Hidden Magic by Wynter Daniels Page A

they run such a short clip with nothing new on the case? But if they did…
    I’m a dead woman.
     

Chapter Three
     
    Checking his rearview one more time to be positive the news crew hadn’t followed them, Zander steered onto the unmarked dirt road that led to Gideon’s Pond. It was a densely forested area that Freedom Bay’s teenagers had been using as a lover’s lane for as far back as he could remember.
    Last time he’d been there—aside from the day they’d pulled Hannah’s car out of the pond—he’d been seventeen or eighteen and horny as all get-out. Kind of like he was right now. No, this was very different. This wasn’t just about sex. He was fascinated by everything about Jilly. Although he couldn’t quite keep the lurid images from his dream out of his mind. Every time he thought about it his whole body tensed with need.
    Stealing a sideways glimpse of her, he wished he knew what the hell was going on in her head. She’d hardly uttered a word since they’d left his office and she’d spent the last twenty minutes either biting her nails or tapping her fingers on the armrest. But damn, she looked pretty. She wore tight-fitting black jeans with a purple lacy tank top and a sheer black sweater. Purple beaded earrings grazed her shoulders and made a jingly sound when she moved her head.
    Damn it. He was concentrating way too much on Jilly and not enough on his case. Maybe she’d hit on something here, something more useful than she had at the Saxon’s home.
    God, he was actually starting to believe what she did was real. The idea warred with everything he’d ever taken as fact about the world. There was a certain comfort in knowing the universe had definite laws like gravity and…attraction. He counted on the black and white of it, almost as much as he did the right and wrong of the laws that were his job to uphold.
    Laws his father broke.
    He shook off the thought as he reached the clearing near the edge of the pond and parked under the shade of a pine tree. “Sure you’re up for this?”
    “I’m fine. Sometimes places—just like objects—hold on to strong energies for a while. Maybe I’ll pick up on Hannah’s emotions or those of whoever was with her.” She clambered out of the car the second he turned off the motor.
    After he took off his jacket, he joined her at the shore a few feet from his front bumper. The lake was murky and green. Two egrets stood watch from a patch of tall grass on the south shore. “This is the spot where Hannah’s car entered the water.”
    Jilly crouched and took an audible breath. She patted the ground then held perfectly still, apparently getting herself into some meditative-like state. After several long minutes, she stood up and furrowed her brow. “There’s still a lot of bad energy here. Intense regret, sadness and…” She rubbed her arms as if she’d caught a chill despite the almost oppressive heat. “Rage.”
    Interesting as this was, it gave him nothing for the case. He could stare at her all day long, but he shouldn’t be wasting time chasing down false hopes for new leads. He was about to tell her he’d take her home when she touched the trunk of an oak tree and gasped.
    “There were two men here with her when…” She fisted her other hand at her side. “He was going to kill them both.”
    He stepped closer and damned if he didn’t believe she was actually seeing something. It was weird to admit to himself, but she had an otherworldly presence about her. “Who was going to kill them?”
    She squeezed her eyes tighter. “I don’t know. But both are important to her.” Suddenly it was as if an unseen force released her. She stumbled forward and he caught her in his arms.
    He held on longer than he should have. Why did he want to protect her? And from what?
    She opened her eyes and stepped out of his embrace, leaving him cold.
    The case, damn it. Concentrate on the case.
    “You saw Hannah here? And two men? What did they look