“Logan, slow down and be reasonable. I sense there is more to this story than you think there is.”
I wasn’t going to be deterred by her soft voice of reason. “What? What more could there be? He’s already done the damage, hasn’t he?”
Prudence spoke up again.
“No, Serena is right. I’m sensing the same thing. There is more to this than just the pregnancy.”
Lily looked up sharply. “More?” She turned to her daughter. “How could there be more? Isn’t having a child out of wedlock enough?”
“Isn’t that kind of old-fashioned, Lily?” questioned Prudence. “That doesn’t sound like you at all.”
“I’m sorry. But wait until you have a child of your own and see if you feel the same.”
“Wait a minute!” Totally shocked to hear Sully finally speak. “She won’t be having any child out of any wedlock.” He puffed up with pride. “I asked her to marry me and she said yes. We’ve been married since the end of the summer. My boys are going to be Sullivans, like me.”
Lily almost fell out of her chair. “Married! You and Jade are married!” I watched my sister as she slipped off a little gold band she had been wearing on her right hand and placed it on her left.
“We were waiting for the right moment to tell everybody. Sully wanted to right away, but I kept telling him to wait. Then when I found out I got pregnant with the babies, he said we had to tell you. Then the whole thing with Christophe happened and it just wasn’t the right time.” Jade sat up next to Sully and rested her hand over her stomach.
Maybe nobody else picked up on it, but wasn’t that the second time she had referred to her pregnancy as a plural? I caught Serena’s eye and realized she had heard it too. I questioned her in mindspeak.
Did you catch that? My boys? The babies? Is she saying what I think she’s saying?
It sure sounds like it.
That’s crazy.
I know. I thought me and Skylar were the only ones.
How long before anyone else catches on.
Not long. Look around.
I did. Prudence gazed at Jade with an understanding expression, as did Eve, Cordelia and Finola. Aisling and Echo were also getting the picture and even Skylar had a knowing smile on his face. Only my mom looked totally in the dark. I decided I better break it to her gently.
“Hey mom, how do you feel about becoming a grandma?”
If there had been any doubt, she never showed an ounce of it. She beamed. She turned to my sister. “Jadie, I am just thrilled. I can’t wait. I think you will make a wonderful mother.”
I felt comfortable enough with her answer to go a little further with it. “So, are you ready to become doubly thrilled, then?”
My mom just sat there staring at me for a few minutes. Everyone in the room let the word ‘doubly’ sink in. Suddenly, recognition bloomed in my mom’s eyes and she exclaimed, “Oh, Jadie! Twins?”
Jade just nodded her head and reached her hands out for Mom. They fell into each other in a mother-daughter embrace that seemed to go on forever.
Finally, Eden cleared her throat and said, “It seems congratulations are in order. Twice.” The room exploded in chaos again. Everyone rushed over to Jade and Sully and were hugging her and pounding him on the back. I hung back, dazed by the news. My baby sister got married, and is pregnant with twins? It was all too much for even me to take at once.
Serena sensed my reluctance and strode over to where I stood. “You’re happy for Jade and Sully, aren’t you?”
“Of course I am. It’s just a lot to take in all at once. To be honest with you, I kind of hoped that you and I would be the next big thing around here.”
“Oh, Logan. How sweet. You know I can’t wait to be your wife, too. But our time will come. Don’t you worry about that. And it will be perfect.” She gave my arm a squeeze. All of a sudden, I felt like a creep for not being right in the middle of that crowd. I looked at Serena.
“Go,” she said. Just that one word. That’s all I needed to hear.
I walked over to where my sister and Sully were seated. Jade took one look at me and burst into tears. I gave her a huge hug. “You are going to be the best momma,” I told her. “I always thought so. Now I know for sure.”
“And you are going to be the uncle who riles my kids up with candy and dumps them at my door at bedtime.” She retorted, with a laugh.
“You got that right.” I agreed. I fake punched Sully on the arm. “How could you marry my baby sister without me? I never got to give you the bachelor party we so richly deserve.”
