I tightened my hand even harder around the seatbelt. The image of Max walking into the bottle shop and placing a hand heavily on the culprit’s shoulder, stopping him in place, midflight, snapped back into my mind. Max had been so damn calm and in control. And the expression on the culprit’s face?
Frigging terrified.
I shuddered. Just what kind of trouble was I in?
At that move, maybe the good side of Josh rose to the surface. “Fine – I’ll put you out of your misery. Max isn’t going to do anything against you. He can’t. You’re under a protection order.”
“But it’s just you who’s upholding that protection order, right? Isn’t Max stronger than you?”
“Firstly, it’s not just me.” Josh started to calm down from his red-bellied anger long enough to give another derisive snort. “I think you’ll find that I am the most competent warlock bounty hunter in the city. That’s why I’m the only one who’s affiliated directly with the government. I’m powerful, Missy, and you need to respect that.”
“And secondly?” I got there first, leaning in a little, despite the fact Josh was driving like a rally car driver. I needed to know this. There was a quick, uneasy feeling gathering in my gut, kind of like a few scant clouds blocking out the horizon and signaling an oncoming storm.
“Max….”
“Max what? I mean Maximus what,” I corrected myself. I wasn’t trying to be a good girl here – I’d just taken Josh’s warning to heart. Something about Max unsettled me….
“He wouldn’t ever break the law – at least directly.” Josh wouldn’t look at me anymore. He decidedly wouldn’t look at me. It wasn’t just that he’d returned his attention to the road in the hopes we wouldn’t crash – he seemed more than competent enough to be able to navigate the traffic while screaming in my face. Nope. He was withdrawing, trying to hide his emotion from me.
But I was too damn observant not to pick it up as it crumpled his brow, tightened his fingers, and stiffened his back. “He’s meant to be some kind of banker, isn’t he? Or does he have stocks or something?” I wanted to draw Josh as far into this conversation as I could. And even though I knew exactly what Max Knights did for a living – as he was easily one of the most recognizable people in the city – I realized the only way to hook Josh into telling me more was by acting the idiot.
Sure enough, it worked. Josh let out one hell of a snort. I was surprised his nostrils didn’t rattle off his face. “Venture capitalist. He is a venture capitalist – everyone knows that, right? Apart from you, because I forgot – you’re an idiot.”
I didn’t bite back. I kept watching Josh’s reaction. “How did he make his money, though? You need to have funds in order to be a venture capitalist in the first place,” I pointed out. At least this was a genuine question. Though I knew on paper who Max Knights was, I’d never bothered to look that far into his history. Now? I was feeling inclined to dig up every single fact I could about the man. Because something about him…. God, I couldn’t put my finger on it, and yet at the same time something told me I needed to. Sooner rather than later.
“The Knights family have always been… wealthy.”
“You mean he came from money? Isn’t he meant to be one of the wealthiest men in the country? Heck, I thought he was one of the 100 wealthiest men in the world,” I pointed out, proving I actually did know more than I was letting on.
It didn’t matter – Josh was so lost in this conversation that he didn’t even notice. He took his hand off the wheel, scratched his chin, and sighed until his shoulders dropped a full inch. “Yeah. He made most of his money. He didn’t start off with that much.”
“He must be a very good venture capitalist, then. I thought there was a great deal of uncertainty in that game. A lot of risk,” I added needlessly.
“Max has always had the ability to find a good deal,” Josh said.
There was a pause as he let those words settle.
I opened my mouth to speak. I stopped. My brow scrunched up just as Josh turned all the way around from the wheel and looked right at me. “That’s right, Missy, and I guess it’s better for you to find out from me than from him.”
“… Is he a finder?” I said warily, putting two and two together as I realized there was only one reason Josh would be acting like this.
Josh sighed even louder until I was sure he was going to pop a lung. He kept scratching his chin, really digging his fingers in now as if he were attempting to pierce through to the other side of his jaw. “Yes, Max is a finder. That makes two of you in the entire city.”
