I shook my head. “I haven’t. I don’t want Nick to know that I have a weakness right now.”
“You don’t trust him.”
“He came back from the dead after spending time in the underground. Of course I don’t trust him. He wanted me to help him kill the King of Vampires. Again, I don’t trust him. I can trust him enough to have my back when we’re working PIB cases, but that’s it right now.”
Oliver snorted. “That’s fair. Sleep well, niece. I’ll wake you up when Liz gets here.”
“Thank you.”
He closed my bedroom door, leaving me alone with my thoughts. I didn’t think Merick would purposely betray me, but Oliver was probably right. It was a trap, and Merick was the bait, but I wasn’t sure if I was the end game or someone else.
#
I woke to a soft knock on the door. I sat up, rubbed my eyes, and went to answer it. Liz stood there. “Good morning, sleeping beauty.”
I looked at my watch and saw it was five AM. “I thought Oliver was going to wake me up when you got here.”
“You were exhausted. I let you sleep with the promise of waking you early. Come on, we’re driving to Black Hawk and checking out that address.”
I nodded. “Let me get ready. Make sure the coffee’s brewing.”
“Already on.” She turned away and went back down the hallway. I checked my watch one more time to make sure I had the time right.
I think last time I saw five in the morning, I was going to bed, not waking up. I shook my head and went to get ready for the day. When I came down, Liz, Oliver, and Merick were all standing at the breakfast bar deep in conversation.
“I don’t think that’s the place I was. I feel like I would have known if Simon was there.”
I walked closer to find that they were leaning over the map. “Could they have kept him in a different part? It didn’t sound like the cells were very secure. It wouldn’t be smart to keep a werewolf there if they couldn’t contain him.”
Merick pressed his lips together. “It’s possible.”
Oliver sipped his tea. “I think Merick should stay with me. If they are tracking him, then they’ll know that he’s heading to the house.”
That was a good point. “I don’t think Merick is up for going, anyway.”
“That’s true. I’m still exhausted. Liz isn’t compromised like Abigail is, so she’ll be able to handle any magic that comes along.”
I made an ugh sound. “I hate the word compromised.”
“If someone is reaching out with magic and is affecting you, then you’re compromised.” Liz shrugged. “That’s just how it is.”
“Nick might also be compromised then, since he was also magically attacked. Just in case it comes up in the case to be an issue. Does he know where we’re going today?”
Liz shook her head. “No. It’s none of his business, and if all goes well, we’ll be back in no time and be able to do some research on the case. As long as a dead body doesn’t show up, we’ll be fine being out of town.”
“We could always just say we were following a hunch.”
“And explain that to Balin? No way.” Liz tapped the map. “Black Hawk is only a couple hours away. We can make it there right after full sunrise.”
Which would, in theory, trap any vampires we’d deal with inside. Unless it was Samuel. I pushed that thought away. “Right, let’s get going then.” I double-checked that I had my gun, and I touched my pentagram and cat charm for comfort.
“We’ll stay here and man the fort.” Merick motioned to Oliver. “And we’ll be here if you need any guidance in the situation you run into.”
Liz and I went to the door. I grabbed my bag, and we headed out to her car. I got into the passenger side and looked at her as she got in. “Thank you for coming with me.”
“I wouldn’t let you do this alone, Abby, as a friend, a fellow agent, or a bodyguard. I have your back.”
I buckled up, and she pulled out of my driveway. I saw Oliver and Merick standing at the front window watching us. “Merick is compromised as well.”
“In more than one way. We talked about it last night. We all agree that whoever had him let him escape, but no one knows why.”
“Did he mention what kind of questions they were asking him in interrogation?”
“No, he said he wasn’t ready to talk about what happened. So hopefully it’s not information we need. I’ve never seen Merick so shaken before.”
Me either. The man had seen his fair share of scary shit, so whatever he encountered, it was bad. “Hopefully it’s not life-saving information. Like who they are trying to trap with him.”
Liz made a noise of agreement and the flicked on the radio. I leaned back in the car and sipped my coffee. Five AM was way too early for trips like this.
#
We pulled into Black Hawk, first passing older houses in rows with small yards and painted fences, and then into the main part of the city with casinos with flashing lights. There weren’t many people on the streets yet, but Liz was right, we’d gotten into the city right after full sunrise. We passed the casinos and went down a mountain road that gave way to a dirt cul-de-sac. Liz parked the car, checked her GPS, and the picture of the map.
“I guess we walk from here.”
I looked around at the evergreen trees, some still lush and healthy and others dead. “Yeah, I guess so.” I got out and shut the car door.
Liz led the way, hiking into the trees without a word and looking at her phone. I followed her and tried to keep my eyes out for something, anything that would be a sign of Simon. Liz and I paused at an old wooden house. Parts of the wood looked rotted out while some looked new, like someone had recently replaced them.
“Restoration,” Liz whispered as if reading my mind. “Sometimes people like to restore old houses like this to keep the history alive.”
Black Hawk had once been a mining community until the veins dried up and people moved on. I paused and put my hand to the ground.
Liz waited for a moment, studying the house in her own way.
