Women of the Otherworld 10.5 - Counterfeit Magic by Kelley Armstrong Read Free Book Online Page B

issues I was dealing with, I was fine with Lucas. But what about him? Was he fine with me?
     
    Savannah was right. Sneaking down here for a romantic surprise was just the kind of thing he used to do. Before his brothers died. Before the Cabal moved into our lives.
     
    He would have called, too. Texted me, at least, ostensibly to get updates on the case, but really just to connect. Why hadn’t he done that today?
     
    When was the last time he had done that?
     
    Had he really been trapped with Ava, unable to return my call? Or had I moved to the bottom of the priority list? Just his wife. He’d call me back when he could. After he was done having a few drinks with a beautiful young blonde with a damsel-in-distress complex.
     
    I silently laughed at the thought. Um, no. Not Lucas.
     
    Still, while I knew no young blonde could tempt him to stray, I could see how the “damsel-in-distress” part might appeal to a deeper need. Lucas liked saving people. That’s how we’d met. He’d come to rescue Savannah and me from the Nast Cabal, and found two very unappreciative damsels. As a client, I’d been less than satisfactory. As a lover, I’d been exactly what he wanted—a woman who could look after herself, and was more interested helping him rescue others than in being rescued herself.
     
    And yet, maybe what he needed eight years ago wasn’t necessarily what he needed today. Maybe I wasn’t what he needed today.
     
    So what he needed was a ditzy girl barely older than Savannah? Someone to make him feel big and strong?
     
    I shook my head and thumped my face onto the pillow. Now I was being stupid. And insulting to Lucas. If he felt the need to offset the ethical challenges of working for a Cabal, he’d get his confidence boost through work, not pretty girls.
     
    There was an issue here I’d been ignoring, though. I wasn’t the only one uncomfortable with the new semi-alliance with the Cortez Cabal. I wasn’t the only one struggling to find a balance. But the fight I focused on was my own.
     
    I was feeling put out because he hadn’t planned any romantic interludes in a while? Why did he need to plan them? That was incredibly sexist of me.
     
    I crept out of bed, opened my laptop and started exploring a few ideas of my own.

Under New Management
     
    The next morning, Savannah fired me as her manager and made an appointment to interview my replacement. I’d be a lot more hurt about that if it hadn’t been my idea. Still, I will admit to being a little miffed at how quickly the real ones had swooped down after her match, whispering—in front of me—that she seemed to be in need of better management.
     
    Over breakfast, we went through the half-dozen business cards and compared recollections of those who’d slipped them into her pocket. When we reached the last, I took one look at the name and slapped it onto the table, brushing the others aside.
     
    “This one,” I said. “Call it a hunch.”
     
    “Right. The day you or Lucas act on a hunch is the day I give up spell-casting.” She lifted the card and peered at it. “Travis Nichols. Say, isn’t that—”
     
    “The manager of the young man who died last night. Davy.”
     
    “Well, he definitely needs a new fighter. He just doesn’t realize it yet.”
     
    * * * *
     
    As we headed up to our room after breakfast, I suggested ways I could be in on the interview, without actually being there.
     
    “We should have brought that new spy camera the Cabal tech lab gave Lucas,” I said. “I’ve been dying to try it out.”
     
    “Geeks and their tech toys,” Savannah said. “Let’s keep this simple, shall we? You want to be in on the interview? Come along.”
     
    “Right. Help you find a new manager after you fired me.”
     
    “I didn’t fire you. You quit. Just when my career starts to take off, and I need you more than ever. Ungrateful bitch.” She opened the hotel room door. “But just to show there’s no hard feelings , I’m