Layla sat, and settled the baby goat on her lap before reaching into her Bruno Magli Maddalena suede bag for a tissue and patting her face. Liz could almost feel Cia’s covetousness as her twin slid onto the bench seat, reestablishing the arm-to-arm, skin-to-skin contact. Of course, even if an Everhart could afford a bag that went for more than two thousand dollars new, none of the sisters would buy it. Maybe a vintage one in need of TLC and a little magical cleanup. Everharts were notoriously cheap. Covetous, but cheap. Liz nearly smiled.
“My mother is Evelyn McMann. She called me the day before yesterday on her way home from work. We ended the call when she locked the door behind her, just like always. It’s this”—Layla waved one hand in the air, as if searching for a word—“safety thing we do when Mom works late. She works for a developer, and late-night business meetings are common, as you might imagine.”
Liz had no idea what hours developers kept, but she nodded, understanding security measures.
“Her boss called the house the next morning. Mom had missed an important meeting. Which she never did. Never.”
Liz had to wonder if that had been a problem to Layla growing up. Maybe growing up second to the job.
“So I went by there. Mom’s house looked perfect, as always. Except her clothes, the ones she wore when we had lunch the day before, were scattered everywhere, like they’d been thrown. Carelessly. There is nothing careless about my mother. So I went to the police.” She wiped her face again. “And they made me wait until this morning to file a missing-person report. They think she was having a fling and took off with some man,” Layla said, her tone bitter. “My mother doesn’t have time for a man in her life. Trust me. She works fourteen hours a day. Every day. Always has.”
Cia nudged her, and Liz knew her twin was thinking along the same lines. Abandonment issues, much? It might explain a lot about Layla, growing up. Not that having issues made them forgive her. Not gonna happen.
“Her keys? Purse? Cell?” Liz asked.
“All on the floor with her clothes.” Fresh tears gathered in Layla’s eyes and she bent over the goat. It nudged her jaw and licked her chin. “I don’t know what to do. Can you help me? Can you find her?”
Cia and Liz shared looks that said, No. Yes. No. Maybe. No.
Layla eased the goat back into the crook of her arm, placed the expensive pocketbook on the table, and opened the flap. “I can pay.” She pulled out a stack of hundred-dollar bills and pushed it across the table toward them. Neither twin looked at the money, but they both saw it. More money than they made in tips in a month. Maybe two.
Cia’s magic rose again, like a wave at high tide, hard and powerful and angry. She leaned forward and said, “We can try. Trying is a flat fee of a thousand. Success is another two thousand. Nonnegotiable.” When Liz started to debate the amount, Cia said, “That’s Jane Yellowrock’s fee for a PI job. And she doesn’t have magic. And”—she looked hard at Layla—“if we get your mom back, the fee is required, no matter what shape your mom is in.”
Liz sucked in a slow, painful breath. Layla gasped, her face paling. The comment was blunt enough to be worthy of Jane Yellowrock herself, and the rogue-vampire hunter was honest to the point of being brusque. Cia meant that Layla’s mom could be dead. She was the gentler twin. Usually. Suddenly Liz remembered what it had felt like to be the brunt of Layla’s cruelty—the goading, the taunting. And that one time . . . In that single indrawn breath, the memory descended, full, complete, and awful.
“Boadecia,” Layla had hissed. “Stupid name for a stupid girl. Some people think the twins have some kind of power. I just think they’re ugly.” A shove, hidden from the teachers by the group of girls surrounding them. “Stupid and ugly. Ugly red hair and ugly freckles. When Mother Nature messes up, she messes up bad. She made two of them.” Another shove. A yank of hair.
The moon had been full that day, making Cia less stable, more reckless, like stormy waves on an icy ocean, pushed by a full-moon tide. Fear had grown up inside Liz, like frozen rocks hanging on a cliff face, ready to fall.
Not fear of the taunting girls, but fear of themselves, fear of losing control. Fear that one of them would erupt and pull the other into her magical reaction through the twin bond. Fear that they would misuse their gifts and pay the price. Then the bell had sounded. They had gotten away, barely, before one of them lost control and they hurt the girls.
Liz blew out her breath. Yeah. Okay. Cia was right. That girl who hurt them back in high school was the woman facing them. To an enemy, their services shouldn’t be offered as a gift freely given, the way they were supposed to be for one in need. “What she said. That’s our price.”