Page 116 of Black Willow Witch
‘It-it doesn’t,’ Bennet stammered.
‘You have a woman of your own. What would you do to a man who put her through that shit?’
Bennet squeezed his eyes shut and turned his face away. ‘I-I don’t know.’
‘Probably nothing,’ Emberlyn hedged. ‘He’s only brave when he has backup, Rip. I’m pretty sure the only reason he held onto his daughter earlier was because he figured I wouldn’t hurt him.’
Bennet’s eyes popped open and landed on her. ‘That’s not tr—’ He made a choking sound as her wolf snapped a hand tight around his throat.
Ripper’s upper lip quivered. ‘I didn’t say you could talk to her, did I?’
His face going redder and redder, Bennet flapped his hands near the large palm still squeezing his neck.
‘You might want to let him breathe, Rip,’ she said.
‘Why?’ A careless question.
She pursed her lips. ‘I actually can’t think of a reason.’
‘You didn’t answer my question before,’ Ripper said to him. ‘What made you think you could get away with it?’ He loosened his hold on Bennet’s throat.
The witch coughed and heaved in mounds of air. ‘I-I wasn’t thinking anything,’ he eventually replied. ‘Not really. M-my emotions were running high – my daughter had been attacked, my whole family was a wreck over it and all I could think was that she could be dead. At the time, it just felt like only Emberlyn could be the culprit.’
Ripper squinted. ‘At the time? Not now?’
Bennet hesitated, dropping his gaze. ‘Having had a chance to reflect on things, no, I don’t now believe she was involved,’ he begrudgingly admitted. ‘Reena was right in all she said. Besides, Emberlyn has an alibi. You. It couldn’t possibly have been her.’ He slid his gaze briefly to her. ‘I apologize for my behavior earlier,’ he said, stiff. ‘I . . . I was not myself.’
‘No, I think you were,’ said Ripper. ‘I think you felt bold enough to be that person to the fullest extent because the woman you’d targeted was all alone.’
Bennet shook his head. ‘It wasn’t like that.’
Emberlyn personally didn’t agree. ‘Who was the first to suggest that I must have sent the Rabid?’
‘It was . . .’ He trailed off, his expression turning shifty. ‘I don’t recall.’
A growl rumbled out of Ripper.
‘Actually, come to think of it’ – Bennet cleared his throat – ‘it was Hank.’
That fit. He’d pushed to the front of the crowd earlier, hadn’t he?
‘Reena disagreed, and we all conceded that she’d made valid points,’ Bennet told Ripper. ‘But after she left, Hank insisted it could only be Emberlyn. The things he was saying made so much sense at the time. Looking back, I don’t understand.’ His brow furrowing, he gave his head a little shake. ‘It was like . . . like someone used magick to manipulate me – maybe evenallof us.’ His eyes went wide at the idea. ‘That must have been what happened.’
Hmm, it was possible that a spell had been cast that put the angry crowd into a suggestible frame of mind so that ‘seeds’ could be planted. But it wouldn’t haveforcedthem to blame Emberlyn for the crime, or forced them to circle and attack her.
‘Yes, we were bespelled,’ Bennet proclaimed, eagerly latching onto the explanation to evade her wolf’s wrath. ‘Taking her on, even as a group, isn’t something we’d normally do. Especially when she has your protection. This explains it.’
Ripper cocked his head. ‘So what you’re saying is that it wasn’t your fault?’
‘Yes, yes. I’m not to blame. There was magickal interference.’
‘I should excuse what you did, then? I should let you go?’
‘Yes, you—’ Bennet choked again as Ripper went back to strangling him one-handed. Fear lived and breathed in the witch’s eyes, his face again turning splotchy and red.
‘You might want to ease up on the scare factor,’ Emberlyn advised Ripper. ‘I heard he has a weak bladder.’
‘You care if he pisses himself?’ Ripper asked her.
