Psychic for Hire Series Box Set

by Hermione Stark

  We both break apart, giggling a little. “So if I give you my phone number, will you call me with an appointment?” I ask a little anxiously.

  “Of course I will.” She takes out a little case from her purse and hands me a business card. “You can call me anytime.”

  “Thank you. And I’ll be sure to text you my number.” I smile at her, turning away slightly because everything just feels overly awkward now. “If I stay here am just gonna keep thanking you,” I tell her. She laughs as I turn to walk away.

  I swing back towards her suddenly. “Beatrice, sorry, one last thing.”

  She had been walking away, but she halts. “Yes, of course?”

  “Raif did mention one thing when I saw him. He was talking about a key? To a safe-deposit box, I think? Or a locker? Do you know what he was talking about?”

  She shakes her head. “Sorry. No idea. It probably wasn’t important.”

  “You’re right. I mean Storm’s team are sure the murderer was after Lynesse and poor Raif just got in the way. She was the gorgeous succubus, newly engaged to the famous actor and all that. And it happened at her house. It would be so weird if it turned out to be about Raif after all.”

  “Exactly,” she says.

  “Anyway, just forget I said anything. It probably isn’t relevant. I’ll let Storm know, though. He likes to cover all his bases. He’ll probably want to do another search of Raif’s place to make sure they didn’t miss anything.”

  I walk away slowly, and I am sure I can feel her eyes on my back.

  Nicely done, says the little voice. Now we’ll see.

  Chapter 22

  STORM

  Caprio rolls to his side on the ground, groaning as Storm handcuffs him.

  “What the hell are you doing, man?” he says. “This isn’t fair.”

  Storm finishes reading him his rights and yanks him upright onto his feet. Remi limps over. She takes off her broken-heeled shoe, looking mightily angry at it. “Serves me right for wearing a human-made shoe,” she mutters.

  “As opposed to what?” says Monroe, catching up to her.

  “Goblin-made of course. You wouldn’t get a goblin-made shoe that couldn't take a beating.”

  “Shoes?” Caprio roars. “What the hell are you talking about? You tricked me! And I never assaulted no one!”

  “Sure you did,” says Remi. “My poor foot is gonna bruise up any second now.”

  “Calm down,” says Storm. “We’re taking you down to our offices.”

  Storm’s phone rings in his pocket. He grabs it with one hand. Seeing that it is Diana, he hands Caprio over to Remi and Monroe. He moves away a little to answer the call, wanting to tell Diana the good news.

  “Hi, Di—”

  She cuts him off, babbling urgently into the phone, “I’ve got her, Storm! She was pretending to be nice to me, and she was oh-so-convincing, but I just know it!” Her voice is low like she is worried about being overheard by others.

  “What are you talking about Diana?”

  “Beatrice Grictor, of course. You have to come to Raif Silverstone’s house because everything is about to happen.”

  “Are you there now?” he asks sharply.

  “Not yet. Meet me there in say ninety minutes, okay?” She sounds odd, and more than a little strained.

  “No I will not!” Storm snaps. “Stay away from that house, Diana. We’ve secured it for evidence. And you promised me you’d let this Beatrice Grictor thing go.”

  “No. I promised to ask Beatrice for counseling, and I did. So that’s all done. Are you going to meet me there or not, Storm? I need you.”

  “You are not to go there, Diana,” Storm says, biting off each word tensely, trying to keep his anger in check. “We already have a suspect in custody. This case is over. Do you hear me?”

  Her tone changes suddenly to chipper and bright. “A suspect? Really? I hear you, boss man. It looks like you’ve won. Talk about spoiling all the fun. Toodle pip.” She hangs up.

  Storm slides his phone back in his pocket, wondering what the hell has gotten into her. He is going to have a serious word with her later. After he’s given himself a chance to calm down.

  Back at the van, Caprio is struggling with Monroe and Remi who are trying unsuccessfully to get him to take a seat. Caprio keeps yanking himself away from the van door and throwing himself onto the ground, determined not to get inside. Even at the cost of injuring himself.

  When he sees Storm approaching, Caprio bodily throws himself in the opposite direction.

  “Okay, okay!” Caprio pleads. “Look, I should have told you that I flew back to London early. I came to see a girl. Why should I stay on set while Jared was out having his fun? But the girl didn’t answer my calls okay? She didn’t want to see me, so I flew back to Ireland.”

  Remi smirks at Storm. “That was easy,” she mouths at him.

  “I want to call my pop!” Caprio yells.

  “Sure. You’ll get your phone call when we’re there,” she says.

  “Now. I want to call him now!”

  “That’s not how it works,” says Storm. “You can call him when you get to headquarters.”

  “And then you’ll answer some questions,” says Monroe. “Like how come your fingerprints were found where they shouldn't be.”

  “Of course my fingerprints are in Jared’s house. I’m his assistant!”

  “Nice try,” says Storm.

