“A similar symbol was drawn into the wall of the theater where my sister was murdered,” he said. All defense was gone from his tone. All defiance, too. He sounded like a weak little boy.
I took a harsh breath. “Have you seen it elsewhere? Is it… I dunno, a gang symbol or something?”
“Not that I know of. No – I haven’t seen it anywhere else before. Just in the theater.” He started to get a far-off look in his eyes.
“These cases really are connected, aren’t they?” I said, either for my benefit or his.
Josh was starting to get angry. I could sense that emotion welling in his chest. It was as if he’d swallowed fire, and second by second, that fire was starting to burn through him. He clenched his hands tighter around the wheel. “The two elementals who murdered my sister were dirt and heat,” he said, his voice halting.
My cheeks paled as I realize what he was thinking. “I… don’t know if we can conclude that the guys in the restaurant were the same men who murdered your sister,” I said, and it was my turn to be devil’s advocate.
Josh didn’t look convinced. In fact, Josh looked like a man on the edge. He tightened his fingers around the wheel until I could sense a charge of magic start to pick up within them.
I didn’t know if Josh was emotional enough to start attacking his car, but before he could, I leaned over, strained against my seatbelt, and placed a hand on his.
It was enough of a distraction that he looked down at me.
“Josh, we can figure this out. We will find the murderers, and we will find the truth. But… I don’t think we can jump to any conclusions. I think it’s too dangerous to do that.”
Though he looked angry, soon enough, he shook his head, and the faintest smile crept across his lips. “That’s pretty rich coming from you, Beth. I’m always the one telling you that there’s a difference between evidence and supposition.”
Sensing that Josh’s anger had subsided – or at least enough that I knew he wasn’t going to tear through the car – I shifted back. I shrugged. “I’m getting the impression we have to do this right. I’m getting the impression that we really only have one option through this situation,” I said with a shiver. “It’s like,” I opened my hands, placed them on my thighs, and dug my fingers in until they left marks across the fabric of my pants, “forces are coalescing, all trying to fight us at once.”
“That’s a cheery image,” Josh managed. “What else are you sensing?”
“That it’s time to head to the theater,” I said as the words jumped into my head.
Josh didn’t look happy. He shook his head. “You know before how you told me the only way to get around Jason’s warning was to investigate this case and not my sister’s murder? Going to the theater would be investigating my sister’s murder.”
“Not necessarily. We’re investigating the symbol.”
“But to admit to that would be to admit to the fact that we’ve seen the symbol and not shared it with the police.”
“Think of who Jason is for a minute. He’s Internal Affairs. He investigates the police.”
“That is not a convincing argument. The Police Department certainly have their troubles at the moment, but so does Internal Affairs.”
I sighed as defeat welled in me, pulled my shoulders down, and made my mouth drop open. Before I could shut down and give in, I shook my head. “Leave Jason to me.”
“Yeah, because you’ve been so good at dealing with him.”
I arched an eyebrow at that particular bitter and hurtful statement. “I’ve done my best. You try navigating your feelings for a man you hate and yet one that circumstances keep pushing you into the arms of.”
Josh frowned. “You’ve been in Jason’s arms already?”
I blushed. “No—” I blurted. I shook my head. “I mean yes. Only a couple of times, though.”
Josh narrowed his eyes. “A couple of times? You’ve had time—”
“No!” My voice went up high. “It was just when he was saving me from things, that’s all. And that’s not my point. My point is neither of us knows what’s going on here. Hell, I’m starting to wonder if anyone has the full picture. The only thing that matters now,” I looked right at Josh, “is doing our jobs. We can’t rely on the police to do it, and I don’t think we can even rely on Internal Affairs to do it. But, Josh McIntosh, I know you’re good, and I think I’m good too. Maybe we’re all the city has right now.”
Josh swallowed. He had an odd look in his eyes. Then, abruptly, he started to laugh. “Not the most eloquent speech ever, but effective.” He looked at me for a few seconds, then pulled out. “You’re right, Bethany Samson. Out of all the people in this city at the moment, I guess we are the two most trustworthy. Maybe this is obstructing justice, and maybe this will ultimately lose me my contract and get you taken off me and given to the government.”
“But maybe none of that matters – maybe the only thing that matters—”
“Is solving this case. It’s finally time to do my sister’s memory justice,” Josh said as his face stiffened. He gunned the engine and headed to the theater.
Chapter 7
Why was it that every time Josh and I struck another one of these world-ending cases, we’d get no downtime?
Other detectives and bounty hunters didn’t work as frantically as we did. Then again, maybe other detectives and bounty hunters didn’t face the same kinds of cases we did. Whenever I was with Josh tracking down some critical case, it felt as if we were pushed from danger to danger with no time to breathe, let alone sleep and eat.
But resting was the last thing on my mind. You see, Josh had turned into a virtual pit of emotion.
We’d just pulled up outside the theater, and I could tell he was trying to compose himself on the premise of checking the symbol on my phone several times.
I didn’t rush him. This would be raw as hell for him. I still didn’t know the circumstances of why Josh hadn’t been able to track down the murderer of his sister two-and-a-half years ago, but I could bet they were complicated. And I could bet that he’d been hating himself every second he’d let his sister’s murderer walk free.
