by Lily Webb
“It’s Marcus!” Zoe shouted, taking the words out of my mouth, but she hadn’t seen him on my camera; instead, she stared at him in horror as he stood frozen with a wand dangling in one hand. He stared down at it in puzzlement, as if he’d just woken from a trance with no recollection of how he’d gotten there, then scowled in anger when Leo’s blond head peeked up from the pile of guards.
“He’s gonna fire again!” Thorn cried and tried to force me to the ground, but I fought to stay upright and cupped my hands around my mouth.
“Marcus, no!” I bellowed, and amazingly, I got his attention. His wild eyes shot to mine. “You don’t have to do this! Please, just put the wand down!”
Marcus smiled sadly at me and shook his head, then jabbed the wand through the air at Leo and shouted, “Interficio!” Another ball of crackling, sinister green magic hurtled from Marcus’ wand toward Leo, who seemed to have lost all his confidence, but at the last second, a guard batted the spell away with a counter. It crashed into a nearby shop’s second-floor window and sent shattered glass raining down on the square, followed by another round of panicked screams from the reporters who were trapped in the middle of the confrontation.
While everyone was distracted, Marcus turned and dashed down the street behind him. Shocked, I watched his bald, shining head bounce away for a moment before I snapped back into reality.
“He’s running! We have to stop him!” I shouted and forced myself out of Thorn’s grip to chase after Marcus with Zoe and Thorn right on my heels. Though I had a good guess why Marcus had just tried to assassinate Leo, I wasn’t about to let him get away with it — or hurt anyone else.
Chapter 12
Despite the stitch in my side that screamed in agony with every thundering step I took and the rising heat, I kept running through the cramped streets of Starfall Valley like my life depended on it. Thorn and Zoe’s shouts had long turned into background noise as I focused in on where Marcus had gone — because I’d already lost track of him.
Eventually, though, my body couldn’t take anymore, so I broke into an exhausted jog before eventually coming to a stop with my hands on my knees while I tried to catch my breath.
Thorn caught me first and rested a hand on my back. “Are you okay?” he wheezed. “What were you thinking?”
“That we have to stop him,” I said before taking another deep breath, “before he kills someone else.”
“Look, I know I’ve got no room to criticize you for chasing after an armed killer — Lilith knows I’ve done it enough myself — but I really think we need a plan,” Zoe said. “This guy is erratic.”
“The plan should be going back to the police and telling them everything we know,” Thorn said, a bit too firmly for my liking.
“And what are they going to do about it, Thorn?” I asked him. “You saw the same thing I did back there. Those guards almost let Blackwood die.” I still couldn’t shake the image of them all standing around slack jawed like they were in some kind of trance while Blackwood spoke.
“That’s my point. If even the police can’t handle Marcus, then what chance do the three of us have against him? What if this is a trap, Selena? Have you stopped long enough to think about that?” Thorn snapped, but despite his tone, I knew he meant no harm. I hadn’t considered that, and the realization gave me chills.
While I was sure the police had some information Zoe and I hadn’t gathered yet, I was also willing to bet that we had more of a complete picture than they did — and Marcus knew that, which made both of us a problem for him. If he was bold enough to stride into the town square and try to kill Leo Blackwood in broad daylight, who was to say he wasn’t cunning enough to lure Zoe and I into a dark, secluded alley where he could do us both in too?
“I didn’t think so,” Thorn said. He shook his head and sighed. “I don’t blame you for wanting to stop him — I want that too — but we’re dealing with someone who’s clearly dangerous, so we need to be smart.”
“Thorn’s right,” Zoe said. “So, let’s think: If we were Marcus and fleeing a crime scene, where would we go?”
“Well, for starters, I’d want to get off the major streets,” Thorn said. “But I don’t know where I’d go specifically. Maybe to a friend’s place or something?”
“He went to Ryder’s shop!” I shouted as another piece of the puzzle clicked into place in my mind. With a rush of adrenaline that only accompanied a mental breakthrough, I glanced around the area and realized where we were. Zoe and I had first met Marcus on this same street, which meant that Hallewell’s Heels wasn’t far away. Though I’d heard that Ryder had so far refused Marcus’ attempts at reconnecting, I had a feeling that if Marcus showed up in a panic after having attempted an assassination, Ryder would take him in — voluntarily or otherwise.