  “I knew you would think it was me!” Jared says. “So my fingerprints are in her bedroom. She wanted it, okay? She was always coming on to me. She couldn’t get enough.”

  “So you admit you were having an affair with Lynesse Jones?” says Remi.

  “So what? We’re consenting adults!”

  “And the baby was yours?”

  “She wouldn’t keep it. I loved her but she wouldn’t keep it.” Caprio is crying now, his face crumpling as tears pour down his cheeks. “I said we could get married, but she wanted the hot celebrity wedding with Jared and all the fame. She said she needed it.”

  “Sounds like motive for murder to me,” says Storm.

  “It wasn’t me!” he wails. “It was Jared. He must have found out. I bet he rigged the cameras even though we switched them off. He was so possessive. He was cheating on her, but he still wanted Lynesse all to himself. The pig! You haven’t seen how he gets when he’s angry. The guy gets off on playing a vampire hunter! He’s said he could do it for real!”

  “Sure, we can talk about all of that,” says Storm. He puts one hand on Caprio’s back and his other on top of Caprio’s head, and in one swift motion he forcibly bundles him into the van and secures him with restraining seat belts.

  “Wait!” shouts a voice. “What the hell is going on?” A panting Jared Everett has emerged from the embassy. He looks into the van and seems astonished to see Kris in hand cuffs.

  “Why are you arresting him?” He leans around Storm so that he can look at Jared. “Was it you, you bastard? Did you kill my sweet precious Lynesse?” He looks baffled, like he can’t quite believe it.

  “Your sweet precious Lynesse?” Jared scoffs. “Don’t make out like you weren't screwing anything in a skirt any chance you got. You didn’t care about Lynesse!”

  Everett’s face goes red. “It really gets your goat that the women want me. How is that my fault? So what if I had a little fun? Lynesse was the one I loved! She knew it!”

  “Yeah, then why was she screwing me every chance she got?” Caprio snaps, seeming to relish finally being able to throw his secret in Everett’s face. “While the others were throwing themselves at you, Lynesse was throwing herself at me!”

  Everett laughs. “You? She wouldn’t give you a second glance.”

  “I’ve had her,” Caprio sneers. “In your bed. In your lounge. Up against your favorite Jackson Pollock. She liked that. I had her from behind that time. She wanted to look at it while I banged her.”

  Everett’s face goes puce. Something about what Caprio said makes him be
lieve it. “You bastard!” he chokes, barely able to get the words out. “I’ll kill you!”

  “You’ll have to wait,” says Storm, firmly pushing Everett back from the van. “Because your buddy here is in for a very long prison sentence.”

  Chapter 23

  DIANA

  Back off, I tell the little voice. Back off right now. I said I would take care of this.

  “You can’t take care of it,” she tells me, speaking out of my mouth as if it is hers. “You don’t even know where his house is.”

  She doesn't even bother to keep her voice low, and I am glad I had retreated to beyond the pillars at the edge of the ballroom to make my call to Storm. Fortunately there aren’t any other people in earshot. She had fought me for control the second I’d made my call to Storm, taking me by surprise.

  I’m warning you, I tell her. If you don’t give it up, I’ll force you, and then we’ll both have a headache. Is that what you want?

  “Look,” she murmurs reasonably. “You don’t even know where his house is. I do. And you don’t have a way to get there. I do. So just let me take care of this next part, okay?”

  How do you know where his house is?

  “We’re lucky I’m more observant than you. Trust me, the address is right inside my little head.” She taps my head. “Oops. Your little head.”

  You shouldn’t have hung up on Storm, I complain. I wasn’t done talking to him.

  “Sorry about that,” she says. “But you were spilling our business. Let him go after his suspect and we’ll go after ours.”

  He said he already has the murderer, I mutter.

  “Pssht,” she scoffs. “If you’re going to give up at the last hurdle, then it’s just as well I’m taking charge.”

  I never said I was going to give up, I snap.

  “Excellent. So we both want justice for Raif and Lynesse, and we’re both agreed I should do this next part?”

  I’m not fully happy with this arrangement. And yet I know that without her I wouldn’t have gotten this far. She knows she has me in a tough spot.

  “Ooh, look who’s coming our way,” she murmurs.

  Smithers is stalking towards us, a greasy grin on his face. It is like he thinks he owns me and is coming to claim his prize. I grimace, but she keeps a smile pasted on my face.

  Fine, I mutter resentfully. But please don’t kiss him or anything, or I’ll barf.

  She struts towards Smithers with that smile on her face. As he gets close, Smithers extends his arms for her to walk into. The thought of dancing with him makes me feel sick. He will probably try to feel me up.

  She puts out my arm as if to take hold of his hand, but as she reaches him, she shoves her palm smack into his chest. The impact makes Smithers fall over. She doesn’t pause to check if he is okay. She keeps on walking.

  I am aghast. I’ve no love for Smithers but I hadn’t expected that. I don’t know whether to laugh or to tell her off.

  “Just thank me,” she says out loud, not caring that people nearby are looking at her. At me. They saw what she did. None of them care enough to confront her about it.

