Utterly Charming

by Kristine Grayson

  “Alex.”

  “—trying to get to Emma through me won’t work.”

  “And I told you, Nora, I’m not trying that.”

  “Then what are you doing?”

  He looked at her for a long moment. “Maybe I’m trying to get your attention.”

  “You’ve had my attention from the moment we met.”

  He nodded, once, a brief movement. “Then maybe I’m trying to get your approval.”

  She felt her flush grow deeper. “Flirting with me won’t do it.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because, Mr. Blackstone, if I’m to believe you, you were promised to a girl you kept in a coffin for a thousand years. I would hope that you wouldn’t change your mind after she became mobile again. She’s only been awake for a month.”

  “And I haven’t seen in her in all that time.”

  “I know,” Nora said.

  He looked down at his own food and sighed. “But you make a good point. It’s insensitive of me. Which seems to be par for the course in anything to do with Emma.”

  He was silent for a moment. Nora watched him. He did seem confused by all this, but she couldn’t tell if it was an act or not.

  She took a bite of the sea bass and noted that the spices were vaguely Thai and quite spicy. The simplicity of eating brought her back to herself and reminded her that she had a few other questions that only Blackstone or Sancho could answer.

  “What is going on with Ealhswith?” she asked. “I mean, both you and Emma have said she’s not Emma’s real mother. And I can understand a mentor fighting for a student for a while, but not a thousand years. What’s going on?”

  His gaze moved across her face, as if he were assessing her, as if he were afraid she wasn’t going to believe what he had to say. “I used to think,” he said slowly, “that Ealhswith was jealous of Emma. Emma was beautiful. Ealhswith was not. Emma was young. Ealhswith was not.”

  He picked up his water glass and took a sip from it.

  “But, like you, I began to realize that those explanations were too simple. If they were true, Ealhswith would have given up on them after a hundred years or so. I expected her to, honestly. I expected that after a few years, she would stop searching for me, or for Emma. But Ealhswith always showed up, and always before the ten years was up—at least whenever I had Emma in my custody.”

  He smiled. It was a grim look.

  “I supposed that Ealhswith felt that way about me.”

  Nora said nothing. She ate a bit more of the sea bass, which was delicious, and drank some of the tea. Occasionally, she would nod to encourage him to go on.

  “My own training progressed,” he said. “And as it did, I learned about a spell that changed everything.”

  He glanced down, as if he were bracing himself for saying the next.

  “My people,” he said. “They age. We age. Our aging is like any normal person’s until we come into our magic. And then we age one year for each century. Sometimes that accelerates, if we’ve done a lot of spells or if the Fates, our ruling body, decide we have committed a crime that requires losing some years. I used a lot of magic in the years between 1478 and 1700. I’m probably an equivalent of thirty-five human years old.”

  Which was exactly how old she pegged him to be. “What sort of magic?” she asked.

  “It’s a long story, and I don’t want to go into it, but suffice it to say that Monty Python were more right than they were wrong. No one expects the Spanish Inquisition.”

  He took another bite of sea bass, and she used it as a cue to do the same.

  “Often,” he said, after he had finished chewing, “one of our number tries to buy those years back. It doesn’t work. Time does not reverse for us. But it can be stolen.”

  “Stolen?” Nora asked.

  He nodded. “There is a spell—and it’s a forbidden one—that allows a dying mage to take the body of a mage who has not come into his or her powers and use it as if it were their own.”

  Nora frowned. “Live in it? Along with the other person?”

  “No,” Blackstone said. “Steal it. They switch bodies. The young mage will die in the old mage’s body, and the old mage will live another lifetime.”

  “You think this is what Ealhswith wants with Emma?”

  He nodded. “Ealhswith has been punished twice since I’ve known her. The Fates sealed the details, like they always do, afraid that the rest of us will follow suit, I guess. As if we can’t make moral choices for ourselves. But Ealhswith’s lifespan is considerably shorter than it should be. And by keeping Emma on ice, she had her standby body ready.”

