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  Travis jumped up from his chair and grabbed my arm. “Kailyn!” I saw Angie and everyone else hit the floor. Everyone except Liam. While I’d been focused on Angie, he’d made his way to the other side of the room and was now facing the audience, his arm outstretched, a gun in his hand. What the hell? He’d passed through the metal detector—I’d seen him. Half of my brain was refusing to believe what was on the monitor. The other half was yelling at me to do something. I heard Travis talking to the 911 operator. The door of the meeting room flew open and the security guards ran in. In a split second, they assessed the situation and flattened themselves just as bullets flew past them. Travis unlocked the door of the anteroom. I pushed in front of him to block him from leaving.

  “You can’t go out there. If he could kill his sister, he’ll kill you without a second thought.”

  “Maybe I can talk him down.”

  “You’ve got a great voice, but it’s not magickal. I’m the one who should go.” Repeating the protection spell in my head, I pulled the door open and was gone before he could stop me. Once I was in the meeting room, I realized I didn’t have a plan. Aside from Liam, I was the only one standing—the perfect target. But I wasn’t there to cower, I was there to save the people who’d accepted my invitation to this shindig. Telekinesis would be the simplest way to accomplish that. I’d just pull the gun out of his hand. I’d done it successfully on other occasions. My only hesitation was the distance between me and the gun. I might be too far away for it to work properly. But if I started walking toward him, he might panic and pull the trigger.

  “Hello, Ms. Wilde,” Liam said wryly, “why am I not surprised?! You and your boyfriend have been hounding me from the get-go. Well whatever happens here today is your fault. You’re the one who’ll be to blame.”

  “You’re right. Your beef is with me. There isn’t another person here who deserves to be involved in this. Let them go and you can have me as your hostage. I imagine you’re going to need a hostage to get out of this situation.”

  He squinted at me as if trying to read beyond my words. “I don’t trust you. What’s your angle?”

  “You’ve outwitted me. I have no angles left.” It galled me to admit that I was playing catch up. I hadn’t even figured out how he’d smuggled in the gun.

  He gave a short bark of a laugh. “I doubt that. Here’s what I think. It’s in your best interest to draw things out until the police arrive to save the day. I bet you’d like it if I let the people go slowly—like one at a time—would that make you happy?”

  “No, Liam, I don’t want anyone to get hurt, including you.” He chewed on my words for half a minute. This might be my only chance. I had to take it. I concentrated all my energy on the weapon and tugged hard with my mind. Liam started sliding closer to the crowd. He had a bewildered and mildly panicked look on his face. I’d hooked onto him with the gun. I couldn’t hold onto them. The connection between us snapped. He flew backward, crashing into the wall behind him, the gun skittering across the floor. I fell on my butt. Good old inertia. The words from physics 101 flashed in my head, mocking me… for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. I’d never experienced anything like it before with telekinesis, but then I’d never tried to move this much weight from this far away.

  I got to my feet as fast as I could, but my legs were rubbery, threatening to give way and my head was spinning. The only thing I’d accomplished was to weaken myself. Liam was already standing. He retrieved the gun and trained it on the crowd. “I don’t know what just happened, Wilde, but if you had anything to do with it, don’t be foolish enough to try it again.”

  If I did, I’d have to be closer to him and even that might not be enough. I walked toward the front of the room, navigating around the people on the floor. “Please let them go, Liam.” Even my voice sounded frail. “Let everyone go and take me hostage to make your getaway. Things will be easier for you if you don’t have to worry about all these people. Sooner or later one of them is going to try to be a hero.”

  “For once you’re right. I don’t need them. Go on, all of you—get out of here.” I could see that they were hesitant to stand up and become targets. They had no reason to trust him. Some of them started crawling toward the door. It was slow going. When they were temptingly close to the door, they stood up and ran. No bullets rang out, emboldening the rest of the group to follow them, including the security guards. Maybe they thought they could find another way into the room and outflank him, or maybe they decided security work wasn’t worth it after all. I was enormously relieved that Liam had let them all go, free and unharmed. This mess was on me. He was right about that much.