  Her eyes, my eyes, are fixed across the room, where Princess Caroline is holding court talking to the diva singer who has just arrived. She is proudly displaying Xander on her arm, as if he is a trophy. The diva is admiring him appropriately, batting her eyelashes, and doing her best not to flirt. Xander has that effect on women.

  “You’ll love this,” says the little voice.

  Please don’t do anything to make a scene, I beg her. If you touch Caroline, her bodyguards will arrest us on the spot. She’s a princess. It’s probably treasonous. I don’t want to go to jail.

  “Relax,” she says, and as she approaches Caroline she calls out loudly, “Hello Caro!”

  Caroline’s head turns. When she sees it is me she sneers.

  “Caro is right isn’t it?” says the little voice. “It’s what your friends call you? I bet it’s what you made them call you in your teenage years thinking it sounded cool, as if you were anything but a horse-mouthed sloany-pony leeching off the nation’s taxes since her birth.”

  Caroline’s mouth drops open, as does the pop diva’s.

  The little voice giggles. “Only kidding! “she says brightly. “So anyway, what were you saying about education earlier? That I should give your fiancé a lesson on the dance floor? How about it Xander?”

  Xander looks amused, though he doesn’t accept my outstretched hand. Princess Caroline clings firmly to his arm. “We think not,” she says stiffly.

  “No dance lesson? I’m so disappointed. How about a little something for good luck then? On the occasion of your forthcoming marriage. You need it, because it seems to me your marriage is never coming.”

  She hooks my arm around Xander’s neck and drags his mouth down to mine for a kiss. A long kiss. A kiss where she uses my tongue in ways I have never dreamt of. Xander stiffens for only a moment, then he relaxes into it. When she pulls away, he looks mildly stunned. She pats him on the cheek. “Good luck, Xander Daxx. You’ll be needing it.”

  Beside him Caroline is gaping at me. “How dare you?” she utters, as the diva suppresses a giggle.

  The little voice blows Caroline a kiss. “You’re welcome. Toodle pip.” She struts away.

  I can’t believe you did that.

  “Believe it, baby,” she says out loud, mortifying me because the bystanders who are goggling at me can clearly hear her. “And don’t pretend you never enjoyed it. He tasted quite nice. You should go for him. I bet he’d love it.”

  He’s taken!

  “Pfft. They’re never taken. Now where’s that sweet little Benny of yours?”

  Oh God. Please don’t kiss Ben. Don’t do that to him.

  “Relax. He’s not my type,” she says.

  But that doesn’t stop her from flirting with him when she finds him in the kitchens. She croons in his ear, asking him to drive us in one of the catering vans to Raif’s house. “Please Benny. You’re my last resort. I wouldn’t ask if I really didn’t need it.”

  “But… But I’m at work,” he objects, looking severely torn between the desire to help me and the fear of skiving off work.

  “It’ll only take twenty minutes,” she begs. “It’s not far. You’ll be back in forty minutes, and this party is so busy that Smithers won’t even notice. Please Benny? Pretty please?”

  She opens my eyes wide and flutters my eyelashes. Ben’s shoulders sag. He has reached the conclusion that his heart can’t possibly say no. Once we are in the van, Ben still nervously looking over his shoulder as if convinced that Smithers is following us, she punches the postcode into the sat nav.

  Twenty minutes later we pull up outside a row of large terraced houses whose market value is clearly too far out of my budget. Ben peers out of the van window at them. He finally looks a bit suspicious. “You don’t live here, do you?” he asks hesitantly.

  She turns around in her seat to face him. “Listen, Benny, if anyone asks you, you didn’t bring me here tonight. Okay?”

  Ben’s brows draw together with concern. “What do you mean if anyone asks me?”

  She takes hold of his jaw in one hand and squeezes it a little too firmly. “Anyone at all, Benny. Because information is power, so I’m giving you my power. You don’t want to give my power away, do you?”

  “Er, no, Of course not. But—”

  “Wonderful,” she trills patting him on the cheek, before opening the door and climbing out. She ushers him away. “See you later Benny. Off you go now. And remember…” She holds her finger up to my lips. “Shhh!”

  Ben looks baffled, but his anxiety about getting back to work before anyone notices that he is gone wins. He drives away.

  There was no need to be so condescending to him, I complain.

  “The less he knows, the better for him.”

  She turns to contemplate the house. All of the windows are dark. Clearly nobody is inside.

  How are you planning
to get in? I ask. Did you happen to magically find his house keys in his office as well?

  “Nope. Don’t need a key. Just need my wits.”

  She marches jauntily around the side of the house and easily climbs over the gate that leads into the back garden. No skulking for her. She doesn’t even seem to care that people might be seeing us.

  She whistles as she walks up to the back door, which has police tape on it. She opens my bag and takes out a pair of rubber gloves that I can’t remember packing. She pulls them on. She turns my body sideways towards the door and bends my elbow towards it.