I closed my eyes and let my magic reach out to test the boundaries. If there was something magical around the house, my magic would touch it and then come back to me in a warning. I’d used the same technique when we found Moll’s workshop with the dolls.
Nothing hummed. Nothing came back to me in a shock, and I looked at Liz. “I don’t feel any magic.”
“It’s possible that whoever took Simon isn’t a witch, Abigail. It could be pack-related.”
That was true, if that was the case, I wasn’t looking forward to facing down a werewolf or two today. Liz walked up to the door and knocked.
Part of me was horrified she was giving away that we were here. Of course, a werewolf probably smelled us and heard us already.
The door swung open, and we both paused. I closed my eyes and really hoped that there wasn’t a dead body on the other side of the door. It was almost like a horror movie. It was never a good thing when the door swung in, unlocked, and no one was there. Or at least no one seemed to be there.
Liz and I drew our guns. She nudged the door further open with her foot and swept the room. I came up behind her. There was nothing in the main room, no body, no furniture, nothing.
I swallowed as we moved from room to room and found the same in each one. Nothing there, no signs of anyone. The only thing that I found unusual was there was no dust or dirt on the stone floor. Someone had swept recently, or the house had enough foot traffic to keep dust from gathering.
Liz stayed quiet as we got to the back door, or what should have been a back door. There was nothing on the hinges, just a rectangle hole that led outside. We walked out, guns still in our hands. To the left we found two steel doors wide open that led down into a cellar.
Liz motioned to it, and I shook my head. “Oh no, I know what this leads to. Dead bodies.”
She actually cracked a smile. “Flashlight.” She tossed me one, and I caught it.
I sh
ined it down and didn’t see anything moving. It wasn’t a super deep cellar, so I didn’t think I was going to find a pit of bodies if we went down. My heart sank, though. What if Simon was down there? What if he was no longer alive like he had been when we performed the spell?
“Cover me.” I started down the few steps and into the square room. I flashed the light around, finding walls covered in claw marks and brown blood splatters. The beam paused when I found a white gift box in the corner. “Clear,” I called up behind me.
A couple moments later, Liz joined my side. She saw where I had my flashlight pointed and waltzed right over to the box.
She picked it up and tilted toward the light. I could see in red scrawled over the top of the white gift box was my name.
I swallowed. “They knew I was coming.”
“Back upstairs. I don’t want to get trapped.” Liz jerked her head toward the stairs, and we both went up. Liz held the box carefully by the sides as we made our way back to the car. My heart pounded the entire way, and not because of the hike. Nothing good came of gift boxes left in cellars. Hell, nothing good came from cellars in my line of work.
When we got back to Liz’s SUV, we both got in and sat there for a moment.
“Do we take it back to PIB to open it?” My voice sounded numb to me, blank of the emotions hiding in my brain. I was keyed into my work mind. I couldn’t let my personal mind loose because it would think the worse.
Liz shook her head. “PIB doesn’t know we’re up here, remember? Open it and see what’s inside.”
Maybe it was just a letter. I slipped my finger between the bottom and the lid of the box, breaking the small piece of tape there. My heart tried to skip a few beats as I opened the lid.
There on the black tissue paper was a patch of wolf fur and a note. My stomach churned at the colors I knew so well. Simon’s fur.
“Nice try, Abigail. Want him back? Find me.”
The handwriting looked similar to the other crime scenes. I started shaking, and Liz gently took the box from me and closed it. “Now we take it to PIB.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
A few hours later, I sat in a room with O’Donald, Balin, and Nick sitting across from me. Pictures of the box and handwritten notes were laid out on the table between us. I refused to focus on the pictures of the box, but instead focused on the pictures of the handwriting and the notes.
The handwriting was identical.
“You’re lucky I already had a handwriting analyst working on the case.” Balin motioned to the images. “And that the handwriting looked identical enough for it to be concerning. My question is, why didn’t you or the wolf pack tell us that Simon was missing?”
I shrugged. “We didn’t know it was connected to the current case. Wolves handle their business differently. I’m not a wolf, so it’s not my place to question it.”
“But you went looking for him alone?” Balin raised a brow. “A bit reckless.”
“I didn’t go as a PIB agent, but I had backup.”
O’Donald motioned to the pictures. “It seems this is a lot more personal than we originally thought. If this is the same person, they aren’t just trying to aim suspicion at you anymore, but they are targeting and taunting you.”
He was going to pull me off the case. I met his gaze, daring him to try it.
“I don’t like you working the case as the intended target, but I’m also not a fan of what you might do when you’re idle.” O’Donald shook his head. “You find trouble, Collins, regardless of if you’re on the case or not.”
“We call that insubordinate,” Balin chimed in.
O’Donald and Nick both look at Balin like he’d grown a second head.
I closed my eyes and counted to ten.
“It would risk her badge if she was on my squad.”
O’Donald let out a short laugh. “You’ve already spoken to me about taking her badge. And whereas Collins has done some reckless things, there’s nothing in her cases or files that would say she’s insubordinate.”
I sat silently and glanced at Nick, who gave me a little shrug. I wasn’t even sure what he was doing here. From the confused look on his face, I don’t think he knew why either.
