Page 58 of Sweetwater and the Witch

“That’s because Collins did a very great job of making the team look good. Your nephew was a last-minute addition. After the takedown he was immediately yanked off the task force and assigned to another project. He didn’t attend the debriefings, so he doesn’t know that Collins was careful to keep me out of the final report.”

“Because it was his fault you got into trouble?”

“Not entirely,” Ravenna said. “I have to accept some responsibility. I made the classic mistake of volunteering to act as bait.”

“Never a good idea.”

“The idea was that the task force would monitor me and move in if and when Fitch’s goons tried to grab me. There were a couple of major snafus. The result was that I got kidnapped and locked in a cage in the Underworld. I was scheduled to be the guest of honor at a little ceremony that was supposed to conclude with me getting flatlined by Fitch. The team was late. Took a wrong turn in the tunnels. I had to rescue myself, with Harriet’s help.”

“Shit,” Ethan whispered.

Ravenna smiled at the sleeping dust bunny. “It wasn’t all bad. That’s how Harriet and I met.”

Ethan studied her. “Why did you volunteer to act as bait?”

“Because I knew exactly how to make myself look like a witch online, of course. That was where Fitch did his hunting—his own kind of profiling—online. I made sure he found me.”

“I get it.” Ethan thought for a moment. “You said Fitch is delusional. Did he really believe he was on a mission to hunt witches?”

“I’m convinced of it. He was—is—a powerful talent. One of the monsters. They’ve got him on drugs to keep him from using his psychic senses. He’s in a locked ward at a high-security para-psych hospital for the criminally insane. In fact, that’s where he spent most of his adult life. He escaped last year and was free long enough to set himself up in the witch hunting business.”

“What about his followers? Also delusional?”

“Depends how you definedelusional,” Ravenna said. “From what I could tell they were typical cult recruits, the type who would follow any charismatic figure. Fitch just happened to be the one who came along. They are in jail now, but when they get out they will probably end up in thrall to some other psychopathic con artist.”

“After that takedown you decided to go into the matchmaking business?”

“Yep.”

“Think you’ll ever go back to profiling?” he asked.

“No. It’s not for me, not full-time at any rate. I can see that now. My only regret about leaving is that something didn’t feel right about my last case.”

“Jeff said the witch hunter case was a big success.”

“It was.” Ravenna brightened. “What’s more, my dad told me that thanks to a Chastain aura balancer, the doctors were able to unfreeze the paranormal senses of the three women Fitch had flatlined.”

“I hadn’t heard that. Great news.”

“Yes, it is.”

Ethan studied her in the pulsing glow of the wedding chapel lights. “So why aren’t you satisfied with the conclusion of the case?”

“According to my profile of him, Fitch was delusional and charismatic, but he was not organized. He was in and out of asylums throughout his youth and wound up in one permanently when he became an adult. He could not cope with the details of normal life. He was scary because of his talent but he was also disordered. So much so that he couldn’t finish school or drive a car or pay his bills. He could not tell the difference between reality and his delusions.”

“Why doesn’t that information fit with your profile?”

Ravenna looked at him, her eyes shadowed. “Not only did Fitch engineer his escape, he managed to get his cult up and running in a matter of weeks. His Order of the Guardians was small, but well organized. Efficient. Disciplined.”

“Do you think one of the other cult members was managing things for him?”

“Maybe.”

“Did you advise the task force of your theory?”

“I told Collins that I didn’t think we had a complete picture of the cult. He said it didn’t matter because everyone involved was going to be locked up.” Ravenna moved a hand in a short arc. “He’s right. They’re all in prison or, in the case of Fitch, an asylum.”

“Good to know,” Ethan said. “You never told me how you saved Harriet and yourself when the task force was delayed.”

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