Though my head continued to spin, I watched as a young, attractive man got down to his knees a few meters in front of me, his face awash with fear. “I don’t get it – how did that spell—” His gaze locked on the phone I was holding. Suspicion took hold of him.
Though I didn’t think I could move, apparently I could, and I suddenly snapped the phone in close to my chest. “Who the hell are you? What have you done? Where am I?”
“How did you get that phone? Did you steal Maximus Knights’ phone?” The guy pointed at the phone, and there was real fear in his voice. Not fear at the fact I could be a kleptomaniac – a much deeper, far more real fear. The fear of a man who had just given up his last chance.
“I know Max – he let me borrow his phone. Who—” I began. I stopped. I remembered the caller ID that had flashed on the screen. “Hayden?” I said through a hard swallow.
The guy blanched. I didn’t need truth magic to see that he had to be Hayden.
Though he was down on his knees, he pushed back, stood up, wrapped a hand over his mouth, and shook his head. “I don’t have the magic to try again. Goddammit – this isn’t fair. I don’t have time for this. And how the hell do you know my name?”
“Your caller ID flashed on the screen before the portal spell started.”
“You know what a portal spell is? Are you a witch?” You should’ve seen Hayden’s face; it suddenly opened with hope.
I was now faced with a decision to make. Hell, I was facing several decisions here. The most important was how to proceed. I had no idea where I was, and even though I’d found Hayden, I was as weak as hell, and I had no idea what kind of forces he was up against.
But the question was whether to tell him the truth or not to.
“Please, are you a witch?” he asked, hope infiltrating his tone.
“Technically,” I found myself saying.
“What does technically mean?”
“It means I’m not a warlock – I can’t practice magic like that. I’ll be no use to you, and I won’t be able to help you cast another portal spell.”
I was right – that was all he cared about. At that admission, he withdrew, looking as if he was about to die on the spot. He crammed a hand over his mouth and started to breathe tensely through his fingers. Every breath was so deep and shaking, I was certain he would hyperventilate.
Slowly but surely my body was starting to right itself, and after a while, I found the ability to push up into a seated position. There were still a few scant crackles of magic charging over my arms and discharging into the concrete. I stared at them. They looked like little insects burrowing through the ground to get away from some predator.
I looked up at Hayden. “Why did you want Max so badly? He said you made a meeting with him for him to look over some arcane books. Why—”
“Because this was the only way,” Hayden said. He finally allowed his hand to drop, and it left several elongated stiff white marks in his face from where he’d been gripping it.
“… What exactly is after you?”
“There’s no point in telling you, Miss. There’s no point in anything anymore. Without Max – I….” He shook his head, a few tears appearing in the corners of his eyes.
I frowned. “Max is an opportunity finder – not a warlock. He wouldn’t be able to help you cast any more portal spells either.”
“No – but he would have helped me figure out the only way out of this.”
I ticked my head to the side. “What are you talking about?”
He brought his hands up and spread them wide. “Like I said – there’s no point in talking this through. It’s over. I’ll let you out of this basement – but you’ll have to navigate through the tunnels yourself. I can’t leave. As soon as I set foot outside of here, they’ll come find me.”
A thrill of fear chased up my back. Before I knew what I was doing, I shook my head. “I’m not going to leave you alone. I’m here to find you, anyway.”
Hayden’s expression stiffened in an instant. “What?”
Now I’d said that, I could hardly unsay it. So it was time. Time to tell the truth. I took a breath. “I work with Josh McIntosh – the only government sanctioned bounty hunter in town. We’ve been sent by Ming Chen to track down Isabella, your girlfriend.” I had no idea if telling him the truth was the right thing to do. Hell, on the face of it, it was very much the wrong thing to do. Hayden was clearly unstable, and this new worrying information could send him over the edge.
Sure enough, at this revelation, he took a tight step away from me, and he also started to fumble with something behind his back.
