Chapter 16
A shiver rolled down my spine like an icy drop of rain. Had we been staying in the same house as a killer?
What was Louisa’s motive? She was already married, so her being in love with Darcy seemed less likely—not impossible, but not as probable.
But what other reason could she have for trying to give Darcy a love potion and attacking me for being around him?
And if it was Louisa, Caroline’s anger didn’t make sense unless she’d found out what her sister had done.
“There must be some mistake,” Jane whispered.
Charles’s lips fell into a flat line. “I would like that, but it doesn’t seem likely. The more Lizzy talked, the more it made sense.”
“Wasn’t she scared of her magic?” Darcy narrowed his glittering green eyes.
“She used to be, but that doesn’t mean she can’t use it,” Charles said. “I suppose she could have been practicing.”
His words brought me back to the day I met Darcy at Club Meryton. Caroline had made a comment about Louisa not being around as much. It hadn’t stood out, but considering all the times I’d seen Louisa glued to Caroline’s side, her absence was strange. Had she been practicing her magic then too?
“Before we assume anything else, I need to confirm what I can,” Charles said. “I don’t want to make any mistakes that could harm my family.”
“Are you going to check the magical residue on the gargoyle?” Darcy asked.
Charles gave a grim nod and disappeared out the door.
“If he can check the magical trace and figure out who knocked over the gargoyle, why didn’t he do that immediately?” I asked.
“It isn’t as straightforward as that.” Darcy rubbed a hand along his scruffy jaw. “It’s like magical DNA. Most of the time there’s no match in the system, but if you already know who it belongs to, it’s just a matter of comparing the two.”
Long minutes passed while we waited for Charles. Only the crackle of the fire and the sound of the clock filled the silence.
Tick.
Tick.
Tick.
When the door opened again, Charles came in, his lips pressed into a neutral expression and his eyes lacking their usual spark.
“I’m sorry, Charles, but we’ll have to arrest her,” Darcy said.
“I understand. My men will handle it.” Charles patted Jane’s hands once, then squared his shoulders.
“We’ll keep it quiet until we figure out what to do,” Darcy told him.
Charles nodded stiffly, gave Jane a soft look, then pulled out his phone and stepped into the hall.
“I want to go with him.” Jane swung her legs over the side of the bed.
I touched her shoulder. “You should stay. You’re still recovering.”
She caught my hand, tears gathering in her eyes. “Then will you go for me?”
“Will you be okay alone?” While it was hard to imagine anything happening to Jane here with a blanket wrapped around her shoulders and a fire crackling merrily, I hadn’t expected her to be hurt the first time either.
“I’ll be fine.” She jutted out her chin in a rare show of stubbornness.
“Okay.” I squeezed her hand, then followed Charles into the hall, Darcy at my heels.
“Are you sure you want to go?” he asked. “We could stay here with Jane.”
“I need to be there.”
He quirked an eyebrow. “For your story?”
I rolled my eyes, even though disappointment flared through me. “I think that ship has sailed. I’m pretty sure I lost my job tonight.”
“A scoop this big might save it.” Lightning flashed through the window, highlighting the indecipherable expression in his eyes.
I chewed on my lip. Solving Easton’s murder and exposing the involvement of a highborn fae would probably earn my job back, but I couldn’t do that to Charles.
Maybe another reporter would find the story or maybe the Bingleys would cover it up, but either way, it wouldn’t be me.
While Louisa seemed exactly like the Blackthorns who had tainted my childhood, Darcy, Charles, and even Steven had proved there were plenty of good fae out there, even highborn fae.
Ones who cared about their family, their friends, and others.
Darcy opened his mouth as if to say something else, then glanced down at our interconnected hands, his face a mixture of hard lines and sharp shadows in the dim lighting.
Charles disconnected his call and turned to us. “My men are in position outside the house to make sure there’s no escape if she runs.”
Darcy snapped his mouth shut.
What had he wanted to say?
I shook off my curiosity and tucked my nerves behind an unreadable expression of my own.
It was time to end this.
Darcy talked to one of the men, who fell back to stand guard outside Jane’s room. My heart fluttered at his thoughtfulness. We moved down the hall, men falling into place behind us like shadows. We passed Darcy’s room and stopped a few doors down.
Charles clenched his jaw, then glanced at his phone. It must’ve been a signal because Charles rapped on the door. “Louisa, it’s me.” He didn’t wait before walking in.
