Believe the Magic Page 24

I passed it to her. “Open,” I mouthed. At first she pounded a foot and shook her head. The audience laughed. I played along but repeated my instructions. Her hands fisted into her pockets.

  Once more she shook her head. I had to laugh with the crowd this time. What was she, six? Sassy little thing. Okay, okay, I mimed. I pointed at the pocket on the girl’s pinafore and held out my palm.

  She had a tissue there. One I’d put there. That, she was willing to give up. I wadded it up, walked around the cage, opened the door and tossed it inside.

  Of course, by then, it was a live dove.

  And I was tired. Exhausted.

  “You did good,” Quentin whispered in my ear. I’d had a feeling he was around, invisible during this. It was our ace in the hole, since we knew nothing about this illusion bit.

  I dared not answer, but tuned in to his thoughts. The crowd’s cheers faded, and all there was left was a stage and two lovers.

  I lifted the cape. This was Quentin’s grand entrance.

  The stage darkened. Those lighting people were good, almost as if they knew what we were thinking. Uh-oh.

  I didn’t let it force me to miss a beat. I followed Quentin’s lead as the music shifted to something darkly romantic. We danced.

  Around and around, my feet barely touched the floor. The cloak billowed like wings in a breeze before pulling tightly around us. The faintest puff of smoke added to the atmosphere. For me as well as the audience. I was in another world with Quentin, one in which we were touching. Heart to heart. Soul to soul.

  “Invisible.” His command broke the spell. He gathered the corners of the cloak and circled until I was gone and he stood alone in the center of the stage. To the crowd, I had become Quentin and the dance had never taken place.

  I backed away in the frenzy of a standing ovation. Exhaustion weighted me down. From my seat on the side of the stage, I watched Quentin bow and wave.

  It was hard not to be jealous. Not of Quentin, for he deserved the thunderous applause for his fanciful tricks. But I was jealous of the crowd, who had his undivided attention. He wanted to please them, share with them the things that would make them happy. Too bad he wouldn’t glance behind him and wink, just once.

  “Ready, darling?”

  The mental query jerked me to alert status. I hate it when he startled me like that.

  “For?” I asked while rising to my feet. Did someone add lead to my shoes? This magic stuff wasn’t unlike a sport. Wow.

  I watched as the saw-the-lady-in-half box was rolled on stage. Quentin even invited three people to inspect the saw and the box. No trapdoors. No secret passages.

  This was it. He intended to do away with me once and for all. Fine.

  I’d seen enough magic shows to know how I was expected to vamp it up. I smiled and pointed my fishnet clad toes as I circled the box.

  “Talk to me, Quentin.”

  “You don’t have to do anything. Save your magic. I’ll use mine.”

  Trust him? My hands shook as I stroked the sleek black wood.

  “Trust me,” he reaffirmed.

  And I’m a dancing bear.

  “Say chicken loud enough for the audience to hear when I ask you a question.”

  “Chicken?”

  The box was open and I was being helped inside. A little reluctantly.

  “Dancing Rain, are you afraid?”

  Ready to hurl, I wanted to say. But I didn’t ruin it for him. “Chicken,” I stated evenly.

  The crowd howled. I was mortified. The box closed over my head and I heard the lock snap.

  “Lord, I haven’t meant all the bad things I’ve done, I—”

  I was back in the closet-like dressing room after only the slightest jostle.

  I went invisible and ran back to the corner of the stage. Quentin was gritting his teeth and acting like he was cutting through bone. I checked my waist. No blood. Not even a run in the hose. Amazing.

  “Honey?” Quentin knocked on the top portion of the box. “Are you in there?”

  Of course I didn’t answer.

  “She said it tickles,” Quentin announced.

  The crowed cheered.

  Quentin resumed his sawing until he was all the way through. The lights emphasized the sheen of sweat on his forehead and upper lip. Faintly defined muscles bulged against the tightness of his costume.

