Forever Magic

by T. M. Cromer

  Ryker assumed it was because the man didn’t possess half the natural magical talent as Alastair. “Is that a creole spell?” he asked.

  “Yes.” Alastair’s answer was abrupt, and his eyes connected with Harold Beecham’s as their faces appeared in the other man’s mirror. Beecham swore when Alastair held up his middle finger and swiped a hand over the glass. “Occaeco.”

  They could still see Harold, but now the mirror he held was useless. His face turned the shade of a ripe beet. He swore long and loud as he smashed the mirror on the floor.

  “Looks like his favorite toy was taken away,” Martin muttered.

  “Yeah, he’s a real fucking peach,” Ryker returned.

  “If I’m correct, he’ll be here in a few minutes.” Alastair swept his arm in a wide circle. Seven crimson candles appeared in a perfect circle surrounding a pentagram now etched in the wood floor.

  “No amount of sanding is going to take that out,” Ryker quipped.

  “Will you be serious for two minutes? We need to sever his connection to you.”

  “Say what?” Surely he hadn’t heard correctly. Either that, or Alastair had finally gone over the deep end.

  “He arrived here, Thorne Manor, and then at the warehouse without ever going to the first building Matt and Leonie teleported to. He’s not tracking them, Ryker. He’s tracking you.”

  “How the hell would he do that?”

  “Trina’s blood.”

  Ryker’s stomach dropped, and his insides went cold. If that was true, he couldn’t be anywhere near GiGi without endangering her. Hell, he already had.

  “Al, it’s not a simple matter to remove a spell of that magnitude. If you do this, we can kiss any chance of using blood magic to bring the Council to the Otherworld.”

  This whole thing could backfire, and the ramifications didn’t bear thinking about.

  “What do you suggest?”

  “I keep moving until you and Spring have everything in place for the transference.”

  “And if he catches you? The whole thing is a bust.”

  Ryker’s mind raced frantically, searching for a solution. It was Martin who solved their dilemma.

  “Turn yourself in to the Witches’ Council.”

  Both he and Alastair stared at Martin.

  “Elaborate,” Al barked.

  “They have to hold you until trial. You can insist Harold Beecham not be allowed access to you and that a few of Mr. Thorne’s guards be on hand for your protection round the clock as a condition of your surrender. It would make it harder for Beecham to target you.” Martin shrugged. “As soon as the tribunal is set up, we spring you for whatever plan you all have up your sleeve.”

  A slow, pleased smile came over Alastair’s countenance. “Remind me to give you a raise, Martin.”

  A slight flush dusted the other man’s cheeks. “You pay me plenty, Mr. Thorne.”

  “A bonus then.” Alastair turned his attention back to the scrying mirror. “Beecham is gathering his army to come here. Call Drake and have him set something up with Stanley Smythe. We need to get you to safety.”

  Ryker placed the call.

  20

  “What do you mean, he’s in the custody of the Council?” GiGi screeched.

  The three men standing in front of her winced. Martin looked a lot less thrilled to be confronting her with the news than either Nash or Alastair.

  A boiling rage mixed with mind-numbing fear set her off, and in doing so, created a maelstrom of emotions she found difficult to control. The windows slammed open, threatening to shatter the glass, and wind whipped into the room. Vases rattled on their shelves, and stray papers began to swirl in the air around them. They crinkled as they whipped past.

  “I should have known better than to trust him in your care,” she snarled at Alastair. “How could you?” She lifted up her hands and blasted him with icy air.

  Although he grunted and skidded a foot, her brother remained standing. “He’s going to be fine.”

  “You can’t promise that, Al!” She threw her arms wide, and dining chairs toppled. If she were a bystander, she’d be impressed by the power behind the tantrum. As it was, her heart was in her throat and her stomach was tied in knots. All she wanted to do was destroy anyone responsible for Ryker’s capture.

  “He knew you’d react like this and told me to tell you, he’d see you soon and ‘no hooking up with Sebastian Drake in the meantime.’”