Fear spiked in my heart, but I didn’t go with it. Nor did I push up and stand. It was my turn to bring my hands up and spread them wide. “I’m not here to hurt you, Hayden. I’m here to help you. You’re the key to this case, aren’t you?” I found myself asking softly.
“Exactly what kind of witch are you? And what do you mean you’ve been sent to track down Isabella?” His voice shook.
I ticked my head to the side quickly. “I… I help people find things,” I managed.
Hayden’s lips stiffened. “… What? But— where’s Isabella? No, wait. What?” He looked at me.
The cat was out of the bag. “I’m a finder – just like Max. Well – a little different to Max.”
Hayden swallowed. His arms dropped loosely to his sides, and his eyes opened fully as he stared at me. “Are you playing games with me? Are you an opportunity finder too?”
“Technically I’m a complete finder – so yeah, I’m also an opportunity finder. My abilities to find opportunities, however, aren’t as developed as my abilities to locate.” Once the words were out, I couldn’t take them back. And I didn’t want to, either. Because my opportunity magic was flaring in my stomach, telling me this was the right thing to do. It was time to trust Hayden.
Hayden went to clamp a hand over his mouth again but stopped. He shook his head. “You’re lying to me, aren’t you?”
“No,” I said softly. “Honestly, though I didn’t think it was a good idea to reveal this, my… opportunity magic did. Now, to answer your question, Isabella disappeared around 28 hours ago. My partner, Josh, and I were sent to track her down by Ming this morning. We went to your apartment, found the D 20, and then Max showed up. I took his phone and… walked out after an argument with his brother,” I winced, “and then you brought me here. Where are we exactly?”
I’d obviously just dumped a lot of information, and Hayden was struggling to keep up. But one thing had piqued his attention. He shook his head to the side. “I’m sorry, you found D 20 in my apartment? What are you talking about?”
So I’d been right, then? The D 20 hadn’t been Hayden’s. Though if Josh were here he’d just point out Hayden was lying – Hayden wasn’t lying. I didn’t need my truth magic to figure that one out – anyone with basic psychology skills would be able to see that he was telling the truth. I nodded. “There was D 20 – five pills, to be exact – stashed in the bottom of a face cream container in the bathroom. It was in the bottom of a face cream designed for men,” I emphasized. “It wasn’t yours, was it? It was Isabella’s?”
Hayden closed his eyes. He shook his head. “Idiot. I told her not to go down that path. Frigging idiot.” He brought up a hand, clenched it into a fist, and pounded it against the center of his head.
“Isabella was in some kind of trouble, wasn’t she? She… she has some kind of connection to the Cruze Gang, doesn’t she?” All of the assumptions – or at least Josh would call them assumptions – I’d made on Hayden’s bathroom floor were turning out to be right.
Hayden looked at me, and something obviously clicked in his head. He took a harsh breath. “You really are a complete finder, aren’t you? Isabella was so careful – she didn’t let anyone know about her connection.”
“Anyone but you. She… she found you, didn’t she? I mean,” I shook my hands as I searched for what I was trying to ask, “she came on to you.�
� I winced at how awkward I sounded, but it had to be said.
Hayden straightened a little. “I didn’t think I had a chance with the city’s brightest starlet – if that’s what you mean.”
“No, what I mean is Isabella recognized something in you she didn’t recognize in anyone else. As an emotion reader, she saw that… you were the kind of guy who would do anything to keep someone safe. Which is precisely what you’ve been doing your entire life for your brother,” I added.
This was obviously a step too far, because Hayden jerked to the side. “How do you—”
I brought my hands up and spread them again. “Yeah, I know about your brother. No, we haven’t told the police. He’s an Internal Affairs informant,” I added. Though I didn’t technically know that for certain, it didn’t seem that much of a stretch. He’d been chatting freely with Jason, after all.
Hayden winced, bringing up his hands and clasping them over his face. “Goddammit. Goddamn frigging idiot. He would’ve gone to them to try to save me. But he’ll never be free again.”
