stared at her, brows pulled back and forehead creased in a look of incredulity. “You don’t get it, do you, Miss Perfect? They’re not going to see me as a witness, they’re going to see me as an accomplice. They’ve already been tracking Rex’s activities and probably know he was behind the museum job, where I just so happened to be when a valuable artifact was almost stolen. Now I show up at the murder scene of one of Rex’s victims, someone who could put him in jail if she had only talked, and she ends up mysteriously dead? There’s no way I’m coming in. All that tape will do is get the FBI to start digging into my past, and I ain’t gonna let that happen. I don’t care what kind of hocus pocus your lawyer thinks she can work, but unless you plan on telling the FBI about wizard strangling spells, there is only one thing that could have logically happened: loverboy killed that woman and I watched him do it.”
As Tina spoke, Lily’s stance slowly deflated, and her arms dropped to her sides. “Wait, wait,” she finally said, “You’ve got it wrong. John Faust LeFay was behind the museum job. So how is Rex Morganson involved? Was he John Faust’s partner?”
“Seriously? Sebastian didn’t already tell you this?” Tina threw up her hands, annoyance in every line of her body. “He’d better not get out of jail anytime soon, because if I get my hands on him—”
“You and me both,” Lily muttered, and Tina froze, staring at her in surprise. Then she let out a guffaw, slapping her knee in mirth. Lily managed to crack a smile, sharing the brief moment of mutual frustration.
“Look,” Tina said, turning serious again. “I don’t really know what’s going on either, I just read some FBI reports. But here’s the gist: the FBI is investigating this guy named Rex Morganson, who’s some sort of crime boss wanted for everything from fraud to theft and extortion. Only they think Rex is just an alias for this other guy named John Faust LeFay”—Lily froze at the witch’s words, eyes widening in horror—“who they think is connected to a bunch of kids going missing over the past couple decades. It’s pretty convoluted,” Tina admitted, shrugging as she misinterpreted Lily’s expression for confusion, “which is why loverboy and I tracked down one of the missing kid’s moms to interview her and try and figure out what was going on. Then your idiot friend uses some sort of gimmick to look like Rex Morganson and trick the woman in to talking, and she freaks out! She yells his name, and before you know it her necklace comes alive and starts strangling her. I stuck around long enough to call 911 and then I booked it.”
Lily felt around for a chair to collapse into, realized there wasn’t one, and had to lock her knees halfway through trying to collapse into said nonexistent chair. The effort left her feeling lightheaded and clammy, despite the heat, but she gritted her teeth and tried to hide her shock. She shouldn’t be surprised, of course. She already knew her father was an insane criminal. But realizing the full extent of his activities—especially when pointed out by someone else—filled her with shame. And then there was Sebastian. She finally realized why he’d been so reluctant to explain his and Tina’s investigation. He’d wanted to spare her from this horrible feeling of…taint. How long had the FBI been investigating her father? What had Richard known that she didn’t? She felt a pang of guilt on top of everything else, and cast her mind about, trying to think what to do next.
“Hey, you okay?” Tina said into the silence, staring at Lily who stood frozen, body stiff and eyes unseeing.
Lily shook herself, wishing desperately to bury her face in a book and forget about the world and its convoluted mess of humanity. “Yeah,” she managed.
“Look, I’m actually sorry about Sebastian,” Tina offered, still looking at Lily strangely, but in a you’re-a-big-girl-you-can-handle-it kind of way. “It’s not like I want him to get in trouble. But it’s honestly not my problem. He asked me to help him dig up information, and I’m not even going to get the payment he promised for all my work, not with him stuck in jail. If there was anything I could do, I would. But there isn’t. So just leave me alone, will you?”
She turned to go, but Lily caught her arm again, no longer assertive but desperate. “Wait! Please, you have to help. I—I can’t let you go unless you do.” Lily gulped, trying to summon her inner she-tiger as Tina looked at her with a raised eyebrow, eyes glinting dangerously.
“Can’t let me go, huh? I wouldn’t try that, if I were you, Miss Perfect. I’ve got friends.”
“Well—so do I,” she replied with much more bravery than she felt. But then a thought hit her. A thought which she did not like one. Single. Bit. But it was all she had. “In fact,
I have friends in the FBI. I can get them to promise you immunity.”
Tina stopped pulling away, looking at her suspiciously. “From everything?”
