Dime Store Magic (16 page)
Another flare of anger, then she lowered her eyelids. Her lips moved and, when they finished, she was gone. Invisible. So long as she didn't move, no one would see her. I paused a second, making sure she was staying covered, then crept into the stairwell.
It took an eternity to descend. Step down, pause, listen, duck and look, step down again. Coming down a staircase is more dangerous than you'd imagine. If the stairs are enclosed, as these were, then someone standing on the lower level will see you long before you can see them. Hence the stopping, ducking and looking, which made me feel safer, though I doubted it would have saved me from anyone standing below with a gun.
Actually, I wasn't too worried about guns; supernaturals don't usually use them. If Leah
was
down there, she'd more likely use telekinesis to yank my feet from under me and drag me down the stairs, breaking my spine so I'd still be alive, lying at the bottom, paralyzed, when she crushed me with a flying file cabinet. Much better than being shot. Really.
When I finally reached the bottom, I lunged for the door handle. I grabbed it, yanked—and nearly flew face first into the wall when the door didn't move. Once I'd recovered my balance, I looked around, and tugged the handle again. Nothing. The door stood an inch open, yet would neither open nor close. A barrier spell? It didn't seem like one, but I cast a barrier-breaking incantation anyway. Nothing happened. I grabbed the door edge.
My fingers passed through the crack without resistance, but I couldn't pull it open. I cast an unlock spell. Nothing.
As I stood there I was keenly aware of time passing, of standing here in plain sight, yanking on the door, an easy target, and of Savannah hiding in the upper hall, undoubtedly losing patience. After one last round of breaking-spells, I flung my back against the wall and caught my breath.
We were trapped. Really trapped. Any moment now, Leah and Sandford and God knows what other kind of supernaturals would arrive and we'd—
For God's sake, Paige, get a grip! The front door's barred. Big deal.
How about another door? How about windows?
I glimpsed sunlight glinting through the doorway behind Lacey's reception desk. Staying close to the wall, I eased a few feet left, so I could glance through the doorway. It led into a large meeting room and at the back of that room was a huge set of patio doors.
I hunkered and bolted across the room. Then I inched along the opposite wall toward the doorway. As I slipped into the other room, a shadow flashed across the sunlit floor. I ducked behind an armchair, barely daring to breathe, knowing the chair did little to hide me. I cast a cover spell.
The shadow danced across the floor again. Had I already been spotted?
I glanced left, being careful to move only my eyes. The shadow returned, skipping over the floor. Realizing it was too small to be a person, I looked up and saw tree branches fluttering in the wind just outside the patio doors.
As I was easing from behind the armchair, footsteps pattered across the front hall. I zipped back and cast another cover spell. The steps turned left, receded, then returned, went too far right, nearly vanishing into silence, then came back again. Searching the rooms. Were they coming my way now? Yes… no… they paused. A squeak of shoes turning sharply. More steps. Growing louder, louder.
I closed my eyes and prepared a fireball spell. When a shape moved through the doorway, I launched the ball. A fiery sphere flew from the ceiling. I tensed, ready to run. As the ball fell, the intruder yelped, raising her arms to ward it off. Catching sight of her face, I flew from my hiding spot and knocked her out of the fireball's path. We hit the floor together.
"You promised to teach me that one," Savannah said, disentangling herself from my grip.
I clapped a hand over her mouth, but she pulled it away.
"There's no one here," she said. "I cast a sensing spell."
"Where'd you learn that?"
"Your mom taught me. It's fourth level. You can't do it." She paused, then offered an ego-consoling, "Yet."
I took a deep breath. "Okay, well, the front door's barred somehow, so I was going to try that one." I waved at the patio doors. "They're probably jammed, but maybe we can break the glass."
Again, we moved against the wall, in case someone outside was looking in. When I reached the doors, I peeked out. The patio opened into a tiny yard, grass-free, low-maintenance, covered with interlocking brick and raised beds of perennials. As I reached for the door handle, a shadow flickered across the yew hedge at the rear of the yard. Assuming it was another waving tree branch, I stepped forward. Leah was standing against the bushes. She lifted a hand and waved.
As I whirled toward Savannah, time slowed and I saw everything, not in a blur of movement, but in distinct, slow-motion frames. Leah raised both hands and gestured toward herself, as if beckoning us closer, but her gaze was focused on something over our heads. Then came the crash of glass. And the scream.
