Conjured

She swallowed hard and knew she couldn’t tell him about her memory loss. Her eyes shifted away from his, and she focused on the clock. Seven thirty. She remembered the librarian, Patti Langley, saying her shift would start at nine o’clock. She must have been switched to an earlier shift. So much could have changed.

She felt Malcolm’s hand on her shoulder. “I don’t mean to pressure you, Eve. Lou’s methods, though … I don’t think either of us wants a repeat of that. We have to make forward progress.”

She nodded. She couldn’t think of any other response. She thought of the hospital—the drip of the IV, the beep of the monitors, the pain that gouged like a fork in her veins, and his orders for more, more, more. “I’d better … I have work.” She put her hand on the door handle.

He squeezed her shoulder. “Don’t let anyone know that you’ve forgotten again.”

She froze. Her heart fluttered in her chest. Air roared in her ears. She hadn’t … He couldn’t … “How did you know?” Her voice sounded thin.

“I know you,” he said simply.

“How often …?” She licked her lips. She knew this had happened before, in the agency, in the hospital, but she didn’t think it had happened here before. Maybe it had.

“Often enough.”

“Why?”

He hesitated, as if considering many answers. “Your magic makes your mind unstable,” he said at last.

“Can you fix me?”

The pity in his eyes made her throat feel tight. She blinked fast, her vision suddenly blurry, watery. “We’re trying,” he said. “All of this … Believe me, we’re trying.”

“Will my memories come back?”

“Maybe. I don’t know.”

“What do I do?” She meant about her memory, herself, the case, the lost weeks, all of it.

“Lie,” he said. “Lie to everyone until you know the truth.”

Chapter Six

Eve stood in front of the sliding glass door. Inside, the library lobby was dark and empty. Weakened by clouds, sunlight seeped through the windows in a pale haze. It wasn’t enough to alleviate the shadows that lay in thick gray blankets over the circulation desk, the bookshelves, and the benches.

A sign on the door read LIBRARY OPENS 8:00 A.M. CLOSES 9:00 P.M.

Malcolm must have made a mistake. He’d left her outside a deserted library.

She checked the parking lot. He was gone. The lot was empty except for one black SUV parked at the back of the lot, far enough away that she couldn’t see inside it. It could be a WitSec car. Or it could belong to anyone, watching her.

Don’t, she told herself. She couldn’t freak herself out continuously. She had to trust that Malcolm wouldn’t make a mistake with her safety. He and Aunt Nicki had deemed this place safe. She had to trust that and trust them.

Deliberately, Eve turned back to the library door—and saw a face, ghostly, in the glass. Every muscle in her body froze.

“You know, on average, we can remember seven items in short-term memory for thirty seconds,” a voice said behind her. Zach. It was his voice, and it was his reflection in the glass door. He was holding a paper bag, and he was smiling cheerfully at her reflection. Her body slowly unfroze.

“Oh?” she said.

“Of course, that doesn’t make sense,” Zach said. “If I had eight friends in a room, I wouldn’t automatically forget the eighth one. So I’m thinking that it must only be true in an experiment; like, show a guy twenty objects for one second and he’ll remember seven of them thirty seconds later. Anyway, point is that this is always your eighth item.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out a snarl of keys. He jingled it. “You forgot your key again, didn’t you?”

She forced her lips to smile. “Guess I did.”

“Mmm,” he said, as if he understood. She wondered if he could understand. She must have seen him every day since her last clear memory. They must have talked. But about what?

“Shall we go in?” he asked.

“Oh. All right.” She continued to stare at him, as if by committing his face to memory she could elicit other memories. He shifted uncomfortably under her stare.

“Okay. Um, excuse me.” He reached around her and stuck his key in the lock. Close, she felt his breath on her cheek. He blushed, and the red spread across his cheeks to his ears. She wondered if she’d ever kissed him. Why did I think that? she wondered. She felt her face heat up, as if she were blushing too, and she stepped quickly out of his way.

The door slid open.

She followed him inside, and the door slid shut behind them, erasing the sounds of outside that she hadn’t even noticed: cars on the road, wind in the trees, a lawnmower hum in the distance. In the lobby, the clock ticked extra loud in the silence.