Turn Coat by Jim Butcher Page B

that.”
    Morgan snorted.
    I ignored him. “Go on,” I told Molly. “Talk.”
    “He just . . . I just got so angry,” Molly said. “He made me so upset. I couldn’t help it.” She gestured to Mouse. “And then he just . . . just flattened me. And he wouldn’t let me up, and he wouldn’t let Morgan move, either.”
    “Seems to me that the dog had better sense than you,” I said. I glanced up at Morgan. “Either of you. You’re supposed to stay still. You wanna kill yourself?”
    “It was a reaction to her approach,” Morgan said calmly. “I survived it.”
    I shook my head. “And you,” I said to Molly. “How many months have we spent working on your emotional control?”
    “I know, I know,” she said. “It’s never good to use magic in anger. I know, Harry.”
    “You’d better know it,” I said quietly. “If it’s so easy to get a rise out of you that one bitter old washed-up Warden can blow your O-ring, the first reactionary goomba to come along looking for an excuse to take you out is going to put you in a casket, claim it was self-defense, and get away with it.”
    Morgan bared his teeth in an expression only remotely resembling a smile. “You’d know all about that, Dresden, wouldn’t you?”
    “You son of a bitch!” Molly snarled and whirled toward Morgan, seizing a candlestick and hefting it like a club. The candle on it tumbled to the floor.
    Morgan sat perfectly still with that same gruesome smile on his face, never flinching.
    I lurched forward and grabbed Molly’s arm on her backswing, an instant before she would have brought the heavy candlestick crashing down on Morgan’s skull. Molly was strong for a woman, and I had to make a pretty serious effort to hold her back, my fingers digging into her wrist, while I snagged her around the waist with my other arm and bodily hauled her away from Morgan.
    “No!” I demanded. “Dammit, Molly, no!” I actually had to lift her feet off the ground to turn her away from the bedroom. I tightened my grip on her wrist and said, “Drop the candlestick, Molly. Now.”
    She let out a sound full of anger and laced with a little pain, and the heavy candlestick dropped to the floor, making a dull thud as it hit the rug-covered concrete. The air around her was alive with power, buzzing against my skin like a thousand tiny sparks of static electricity in a dry winter. “He can’t talk to you like that,” Molly snarled.
    “Think,” I told her, my voice hard but measured. “Remember the lessons. They’re just words, Molly. Look for the thought behind them. He set you up for this reaction. You’re allowing him to make you embarrass me.”
    Molly opened her mouth on an angry retort, then forced her mouth closed and turned her face away from me. She remained rigidly tense, and after a fuming half minute, she said, her voice more calm, “I’m sorry.”
    “Don’t be sorry,” I replied as gently as I could. “Be disciplined. You can’t afford to let them rattle you. Not ever.”
    She took another deep breath, exhaled, and then I felt her begin to ease down, relaxing her mental grasp on the power she’d instinctively prepared. “Okay,” she said. “Okay, Harry.”
    I let her go slowly. She began to rub at her right wrist with her other hand. I winced a little on her behalf. I thought I’d left bruises on her skin.
    “Do me a favor,” I said. “Take Mouse and grab the mail.”
    “I’m fine. I don’t need—” she began. Then she stopped herself, shook her head, and looked at Mouse.
    The big dog heaved himself up, walked over to the basket next to the door, grasped his leather lead in his jaws, and dragged it out. Then he looked up at Molly, his head cocked to one side, his tail wagging hopefully.
    Molly let out a rueful little laugh and knelt down to hug the big dog. She clipped his lead onto his collar, and the two of them left.
    I turned and eyed the candle. It had spilled hot wax onto a genuine Navajo rug on the floor, but it