Page 24 of Warlocks Don’t Win (Singsong City #9)

She gave me a slight smile. “You find it exhausting to control others? I thought that was supposed to charge you up.” She said it part casual friends chatting about one’s hobbies, and part accusation for being someone like my mother.

I was sort of like my mother, in that I’d inherited her magic, but I hadn’t inherited her taste for the pain and suffering of her victims. Pity, because I was feeling insecure with Cara and her do-gooder ways, working with Winston all these years, both of them commiserating in their orphan status, uniting to take down their parent’s murderers.

And he’d said he wanted to talk to get me to talk to her.

He’d lied for her. I was starting to think I’d really enjoy her pain and suffering.

“Where’s my stuffed crust pizza?” I asked, standing up and looking around the empty room, empty other than the guards watching the exits and windows.

She stood with me. “You don’t want to find those who destroyed your coven and killed your mother?” Ah, she’d let me join their orphan club.

I looked at my nails. They needed about fifty coats of paint. “I killed her. If you don’t believe me, just ask Winston.”

She touched my shoulder. The sore one. “He didn’t realize what was going on until later.

He really thought that you were part of the secret society, the one he was sure were behind his parent’s deaths.

He was investigating the disappearance of the Salem Mayor’s son as part of it, and all the clues led to you.

The next thing he knew, you were in Apple City, away from your mother.

It was the perfect opportunity to get close to you, to get the answers he needed.

You played the game perfectly, never giving him what he wanted but enough hints to make him think you were on the brink of trusting him. ”

We’d talked about philosophers, morality, good and evil, that kind of thing.

Also magical theory. I hadn’t mentioned turning Evan into a toad.

He’d been the mayor’s son. Oh. Win brought Cara to Salem after Jessica told him that I turned Evan into a toad.

I hadn’t been on the brink with Winston.

I’d fallen head over perfect heels between stuffed crusts and good tiramisu. And all that time he’d been playing me?

My heart ached agonizingly for a few beats before it settled down to its normal numbness.

“Sure. He’s always played Detective Warlock, even before he had a tv show.

Makes sense. So after fifteen years, has he closed in on this mysterious they ?

If not, he might want to try a new career.

Don’t tell me I’m still his prime suspect. ”

She shook her head and sat back down, looking up at me hopefully.

“Of course not. You’re they key to everything.

The first coven to be eaten from the inside out, your mother taken down when she wouldn’t join them while they covered it with your supposed murder.

Even now, your house is being used by them. ”

“Tabitha is the voice of Salem,” I said, slowly sinking back into my chair, mostly because the server just came out with my pizza.

“She’s a puppet. She couldn’t have controlled such an unruly coven without help.”

I snorted. Unruly was one word for it. The wrong one. She used to be more precise. Singsong was unruly. Salem was diabolical, calculated anarchy. “What’s the ultimate purpose of this evil conspiracy, or am I not allowed to know? Just general evilness?”

She frowned at me. “They killed my parents, like they killed Winston’s and your mother.

So many ‘accidents,’” she said doing air quotes, “All seemingly unrelated, but Winston was watching. He’s the only reason I held the voice when my parents…

” Her expression closed down, became icy and cool.

“He thinks that you can help us. I think that whoever’s in charge of your Singsong coven is playing you. ”

The server gave her a frown before smiling at me and putting the pizza down on the table. “Careful it’s hot. Let me know if you need anything else.”

“Sarsaparilla,” I said before taking a large piece of gooey happiness. “Why are you telling me this instead of him?” I asked when the server was back in the kitchen.

“You don’t trust him.”

“I don’t trust anyone.” I took a vicious bite out of my pizza. I particularly didn’t trust incredibly pulled together people who had introduced me to the hate of my life.

She watched me for a long time before she finally broke and grabbed a slice.

She chewed with her mouth closed. So prim and proper.

And look at that posture. You could use her for the poster child of well-behaved citizenry of magical society.

Winston probably did. And to think that she was in stabbing distance.

The server put a cold bottle of sarsaparilla on the table and withdrew.