  My own mouth watered at the truly masculine sight of him. Any jealous feelings left when he arched an eyebrow toward me. A fountain of hope spouted from my chest. And for now he’s mine. Good or bad, angry or mad, I’m with him.

  “What about happy?” he chimed in. “Don’t I make you happy?”

  His routine never missed a beat. He stood back while his audience members unlocked the box and fell away laughing. At Quentin’s insistence one man went back to lift what they’d found in the foot of the box.

  A live chicken.

  “Touché.” I strolled around the box and came up behind him. I figured a nice pinch on the rear when he bowed for the audience wasn’t exactly out of line.

  “Hey now, no touching unless you’re serious.”

  “Serious? I won’t deny you’re a seriously nice looking piece of flesh. Is that enough?”

  “For now.” He wouldn’t look at me. “Get in the box. Invisible, of course. Can you pull your feet up to fit in half?”

  I eyed the box. “I suppose.” While the men goofed and chased the chicken around the stage and Quentin thanked his two helpers I stepped into the death trap. Watch, he’d want to saw me in half now.

  The spotlights followed them around the stage and gave me glimpses of the audience members. I could see faces, features and laughter. And on one face, utter hate.

  I was glad to wrap myself in a hidden ball. That man’s eyes were black. Not even a reflection of light in them. And his gaze never wavered from Quentin. Even when the spotlight did.

  “You in there?” He closed the lid to the box and walked around it. Funny how the mental voice moved when the speaker did, just as if it was carried on sound waves.

  “Yeah, did you see that creep in the audience?”

  “Which one?”

  The box was rolling. In a circle. “Can I stretch out yet?”

  “Just wait.”

  “This guy—he wore all black, maybe navy. Sat about three tables back along the left wall. Black creepy eyes.” I shivered.

  “Ten-Four. Straighten and find a smile, Ella.” Quentin’s voice held little inflection.

  I obeyed and found myself not only being shown to the crowd as reappearing, but also floating at waist level.

  “Aren’t you cute?” I dodged at him. “How much longer of this show?”

  “Couple more tricks. Aren’t you having fun?”

  “I was. That creep made me nervous.”

  “He should. But don’t look too hard. There are bunch of them in the crowd.”

  “Great.”

  “Is that why you wanted to jump?”

  “Mmm. Yeah, and we’re going to—it’s our finale.”

  “You got the gem?” I couldn’t imagine him hiding it under those skintight clothes.

  “I looped it into the back of my necklace. So guard my back.”

  His chuckle curdled the contents of my stomach. What if I had to?

  Our banter continued for the next half-hour. I didn’t ask where the white tiger came from. I didn’t want to know. But when Quentin took his final bows I knew he was using the final gem as his ace in the hole. The sweat was dripping, darkening his clothes, and I watched his chest rise and fall faster. He was tired.

  “Whatever you do, don’t let go.”

  “Are you going to fill me in on this trick?”

  “Follow my lead. And trust me.”

  Easier said than done. “Where are we going, by the way?”

  “I though we’d check out Venice.”

  “Venice?” As in Italy? As in canals and old architecture? “Okay.”

  “On the count of three.”


  We stood hand in hand, side by side. I felt safe, secure and worthy of the cheesy grin plastered on my face. If I could escape the political mess and keep the gems I might give Copperfield a run for his money. Vegas was warm, right?

  “One.” Quentin squeezed my hand as we bowed again.

  —but I’d sure miss him.

  “Two.” He held the cape out like bat wings. I moved within them.

  “Three!” He shouted, picking me up, twirling and making us disappear into a cloud of smoke.

  Venice was cold.

  Especially for this half of the would-be figure-skating couple. Well, that’s what we’d been mistaken as. The gondola driver had shouted at us when Quentin indicated he had no money to pay him. We were “cheap American ice-dancers.”

  It made me wonder if the canals froze in the winter and if so, what did those glorified cabbies do for a living then? Play hockey?

  “We need to get to Frederique’s hotel.” Quentin’s hand pushed me along. Normally I would have enjoyed his attentive touch on the small of my back. It felt…possessive. But now it was demanding I pass up the sights I’d waited a lifetime to see.

