Excerpt from The Lightness of Hands by Jeff Garvin, plus links to reviews, author biography & more

I could only keep his gaze for a few more moments, and then I turned away. "Why did you come find me?"

"You were on my balcony."

He was right, and I was making a total ass of myself.

"I'm kidding," he said. "I did come to find you. I just ... I don't know. It's been a long time. I wanted to talk to you."

I felt that not-unpleasant warmth in my midsection again. "So talk."

He seemed about to say something, but my ringtone cut him off. I checked my phone: it was the same unfamiliar Las Vegas number. I forgot my embarrassment at once; this could be the gig we needed.

"I have to take this." I stood, walked up the steps to the Millers' porch, and accepted the call.

"Hello?" I said, leaning against one of the Victorian columns.

On the other end, a woman's voice said, "Is this the number for Elias Dante? The Uncanny Dante?"

"Yes, it is. How can I help you?"

"My name is Grace Wu. I'm calling on behalf of F—"

The phone beeped in my ear, cutting off the caller—and then a robot voice informed me I had less than a minute of prepaid time left.

"I lost you for a second," I said, panic rising in my throat. We needed this gig, whatever it was. "Could you say that again?"

"My name is Grace Wu," the woman repeated. "I'm calling on behalf of Flynn Bissette."

The name hit me like a slap. Flynn Bissette? As in Flynn & Kellar, the most successful duo in the history of magic?

"Hello?" the woman said. There was something overenthusiastic, maybe even insincere about her voice.

"Did you say you're calling on behalf of Flynn Bissette?"

"Yes!"

Irritation tightened my jaw. This was just one more in a long series of prank calls. They got our number off our Facebook page and thought they'd have fun taunting a has-been.

"It's Grace, right?" I said, unable to keep the contempt out of my voice.

"That's right. Grace Wu."

"Okay, Grace. What can I do for literally one of the most famous magicians ever?"

"Grace" was undeterred by my sarcasm. "Mr. Bissette is shooting a live magic special at the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood. He'd like Mr. Dante to—"

"Fuck off." I was surprised at the rage suddenly heating my face.

"Excuse me?" the woman said.

I was about to launch into a tirade, but the robot voice broke in once more and told me I was out of time.

CHAPTER 3

I POCKETED MY PHONE AND leaned against the column.

"What was that about?" Liam asked.

I looked away. "Can I use your bathroom?"

I sat on the toilet lid, one hand pressed against the wall, the other on my chest. My heart was pounding—which felt wrong, because depression was rolling toward me like a summer storm. Usually, that slowed everything down. But so much had happened in the last five minutes, thoughts were pinging around my skull like ricocheting bullets.

The prank call had been the trigger, but it was more than that. I was out of cell minutes, cut off from Ripley, cut off from clients—I couldn't even take my fucking US History test. We were almost broke, and we'd just stolen three hundred dollars' worth of diesel. This was our last gig on the books. We were running out of options.

Applause drifted in through the bathroom window; the show was over. I splashed some water on my face and headed upstairs to pack up. I didn't see Liam as we were loading the trailer, and I found that I was disappointed. Which was probably stupid: A year ago, he'd fooled me into thinking he liked me. Probably, he'd just done it again.

But as I stepped into the RV, he called my name.

"Ellie!"

I paused in the doorway.

"I'm sorry," Liam said, stopping at the bottom of the retractable steps. "Can I get a do-over?"

I cocked my head. "What are we, in third grade?"

Excerpted from The Lightness of Hands by Tim Garvin. Copyright © 2020 by Tim Garvin. Excerpted by permission of Balzer + Bray. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.