Love Spell (31 page)

“Then let’s do this.”

The RV door clicked and creaked open at the same time he heard other, newer footsteps marching toward the bus.

“We’re closed,” Clint heard Fey call behind her. “Come back tomorrow night.”

Clint glanced through the window but couldn’t see whoever Fey had been talking to. Probably some dumb kid hoping for a quick wish. Clint chuckled bitterly at what the newcomer would find when he visited Fey. He could still hear the kid coming.

“I said leave me alone,” Fey cawed, before pulling the door shut behind her and latching it. The old woman turned and caught sight of Clint and Lindsay. He expected Fey to jump, but instead she rolled her eyes.

“Don’t lose my cards, hot stuff,” she said almost wearily. “And next time, try making an appointment.”

“We’re here about a wish,” Lindsay piped up.

“You already got it,” Fey shot back. “He’s right next to you. And he already got his, too.” She unlatched the door. “I just had a blast with three studs who know how to show a lady a good time in Vegas. I’d like to dream of them instead of past customers tonight. So how about you two lovebirds take a hike and leave an old woman to her fun, huh? In fact, let me get the door for you.” She pushed the door open, and Lindsay gasped. A pistol silencer slid through the opening, and pressed itself against Fey’s forehead.

A cold, but familiar voice said, “Don’t try anything. I don’t miss.”

The gun advanced, causing the perturbed gypsy to retreat a few steps, and then, to Clint’s surprise, Molly stepped into view. “Hello, Clint,” she said. “I’ve been missing you.”

TWENTY-EIGHT

In the mind of Molly Weatherpound, Clint had only two options left to him: submit, or die. Molly liked simple choices; life held precious few of them—especially as a federal agent.

Clint, like everyone else, had abandoned Molly. This time she’d decided to be proactive about it instead of reverting to her usual response—shoving the emotional wound deep into the dark recesses of her mind where she’d locked away every other hurt she’d received. Mom pushing her down the stairs because her room wasn’t perfectly clean. Dad pulling her out of bed in the middle of the night and driving off to who knew where to get away from Mom. Dad remarrying and spending all his time with his new wife Gwenda and her two kids. The custody battle. New schoolmates who had nothing better to do than knock her down on the playground or draw mean pictures of her. Gwenda, who cared more about her daytime television than the fact that her precious son was regularly tormenting “Jason’s pigtailed brat.”

Molly took it all. Not this time.

Long ago she had accepted the fact that she mattered to no one and, for a time, she stopped mattering to herself. That made it easier to accept the way people lapsed into whispers and stolen glances whenever she walked into a room. It meant she didn’t have to care about stupid things like how she did her hair, or whether her outfits matched. Best of all, it meant she didn’t have to care about anyone else.

After the initial shock of her forced relocation in the wake of her parents’ failed marriage, a desire to excel sprouted in her heart. Why should she let herself rot and turn out no better than those who had brought her low? And so she
determined
to make herself better than all those who had shunned her, so that one day she wouldn’t have need of anyone. Then, when they finally realized how much they needed
her
, she would have moved beyond their reach. They would be left to their miserable existences, alone and forgotten.

And then they would understand her.

Molly started acing classes with the ease of brushing her teeth. She annoyed a martial arts instructor to the point that he finally gave in and began teaching her. Within a year, he’d made Molly an instructor herself, and was even paying her a small wage under the table. Dad seemed mildly pleased with what she was doing, but never attended her tournaments. Gwenda told her she was being a tomboy, and that there would be “none of that karate garbage in her house.” When Gwenda’s biological daughter decided it would be fun to set fire to the eight-year-old Molly’s hair, Molly defended herself. Lynn spent a night in the hospital, at which point Gwenda threw Molly out. Dad brought Molly home that same day, and an uneasy truce was settled.

But Dad didn’t leave Gwenda as he’d left Mom.

The silver lining to her childhood was that she’d ended up meeting the Christopherson family. Mr. and Mrs. Christopherson had a set of twins that happened to be about Molly’s age: Holly and Clint. The “C Clan,” as they called themselves, treated Molly better than anyone ever had. Holly doggedly pursued Molly’s friendship, all but forcing her into her inner circle, along with Jane Li, and Becca Sellers, both of whom were misfits in their own right. Clint, of course, had no interest in girls, but since he was always with his twin he at least tolerated Molly.

