Page 14 of Promises to Keep

Agnie laughed with the surrounding men. “So overdramatic! I knew ye would sign anything, would promise anything, with your precious artwork in the balance.” She tapped an envelope against her hand as if she were thinking about something.

Then she said, loudly, “Did ye get that, Kaitlyn Campbell, eavesdropping incompetently behind the bush?”

“Oh, um…” For a half second I thought,hide more?But no, that would look idiotic. I decided to go for haughty condescension as I stepped from around the tree. “Agnie.” I nodded. “I see you are being a bitch yetagain.”

She asked, “I will ask once more, did ye hear all of that, Kaitlyn?”

“I heard that you threatened my mother-in-law with some kind of explosives around her art, at her party, which makes you cruel.”

“Says the woman whose husband has murdered my sons in cold blood.”

“Ha! Cold blood. They were attempting to kill my husband, for centuries they tried — showstheirincompetence that they couldn’t manage it.”

She asked, “How’s Fraoch?”

I said, “You know what, I am not a fan of you or your bullshit, Fraoch is fine, he’s excellent by the way.”

“Tell him I said hello.”

“Nah lady, I’m not going to fuck with Fraoch’s head, he’s too sweet to have you messing with him.”

She exhaled. “I have won, Kaitlyn, I have explosives set throughout this party, see that man with the wire from his ear? He’s with me, he’s rigged this whole place. See the men near the columns? They are also working for me. This is my first step. I destroy Lady Mairead, then I destroy your whole family.”

“You seem in a talkative mood, make it make sense for me.”

She opened her eyes wide. “I heard ye were dim, Kaitlyn, but this is really too much.”

I narrowed my eyes. “Magnus can barge through the door right now, he can barge through the door ten minutes ago. All he has to do is kill you.”

“Eh, unlikely, because he winna be able tae kill all the men who are here.”

“I only count ten in this room.”

“When ye report back tae yer husband ye tell him that when he comes the whole place crumbles down around him. You tell him that from the moment Lady Mairead set eyes on me until now, there will not be enough time for him to set up a defense. The game is lost.”

“You have to know that Magnus will never let you get away with this.”

“I daena care.”

“Of course not, you’re all like, ‘Whatever, I’m going to destroy the world, I am an agent of chaos,’ as if you’re a villain who learned how to be evil from Tumblr in the early 2000s.”

Agnie directed, “See that painting?”

Lady Mairead put her hand to her throat. “The Van Gogh?”

Agnie smiled. “Aye, watch this.” She pushed a button and an ink-black liquid poured down the front, a river with tributaries fanning out, completely obscuring it.

Lady Mairead screeched and fell on Agnie clutching her jacket, begging her, “Please stop!”

I said, “Holy shit, Agnie, that’s pure evil.”

A furor had gone up and a crowd formed around the painting. Agnie whispered, “Stand straight and stop begging, Mairead, ye are embarrassing yourself.”

Lady Mairead straightened up and smoothed down the front of her dress. “Aye, of course, I understand. Please, Agnie, daena destroy any more paintings,please.”

Agnie held up the button again. “I said, stop begging!”

Lady Mairead clamped her lips between her teeth. A man sidled up, holding a struggling Hayley. He whispered something in Agnie’s ears.

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