Sully laughed hard at that one. “You know your sister, Logan. You think for one second I’d be allowed to have one?”
He wasn’t wrong. She’d allow that, like, never. “Never mind that. You’re family now, man. That makes us brothers. I always thought of you as one, anyway. This only makes it official. Welcome to the weird, witchy family, Sully.” We man-hugged, making it short, because all the coven sisters were watching. It still embarrassed me.
Eden interrupted the merrymaking. “I hate to bring us back to reality, but this definitely puts a new spin on Christophe’s arrival. Now we know why he’s back. And what he wants.”
She didn’t have to spell it out for me. Christophe wanted my sister’s unborn babies.
Part Two
Chapter Twenty-two
SERENA
I stood on the other side of the kitchen and watched Jade as she lowered herself onto one of the dining room chairs. More than seven months pregnant, and carrying twins, she was quite heavy in the front. She wasn’t usually the type to stay quiet, but she had been surprisingly good-natured about being confined to our big house. We never let her out of our sight. Christophe had been quiet for so long, we all began to think he had disappeared. But we kept all the usual precautions in place. Eden didn’t want us to become complacent, so she had restricted Jade to the house. Even though Jade appeared trapped here, she always had Sully by her side. Lily and Eden had decided that a married couple should have their own room, so a large bedroom in the back of the house had been made available to Jade and Sully.
For his part, Sully had become an incredible expectant father and husband. He had breakfast with Jade every morning, which he made himself, and took to their bed on a little silver tray. Then he and Logan and Skylar went off to work at the sporting goods store, while Tabitha and I went to school, sometimes a hard thing to do without Jade. My new friends were astonished when they learned she was now a married woman like Tamera, and they teased me mercilessly that I would be next. Tabby and I were nervous to be out of the house, but our guardian dogs, Zena and River were always close by. Logan’s dog, Charlie, went with the guys. The dogs always made us feel better. But we remained vigilant, nonetheless. Christophe was back, and we were never sure what he would do.
“You’re not looking at my giant backside, are you?” I was jolted from my reverie by Jade’s insistent whine.
“No. I am not looking at you. Plus, I don’t think you’re giant anyway. You are pregnant and I think you look beautiful, as a matter of fact.”
Jade worked her way up and out of the dining room chair. “How can you even say that? I don’t fit anything I own, my hair is limp all the time, and I haven’t seen my own feet in, like, a month!” She leaned heavily against the kitchen counter.
Prudence and Finola wandered in to see what all the commotion could be about. I cocked my head in Jade’s direction and instantly they understood. When Eden overheard as she came in the room, she too, knew right away that Jade needed some kid-glove handling.
“Jade, my dear, you mustn’t let yourself get so overwrought.” Eden took Jade’s hand and expertly guided her to the far more forgiving sofa in the sunroom. We all followed. “You are the picture of glowing, natural health. I have never seen you look more womanly, more relaxed, more contented, or more prepared to bring those happy, lucky lives into the world.” Eden laid her hands on Jade’s pregnant belly. I watched as Jade’s face ch
anged from annoyed and anxious to delighted and beaming. Eden certainly knew how to calm her. And I knew another way.
“Jade! I don’t know why I haven’t asked you this before, but I would love to throw you a baby shower.”
Jade jumped up and whirled around to hug me. “Finally! I wondered if I would have to give myself my own party. Now we’re talking!”
Now that represented such an expected response from Jade that we all started laughing.
I grabbed Jade’s hand and twirled her around in a pirouette. “Jade, you are going to make the prettiest mommy-to-be! Maybe we can get Eden and Lily to lift their house arrest long enough to let us go shopping for something to wear and some party favors.” I glanced over at Eden with the question in my eyes. Secretly, I felt glad that Lily had missed this working at the flower store; she surely would have vetoed Jade leaving the house for any reason at all. Eden seemed to give it serious thought before she closed her eyes and gave her approval with a slight nod of her head. Jade and I began to twirl around the kitchen again, giddy with joy. Eden held up her hand. There would be a caveat.