  As soon as I was close enough, Liam grabbed my forearm, fingers digging in deep enough to hit bone. They felt like they were gouging holes in my flesh. He pressed the gun against my temple and cocked it. I thought about trying the spell I’d recently used at Eagle Enterprises. There was only one problem. A spell against other people had hard limits even if it was used defensively. If it was too weak, it might just irritate Liam, make him decide to punish me. Having Merlin’s ability to transmute or even glamour would have come in handy. Why didn’t I hear any sirens yet?

  I felt Liam stiffen and the gun dig deeper into my skull. What happened? I followed his line of sight. Travis had come out of the anteroom, hands in the air. Why didn’t he stay in there until the police arrived and had things under control? Would you have? He probably would have asked me.

  “I should have known your partner wouldn’t be far away,” Liam muttered. He called out to Travis, “Today’s your lucky day, Anderson—I only need one hostage. You get to walk away.”

  “I want to make you an offer,” Travis said coming slowly toward us.

  “Yeah? What do you have in mind?”

  “I want to tell your side of the story. No one knows what you’ve been through, how hard your life has been from the beginning.” I could feel the tension in Liam’s body start to loosen as Travis spoke, the pressure of his gun and fingers eased. Travis was reaching him on a visceral level. “Don’t you want everyone to know the truth? You’re not some crazy bad guy. Life has brought you to this.” He was only a few yards away from Liam and me.

  “Stop right there,” Liam shouted, shaking off their connection. “You come one step closer and I’ll blow her head clean off.”

  Travis stopped. “Think about it, Liam. I know the right people who can make it happen. They might even make a movie—” A bullhorn blasted the air. The police had arrived.

  “Liam Duncan, this is Lieutenant Thomas Van Buren of the Rochester PD. Let your hostages go now and we can resolve this incident in a peaceful manner. We don’t want anyone to die here today. You have two minutes to release the hostages and walk out unarmed, your hands in the air.”

  “What do you say,” Travis asked. “Do we have a deal?”

  Liam was chewing on his bottom lip. “Yeah, okay.”

  “All right, but for that to happen, you have to let Kailyn and me go.”

  “No.”

  “It’s the only way you walk out of here alive,” I said.

  “Shut up both of you! I can’t think with you jabbering at me.”

  Travis’s phone rang, making the three of us jump. He asked Liam’s permission before retrieving it from his pants pocket. He listened for a moment and then held the phone out to him. “Lieutenant Van Buren wants to talk to you.” Liam kept his gun at my head, but he let go of my arm and took the phone gingerly as if he thought it might be booby-trapped. He listened to Van Buren, growled “rot in Hell,” and smashed the phone onto the floor.

  From beyond the open door of the room, I picked up the muted sound of rubber-soled shoes. Liam had heard it too. He pulled his gun away from my head, aimed it at the doorway and fired a warning round. I ducked under his arm, Travis grabbed my hand, and we ran to the far back corner where we’d be safer if the police storm
ed the room. We curled together there, his arms around me, my head against his chest, his head resting on mine.

  A cop in tactical gear peered inside and immediately drew Liam’s fire. But he must have seen what he was looking for—the hostages far enough away from Liam to take him down. They didn’t have much time. Liam realized he’d lost us, his tickets out of there. Keeping his eye on the doorway, he did a sideways shuffle toward us. I had one card left to play. The odds were against me being strong enough to pull it off, but I didn’t want to spend eternity regretting that I didn’t at least try. “Hold on to me no matter what happens,” I told Travis. “No matter what!”

  “Got it.” He tightened his grip on me.

  I pushed the negative thoughts and what ifs from my mind as best I could. In another few steps, Liam would be close enough to grab one of us. It was now or never time.

  From here and now, to there and then,

  Attract not change, nor harm allow.