  “Why didn’t your Fates stop her?”

  “Because this battle has looked like a simple fight between me and Ealhswith, and since it involved one of us, and it predated all the protection laws, the Fates had to let it go on.”

  Nora was so full she felt as if she were going to burst. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d had this much food at lunch—or enjoyed it so much. But she pushed her plate aside and picked up her water glass as a way to prevent herself from eating any more.

  “But now Emma’s awake,” she said.

  “Yes,” he said. “And Ealhswith has to figure out a way to get her back into a state of suspended animation.”

  “Wouldn’t that be a tip off to the Fates?”

  “If she did it wrong, it would,” he said. “But remember that warning she gave me? Not to kiss Emma? It was a setup. There’d be no way to prove I didn’t send her spiraling again.”

  “Wait,” Nora said. “I thought the kiss-and-tell spell meant that if you kissed Emma, she’d die, and you put her in that long sleep to keep her alive.”

  He nodded. “I was young. I didn’t know how to get around a spell like that, so I did exactly what Ealhswith knew I would do. I played right into her hands. Our entire community knows it. The Fates reprimanded me for it but couldn’t undo it. Now if Emma ends up back in the same state while Ealhswith and I are fighting over her, I’ll get the blame again.”

  “But you haven’t come near Emma in a month.”

  “And neither has Ealhswith. Then she hits you with a legal conundrum, and you come to me. See? Involvement again.”

  Nora shook her head slightly. “How do you know that Ealhswith is doing this?”

  “I don’t,” he said. “But she has never shown any feeling for Emma as a person. And there is nothing else that makes sense.”

  Nora swallowed. “Forgive me for asking a lawyer question,” she said, “but how do I know that you’re not wanting to do the same thing?”

  His spectacular eyes widened. “Me? Keep Emma on ice until I’m an old man near death?”

  Nora nodded.

  “Because,” he said, and then he stopped himself. Nora could almost hear the end of that sentence. Because I love her. He watched her face, as if he knew what she were thinking. “You won’t believe me, will you?”

  “Just tell me why not,” Nora said.

  “I’m not the kind of person who would do that,” he said. “But even if I were, it wouldn’t work. My magic is different than Emma’s. I’m a man. I came into my powers at twenty-one. She’ll come into hers at fifty or so. And we have different powers, different ways of using them, different ways of accessing them. If I could steal her body—and I don’t think I can—but let’s say for the sake of argument that I could, I certainly wouldn’t be able to use her magic skills. I’d simply be a man living in a woman’s body, with no abilities at all.”

  “Of course, I have to take your word on this.”

  “Actually, no,” he said. “There are hundreds of magic texts, most of which are in your libraries. I can tell you which one to look at.”

  “After you and Sancho use your documentation skills to make it up.”

  He crossed his arms. “Does anything get past your skepticism?”

  “Not much,” she said. “That’s why I’m a good lawyer.”

  “But it makes for lousy friendshi
ps,” he said.

  “Who said we were friends?”

  A slight frown creased his forehead. He sighed softly and looked away. Then he ran his hands along his pants and sighed again. “You know,” he said. “I’m not trying to hurt Emma. Or take her for my own. You have to be able to see that. I’ve done everything you’ve wanted.”

  Nora remained silent.

  “You’ll have to start trusting me at some point. It was my idea that got Emma awake for the first time in a thousand years. When you decided to help her, I let you. I could have just as easily charmed you, taken her from you, and made you forget.”

  Nora looked down. He could have. She hadn’t thought of that. But he could have. And it was only luck that made him find her first after she had rescued Emma. If Ealhswith had found her first, she would have done that.

  “I know you think I’m horrible,” he said softly. “But I’m not. I just made a few mistakes.”

  The waiter came over, heard that last, and shifted nervously. He had brought a dessert tray with him.

  “Two berries with cream,” Blackstone said, without looking at the waiter. “And two coffees.”

