A Criminal Magic (25 page)

The group nods and mumbles in assertion.

Gunn adds, “All right, take a spin, run it through—we've got less than two days to master this.”

And then we divvy up our tasks, fill out the length of the show space, and immediately start improvising. But this rehearsal's even more exciting, 'cause Alex is right by my side. Our troupe finally breaks for the night invigorated, and I swear, I've never felt so alive after a full day of magic.

After Alex goes home and the rest of the sorcerers head upstairs, Gunn pulls me into his office. He closes the door but doesn't sit down.

“I'll be holding an important meeting in the VIP lounge tomorrow night. Some of the underbosses will be here for the show, but once the shine gets passed around, I want the hallway
fully concealed, you understand?” He opens his top drawer and pulls out one of my blood-caged bottles. “Think it's time to show folks what we've been working on.”

I look at him, confused. “I don't understand. You won't be able to open the bottle—”

“Which you and I will figure out,” Gunn interrupts me. “It's time to take another risk. If I can't tease them with what's possible now, I'm going to start losing them.” He holds the bottle up to his face, like the answer to our problem might be in the shine itself. “They'll be able to see that the shine outlasts magic's normal one-day shelf life. I'll tell them it's cursed. That it can't be opened until I have their firm support. Should buy us a few days.”

Christ, I wish I knew what Gunn is up to. He better know what the hell he's doing. Ruby and Ben, our livelihood—hell, from the way he talks,
my
life
—it all hangs on Gunn, just as much as it does on me figuring out this spell. “I'll make sure to conceal the meeting, sir.”

“And how's the new boy working out?”

“Just fine.”

“Any wrinkles, issues?”

I shake my head, still feeling the faint buzz of pride over a good day of magic. “He's a hard worker, fits in, puts his head down.”

“Good,” Gunn breathes out. “Tomorrow night is key, has a lot riding on it for the Red Den, and for you and me as well.”

“The troupe will be ready.”

Like a reflex, Gunn reaches out to pat my shoulder, but just as quickly he pulls back. He strokes his hand over his slick blond hair instead. “All right, get out of here.” He opens the door with the faint trace of a smile. “And keep thinking about that spell, Joan. Your deadline's coming faster than you think.”

THE SHOW

ALEX

I've been in a lot of nerve-racking situations these past few months, but none of what's come before has triggered the strange, almost surreal blur of emotions I feel walking back to the Red Den right now. Because tonight, in some weird twist of fate, the powers that be—Frain, McEvoy, me—have moved me like a pawn onto a stage. A stage that I'm sharing with Joan. A performance where I play an agent, playing a gangster, playing a sorcerer. For a packed house.

I cut through the busy streets, sidestep the rush of business suits wrapping their thick wool coats around them as they grasp their briefcases with leather gloves. Then I make my way through the throngs of families as they wait patiently, in the blistering cold, for the doors of Saint James on 15th Street to open for nightly mass.

I haven't been able to connect with McEvoy since I started up at the Den yesterday morning. I've barely been home except to sleep, and the one time I managed to sneak out of practice for a “smoke” and run to the nearest pay phone to let him know I'd been officially folded into the troupe, no one answered McEvoy's line. The past couple of days have been a blur of training next to Joan, learning her tricks,
complementing them. In fact, I've been trying to enjoy this hour of downtime, of just existing and nothing else—but I can't seem to do it. If I'm not figuring out the next move that gets my Unit and me closer to our score, I get restless, like I'm just wasting time and standing still.

I walk into the liquor bar that the Shaws use as a storefront cover for their Red Den. I nod at the stagehand already settled in behind the bar, walk through the magic-made wall, down two flights of stairs and into the wide performance space. My “troupe” is already clustered in front of the bar on the left side.

They stop talking once I approach, and I wonder if they've been talking about me. Maybe whispering that I'm not ready, that I'll never fill Stock's shoes. Or maybe that they suspect something's afoot, that one of them has a
feeling
, can delve into my thoughts and mine out the truths I'm desperately trying to keep locked inside.

The troupe fans out from the bar, and Joan steps forward from the center. She gives me a huge smile, and my worries start to slip away. “Don't you clean up nice.”

I feel a deep hum in my core. Because Joan doesn't just clean up nice. She looks stunning. Perfect. Her black hair falls in deep, luxurious waves around her shoulders, which are covered in an elaborate, long-sleeved lace dress, with a neckline that gives just enough away, while teasing everything else. I can't take my eyes off her, and for just a minute, I actually forget what I'm tasked with, why I'm really here.

I force myself to look down at the tuxedo Gunn tossed at me as I headed out the door, maybe an old one from the back of his closet, or an extra from the wardrobe for the troupe. “At least I
look
the part.”

