“I remember,” Crux said before he chugged the last of his shake.
“That’s right. Mercutio took a bite out of your neck that one time.”
“It’s a wonder he didn’t retch his stomach out at the taste,” Kismet said with a little smirk.
Crux’s smile never faltered. “I don’t know why you say it’s a wonder. You’ve tasted my blood. It didn’t make you sick.”
Her smile faded till it was gone. “I may yet, you know.” She paused. “Kill you.”
He shrugged. To me, he said, “If she planned to kill me, she’d have done it.”
“I can change my mind. Free will,” she said.
His smile finally disappeared. “You’d have to answer for it. You’re Seelie fae. Inside the Never and out of it.”
Kismet replied, “I don’t bow to the queen’s will anymore. And never shall again.”
He sighed. “You’re born of the blood. She’ll always be your queen.”
The oven timer rang. “Come on,” I said. “Don’t argue.”
“My sister’s a peacekeeper. She cares for people. Be glad her goodwill leaks all over me when I’m around her, or I might have challenged you to a death match.”
She’d said it so casually, it was kind of unreal. I blinked, then swallowed.
“Um, well, death matches are illegal in the state of Texas, which is where we’re standing. In fact, fighting to the death is illegal all over the United States. Canada, too, and probably Mexico. In the Old West, there were gunfights in the streets to settle disagreements and all, but that hasn’t been allowed for a long time. At least a hundred years.”
Crux cocked a brow. “A hundred years is a long time?”
“Yep. In human years that’s a real long time. So c’mon. The biscuits are done. And everything will seem better with a belly full of biscuits.”
Most times an announcement like that would be met with skeptical chuckles from people, but these two just turned and went inside, like they understood the truth about the fortifying power of biscuits. I frowned. There were moments when I felt my own Seelie roots.
I’d been raised by witches and hadn’t known I was half fae until a couple months earlier. Momma, Aunt Mel, and my double-great-aunt Edie had all kept my magical mixed race a total secret, even from me, because the World Association of Magic was against the fae in every way.
It was possible that the Association would lock me up or kill me if they found out I’d used fae magic on occasion. It wouldn’t even matter to them that I hadn’t meant to or tried to. In some ways, that would make it worse. I had powers that I couldn’t control and that they wouldn’t be able to control either. They wouldn’t like that. And when they didn’t like something . . . well, they weren’t nice about how they dealt with problems, or witches who caused them.
Inside, the house smelled like melted chocolate and spiced vanilla with just a faint note of pine needles from the tree. After putting the biscuits and fixings on the table, I raised the volume on the country Christmas music, hoping to put everyone in a festive and friendly mood. Kismet’s shoulders bobbed in time to the beat as she broke her biscuit in half down the middle and dipped the right half in a circle of berry compote and then in a dollop of whipped cream. A jolt of recognition ran through me, leaving me tingling and smiling. I’d eaten biscuits that way a thousand times. When I’d been little, Momma and Aunt Mel told me over and over, “Use a knife and cut them in half the other way. Spread whatever you want on the bottom half and put the top back on, like a sandwich. When you dip, you make such a mess, and half the time the biscuit crumbles and you get your fingers sticky by going after the lost pieces. Little ladies have better table manners.”
Little faeries apparently didn’t. Neither did big ones.
A small chunk of biscuit fell onto the dish. Kismet retrieved it and dipped it and the tips of her fingers into the crushed berries. She dropped the morsel in her mouth and licked the sweetened fruit from her fingertips.
“That’s delicious, delectable, and divine,” she said.
I chuckled. “We’re sisters, all right.”
She grinned.
I ate a biscuit, dipping it into butter, then the fruit compote, and licking my fingertips in the bargain. Then a key in the door’s lock announced that Aunt Mel had arrived. My shoulders stiffened and my smile dropped. I loved her dearly and couldn’t wait to see her, but there was so much I had to tell her. And none of it would make her happy.