“I will have to speak to your mother, Jade. She’ll need to give her approval as well. And you will need to be heavily guarded. The dogs must accompany you, and possibly your brother as well.”
Jade already nodded her head. I had the impression she would agree to anything just to get out of the house. It reminded me of another time someone did the same thing and how that had turned out. That time, Logan truly realized the magnitude of the power Christophe had over us, over the whole town of Lancaster. I wondered, would this turn out the same way? Looking at how happy Jade became just by the idea of the party and leaving the house to plan for it, I sure hoped not.
****
“Hurry up, Tabitha! We need to get home.” I called out to my little sister, in an effort to get her moving. I had been trying to get her in the car after school, but she kept dawdling with her friends, having become a bit of a sensation as the only source of information regarding the hot new gossip on Jade and Sully. She basked in it.
“Tabitha! Come on!” She finally turned around and saw me. Suitably sheepish now, she said goodbye to her friends and ran over to where I stood, breathless.
“Whew! I’m so popular today! Everyone wanted to talk to me.”
“Well, come on, Paris Hilton. We need to get home as soon as we can. It’s not safe for us to linger.” I scanned the back fences until I saw what I needed to. River and Zena prowled the perimeter and they both had us in their sights. I sighed and relaxed. Just then my cell phone rang.
“Hey, you guys okay?” Logan’s voice, anxious and worried, came through the line.
“We’re fine, Logan. We were just about to leave school.”
“It’s really busy here at the store. Must be everyone is trying to get their game on before it gets too cold to do anything. We’ve been jammed all day.”
“That sounds great for business for you guys.”
“Yeah, it is. Only thing is, I wanted to check on my mom today. Do you think you and Tabitha could swing by there on your way home? You have the dogs with you, right?”
I glanced over the top of the car and silently called to the animals to come to me. Their coats glistened in the late afternoon sun as they bounded their way through the parking lot and jumped into the back of the car.
“I do now. It would be no problem to drive by Free Spirit Flowers, Logan. I haven’t been there since the plants went wild. Of course, I can.”
Logan sounded relived. “Thanks, Serena. It may be nothing, but my mom has seemed so distracted lately. I’ll feel better just knowing you were there to check up on her.”
“You got it, Logan. Are you working late, or something?”
“There are so many people here. I’m not sure what time we’ll be closing. Thanks, again. See you later?”
“Absolutely.” I hung up with a strange feeling. It wasn’t like Logan to worry about his mom. Now he had me concerned as well.
“Hey, kiddo.” I patted Tabitha on her knee. “Mind if we make a pit stop on the way home? I thought we might go say ‘hi’ to Lily and Elizabeth at the flower shop.”
“Okay, whatever. Is something wrong with her?”
“What makes you ask that?”
“I don’t know. She’s been acting weird lately.”
“Weird, how?
“Like, quiet? Always walking around like she has something on her mind. Deep in thought, like.”
I thought about what Tabitha had said and realized Lily had been quiet and distant lately. I also remembered how out of it she had seemed when she got home from her last date with Declan, the new man she had been seeing. Elizabeth told me she said there had been something about him she couldn’t put her finger on, but only when she wasn’t with him.
“Serena? Are you even listening to me?”
“Huh? Oh, sorry. Maybe Lily’s just getting used to the idea of being a grandmother.”
“Well, she shouldn’t care about that. Lily is going to be the awesomest grandma ever!”
I had to agree.
I pulled up in front of Free Spirit Flowers and found a parking spot. As Tabitha and I walked in the front door, the little bell over the top chimed announcing our arrival, but she didn’t rush out from the back. I could hear Lily and Elizabeth’s laughter from the stockroom and was about to join them when the sound of a male voice stopped me. Tabitha and I exchanged looks and she whispered to me, “It’s him.”