“It’s okay,” I said gently. “I think he just wanted to help his brother. And if he hadn’t—” I gazed around the basement again. To be honest, I needed to speed this up, because, though I technically didn’t know how much time we had, I doubted it was much.
I didn’t know who was after Hayden, but I knew who would be after me. Just the three strongest witches in town. It wouldn’t take Josh and Jason long to figure out a portal spell had been cast in that elevator. And maybe it wouldn’t take Max long to figure out just who had cast it.
Though I wanted to help Hayden, at the same time, I realized he wouldn’t be as willing to divulge secrets if Jason appeared on the scene.
I finally got to my feet. It was a wobbly affair, and I found myself clutching Max’s phone to my chest as if that would somehow balance me. And weirdly? It did. Because strangely I swore it strengthened the tether between him and me. I took a heavy breath. “You need to tell me exactly what kind of trouble you’re in. I need to know all of the facts – then and only then will I be able to help you.”
He looked up at me sharply. For several seconds he didn’t say a word – he simply appeared to assess me. “Help me?” he said, his voice cracking. “Why would you want to help me? I’ve broken so many laws; there’s only one place I’ll be going.”
“I don’t have the authority to offer you a plea bargain. Nor can I make you an informant. But I can find opportunities,” I said simply. I left it at that.
Though I could’ve said more to try to convince him, I didn’t need to.
As my words hung in the air, slowly Hayden let his hands drop again. “Why would you want to help me, anyway?”
It was a prying question, and maybe I should’ve paused to answer – but I didn’t have to. “Because my opportunity magic is telling me to try. Because I feel like you’ve always been trapped in this situation. From protecting your brother, to protecting Isabella – you’ve never been able to live your life. I don’t think you’re a bad man,” I added, because that needed to be said.
Sure enough, it had an immediate and powerful effect on Hayden. He stood there, blinking back his tears as violent emotion took to his face. It took several seconds to subside. He dipped his head back, closed his eyes, and breathed hard. “It doesn’t really matter what you think—”
“Yes, it does. I’m a complete finder – that includes the ability to find the truth,” I said softly.
His eyes widened at this. I mean they really stretched. “That’s the hardest ability for a finder to learn,” he muttered. “It’s also extremely costly. But if you can find the truth—”
It was my turn to bring my hands up. “I can sometimes find the truth. It’s a patchy skill – and it’s costly. How do you know so much about finding magic, anyway?” The question popped into my head. After all, it wasn’t every single witch, let alone ordinary human, who understood the vagaries of finding.
“Years and years of study. Plus, I learned a hell of a lot about them when I tracked Max down.”
I ticked my head to the side. “I get why you wanted him – because you thought he could find the only opportunity for you to get out of this mess. But what was with the portal spell?”
“It was the only way to get him here without revealing myself to them.”
The way Hayden said them would stick with me for life. His voice dropped all the way down low, and I swore it rattled through the basement. A quick and cold chill pulsed up my back, and I stood a little straighter, finally finding my balance. “Who are they? And more to the point, where are we? What exactly is after you?” The questions started to flood out of me. I couldn’t waste any more time. And I was confident that I’d finally gained enough of Hayden’s trust to break down the wall between us.
I was right. He tilted his head back. He brought a finger up and turned it around in a circle. “This is what you call a protection basement. For the past year or so, I’ve been working on it. Every single layer of concrete has been imbued with protection symbols.”
“But you’re not a witch.”
“You’re right; I’m not. So I paid people to create the material for me. And before you ask whether I let the people inside this basement – and if anyone knows where this place is – I didn’t and they don’t. I went around town – sometimes around the freaking country – getting people to imbue small sections of concrete with protection spells. Then I labored putting them in place myself.”
I blinked hard. “Just what exactly are you hiding from?”
“The head of the Cruze Gang. Isabella’s father,” he said. There was such a defeated tone in his voice.
