The Magician & the Fool - Excerpt
“What’s wrong, sweetie?” Bethany asked, moving to sit next to Kyrah on the tiny little bench in the tiny, little dressing room.
Kyrah automatically scooted out of the way so that Bethany could not touch her.
“Right. No touching. No hugs.” Bethany recited Kyrah’s rules. “Not even when you’re crying?”
Kyrah shook her head, staring at her lap. She was struggling not to cry in front of her friend.
“Just tell me what’s wrong,” urged Bethany. “Also, I need to check your body for gaping wounds.”
Kyrah inadvertently let out a snort of laughter. “Bethany please. I can’t deal with anything tonight...not even for you.”
“Well, if you don’t tell me what’s going on immediately, I’m going to sit here telling dirty jokes until you either laugh or we both get fired.”
Kyrah buried her face in her hands and no words of any sort emerged. Only another muffled grunt of a woman desperately trying not to cry. The worst crying of all was the crying that you tried not to do... it just sounded awful.
“Okay,” said Bethany. “You asked for it. Here come the dirty jokes. You know I always flub the punchline. Don’t say I didn’t warn you. Three nuns and a raccoon walk into a bar…”
“Stop, stop... I’ll tell you.”
“You saw a ghost!” cried Bethany.
“What?” Kyrah stared at her.
“Is it worse than seeing a ghost?”
Kyrah made a huffy noise. She was beginning to sound exasperated. That was good! If she was exasperated with Bethany, then Kyrah wasn’t focused on how sad she was about whatever had made her scared and sad.
“Yes, Bethany,” Kyrah emphasized. “It is worse than seeing a ghost. I agreed to get married.”
“Do you love him?”
Kyrah shot her a dirty look.
“Dumb question,” Bethany said. “Obviously if you loved him, you wouldn’t be crying. Right. Unless you’re marrying a ghost and you’re crying because love matches never work out between a ghost and a human…” She broke off because Kyrah was looking miserable again and not even listening to Bethany’s nonsense.
“I’m sorry, Kyrah. I won’t interrupt anymore. Please tell me. Tell me what is going on and why you would agree to get married when you obviously don’t want to.”
Kyrah explained the situation. Bethany could hardly believe her ears. It was so fantastic, it was like one of the crazy things that Bethany invented off the top of her head just to make people laugh.
“Why would you agree to this?” Bethany finally asked.
“Obviously, for the money. You know what they do to you in this town if you owe someone a lot of money and you can’t come up with it.”
“You mean your mom needs the money.”
“Father can’t control Mother’s gambling addiction anymore,” Kyrah admitted. “She’s done this to us before, but this is the worst it’s ever been. I’m afraid they might even kill her if she doesn’t turn over what she owes to them. Then this guy shows up and tells me there’s a way I can make all the problems disappear. All I have to do is… Well. Like I told you.”
Kyrah hitched a breath. “Mother was standing right there when he said this, and I couldn’t refuse. She looked at me. You should’ve seen the way she looked at me. I felt I might as well drive the knife into her heart myself if I didn’t agree. But now the time is come, and I just can’t. I realized I’d rather kill myself.”
“There will be no talk of killing yourself!” Bethany commanded. “None whatsoever.”
“I wouldn’t do it before the wedding. Then Mother wouldn’t get the money.”
“Kyrah!” Bethany banged her head on the wall. She flipped around and faced her friend. “Our boss, Alephander Guiscard, the billionaire Las Vegas superstar Magician, really asked to marry you?”
“He didn’t ‘ask’ me. He sent his manager, or his fixer, or whatever one calls his smarmy minion, Mr McGee, to blackmail my parents into selling me to him. They signed the papers right in front of me.”
“What makes you think it would be so terrible? After all, Alephander is one sexy beast. He’s gorgeous, rich, famous...”
“A façade.” Kyrah shuddered. “He’s horrible.”
“He might be fantastic.”
“Don’t count on that,” Kyrah said darkly. She lowered her voice. “Do you know that he’s been married six times before? And every single one of those other wives disappeared without a trace. Just—poof—vanished!”
“Like magic?” blinked Bethany.
“It’s not funny!”
“No, not if you’re going to be Wife Number Seven. When do you have to go?”
“I’m supposed to go up to the roof right now.”
“Do you mean after what you agreed to do, they still made you work your waitress shift? Unbelievable!”
Kyrah smiled wanly at Bethany’s outrage. “I asked to work. I hoped it would keep my mind off what was coming afterward. Bethany, I shouldn’t have told you any of this. I know how impulsive you are, and I don’t want you to get in trouble. I should’ve stayed in my hotel room. And done it there.”
“Done it? Killed yourself, you mean?! HELL NO. I told you, just get those self-destructive thoughts out of your head right now. I have a solution for all of this.”
“Bethany, you don’t have the money. And you’re not gonna take on the mob, or whoever the hell these guys are. They’re powerful. Powerful in ways I don’t think you can even understand.”
“Suuuuure,” said Bethany. “But I am going to help you.”
“Bethany, you better not be suggesting what I suspect…”
“If what you suspect is that I am secretly a lethal government-trained assassin, with a Sixth Dan Black Belt in Krav Maga, and that I intend to go kill all these guys who threatened you, then no, it’s not what you suspect. But if you suspect that I’m going to switch places with you, then hell, yes, girlfriend, that’s exactly what I’m going to do.”
Kyrah started to argue.
“Don’t talk,” said Bethany. “Don’t say another word. Your job now is to keep quiet. Mum’s the word. I don’t know if ‘MUM’ is really a word. It means ‘mom’ in Britain but what does that have to do with keeping quiet? My mom talks constantly, like me... Anyway, never mind. You’re going to go back up to your hotel room, with my purse and my driver’s license. Gather anything important and leave everything else behind. You are going to get a taxi and leave Las Vegas right now and get as far from here as you possibly can. That way if they don’t accept the switch, you’ll have a head start. And stop looking at me like that. They will accept the switch. I’m going to take your purse, and your ID, and I’m just gonna pass myself off as you. No one will be the wiser.”
Kyrah shook her head. “Bethany, it will never work. I have black hair, pasty skin, and weird grey eyes—”
“Lavender, really. You have gorgeous purple eyes. I’ve always been jealous—”
“You have blonde hair, a gorgeous suntan, and the biggest, brightest teal eyes I’ve ever seen in my life. You fill out the leotard while I resemble an ironing board. We look nothing alike.”
“So what? The dude has never seen either of us. End of story. Give me your purse and go.”
When Kyrah tried to object one more time, Bethany said wagged her finger, miming sealed lips. “Nhu uh uh! MUM.”
A woman shouted into the dressing room. “Anyone heading up to the roof for the Colorado flight, this is your last call!”
Kyrah went white. “That’s my cue.”
“No, that’s my cue,” Bethany said.
“I can’t let you do take my place, Bethany,” Kyrah said. “You have all these naïve ideas about the Magician, but Alephander Guiscard is not a good man. You’d be in danger.”
“Gosh, you’re right,” said Bethany. “Fine, I’ll just help you get dressed...hurry and take off that leotard...quick, hand it to me...c’mon, they’re waiting!”
Hurriedly, Kyrah stripped off her costume. Bethany snatched it out of her hands; at the same time, Bethany also grabbed Kyrah’s street clothes, leaving the Kyrah naked in the stall.
“You can’t go without clothes, can you?” whooped Bethany. “I’m going in your place, bestie, and you can’t stop me!”
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