One of her delicate eyebrows winged high on her forehead. “I somehow doubt that.”
The marshal rubbed a hand over his bristly hair as though straightening it. He must not have counted on getting this close to the magistrate. Usually a private audience took months and an appointment. Which meant he probably didn’t realize she had her guards tucked somewhere nearby. I could almost feel their warm breath tickling my nape.
“You may go.” She flicked her fingers toward the marshal, who bowed his head.
“Yes, Magistrate.” Flushing bright red, he squealed out her title.
Once the door shut behind us, she withdrew a button-sized charm, placed it on the desktop and crushed it with a black metal stapler. My ears popped as the spell activated. If Vause felt the change in pressure, she gave no outward indication.
“What news do you have from Abbeville? Has Harlow been found?” I seized control of our meeting by asking the first rapid-fire questions. “Have they located Charybdis?”
“Charybdis is dead.” She squared her shoulders, preparing for a fight. “I was sent pictures of his corpse for confirmation.”
A prickling sensation told me we weren’t on the same page. “So they found the person responsible for the medics’ deaths?”
“You left the state without checking out of your hotel room.” She dusted the used charm into the trash bin. “Where did you go?”
She offered up her palm, and the scent of hand sanitizer perfumed the room as it squirted from thin air. Invisibility? That was a dangerous magic, though it shouldn’t surprise me to learn the conclave employed it for their high-profile members.
Two could play this game. “I touched one of the corpses, and I’m ready to swear before the full senate of magistrates that whatever killed those medics gave off the same magical signature present at all the previous crime scenes.” I stared her down. “My skills are documented, and my identifications have never been contested.”
“You were last seen exiting your hotel and getting into a cab.” Her clear gaze never left mine as the two different conversations merged into one. “The warg followed minutes later. Where did you go?”
“You had someone following me?” That tidbit of information shouldn’t have surprised me. Then the implications of her statement sank in, and fury trembled in my voice. “What are you insinuating?”
“I have made no insinuations,” she informed. “I have stated facts in an attempt to clarify your whereabouts during the past few days. As to your former question, yes. I did not trust the warg, and I assigned a guard to you for your protection.”
I held in my snort and almost choked on it. A guard. Assigned for my protection. No doubt her plant had texted her updates on our every move. Nice.
“I have other information at my disposal. Either I reconstruct the timeline with possible errors, or you can report to me now.” She cocked her head, expecting a recitation of dates and times and other damning intel. “The choice is yours,” she prompted, her gaze tagging the chair opposite hers. “Do have a seat. You must be tired from your activities last night.”
I sank into the plush cushion and debated how much to confide in the magistrate I wasn’t sure I trusted anymore. I chose the safer option, the one where she filled in blanks and I corrected her when she got things wrong. “How much do you know?”
“A substantial amount,” she said, not falling for the ploy. “Enough that any deviation will be apparent.”
“Graeson met me in my hotel room. He wanted to discuss the case. He asked for my help with a plan he had concocted. I declined.” I kept it short and to the point. “He refused to leave my room until I heard him out. I declined that too and left when he refused to go.” She nodded encouragement, and I continued. “I noticed Harlow hadn’t returned from the Sardis Lake site yet, and I made the decision to go to her, hoping by the time I returned the warg would have lost interest and left. At the site, I was unable to locate Harlow. Graeson appeared, without invitation, and we searched for her together.”
“Did you feel threatened by the warg?” she interjected.
“No.” There was no hesitation in my answer. “He would never hurt me.”
“Hmm,” she replied. “You sound certain of that.”
A tingle of doubt spread through me. I got the impression I had given away a personal truth I should have kept to myself, but it was too late now. If Vause had been following Graeson and me as closely as she claimed, she would know the warg had formed an attachment and that I was, sadly, not immune to his charms. Graeson was a gorgeous specimen of wargdom. I had seen every inch of him nude, many times, and had yet to isolate a single physical flaw. No. Those emerged as soon as he opened his mouth. The man was a master manipulator.