“Oh,” I managed. As far as reactions went, it was underwhelming. It also didn’t match the sensations rushing through my belly, darting up my back, and ultimately sinking into my chest.
I hadn’t even known what finders were until this morning. Worse – I still didn’t fully appreciate what our full powers were. But now I had an example of another finder – and that example happened to be one of the most powerful men in the country.
A whole host of questions hit me at once, breaking my silence like a battering ram to a door. “I don’t get it. He’s a finder – why would he have any interest in me? And why isn’t he contracted? And how come there are so few finders? And isn’t… I don’t know, isn’t it illegal to use your finding powers to make money? Surely it’s an unfair advantage?” I could hear my own voice, and I sounded just as pathetic as I felt.
Josh shook his head. “Please try not to freak out. I can’t even remember all of your questions anymore – you said them too fast. But here’s the summary – no, it’s not illegal. It’s venture capital – not stock tips. Plus, Max Knights has always had a very developed ability to walk the fine line between what is illegal and what is not,” Josh said stiffly, once again intimating that his experiences with Max weren’t as simple as they seemed. “Now, where was I? Oh yes. The only question that really matters.” He looked at me, and I swore that even if a semitrailer came hurtling across our lane and tried to squish us flat, he wouldn’t glance away. “He would be… interested in you,” he measured his words, actually dropping his tone as if he gave a crap about my feelings, “because two finders are always more powerful than one. Plus, Max’s abilities are more based on finding opportunities. Though you haven’t come into even a fraction of your abilities yet, based on the test Stanley gave you, it seems you’re more of a locator.”
I was about to ask if there was any difference between the two, then I realized promptly that of course there was. It sounded as if Max had the ability to find opportunities, almost as if he was perpetually being smiled on by Lady Luck. Whereas, if Stanley’s test was anything to go by, I seemed to have the skill of locating existing objects.
I sat there and scratched my neck. “What about my original question?” I finally managed.
“What do you want to know?”
“Am I in some kind of danger from him?”
Josh looked at me. He looked away.
And that was enough of an answer.
My stomach went into overdrive, dropping and twisting like an acrobat. I was now holding onto my seatbelt with such a tight-knuckled grip, even the Hulk wouldn’t be able to rip it free from my grasp.
“Don’t worry, Beth.” For the first time, Josh actually used my name as he slowed down and started driving like a normal person. “Like I said – Max doesn’t break the law.”
“You said he just treads a very fine path between right and wrong. I’m not sure if that puts my mind at ease. Plus, he must be a hell of a threat to have had such an immediate effect on that guy back in the bottle shop. Did you see that crim’s face? He looked as if he was going to swallow his own tongue.”
Josh snorted. There was a playful edge to it this time. “I’m sorry, how long have you been working for me that you’ve started to call our targets crims? You’re now the one who sounds like she’s out of a ‘70s cop drama. A bad one,” he added, because when it came to Josh McIntosh, he could never pass up an opportunity to get ba
ck at me.
“Just answer the damn question.”
“Max isn’t going to breach the protection order, Beth, and that’s all you need to know for now. Let’s go home. You can order me pizza and get a shower – because you stink. I hope it’s just the stress of the day and not your natural body odor.”
“I’m sorry, but I’m not your secretary.”
“Why do you equate body odor with secretaries? You’ve got a weird mind.”
“I’m not going to order you pizza. Presumably you have a phone and a thumb, and you can do that yourself.”
“Where exactly do you get off talking back to me with so much lip? You are my employee – you get that, don’t you?”
“If you’re about to threaten me with noncompliance, so help me.”
Josh rolled his eyes and continued to drive.
And me?
I slid my gaze out of the window. We’d joined a freeway, and it was high enough up that it gave a good vantage over the city. I found my gaze darting over the various buildings and spires of downtown. It took me a while to realize what I was looking for until my eyes snapped to one of the newest, tallest office blocks.
