The Illusionist's Apprentice

by Kristy Cambron

  “The baseball game. Remember? The ticket stub in Peale’s book?”

  “That’s connected to this? It couldn’t be.”

  “Someone wants us to believe it is. Here. Have a look.” He pulled another news clipping from his pocket, knowing this was the one that would get the reaction. “The date was smudged on the ticket. Even so, Connor’s been digging into the newspaper archives, looking for newsworthy events between the two teams and then cross-checking that for any mention of Peale. And we got a hit on it just this afternoon. I knew you’d want to know, so I came right over.”

  When her eyes widened, he knew she’d found it: one of the twelve killed when the balcony collapsed was a man named Victor A. Peale, and his photograph was a dead ringer for the man they’d both watched die at the cemetery on New Year’s Eve of 1926.

  “Why . . . it’s him, isn’t it?” She shook her head. “But how is it possible? This was more than twenty-three years ago. How in the world could a man look exactly the same after that much time?”

  “So goes Stapleton’s argument. He’ll think it’s another notch in his win column, no doubt.”

  Wren slapped the newspaper clippings down on the table, then shot to her feet. “I don’t know how it’s possible. But surely you see someone planted this. They wanted you to find it. And with every piece of evidence stacked up in favor of Stapleton, I’m more compelled than ever to go out on that stage. I have to declare truth through my actions—that these are illusions, and that’s all they are. No magic. No spiritual trickery or deals with the afterlife. Just a show to entertain. I’ve never lied about what I do out there. And I’d never seek to deceive a crowd in the way he is so capable of doing. Just like you said, there’s but one man who could claim power over the grave. And I assure you—Horace Stapleton isn’t him.”

  “You’re angry.”

  “You bet I’m angry,” she shot back, arms tense at her sides.

  “I was going to say, you’re angry . . . and yet you still won’t consider canceling, will you? Even when the evidence in favor of Stapleton’s claims keeps building and whoever’s out there could try to silence your voice against him?”

  “Seems to me if someone was going to try to get rid of an illusionist, they’d simply find a way to slip in when no one was around and make her disappear. They’d certainly not bother while she’s onstage in front of a packed auditorium with hundreds of witnesses and the press with flashbulbs at the ready. Seems like I’d be safer out there than just about anywhere.”

  It wasn’t wise for Wren to perform tonight.

  They both knew it.

  She hadn’t been allowed a full week to heal from a bullet wound, and yet it was already proving an uphill battle to convince her out of her rather stubborn willfulness regarding the car chase. Elliot couldn’t leave her unprotected now, for too many reasons, despite the pigheadedness that seemed to be slowly growing on him. Maybe she’d at least hear him out this time before she declined an offer of protection.

  “While I admire your tenacity, Wren, that’s the very reason I’m going to stay right here until the curtain closes.”

  Tell her why.

  Elliot sighed, warring with himself.

  “But you know no one can touch me out there. The stage is the safest place to be right now.”

  Tell her why . . . Tell her what you know about Jennifer Charles.

  Still Elliot battled with his thoughts. The closer he tried to get, the more Wren was inclined to bolt in the other direction.

  “I’m not convinced hired guns are all that clever to begin with. I think they’d try anything, witnesses or not. That’s why I’m not leaving. You need someone on your side.”

  Wren tensed her jaw and turned away. She reached for the crystal vase, then moved in front of the spindle chair, blocking his view. Crystal meeting wood gave off the lightest sound. She left the vase there, breaking up what light there was in a thousand brilliant sparkles.

  “And who will ensure you keep your nose out of my props? I know it must be eating at you from the inside, but you’ll just have to stay content with being the only person who knows about the cuff links.”

  He tipped his head to the door leading to the back of the stage, the one that Irina swept in and out of while attending to her duties. “You mean . . . ?”

