T*Witches: Don’t Think Twice by Randi Reisfeld, H.B. Gilmour Read Free Book Online

Thanks to caller ID, she knew who was calling — and didn’t sound completely surprised to hear from Cam. “Cami, hey, what’s up?”
    “You tell me,” Cam said. “Kris … where are you?”
    “I can’t really talk now,” Kristen said, almost apologetically.
    “You were in Boston on Sunday. You saw Dylan and bugged.” Cam came clean. “So I know you’re not in Los Angeles with Brianna. So why’d you blow off school today? What’s going on?”
    There was a long pause on the other end. “I’m sorry, Cam,” Kris said. “I … I can’t talk about it.”
    “Why not?” Cam looked up and saw Alex coming down the stairs.
    “Emily just pulled into the driveway,” her twin told her.
    Cam turned as the front door opened. It was her mom, with a bolt of fabric under her arm, two shoppingbags in one hand, and the mail in the other. Emily’s face lit up automatically the moment she saw her daughter.
    “I have a good reason,” Kris was saying. “Camryn, listen, please don’t call back.”
    “Kris, wait,” Cam said, but her friend had hung up. Cam clicked off her cell phone and went to help Emily with her packages.
    She sensed Alex watching them from the stairs, then heard her flame-haired sister’s melancholy thoughts. It was the first time Alex had looked at them and realized how much Emily and Cam’s relationship mirrored hers with Sara. Cam glanced up gratefully at her twin.
    “Oh, this one’s for you, both of you.” Emily turned over a manila envelope. “No stamps. Someone must have shoved it into the mailbox.” She smiled at Alex and handed the creased envelope to Cam, who was standing nearer. “Look at the address. Isn’t that creative? The letters are all different styles and sizes.”
    Cam set down the bolt of fabric and hurried to her sister. The moment Emily left the hallway they tore open the envelope.
    Inside was a sheet of paper with only eight words on it, some done in calligraphy, others printed in red in different urgent type styles:
    If she doesn’t get help
she could die!

CHAPTER EIGHT
    UNDER THE DOME: JUSTICE
    The trial of Fredo DuBaer had begun.
    Before each voting Council member was a computer on which he or she would register a secret verdict. The laptops, as Ileana had protested to Lady Rhianna, had all been donated by Lord Thantos. Ileana found herself frowning at them, as if they were the monstrous tracker himself.
    “The computers,” she whispered to Karsh. “What if Thantos has meddled with them? He’s supposed to be a computer genius.”
    Karsh shook his head. “He’s a genius at business. It was Aron who was brilliant at technology —”
    From her perch at the People’s bench, Ileanaglanced over at the surviving DuBaer brothers. What a bizarre pair they made — Fredo, short, slight, reedlike, his thinning dark hair slicked back with grease, a wispy goatee straggling from his pointy chin; Thantos, a looming, fearsome presence in a dark cape and hobnail boots, his beard thick and black as a moonless night.
    In other circumstances, Karsh and Thantos might have been well matched against each other. They’d known each other all their lives, and both were men of intelligence who passionately believed in their arguments. But hapless Fredo had made such a tangled mess, it was doubtful that even a force like Thantos could persuade this Council of his brother’s innocence.
    Fredo, it turned out, had no alibis, no means of proving his innocence, and a pitiable parade of character witnesses. Ileana looked at the sad little group lined up behind the Accused’s table. Five in all. Three of them wore the striped jumpsuits of convicted felons. One, a trembling young witch, worked for 3B, one of Thantos’s computer brands. The last, a sad, shabby old warlock with gambling troubles, probably owed Thantos money. “Characters is right,” she muttered to Karsh.
    Ileana grew increasingly impatient as the circus parade of witnesses was called upon and led, one by one, through