Okay. What did I know? I’d murdered my mother.

Winston had testified. I’d spent the next five years writing to his grandmother.

Was that also part of his sleuthing? Did she write to me for him?

Or… and that’s the thought that had me gripping my bottle like a weapon. Did Winston do the dirty work himself?

I stood up and flashed her a lazy smile. “Time’s up. It’s been a laugh. At least the pizza was genuinely delightful. You’d better get back to Apple City before you become a victim of this secret society.”

“Clary…”

I left her in her perfect pink suit, walking quickly until I stepped outside into the cool air and gasped a breath or two.

Winston was leaning against his movie star car, looking at me with heavy lids over his meltingly warm eyes. He could make anyone do anything, include fall helplessly in love with him. He even turned me into the criminal he was looking for. So why did he have a sage plant tattooed over his heart?

I walked over to him and nodded at his car.

“I could use a ride home. Do you mind?”

He smiled and opened the passenger’s door, searching my face for signs of what I was feeling. He’d wanted Cara to tell me about the secret society. Why? He was a master manipulator. There had to be a reason I was too sensible to understand.

Once we were both inside, I crossed my arms so I wouldn’t accidentally touch him.

Kill him. He’d played me from the beginning.

I’d been an even bigger idiot than I’d thought I was, and I’d known I was a fool.

“You think that Singsong Coven is part of this secret conspiracy, but what do you think that I can do about it? It’s not my coven. ”

“Portalia came through a portal. She’s been monitoring your magic, your energy, which likely means that she’s connected to it, drawing it out of you and your house.”

I snorted. “The amount of effort for that kind of spelling makes it so impractical as to be impossible. She would be basically comatose with the struggle.”

“Unless she shared the effort with a group of extremely competent magic users.”

“Right. I can now see that Portalia is definitely the head of a secret society that plotted to murder her opposition across the country.” I nodded soberly. “It’s the pink turban. I should have seen it at once.”

“I don’t think she’s in control of it, but she may be a piece of the puzzle.” His eyes tightened as he slowly brushed his fingers over mine.

I pulled away like I’d been electrocuted.

It felt like it, electricity jamming my heart, trying to get it to feel again.

“The next time you touch me, I’ll draw the life and magic out of you until you are dead.

I’m done playing your games.” I bared my teeth in a smile and let him see how feral I was. My familiar was a skunk, you know.

He curled his fingers into a fist before returning them to the steering wheel. “I know. You weren’t ever playing. It took me a long time to realize that.”

“And you’re supposed to be bright. What I don’t understand is why you tattooed a sage over your heart. It wasn’t about me.”

His mouth tightened before he gave me a slight smile. “Of course it was. I needed a reason to unite witches for their protection while I uncovered the dark covens. My heartbreak about your imprisonment was the obvious driving force that covered up my deeper motives.”

“How is that about me? It was your lie about me. Those don’t count.

” It didn’t hurt to hear him admit he’d even used my jail time.

I was too numb for anything to hurt me. Good.

Hopefully it lasted until I got out of this awful hole and left Winston behind.

Permanently. It did feed the slowly growing anger, though.

“It was always about you.”

I glowered at him. “Excuse me?”

His eyes grew dark and smoky as he pulled over on the side of the road in front of a field with a fast food place a few car lengths away.

Traffic wasn’t busy this time of night, but we weren’t isolated on the middle of a desolate highway, where he could strangle me.

Let’s be real. I was more likely to strangle him.

“What are you doing?” I demanded.

“I fell in love with you.”

My stupid heart had the nerve to have nerves, like it hadn’t been stupid enough for one lifetime. “It’s the stripes,” I drawled. “It seems tasteless, but it’s secretly the key to unlocking true love. Why would you say something that stupid?”

He turned to look at me, eyes flickering with the purple lightning. “The letters. Do you remember?”

My whole body became encased in ice and then exploded into shards of agony. “You wrote them?” He’d say no. He just found them in his grandmother’s dresser and reading my words had wracked his soul with the endless torment of undying love.

“I wrote them,” he said after a long pause.