Max Knights.
I didn’t know that building was where he worked. Nope. I felt it. Because, for the second time today, I found something I wasn’t looking for.
Max had gone home to his tower. But something told me he wouldn’t stay home.
Chapter 7
“Just get in the damn car,” Josh grumbled as he jammed a thumb toward his monstrosity of a vehicle. Why he thought he needed such a big car to drive around the damn city in, I didn’t know. But before I could label it as a complete waste of fossil fuel and demand he pay for it by planting at least a million trees, I realized he couldn’t exactly have a small, two-door zippy thing in his line of work.
It was a new day, and thankfully, I’d gotten a little more practice hauling myself into his truck. It wasn’t pretty, and I sure did grunt a lot, but I managed it.
Josh waited, drumming his fingers on the steering wheel as I put my seatbelt on. “Dignified,” he quipped.
I arched an eyebrow. “You going to tell me where we’re going this time? Or are you just going to throw me in the deep end and wait for me to swim?”
“Sorry?” He reached forward and gunned the ignition, swiftly pulling out from the curb before he put his seatbelt on. “Swim? Pretty sure you didn’t swim last time. I’m pretty sure you sank like a frigging stone. Now, we’ve had this conversation so many times already, but—”
“I get it,” I said softly, bringing up a hand and tucking my fringe behind my ears. To do so, I kind of had to shake my head to unstick my fringe in the first place – but that wasn’t the point. The point was hiding from Josh.
You see, it’d been two days since the incident with Max, and it was still playing on my mind. A lot of other stuff was playing on my mind, too – like the fact my life had been turned completely upside down and I now had to get my head around being a magical bounty hunter. But Max?
God, I’d been dreaming about him. And no, before you get excited – they weren’t those kinds of dreams. Just snippets, here and there, like my mind was locating him even when I was asleep. Seriously. He was walking, he was talking, he was in a meeting, he was driving, he was sleeping – an endless plethora of ordinary activities as if I was glimpsing his actual routine.
It was stupid and seriously obsessive, but no matter how many times I told myself to stop thinking about the guy, thoughts of him just arose in my head like bubbles in boiling water.
“You’ve gone all quiet – I don’t like it when you go quiet. I may have only known you for two days now, Miss Samson, but I know quiet means you’re planning something. So what are you plotting?”
If anyone could distract me from my swirling thoughts about Max, it was Josh and his ridiculous statements. I shot him the kind of look that told him he was an A-Class idiot. “Sorry, plotting? Have you confused me for an idiotic mad scientist out of a bad superhero film or something?”
He snorted with laughter. He brought a hand off the steering wheel and clicked his fingers. “Kind of like that. I like the idea of you as stupid.” He let his lips tick up around the word stupid until he was grinning like a maniac.
I rolled my eyes. “Stop insulting me already and tell me where we’re going.”
“Ah, so you’re not distracted anymore, ha?” The comment was pointed.
Before my cheeks could redden, I straightened in my seat, locked a hand on my seatbelt, and turned my head toward the window. “Just realistic. You never tell me anything – so what’s the point in asking?”
“Don’t worry; I learned my lesson from last time,” his voice dropped momentarily before he cleared his throat. “To answer your question, we’re off to see—”
“The Wonderful Wizard of Oz?” I couldn’t help myself.
He looked at me sideways and shook his head in that long-suffering way people do when they’re trying to tell you that you’re hopeless and you will never change. “No. Though she is wonderful,” he said, and with every word, his lips spread all the wider until his grin became as hyper as a man chugging down half a kilo of cocaine.
I frowned, my brow contracting with consternation.
He brought his hands off the wheel and clapped. I would’ve snapped at him not to drive dangerously, but this was Josh. In between being a powerful warlock and an idiot, he simply couldn’t have an accident somehow. Perhaps the other drivers of Madison City were now so wary of him, they knew when they saw his oversized, overpowered monster truck to get the heck out of the way.
