‘Harper?’ the detective’s head snaps round as she realises for the first time there’s someone here with Luka.
‘I was literally about to immobilise him and call you folks,’ I tell her. ‘That was my whole plan. You stole it.’
Knight stares at me, looking almost …wounded? Her handcuffs click around Luka’s wrists as I hear two more vehicles pulling in. Her backup. Boots crunch across the gravel toward us.
Which is when my hands are grabbed from behind and locked into cuffs.
‘What the hell!’ I scream. ‘Detective Maggie?’
‘I didn’t,’ the cop says. ‘They’re not with …’
‘Theodorou will take it from here,’ says a familiar voice. A man strides past, bending to Luka’s struggling form with a second pair of cuffs, for some reason. ‘Harper isquitethe bonus. Thank you, Maggie.’
‘Detective Margaret Knight to you,’ she spits. ‘And on what possible grounds can you take her?’
‘Aiding bail flight for starters,’ says Michael Whitman. ‘From there, maybe domestic terrorism. And, oh yes, as of fifteen hours ago, resisting Registration. An amendment to the Witchcraft Act.’
Fuck this loser. He should have remembered it’s no good cuffing witches unless you bind their hands completely. And he should know that in my case, even that doesn’t apply, as my sigils are a part of me. No mercy this time. I’ll Ruin this bastard.
I reach for my magic.
And find nothing there.
35
MAGGIE
It’s like I’ve been pulled on stage in the middle of a play, when everyone’s read the script but me.
Why is Harper here, doing what sure looked like magic with Luka Ortiz? Have I been wrong about her all along? Are she and her dad dark witches, and was she complicit in Luka’s horrible crimes? Wasshethe girl he referred to in his testimony, who initiated contact with him, and directed him to dangerous rites and rituals? In my heart I still sayno, but in my head I want to shake her and demand answers.
But there’s no chance of that, because Theo is somehow here – and that creep Whitman, who’s cuffed Luka a second time, as if he doesn’t trust me to have done it properly.
Thank god neither Naomi nor Sarah is present for this witch-arresting free-for-all.
I stand back from Luka, who’s being hauled up by another of the Beulah County cops and walked to the car. Put my hand on my hip in a way that draws aside my jacket to show my sidearm.
‘On whose instructions are you here, Theo? You must have been using police systems for my vehicle’s location. That’s a dischargeable offence if not properly authorised. And we have Professor Whitman, a civilian, applying handcuffs?’
Theo colours. ‘He shouldn’t have done that. It’s only precautionary.’
‘Precautionary?’ Harper bellows. ‘Get them off!’
‘Remy Lamarr,’ Theo says, seeing I’m serious about needing an answer. ‘He told me he’d tasked you with retrieving Luka.’
‘He assigned you to tail me?’
‘He was worried you’d flake out on the recovery.’
‘Hetoldyou this, or you inferred it and acted on your own initiative? Or perhaps with a little prompting?’
I cast a meaningful look at Whitman. But I shouldn’t have given the guy an opening, because the minute attention’s on him he starts instructing the support cops to get Luka into the first car. Seeing an opportunity, I go to Harper.
‘You’ll be able to break out of the cuffs?’ I ask her. ‘Do a spell or something?’
But she’s looking pale and sweaty, like she might throw up. ‘There’s something about the cuffs,’ she gasps. ‘I can’t reach my magic.’
Then Whitman and Theo are beside us, my fellow cop manhandling Harper – in an apologetic way, but still physically pulling her toward the car when she resists. It gets my blood up, and Whitman lays a hand on my arm which I instantly shake off. What the heck is it with these men and their hands all over women’s bodies?
