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“No!” Ingrid whimpered, scrambling to her feet.
I turned and someone came striding through the door. She had my face, but everything else about her was different. I didn’t recognize her clothes this time. She had a scar through one eyebrow, and her nose was pierced through the left nostril. The dagger from the cemetery flashed in her hand, and she walked right through me, crossing the room.
By the time I turned around, the blade was in Ingrid’s neck and the vision had begun to fade. The doppelganger removed the knife, and a spray of blood shot across my face as I blinked my way back into my office.
Ingrid wrenched her hand from my grasp and held it to her chest. “Don’t do that!”
“Damn, I wanted you to be crazy,” I said. My silence spell had dropped the moment my concentration shifted to her death. “But it looks like you are on her hit list.”
“Ingrid, why would this shapeshifter want you dead? What did you see?” Jackson asked.
“I saw her in the Borderlands, meeting with someone. Buying something. I don’t know. I took a bunch of pictures and she saw me. I thought I’d gotten away when I went through the portal, and then…and then Nadia turned up dead.”
“Where in the market?” I asked, thinking about my journey to Matteo’s shop. Was he involved in all this? My heart started to race, and Jackson inhaled sharply, sensing the mounting panic hovering around the edges of my mood.
Ingrid threw up her hands. “I don’t remember where exactly. There were a lot of people, and the shop names were all written in Deep Fae. It’s a miracle that I made it out of there without getting lost. I took pictures, but—”
“Where are they?” Jackson interrupted.
“Where do you think?” She glared at him. “My house. I ran from the market and put myself behind a wall of wards, thinking I’d be safe, but then I had this strange dream and…and I knew I had to find help.”
“Dream?”
“Your doppelganger came to me in a dream and threatened me. I woke up and my entire place was tossed.”
“I need those pictures,” I said, folding my arms over my chest. “Are you sure they’re still in the house?”
“Yeah, they are. I checked everything three times over. It was weird. My entire house was tossed, but nothing was taken, and the wards were still intact. Which should be impossible. Someone else was in that house. There should be some sign of it, right?”
I nodded and walked back towards my desk. My selfish side wanted to kick Ingrid out of the house and just go to bed, killer be damned, but my decent parts reminded me that I’d never forgive myself if she died, too. I already had one corpse burned into my brain. I didn’t need another.
“Fine,” I said, leaning on my desk. “Go get us the pictures and we’ll help you.”
She gaped at me in shock. “I’m not going alone!”
“Of course not,” Jackson said, narrowing his eyes at me. “We’re going to escort you. We’ll get the pictures, and then take you someplace safe while we deal with this doppelganger. Where do you live?”
I stared at Ingrid. “She lives and works on Chartres Street.”
“Okay.” He nodded. “Can you teleport us there with that—"
“She’ll have to take us,” I said, gesturing at Ingrid.
Her eyebrows shot to her hairline. “You want me to teleport all three of us across the Quarter?”
“We need the photos if we’re going to help you, and I’d rather not trip over one of your wards trying to break in.”
She shook her head. “I can just tell you how to get in. You need to get me somewhere safe.”
“No, you’ll come with us,” Jackson said. “Thenwe’ll take you to a safe house.”
“But…but—”
“You heard the man.” I chuckled. “Cast a rift, and let’s go.”
Ingrid looked dumbfounded. Her eyes fluttered back and forth between us, and her hands shook at her sides, jingling her bracelets. I felt the energy in the room shift around her, dancing in circles across the floor. She was a witch caught between fight and flight.
“If you want our help, Ingrid. This is what it looks like,” Jackson said.