My eyes shot down the street and locked on the giant heel mounted on the building above the shop’s entrance, then drifted down to the front door. Unlike the first time Zoe and I had visited, there wasn’t a heel propping the door open this time; instead, Ryder had sealed it shut tight. The sight doubled my heart rate, and when I noticed that the sign hanging on the inside of the door said, “Closed,” I got even more anxious. I wasn’t familiar with the store’s hours, so it was possible that Ryder just hadn’t opened up yet, but I doubted that was the case.
“Please tell me you’re not going to just barge in there,” Thorn said, more begging than complaining.
“I’m reckless, but I’m not that bad,” I said as I racked my brain for alternatives. If Ryder was in the store and we knocked, I didn’t think for a second he’d actually answer. But if Marcus really was hiding in the store, then we had to find a way inside.
“Well, let’s at least get closer to see if I can pick up any mental activity from inside,” Zoe said, and I couldn’t help but smile at the genius idea. If she’d already heard Marcus’ thoughts in the square during the attack, unless he or Ryder cast another blocking spell on their minds, she’d probably be able to hear them from outside the shop, too.
“We’ll have to play it cool, though. Ryder will definitely recognize us, and I don’t think he’ll be friendly if he notices us lurking around outside his shop — especially if he’s hiding Marcus inside it,” I said, and Zoe nodded.
“As long as we stay away from the windows and watch out for any cameras on the building, he’ll never know,” she said and headed down the street as casually as if we were out for a morning stroll around the shops. I followed her with Thorn glued to my side, and though we weren’t in any immediate danger, I couldn’t shake the fear that at any moment Marcus might leap from the space between buildings and take us all down with a well-aimed killing curse.
Thankfully, though, we reached Hallewell’s Heels without an incident, but Zoe kept walking past it into the alley between Ryder’s shop and the next. Her eyes scanned the upper perimeter of the building, and when she found no cameras, she nodded. “This is probably as good a place to start as any.”
“Then work your magic, girl,” I said with a wink, and she smiled before she closed her eyes and listened for something that only she could hear. Thorn and I exchanged nervous glances, and I couldn’t help worrying that someone might step out and catch us standing rather suspiciously in the alley — but that wasn’t likely to happen now that word had spread about a murderer prowling the streets.
“Ryder’s definitely there, but I can’t make out what he’s thinking. It’s muffled, probably because of the distance,” Zoe said after what felt like an eternity.
“Is there anyone else?”
Zoe hesitated while she continued to listen, but eventually shook her head. “Not as far as I can tell, but that doesn’t mean Ryder’s alone in there.”
“Well, what do we do now, then?” Thorn asked, beating me to it.
Zoe grimaced. “I mean, if we really want to know if Ryder’s got company, we’re gonna have to get inside, but I really doubt he’ll be open to the idea after the way you groped him last time.”
<
br /> I scowled at her. “I did not grope him.”
“Relax, I’m teasing. Anyway, I don’t think we have a choice but to knock. Ryder will probably slam the door in our faces as soon as he sees us — assuming he even answers — but that’s all we’ve got.”
I looked at Thorn with a devious smile. “No, it isn’t. What if we send you to knock instead?”
Thorn raised an eyebrow at me. “And say what, exactly? That I’m in the market for a shiny new pair of heels?”
Zoe snorted. “Yeah, I don’t think that’s gonna work, Selena.”
“They sell more than heels,” I said, annoyed. Now wasn’t the time to be joking around.
“Okay, but what am I supposed to do, assuming he lets me inside? It’s not like he’s going to give me free rein to search his store for Marcus,” Thorn said, and as much as I hated it, I had to admit he had a point.
“Actually, wait. This could work if all three of us go in. One or two of us can distract Ryder while the other engages in some ‘casual browsing,’ if you catch my drift,” Zoe said. “But we’ll have to pass you off as someone else, Thorn. Ryder already thinks Selena works for the Moon Grove Messenger, so I don’t think we can use that excuse again.”
