Ritual Magic

quieter he got, the worse things were.
    Susan sighed. “Thank God for Grandmother . . . and that’s not something I say every day. But no one else could’ve gotten Aunt Mequi out of there so quick. She sure wasn’t listening to me.”
    When the restaurant doors swung open, both sisters turned to look. It was the CSI squad. “My people, not yours,” Lily said. “I have to go.”
    “I need to get back to her anyway.”
    “Over here,” Lily called. She wasn’t sure what good CSI would do. Magical evidence was hard for nulls to collect even if they could spot it, and it couldn’t be tested in a lab. Which reminded her that she needed to call Ruben. Cullen was good, the best, but the courts only accepted magical evidence from accredited covens, plus there were some spells that needed to be a group effort. She had to get the coven the Unit used out here, and she needed to report.
    Lily pulled out her phone and moved toward the squad so she could tell them to hold off until her magical consultant checked the scene.
    Ruben answered right away. While she briefed him, two more patrol cars arrived; she broke off to direct the officers to start getting names and addresses of the sixty-odd customers in the main dining room. The ambulance arrived just as she finished reporting.
    “That does explain the disruption I felt in the probabilities,” Ruben said. “Which in turn suggests that Robert Friar may be involved.”
    Ruben was an off-the-charts precog. Friar was an off-the-charts patterner. The two Gifts worked differently, but Ruben usually sensed it when Friar was manipulating the probabilities in a major way. “Does that translate into a hunch you can share?”
    “I’m afraid not, but the level of perturbation suggests this event may have wider repercussions than is immediately apparent. Lily, I’m going to allow you to remain in charge for now because you’re on-scene, but you can’t keep the lead. Not when the victim is your mother.”
    No. No, he was right. She was too damn angry. “I understand.”
    “Ida will send the coven to you ASAP. I’m going to send Abel Karonski. He’s in Kansas City tying up the last dangling ends of a case, but that can be left to the junior agent he’s been training. He should be there tomorrow. I’ll have him contact you.”
    “Okay.”
    “I’m very sorry about your mother.”
    The EMTs were wheeling an empty gurney across the dining room. “Yeah,” she said, her voice thick. “Me, too.”
    She’d barely disconnected when her phone gave a drumroll. That was Cullen’s ring tone. She answered. “Yes.”
    “I’m pulling into the parking lot now.”
    “Good.” She glanced at her watch, frowned. Maybe thirty, thirty-five minutes had passed since Rule had called him. “How did you get here so fast?”
    “Rule said to hurry. I need you to have a chat with the guy who pulled in behind me. Surly-looking fellow. He’s got a flashing red light on top of his car.”
    The patrol officer did not want to leave Cullen free to wreak havoc on the streets of San Diego. At the very least, he wanted to explain to Lily in detail how many traffic violations Cullen had racked up. “Officer, you can hang around and write tickets for Mr. Seaborne all night if you like, but you will have to wait to deliver them. I need my consultant
now
. Cullen, come with me.”
    As she turned and started for the front door of the Golden Dragon, she heard the officer mutter, “Goddamn feds.”
    “Rule said your mother suffered some kind of magical attack,” Cullen said, keeping pace beside her. “What do you know?”
    “Too damn little. She thinks she’s twelve years old and that today is February twenty-fourth, 1968. I confirmed that magic was involved, but it . . . no, I want to find out what you see before I tell you what I felt.”
    He grunted.
    The double doors opened just as they reached them. Mark held one of them wide. Rule held the other. Rule looked at her and nodded in a way meant to be reassuring. The gurney the EMTs pushed out those double doors was no longer empty. Susan walked beside it. Grandmother and Lily’s father followed. His face was tight and pale and she didn’t think he saw anything but the gurney carrying his wife.
    Lily stopped moving. Someone had scrubbed some of the mascara streaks off her mother’s face, but she still had the raccoon look going. Beneath the smeared makeup, her eyes looked lost. Bewildered.
    “Hey,” Cullen said as he stepped up to