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“You were worried about pigeons overhearing us?”
“I was worried about wizards shapechanging into pigeons or doing spells on pigeons to use them to spy on us.”
“And I thought I was paranoid.”
“The people you’re talking about are serious. I’ve had my eye on them for years, but they’re just about untouchable. Why do you suspect them?”
“Matilda Mayfair was at the festival on the day of the big dancing spell, and she didn’t dance. She also made contact with Owen then. He claims they were never friends, but now she’s acting like they’re old friends reunited. He thought she might be trying to recruit him, but it was just lunch—except now she wants to hang out with him, and he’s surprisingly okay with that.”
Much to my relief, he didn’t say anything about me being jealous or insecure, even though I was afraid that really did have something to do with my suspicions. “What do you think she’s up to?”
“I think she’s going to expose magic and pin the public magic that blows it all wide open on Owen, and then she and her family will profit from having a whole new market for their magical travel services. They need the money since they lost their Collegium connections.”
“Sounds like a reasonable suspicion.”
I felt light from relief to hear him say that. “You really think so?”
“Yeah. As I said, I’ve known they were fishy, but there wasn’t anything in my jurisdiction I could pin on them. This is still iffy, but if they’re goin’ after Owen in any way, that makes it our business, officially.”
“The trick is finding evidence. I think I know who the plant within the anti-magic group is. I saw him in a magical nightclub with the guy I think did the bus spell. If we could connect him to the Mayfairs, that might give us what we need.”
“Still not enough evidence to take on those people. We’ll need to catch ’em red-handed. I’m afraid Owen may be on the right track. He’s in a position to learn what she’s up to—if he can manage to do that without taking the fall.”
I sighed heavily. “Do you know how much I hate to hear you say that? I don’t want him to be right about that.”
“He’s a smart boy. He can take care of himself.”
Resting my hands on my hips, I said, “Oh, really? And how often have we had to come to his rescue?”
“We’ll just do it again. We’ll keep an eye on him, make sure we have witnesses for anything he does—or doesn’t—do, and swoop in to rescue him if he gets in trouble. Meanwhile, you see what you can get on Matilda and any links she has to those anti-magic groups.”
“I’m afraid I may have burned some bridges with that one group,” I said, wincing at the memory.
“Hang in there, kiddo. We’ve beat worse than this. We’ll do it again.”
I wished that was as reassuring as he made it sound.
I was surprised to find Owen outside my building the next morning when I headed out to go to work. We hadn’t talked at all the previous day, and I wasn’t sure if that was just because we’d both been busy or if we’d been officially not speaking. “Hey!” I said cheerfully when he handed me a cup of coffee. It was a huge relief to learn that it definitely wasn’t an official not speaking. “What’s up?”
We began walking toward the subway station. “She wants to meet me after work today—and she said to come alone. That may mean she wants to discuss something secretive.”
And there went my good mood. “That doesn’t sound fishy at all,” I remarked. “But have you considered that maybe she’s just hot for your bod and that’s why she doesn’t want your fiancée there?”
He turned a delightful shade of red. “I doubt it. I’m not really her type.”
“Funny, I’d have thought that rich and gorgeous was her type.”
I hadn’t thought it possible for him to turn even redder, but he managed it. If he kept that up, he was going to explode. “I don’t think she’d be quite this cagey if she were going after me that way. She’d be a lot more direct. I saw how she made her conquests when we were in school.”
“She clubs them over the head and drags them back to her lair by their ankle?”
“More like grabs them by the lapels and lays a kiss on them,
then they usually willingly follow her back to her lair.”
“Did it work on you?”
“She never tried it on me. That’s why I doubt that’s what’s going on here.”
