Page 96 of The Women of Wild Hill
Liam smiled as one of the men stepped forward.
“It’s come to our attention, Ms. Laguerre, that people have been dying in your presence.”
Brigid ignored him and turned back to Liam instead. “You fucking traitor,” she said.
Witch Hunt
Do you hear that?” Phoebe asked her daughter.
Sibyl looked up from assembling the mushroom bruschetta. “Hear what?”
Phoebe held a finger up and waited. All she could hear was the blood rushing through her veins. “It just went quiet out there.” She glanced over at the kitchen door. “I’ll be right back.”
“Don’t be gone too long,” Sibyl told her. “I didn’t expect everyone to show up so soon. They’re going to start wondering where all the food is.”
Phoebe removed her apron and left it on the counter. “I’ll just take a peek.” She paused for a moment with one hand on the kitchen door. She could feel its atoms vibrating. Something on the other side was generating waves of powerful energy.
“What is it?” Sibyl inquired.
“Stay here,” she ordered her daughter before pushing through.
The hallway outside the kitchen was empty. Phoebe followed the sound of a single male voice to the living area. There, one hundred men stood facing the front of the room with their backs to her. The portrait of a plump, bespectacled man in judge’s robes glowered at Phoebe from high on the wall. Fortunately, he was the only one who was watching her.
“Thank you all for gathering here tonight. I know it was short notice, but I think it will soon be clear why all of us needed to be here.”
She knew the voice, but she couldn’t quite place it. Withoutheels, she wasn’t tall enough to see the speaker. Phoebe circled the back of the room, searching for a line of sight through the crowd.
“Days like today remind us why this coalition is so essential to our individual survival. We may find ourselves rivals in the marketplace, the poll booth, or the courtroom, but we are all beneficiaries of an order that has existed for millennia. An order that has been responsible for mankind’s greatest feats and advancements. It is this order that we have been called upon to defend against the forces of evil.”
Dread settled on Phoebe’s shoulders. Each step felt taxing, and she struggled for every breath. No one in the crowd had moved an inch since she’d arrived. Phoebe knew she did not want to see the speaker who held the audience so rapt.
“Three of us have died in the past week,” the same speaker continued. “All three deaths were due to what they call natural causes. Most assume that a death by natural causes means no human being was responsible. We now have evidence that this is not the case. Apparently, there are those who can call on nature to do their bidding. We have one such person here with us tonight.”
A guest in front of Phoebe shifted and she saw them. The speaker she recognized as a Supreme Court justice. A senator stood to his left, a tech mogul to the right. Liam Geddes was also nearby, with a cabinet secretary at his side. There were six in all. Five men and one woman—her sister. Brigid was looking straight at her through the crowd as though she’d known Phoebe was there behind the others. The message she conveyed could not be mistaken.Run!Brigid was warning her.They don’t know about you yet.
At that moment, Phoebe saw her sister at thirteen. It was the day she’d almost been kidnapped and Brigid had just returned to the caretaker’s cottage with an empty hornet’s nest in her hand. She held it out like a gift but pulled back before Phoebe could grab it, as though her generosity were conditional.
Promise me that the next time you’re in trouble, you’ll be smart and run, Brigid told her.I may not always be able to save you.
Phoebe threw her arms around her sister and squeezed her as tight as she could. She’d never agreed to Brigid’s condition. In her heart, she’d always believed that Brigid would be there for her—and that she would return the favor.
NOW IT WASN’T HER LIFEalone she’d be risking. And there was one other person who knew she was Brigid’s sister—and Sibyl’s mother. He was standing just to the right of Brigid, looking straight at Phoebe as though he’d been listening to her thoughts. Their eyes locked for a moment. Then Liam looked away. What was happening? she wondered. None of it made any sense.
“Our friend, Senator Rivera, will present the evidence. Before he begins, we owe Liam Geddes a debt of gratitude for bringing these facts to our attention. He’s filling his father’s shoes better than any of us could have imagined.”
Liam beamed as the crowd applauded. The Geddes men had done it again. Phoebe wished she could uproot the entire family tree and set it ablaze.
The justice addressed Brigid. “Before we begin, how do you plead?” he asked.
“Fuck off,” Brigid told him.
A man Phoebe didn’t recognize reached out and slapped Brigid across the face. A blazing-red imprint of his palm appeared on her skin. “Show some respect or we’ll move straight to punishment,” he demanded. “Senator?”
“I’ve just dropped you all a file,” the senator told the crowd. “Please take a moment to review it.”
Everyone in the room pulled out a phone. Phoebe backed into the hall.
“One week ago, at a party thrown at this residence, Senator Josh Jacobs drowned after he was repeatedly stung by jellyfish.”