Molly decided that one day she would marry him.

As grade school morphed into middle school, and then high school, Molly watched Clint, quietly waiting for the day when puberty would take him and he would become interested in girls. More specifically, interested in
her
as more than just someone to play Chutes and Ladders with. Sure enough, Clint’s voice deepened, his arms, legs and torso bulked up pleasantly, and he shot up several inches almost overnight. As expected, girls suddenly stopped being gross—except, apparently, Molly.

Year after torturous year she waited, hoping. Every time Clint tried his hand with a different girl, it was a triple heartbreak for Molly: first when she watched him pour his efforts into the other girl; second when she watched him suffer the rejection; and third, when he
still
didn’t turn to Molly in the aftermath. Unwilling to endure a fourth year of the pain, she pushed herself to graduate early, and was on a plane to Virginia the next morning, bags in hand and ready for college.

She was still uncertain whether Clint’s goodbye was better than nothing at all.

Forty-eight months later, Molly had a bachelor’s degree in criminal law with a minor in linguistics, and a masters in intelligence. What would have burned out most of her peers only fueled her fire to excel. Quantico had courted her even before she’d graduated, and shortly after turning twenty-three she had an FBI badge. Within three years, “Agent Weatherpound” had become a name in the bureau. A small name, yes, but a name with definite promise and with a lightning-quick hand on the draw.

And then Holly had called her up out of the blue. Could Molly come back home to San Francisco? Holly was assembling the girls for the first time in forever, and it wouldn’t be the same unless Holly, Molly, Becca, and Jane were
all
there. Molly nearly decided against attending when she’d learned that Clint might be there. Would he even remember her? What was to remember? Those times he’d picked her up off the blacktop, and chased away the other kids were nothing more than him being a good boy scout, right? Him crying on her shoulder on the bleachers the night Joni Demeter had dumped him at the Homecoming dance was just a “friends” thing, wasn’t it?

When a lead on an underworld boss demanded action in the Bay Area, she’d pulled some strings and used the situation as a cover for her real intentions. She steeled herself for the inevitable meeting with Clint.

Holly’s party was enjoyable enough that Molly stood down from “high alert” and relaxed her regular “tough chick” demeanor.

And then Clint arrived.

Silly him, he went and tripped on a rug and toppled into her. Never before had she felt the gushing sensation that blasted her when he touched her. At first she thought it was only the impact, but having someone fall on you didn’t typically scramble your brain with overriding thoughts about passionate kissing. When the feeling stuck around, Molly found her adamantine will begin to buckle under the pressure. She’d wanted to strangle Jane when Clint gave the girl a hug goodbye that night. Instead, she shunted her thoughts in another direction for the rest of the night, and got less than no sleep. As the sun rose on Monday morning, she was on her way to Clint’s place in hopes that she could have a… long discussion… with him.

Jane had beaten her to the punch.

Clint had seemed happy to see Molly, but only because it meant she kept him from eating lead. She bought him breakfast and set him up in a nice hotel to keep him at least passingly safe while she thought of a way to work Clint’s protection into her underworld case. The answer was simple: use Jane.

Jane’s biological father had earned himself a reputation amongst the Chinese Triad lords in the Bay Area. Though evidence indicated he’d had little contact with his daughter since her youth, she was still the best link the FBI had. Molly partially regretted having to sacrifice an old friend for the sake of finally waking Clint up to reality, but she justified it as a public service: she was removing dangerous criminals from the street. Jane was party to doing justice.

A whirlwind week followed. Clint got stupid and ran off with some… other woman… but Molly had found him within a matter of two days. Another few days of busywork, and she had the perfect trap for Jane: cover a sting operation with a romantic beach getaway with the man both women craved. Slip a tip to Jane through Holly, and the Asian dynamo was on Clint’s trail like a love-starved vampire.