“Then maybe I should pretend to be a customer. I can walk in casually a few minutes after you two. Ryder will probably be much more suspicious of you since you already have a rocky history,” Thorn said, and I clapped him on the shoulder.
“That’s just brilliant enough to work.”
“Then it’s a plan,” Zoe said with a smile.
“Wait, how long should I wait to follow once you’re inside?” Thorn asked.
“Hm, good question. You don’t want to make it too fast, otherwise it’ll look suspicious, but if you wait too long, you might miss your chance. I’d say no more than five minutes, but you’re gonna have to use your best guess.”
Thorn sighed. “Well, fingers crossed my judgment isn’t totally off then.”
“You’ll be fine. Ready, Zoe?” I asked, though I didn’t feel all that prepared myself. We didn’t really have a clue what we were about to walk into, and the realization made me even more grateful that Thorn had insisted on coming with us. If things went sideways, another friendly wand couldn’t possibly be a bad thing, and he could go for help if things went awry before he entered the shop.
“Ready as I’ll ever be,” Zoe said, and tilted her head to the side to crack her neck. Before either of us could chicken out, we left Thorn in the alley and rounded the building to head for the shop’s front door. Zoe paused with her fist raised to knock. “I was gonna tell you to leave the talking to me again, but after last time, maybe you’d better handle it?”
I gulped because though it was the last thing I wanted to do, I knew she was right. “All right, yeah,” I said, and Zoe rapped on the door. A few moments passed with no answer. But just as she’d raised her fist to knock again, Ryder’s form materialized in the frosted glass.
He cracked the door open, took one look at us, and scowled. “We’re closed. Can’t you read?” he snapped and pointed at the closed sign. Zoe waited for me to say something, but I couldn’t find words. Thankfully, she covered for me quickly.
“Hi, Mr. Hallewell. I know you’re closed, but well, Julia and I realized we got off on the wrong foot the last time we stopped by, so we wanted to visit and try to make things right. We acted insensitively, and we apologize,” Zoe said, and to my amazement, Ryder’s scowl softened.
“Thank you. Honestly, I could’ve handled myself better in that situation too,” he said. I almost couldn’t believe my ears. “What happened to my sister really put me on edge.”
“We totally understand, and we shouldn’t have tried to pry,” Zoe said, though that was exactly what we were still doing.
“Actually, I’ve been thinking about it since you were here the other day, and I’m wondering if maybe I should talk to the press,” Ryder said. “I don’t want a bunch of crap printed about my sister, especially not the stuff I said about her the other day.”
Zoe didn’t miss a beat. “Would you like to clear the record up now while you’ve got some time before the store opens?” she asked, aweing me with her smoothness.
Ryder glanced at the watch on his wrist, and though it was upside down to me, I read the time: it was just before eleven, which according to the sign on the door was when the store opened. “We’ll have to make it quick, but come in,” he said, and opened the door further.
I followed Zoe inside, but my stomach dropped when Ryder locked the door behind us. Thorn couldn’t waltz in after us now, and we still didn’t know if Marcus was hiding somewhere among the rows of shoes, but I had to believe that Zoe would’ve heard his thoughts if he was, so I kept following her to the checkout counter while not so subtly scanning the store for any alarming signs.
Zoe faced Ryder and leaned up against the counter. “Losing your sister when you were already on such rocky terms must’ve been hard.”
Ryder sighed, and his gaze drifted down to the floor. “I’ll never forgive myself for what I said to her the last time I saw her. I told her I hoped I’d never see her again. Who says that to their sister, no matter how angry they are?”
Zoe shrugged. “Don’t beat yourself up over it, Mr. Hallewell. People say all kinds of things they don’t mean when they’re upset.”
“That’s easy for you to say. You didn’t get your sister killed,” Ryder said, jolting me. Immediately, as if he’d realized he’d made a mistake, his eyes shot up to ours. “I mean, not that it was directly my fault. It’s just, I wonder if she might still be alive now if we hadn’t gotten into that fight.”
