2 Witch and Famous by Eve Paludan, Stuart Sharp

disappearances. I haven’t got much more than that.”
    I sighed. “Do any of your explanations explain why Niall would have the letters he has? Why he keeps wandering off on ‘business’?”
    “Did you really expect that Niall would be squeaky clean? I mean, look at the way he lives. That house is the kind of place only a millionaire could afford.”
    I already knew Niall had money. Just look at his art collection. 
     “He works,” I pointed out. “He has an assistant for it, he’s that busy. He’s always in the middle of this deal or that deal.”
    Except that I didn’t really know what any of the business deals were all about.
    “Yes,” Fergie said. “I could probably get you the details for Sampson Holdings inside an hour if you wanted them. But did you think that he wouldn’t use his powers to influence people for that?”
    “That’s not the same,” I said. “What about the rest of it? The gifts?” I shut my eyes, remembering the things I’d found. “What are we saying? That Niall has used his powers to make people give him money?”
    Fergie shrugged. Siobhan actually looked slightly impressed. But then, she made her living as a thief. Then she frowned.
    “Everyone has their dark side, Elle,” Fergie said. “I should know that, given what I am.”
    “But have you ever killed anyone?” I shot back. “Niall has. He’s told me that much. He said it when I found out what he was.”
    “No, I haven’t done that,” Fergie admitted, “but think about when you found me, back after the accident.”
    I’d found Fergie after he’d been involved in an automobile accident on the last full moon. He’d been a snarling, injured werewolf, almost impossible to calm down in his four-legged form. It had taken a lot of empathic power to bring him down to a wagging tail and a lick on my hand.
    Fergie looked at me, his topaz-colored eyes intent on mine. “What do you think would have happened if a hiker had found me, rather than you?”
    I shook my head. “It still isn’t the same thing. All those references to mysterious deaths he’s kept. All the missing coven witches and warlocks. What if…” I could barely bring myself to say it. “What if they’re all part of the same thing? What if Niall killed all of them?”
    Siobhan was still scrabbling about under the table. “Um… I think we have a problem.”
    “Because Elle thinks her boyfriend is a mass murderer?” Fergie shot back, with plenty of sarcasm. “You don’t say.”
    “No.” Siobhan straightened up, holding something in between her thumb and forefinger. It was tiny, and obviously electronic. “I mean, we have a problem because Elle has just said that she thinks that, and…well, I think you’ve been bugged.”
     
     
     

     
     
    One thing I’d learned in my job: always keep a change of clothes nearby. Actually, I’d learned that one chasing after Fergie through the mud of a Highlands forest. So, I grabbed a spare skirt, blouse, and underwear out of a drawer of my desk, disappeared into the office stationary cupboard for a minute or two, and tried to work out what I was going to do while I changed.
    I had to get to Niall. That much was obvious. The only people I could think of who might use bugs were the coven. If the coven had bugged us, then they knew every doubt I had. They knew all about Niall’s past now, and that would just make him look even guiltier than he had before in their eyes. Maybe, maybe Rebecca would stall them, either out of whatever lingering friendship she had for me, or more likely out of fear of what I would do if she didn’t, but how long would it be before assassins got after him, the way they’d gone after me? Would some coven gunman be lining up his sights on Niall even as I sat there?
    An even harder question: should I let them?
    That thought came out of nowhere, and I shoved it away on instinct, yet it came back all too easily. I was asking myself what I should do when it came to Niall, but what