Malichai sent the man standing silently against the door a small smile. “Thanks, Trap.”
Trap shrugged. “Wyatt’s got those five little girls. Too many for me to stay home and guard.” He sounded gruff.
Amaryllis didn’t smile. She was beginning to believe that Trap wasn’t nearly as antisocial as he pretended to be—at least not with those he claimed as his family.
“How close is Cayenne to giving birth?” Malichai asked Trap straight out.
Trap shrugged. “You know Cayenne. She’ll give birth when she’s ready and not before. You’ll know soon enough.”
“What does that mean?”
“She’ll be on that plane. She doesn’t like to be away from me, and she’s gotten so she doesn’t listen to a damn thing I say. Told her flying wasn’t good for her. She’s not showing at all so she thinks she can pretend she isn’t pregnant.”
“I just don’t like the idea of her near combat when she’s so close,” Malichai said. “I have a bad feeling about this. If Callendine was telling the truth and orders came down for him to come here and carry out some mission, you and I both know someone at the White House wants to stamp out all GhostWalkers.”
“They were here before you were. There’s no way for them to have guessed you’d be coming,” Ezekiel said. “This isn’t about you.”
“Amaryllis was here and she’s a GhostWalker.”
“You’re just worried on her behalf, Malichai. Believe me, I understand the feeling. They had no way of knowing Amaryllis is a GhostWalker.”
Amaryllis felt warm—very happy—when Ezekiel acknowledged that she was the same as they were. She’d never thought of herself as being a GhostWalker. She was part of the flawed group—a woman easily disposed of because she was so inferior. These men, elite soldiers, made her part of them with just a few words and the inclusive camaraderie she needed.
“Speculation on Callendine?” Malichai said.
“He is very committed to whatever his mission is, and so are his men,” Mordichai said immediately. “When they took off, they carried their dead. The only body we have is Mills.”
Ezekiel shook his head. “We don’t have that either. Less than forty minutes ago, I got word that someone broke into the medical examiner’s office and took the body. We know who Mills is. We have a clear identification, so the why of taking such a risk eludes me.”
“Callendine hired a hit man,” Malichai said. “Why would he do that? And what business did Mills have killing Anna and Bryon? This is so crazy.”
Mordichai moved close to the bed, took Amaryllis’s pulse and then tried to nudge her to sit so he could give her more water.
She tried to wave him away.
“You need it. You’re badly dehydrated. Your lips are so cracked they’re bleeding. If you don’t drink this water, I’m hooking you up to an IV.”
She didn’t like that idea. She tried to open her eyes. They burned, refusing to cooperate. When she tried to move her head, it pounded, lashing at her. Mordichai was right, she was dehydrated.
“It’s a good idea anyway, Mordichai,” Malichai said. “No matter how much water you push into her that way, she’s never going to catch up.”
“She’s awake,” Amaryllis muttered, trying not to sound rebellious. “I can drink water.”
No one seemed to pay attention to her. Mordichai was fast and very efficient, finding her vein without doing much more than looking at her arm. She couldn’t summon up enough energy to protest. Malichai’s arm pulled her tighter against him, making her feel safe and secure, so she just settled beside him and continued listening.
“I think we should go back to figuring the San Diego Convention Center is the target,” Malichai said. “If Anna had to be silenced because she wanted to tell the cops, then she did, in fact, overhear something no one wanted her to repeat. Callendine, Salsberry and Mills were using the magic shop and Miss Crystal’s apartment in the back of the store as their headquarters.”
“They removed Miss Crystal by making her believe she’d won a trip on a cruise. They paid for everything,” Ezekiel said. “So they didn’t murder Miss Crystal. Why, when they so readily killed others over the last two years?”
“They needed her magic shop open,” Amaryllis said without thinking. She didn’t even open her eyes. “If they killed her, the shop would close. There was no one to take her place. She’d said so dozens of times. But if they just had her go away for a time, they would have the shop and be able to do anything they wanted from it.”
Ezekiel nodded. “Thank you, Amaryllis. I believe you’re correct. They needed her alive more than they needed her dead.”
“Callendine trusted someone to do the intel on Miss Crystal. He would never have been so sloppy as to say she was visiting a son. That was just idiocy not to say she was on a cruise,” Malichai said.
“They practiced a script,” Mordichai guessed. “Just like we rehearse a mission, over and over until we know exactly what we’re going to do, they had to have rehearsed a script. My guess, in the script they first used, she was dead, they killed her, so they came up with various reasons why she wasn’t there. Midstream, they sent her on a cruise and everyone got confused.”
That was plausible. Amaryllis didn’t like to think that the people she knew were so easily disposable to others, but it was obvious that they were to Callendine. He had hired a man to rid the world of Marie, Jacy and Amaryllis.
“Rubin, you can’t go to the magic shop pretending to look for Shevfield because they aren’t there. I’m going to have you arrested and put it in the papers that you’re a suspect in Anna and Bryon Cooper’s deaths. Callendine will look into you. He has to have someone at the police department or a hacker helping him. You will be suspected of being a hit man, but no one has ever been able to convict you. The police will have to release you because there is no evidence against you and you’ll be staying here.”
“Lovely,” Amaryllis murmured. “Our reputation is growing.”
“A thrill a minute, baby,” Malichai assured. “People love that. The B and B will be more popular than ever.”
Ezekiel ignored them. “Shevfield’s body will be found so Callendine will have to use one of his men to create his diversion or contact the supposed hit man at the B and B. That puts Rubin right in an enticing situation. Callendine won’t be able to resist the fact that you’re exactly where you need to be to carry out his diversion.”
“You don’t think it’s too big of an apple falling in his lap?” Malichai asked.
Ezekiel shrugged. “We have to take that chance. We don’t have any other play. When Amaryllis is feeling better, she can unlock the attic. Trap and Cayenne want the basement. Cayenne will be more comfortable there. We’ve still got to go through the house and find any bugs. There weren’t any in this room. We’ve gone over it several times. Even so, we’ve got a jammer in here, so when we need to talk, let’s use this room.”
“I thought you wanted to move us to Amaryllis’s room,” Malichai said.