  “But-but…”

  “You’ll get to drool over crumbly buildings from the hotel window. Frederique will have secured clothes and money for us.”

  I know I’d heard his name before. The hairs on the back of my neck prickled a little with the fleeting memory. Had he been one of Bergestein’s men? Maybe he’d been at the meeting in Disneyland oh-so long ago.

  “Do I know him?”

  Quentin was still a half-step behind me so I couldn’t see his face. “I don’t think so.”

  His disinterested tone did little to quell the nervous tick that threatened to surface.

  Vegas was sounding awfully nice. And warm, considering my barely there clothes.

  “He will have clothes?”

  “He said he would.”

  My eyebrow lifted on its own. Must have been the natural reaction to my wondering just when Quentin had talked to Frederique last. What plan did they devise?

  I glanced back across the square at the dark water. I just hoped I wasn’t going to end up feeding fish.

  Quentin gave me a push that nearly sent me and my three-inch heels skidding across the mosaic looking tiles.

  “Is that how you intend to kill me, by making it look like an accident?”

  “Who said anything about killing you?” His warm fingers wrapped around my upper arm and steadied me.

  A flick of his wrist sent me spinning into his arms like an intricate dance move. Mamba, samba, ooh.

  When my body stopped with his arms around me, my head continued the dance. I let it spin across the square. I didn’t need it. I had hot breath against my temple and a lean, hard body melting into mine.

  “Stop.”

  “What?”

  “Quentin, stop. Just take me to where I can get some real clothes on and find a place to rest.”

  “We’re going.”

  I leaned my head sideways against his shoulder. Why couldn’t I just accept the attraction, the friendship? Neither of us had a future, much less the ability to plan one together. But I kept finding myself realizing that it was exactly what I wanted.

  I rested my weight on him.

  “Ella?”

  “Hmm?”

  “I promise I’ll let you lean on me once we find ourselves a private room.”

  “Quentin?” The idea of being alone and safe was fading. “What are the chances we’re being followed?”

  His body tightened and he stepped back. Grabbing my hand, he pulled me toward the door to the bakery.

  Quentin turned around once he closed the glass door behind him and surveyed the plaza. It was all store fronts and hotels with tiny slivers that looked like they must be alleyways. Not the kind of place nice girls go.

  The bursting smell of blueberries beckoned like a mirage in the desert. I gaped through the glass while a wrinkled, gray-haired lady stared at me with the same intensity.

  It took her sharp rap on the glass to jerk me from the smell-induced stupor. She rattled something off in a foreign language. It took a minute to figure out what it was—Italian. Certainly nothing I could understand.

  Quentin let me out of the little shop. Either he understood or the woman’s tsking gave him a clue. Quentin wouldn’t let me turn around and give her the evil eye when I heard the laugh follow us out the door.

  “Let me guess, she kicked us out because we didn’t buy anything.”

  “Yeppers.”

  “Then I’m not going back even when I have money.”

  I got a chuck under the chin for that. “Figures. I wanted one of those eclairs for breakfast.”

  Did he know me that well already?

  “Frederique’s hotel should be about another block. Lose the shoes and we’ll step into the alley and go invisible.”

  “Is that smart? Wasn’t there something to them detecting magic?”

  “If they’re already here, it doesn’t matter, now does it?”

  Quentin swept me up. My breath caught as he sidestepped down an alley where sunlight couldn’t reach. He almost made it feel like we were two lovers stepping into the shadows for… I shook my head.

  Must be the romantic vision I had of Venice.

  “Well, we could do that, too.” His voice dropped an octave, and he laughed softly.

  So he was reading my mind again, eh? I shrugged in response and disappeared.

  He already had his hands on me though, so my chance of escaping anything more than his vision was hopeless.

  “Quentin, please, let’s go.” His grip was strong, and almost cruel. “Haven’t the events of the past two days been crazy enough?”

  No answer, not even via mental telephone.

  “Can we go to the hotel now?”

  Silence.