Now his hand softly shook as he thumbed back and forth through the pictures I’d taken.
Eventually, he closed his eyes. He shoved his phone back at me. “Okay, let’s do this. Beth, I need you to—”
“I will watch your back. You don’t need to ask that.”
“… I guess I don’t. But we need to be careful. There’s every chance we might run across the police in there,” he admitted.
I frowned.
“Even if they don’t know about the symbol – these two cases are too similar. So we need to coordinate our story. We’re heading to the theater for the same reason they are—”
“But you said—”
“We’re investigating Olivia’s disappearance. And in investigating Olivia’s disappearance, at her last suspected location, we encountered a warlock attack,” Josh said, slowing down each word as he made it clear he wanted me to learn our excuse by heart. “While investigating the location of Olivia’s last suspected whereabouts,” he repeated slowly, “we came across a warlock attack. We believe it may be connected to an unsolved case from two-and-a-half years ago. We are investigating to see if the theater will give us any leads in Olivia’s case,” he said, emphasizing Olivia.
“Got it,” I said softly.
Josh swallowed. “I hope you do. This is dangerous.”
“Josh?” I managed a half smile. “You can rely on me. Let’s go.”
Josh held my gaze, chuckled with soft relief, then jumped out of his car.
We headed toward the theater. It was only about 8 o’clock at night, and the theater must have had a show at the 8:30 time slot, because guests were already lining up outside.
“Are we going to need tickets?”
“Screw that. We’re bounty hunters. And this time I’m not going to let anyone turn us back.”
I looked at
Josh as he stalked away from me, and my heart stilled.
… He wouldn’t be stupid enough to do something, would he? He wouldn’t be stupid enough to go with his anger and not his reason, right?
… This was the right thing to do, wasn’t it? Or had Max been right?
Had I sensed an opportunity for myself but not for Josh?
Investigating his sister might lead to him losing his bounty hunter contract, his reputation, his job, and me.
I tried to chase that thought away, but it had wheedled in.
We walked into the theater, and sure enough, Josh was on form this time. He strode straight up to the closest usher, grabbed his badge from behind his belt, and pointed to it. “We’re bounty hunters, and we need to investigate something. This business is open to the public, and we have every right to enter without a warrant. Please assist us,” he said forcefully.
The usher blinked and nodded. “Of course. Wait – are you saying there’s a dangerous criminal in here?” His voice went up high.
Josh shook his head. “We’re simply investigating details of this case to help us track down a current bounty. We do not believe that you or your guests are in harm’s way. If they become so, we will warn you,” Josh added, obviously remembering the events of a half hour ago.
The usher paled again, turned on his foot quickly, and waved us forward.
The usher found his manager, explained what was going on, and his manager – unlike the unhelpful maître d’ – gave us leave to go anywhere.
I swear the manager recognized Josh. And I swore Josh recognized the manager. Maybe the guy had been working here since the time of Josh’s sister’s death.
Right – I didn’t need to get caught referring to her as Josh’s sister, did I? I finally knew her name.
Sandra.
One of the female warlocks in the bathroom had mentioned that.
It was funny that no one had bothered to tell me what her name was.
Funny and suspicious. My mind ticked back to what Josh had said – that Jason had warned him not to allow me to look into this case. How many other people had warned Josh not to look into this case over the years? And how much emotional baggage had that put on him?
I remembered what Susan had told me all those months ago when she’d sat me down in our café. She’d said that men like Josh invariably had scars, and to understand them, you had to understand the scars.
Back then I couldn’t have imagined just how deeply Josh’s scars ran.
Before too long, we were at the back of house, in the back stalls, behind the actual stage.
People were rushing back and forth, and though several actors stared at us suspiciously, Josh would just point to his official badge whenever they asked what we were doing, and they would scurry away, satisfied by our excuse.
Josh had warned that the police could be here, but it quickly became apparent that they weren’t.
That did not put my mind at ease. Something told me Josh was right, and they would come sooner rather than later.
Which meant we needed to get this done sooner rather than later.
As we continued to walk through the back hallways, I could feel Josh’s tension escalating. We had to be getting close to the location of the symbol.
… I felt pulled toward something, anyway. The weirdest itch had picked up along my skin since we’d entered the theater. It was almost as if someone had a hold of my magic and they were pulling each particle of it out of me.
Sure enough, we walked down another short darkened corridor and reached a door. Josh closed his eyes and pointed toward it. “It’s in there. The location of the symbol,” he added unnecessarily.
Immediately, I frowned. I twisted my head back in the direction of the stage and tried to calculate how far away it was. “Why is it so far away? The attack occurred in the theater, didn’t it?”
He nodded. “But the symbol in the bathroom stalls at the restaurant was far away from the dining hall, too,” he pointed out. “That didn’t affect where the elementals ported to. Portal magic can be pretty tricky to get pinpoint accurate, especially if you’ve only got a vague idea of where you’re going and you can’t isolate a signal perfectly.
I nodded. “What kind of spell could we be dealing with here? I mean, was it some kind of calling card?”