The room was empty.
“Where is she?” Darcy looked around.
I bit my lip. Could my Portent have been one of the future instead of the present? “She might be by the lake,” I said hesitantly.
“Let’s check.” Charles signaled his men, and they spread out around us. He led the way through another door that went outside behind the property. More lightning flashed, and my heartbeat took off.
“It’ll be okay,” Darcy murmured to me. “I’ll protect you.”
Two figures stood by the lake, just like in my Portent.
“What were you thinking?” Caroline’s voice carried to us across the field.
“I had to do something,” Louisa said.
“Louisa,” Charles called as we approached.
The sisters whirled to face us.
“What’s going on?” Louisa’s tired voice grew higher as she took in Darcy and me standing behind Charles. Her gaze widened before she smoothed it out again.
That was all the confirmation I needed. She was surprised to see me standing here after dropping a gargoyle on me—or Jane.
“I’m sorry, Louisa, but you’re under arrest.” Charles’s voice was heavy.
“What?” Her eyes flew wide again. “Why?”
“I think you know why.”
“Charles, wait. Think about this,” Caroline said.
“I have thought about it.” Charles frowned. “How could you do this, Louisa? To Darcy? To our family? To the Bennets?”
“Do what?” she said.
“Don’t play dumb.” Charles gestured his men forward. They closed in around the sisters in a circle.
I curled my free hand into a fist at the memory of Jane buried under a pile of rubble. “Even if you wanted it to look like an accident, we know you were the one who tried to strike me with lightning and knocked a gargoyle on Jane.”
“I would never hurt Jane.” Louisa’s gaze darted to Charles, and she took a step back toward the lake.
“You already did,” I said. “You might’ve thought you were attacking me earlier, but that was Jane with a glamour.”
Louisa blanched but then held her chin high, her nose in the air. “You’re taking her word over mine, Charles? Don’t you know what she is? What her family is?”
Caroline bit her lip but stayed silent, her gaze darting from her sister to her brother.
Charles sighed. “I’m not choosing Lizzy over you, Louisa. I’m simply believing the evidence. We traced the magical residue on the gargoyle, and I confirmed it was yours. You tried to kill Lizzy, and it was you who killed Easton with that love potion, wasn’t it?”
The circle drew tighter around the two women.
“It was an accident!” Louisa burst out, her shoulders caving. “I never meant for Easton to die. That potion was to make Darcy fall in love with Caroline after she was disinherited and lost everything. I didn’t know there was anything wrong with it, or I never would have tried to give it to Darcy.”
“You killed a man because of some silly childhood crush?” Anger radiated from Darcy.
Caroline covered her face with her hands.
“There wasn’t anything wrong with the love potion,” Charles said. “It killed Easton because he’d also taken a wolfsbane potion.”
“Wolfsbane?” Louisa wrinkled her nose. “If Easton was a werewolf, then I did us a favor. Someone like him does not belong in the royal guard.”
“Louisa, stop.” Caroline tugged at her sister’s sleeve.
“It’d be in your best interest to listen to Caroline and stop talking now.
” Darcy’s voice was as icy as the wind that blew across the yard.
“You had no right to try to give me a love potion. If you had come forward to talk to us, maybe we could have helped after what happened to Easton, but now you’ve tried to kill Elizabeth twice. ”
“Well, it’s her fault.” Louisa jabbed a finger in my direction. “She should’ve kept her gold-digging hands off of you.”
My mouth fell open at how hypocritical it was to call me a gold digger after admitting she was trying to use Darcy to save Caroline after she lost her money. “What did I do?”
“You threw yourself all over Darcy even though he’s completely out of your league. You’re nothing more than a half-breed.” Her face grew red, and she cut a hand through the air. A towering wave formed over the lake, the crest roaring like a beast about to strike.
“Louisa, no!” Caroline cried as the water surged toward me.
Darcy yanked me to him and formed a shield around us. The wave crashed against his magic with a deafening boom, shaking the ground.
I glanced around to make sure everyone was okay, but Louisa was already preparing another strike, this wave even bigger than the first. The water coiled around her like a snake, and her eyes burned with desperation.
I broke free of Darcy’s grasp and spun around. “Louisa, stop! You’re making a mistake.”
Her lip curled in a sneer. “The only mistake was letting your kind spend time with us.” The water whipped forward, and I braced myself for impact.