  The waiter nodded crisply and disappeared into the kitchen.

  “I can order for myself,” Nora said.

  “It’s my restaurant,” Blackstone said again. “I know what’s good.”

  “But you don’t know how full I am. I doubt I can eat anything else.”

  “You can at least taste it,” he said. “As my guest.”

  A busboy swooped behind her and picked up the plate with her sea bass. She noted, out of the corner of her eye, that the staff were all watching the table.

  “Don’t you usually sit with the customers?”

  “Sometimes,” he said. “But not here.”

  “What’s so special about here?”

  “I’ve been saving it,” he said.

  “For Emma?”

  He shook his head. “For you.”

  Her heart did a small flip-flop. “What’s so special about me that you have to keep flattering me like this? I have to assume it’s about Emma.”

  “It was about Emma,” he said. “At the beginning, anyway. But I needed you to be rational. I needed you to make decisions. I couldn’t make them for you, or Ealhswith would have been able to find Emma. It was one of my many mistakes in trying to hide her.”

  The waiter set two crystal champagne flutes in front of them, layered with berries, then homemade cream, then more berries, and more cream. He gave them each an ice tea spoon, and another waiter set down steaming cups of coffee.

  Blackstone waited until they were gone before continuing. “Now, I guess I find you to be a challenge. I know how hard it is to get your approval and your respect. I guess I want to earn them both.”

  “Why?” she asked. “I’m just a simple mortal.”

  “If you were a simple mortal, you wouldn’t have stood up to me let alone Ealhswith. You would have let us go on with our battles. You have not.” He picked up his spoon. “I’m grateful for that.”

  He was saying thank you. She hadn’t expected it from him. She felt the flush rise in her cheeks again. “I was just doing my job.”

  “You’ve never just done your job,” he said. “And now you’ve taken on Emma on Emma’s terms. It’s got to be quite a task.”

  Nora took a bite of the dessert while she thought of an answer. The cream wasn’t so much a cream as a vanilla mousse. It was a perfect complement to the tartness of the summer berries.

  “The first day was the hardest,” she said. “She wanted to know what everything was, from the remote control to the fabric on the couch. She still does.”

  He had nearly finished his dessert. He set it aside and picked up his coffee, cradling the cup between his long fingers. “I barely remember her.” He spoke softly, and as he did, color crept into his cheeks. “I mean, I remember all the time we spent together, but it was so long ago. She has slept ever since and I—” He stopped and shook his head, then smiled ruefully at Nora. “I never thought this through.”

  It was hard on him too. She hadn’t thought of that either. He had spent a lifetime—hundreds of lifetimes—protecting a woman that he no longer knew.

  “She’s supposed to be your soul mate, right?” Nora asked. “You’ll have to get to know her, when she’s ready.”

  He nodded. “I guess I have time.” He took a sip from his coffee cup, and then set the cup down. He looked around the restaurant again, as if it gave him comfort. “Sometimes what you want, what you need, and what you have are so completely different.”

  Nora thought of Max. Once upon a time, what they wanted and needed were the same. Then at some point, their interests changed. Their personalities changed. In ten short years.

  But they hadn’t been soul mates. She had known that from the beginning. There had been none of that instant love, none of that instant knowledge, the books talked about. Only an attraction, a strong friendship, and then a separating.

  “Do you believe in soul mates?” she asked Blackstone.

  He continued staring over the balcony for a moment, then he turned to her and smiled faintly. “I’m afraid I do.”

  Nora felt a pang in her heart so deep that she nearly gasped. She made herself blink and smile. “When Emma’s ready, I’ll tell her about Ealhswith’s plans. I’ll tell Emma what you did. Maybe then you can see her.”

  That faint smile remained on his face. It was a distracted, almost sad look. “As I said, I have time. Now, I guess, Emma does too.”

  Nora finished a last sip of her coffee and then stood. “Thank you for lunch,” she said, holding out her hand.

