She sat up in bed, her cheeks damp and I crossed to her, wrapping her in my arms.
“Couldn’t sleep?”
“No. It was… hard seeing how few of us are left today.”
“We’ll have the witch responsible for this by sunrise.”
She went still and I pulled back so I could look at her. She wiped tears off her face. “You know who it is.”
“Yeah. We’ve found the guy who killed Willow. We’re bringing him in now. If you want to watch us talk to him, Samael can set you up with a monitor so you can observe.”
“Yeah. I want to watch. Dani, I just want to say… I know this has been a lot. Juggling Riona’s kidnapping with this. I know the witches haven’t made it easy and it probably brought up all kinds of feelings and memories. But this is why I asked you to do it anyway. I knew you’d find out who did this.” She smiled and gestured to the shirt I was wearing. “When you love someone, you’re all-in.”
“Look, the coven may not be my family now,” I said carefully, “but they were once. Mom took us to that coven and they sheltered us. They may not have done it the way we would’ve wanted them to, but they helped save your life.”
“I’m trying to remind myself of that. I’m so mad at Gemma for never telling me the truth. I feel like I can barely look at her. But I have to go back for this. I have to watch as they make whoever did this pay.” She sighed. “Are you going to tell me who did it?”
“Let’s wait until the interview. I don’t want to be wrong about this.”
“Okay.”
I glanced at my phone. “I need to get downstairs.”
Someone knocked on the door and we both turned our heads.
Vas carried two cups of coffee and I just about tackled him as I held out my hand. “Gimme.”
I took the first life-affirming gulp. “Please tell me Samael didn’t wake you up for this.”
He smiled. “I was up on business anyway.” He glanced at Evie and sympathy gleamed in his dreamy eyes. “I’ve linked the feed to the TV in the living room so Evie and I can watch from there.”
My throat tightened.“Thank you,”I mouthed at him and he nodded.
I glugged more coffee. “I’ve got to get going. I’ll talk to you both later.”
* * *
Danica
Kyla was waiting for me downstairs, outside the interrogation room.
“Thanks for this. You want in on this little chat?”
She raised one dark eyebrow. “I sure fucking do. You know, I wouldn’t have guessed it was her.”
I thought back to my interview with Caroline. I’d had Misty on me the whole time. And it hadn’t glowed once.
“She lied like the fae when I talked to her,” I said. “Not outright lying, but dancing around shit. Choosing her words carefully. And I didn’t notice.”
“I didn’t spend much time with her, but I didn’t smell any deception. Still, she could’ve been focusing on her grief, which would’ve covered up the stink of fear.”
I nodded. “Right. She’s likely been planning this for years. I bet she waspissedEvie wasn’t in the house. Take out a few more witches in the next year or so, and she’d be Gail’s number two. In fact, she wouldn’t even need to take them all out. You bet your ass she’d start campaigning to be made number two based on her stupid healing spells alone.”
I rolled my shoulders. “Let’s get this done.”
I opened the door. Peter Hanson looked very young and very scared. I clamped down on the pity that wanted to rise. Willow had been young too.
His eyes were red, and he needed a shave, the sparse stubble somehow making him look like a teenage boy. He’d obviously slept in his clothes last night, and he met my eyes for one moment before dropping his gaze to the table.