“I’m sorry, Miss Samson, but are you jealous? I thought you never wanted me to hold your hand—”
“Just get to your point, already. You were about to say that we’re going to meet Helena, right? Why?”
“Because we’re bounty hunters, and she’s got a bounty for us.”
“So this is a nongovernment job, then?”
“Yep. Gosh, you really are learning fast. Soon you’ll be able to say the whole alphabet.”
“Very funny. Are you gonna tell me why we’re going to see her? You know, what bounty she wants us to pick up? Or do you just want me to stupidly blurt that I’m a finder again?”
This comment got to him. Even though I’d just admitted that what I’d done was stupid, he didn’t catch hold of that comment and insult me further. He shrugged, ran a tongue over his teeth, and shrugged again. “One of her managers has gone a-wandering.”
“Managers?” My brow crumpled again. “I got the impression that she pretty much only hired construction workers – you know, the guys on the ground.”
“Surprisingly, I actually do know what a construction worker is. And you’re wrong. Like I told you before – which you would remember if you had a brain larger than a pee – the Hancocks are the largest contractor of witches. Not everyone is suited to construction, Missy. Some of us,” he patted a hand on his chest, “are much better at managing others.”
“Still, is it usual for managers to go missing?” I tried to wrestle Josh back to the main point. With the rate at which he was driving, even if we had to head to the other side of the country, we would be there in less than five minutes.
And I really, really couldn’t afford a repeat of last time. Because just thinking about it….
I clutched the seatbelt harder as I tried to stifle a shiver.
“Contracted witches will run for all sorts of reasons. It’s not necessarily their level of pay or responsibility. If the guy’s pushed, then anything can happen.”
I tilted my head to the side. As I’ve already told you so many times before, I’m good at observing people, and two very important things had just occurred. Josh had stopped making eye contact, and he’d gotten a far-off look in his eyes as he’d concentrated for the first time on driving.
… My gut reaction wanted to tell me that Josh actually had some sympathy for this guy – but then my brain reminded me that h
e was the frigging state-sponsored bounty hunter who was sent to track wayward witches down.
So what exactly was going on here?
“The guy’s name is Howard Rush. Middle management. On 100,000 k+ a year. Good bonuses. From his work history, it looks like he knew what he was doing and he was well suited for his job. He’d been given multiple out-of-town permits – and, occasionally, he’d even been allowed to leave the country. Not every witch gets that – you have to prove yourself,” he said pointedly.
I ignored his point. I was too interested in what he was saying.
No, I didn’t want to be a bounty hunter. Yes, I wanted to go back to being a waitress and a soon-to-be café owner – but no, that wasn’t going to happen. Plus, I was interested in this. Something in my gut was tickling, and it was telling me I wanted to find this guy.
Back when I was a kid, I’d been one of those irritating toddlers who wouldn’t stop looking for Easter eggs until she’d found every single one. I would stop my exasperated parents from telling me where they were – and I’d chuck a tantrum if they’d tried.
That was the point of the game, after all. The point was to find what had remained hidden.
Now I unclenched my hand from my seatbelt and leaned forward.
Josh narrowed his eyes at me. “Why do you suddenly look as if you’re competent and interested in the case? Stop messing with me. Go back to being pathetic and idiotic.”
“Maybe it’s my nascent powers finally waking up. Maybe I’ll find this guy before you have a chance to say boo.”
Josh looked at me askance. “Or maybe you’ll fall down on your ass multiple times and get lost in a crowd. I think I’m going to go with experience on this one.”
“Just tell me everything I need to know already.”
“I am. This is it. Howard’s done a runner, and as of yet, we don’t know why. Then again, we don’t really care. We’ve just got to catch him.”
“If we already know these facts, why exactly are we going to Helena?” I asked, even though I was pretty sure I already knew the answer. And maybe my tone gave away my cynicism, because Josh shot me a disgruntled look.
Forgotten Destiny Book One Page 6