“The Fury, Letitia Rebec, captured us,” I continued, to stall her next segue. “I was knocked unconscious and—”
“I’m aware of those proceedings.” Vause waved a thin hand, appearing eager to reach a specific point in my narrative. “I have an eyewitness account of every moment from the time you left the hotel to the time you were taken into custody by Mr. Graeson and his associate, Adele Preston.” She leaned forward. “You were missing for several days, unwilling or unable to return any of my phone calls, and the next I hear of you is through a liaison informing me that you were in Abbeville and asking for me. What brought you to Abbeville, Camille? How did you end up in the middle of a crime scene?”
I told her the truth. “Graeson believed that area was the next location where the kelpie would strike.”
“How did he come across this information?”
“He gave a scale we found at the Brushy Creek site to—” despite my irritation with them, I covered for the Garzas anyway, “—a witch. He used it to power a divination spell.”
“Interesting. Not many packs employ witches.” Her gaze sharpened. “What else did this witch divine?”
“All I know is what Graeson told me.” I spread my hands in a helpless gesture. “He claimed the kelpie would take its next victim in Abbeville, Mississippi, and that’s why he brought me there.”
That Charybdis had been predicted to make an appearance in Tennessee, I kept to myself, unsure whether that timeline had been negated by the kelpie’s death.
“What did he hope you would accomplish that his own people could not? He didn’t allow you access to any resources, which means your conclave contacts would have proven useless.” When I didn’t immediately answer, she gave a knowing nod and her lips thinned. I glimpsed the tip of an emotion too vast to be labeled as anger there, but she blinked, and her mask slid back into place. “I see. I suspected that might be the case.”
Angry he beat you to the punch? The words almost flew out of my mouth, but I clamped my jaw shut and caged them. Pissing off a magistrate was far more dangerous than yanking Graeson’s tail ever could be.
“Wargs are practical beasts. Graeson saw Lori, and he began plotting a way to use her.” Vause rubbed a finger over the creased skin between her eyebrows. “That was my fault. I acted…rashly…in allowing him to sit in on the McKenna girl’s interview. I apologize for sharing your secrets with him so openly.”
“I would have agreed to help if he’d asked.” The urge to defend Graeson loosened my jaw. “I could have escaped if I’d wanted to.” I amended that to, “He would have released me if I’d asked.”
Her hand dropped, and she stared at me. “Why didn’t you?”
“I felt he had information pertinent to the case.” I shifted in my chair under the weight of her consideration. “Since native species are hesitant to trust fae, it seemed like a good opportunity to learn what they knew.”
Vause let that statement hang suspended between us. “Yet you made no attempt to share this information with the conclave.”
“He took my phone.” For the first time, I was glad for it. “Wargs don’t need them for interpack communication. None of the wargs I saw carried one. As isolated as we were, I doubt I would have had reception in any case, so the
point is moot.”
Not a total lie. I had held Daphne’s phone in hand, but I hadn’t checked the bars for signal strength. As far as I knew, I was telling her the truth.
“You aren’t on trial here, Camille,” Vause soothed. “Despite his methods, I can’t argue with the results. The two of you managed to do what we could not. You brought down Charybdis and saved a girl’s life.” Her voice remained cool. “If you are satisfied with your treatment, then we won’t press charges against Mr. Graeson or the Chandler pack.”
“I appreciate your generous offer, and I accept. I am satisfied on that front.” I mounted my next argument. “But the kelpie was not Charybdis. The evidence supports magical tampering with the crime scenes, as well as the odd behavior of the beast itself. I posit that Charybdis is a separate entity. We killed a vassal, a thrall, something, but the man behind the murders is still free and killed two more fae today, long after the kelpie’s witnessed time of death.”
“A full investigation is underway,” she assured me.
“What about Harlow?” I still had no answers. “Have they found her?”
“The changeling has not been located, no.”
My spine went stiff at the mention of Harlow’s heritage.
