Page 80 of Killing Time

Or maybe nothing at all. Most of witch-kind believed in an afterlife — it was the sort of thing that was kind of hard to ignore when there were those among your clan who could talk to ghosts — but lying there on that hard table, I wasn’t sure what I believed.

Coming back as a ghost might not be a bad bargain, though. With any luck, I could hang around the house and break things and moan in the middle of the night and use my otherworldly anger to seize all the furniture and throw it out onto the lawn, or bundle up all the table linens and use them as fuel inthe fireplace. Whatever little supernatural tricks I could think of to let Jasper Wilcox know that sacrificing me had been a spectacularly bad idea.

Although it made me feel a little better to imagine all the ways I could wreak my ghostly revenge on the Wilcoxprimus,that still couldn’t rid me entirely of the gnawing dread in my belly.

Or the regret. I was going to die here without being able to say goodbye to Seth or give him one last kiss. Did he even have any idea of what had happened to me?

Well, he must have some inkling, even if he wouldn’t have been able to return to Wilcox territory to come in search of me, not when I wouldn’t be there to conceal him from all those hostile witches and warlocks.

As to why he hadn’t come to my rescue….

He would have tried, I knew, even as irrational anger rose in me that there hadn’t been a single attempt to break me out of here. But I had a feeling everyone in the McAllister clan had done their damnedest to convince him there was nothing he could do, and that even if his talent was a strong one, it still would never be enough to give him even the smallest chance of defeating Jasper Wilcox.

Especially when Seth knew as well as I did that he would get absolutely no backup from the elders or his fragileprima.

Voices began to drift down from upstairs, telling me someone must have opened the door to the basement. As far as I could tell, all those voices were male, which meant Jasper apparently wasn’t comfortable having any of the women in his clan witness what he was about to do.

I supposed that made sense. While they might have understood the need to put themselves at risk so the lineage of the Wilcoxprimusescould carry on, they may have drawn the line at actual human sacrifice.

And if those men were coming down here now, then the fateful hour had probably arrived.

The ropes holding me down were far too tight for me to even think about wriggling out of them. But I didn’t have to physically move to get out of here. A blink to send me into the future — in that awful moment, I didn’t much care when — and then I’d be past all this ugliness, and Jasper would find that his prize had slipped through his fingers.

Except when I focused on sending myself forward, nothing happened.

Shit.

Well, my gift had never been the most reliable thing in the world, but it would have been nice if it could have behaved itself just this once.

I wasn’t about to give up. Past, future — it didn’t much matterwhenI was, as long as it wasn’t this awful time with the seconds ticking down to the dark of the moon, when all sorts of black deeds could be done with no betraying light to reveal them to a watching world.

But still I lay there, heart pounding in my chest, my entire body weak with rushing adrenaline that had nowhere to go.

One of the hooded figures paused by the table.

“I suppose you’re wondering why your gift has betrayed you,” came Jasper’s voice from within the hood. For some reason, I thought I would have heard triumph in his tone, but instead he sounded preternaturally calm. “Simple enough. I knew you would try to slip into the future or the past, so I made sure to ward this place so you wouldn’t be able to use your particular brand of magic.”

Dammit. I’d already begun to suspect that might have been what was going on, but it didn’t feel any better to have the Wilcoxprimusconfirm those suspicions in that gloating tone.

“This isn’t going to solve anything,” I told him. My voice shook slightly, and I hated myself for that betraying moment of weakness…even though I guessed most people probably would have excused me for not being at my best right then.

“That’s where you’re wrong,” Jasper replied. “I think it’s going to solve a great many things.”

“You don’t know what the hell you’re talking about,” I said. Tears had begun to leak from my eyes, and while it might have been a silly thing to worry about, I really hated how I couldn’t even reach up to wipe them away, not with my arms strapped down to the table like that. “I can travel in time, you clueless asshole. I know how all this is going to turn out — and that future doesn’t happen just because you gathered your pack of hyenas here with you to slit an innocent woman’s throat.”

If that was even how he planned to sacrifice me. Maybe it would be a dagger in the heart instead…or something even worse, something my mind couldn’t quite manufacture.

For a second or two, I thought my words might have gotten through to him. He paused, holding himself very still as he gazed down at my face.

But then he laughed, dark eyes glinting with malicious amusement.

“I suppose you think that you’re being clever in trying to delay me,” he said.

“‘Clever’ has nothing to do with it,” I replied, even though I knew it would be wonderful if I could keep him talking until the fateful moment had passed.

Fat chance of that happening.

“I just thought you should know that you’re going to commit murder and get absolutely nothing out of it.”

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