But it's Ral who responds. “Joan was right, Alex, you're talented,” he says. “Don't doubt yourself. You're ready.” He and Billy have been just as transformed as Joan, have traded their
farm-friendly button-down shirts and beat-up slacks for cummerbunds and black silk vests. Grace and Rose both look dazzling too, with deep-red lips and sequined black dresses. Even Tommy, the dimwitted chap who seems to let his sister do his thinking for him, looks all polished up in a slick tuxedo with tails. He actually shoots me a begrudging smile. “Let's give them all a show they won't forget.”

“It's almost eight.” Joan takes my forearm lightly, my skin firing underneath her touch.
Stop it, Alex, focus
. “The stagehands are bringing in the mirror stand now. We should get ready.”

The troupe exchanges words of encouragement, divides, takes their respective places around the performance space, and waits for the crowd. I follow Joan over to our circular stage, the one the audience will see first and, given our trick, no doubt flock toward to watch. Our tilting mirror stand has already been placed in the center of our performance stage, but instead of a mirror inside it, it holds a long, narrow piece of glass. Joan and I each settle on opposite sides of the glass and smile at each other through it. Waiting.

You need to make sure, in the midst of all the tricks and manipulations, that you're not fooled yourself.

Keep your eyes open—for McEvoy, for Agent Frain. Something's going down, maybe something tonight. Remember your purpose—don't get distracted.

In minutes, the doors open. The stagehands have dimmed the lights, taken their places behind the liquor bar to serve a complimentary cocktail to our patrons. A staccato-like jazz begins to waft from a phonograph next to the bar. And then, in clusters, the patrons begin to pour into the space.

They come in, dressed in their evening best—polished, powerful-looking older couples, furs and gems on the ladies, fedoras on the men. Crowds of youngish professionals and new-money gangster types, each one of them willing to throw away fifteen
dollars to get lost in magic for a night. They burst through the door hungrily, flood around the bar, buzz around the stagehands.
Soon they'll be on to us.

Joan takes a long look at me through the glass. Despite the confident smile I've managed to glue on, perspiration starts dotting my forehead, and my throat is tight. I can feel the jump of my heart through my borrowed silk vest. I've been onstage a long time in one sense, for months, played all sorts of venues. But something about being under these hot lights with the music playing and the audience closing in, it starts to turn me inside out. Almost like it's too fitting, too much.

“Alex, you're going to be great,” Joan stage-whispers around the mirror stand. “The first show was hard for me, too.”

“It's nerves. I'm fine.” I flash her that false smile again.

But I can't seem to calm down. Working over Howie, working over Win, working over McEvoy—it was careful work, nuanced, and personal. This is a performance in the truest sense, big and bold, and with a huge audience. My eyes scan the room for the underbosses I'm here to tail, to spy on—
can anyone tell I'm here to bring this Den to its knees? Can anyone see right through me on this stage?

Christ, I actually might vomit—

“Alex,” Joan says as she walks quickly around the glass stand dividing us. Now she's inches away. Her eyes flit to the crowd at the bar. “You just need to focus, okay? Don't make this about more than it is, like proving McEvoy wrong.
You are talented
. It was his loss, letting you go.” She grabs my hand and I puff out a breath. She thinks I've got stage-fright. That I'm paralyzed over what happens if McEvoy's discarded street sorcerer can't earn his way to stay working at the Den. She's as right as she is wrong.

“I understand what you're feeling”—Joan drops her voice another octave and squeezes my hand—“like you're on your last legs, like everything's riding on one night. But just focus
on one step at a time, all right? Keep your focus on me, me and you, right here, right now, just like practice.” Her eyes are warm, encouraging, almost needy. Like she's depending on me.

Just her and me.

Joan is right, I need to focus. Alex the agent doesn't survive another day without Alex the performer.
All I need to think about is this trick, this show.

Joan flashes me one more encouraging look, drops my hand, and walks back across our circle. A small crowd has gathered around us, and I hear whispers, speculation about the new boy onstage with Joan, attempting a trick they've never seen before.

I can do this, just like everything I've managed to do to land me on this stage.

And then Joan and I begin. We approach the stand, stop when we're a few inches away from it, and press our palms against our respective sides of the glass. At the same time, we take a breath and whisper, “
Capture and divide, befit to enchant
.”

The glass trembles, glimmers just the slightest shade brighter before it settles, spellbound, in between us, as a double-sided trick. But unlike a double-sided trick that links two objects into one, like two doors into a passageway, this is a separation: it takes one object and divides it into two. On my side, the image of Joan is now trapped in the glass, my easel to use and manipulate, like a mirror that gives me back the wrong reflection. On her side, my image in the glass will remain fixed and provide my own replica as her canvas. The audience immediately starts murmuring, some of the polished, painted women in the front getting off their benches to make sure they see both sides.

