‘I believe him.’
Jingo smirked. ‘For now. But once Witterhall is done with you, you won’t. You won’t remember I’m in Fairglass, and you’ll comfort him when he is devastated by Kate’s death.’
Behind her gag, Kate whimpered.
‘Don’t you fucking dare touch her,’ I snarled. ‘Don’t you fucking dare.’ I turned my head to include Witterhall in that threat.
Witterhall flicked open a lighter, then closed it. Open. Closed. Open. Closed. He was anxious. Good. He should be.
‘Imagine my surprise when Kate suddenly refused my calls and wouldn’t see me?’ Jingo said. ‘I knew then that you knew who I was in. I can’t work out how you found out, but you did. But I know how to fix it … with some judicious memory charms. Anything can be fixed with a little memory charm.’
Did Dwayne Witterhall look even slightly conflicted?
He did not.
Wanker.
‘It’s funny,’ Jingo mused, ‘how these things go full circle. Your dad hunted me ceaselessly, and one day I got sick of it, so I ended him.’ A brief frown crossed his face, and I realised he didn’t understand how and why killing my father hadn’t ended in his successful possession as it should have done.
It confirmed, after all this time, that Jingo had killed my father. I’d been almost sure of it from my communication with my dad, but this nailed it. Jingo had killed Dad.
I had expected my rage to be incandescent; instead it was cold and level. I’d get even. I’d get vengeance. One way or another, Jingo’s days were numbered.
The doppelganger continued, ‘As a teenager, you glared at me with the same fucking eyes as your father’s, bearing the same fucking disdain, and I had to win. But you got snatched away before I could break you properly, and instead I just made you stronger. I watched you, Inspector, take the badge. And when we met again, I thought I’d take a different approach with you. A little flirtation here, a little gift there … yet even so, here we are again, toe to toe. Just like your father.’
He studied me, shaking his head with mock sadness. ‘You’re becoming a thorn in my side, Inspector. I’ve been trying to distract you but you keep getting in my way. Focused on me. I can’t have you fucking up my plans with the mer, Inspector. So Witterhall here is going to alter your memory, and I might even make you fall in love with me.’
‘There’s a small issue with that,’ I said drily. ‘My fiancé?’
‘The Order will have seen to his death by now. There will be no rescue for you, and of course, we’ll bond over our mutual grieving. I’ll be devastated by Kate’s loss, and you’ll be devastated by Krieg’s, but Witterhall will see to it that things proceed as they should between us. Subterfuge wizards are so handy.’
He nodded to the black operative. It was the order Witterhall had been waiting for, and his mind launched at mine, but I was ready. Had been ready the whole time. I just hoped to hell I had magic enough for this.
The moment he opened his mind to attack mine, there was a beat before his own shields locked down again, and in that moment, I pounced. I slid into his brain, into his medulla oblongata, and I sliced through it. Didn’t hesitate. Couldn’t. Or he might do the same thing to me.
With that slice, I stopped his heart as surely as if I had stuck a dagger into it.
He gasped once, clutched his chest, and toppled over.
And I did the same.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
I came to and realised I must have only been passed out for a moment or two, because Jingo and Reed were both examining Witterhall.
Without needing a mirror, I knew that the triangles on my forehead were gone. I was in the Common realm with no access to my magic.
My fingers closed around the vial in my holster. I didn’t need magic when I had poison. I got to my feet. My head was banging, but I’d survived worse. Compared to the agony of the scrying, this was a walk in the park.
I needed Jingo closer than this.
Luckily, he obliged me. Seeing I was conscious again, he stalked over to me. There were no nice smiles now, only rage.
‘Inspector,’ he spat between clenched teeth, ‘you are making this more difficult than you need to. Now things are going to get messy.’
‘It had nothing to do with me,’ I said mildly. ‘Perhaps he had an attack of conscience? Or, more likely, a heart attack. All that stress wasn’t good for him. You’d better call an ambulance.’
‘An ambulance can’t raise him from the dead,’ Reed groused.
