He didn’t seem much of anything, because he hid his feelings well. This time, though, he met my eye, and I remembered him telling me, just do what Maguire says and everything will be okay.
So I put on a face like I was riding the wave and not drowning in it. “What spells have you tried so far?” I asked Lauren, just one professional to another.
She didn’t give me the same courtesy. “This and that.” She sounded bored, or maybe like she was humoring me. “Divination, location spell … and a little misdirection to hide your disappearance from your FBI boyfriend. He thinks you’re tucked safely in a cot at the office, sleeping off your headache.” She looked smug, because she was proud of her spellcraft, or maybe she was just a bitch. “In case you were wondering.”
I hadn’t been wondering. I’d been sure Taylor would be looking for me soon. The bottom dropped out of my bravado, leaving an empty, sick hole where I’d kept the comforting thought of rescue. But I was on my own. A glance at Carson showed he had gone inscrutable again, avoiding my gaze. He might not wish any harm on me, but that didn’t make him my ally.
“Here’s what is going to happen,” said Maguire, sounding chillingly certain that I would comply. “I think you can do far more for me than you let on. You will follow the clues leading to Alexis. Think of it like a treasure hunt. But you will take this on. And you will give me your oath, three times.”
I gripped the arms of the chair. A triple oath was a binding promise. You couldn’t break it by your own actions. It was one of the most basic spells, and I bet it came in hella handy as a mob boss.
“And if I don’t promise more than once?” I asked.
Maguire picked up a phone from the desk. My phone. With a few taps, he scrolled through my pictures. “You have a lovely family, Miss Goodnight. Lots of young cousins, lots of talented aunts. If you won’t work with me, I will work through them until I find one who’ll do the job.” He set the phone on his desk, propped so I could see the screen and the snap of my cousins and me at Aunt Hyacinth’s farm, our arms linked, faces flushed with laughter and summer heat.
“And please believe me, Daisy,” Maguire added in that same velvet tone, “the inconvenience of that will fray my temper in ways you do not want to imagine.”
The room had grown icier, and it wasn’t just the coldness of his gaze holding mine. Remnants whispered wordless warnings in my ear, as frightened for me as I was for my family.
Anything he could do to me was insignificant next to the idea that someone I loved might be hurt or killed because of my refusal. The idea turned everything inside me dark and heavy, filling a noxious pool in the pit of my stomach.
“I’ll do it,” I said, my voice steady only because I forced it to be that way. The triple vow seemed unimportant when I was already bound by my fear that I would fail—fail Alexis, my family, my duty … everything.
Maguire smiled, as if I’d said something funny. “I know you will.”
“But without the binding oath,” I added, because redundant didn’t mean harmless.
He didn’t seem surprised or impressed by my rebellion. “I’m afraid it’s my way or the highway. Stand up,” he said, gesturing Lauren and Carson forward as well.
“Is this really necessary?” asked Carson. “She has plenty of incentive not to renege on the deal.”
Understatement of the century. But Maguire hauled me out of the chair and pushed me toward Carson. “Let’s just say I want no errors in judgment along the way.”
Carson steadied me when I stumbled and kept his hands on my shoulders, standing behind me so we both faced Maguire. It was probably a good thing. I wasn’t going to run, but my knees were high-diving-board shaky and might not hold me up.
My cousins and I played with this type of binding spell—geas was the old-fashioned term—as kids, the Goodnight version of a triple-dog-dare. Nothing really mattered but the words and the intent. That was it. But the witch’s intent as she pulled a red silk cord from the pocket of her leather jacket and held out her hand for mine made me shrink back.
“What’s that for?” I asked. “No one in my family needs