“It's some kind of double replica—”

“He's got her, she's got him—”

“Did you see the other side?”

The excited whispers encourage me, empower me. I can no longer see Joan herself, just her replica, who smiles at me, frozen,
inside my side of the glass. I slowly raise my left hand to touch the image of her hair. The thick black waves spark and then turn red as fire, her hair churning into a sea of bright auburn.

I hear the crowd gasp, laugh with delight behind me.

Joan must be meeting my move with her own embellishments to my image on the other side. I can't see what she's doing, but the crowd of women behind her look at her side of the glass, then peer around to me. “She somehow made him better,” I hear the amused whispers.

I turn back to my own work in progress, touch the glass where Joan's lips are smirking at me, and with a wave, I change them to purple. Joan responds with another embellishment on her side. I carefully touch the shoulder of her replica's dress. It's just a replica, but even still, I find myself blushing with the gesture. At my touch, the replica's entire black, lacy dress transforms into a pure, sky-blue shimmer.

“Time's up,” Joan says softly.

I step a few feet away from the glass, and as we've rehearsed, we switch places to see what the other has created. I laugh out loud. My replica has hair as colorful as our upcoming dawn ­finale—a nice touch and teaser from Joan—a shimmering purple suit, skin the color of eggplant. I look more than magical. The reflection is electric. I wonder if this is how Joan somehow sees me.

It gives me a strange and wonderful sensation, thinking about whether it is.

I look around. We have at least fifty patrons of the hundred fifty surrounding us. I get a heady surge of pride, but for the first time in a long time, I don't ground myself. Instead I just enjoy who I'm with and revel in this chance to showcase what I can do—regardless of what it's ultimately for.

Joan and I pinch out our own replicas, and then we spellbind the mirror once more, run the trick through once, twice, four more times as some of our initial patrons flitter off to other
performance circles, but many stay camped right in their seats. Before I know it, the music changes, becomes more festive, lively, and the clock hanging above the double-door entrance chimes nine. Joan rounds the glass stand and joins me on my side.

“I forgot to tell you about this part,” she whispers. There's excitement in her voice; she knows we've done well. “The finale will start in about twenty minutes. This is intermission, where we interact with the audience, flirt a little, get them excited for the finale.”

I smirk at her, emboldened by our trick together. “Flirt how?”

“Like a little parlor trick for a patron or two, like your compass manipulation, or that flower move you pulled on me in the hall.”

“That wasn't a move,” I say. “That was for you.”

It's the right answer, because she blushes, smiles at the floor. “Whatever you say, Alex Danfrey.” She steps around the benches and makes her way into the crowd. “Go after the ladies. They'll love you. I'm sure you'll do just fine.”

She disappears into the crowd of tuxes and evening gowns and is swallowed whole by hungry patrons who begin to chat her up, angling for a little magic for themselves. I take a scan around at the packed crowd of the auditorium. One hundred and fifty people move through the performance space in all directions, surrounding the sorcerers, or milling around the stages. I do a quick scan for familiar faces—for McEvoy's main men, his underbosses, for anyone I'm actually here to track—but I don't recognize a soul.

So I target my sights on an older woman, fiftyish, painted, all dolled up with money and privilege. She's got a smile on, but it doesn't reach her eyes. As I walk toward her, ready to fashion her a rose, put a real smile on that painted face, Howie Matthews appears out of nowhere, stops right in front of me, blocking my way.

I'm shocked still at seeing him. It's like a window to my past
opening, sobering me, blowing in a stiff, uncomfortable breeze in the middle of this warm madness.

He grins. “You look good in a costume, Alex.”

“It's good to see you, Howie,” I reply, recovering. “Been a long time. Too long.”

He shrugs as he looks around the performance space. “I've been busy.”

“You just here for the show?” I say slowly. The pull of my hunt is now back in full force, tugging inside me once more.
Howie's a small-time player, just another guy on Win's ride-alongs. He wouldn't be in on anything involving the higher-ups . . . would he?
“Nice to see you get a night off.”

“I'm moving up in the world, Danfrey,” he says with an annoying little pedantic smirk. He gives me a long, exaggerated once-over. “Too bad I can't say the same for both of us.”

Like a reflex from a phantom limb, I almost tell him that despite what he thinks he knows about me, it doesn't scratch the surface—I'm not the half-rate gangster chump he thinks McEvoy has discarded, who he needs to believe he's eclipsed.

But I manage to quash the urge. Because those days, of making sure the world knows how important Alex Danfrey is, they're over. There's just too much at stake. I can't afford to have any enemies lurking in the corners of this place.