  Safe passage guarantee to souls

  As well as lesser, mindless things.

  I thought it worked. I thought we’d made it to my shop. I’d felt the unique whoosh associated with teleporting, but when I opened my eyes we were in the same corner. My heart sank. Travis looked bewildered. But where was Liam? I found him on the other side of the room, his eyes bugging out of his head. Maybe my attempt hadn’t been a complete failure after all. It was possible I’d teleported us away, but I wasn’t strong enough to complete the journey. Much like the problem I’d experienced with the telekinesis, we’d been snapped back here by a sort of magickal bungee cord. It was better than having our molecules adrift in the ether. All of this went through my mind in the second before the assault began and ended.

  Liam couldn’t tear his eyes away from us to watch the doorway. By the time he did, it was too late. The SWAT team was coming through the door. He managed to squeeze off two shots that didn’t hit anyone. He took a bullet to his lower leg and went down screaming. It was over.

  One of the tactical officers escorted Travis and me out of the room to a waiting ambulance where we were checked out briefly by an EMT even though we told him we weren’t injured. Two other EMTs ran into the hotel with a stretcher. Across the street, a crowd had formed behind a police barricade. Reporters and photographers were being held in a separate area, slightly forward of them. They called out to us, their questions swallowed by the cloud of noise around us. We were talking to the lieutenant when Liam was brought out on the stretcher and loaded into the ambulance. I was glad they hadn’t killed him. I had a lot of questions that needed answers.

  Chapter 43

  Liam’s lawyer wouldn’t allow him to talk to Travis and me until after his trial. The good news was that Watkins Glen didn’t have a large backlog of cases awaiting adjudication. It was just a matter of giving the prosecution and the defense time to mount their cases. Travis coped by throwing himself back into his work. I was grateful for every tour bus that came to New Camel. On slow days, I restocked all of my products until every shelf was full, and then made extras to keep in the storeroom for when the tourist season was in full swing.

  To say that I was surprised to hear from Valerie Duncan was an understatement. She called late on the morning of July Fourth. Two days had passed since the verdict came in. Liam had been found guilty of murder one, premeditated murder, among other serious charges. He was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. Val and Teddy had taken a month-by-month rental in Watkins Glen, so they could be there in the courthouse every day. I couldn’t begin to imagine how gut wrenching it must have been for them.

  When I answered the phone that morning, I had trouble recognizing Valerie’s voice at first. She sounded diminished, hollowed out by the dreadful twist of fate that had been visited upon her family. “You treated us kindly during the investigation,” she said, “so we wanted to let you know the truth about what happened minus the hype of the media coverage or the innuendos, and drama of the trial.”

  “Would you like me to come up to Williamsville?” It didn’t seem like much to offer, since I would have jumped through hoops of fire to hear what she had to say.

  “I appreciate that, but I’m not up to seeing folks. I’m barely up to making this call.”

  “Whatever works for you is fine with me,” I said.

  She took a deep wobbly breath before she began. “I’m going to assume that you know about Liam’s gambling problem among other things.” I murmured that I did. “Teddy and I made it clear that we would cut him out of our will unless he went for help. He never went. He refused to believe it was an addiction. Ava helped him out of a few tight spots by loaning him money to cover his debts. But the last time he went to her, he was in big trouble. He owed a large amount to some bookie with ties to the Mafia. They threatened to cut off his arm or leg to teach him a lesson. Ava couldn’t help him—she didn’t have that kind of money. For that matter, we wouldn’t have been able to help him either.

  “According to Ava, a friend of his said he could pick up serious money on the Dark Web. After he figured out how to navigate it, he found an ad for wet work, which I have since learned is a euphemism for murder.” Her voice cracked and she excused herself to ask Teddy for a glass of water.

  While I waited for her to get back on the phone, I thought about her and Teddy. Despite all they’d endured, they hadn’t lashed out at each other or assigned blame. They’d shared the burden and come through it together. That had to count for something.

