In that moment he was ashamed of his intrusion, wishing he’d had the sense to stay at home and stew on the matter himself, rather than burdening Angela with it. She had enough on her plate already. But, since he was here now, he decided he might as well plunge ahead. “Well — I guess if there’s anything you can tell me that’ll help me figure out what’s going on in her head. I’m getting some mixed signals, and I’m not sure what I should do next.”
For a few seconds, Angela didn’t say anything. When she did speak, her tone was gentle. “Lucas, it’s your life, and you can tell me to butt out, but did you go out and choose the worst woman for you on purpose?”
“Why would you say that?”
“Because she’s an elder. Because she’s spent her whole life thinking of you Wilcoxes as the enemy. You don’t just turn that off overnight.”
That’s for damn sure. But he thought again of how she had responded at first last night. He could tell she’d wanted him, if only for a few seconds before the logic centers in her brain switched on. “I get that. But….” He let the words trail off, then shrugged. “I guess I’m not willing to give up yet. So anything you can tell me would help.”
“There’s not much to tell.” Angela reached back and tugged at the pillow in the small of her back, apparently moving it into a better position. “That is, Margot’s a really private person. She lived with her mother until a about a year ago, when Sylvia moved down to Clarkdale. And Margot’s illusions are amazing — I mean, I can see why they chose her to be an elder.”
“About that,” Lucas broke in. “She seems way too young to be an elder. How did that even happen?”
Angela replied with a lift of her own shoulders. “I really don’t know. I mean, I was just in middle school when Rory McAllister died and they had to get a new elder. My Aunt Rachel told me they chose Margot, and I was just sort of, ‘okay.’ The thought of Margot’s age didn’t really occur to me, because when you’re twelve, everyone seems a lot older, you know?”
He supposed he did know, or at least vaguely remembered. “But you don’t recall anything else about it?”
“Not really. I was more worried about my algebra homework, frankly. Sorry, Lucas, but you’d really do better to ask Rachel about all this.”
That prospect didn’t sound too appealing. Yes, Rachel was beginning to loosen up a bit, mostly because she really did like Connor — pretty much everyone liked Connor, actually — but that still didn’t mean Lucas wanted to drive down to Jerome and grill her on the subject of Margot Emory.
Angela must have noted his distinct lack of enthusiasm, because she said, “If I had anything more to tell you, I would. And really, I’m the last person to get all judge-y about impossible relationships. I think you’d be good for Margot. Whether you can convince her of that?” She let out a tiny sigh, hardly more than a breath. “I don’t know.”
Neither did he. Even so, Angela’s remark that he’d be good for Margot buoyed him a bit. He had to keep trying. Sure, a smarter man might have decided it wasn’t worth the trouble, but Lucas knew better. Last night he’d gotten just a glimpse of who she could be, if she only would allow herself, and he wasn’t going to stop now.
“Thanks, Angela,” he said, smiling at her, hoping she could see from his expression that he’d found her input helpful. “I know what I need to do next.”
* * *
Margot lay in bed past her usual rising time of six-thirty, staring up at the ceiling, wondering if and when she finally got herself dressed and went out, whether the members of her clan would see the stain of Lucas Wilcox’s kiss on her mouth like some latter-day scarlet letter. Surely it had to be visible; she swore she could still feel the pressure of his lips on hers, even twelve hours later.
No, that was silly. She knew what she had done, but since the McAllister clan didn’t currently number any mind readers within its ranks, her secret should be safe enough. Apart from Connor, no one from either family had even been at the gallery walk the night before, so she hadn’t been seen with Lucas. It was going to be fine.
But was it, really?
She showered and dressed, applied her makeup with care, dried her hair and ran a brush through it. The heavy locks lay loose and gleaming on her shoulders, and she decided not to pull them back today. No real reason, except that it promised to be cold, and her hair was warm against her neck. As she did each day, she scrutinized it, wondering when the first strands of gray would appear, and whether she’d wear them proudly or would cast just the teeniest, tiniest illusion spell to cover them up.
Or do what everyone else did, and go to the drugstore for some dye to hide the evidence that she wasn’t twenty-five anymore.
No white hairs had appeared overnight, despite the way she’d tossed and turned, and so she left the bathroom and went to the kitchen. The ritual of making tea calmed her a bit, and by the time she’d sat down at the small round table by the window with her Darjeeling and her sourdough toast, she could almost convince herself that this was just an ordinary day like any other.
Except it wasn’t. It was the day after the night when she’d kissed Lucas Wilcox, had felt her whole body come alive in a way it hadn’t for a very long time. Trying to ignore the effect he’d had on her was like telling the green grass not to grow after a much-needed rain.
And that was it. As much as she wanted to deny what he’d done to her, she couldn’t. Even now, as she sipped her tea and tried very hard not to think of anything at all, memories of him kept crowding her mind — the dark eyes with their heavy fringe of lashes, the mouth that managed to be sensual and amused at the same time, the way the laugh lines around his eyes crinkled when he smiled. And the harder she tried to banish those images, the more they seemed to be the only thing she could think about.