Molly nearly died inside when Jane had gotten to Clint earlier than expected, but Clint had survived the ordeal. Expunging Clint’s little private investigator had been as simple as a bit of Photoshop magic on a laptop, and a small fee to a local paper for a vanity page; she’d even been fortunate enough to find photos of the battered RV on the cell phone Clint had used. The ruse had worked beautifully.

At last, Clint was finally where he belonged. Though he’d pined over the redhead who was playing dress up as a detective, he’d gotten over it after about a year. Molly had been there for him every step of the way. She’d even convinced him that she was immune to his odd touch issue. That led to increased physical contact, and he started warming to her. One night over dinner, a full eight months after he’d finally shut up about Sullivan, he dropped a hint that marriage may be in the cards once he was allowed out of hiding. Molly had gone to bed with a smile in her heart that night.

Jane’s case dragged on for well longer than it should have, but ended with the inevitable conviction Molly expected. Eventually, Jane’s father and several of his lieutenants were brought down, and the drama was over. Except for the fact that Clint still hadn’t proposed.

When he was finally released from the Witness Protection Program, things had looked hopeful. Molly went on the offensive by purchasing tickets for every San Francisco Giants game that season. She privately thought of it as a “pre-honeymoon,” but without the intimacy.

During the summer-long baseball tour, Molly had broken down and gone shopping. The result was a tight black dress that left her feeling a little too exposed, and shoes that required her expert level of martial arts training to maneuver in. Flats were so much more practical, especially when you had to run as much as Molly did. Then, it was simply a matter of waiting for the perfect night to spring her surprise.

That night came in the heat of Phoenix Arizona, during the game that actually occurred on Clint’s birthday proper. The hotel’s catering service had set up the perfect spread. Cold champagne was waiting in a bucket of ice in the sitting room of her suite, and mood music was already going. Molly had even gone so far as to purchase the ring for Clint; she was practical enough to know he’d never figure it out on his own. In mere hours, she’d finally consummate two decades of wishing and hoping as he slipped the sparkling diamond onto her finger, and asked her the question that would make everything right. Maybe they’d even walk the aisle before the year was out.

While Clint showered in his suite, she had skinnied into her outfit, and did her makeup according to instructions she’d found on the Internet. Even her mirror agreed that, for once in her life, Molly Weatherpound looked stunning.

Clint hardly even noticed.

As always, Molly pretended it didn’t hurt. She chalked it up to his stress at learning his car had been hit. One step ahead of him, Molly had discretely copied the information from the card she’d watched him take from his windshield when he begged off for a shower. If he was
that
broken up about the incident, it was the least Molly could do to resolve the issue for him, and get him back on the right train of thought.

Of course, it just
had
to be that other woman.

Molly had locked herself down as tightly as she could when Clint approached her about needing some “time to think” after dinner. He actively avoided any mention of matrimony. His lie was bald, brutal, and cut to the core. Still hopeful, however, Molly decided to let it play, and see whether he really was making his own noose.

He gave himself plenty of rope that night.

The FBI agent had commandeered a random, white pickup, and followed Clint within minutes of his departure. She drove directly to the address on the card. A simple stake-out (and a bit of luck—she recognized Clint’s old Corolla) was all she needed to put a leash on Clint again. Jimmy his trunk, place a GPS unit, and wait.

Molly’s heart had frozen as she watched him pull into the parking lot, and then proceed to contact his little pet tramp—at her own condo no less. It was no surprise when they fled to who knew where. Molly felt a pang of regret at that—he had forced her hand. Sullivan would have to be permanently removed from the picture. Molly was confident she could figure something out that wouldn’t implicate her in the attorney’s disappearance.

GPS tracking made following Clint and his man thief a simple task. Not once in their journey to Las Vegas had they given even the slightest hint they suspected a tail.

Eliminating Sullivan in Vegas wasn’t going to happen easily. Then, they made an opening for Molly by driving out into the wasteland surrounding Sin City. Molly had hoped the pair would stop in an open expanse of desert to dispose of the body (she hated to think it might be “bodies”), but she knew better. She was surprised, however, to watch them park at a large fair. She’d have to wait until dark.