  “No one knows. Not even Irina,” she said, but before he could read anything into it, her face brightened with a smile. “And if I hadn’t been knocked out at the time, you wouldn’t know about them either. Since I can’t change that now, I’ll just have to trust you will hold it in the strictest confidence and not let your curiosity stray any further.”

  “I won’t get involved unless I absolutely have to. You said yourself it’s safe out on that stage. Well, here’s your chance to prove your theory.”

  Shades of willfulness fell across her face, almost making him laugh. He backed off, hands in the air. “I’m here strictly as a member of law enforcement tonight. You and Amberley are paramount to our case against Stapleton, and that means we’re not leaving either of you alone for one second. So you can go ahead to your stage if you have to, but I’ll always be here waiting when you’re through.”

  In a blink, it became all too apparent what he’d said.

  Always.

  The audience murmured and the band began to cue up past the curtain, punctuating the sudden grip of silence that had fallen between them.

  Whether Elliot had meant the admission as more than just a job didn’t matter. For reasons even he couldn’t explain, there was the smallest measure of truth in the one word. That thinking about Wren’s bandaged shoulder felt like a punch to the gut every time. That the sight of her bloodied tuxedo jacket was something he wished he could expunge from his memory. That he couldn’t forget the way her hair had fallen across her brow when she’d passed out in his arms. That she bore a will stronger than anyone he’d ever known, with talent and determination that cast her ownership over every stage, but she also possessed the unexpected presence of a softer side.

  The side so few were privileged to see.

  The side he longed to see more of.

  Wren stood before him, her eyes shining under the dimmed light from the sides of the stage. And it hit him as he looked at her—they were alike. Both self-professed loners and workaholics who finally had something that stirred a bit of life in them again.

  Wren Lockhart, and not the whole of Stapleton’s case, was the real reason for the shift in his thinking. Unbelievable.

  “What did you just say?” she asked, breathless.

  “I said I’ll be right here.” A pause. The summoning of bravery, and then, “If you want me to be.”

  “Please don’t . . .”

  “Why?” He searched her face for an answer. “Why can’t I say it if it’s true?”

  “Because we’re working together for a very short time. Because I don’t want anyone else. I have to rely on myself.”

  “Yet you speak to me of faith? Isn’t that relying on more than just yourself?” He shook his head. Felt a pull drawing him a measured step forward. “You can’t walk on both sides of the street, Wren. I’m not asking you to change anything. Not who you are or what you do. I know I can’t prevent you from stepping onto that stage tonight. I’ll try to sway you every time if it’s in your best interest, but I won’t bully you out of your will. All I’m saying is that as long as you want me to, I’ll be right here waiting when you’re through.”

  She crossed her arms over her chest, as if bravado would continue protecting her. Even tried to look away, scanning the backstage area as if she needed one last check of the stage props, though her meticulous nature would have ensured she’d already done so before that very moment.

  Elliot saw it, plain as day.

  The ever-composed Wren Lockhart he’d come to know was crumbling before his eyes. It wasn’t like her to shed vulnerability, yet she did. Earnestly. And that spoke volumes.

  Finally, she exhaled. “When I was young,
I moved to England to live with my uncle. It was not long after my mother died and everything about my world had changed.”

  “I’m so sorry, Wren,” he whispered, empathy carving a slow trail through his chest like a surgical knife.

  “Thank you. It was a long time ago. I’ve taught myself not to think on it much. But then the case—these past weeks . . .” She ran a gloved fingertip over the back of the spindle chair, lost in thought. “Memories have come to life and it seems I have nowhere left to run from them. They haunt me.”

  Elliot studied her, ignoring the fact that she’d avoided his confession entirely and instead had chosen that moment to revive a childhood memory. But whatever must have been going through her mind, he didn’t stop her.

  He stood still.

  Drawn to silence in the shades of light falling from the backstage rafters. Telling his feet to hold fast when all they wanted to do was charge forward. He had to wait for Wren to come to the door of her past and invite him to step through of her own volition.