To her credit, Zoe either hadn’t picked up on the tension, or she was playing it off perfectly. “What was the fight about, if I can ask?”
“Oh, nothing important. Just stupid old sibling resentments,” Ryder said and waved a hand through the air to emphasize how inconsequential it was. But judging from the look on her face, Zoe wasn’t buying it any more than I was. After all, I’d stood in this shop and watched that argument play out — and it was anything but inconsequential.
Which made me wonder why in Lilith’s name had Ryder so graciously invited us in to talk, especially after the gruff way he’d treated us during our first visit? As a tingle of suspicion rippled down my spine, I reached into my robes for my phone, ready to call for help at a moment’s notice. To avoid Ryder’s scrutiny, I scrolled through the alerts on my lock screen to make it look like I wasn’t up to anything — and nearly dropped the phone when I saw a message from Jadis.
“Officer Dunham was the one getting money from Blackwood,” the text read, accompanied by a screenshot of what looked like an organizing document for The Alliance for a Safer Starfall that listed Eva Dunham as the founder.
All at once, everything crashed into place in my mind. Suddenly, I understood why Officer Dunham waited outside Hallewell’s Heels the night that Ryder and Rory had their fight. Leo Blackwood had been bribing her in secret all along, and that bribe must’ve included monitoring Rory as she investigated Blackwood. The fact that Ryder had connections to Marcus, a convicted smuggler, gave Officer Dunham a convenient excuse to open a case on Ryder.
And Ryder had just said it himself: He wasn’t the one who’d killed his sister; according to him, his actions had gotten her killed. If he hadn’t argued with Rory, if she hadn’t stormed out of the shop that night, she might still be alive — and there was only one other person who knew where Rory was that night: Officer Eva Dunham, who’d stood outside the shop and watched the whole conflict play out.
After her fight with her brother at the shoe store, Rory must’ve gone back to her post on Blackwood’s property to keep watching him, and Dunham must’ve followed her. Dunham had to know that witnesses overheard the twins’ fight, and given their conflicted history with each other and Ryder’s past ties to organized crime, everyone in Starfall would’ve believed that Ryder killed his sister.
Even thou
gh I had no concrete proof, and I was still missing several pieces of the picture, I knew it wasn’t Ryder who’d pushed Rory off that cliff; it was Eva Dunham. But why? What could Rory have possibly dug up about Leo that would drive him to kill her? What leverage did he have over Officer Dunham that would force her into murdering an old friend? And how had all this culminated in Marcus attempting to assassinate Blackwood?
“Drop the phone. Now,” a menacing voice snapped from behind me, shocking me into doing just that. It clattered against the tile floor, and a distinctive glass crunch left no doubt that the screen had shattered. Ryder walked over and stomped it a few times for good measure. “Good. Now both of you put your arms above your heads and turn around slowly.”
I did so without objection, and had to bite back a groan when I came face-to-face with Marcus Drach, who stood behind the counter with his wand aimed squarely at my chest. As she turned around, Zoe tried to disguise reaching for her wand in a fluid arc, but Marcus caught it just in time.
“Obstupefacio!” he shouted, and a blinding white light shot from his wand to collide with Zoe’s chest. With a grunt, she tumbled backwards, crashing into a display of shoes before hitting the ground and crumpling.
Dutifully, Ryder snatched her wand from her limp hand. Though it was happening right in front of me, I still couldn’t believe they were working together. Had Ryder gone so far out of his way to reject Marcus such that no one would suspect this? And did this mean they’d been communicating secretly all along?
“Lights out. Obstupefacio!” Ryder said from behind, and a moment later, a scalding blast of magic slammed into my back, my knees buckled, and everything went dark.
Chapter 13
The scent of dank, stagnant soil filled my nostrils as I stirred. From somewhere seemingly far-off, muffled voices reached my ears, as if I were overhearing an angry confrontation between neighbors in an upstairs apartment.
But when my eyes fluttered open, they may as well have stayed shut because there was no difference between the darkness behind my eyelids and the darkness outside them, and for a moment I wondered if someone had buried me alive. Had it not been for the hard, moist surface pressing into my left cheek, I would’ve sworn I was already dead.