  GiGi stared at Alastair, and all the fight died. The windows slid back into their original position, and the handful of papers settled on the floor. “He can’t protect himself from Beecham in a jail cell, Al. He can’t.”

  They all knew what imprisonment by the Council meant. Ryker’s powers would be bound, and he’d be thrown in a room designed to make the use of magic impossible.

  “If Harold Beecham decides to stroll in and use his abilities against Ryker then he’d be as powerless as a newborn babe.” She sent her brother a beseeching look. “You have to get him out of there.”

  “Harold can’t get to him. We’ve made sure of that.”

  Alastair gently embraced her, and she fought against the mind-numbing terror threatening to take her since the second he had told her Ryker was now a prisoner.

  “What if they bypass a tribunal?” she whispered fearfully. Her heart spasmed at the thought.

  “They won’t. No matter what the crime, a tribunal is standard procedure.”

  “I couldn’t bear it if something happened to him. Not now. Not after resolving our differences.”

  “It won’t, sister. I promise.”

  “You can’t promise that, Al,” she said again, softer this time, but with no less angst.

  “I will tear that institution to the ground before I let them execute him. I imagine every Thorne in existence will stand beside us to do it.”

  She pulled back to gaze up at him. The harsh lines of his face were sharpened by the determination in his sapphire eyes. “Okay.” She borrowed from his steely resolve and inhaled a fortifying breath. “Tell me the entire plan and leave nothing out.”

  Alastair had just finished explaining the steps they intended to take, when Sebastian Drake arrived. He looked as grim as GiGi had ever seen him.

  “What is it? What’s happened to Ryker?” she demanded.

  “They’ve set a time for the tribunal. Tonight at nine,” Sebastian stated.

  “What? Is that normal? So soon? How can they not let him mount a defense?” All the questions tumbling around her brain came pouring out of her mouth. Dear Goddess! That gave them only eighteen hours to figure out their next step.

  “It’s not normal, but they fear Alastair. They believe if they limit his window of opportunity…” Sebastian trailed off, the reasoning implied.

  “They should fear him—along with the rest of us,” Nash replied, anger tinging his words. “I’ll call Spring and Knox. Drake, will you go wake Mackenzie and tell her we need her keen scientific mind? First room down the hall on the left.” He faced Alastair. “We’re on.”

  “Go make your calls. I have a few of my own.” Alastair glanced down at GiGi. “Are you going to be all right for a few minutes?”

  “Yes. Go. Do what you need to.”

  When all the men left the room, GiGi closed her eyes and envisioned her niece’s home. Within seconds, she approached Holly’s and Quentin’s front porch. The guards on duty recognized her and admitted her through the front door. She found Quentin sprawled half asleep on the sofa with his infant daughter resting on his bare chest.

  “Ms. GiGi,” he murmured. A warm, lopsided grin graced his jaw-droppingly handsome face. “Here to finally run away with me?”

  For once, she couldn’t find it within her to tease him in return. “I need your help.”

  “Let me wake Holly to care for Frankie.” Immediately, he became alert, all semblance of sleepiness gone.

  Within moments, Holly was downstairs and seated beside GiGi as she explained the circumstances
to the couple. “I’d like Quentin to assist me with my backup plan.”

  Although she paled, Holly nodded her agreement.

  Quentin squatted in front of his wife and cupped her lovely face within his large palms. “I’ll move heaven and earth to return to you and Frankie. I’ve done it before. Don’t worry.”

  “That’s like telling the grass not to be green, you tool.”

  “I adore you, my prickly pear.” His grin was wider and much more impactful than the lazy smile he’d cast GiGi’s way upon her arrival.

  GiGi rose and shifted away when he swooped in to kiss Holly. Based on the seductive look in his eye, it would be a steamy one. Holly’s soft sigh brought a small smile to GiGi’s lips. These two were perfect for each other in every way. Where Holly’s temperament was indeed “prickly,” Quentin’s was laid back and playful. They balanced each other marvelously well.

  “I’ll see you in the morning. Try to get some sleep, love.”

  “Like that is going to happen,” Holly retorted.

  GiGi placed a hand on her niece’s shoulder. “Perhaps you should go to your father’s with Frankie until we return.”