  Val returned to the phone with an apology. “I spent so many weeks in that courthouse where I wasn’t allowed to speak that my voice seems to be out of practice.” I assured her there was no need for apologies. “Now where was I?” she asked.

  “Liam found an ad…?”

  “Yes, right… the person who put up the ad went by the name Ursa Major. Liam signed on for the job and was paid half of the fee, the remainder to be paid upon completing his assignment. When he was given the victim’s name, he thought it was a joke. Ursa Major made it clear that it was no such thing. Liam tried to explain that Ava was his sister and that he couldn’t possibly be expected to kill her. He was told he had a choice—either kill Ava or lose his own life. Now Liam would be the first to tell you that he’s no hero. He’d already given the bookie the first half of his payment, so he couldn’t have given the money back to Ursa Major even if that would have changed things.”

  I tried to imagine myself in Liam’s place. Although I didn’t have any siblings, I thought of my aunt Tilly. Would I be able to kill her to save my own life? My mind recoiled—no way, never, not for any reason. “Did Liam ever find out who marked Ava for death?”

  “Eagle Enterprises, but who was actually calling the shots at that point is still a little murky. As you know, they’d made a deal to sell the weapons system to a Russian company aka the Kremlin. Putin has his hands in everything.

  “Are you up to answering one more question?” It had bothered me from the beginning of the case.

  “Go ahead,” she said, but I could hear the fatigue dragging at her. I had to let her go after this.

  “Why did Liam leave Ava’s body in Lolly’s backyard?”

  “Ava had told him about her affair with Dani’s husband. That meant Dani had a motive for killing her. Lolly did too—a mother protecting her young—practically archetypal. By leaving Ava’s body in Lolly’s backyard, Liam hoped to frame one or both of them.” I thanked Valerie for her call. After we said goodbye, I found myself wondering if she and Teddy still loved their son and if they would visit him in prison. I would probably never know the answers, because I would never ask the questions.

  When the doorbell rang, I realized Valerie’s call had me running behind. I opened the door for Travis, who was stuck firmly in spring with his beige chinos, navy polo, and loafers. Summer was taking its time coming north this year. I’d taken the opposite tack, rebelling against the be
low normal temperatures in white jeans with a navy and white striped tee and sandals. My toes were cold, but I didn’t want to give in and go back to closed shoes. I was in a standoff with the weather.

  My cat pack had finally sanctioned my relationship with Travis. They no longer headed for their hidey holes when he arrived. Three of them came to greet him by rubbing against his legs. The other two, along with Sashki, remained on the couch and chairs, but meowed an invitation to come over and pet them.

  Travis kissed me, then noticed that my hair looked like I’d just fallen out of bed. “You’re not ready,” he said bemused. “Did the Earth fly off its axis?”

  “Funny. I had an important phone call.”

  “Not more important than Merlin’s party!” He sounded scandalized. The party had gone from being a passing thought to a full-fledged celebration of the wizard’s first year with us. Or as Tilly put it, “How did we survive the year?!”

  “You be the judge. Come upstairs and I’ll fill you in while I comb my hair.”

  “How do I know you’re not just trying to get me upstairs to have your way with me?”

  “You’ll just have to take your chances.”

  By the time my hair was beaten into submission, Travis was up to date. I put him to work filling the cats’ water dishes. I pulled out all the items Tilly had assigned me to bring—a chopped salad with a dozen vegetables and three kinds of lettuce, twice baked potatoes and the ice cream cake Merlin had campaigned for. My aunt baked two pies, cherry and blueberry, to be served with vanilla ice cream, because it was the Fourth.

  “With an ice cream cake, we’ll be awash in ice cream,” she’d groaned, “but if I don’t buy the vanilla, my dessert won’t be red, white and blue.” To equalize things, she made a chocolate layer cake. I didn’t agree with her math. Too many desserts always equaled too many desserts, but I’d learned a long time ago not to argue over the small stuff.