“Everything.” Lily gulped. In for a penny, in for a pound, she thought. “I can get them to drop the whole case against Sebastian if we can give them Rex. You know they do this sort of thing all the time, giving immunity to people who rat out crime lords and drug bosses. This situation is no different.”
The witch was silent for a long moment, and Lily could see gears whirring behind her calculating eyes. “I still get the payment you promised through Anton?” It was not a question.
The thought galled Lily, but she nodded anyway.
“Fine.” Tina jerked her arm out of Lily’s grasp, straightening her shirt with a huff. “Contact me the normal way once you have the immunity agreement in writing, judge-stamped, on official FBI paper or however they do it. And not before. Got it?”
Lily nodded again, assuming the conversation to be over. But Tina paused, mid-turn, looking at her strangely. Lily felt like she was being evaluated.
“You know, you don’t deserve him,” Tina said.
“Ex—excuse me?” Lily spluttered, not sure whether to be shocked or offended. Or just confused.
“Don’t get me wrong, you’re spunky and all. I’ll give you that. But your Little Miss Perfect act makes me sick. You can’t love him for who he is when you’re always expecting him to be like you.”
This time Lily really was shocked speechless, staring at Tina with her mouth hanging open.
“Oh, puleeze!” Tina rolled her eyes. “Don’t pretend you haven’t noticed. I started calling him loverboy as a joke, you know, because that’s kind of the hat he wears. And I thought he was after me, at first. But he keeps turning me down. Na, he’s loverboy because he’s stupid in love with you. I’m talking really stupid. Smart guys get what they can, when they can. But no. He’s only got eyes for you, and you haven’t even noticed. That’s rich.”
“S—Sebastian?” Lily asked, so dumbfounded she’d even forgotten to blush.
“No, duh, Einstein. Good grief, you really don’t deserve him. Heck, since the feelings obviously aren’t mutual, be sure to send him back my way when this all blows over. Maybe even put in a good word for me,” she winked impishly. “Be sure to say you were too busy judging him to even notice. That’ll cinch the deal. See ya!”
The tiny witch gave a mocking wave and headed off toward the parking lot. As Lily stared after her, Sir Kipling gave a pained yowl, racing past her up a tree to glare around at empty air from his perch. Percy the poltergeist had finally made himself known, but Lily was too preoccupied to comfort her abused feline.
Sebastian loved her? No. There was no way. He’d never said a word, never made a move. He’d been hanging out with that witch, for goodness’ sake. Tina said he’d refused her advances, but she could be lying. Why else would he be acting all cozy with the witch? Not to make her jealous, surely…
She’s…kind of wild, and not a very nice person. Not like you. You actually care about people. She only cares what she can get out of you.
Sebastian’s words echoed in her head, spoken at her bedside after he’d helped rescue her from the LeFay estate. She blushed at the memory, recalling the tender way he’d looked at her, the way his hand had felt, soft but strong.
You don’t deserve him…You can never love him for who he is when you’re always expecting him to be like you…You’re too busy judging him…
Lily winced, shoulders drooping as she let out a long sigh. Tina was right. And she’d been too busy picking apart every way Sebastian offended her to even notice. Apparently, her self-awareness had some serious blinders when it came to her friend. She suspected it had to do with pride, not to mention her tendency to ignore things she didn’t want to deal with. And there was plenty of that where Sebastian was concerned. Such as that word Tina had used, a word which made her want to cringe and whoop with joy at the same time.
Love.
Did she love Sebastian? She had no idea. But maybe it was time to start thinking about it, instead of ignoring it. Time to stop pretending and start dealing. Yes, that sounded nice and “go get ‘em.”
Lily groaned, remembering the task that lay ahead. This was going to be so much more complicated in light of her new resolution.
“Kip, are you okay?” She called up into the tree where her cat still crouched, looking grumpy.
“Humph. I will be, once my tail stops feeling like it’s been used as a bell rope. If I ever get my claws into that poltergeist…”
Making soft noises of sympathy, Lily coaxed her cat out of the tree and retrieved her purse from the bench. It didn’t have anything in it, of course, but it was one of her favorite purses, so she was grateful the random lady who’d served as unwitting bait hadn’t carried it off.
On the way home she didn’t bother looking for a tail. After all, she was about to paint a target the size of Georgia on her forehead, so what was the point? She briefly considered putting it off—perhaps giving things a few days to settle down would be better—but knew that Allen didn’t have time for delays. For all she knew, he was already dead. Or driven to insanity. Or being tortured for information.