“I see you were aware of the circumstances of the girl’s birth. For your sake I hope that is a recent development.” Her lips formed a moue of disappointment. “After Wink—” ice formed on her next words, “—we couldn’t afford to be ignorant of her deficits. We had her tested and her background thoroughly researched beyond the superficial probing she and other minor contractors receive.”
“What Harlow is—or isn’t—doesn’t concern me. It doesn’t change to fact she’s one of ours, and she deserves our help.” I scooted to the edge of my seat. “I would like to return to Abbeville and provide support for the team.”
“That’s not possible.” Vause lifted a pen and then discarded it. “Your involvement with the warg has been called into question. Your defense of him, of his actions, even now, is too impassioned to believe you’re ambivalent toward him. Even if I could defend you against those accusations, you were close to Harlow. You can’t be circumspect.” She softened her voice. “Given your past history, it was foolish of me to recruit you for this case.”
Bitterness coiled in my chest. “You’re taking Charybdis from me.”
“Go home. Rest. You’ve been granted two weeks of leave time. Paid, of course.” She stood and smoothed imagined wrinkles from her skirt. “I will forward any updates on your friend that I receive.”
Two weeks. The pronouncement hit me with the force of a backhand. Paid or not, being shut out hurt. Aunt Dot would be thrilled about the forced vacation, but the idea of sitting at home that long made my skin itch. Foolish or not, Vause had recruited me to unmask Charybdis, and after witnessing his carnage, I had no intentions of leaving his capture up to the conclave. Maybe I would take Graeson up on his offer of cooperation after all.
Vause waited until my hand was on the doorknob and my back was to her before extending an olive branch. “A few months ago a death goddess, the Morrigan, attempted to escape Faerie and take up residence in the mortal realm.”
A zing shot down my spine. The Morrigan. That was the name Thierry had danced around in Wink. I had summoned the goddess once, back when I was still a marshal. The Morrigan had access to the mortal realm. Why press to make residence here permanent when she had the best of both worlds? I hesitated, waiting to see if Vause enlightened me.
“Some believe she encouraged the cutting of the tethers connecting this realm with the fae realm in order to prevent extradition.” Vause turned introspective. “You might ask yourself what a death goddess fears enough to jump realms and burn the bridges after her. You might also ask yourself who offered her the match.”
“The boy’s death in Wink wasn’t related to Charybdis.” I slowly faced Vause. “You knew that before you sent me to Texas, didn’t you?” I leaned back against the door. “You wanted me to know about the portal.” Another thought occurred to me. “You wanted me to meet Thierry.”
“The kraken had to be dealt with sooner or later.” A speck of a smile teased her lips. “I chose sooner.”
“Why not tell me that outright? I could have flown out and grabbed a cup of coffee with her without all the pretense.” I squeezed the knob until it squeaked. “A good man might not be dead—his wife incarcerated and his children parentless—if I hadn’t intervened.”
“It was necessary for you to visit Wink in more ways than one.” Her mood darkened. “There were restrictions placed on me meant to curb my involvement. A few of the more cumbersome vows had to be lifted before this conversation could occur.”
“You mean the blood oath I pledged to Thierry.” I thumped my head against the flat of the door. “Did you bribe her to initiate me?”
Our chat, the baring of our souls, couldn’t have been scripted, right? Who was I kidding? Vause lived to dig deep into the tender heart of people to discover what weaknesses she might use against them.
“No.” She laughed, actually laughed, out loud. As startled as she was, I had to wonder when the last time was that something had tickled her funny bone. I knew the feeling. Coaxing laughter out of the reserved subset we belonged to tended to require herculean effort few made. “Thierry would do the opposite of what I asked to spite me. She believes in the conclave as an institution, but she has no love for magistrates.”
Unexpected relief spiraled through me. I liked the no-nonsense marshal, and I fully intended to make good on her offer to dial her up if I needed help. Due to my current circumstances, I had to hope her rebellious spirit lent itself to helping out those of us about to lose access to restricted information, including sending me a copy of the portal breach video.
