Lowe charged at Noel and tackled him. Knocked the man clear off his feet like he was nothing more than a leather-bound punching bag, sending his hat flying off. And Hadley nearly slipped again as their combined weight hit the felled tree limb and pushed it backward several inches toward her.
Growling, Lowe grabbed the man’s hair with his disfigured hand and slammed the back of his head against the branches—once, twice. Noel flailed. Struggled. Then regained some strength and struck Lowe across the face so violently that Hadley cried out.
But Lowe just shook it off and changed tactics, spitting out Swedish curses. His bad hand came down on Noel’s wrist. The dagger rose up in the rain as Lowe lifted his arm, grunted savagely, and swung down with brutal force. The blade sliced through the middle of Noel’s palm and jammed into the tree limb.
Noel screamed. He tried to lift his arm and failed as blood pooled in his palm.
Lowe had pinned the man’s hand to the wood.
And the wound was already mending itself, trying to close up around the blade.
“Hadley!” Lowe shouted. “Give it to me, now.”
She hesitated, gripping the muddy amulet in her fist. The chain was broken. She needed to tell him that. And so much more. She wanted all of this madness to disappear, for the landscape to be wiped clean. For one minute alone with him, so they could assess the situation together and find a solution, like they had done so many times before everything went so terribly wrong.
Before he smashed her heart into a thousand pieces.
God, how she wanted him to be the man she’d trusted.
More than anything.
Some part of her must have had faith, because her arm jerked forward on its own accord, offering up the amulet to Lowe.
In a flash, he seized it from her hand. Wild eyes met hers. Just for a moment. But when she failed to get a single word out of her mouth, he dropped his furious gaze onto Noel and wrapped the loose ends of the chain around the man’s neck like he was trying to choke him with the amulet.
The Mori let out a collective wail. A warning. Something was happening.
The ground shook. The bough cracked. And the amulet’s nasty energy suddenly intensified as a dark void opened up beneath Noel’s back.
It was working!
The void spread like a black halo over Noel’s shoulders, down his legs. The Mori flew down from the tree and circled the men like dark angels.
Noel screamed in horror. But he wasn’t the only one. Lowe struggled to push himself off of Noel. They were sinking together into the void, as if the darkness was made of quicksand—a hungry, pitch-black mouth eager to swallow them alive.
Hadley rushed forward, and with both hands, grabbed Lowe’s arm and pulled.
“Hang on,” she shouted, digging one heel into the muddy ground and pushing one against the fallen tree limb for leverage. It was impossible. She could feel the dark suctioning energy of the void sapping at her strength. And Lowe was too big. Too heavy. His wet clothes slipped under her hands and she nearly lost him.
Nearly.
Heart galloping, she quickly adjusted her grip, gritted her teeth, and tugged harder.
Noel screamed again. Near her foot, his flesh tore away from the dagger. His body sank into the void all at once and . . . disappeared.
And as if she were on the winning side of a tug-of-war game, Lowe’s torso suddenly gave way and flew over the tree limb. They both toppled into the mud, a tangle of arms. She gasped for breath as he flipped around and drew his legs over the bough. Then they both scrambled to their knees.
One by one, the Mori dove into the shrinking void like a flock of black birds arrowing into a pool of water. What was seconds ago big enough to swallow Noel’s body was now the size of a dinner plate as the last specter flew in.
Out of the corner of her eye, Hadley saw gold glint. The amulet. It lay strewn across the tree limb, one side of its broken chain caught on the dagger jutting out of the wood.
Lowe saw it, too. His hand shot out. He snatched the amulet off the chain and tossed it into the closing void. As if it finally had everything it wanted, the black mouth snapped shut and disappeared completely.
A weary grunt pulled her attention across the lawn.
She raced around the branches and stopped short in front of her father’s wheelchair, where he was prying his twisted legs apart. He was still in pain, his eyes still pale. But he was alive. “Father,” she said, unable to hold back the tears that streaked down her cheeks.
Her father’s staff came running from the back porch, terror and fear in their eyes. “Call an ambulance,” she shouted out to them.
“It worked,” her father said between labored breaths. “I can feel the magic leaving.”
But it wasn’t the only thing.
Lulu’s rumbling engine sputtered to life again. Hadley tried to call for Lowe, but whether he heard her or not, she didn’t know. He just leaned forward into the motorcycle’s handlebars and sped away without a single look behind.
And he was gone.
THIRTY-THREE
ONE MONTH LATER . . .
HADLEY SET A FULL glass of champagne down on the edge of the desk as distant laughter from the office party floated through the doorway. She’d never shaken so many hands in all her life. All that bare skin was hard to get used to, and now that it was over, she had to fight the urge to wash her hands, exchanging one phobia for another. But she did fight it—a small victory.
She just needed to take a breather. If she stuck around any longer, Miss Tilly might’ve damn well tried to hug her. She gritted her teeth and shuddered at the thought.
Small steps.
“That’s the last one,” her father said as he hobbled into the room on crutches. He nodded to a box of odds and ends that sat at her feet.
“You sure you want to give up this desk?” She leaned back against the edge of it. “Last chance to withdraw your retirement. The staff’s already half-cut. I’m sure they’ll be more than happy to toast to you changing your mind.”
A smile lifted his lips. “Can you imagine the paperwork? Besides, they’ve already printed your business cards. How does it feel to be department head?”
Strangely, not as satisfying as she once imagined, but she merely said, “Daunting.”
“Pish. You’ll be fine. Oh, and while I’m thinking of it, I had Miss Tilly place notices in the trade publications that we’re seeking a replacement for George’s position. And if you need help interviewing—”
“I think I can manage.”
He blinked at her, studying her face while motes of dust fluttered within a slice of afternoon sun spilling from the nearby window. Though his sight had returned days after the final confrontation with his old partner, he still spent a lot of time looking at her more closely than he ever had before the blindness. “Don’t be too proud to ask for help.”
“I won’t,” she assured him, as her father’s assistant, Stan, walked into the room.
Stan picked up the box of her father’s things. “We should get going, sir. Driver is waiting outside.”
“Take that out to the trunk,” he said. “I’ll be there in a minute or two.”
“When’s your appointment with the doctor?” she asked her father as Stan left the office.
“Half an hour, but he can wait. There’s something I wanted to talk to you about.”
“Father, I appreciate all your concern, but I really can handle things here.”
He leaned on one crutch and shook his head. “It’s not that. I wanted to talk to you about Mr. Magnusson.”
Just the sound of his name sent a pang through her chest. Had it been a month since she’d last seen him, riding away out of her father’s backyard? Because it felt like an entire year’s worth of sleepless nights.