No, there could be no delay. As soon as she got home, she had to call Richard.
3
The Advantages of Being Crazy
To say that she dreaded this phone call would be putting it mildly. Sitting on her couch, staring at the cell phone in her lap, she procrastinated by thinking of a sufficiently colorful comparison for how she felt about the situation.
She would rather drink bottled green tea than call Richard Grant.
She would rather admit she’d had a crush on her ninth-grade English teacher, whose rendition of Shakespeare’s 116th sonnet had always made her swoon, than call Richard Grant.
She would rather be seen walking the streets in a neon-orange vinyl jumpsuit with a feathered mullet than call Richard Grant.
She would rather burn a book…well, alright, perhaps that was going a bit too far.
The point was, he had manipulated her, lied to her, and betrayed her. What was worse, he’d probably done it in an effort to protect her, darn drat his overdeveloped sense of chivalry. And, therefore, the worst part of all: she felt guilty for yelling at him. Not that he hadn’t deserved it, but it had been terribly impolite, not at all like her. At least, not like the person she tried to be. She was beginning to realize the two were more different than she cared to admit.
Sir Kipling, who was cat-loafing on the floor by the bookcase and watching her with half-lidded eyes, gave a yawn. “Coward.”
“Oh hush,” she retorted. “You have no idea, so don’t even pretend. Have you ever had your heart broken by a lady cat? Hm? Have you ever even talked to a lady cat?”
“I’ll have you know I’m all the rage among the local dames,” he informed her, whiskered nose in the air.
“Uh-huh. I’m sure.”
He gave an indignant huff and shifted, uncurling a paw, which he licked with deliberate care, proving his utter disdain for her unbelief.
Silence fell once again, and Lily’s thoughts returned to the issue at hand, namely, thinking of a way to get out of calling Richard. She heaved a deep sigh. No, that was only wistful thinking. She had a duty to her friend; to her uncle; to a world that didn’t deserve being inflicted with someone like John Faust. And then there was her recent commitment to “stop pretending and start dealing.” Which meant she had to figure out her feelings for Sebastian without letting them obstruct her sound decision-making.
Not that what she was about to do was in any way sound. She was preparing to break the cardinal rule of wizardry: never reveal magic to mundanes. Madam Barrington would absolutely forbid her to do any such thing, which was why she had no intention of telling her until after the fact.
She wasn’t even sure how she was going to do it. What if Richard simply refused to believe what was in front of his very
eyes? What if he tried to get her locked up in an insane asylum? He didn’t seem like that sort of person, but still. She was about to do something very, very unwise. But her back was to the wall and time was running out. Now that she thought about it, it was a very Sebastian thing to do. The idea made her smile, and she finally got up enough willpower to dial Richard’s number.
To her delight, and despair, he answered on the first ring.
“Miss Singer?” His greeting was more of a question, wavering between uncertainty and hope.
“Agent Grant, we need to talk.” Hearing his voice again brought back all the anger and hurt, and she fought to keep it out of her voice.
“Thank goodness, Lily, I was so worried. Thank you for understanding. I promise, I’ll explain everything—”
“Shut up.” Her sharp words cut him off, and there was a stunned silence on the line, Lily being just as surprised as Richard at the words that had come out of her mouth. She hadn’t meant to say that. At home it would have earned her a mouth-washing with soap. She hurried on.
“I wish to make it abundantly clear that I have no intention or desire to continue in any capacity but as professional acquaintances. We need to discuss your investigation. I have information you need to know, and I believe I deserve an explanation as well. We have the same goals and can better achieve them if we work together.”
“Oh…alright?” He sounded disappointed but rallied himself. “Why don’t you come into my office? We can set up an interview with myself and Agent Meyer.”
“No. I assure you, you will want privacy for this conversation. Come to my house. Now.”
“Well, that’s highly irregular—”
Lily snorted, a most unladylike sound, but it made Richard pause.
“Irregular? You’re trying to hide behind doing things by the book now, are you? Please, Agent Grant, have some self-respect. You are investigating my father, John Faust, and I can promise that I, more than anyone else, want him to face justice for his actions. If you want my help, and my information, you will come, now, to my house, alone. I’ll be waiting.” She hung up…and promptly slumped down into the couch’s cushions, head back and arm flung over her face.
Love, Lies, and Hocus Pocus Allies Page 21