No sooner had those words left her lips than he appeared. Dressed almost entirely in gray, I saw his face, but an hour later found myself unable to describe it. He came out of the back room before Lily and Elizabeth; they trailed after him almost like rock star groupies. He moved with the ease of a man who had been in this location many times before and seemed familiar with the layout. I turned back to Lily’s interesting and dangerous new man as he spoke.
“You must be Serena.” His voice sounded lilting and entrancing. Pleasant, even. I took his outstretched hand in my own, in greeting. His hand felt soft, smooth, even seemed to be lightly perfumed. As our hands connected, my brain exploded.
No, Serena, no! Don’t touch him! Get away! Get away as fast as you can! Get Tabitha and Elizabeth and Lily and get out of there immediately! There’s danger there! DANGER!
The voice in my head startled me half to death. I heard Eden. How she knew, I’ll never know. But, I had entrusted Eden with my life in the past and learned to never question her judgment. As both the head of my coven and the leader of the Council, if she knew, it was so.
I jerked my head up to see if Declan had heard Eden mindspeaking. He still smiled benevolently at me. I found it hard to tell, but my guess would be no. I had to think fast. I withdrew my hand smoothly.
“Nice to meet you, but I’m afraid my sister and I have come on an urgent errand.” I glanced at Tabitha and mindspoke to her quick.
Tabitha, no matter what I say, play along!
“There’s been an accident at home and Lily and Elizabeth need to close shop and get there right away.” I moved around the counter, reaching under and fetching both of their purses. “We need to get going.” I fished Elizabeth’s car keys out of her bag and held them out to her.
“I’ll lock the back up.” Tabitha disappeared in back and could be heard locking the rear door.
Declan’s smile faded. “An accident? Is everyone all right?”
Elizabeth joined in. “What happened, Serena? Is it Jade?” That got Lily.
“Oh, no! Is it!”
Eden mindspoke loud in my head.
If that gets them out of there, then tell them Yes! All will be forgiven later when they find out she’s safe. JUST GET OUT OF THERE NOW! Her words resembled thunder clapping and I jumped.
“Yes!” I hollered. “And we need to leave now!”
Elizabeth grabbed her keys out of my hands. “Why didn’t you say something earlier! Lily! You go with Serena! I’ll take Tabitha!” She flew out the door,
my little sister in tow.”
Lily turned to Declan. “I’m sorry. I have to go. You do understand?” She ushered him out the door and we followed right after him. I dreaded telling her the truth. I hoped Eden would do that, right after she told me what in the world that had been all about.
Chapter Twenty-three
SERENA
By the time we got home, I prayed Eden would know how to handle this situation. I pulled up to the house only a few seconds after Tabitha and Elizabeth. Lily jumped out of the car before I turned it off and flew into the house, two steps behind Elizabeth. I hung back with Tabitha, both of us unsure of what to do next. We waited about five minutes by the car before we went inside.
We found Lily and Elizabeth sitting side by side on the front room sofa facing Eden, who sat on a chair across from them. Clearly, Eden had told them Jade hadn’t been in an accident. And just as clearly, they were both quite angry.
“Why in the world would you tell us something so awful if it wasn’t true, Eden?” Lily awaited an explanation, her hands on her hips and her foot tapping impatiently on the floor.
“What could be so important that you had to lie to get us home?” Elizabeth sounded indignant. “Couldn’t you have just asked us to close the shop early, or something? It had to be a horrible lie?”
Eden stood her ground. Calmly, she said, “You had to be extracted from the situation with no delay.”
Lily, whirled, incensed. “Extracted? Situation? I think you had better tell us what is going on, Eden. You embarrassed me in front of Declan.”
“Yes, Lily. I know. It couldn’t be helped. You needed to be extracted.”
“Stop saying extracted!”
Eden took a breath. “Removed, then. Declan was the reason you needed to be removed.”
Elizabeth smacked her hand hard on her thigh. “I knew it! I knew there had to be something about him.” She twisted on the couch to face Eden. “Is he a demon, Eden? Is he with Christophe?”
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