  He rose, took her hand as if he were going to shake it, then turned it over in his own. His palms were warm and dry, their touch gentle. Slowly he bowed, just as she had once imagined him doing, and kissed her palm.

  It was a strangely intimate gesture, and it sent a wave of desire through her that she tried desperately to ignore. He stood up, still holding her hand, then folded her fingers over the still tingling place where he had kissed her.

  “You are an amazing woman, Nora,” he said. Their eyes met and held for a moment.

  She was the first to break the gaze. She looked away, removed her hand from his but kept the fingers over the kiss, protecting it. She no longer trusted her own eyes to keep her own feelings secret. How many other women had looked at him with such desire? How many hundreds in all of those years? Only to know that he was bound to a woman he barely remembered?

  “Thank you,” she said finally, looking up.

  But he was already gone.

  ***

  It took her a while to get to her car. She found, as she left the restaurant, that a lot of people watched her. They had apparently never seen the mysterious Alex Blackstone with a woman. A few members of the staff asked her trivial things, apparently to find out more about her, and she would have had them find Sancho, only she didn’t know what name he was using in this place.

  After she left, she leaned against a tree for a moment, willing her heart rate to slow. She wasn’t sure what had happened in there, whether Blackstone had charmed her (but to what end?) or whether he’d been expressing a natural regret or whether he had meant every word he said.

  It felt as if he had meant every word. But it might have felt that way anyway, if she’d been charmed.

  She shook her head. He said he needed her to think for herself, and he hadn’t charmed her for that reason. Did that standard still apply? She thought so. No matter what kind of documentation Ealhswith had had her attorney send over, for the time being, Nora still had Emma as a client. And Blackstone needed Nora to use her full faculties.

  Didn’t he?

  She had never been this confused by a man. Not Max, not anyone. She sighed and pushed away from the tree. She wandered to her car, got in, and drove back to her office.

  As she got off the elevator, she saw the receptionist pick up the phone. Nora stopped to pick up her messag
es, and as she did, Ruthie came running out of the back hallway. Her hair was askew, she was breathing hard, and she had forgotten to put on her shoes like she usually did when she got up from her desk.

  Nora looked at her in alarm. “What is it?”

  “I’ve been trying to reach you all afternoon?” Ruthie said, breathlessly. “What happened to your cell?”

  “I forgot it.”

  “Of all days to be without a phone,” Ruthie snapped.

  “What is it?”

  “Your mother’s been calling all afternoon.”

  “My mother? What happened?”

  “Emma? Your new client? The one that’s been staying with you?”

  Nora didn’t like how this was shaking out. “What about her?”

  “She’s gone.”

  * * *

  Chapter 9

  All the way home, parking the car, running up the stairs, hurrying toward the door to the loft, Nora vacillated between anger toward Emma (What was she thinking, leaving now?) and worry (Did Ealhswith know? Did the uninvited words work now that Emma was outside of Nora’s protection?) As she unlocked the door, someone opened it from the inside.

  Her mother was standing there, eyes red. “Thank heavens,” she said, rubbing her hands together in a gesture that could only be what some writers called “wringing.” “Where have you been? Why didn’t you call? Emma’s been kidnapped.”

  Nora felt cold. She came inside and closed the door. “Kidnapped?”

  Jeffrey was standing just behind Amanda. He was shaking his head. “I still contend that she wandered off. She’s a bit confused, you know. I try, but there are just some things that throw her.”

  “Where was this?” Nora asked. “Why aren’t you looking for her?”

  “We did look for her,” Jeffrey said. “At least I did. I was about to head back out when your mother said you were coming here. I thought you might want a voice of reason.”

  “I am being reasonable.” Amanda turned, grabbed Nora by the shoulders, and shook her. “Can’t you tell I’m being reasonable?”

  Nora put her hands on her mother’s and took a step back. “Of course you are,” she said as soothingly as she could, mouthing “thank you” over Amanda’s shoulder at Jeffrey. “Now tell me what happened.”