  It wasn’t Quentin’s hand that dug like leeches into my skin. Someone jerked me half off my feet and to the right. I landed against Quentin’s chest. His breath and lips grazed my cheek as his shaky hand plunged down the front of my costume. Something icy remained when he withdrew it. I reached for him, grazing only the tips of his fingers as we were pulled in separate directions.

  Monsters had emerged from the shadows of the alley.

  This was going to be no vacation.

  I didn’t fight him, them, whoever. I mean, what was the point. It was obvious my captor was bigger and stronger and had magic to boot.

  A little itch allowed me to position my tiny gift beneath my breast. If they managed to find it there, I’d better be dead already. Kidnapping I could handle, rape was out of the question.

  “Quentin?” I cried out a mental beacon one last time. What were they going to do with him? If they suspected him of any wrong doing toward Mr. B they surely wouldn’t hesitate to…

  I grimaced to imagine life without Quentin. He irritated me to no end but I’d allowed myself to fall in love. Bad, bad Ella.

  “He’s gone already. You’re the one we need. Now get yourself visible before I rip those gems from your pretty little neck.”

  Didn’t have to tell me twice. While I wasn’t scared enough to pee my pants, I certainly was shaking enough to know the shoes had to go.

  I strained to recognize the voice. Nothing. Not a clue. All I figured was that it had to be just another of Bergestein’s guys.

  “Guess again,” he muttered in my ear. I jerked back from the flash of hot breath. At least he could have had the decency to have eaten a breath mint before the kidnapping attempt. Not that it mattered.

  “Ready?”

  As if he gave me the time to answer. He twisted me until my back was against his broad chest and the fireworks went off. Visual, not emotional ones. Unless you count my temper.

  “Here you are, ma’am, would you like anything else?”

  A plate of steaming lobster tickled my nose with its faint garlic, buttery smell.

  “No thanks.”

  This was like b
eing stuck in Annabelle, but worse. I was a leech, a rider. My host was oblivious to me and I had about zero influence on her actions.

  What fun.

  Now where’s the dude who snatched me away? Surely he hadn’t morphed into that sweet little old lady who sat across the table.

  “Mom, how’s your pasta?” The deep but definitely female voice of my host asked.

  I listened to their conversation about unsalted potatoes and watered down drinks.

  Despite the mild complaints, I felt good about where I was. Middle class America. Probably in the body of a workaholic daughter who was taking her mom to lunch to celebrate a birthday or anniversary.

  Mr. B, and even Quentin, seemed miles and years away. I ignored the emptiness in the fleeting thought of Quentin. I had to be strong and get my own self out of Mr. B’s control before I could find and rescue him. That’s what I was supposed to do, right?

  “Mom,” I heard the woman interrupt, “Jason and I are getting married.”

  Good thing I wasn’t in the mom’s body or I would have toppled right out of the chair. Or spit my drink across the table.

  Instead I watched emotion play across the wrinkled, powdered features. Surprise, shock and then deep lines of anger.

  “I told you about him.”

  “I know you think he’s after my money. But he said he’d sign a pre-nup. Isn’t that enough?”

  I mentally rolled my eyes and cursed myself for the thought this could be normal.

  Had I lost my mind?

  Then again, I imagined breaking the news to my parents I was getting married. To a man with no past and no future. Someone who doesn’t even have ID to fly across the States. Yeah, that’d go over about as well as this.

  I’d lost my mind. At least, it seemed to be the only viable answer when a dragonfly dive-bombed the water goblet.

  “What was that?”

  “Too big for a fly. A bird?” Dear old mum waved her hand. “It’s gone now. Enjoy your meal, Meredith. You’re too uptight.”

  What if—was it? Winzey?

  I definitely wasn’t liking this along for the ride thing. Forget any prior ideas that this might be a good place to hide. At least in Annabelle I had control. Even that short stint in the bride, I had influence over her actions. This was nothing but prison. I couldn’t even get Meredith to turn her head so I could try to catch another glimpse of the insect looking visitor.