Another smack, harder.
I opened my eyes to see trees, and more trees. No sign of the SUV. Or the road. Or people. Just Molly, crouched in front of me.
She grabbed my hair and wrenched my head to the side, calling my attention to the source of that rotting smell-a swamp visible through the trees. "Who sent you?"
The threat was clear: if I didn't talk, there was a convenient body-disposal site nearby. She ripped the duct tape off my mouth, taking a layer of skin with it. When I gasped and paused to catch my breath, she cuffed me again and I glared at her.
"I don't know what this is about, but-"
She slapped the tape back on, then laid her hands on my forearm and recited a spell. It was like I'd spilled boiling water on my arm- a moment of confusion followed by blinding pain. I screamed behind my gag, more outrage than fear.
When I turned a fresh glare on her, she only smiled. "Didn't like that much, did you? Maybe I should come up with an inducement better suited to the lovely Jaime Vegas."
She backed up on her haunches, looked around and found a twig. Another spell, then she lifted it and put her finger to the end, making it glow like a lit cigarette. She brought the burning end so close to my cheek I could feel the heat.
My heart hammered but I resisted the urge to shut my eyes.
"I'll bet you wouldn't find it so easy to make a living with scars on your pretty face."
She moved the twig even closer. An ember dropped onto my cheek and I jumped, then held firm. Molly wielded the twig like a pen, pretending to write.
"Perhaps a nice big W. Let the world know what the rest of us think of you-a whore who uses her gifts to make a quick buck."
The tip touched my skin. I gritted my teeth and steeled myself. I wouldn't think about what she could do-to me and my career.
"Or maybe that's still not incentive enough…" Molly said.
She lifted the stick until it was level with my right eye. I instinctively tried to close it, but found myself caught in a binding spell, my eyes glued open, that brand coming closer, the end glowing red hot.
My brain went wild with panic.
Molly laughed. "That's better. Now, let's get this over with or you're going to have a hell of a time fumbling your way from this forest blind." She said it as casually as if she were threatening to break my fingernails.
She stood, stretching her legs, and circled me. "The person who sent you here. It was Mike, wasn't it?"
For a second, my brain just whirred. Who was Mike? Then I remembered. Her dead common-law husband.
She made no move to remove my gag, just kept circling me, brandishing the burning twig. For one moment, I felt the almost irresistible urge to giggle, thinking I've seen this scene. Only this wasn't a b movie and, no matter how ridiculous it looked-this suburban mom playing evil interrogator-there was nothing funny about it. She could do exactly what she was threatening, and from the look in her eye, she would. She'd put out my eyes to get the information she wanted, kill me and dispose of my body in the swamp, then call her kids to remind them to finish their homework before she brought dinner.
"Mike contacted you," she continued, "then you decided to come to me with this silly story about needing help with trapped spirits in return for 'contacting' him. What I want to know is why. Did the council send you? Or are you acting on your own, hoping to collect a bribe for not going to the council?"
With a jolt, the pieces fit together in the only way that made sense. What could her dead lover tell me that the council would investigate? Or that I could blackmail her with to avoid an investigation? Proof that the grieving widow wasn't so heartbroken after all.
"Ready to talk?" Molly said, crouching in front of me.
I nodded. As she ripped off the gag, my brain raced. I could point out that murdered ghosts rarely remember the circumstances of their deaths, but that would only confirm I knew he'd been murdered.
"It's a council investigation," I said. "I was walking past your house scoping it out, waiting for my partner, when you opened the door and I had to approach alone."
From her expression, I knew this was what she'd feared. If it was blackmail, that was easy. Kill me and the situation was resolved. It wouldn't be so simple if others already knew.
She eased back on her haunches. "So Mike told you what happened, and you contacted your delegate partner…"
In other words: please tell me there's only one other person involved.
"I took the problem to the whole council at the last meeting. That's proper procedure and, being new, I always follow protocol. They assigned an investigative partner-the werewolf Pack Alpha-" I added for good measure, "-to accompany me."
Fear, maybe even panic, touched Molly's eyes. Good.
"I don't know what Mike told you," Molly said, "but that bastard earned it. After five years of living in my house, he decides he's tired of me. But he's not tired of my money. So he offered me a deal. Give him fifty grand and he'd leave quietly, without telling the council… a few things. I told him I didn't have that kind of money lying around and you know what he told me to do? Empty the girls' college funds."
Flecks of saliva flew from her mouth as she snarled. "He spends five years in our house, winning my girls over, getting them to call him 'Dad,' and then, as his parting shot, he's going to steal their college tuition? Over my dead body." Her snarl twisted into an ugly smile. "Or over his, which was much more to my liking."
I was quiet for a moment, then said, "That's not the story he told, but yours sounds a lot more believable. If you can support that with evidence, we can explain it to the council. You were furious- rightfully so-and you wanted to teach him a lesson about messing with a master of the dark arts. But things went wrong."
Molly nodded. I blinked to hide my relief.
She stepped away, then took her cell phone from her jacket and called her daughter, telling her to pack overnight bags and take her sister to a family friend down the street. Molly would pick her up there.
"They aren't in any danger," I said. "My partner would never touch your girls, not even to find out where I am. It would be totally against council policy. Plus he has little ones of his own-"
"I'm not taking that chance."
"Okay. I understand. Then let me call-" I remembered Jeremy didn't have a cell. "Better yet, take me back and if he's there, we'll settle this right now-"
"I'm not taking you anywhere but there."
She pointed at the swamp. Panic welled up. Before I could protest, she slapped the tape back on.
Molly straightened, then flew backward, knocked off her feet. I looked around wildly, but saw only forest. I rocked, trying to get up without the use of my hands. I had to stand, escape before she-
A binding spell caught Molly in midrise. Then I heard a woman's voice, chanting another spell, somewhere behind me, growing louder as if approaching. A sizzling sound, like the air electrifying.
Then Molly toppled forward, binding spell broken. She scrambled to her feet, took one hard look at me, then ran.
The sounds of pursuit followed, the other witch still out of view in the thick woods. I struggled to my feet. A corner of the overused duct tape gag got caught on a branch, and I managed to rip it off. I opened my mouth to shout for help… then reconsidered. Another witch didn't necessarily mean a helpful one.
Heavy footsteps sounded, each punctuated by a mumbled "fuck." That gave my rescuer away even before her dark head bobbed into view.
Savannah jogged toward me, still cursing as she untied me.
"Hold the binding spell, cast the energy bolt," she muttered. "Easy, right? But no. I try it, I lose the binding spell and the energy bolt flops."
"We have to warn Jeremy," I whispered as I pulled my hands from the loosened rope. "She knows he's heading to her house and she'll-"