  There was no pushing his way in this time.

  “I remember my uncle had many business associates in France and traveled often before the war. It was very much a golden time, the calm before the world’s storm of the Great War. And my uncle knew I loved stories of kings and castles, that sort of thing. He took me to see the palace of Versailles once. Have you heard of it?”

  “I’ve heard of it. Yes,” he said, his voice strong but making sure it was void of coaxing. She wasn’t likely to take to that.

  “I’d never seen anything like it. It was so different from my view of the world—of Boston at night and the back halls of vaudeville theaters. My view was always darkness. But this world seemed gilded with daylight. Marble and manicured gardens and surfaces dripping with gold . . . It was like something I’d read in a fairy tale. But it’s odd that when in comparison to all that splendor, the memory that holds me fast is of something you only find when you look past the gold leaf. It was a painting, an arch positioned above the door to a salon at each end of a lavish hall.”

  “The Hall of Mirrors?”

  “Yes. You’ve heard of it too.” A faint smile eased over her lips with the remembrance.

  He nodded. “I do read a fair bit.”

  “It’s said that when any visiting dignitary came to Louis VIX’s palace, they were invited into one of the two grand salons flanking the hall. Above one door is a painting celebrating the king’s gift of peace bestowed upon Europe from France, portrayed in a regal, very heroic pose. Over the other is the depiction of the king atop a magnificent steed, fierce and charging ahead in battle, trampling over his adversaries along the way.”

  “So based upon the invitation into either salon, that country would know exactly where they stood with France.”

  Wren nodded softly. “Yes. One room for peace, the other for war. They’d immediately know whether they were considered a friend or foe, and they could expect their audience with the king to go accordingly. There was no guesswork after that because the paintings spoke without the necessity of words.”

  “And that’s why—?” Elliot stopped short when something more open registered in her eyes. He glanced around the large space before he brought his gaze back to rest on her. “It’s why you bring everyone into your library first. That’s your war room, isn’t it?”

  She didn’t deny it. Illusions were one thing, but dealing with real emotion was something else entirely. And she didn’t look able to master this.

  “I don’t have friends, Elliot. Everyone is a foe in the beginning, you understand. It’s not personal. It’s just meant to help me survive another day. If I make sure I don’t rely on anyone other than myself, I’m assured I’ll never be let down.”

  “And yet I’m still allowed in your backstage at the moment. You didn’t invite me in, but you haven’t exactly asked me to leave either.”

  “Then why are you here?”

  He took a step closer, until the hairline part in the curtains cast of swath of light that no longer cut across the floor between them but split up the side of his shirt-sleeve. Elliot looked down at it, then back to her, as if it were an invisible line he’d intentionally crossed.

  “I told you,” he whispered. “Security.”

  “Mine or yours?”

  Elliot held up his index finger for a brief second, then brushed back a lock of hair that had fallen over her cheek.

  “Do you want me to leave? Just tell me to go back to the library and I will.”

  Wren blinked back, saying nothing, giving him no indication what she might be thinking. She turned back to the table and pulled out the drawer. Her gentle fingertips grasped the worn edges of the book she’d put there.

  She stopped before him, offering it.

  “The Welsh Fairy Book.” He read the title, raising his brow slightly. “What’s this?”

  “It’s a favorite of mine. And it’s very dear to me. So I wonder if I could trust you to hold on to this until after the show. Keep it safe.”

  “Why do you want me to take it?”

  Head shaking ever so slightly, she whispered, “It’s what I can give right now.”

  Those words wrecked him.

  Without thinking better of it, Elliot gave in. He moved forward, his shoes brushing the tips of hers, and leaned in. Dangerously close. So she had to lean back a breath with him, clutching the tabletop at the small of her back.