2
WHEN I WAS eleven years old, Edie told me that if we’d all been drinks, she’d have been a whiskey sour, I’d have been a gin fizz, Momma a maiden’s prayer, and Aunt Mel, sangria. I hadn’t understood her at the time, but now I did. Edie’s sarcastic wit had a tart bite. I was bubbly. Momma was soulful and mysterious. And Aunt Mel loved exotic men and places, and she lived in pursuit of things that made music play in her head.
Upon entering, Aunt Mel called out my name and then strolled in wearing a fitted dress that had alternating indigo and mint-green horizontal stripes. She wore dark blue platform heels and a mint-colored scarf around her ponytail. She was thirty-nine, but looked twenty-nine, and her style was as young and fresh as springtime.
She’d come in with her hand outstretched to present me with a small wrapped present, but her arm dropped when she saw the visitors in the kitchen. Her lips parted slightly in surprise, her gaze jerking from Crux to Kismet and me and then back.
“What’s going on?” she asked, moving slowly away from Crux. She clutched my forearm and looked at Kismet. “You’re . . . Who are you?”
“You must be the mother’s twin. Melanie, you’re called,” Kismet said.
“This is our aunt,” I said, nodding. “Aunt Mel, you won’t believe it, but I’ve got a twin sister, too. This is her. Her name’s Kismarley, but she goes by Kismet. Isn’t that pretty? I like it a ton.”
There was a stunned silence, and Aunt Mel pursed her pale pink lips.
“I don’t know how that’s possible,” Melanie said. She stared at us. I had dark red hair like Momma and Aunt Mel, while Kismet’s was strawberry blond. I’d gotten hazel eyes that were mostly light brown and flecked with green and gold. Kismet’s eyes were much greener, like theirs and Edie’s. “She died,” Melanie whispered. “You died. We had to—” Melanie swallowed.
“It was a changeling who died. I was taken underhill. I guess he decided one for the fae and one for the witches.”
“He who? Caedrin? He made the swap? He stole you from Marlee? When? How?”
“I wouldn’t know,” Kismet said. “I was young at the time, being an infant.”
Melanie looked at Crux, and her eyes narrowed. “What’s he doing here? Why did you bring him? Can we count on him to keep Tammy Jo a secret now that he’s seen her?”
“No, we can’t count on him,” Kismet said. “He’s here to take me back. And he wants her, too. But he can’t have us.”
“No, he can’t!” Melanie said, her voice rising.
A knock on the front door made my head jerk toward it.
Bryn?
Bryn’s my boyfriend. Actually he’s more than that. A lot more.
Still, I didn’t think he would come over without letting me know. I’d insisted I wanted to talk to Aunt Mel alone about some news that would shock her. Bryn agreed to wait at his place while I did. And since he and I had some big news of our own, I wasn’t ready for him to arrive yet. One big surprise for Aunt Mel at a time.
“I don’t know who that could be,” I murmured. “But I’ll check.”
“Let’s both go,” Melanie said, hooking her arm through mine. When we reached the front hall, she whispered, “As soon as we get to the door, you run. I’ll do whatever I can to slow Crux down. You go to Bryn Lyons’s property. I’m sure his fortress of a house has some weapons you can use against the fae and—”
“Aunt Mel
, we can’t. And especially you can’t go up against Crux with your magic not even working.” Aunt Melanie had been in the land of the faeries looking for Momma, but later, when she’d come out, she’d gotten in trouble with the World Association of Magic. They’d bound her powers with a curse and she was supposed to stay in the United Kingdom and make amends. If she’d done as she’d been told, they would’ve given her magic back. But I’d been in trouble, and she’d come home to help. So if she didn’t find a way to lift the curse, it would prevent her powers from working for seven whole years. It was a mess.
Melanie said, “Don’t worry about me. If I don’t attack him, Crux won’t kill me without orders from the Seelie queen. You just go—” She pulled the front door open, but the path wasn’t clear. Standing on the front step was the body of my friend Evangeline Rhodes. She reached for the knob, but paused when she saw us.