I shook my head as something clicked. Hayden was definitely telling the truth. I brought my hands up, pressed them against my face, and then let them drop as a single word came to mind. It was the same name I’d heard Jason use in the library when he’d been talking to Bradley. “Jeopardy?” I said.
Hayden paled and nodded. “Jeopardy. You must be powerful – because nobody knows his name outside of the inner circle.”
“The head of the Cruze Gang is Isabella’s father?”
Hayden nodded. “Isabella didn’t share his proclivities, even though he used her for most of her life.”
“… She found you because she thought you could help her, right?”
Hayden wouldn’t make eye contact anymore. “She told me she loved me,” he muttered.
I paled as I realized what I’d just implied. “I’m sure she did. But—”
“Yeah – I was helping her. Because I could. And because I was obliged to. Isabella was a good person with a bad family,” Hayden said, a knowing look in his dead gaze.
I blinked hard. “I… I know this sounds defeatist, but how did Isabella ever think she could get away from the Cruze Gang?”
Hayden snorted. “I don’t know if she ever thought she could get away from them fully. But I think she thought she could start to lead a good life. Me, I wasn’t so sure. That’s why… I prepared for the worst.” He brought a hand out and gestured to the basement. “It’s also why I made a deal,” he said softly, his words barely breaking from his throat.
My mind struggled to figure out what he was talking about.
I knew a lot about this case so far, but there were still massive holes. And yet I could feel as those holes started to fill.
Hayden was a lot of things, but at the end of the day, he was a rare book salesman. And that? That was key.
My face became cold as my eyes widened. “You promised Jeopardy you’d give him one of the Hidden Grimoires, didn’t you?”
It was a gamble that Hayden knew anything about the Hidden Grimoires, but it was a gamble that paid off.
Hayden looked right at me and nodded. “That I did. I made a deal – one where he would finally give Isabella up, and Jeopardy would get one of the goddamn Hidden Grimoires. And I was going to hold up my end of the bargain – but Isabella… the idiot…” he shook his head, trailing o
ff as he once again clamped a hand over his mouth and breathed through his stiff fingers. “She must have gotten freaked out that I’d disappeared, and she must have gone to her dad.”
My heart was beating at the very prospect of what Hayden was discussing. Though I still didn’t honestly believe all the crap people kept telling me was true about the Hidden Grimoires, my body did. It tensed as it realized how important this was. “Have you given him a set of the Hidden Grimoires already? I mean – did you give them to him several weeks ago?”
Hayden looked at me, his expression confused. He shook his head. “I haven’t secured a set yet. I’m on the cusp of it. Why?”
“Because he already had a set of Hidden Grimoires,” I commented under my breath.
Hayden paled. He’d paled a lot throughout this conversation, but this was on another level entirely. It looked as if the blood had been drained from his cheeks by a surgeon. “He already had a set? That’s impossible. He didn’t tell me that—” Hayden began, then he shook his head. “Christ, I’m an idiot. A goddamn frigging idiot.” He brought a hand up and started to slam the base of his palm into his forehead.
I took a step toward him and reached a hand out. “Don’t hurt yourself. You didn’t know. Why is it such…” I trailed off. I think I could figure this one out. Maybe it would be bad if a man like Jeopardy had one set of Hidden Grimoires, but if he had two?
Hayden looked up at me sharply. “Jeopardy is one of the rarest breeds of witches out there – apart from you,” he said softly. “He has the ability to take a snapshot in time.”
I’d never heard of such a witch, and I blinked at Hayden in confusion. “What does that mean?”
“It means that Jeopardy can create complete memories that he can walk into – right from his childhood up to the present day. If Jeopardy has seen something or experienced something, he can walk back into a perfect re-creation of it in his mind. It makes him the perfect witness. It also makes him capable of creating complete energetic imprints of books.”
I was lost, and I revealed that as I shook my head hard. “Can such magic exist? That sounds insane. And….” A sinking feeling started to push through my stomach as I trailed off.
Forgotten Destiny Book Three Page 8