  Quentin nodded his assent.

  Holly searched her husband’s face. For what, GiGi didn’t know. Reassurance that all would be well?

  Finally, Holly nodded. “All right. Let me gather a few things, and I’ll follow you over. Am I to assume you don’t want my father to know of your intentions?”

  “I don’t care if he knows or not. I’ll do what is necessary to protect my husband.”

  “Spoken like a true Thorne!” Quentin laughed. “Come, let’s go have some fun.”

  And for him, it probably was. GiGi, on the other hand, found it difficult to keep fear from clawing a hole through her throat.

  “Harold Beecham is dangerous and not to be underestimated, my boy,” she warned with a hand on his arm.

  “Understood. Lead the way, Ms. GiGi.”

  Ryker lounged on the uncomfortable twin-sized mattress in his ten-by-ten cell and stared at the white cinder block wall. How the hell had he let Alastair and Martin talk him into this stupid-ass idea? He was claustrophobic. On his best day, he could scarcely tolerate a space like this: basically a box with a twin bed, a sink, and a tiny one-person table with matching chair. On his worst? Yeah, he would go out of his freaking mind. Although he didn’t have too many days to stress it. According to Sebastian Drake, an emergency hearing would take place tonight.

  He snorted his disbelief. The entire WC had to believe he was guilty as sin. Although he was a bit surprised they hadn’t given him time to mount a defense. If Al and Nash couldn’t rally the rest of the Thornes in time to create a mass drugging of the Council, Ryker was as good as dead.

  Regrets poured in, nearly drowning him, as he thought of his wife. Without a doubt, GiGi would be raging about now. He grinned. He’d be surprised if she hadn’t blasted Alastair to hell when he broke the news. Hopefully, she wouldn’t do anything impulsive to put herself in danger. There was no telling with GiGi.

  He ran a hand through his hair and blew out a sigh of frustration. The end had never seemed more eminent before. Well, maybe once when Marguerite Champeau shot him, but never since.

  The clank of the outer door opening caught his attention, and he lifted enough to rest on one elbow to face the opening. There was no need for actual doors for the cells because all prisoners had their magic bound and an electrical forcefield protected the cell entrance. A hole widened large enough for the attendant on duty to pass a tray through.

  As if he’d conjured her, Marguerite posed dramatically on the other side of the doorway. She hadn’t aged a day in the fifteen years since he’d last seen her. Still lovely as ever. Ryker could only imagine the inside had withered and blackened through and through.

  “To what do I owe this non-pleasure?”

  Her lips tightened, and her aquamarine eyes hardened. “No more playing the charming rogue, Ryker?”

  “It was all an act, Marguerite. There is no way on earth I could be attracted to a succubus like you.”

  “Tomorrow you will be put to death. I thought I’d extend you the chance to apologize.”

  He laughed. A deep, loud belly laugh that echoed off the block walls around him. “For what?” he managed.

  “You used me.”

  “No, darlin’. Beecham did that, and you let him. Did you ever consider what would happen if I’d have died the day you shot me?” He studied her frowning face. “No, I can see you didn’t, or not fully anyway.” Slowly, he sat up and placed his feet on the floor. “Beecham would have seen you were put to death for the murder of a Witches’ Council agent. You were a patsy to him. Nothing more.”

  Though her face paled, she remained silent.

  Rising, he strolled to stand on the other side of the opening. He folded his arms across his chest and stared down into her comely face. “Beecham is the spider, and the rest of us are flies in his web, Marguerite. He is a master game player. All he ever wanted was to tear apart anyone who stood in his way. Alastair, me, you, Georgie, my sister, and everyone else whose life he’s destroyed along the way. He leaves a path of murder and destruction in his wake.”

  Her frown deepened.

  He gave her a wry half-smile. “I’m sorry if you felt used. I was only ever doing my job, just as I’m sure you were doing yours. Without a doubt, we were at crossed purposes.” He rubbed the back of his neck, suddenly weary of this whole mess. “Watch your back, okay?”