My jaw dropped. Vangie’s looks had been transformed. Her former long, often disheveled hair had been cut to medium length, dyed from plain brown to sable, and smoothed until it shone like patent leather. Bright green eyes greeted us. The eyes of our aunt Edie.
“Melanie’s home. Hello, darling,” she said.
“Um . . .” I said, ready to explain that when Vangie got herself murdered, Aunt Edie’s ghostly spirit inhabited Vangie’s body to help me. When I killed the wizard we were fighting, Vangie’s soul had been set free as a ghost, but Edie had stayed in the hijacked body and was still there. One look at Aunt Mel’s slack-jawed expression, though, told me she recognized the sly tone and smile.
“Edie?” Aunt Mel finally whispered, cocking her head.
“In the flesh. Again,” she said with a smirk. “Hello, biscuit,” Edie said to me. “Did you tell her yet?”
“I didn’t get a chance. She just got here and you showed up,” I said.
“Not about me,” Edie said with a wide sweep of her arm, dismissing her resurrection as though it weren’t a hot topic. Edie strolled in. Her silky black coat swished behind her, as did the fabric of her dark purple dress. Her crystal-encrusted heels matched a beaded comb tucked elegantly into her hair.
“Where did you get that outfit?” I stammered.
“I bought it at a boutique. I’d admired it.”
“The town’s shops are closed. It’s a holiday!”
“One thing you should understand,” Edie said, nearly gliding into the room. “Any locked door can be opened with the right inducement. Charm, magic, money, or some combination therein always does the trick. This time it was charm and money.”
“You can’t spend Vangie’s money! It’s not yours!”
“What shall I do with it? Put it in an empty coffin and bury it in her body’s place?”
“No,” I said. “But it’s not right for you to spend it. She might get back in her body sometime and then need her inheritance.”
“There will still be plenty. She has a great deal of it in her accounts. I don’t intend to spend it all. At least, not right away. Do we have champagne in the fridge?”
“Nope,” I said. “Hang on.” I reached for her as she sailed past, but I only caught rustling air.
“We should always have at least two bottles chilled. Reasons to celebrate and fabulous company can turn up at the most unexpected times. I’d have loved a glass tonight.” Edie strode to the liquor cabinet and poured herself a gin and tonic. “To celebrate us all being together. If only Marlee were here, too. We need to get her home. Even if it calls for trickery. It would be for her own good, and she’d forgive us for deceiving her, because we’re us, her precious family,” Edie said. “Do we have lemons or limes?”
“We do have to bring Momma home,” I said. “And sooner rather than later!”
“Why?” Edie asked, her green eyes turning sharply to my face at my raised voice.
“Because Crux the faery says that if I don’t go to the Never, the Seelie queen will kill her.”
“That bitch,” Edie hissed.
“Crux is lying,” Aunt Mel said. “Ghislaine won’t kill Marlee. Mar and Caedrin have done everything imaginable to appease the queen. They—”
“Not everything. Caedrin’s broken faith with our queen,” Crux said, leaning against the kitchen door frame.
“Broken faith how?” Melanie demanded. “I don’t believe it.”
“He has. And at Marlee’s urging.”
“Never. She wouldn’t risk the queen’s wrath. The only thing she cares about is being allowed to stay with Caedrin,” Melanie said.
“She would and did risk the queen’s wrath. And she’s brought it down upon them,” Crux said.
“How?” Melanie snapped, incredulous.
“Ask your niece.”
“For the love of Hershey, how would I know?” I demanded, throwing up my hands.
“Not that niece,” Crux said, tilting his head toward the kitchen.
Kismet stepped into the doorway, shoving the golden knight aside. “Stop causing trouble.”
Edie’s glass slipped, but she caught it by tightening her grip. The liquor swished and a few drops splashed out onto her slim fingers. “Who’s this?” Edie asked, her voice low and cool.