  He allowed his lips to graze hers as he eased his fingertips over the spine of the book at the same time, taking it in hand. “Then I’ll take that as an invitation to stay,” he whispered a breath away from her lips, just as the familiar music began to play out against the ceiling vaults in the auditorium. “I believe that’s your cue, Ms. Lockhart. Please try not to break a leg. The federal government would like you to remain in one piece.”

  He melted back into the shadows just as quickly, leaving Wren frozen in her spot behind the center part of the curtain. He watched her visibly shift tracks to the task at hand, dipping her head and closing her eyes, waiting in her signature pose as the curtain drifted apart.

  Though she was a consummate professional, the tiniest shred of hopefulness cut into his chest when he took his place at the stage wing, with enough of a vantage point to see her place under the spotlight.

  She’d smiled—a whisper-soft display of contentment that he hoped was in the lingering memory of the moment that passed between them. She inhaled, music swelling, even as her teeth just caught the edge of her bottom lip.

  It was no use to deny that the woman in red was more than a means to an end for the case. Even with her eccentric ways and masked persona, Wren Lockhart had begun to mean more to Elliot than he dared say.

  He gripped the book in his hand, the blue cover and thick spine worn, printed with the name William Jenkyn Thomas and the ethereal title in block gold letters: The Welsh Fairy Book.

  Fairy tales were stories where anything was possible, even the fanciful dreams of childhood. But how could Elliot tell her that he wasn’t just there as a precaution? That he had a terrible instinct growing in his core: more threats were looming. Bringing them to a war room whether Wren wanted it or not. And if she longed for a fairy-tale hero, he wasn’t it.

  Not by a long shot.

  Stay with me, Wren. A battle was raging, bringing a fight she didn’t know was already on its way.

  Elliot swallowed hard as he saw a little girl skipping down the center aisle with a basket of mingled peonies and roses hooked under her elbow, drawing the crowd into the opening act with Wren eloquently weaving her story from the stage.

  “Stay with me . . . ,” he whispered, holding tight to the book from her past.

  Even when I have to tell you that I already know what Jennifer Charles is hiding.

  CHAPTER 17

  Wren’s shoulder protested, slamming her with pain even while wrapped in the soft cradle of water.

  She’d been chained to the bottom of the glass water chamber, both ankles and wri
sts bound in thick coils of metal, and covered in water that had been pumped in until it was full and rippled just over the top of her head.

  The audience became a jumble of figures—watercolor shapes bleeding into one another from her submerged view. With the errant hammering of her heart and the muffled gasps from the audience piercing through the water, it proved a losing battle to keep her hands calm.

  Instead of the lock clicking open as it always did, Wren felt it tighten and fight back. Terror slammed through her mind.

  This isn’t my lock . . .

  A new lock, untested and firm, became a different kind of enemy—one that rendered her injured arm near useless. Her shoulder refused to help, every motion she’d practiced time and time again turned into a fresh battle against dexterity now.

  The pick caught in the lock, jarring slightly, and to her horror—slipped from its secure perch between her forefinger and thumb. And it was gone, disappearing into the depths of the water tank, leaving her hand painfully empty.

  With the minimal stage lighting, Wren knew it was impossible for the crowd to see the tiny glint of metal as it cut down through the water. She’d planned it that way. It had always been her fail-safe. If the first pick was dropped or caught on the tape in her glove, there was no need to panic. She always had a spare in the other hand. Candlelight onstage would become her ally, too, providing a backdrop just dim enough to conceal the falter and save the illusion.

  But this time panic gained its first true foothold on her stage.

  She had a second pick to turn to, but she couldn’t move her left arm enough to reach it from under the tape in her other palm. Her first tiny savior had already sunk to the bottom of the chamber and without it, she’d have little chance to free herself with the second one.

  Wren turned her head to both sides, pleading with the watercolor splotches for help. Surely Elliot was there. He’d be standing off in the wings somewhere, waiting with everyone else, expecting her to emerge triumphant to the adulation of the crowd. If only she could see him through the wash of color splotches . . . Cry out for help . . .