“I will not have Collins on the field on this case. She’s more than welcome to work from the office, but I will not chance her fucking up the investigation.” Balin slammed his hand on the table, making us all jump a little.
I didn’t like the outburst. “How about I work with the wolves since I have a connection to them, and I’m allowed on pack lands?”
“Because you’re the alpha’s girlfriend?” Balin guessed.
“No, because I’ve helped them before, and they trust me. Even if Simon and I weren’t dating, Travis, his second-in-command trusts me and has already asked for my help in this.”
O’Donald nodded. “I think that’s a good idea. Collins, you work with the wolves. I know the King has also pulled you in, so work from that angle. Share information with Balin, but I agree, it’s not wise to have the two of you on the field together.”
“Understood, sir.” I added the sir to help the situation. My snark and sass wouldn’t get me far right now, and O’Donald was on my side at the moment. I needed it to stay that way.
Balin nodded in agreement. “If that’s the best I’m going to get, then I’ll take it.” He stood. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to go work on the last crime scene we had.”
He walked out of the room, leaving Nick, O’Donald, and me.
Nick waited until the door was shut to speak. “I know you and Liz went up there without the expectation that it was connected to the case, but I would have liked to know where my team was in case we needed you or you needed back up.”
“I had a couple people in place for backup in case we ran into trouble. I didn’t want to involve PIB because I knew that Travis hadn’t reported Simon as missing. He was trusting me with finding the alpha.” I folded my hands on the table to keep them from shaking. I still needed to face Travis to tell him I was too late to find Simon. I swallowed the panic that was rising in my throat.
O’Donald pushed a picture toward me. It was one I hadn’t noticed because I was so focused on the handwriting ones to keep my eyes off Simon’s fur. I looked at it. It was a woman, probably about my age. Her hair fell around her face in perfectly styled beach waves, her smile was bright, her makeup flawless.
“Do you know her?”
I shook my head. “Should I?”
“This is Annabella Louise, the person who Balin pulled in as a suspect. She’s a witch, supposedly leans more towards healing than anything else. According to her interview, she had no idea what Balin was talking about. She just moved here and is getting ready to open up a little shop in Manitou.”
Nick chimed in. “You’ll be familiar with the shop. She bought the slot that Loraine’s Dollhouse was at.”
I shook my head. “I was down there the other day at the crime scene and there was another woman standing outside that shop.”
“I went and scouted it out. She has one employee.” Nick pulled out another photo, and I stared at the woman I’d seen the day I was there. “The shop isn’t set up yet. It looked like they had just finished gutting it.”
I wondered if they had found anything interesting there. I wasn’t going to ask, because I had no desire to relive the living doll nightmares. “Okay, honestly, it’s a good choice. There’s not a good metaphysical shop since Clarissa’s shop closed.”
“A smart business move, for sure,” Nick agreed. “She said it’d be open at the end of this week and we should check it out.”
Interesting. “She doesn’t know me so…”
“She doesn’t know you’re involved with the case, and it’d be logical for you to go check out the shop since it’s just down the road from your best friend’s old shop.”
I sighed. “Okay, I’ll make plans to go scout it out further when it opens.”
Did you like my present?
&nb
sp; The woman’s voice was back suddenly, and both Nick and I glance around the room, while O’Donald just sat there.
I glanced at Nick, and he gave a small nod of his head.
Your wolf is safe with me, Abigail. Don’t worry, I didn’t skin him too much to get that patch.
I wasn’t going to answer her. I wouldn’t give her the time of day.
Magic brushed through the room, and this time O’Donald looked around.
“Abigail, get your magic under control.”
“That’s not mine, sir,” I muttered. I closed my eyes and pushed out a circle around us, pushing the magic away. I met O’Donald’s gaze. “I have a feeling that whoever’s magic it is, that’s our new suspect.”
Nick nodded. “Abigail and I will devise a plan today to figure out who it is that’s attacking us and then add them to our suspect list.”
O’Donald gathered the photos. “Make a plan, inform Agent Jefferson about it, and then put it into action. I want no more dead bodies. Balin isn’t playing nice, so that’s going to make it harder, but I know this team can do it.” He put the photos in a file and handed them to Nick. “Watch each other’s backs. I don’t want any dead or injured agents either.”
He walked out of the room. Nick sighed. “You hear her too, then?”
“Yeah. I have since I was attacked.”
“Me too.”
“Merick as well.” I sighed. “So what does this all have to do with everything else.”
“We’re going to find out. There’s a spell I can do that allows us to pull the magic user to us.”
I stared at him for a moment. “Like Adrianna?” She’d pulled me through because I’d used my blood to track her.
“Similar.”
“Nick, that’s dark magic.”
He raised a brow. “Sometimes dark magic is called for, and as long as I’m not hurting anyone, it won’t taint my aura.”
I shook my head. “If you’re using her magic against her, so many things could go wrong.”
“Then what do you suggest?”
“I don’t know yet, Nick. I’m still trying to wrap my head around the fact that there’s a witch who’s in my head. With vampires there’s a spell to cleanse you from the influences, but I don’t think it works for magic.”
Something Wicked (Here Witchy Witchy Book 11) Page 14