“She’s my twin,” I said, going over to Kismet. I tried to take her arm, but she pulled back. “It’s okay,” I told her. “That’s our aunt Edie. She was a ghost, but now she’s a girl again. Sort of.”
“Witches by the houseful,” Kismet whispered, wrinkling her nose.
“Well, yeah,” I said. “Momma’s people are all witches. You knew that, right?”
“I knew,” Kismet said, her green eyes like tinted ice.
“What happened in the Never?” Edie asked, taking a slow swig of her gin and tonic. “You convinced Marlee to do something for you? Or she was forced to do something to protect you?”
“I don’t need her protection,” Kismet said.
“But she helped you,” Edie said with a calculating look. “Didn’t she?”
Kismet fell into a stony silence for several moments. I looked at Crux, but he didn’t speak.
“If something happened, you can tell us about it. We’re your family,” I said, giving Kismet’s arms a squeeze.
Kismet looked at me, ignoring everyone else. “I didn’t ask that witch for her help. I wouldn’t. She can’t even help herself in there.”
“But you might’ve needed help escaping,” I whispered, looking into her eyes. “If you had to be sneaky about it?”
She bit the corner of her lip for a moment.
“She bites her lip like Tammy. See that?” Edie asked.
“Yes,” Melanie said. “They’re so much alike.”
Kismet’s expression flashed triumphant and then defiant when she looked at Aunt Melanie and Edie. “She and I are the same. Exactly. We’re not like the faeries. And we’re not like you either. We’re our own breed. Just us. Just we two.”
“Darling, really,” Edie said. “You’re sisters, not lovers. It’s not like you can start your own tribe and populate the world with a mixed magical race. Calm down. Have some gin. We’ll sort this out.”
“We won’t sort it out, and you won’t want me to drink with you when you realize I’ll never do what you want.”
“What is it that you think we want?” Aunt Melanie asked.
“You want us to sacrifice ourselves to rescue her,” Kismet said.
“No,” Melanie said. “We don’t want that. No.”
Kismet’s brows rose. “Even if the queen kills her because we won’t go back?”
“Tammy Jo would not be going ‘back.’ She’s never even been. And we don’t expect either of you to go underhill. There will be some other way to save Marlee. There’s always a way. What does the queen want? There must be something she values more than Marlee’s life,” Aunt Mel said.
“Yes, there is. Me,” Kismet said. “She values
what I can do.”
“What is it that you can do?” I asked.
“I can pass in and out of the Never, even with the witches sealing the gates closed.”
“That’s not all,” Crux said.
“Why is that so important? You’re a spy for the Seelie queen?”
“Sometimes,” Kismet said quickly, and then glared at Crux, who grinned.
I glanced at him, hating the smirk on his handsome face.
“She’s the queen’s secret weapon against all foreign enemies. Kismarley is an assassin. She hunts her quarry all over the world. And a better killer you’ll never see.”
My stomach lurched, and my face fell. It was one thing to kill someone in self-defense or even to keep him from kidnapping you, but to track creatures down to kill them? To hunt people? That was totally different.
I turned to Kismet, hoping she would deny it.
She didn’t.
3
TWIN SISTERS DON’T grow on trees, even if they do sometimes climb and flip from them. And my sister had helped me. She’d saved my life. That much I knew.
“You didn’t have a choice? You had to kill people?” I asked softly.
She gave a sharp little nod.
“You don’t have to anymore,” I whispered, catching her hand and lacing our fingers together. “I’ll help you get a job. You can live with me wherever I live.”
The corners of her mouth turned up. “Let’s live in the mountains, where the woods go on forever up one side and down the other.”
I shivered. “Um, well, I bet that would be real pretty, too. But see, when I said wherever I live, I meant wherever I live in Duvall.”
Her face leaned close to mine, her mouth by my ear. “We can’t stay here. The fae will find us. I could kill Crux, but they’d send someone else after me eventually.”
“No killing,” I whispered back. “Not even Crux.”
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