“I don’t know. I never saw the original symbol. I only heard about it. It disappeared before police had a chance to do a full investigation on it.”
“So how do you know that the symbol on my phone is the same?”
“Because I saw a written description of it. A P and an M with an X through them.”
I shrugged.
Why did I feel as if I was missing something here?
“You’re getting that look in your eye again,” Josh pointed out softly. “What are you suspecting?”
“In the bathroom stalls, I had to push magic into that symbol to activate it. I did it unconsciously to begin with but then purposefully.”
“And?”
“Presumably if it was the same symbol, and someone did the same thing in here, too,” I pointed at the closed door, “then a witch had to activate the symbol,” I explained clearly.
Josh frowned. “I don’t see how that’s important.”
“Trust me, it is. It’s so important it’s making my skin itch,” I said as I brought my hands up and started to run my fingers down my arms.
My arms were so itchy that I started to leave scratch marks on them.
The theater was well heated, and I’d already taken my leather jacket off and rolled my sleeves up.
“I think you’re clutching at straws. Beth? What are you doing to your arms?”
“I’m just itchy, that’s all. Maybe it’s my finding magic—”
“That’s not finding magic,” he said, alarm tightening his voice as he shoved forward, grabbed my wrist, and tenderly twisted my arm up. “You’re reacting to something.”
I frowned at him. “What are you talking about?”
“Can’t you see the magic escaping over your skin?”
Now he’d pointed it out, I leaned in, focused my gaze, and indeed saw the faintest few charges of blue magic shifting over my skin.
My shoulders started to tense up, and I felt a nasty heat shift across my neck. I brought my hand up to start to scratch, but Josh grabbed it. “Don’t scratch,” he warned.
“What’s happening to me? Am I having some kind of allergic reaction?”
“I don’t think this is an allergy, Beth,” he said, his tone unreadable. He frowned and looked at the door, then back to me.
“Josh, what’s going on?”
“Show me your phone again,” he demanded.
With one hand, I grabbed my phone and shoved it toward him. With the other, I tried to scratch my neck. Before I could sink my nails into my flesh, Josh slapped my hand down.
“Don’t you dare touch your skin. If you start scratching, you’ll get one hell of a histamine reaction. You will turn bright red, and you will become so itchy, you’ll feel like tearing your damn skin off.”
I blanched at his warning but still had to fight against the unholy itch erupting over my flesh.
Josh scrolled to the photo of the symbol once more, and a deep frown etched his lips.
“What is it?” I stuttered.
“I need a bit of quiet, Beth. I really have to concentrate for this. Considering you’re having a magical reaction – I need you to stand over there.” He pointed several meters away. “But don’t you dare touch your skin, got it?”
“Got it,” I managed as I curled my hands into fists and walked stiffly toward the point where he’d gestured to. I had to use every ounce of will I had not to start rubbing my back up against the wall like a sheep scratching itself against a tree. I was that itchy.
Josh pushed his tongue out, rested it against the outside of his lips, allowed his eyes to flutter half closed, and started to make the strangest guttural sounds. He hadn’t gone crazy – he was pra
cticing magic. My body might currently be reacting to magic, but I was still just focused enough to pick up a powerful warlock enchantment.
A few faint charges of magic crackled off his hand and sank into my phone. I didn’t worry that Josh was about to blast it apart – even though it was still on a contract. I trusted him.
He continued to do whatever he was doing.
Then a sinking feeling started to push through my stomach. “Josh?”
He shoved a hand toward me, batting it my way as if telling me not to interrupt him.
“I think… we’re running out of time. Our window of opportunity is closing. Maybe the police are close?” I suggested.
Josh darted his gaze toward me, his eyebrows descending with worry. But he didn’t stop chanting his spell.
Several seconds later, whatever he was casting finally worked, because he allowed my phone to drop.
And as it dropped? Something slipped out of the screen. Light, in fact.
For a few seconds as I saw that light spill out of the glass, I didn’t even remember I was itchy. I was so damn distracted by the otherworldly sight.
I’d faced elementals today, but this was different. This looked like something out of a sci-fi film.
Josh waved his hand in the air, ticking his fingers to the side, almost looking as if he was a priest giving communion. The light that spilled from the phone started to solidify. It produced an image. A perfect three-dimensional image of the symbol.
My back erupted with heat. I gasped and wiggled against the wall, grinding my fingers into my palms so hard, it was like I was trying to chop them in half. “Josh… something’s happening. I—”
“You’re reacting to the spell,” he said as he pointed toward it. “I did as you suggested, and practiced some warlock forensic spell stuff. This is a perfect magical creation of what was on the phone. As it’s all the evidence we need to understand what’s happening to you,” he said as he ticked his gaze toward me.
I suddenly lost control, brought up a hand, and tried to scratch my neck, but Josh darted in, grabbed the same hand, and held it tightly. “You really need to hold onto your self-control, Beth. I know you’ve got it – you have to have it as a sorcerer. You have to stop yourself from scratching. With that much of a magical reaction, if you scratch and it gets worse, you will be out of it for several days. And you can’t afford to be out of it for several days.”
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