  Her mouth tightened in a silent, little mew. She stared at him a moment longer, then turned on her heel to leave. She made it five steps before turning back. “Ryker?”

  “Yeah?”

  “I’m sorry, too. For you and GiGi and… your baby.”

  Emotion clogged his throat and made it hard for him to swallow. It was the odd moments when the loss of his child snuck up and hit him with a two-by-four across the back of the head. Incapable of speech, he merely nodded.

  She approached him again and softened her voice to say, “For what it’s worth, I don’t think you murdered Georgie. Deep down, you have a moral compass that most of us don’t.”

  “Thank you.” He took a step closer and lowered his own voice. “Get as far away from this mess as you can, Marguerite. Get off Beecham’s radar and find someone to make you happy.”

  “I always wanted that man to be you.” The smile she flashed him was bittersweet. “I thought maybe once, when we were young, long before the war, before you and GiGi got together, we might have had a chance. I suppose the disappointment of failure is what made me so easy to manipulate.” She sighed and swiped the moisture from the corner of her sad eyes. “I couldn’t let you die without saying goodbye.”

  “Goodbye, Marguerite.”

  Tears burned brightly in her exquisite eyes. Placing her fingertips to her lips, she spun away and rushed from the holding area.

  Ryker sighed heavily. He’d had no idea she carried any type of unrequited feelings for him, but it wouldn’t have mattered. The moment he’d set eyes on GiGi he was a goner.

  Moving to the sink, he stared at the man in the mirror. How many times over the years had he studied his own reflection, wishing he could be worthy? Worthy of his deceased family. Worthy of GiGi. Worthy of the friendships he’d cultivated over the years, like the ones with Alastair and Georgie. He owed it to all of them to come through this unscathed, or if not, then at least to take out Harold Beecham in the process.

  The outer door clanked again, and with a resigned sigh, Ryker turned around. It seemed whichever enemy he happened to think about coincidentally strolled through those doors.

  No one would believe the pudgy, unkempt, balding man standing on the other side of the cell opening was a murdering sociopath. With his round, pink cheeks and perpetual smile, he looked as jolly as old St. Nick.

  Ryker leaned back against the white porcelain sink and folded his arms over his chest. Crossing his ankles, he perfected a careless pose he knew
would get under Beecham’s pale skin. The man firmly believed he deserved the devotion of everyone he came in contact with. He wouldn’t get it from Ryker.

  “Why did you do it, Gillespie? Why did you murder Georgie?”

  He wasn’t sure what game the councilman was playing, but he refused to participate other than to claim his innocence. “I didn’t. I loved her like a mother, and that’s all I’m going to say about it until the tribunal.”

  A crafty expression flashed so swiftly across Beecham’s face, Ryker almost believed he imagined it. Harold effected a sorrowful look. “She was like a mother to us all. How you could do something so heinous to that poor woman… tsk, tsk.”

  In an effort not to grind his teeth to the pulp, Ryker unclenched his jaw and dropped his arms to his sides. He wouldn’t be baited. Georgie would have urged caution. And where the devil were Alastair’s guards? Beecham should have never been allowed into the holding area.

  “What do you want, Harold?” Ryker demanded when he’d had enough.

  “To let you know I’ll be happy to comfort your widow after you’re gone.”

  If the invisible electrical beam across the opening wouldn’t send Ryker into cardiac arrest, he’d have been through it in a second just to rip that rotten fucker’s head from his shoulders. As it was, trying to keep a tight rein on his temper was proving near impossible.

  “She can have any man she wants to keep her company should I be found guilty. Trust me, she’ll never fall for a smarmy shithead like you.”

  “Ah, ah, ah!” Beecham waved a finger back and forth. “Temper, temper, Gillespie. Keep it up, and the Council will see exactly how volatile you can be.”

  Harold didn’t know it, but his words were precisely what Ryker needed to calm down. The video cameras had to show him in control at all times. He gripped the edge of the sink and offered up a chilly smile. “If you don’t mind, I’m going to turn in and get some sleep until the trial. You can show yourself out, I’m sure.”

  It gave him a little thrill to know Beecham would chafe under the dismissal.