He’d murdered nobody and wasn’t in the same league as Alan or that kid shrink. Morris’ fate was possibly overkill, but the diary’s power was at times an inaccurate process.

She didn’t know when her agent had decided her money was his. Once she realized he had his hand not only in her cookie jar but other authors, what else could she do? It wasn’t hard to work out with her statements. She’d always been good with numbers and with just a little investigation his legal but dishonorable deceit became clear. It all came down to wording.

She warned him bad things would come his way. Without revealing how or when, she simply quoted him the cliché: what comes around, goes around.

His go around would hurt.

He didn’t get it though, and in a smug, self-righteous manner, he proceeded to explain the contract she had signed gave him every right, and her not so much.

That made her bristle. Everything she had worked toward had been blackened by his betrayal. It wasn’t the money. It was his hubris in believing he could take advantage of her naïveté.

She wanted out of her contract, but he wouldn’t agree. The arrogance of him, in that he believed his contribution created her best seller status.

Small warnings, accidents too regular to be random, had been sent Morris’ way to persuade him he shouldn’t fool with her. Several bouts of food-poisoning; nothing like constant days of diarrhea to humble you. Bumping into doors in the middle of the night. A minor car accident. Falling down stairs. Cutting his finger with a knife which required stitches.

The whole thing made even more amusing when he told her he had hired a psychic to come to his home and office with magical charms (including burning a foul-smelling cowpat) to ward off evil spirits.

He thought she’d be scared off when he told her he had organized protection. The fool actually laughed and mocked her, saying an ungrateful prima donna could easily find her sales declining and head in the same direction as an ex-client.

“Where do think William Barnes is these days?” he’d said.

When he added, “William Barnes was right. You are a witch,” that surprised her.

She’d taken a moment to think through the William mess. In all the months of the man’s mentorship, he had seemed harmless. Conceited and arrogant. Yes. Confident his answers were the only ones. Yes. But other than a talent for writing prose, he hadn’t appeared to be as great a genius as she’d first thought.

His comment concerned her though. She’d never had anyone sense she had been responsible for good or bad luck that came their way. It had occurred to her that some recipients of either might recognize that more than serendipity twisted around them.

Barnes’ appearance at the canceled bookstore presentation, albeit collapsed on the pavement, had aroused her suspicion. She did consider that he had followed her there and had something to do with the mix-up. Morris seemed convinced that he did but by then she couldn’t believe anything that sprang from the agent’s mouth.