I lunged at Savannah, slamming us both to the floor. As we rolled, a dark shape plummeted toward the ground outside. I saw the chair first—
Cary's chair—dropping like a rock. No, faster than a rock; it flew so fast it I heard it hit the brickwork before my brain had processed the image. In my mind, I still saw the chair in midair, tilted backward. Cary sitting in it, arms and legs thrust forward by the force, mouth open, screaming. I could still hear that scream hanging in the air as the chair slammed onto the brick, and bright drops of blood sprayed outward.
As I lifted my head, Leah caught my gaze, smiled, waved, and walked away.
I scrambled to my feet and raced out the patio doors, which opened without resistance. Even as I ran to Cary, I knew it was too late. The force of the impact, that horrible shower of blood. Two feet away, I stopped, then doubled over, retching.
I squeezed my eyes shut against the sight, but it was too late. I could see it against the backdrop of my eyelids. Grantham Cary Jr., toppled from the chair, spread-eagled on the ground, his head crushed like an overripe fruit, bursting into a puddle of blood and brains. The force so great that a huge shard of glass had impaled his stomach clear through; so great that his arm, striking the corner of a perennial bed, had been
severed, his detached hand still gripping the arm rest. I saw that, and I remembered Leah, smiling, waving, and I wasn't sure which was worse.
"Paige?" Savannah whispered. Looking up, I saw her face, stark-white, staring at Cary as if unable to look away. "We—we should go."
"No," said a voice behind us. "I don't think you should."
Sheriff Fowler stepped through the open patio doors.
Lawyer Roulette
LEAH HAD FRAMED ME FOR THE MURDER OF GRANTHAM
CARY.
Take a woman accused of witchcraft and Satanism, a woman known to have engaged in a public feud with the murdered man, who then accused him of intentionally hitting her car and injuring her ward. This woman conspires under false pretenses to meet her former lawyer in his office, on a Sunday when his wife will be at church early. The police receive a call—a neighbor worried about the angry shouts emanating from the lawyer's office. The police arrive. The lawyer is dead. The house is empty except for the woman and her ward. Whodunit? You don't need Sherlock Holmes to figure that out.
Again, the East Falls police department wasn't equipped to handle such a case, so they called in the state cops, who took me to their station. The police interrogated me for three hours. The same questions over and over, badgering, bullying, until I could still hear their voices echoing in my head when they left for a cigarette or a coffee.
They'd taken everything I'd done in the last two days and twisted it to fit their theory. My tirade about Satanism? Proof that I had a wicked temper and was easily provoked. My bakery blowout? Proof that I was paranoid, misconstruing a simple coffee invitation as a sexual proposition.
My accusation about the car accident? Proof that I had a vendetta against Cary.
All my arguments about Black Mass were now seen as protesting too much, denying the very existence of Satanic cults so I could cover up my own participation in such practices. Maybe Cary had learned the truth and refused to represent me further. Or maybe I'd hit on him and thrown a shit-fit when he rebuffed me. Maybe he
had
made a pass at me, but did I really expect them to believe he'd been upset enough over my rejection to slam his new Mercedes SUV into my six-year-old Honda? Grown men didn't do things like that. Not men like Grantham Cary. I was paranoid. Or delusional. Or just plain crazy. Hadn't I stormed off to his house like a madwoman, shrieking wild accusations and vowing revenge? What about
Lacey's reports of electrical malfunctioning after my visit? Not that the police were accusing me of witchcraft. Rational people didn't believe in such nonsense. But I had done
something
. At the very least I was guilty of murdering Grantham Cary.
After the third hour, the two detectives left for a break. Moments later, the door opened and in walked a thirty-something woman who introduced herself as Detective Flynn.
I was pacing the room, my stomach knotted from three hours of worrying about Savannah. Was she here at the station? Or had the police called Margaret? What if this was Leah's plan, to get me locked up while she grabbed Savannah?
"Can I get you something?" Flynn asked as she stepped inside.
"Coffee? A cold drink? A sandwich?"
"I'm not answering any more questions until someone tells me where Savannah is. I keep asking and asking and all I get is 'She's safe.' That's not good enough. I need to know—"
"She's here."
"Exactly where? Savannah is the subject of a custody battle. You people don't seem to understand—"
"We understand, Paige. Right now Savannah is in the next room playing cards with two officers. Armed state troopers. Nothing will happen to her. They gave her a burger for lunch and she's fine. You can see her as soon as we're done."
Finally, someone who didn't treat me like a tried-and-convicted murderer. I nodded and took my seat at the table.