“Damn it,” she muttered under her breath, even as she rose from the table to wash out her mug and clean the crumbs off the plate. The house had a dishwasher, but she hardly ever used it. Wasteful, when it was only her living here.
Only her. In that moment, she realized how much she hated the very idea of being alone in this house. No one to talk to, no one to care what she did or didn’t do. She kept it clean because it wasn’t in her nature to do otherwise, but really, when you came right down to it, she could let the place go completely, and no one would even notice. Well, except her mother, maybe; Sylvia hadn’t been the world’s greatest housekeeper, and it was Margot who’d taken on that responsibility from about the time she was fourteen. But she’d still make a comment when she dropped by, if it turned out the place wasn’t being kept up to Margot’s usual high standards.
If you hate it, then get out, she told herself. It’s time to make the rounds anyway.
So she fetched a jacket, fluffed her hair over it, and went out. She didn’t bother to lock the door. No one would disturb her cottage, and besides, there wasn’t anything in it she really cared all that much about.
Only now did she realize how much that thought bothered her.
* * *
Rachel McAllister had sounded mystified by Lucas’ request to speak with her, but she didn’t say no. She did tell him that Saturdays were busy and that she wouldn’t be able to see him until after six-thirty. He’d said that was fine, even though he chafed at the delay. To take the edge off, he’d called a few friends for an impromptu round of golf, to which they’d all been agreeable. Might as well; winter was on its way, and opportunities to hit the green would be pretty scarce in the near future.
Since they were all casual acquaintances, fine for discussing the merits of a new driver or the Cardinals’ prospects in the upcoming season and not much else, none of them seemed to notice his preoccupation, how he really wasn’t all that focused on the game. Not that it mattered, as he still came out on top, at two under par. Normally he’d force himself to blow a few shots, just so he wouldn’t always win, but today he wasn’t paying the proper attention.
“Drinks?” Dave asked, dropping his putter into the bag on the back of
his cart.
“Not today,” Lucas replied. “I need to be somewhere at six-thirty.”
A knowing grin. “Hot date?”
Well, at least Dave had relaxed a lot, now that his divorce was final. Of course, getting paid cash up front for the house that Connor and Angela now owned probably had something to do with his improved outlook on life.
“Not really.”
“Hmm,” was all Dave said, but Lucas could tell he wasn’t quite buying it. His friends were too used to the apparently unending string of women he dated. Not that he’d added to that string in a long time. Ever since meeting Margot, his heart hadn’t really been in it.
He went home and took a quick shower, then put on some jeans and a T-shirt, pulling a sweater over that. For a second he wondered if he was being too casual, then reminded himself he was going to Jerome. If anything, he probably looked overdressed.
Spatters of rain began to fall as he drove south on I-17, so he was glad he’d decided against going down through the canyon. Not that the Porsche couldn’t handle it, but in his current abstracted state, he preferred the straight-line driving on the highway.
By the time he pulled up in front of the shop Rachel McAllister owned, the rain had begun to fall in earnest. Since the weather had looked iffy in the rain department, he’d worn his leather jacket instead of his wool overcoat, but the shop looked very closed. Rachel hadn’t given him any specific instructions, and he waited in the car for a minute, wondering if he should pull around to the back, where he knew the private entrance to the apartment over the store was located.
But then he saw the shop door open, and Rachel herself standing there, giving him a beckoning gesture. He got out of the car and ducked his head, walking quickly to the entrance. She stepped out of the way so he could move past her, then shut the door behind him.
“Lovely weather we’re having,” she quipped, and he grinned at her.
“I like it.”
She made a noncommittal “hmm” noise, then said, “Come on up to the apartment. If we stand by the front door, someone’s going to think the store’s open, and I don’t feel like shooing away tourists right now. The crew I had to get rid of at six was bad enough.”
“No problem,” he replied, letting her take the lead and guide him up the narrow staircase to the apartment that occupied the top two floors of the building. It took some effort for him to avoid seeming too obvious as he studied his surroundings. Angela had told him about this place, but he’d never been here before. It felt cramped to him, although he wasn’t sure whether that was because the place really didn’t have much square footage, or because Rachel seemed to have crammed it full of antiques and knickknacks and potted plants, most surfaces taken up by framed pictures of family members or crystals or figurines carved from stone.
Above all that, though, he smelled something rich and spicy emanating from the kitchen. He must have lifted an eyebrow, because Rachel said, “I’ve had beef barbacoa going in the crock pot all day. Of course you’ll be staying for dinner.”
“Oh, no — I didn’t expect you to feed me — ”
“Maybe you didn’t, but I’m still going to.” Her hazel eyes twinkled. “But I have some last-minute things to do, so I hope you don’t mind chatting in the kitchen.”
He knew better than to protest. Besides, Rachel’s cooking was supposed to be spectacular. She’d taught Angela, after all, and the girl was definitely no slouch in that department herself.
Rachel washed her hands, and then pulled an onion and a pepper from the ancient refrigerator. After setting down a scarred butcher-block cutting board, she set to work, chopping the vegetables with a brisk, easy efficiency that put the chefs on those cable cooking shows to shame. “I suppose you want to talk to me about Margot.”