Another pressure wave popped my ears. While I was vacillating, Vause had killed the privacy spell.
“An escort has been arranged to bring you to the airport.” Vause held her hands clasped in front of her. “Your belongings were retrieved from Abbeville, and your flight home has already been booked.”
I accepted our meeting was over. “If you hear anything about Harlow…”
“You will be the first person I contact,” she assured me.
I exited her borrowed office and dumped the chai I hadn’t touched in the trash. It didn’t hit me until then that my lips had tingled more than once since Thierry bound me when I spoke to Vause. The magistrate knew so much…and yet… I must hold a piece of the puzzle she had yet to learn. There was only one thing for it. I had to speak to Thierry again.
I located the fae who had escorted me to Vause’s dressing down. “I’m ready to go.”
The man shoved onto his feet with a donut clenched between his teeth and a cup of coffee wrapped in one fist. He set off toward the parking lot, and I trailed him. Music on the ride to the airport was as twangy as the soundtrack to Falco had been. He pulled next to the curb and popped the hatch. I took the hint, climbed out with Harlow’s bag tucked under my arm and grabbed my carry-on from the trunk. The second the latch caught, the SUV’s tires spun, burning rubber toward Abbeville.
Rooting through the pockets of my overnight bag, I touched a slice of heavy plastic. My cell? I hadn’t spotted it since I woke at the Rebec home. I powered it up as I strolled through the lobby of the airport and checked my messages. My thumb was hovering over the first digit of Aunt Dot’s number when the screen went dark.
“Dead battery,” I grumbled. “Perfect.”
In the age of cellular supremacy, phone booths were long extinct. I had no idea if my charger had survived Graeson’s and then the conclave’s packing efforts, and I was too tired to dig through my belongings to figure it out. That meant waiting in line at the customer service kiosk, which was slightly less painful than visiting a dentist when in a major airport. I blessed this bucolic Alabama town as I walked right up to the counter.
“My battery died.” I pasted on a smile that didn’t come close to matc
hing the brunette behind the counter’s megawatt grin and dropped the bags at my feet. “Do you have somewhere I can make a call?”
“Sure, hon.” The attendant set a light blue phone with a dark blue cord on the edge of her desk. “Instructions for dialing out are printed on the handset.”
“Great.” I dialed Aunt Dot, my fingers foreign on the raised square buttons. “I appreciate it.”
“No problem.” She stepped away and gave me a modicum of privacy.
“Pumpkin,” Aunt Dot boomed in my ear. “Did you get my message?”
“No. Sorry. My phone died.” The sound of her voice was a balm to my nerves after the last twenty-four hours. “I just wanted to call and let you know I’m at the airport. I should be home in time for dinner.”
“Home?” She cackled merrily. “Honey, have you spoken to Cord lately?”
“Yes. Wait— What?” My heart shriveled to the size of a raisin. “How do you know Graeson?”
“He called first thing this morning and explained everything.” She sounded peppier than she had in months. “He told me how you met and fell in love working a case together. He sounds like a doll. He’s so smitten with you, it’s precious. I can’t believe you didn’t mention him to me. How tall is he? Does he have a lot of muscles? He sounds gorgeous. Do you have a picture you can email Isaac? No. Don’t do that. I’ll wait. I want to be surprised.”
Me? In love with Cord Graeson? “How did he get your number?” I answered my own question. “He copied my contacts while he had possession of my phone.” Her indulgent laughter didn’t help my mood. “What do you mean you’ll wait? Wait for what?”
“You really don’t know?” She clucked her tongue with budding fondness. “That boy promised he would clear things up with you.”
“Things? What things?” My shrill voice kept rising. “What are you talking about?”
“Cord said you two are getting close, and he wants to meet the family before things get serious.” A sigh blasted my ear. Clearly, I was ruining her fun. “He owns acreage in Georgia. Did you know that? He invited the whole family to drive down so we could spend the week getting to know each other.”
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