Page 62 of Secrets of the Eternal Flame

Given that I was the only one of us that was on a time limit my plan wasn’t the best, but I figured the Flame didn’t know that. Still, it was soon apparent which one of us would win this war of wills when Eva barked from the kitchen; she wanted her dinner. That made me realise that I’d been sitting there for hours and nothing had happened. Not even a flicker.

It was already seven o’clock; I still had four hours until Archer’s supposed rendezvous with his buyer but I neededto go there beforehand to do a recce and stake out the place for any sign of him and the sorceress coming to buy the cup and the grimoire from him.

In an ideal world, I’d get the items off Archer without the need for a ruckus. If my grandmother was the buyer, and she needed these objects to heal her or increase her power, then I should be okay – especially with the advantage of having access to Ernie’s magic.

Maybe I could knock her out without her seeing me coming; brute strength was one of my favourite weapons in my arsenal. Until recently I hadn’t been able to move so much as a feather magically but now I could roundhouse kick someone into next week, and I was betting that grandma wasn’t the fittest of fiddles in her dotage.

I fed Eva and choked down a sandwich. Feeling antsy, we headed out with plenty of time to spare.

I gave my girl a look. ‘If there is any sign of danger, you go and fetch Yanni. You got that?’ If things went sideways, I wanted Eva safe; the only way she’d leave my side was if she thought she was helping me.

She gave a bark and a tail wag. She would fetch Yanni for me.

The industrial estate was not far from the edge of the village and the barrier that protected it. It made sense to have a space that was easily accessible for wagons whengoods came into Witchlight, but it was annoyingly far to walk. Not for the first time that day, I found myself thinking of my car, Rosie.

As I walked towards the industrial estate, I thought about my grandmother. In some weird way I was actually relieved to know she was alive. Her corpse had never been found and I’d always wondered, but now … I knew she was out there. And it was better to know that for certain than to be haunted by an intangible fear. Dahlia mightnotbe the sorceress coming to buy the cup and the Codex, but my gut said she was likely to be involved even though I had zero evidence that she was.

By the time I approached the outskirts of the industrial estate, the light was fading and the sky had turned that dusky pale blue that only comes with the summer months. I hoped Archer was getting a good look at it because after I caught him tonight it would be the last time he saw the sky for a very long time. There would be no bail after this; the sect council took a dim view of dark artefacts and possessing them led to an immediate jail sentence. Even Gwen could have found herself in hot water for having them.

I looked down at Eva. ‘Which way should we go, girl?’ I could spend half an hour carefully tiptoeing around the place, peeking around corners and straining to hear ifanyone was there, or I could rely on her heightened senses to guide me. Straight away she pointed her nose towards the back of the estate where the buildings were more densely packed and darker than elsewhere. Naturally.

Bizarre as it might seem, I have a strange affection for industrial estates. Many of my cases had ended in them but one in particular always stuck in my mind and always would because that was the day I’d found Eva. Or rather, Eva had found me.

I slipped into a narrow alleyway between two warehouses and headed towards the door at the end. There were a couple of smashed security lights, clearly broken by someone who felt more comfortable doing their deeds in the shadows. This was definitely a location for nefarious actions, and a shiver of foreboding ran down my spine.

For a moment, I wanted to call Yanni, or Fraser, or even Ezra. But I didn’t because ifshewas in there, I wasn’t risking any of them. I glanced down at Eva, and wished I’d left her at home too. Still, knowing her, she would have leapt out of a window and followed me anyway. She was my ride or die.

‘Do we go in, girl?’ I asked my four-legged bestie.

Eva cocked her head to the side but made no movement forward or backward. Typical: she had brought me this farbut she wasn’t going to commit to this next part. That decision was all mine.

Narrow alleys were generally good for pinning my opponents down – unless Archer had brought backup, in which case they could block me at either end and leave me unable to get out. Open space was better, I decided, especially with my type of fighting.

Removing my lock pick set from my back pocket, I readied myself to unlock the door and head into the warehouse – only to twist the handle and find it wasn’t necessary. It was already unlocked.

Unlocked doors are a mixed blessing because it’s difficult to anticipate what you are going to encounter. Sometimes it’s a case of careless thieves not thinking through what they are doing but other times it is a trap – the spider letting in the fly.

To give myself the best chance of knowing what I was walking into, I let my barriers down to feel the emotions behind the door. In less than a heartbeat, I had a very clear reading.

In fact, I had two. There were two people waiting for me behind that door and I could feel two very distinct sets of emotions. One was radiating excitement – Archer, perhaps, excited to be getting his pay day? The other was more mixed: there was happiness, so much happiness, butalso fear, apprehension and guilt – a feeling I knew well. Archer’s henchman?

They certainly weren’t the emotions I expected to feel from Granny, but what did I know?

The only way I would find out what was waiting for me was by stepping inside. ‘Stay by my side,’ I whispered to Eva. ‘We go in together, okay?’

Readying my powers, I opened the door and stepped through only for it to immediately slam closed behind me.

Trap it was, then.

Chapter Thirty-Eight

There was only a single light lit the cavernous warehouse, making it hard to see. I dropped instantly to a crouch; Archer would expect me on my feet, so at least if he made a move towards me I’d catch him off guard.

As my eyes adjusted, a figure stepped into the light. ‘Scarlett?’ I said, genuinely confused. ‘What are you doing here?’

Looking regretfully in my direction, she shook her head. ‘It was Archer who stole most of the things from the shop, though I genuinely didn’t know who’d stolen the cup and the grimoire until you reintroduced us… I’m so grateful you did. What serendipity that was – no, not serendipity. It was fate.’

I was totally baffled. While Scarlett may have been confident that I could work out what the hell was going on, it was taking me far longer than I’d have liked. Whatdid she mean, she didn’t know who the thief was until I had reintroduced them? I couldn’t remember introducing her to anyone. With my mind grappling to put the pieces together, I looked at the person lurking in the shadows beside her – because it wasn’t Archer.

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