“I — ” What the hell? He hadn’t said anything about why he wanted to see Rachel, only that he hoped she had time for a quick chat.
A corner of her mouth twitched as she attempted to repress a smile. “Angela called me to give me some warning.” The knife glinted in the light from the aged brass fixture overhead as she continued to chop away. “And I feel like I should be giving you some warning, too. Are you trying to make your life complicated?”
He hoped he hadn’t driven all the way down here just to get a lecture. “Look, I know you’re still not thrilled about the whole McAllister/Wilcox situation, but — ”
“That doesn’t have anything to do with it,” she said, interrupting him, but so gently that he couldn’t really take offense. “Well, actually, it does, but not because of my feelings on the matter.” Vegetables chopped, she went to a skillet already sitting on the stovetop and dropped a pat of butter into it.
“Then what is it?” he asked, hoping he didn’t sound too desperate and guessing that he probably did. “I know it’s not as if you expect your elders to take a vow of celibacy or something. The other two are married, right?”
“Yes,” Rachel replied slowly, not looking up as she stirred rice into the melted butter, and then added the chopped vegetables and some minced garlic she had sitting off to the side. “The thing is, they were both married before they were made elders.”
“So?”
She turned away from the stove and met his gaze directly. “I’m sure Margot would probably kill me for telling you this, but it’s not that it isn’t common knowledge — well, among my generation, anyway. She was engaged when she was called to be an elder, and her fiancé just didn’t want to deal with the implications of that. He broke it off a month before the wedding.”
The word escaped Lucas’ mouth before he could stop it. “Asshole.”
To his surprise, Rachel nodded. “More or less. Luckily, he was with the branch of the family over in Prescott, so it’s not as if she’s been tripping over him continually for the past ten years, but it still was rough on her. As far as I know, she hasn’t even tried to be with anyone since.”
Ten years…with no one? He had a hard time even comprehending that level of loneliness. “I still don’t see why her being made an elder would be such a big deal.”
“Well, you Wilcoxes don’t have elders the way we do. It’s sort of being a city council member, a marriage and family counselor, a real estate agent, and an attorney all rolled into one. You’re basically on call all the time to handle family business. It’s one thing if you’re already married and settled — Bryce was in his early fifties when he got the call, and Allegra around forty-seven, if I’m remembering correctly. Their marriages were stable, their kids already out of grade school or even in high school. It was an adjustment, but they could handle it. But thinking you’re going to have your wife all to yourself, only to discover that you’re going to have to share her with the whole clan?” Rachel shook her head, then picked up a can opener and began to open up some tomatoes. “Clay couldn’t handle it. So he backed out.”
“Clay, huh?”
Once again her mouth twitched at the disapproval in his tone. “Yes, Clay McAllister. Like I said, from over in Prescott. They met at Great-Aunt Ruby’s seventy-fifth birthday party, as the Prescott McAllisters generally keep to themselves, but they did show up for that occasion. Good-looking man.”
“Of course he was.”
Now smiling openly, she dumped the tomatoes into the skillet. “I don’t think you have too much to worry about on that front, Lucas. Anyway, you can see why Margot is gun-shy. She doesn’t think anyone would be willing to take on everything that comes with having an elder as a significant other. So she hasn’t even tried. And now you come along, and you think because Connor and Angela made things work, that magically every other Wilcox/McAllister pairing is going to work as well. But it’s not that easy.”
“I don’t want easy,” he told her. About a million thoughts were raging in his head, foremost among them the desire to drive to Prescott, find this Clay person, and punch him in the face. Hard. But that wouldn’t solve anything, would only make matters far, far worse. “Margot needs to realize that just be
cause Clay was a cowardly prick, it doesn’t mean every man who’s interested in her is.”
“No, you’re definitely not cowardly,” Rachel agreed. “But you don’t have much frame of reference, either. You see things going fine for Connor and Angela, and maybe in the back of your head you think it should be the same for Margot. The problem is, Angela was barely a prima before her entire world changed. She doesn’t see why there should be an issue with her splitting her time between here and Flagstaff, because she hasn’t spent the past ten years being available whenever the people in her clan needed her. But Margot has all that history, and it’s not going to go away just because you want it to.”
Put that way, the prospect of getting Margot to change her mind did seem fairly daunting. But there had to be a way. He wasn’t going to give up that easily. “Okay, I understand that,” he said at length. “But she has to understand that history isn’t necessarily destiny.”
“True,” Rachel replied. “And I wish you luck in convincing her of that. In fact,” she added, as Lucas heard the front door to the apartment open and muffled voices coming from the tiny entry, “you can start right now.”
And as Lucas began to frown at her in confusion, he saw Rachel’s “friend” Tobias and Margot come around the corner of the dining room, and realized what Rachel had been planning all along.
6
To tell the truth, if she hadn’t been so on edge after her “date” with Lucas, she probably wouldn’t have accepted Rachel’s invitation to dinner in the first place. But when Margot had stopped by for a brief chat during her rounds, Rachel had made the offer, and at the time it sounded infinitely better than a Saturday night home alone with a book and a bowl of soup.
Sympathetic Magic (The Witches of Cleopatra Hill Book 4) Page 7