Sympathetic Magic (The Witches of Cleopatra Hill Book 4)

by Christine Pope

Now, though, Margot paused in the cramped dining room just outside the kitchen and wanted to flee. Because there was Lucas, leaning casually against the counter as if he’d done so a thousand times, watching as Rachel made Mexican rice. His gaze slid over to Margot, and she realized that, even though his posture looked relaxed, he was anything but. He hadn’t been expecting this, either.

  “Hello, Lucas,” she managed to say, and the slow smile she’d already come to recognize spread across his lips.

  “Hi, Margot,” he returned. “Guess you couldn’t resist Rachel’s barbacoa, either.”

  Just the right note, friendly and unconcerned, as if the two of them meeting like this was something that happened every day. Margot could feel Tobias’ gaze on her and wondered how much he really knew. It seemed clear enough that Rachel had some idea of what was going on between Lucas and herself, with information probably supplied by Angela. Whether Rachel had said anything to Tobias, Margot wasn’t sure. Then again, Lucas might have mastered the art of appearing as if he didn’t have a care in the world, no matter what might be going on around him, but she wasn’t sure she was quite that skilled. She could have given something away, even while thinking she had everyone around her fooled.

  “Do you need help with anything, Rachel?” she asked, hoping the words didn’t sound too strangled.

  “Not at all,” Rachel replied. “The table’s set, and Tobias will help me get everything transferred over. Lucas, there’s a bottle of wine on the sideboard. Do you mind opening it? The corkscrew’s in the middle drawer.”

  “Sure,” he said, pushing off from the counter where he’d been leaning and coming into the dining room. Luckily, the sideboard was on the opposite side of the space from where Margot stood, so at least he didn’t have to brush past her to get to it.

  Tobias went on into the kitchen to assist Rachel, and so Margot found herself strangely at loose ends as she lingered in the no man’s land between the dining and living rooms. She watched Lucas head toward the aforementioned bottle of wine, extract the opener from a drawer in the sideboard, and begin to extricate the cork. Since Tobias and Rachel were clattering away in the kitchen, Margot decided it was safe to speak.

  “Since when do you make a habit of having dinner with Rachel McAllister?”

  “I don’t,” he said easily, twisting at the corkscrew. “But we had a few things to talk about.”

  Margot had a pretty good idea what those “things” were. Casting a quick glance toward the kitchen, she replied in an undertone, “Why can’t you just let it go?”

  He paused then, dark eyes meeting hers in a stare that made a shiver run down her back. “Because I don’t want to.”

  What she possibly could have said in reply, she had no idea, but Tobias came in then carrying the big pot of the barbacoa meat, and Rachel followed with a bowl of rice and a bowl of beans, and by the time the other odds and ends had been set out — tortillas, cotija cheese for crumbling, a big glass bowl of Caesar salad — the opportunity to say anything at all was lost.

  Conversation wasn’t as awkward as she thought it might be, either, as Rachel asked Lucas about Angela, and he said she was doing fine but was looking a little tired, as might be expected. The talk flowed about the impending arrival of the twins, and the upcoming preparations for Thanksgiving and all the holiday hubbub that would follow afterward. Lucas asked a question here and there, complimented Rachel on the food, said he hoped Margot hadn’t gotten too damp on the walk over here, and in general acted like a model dinner guest. She wasn’t quite that nonchalant, but she did manage to respond normally to most questions put to her, and even laughed at Lucas’ jokes without sounding as if she were pretending.

  Through it all, though, it was difficult to keep herself from staring at him. She wanted to gaze at the long, strong fingers as they wrapped around the stem of his wine glass, the way his heavy dark hair waved back from his brow, the fine shape of his mouth…the mouth that seemed as if it had been created to match precisely with hers. At that thought, she felt a sudden heat burn through her, and she reached for her own wine glass and took an over-large gulp, then coughed.

  “Are you all right, Margot?” Rachel asked.

  “Fine,” Margot got out. “I must have swallowed something wrong.”

  Rachel appeared unconvinced, but she let it drop, instead asking Tobias if he thought the rain was going to keep up all night, or whether it would blow by quickly. Margot had to hope for the latter, as she’d already gotten somewhat damp on the walk over and was only now drying out.

  “The wind was pretty brisk, so I doubt the rain will hang around long. It usually doesn’t,” Tobias said.

  Well, that was true enough. The storms in this part of the world were intense, but in general they did what they had to do in a brief period of time before moving on. It was hard to tell exactly what was going on outside, as Rachel had the curtains drawn, and there was still the third floor of the building above their heads, effectively blocking any sound of raindrops hitting the roof.

  The conversation drifted to the coming winter, and whether there would be much snow, or whether the drought would continue to limit the number of storms passing through. Before she knew it, Tobias was clearing the dinner plates and Rachel was bringing out some of her homemade flan. Where she expected her dinner guests to put it, after everything else they’d consumed, Margot wasn’t sure.

  She did manage to eat most of hers, just because it was too good not to, and then it was time to wrap things up, and do what she could to slide out of there gracefully before Lucas could see what she was doing. Not that her ploy worked, as he saw her struggling into her raincoat and came over to retrieve his own jacket from the coat rack.

  “Can we talk outside for a minute?” he asked.

  “The rain — ”

  “If it’s raining, we can go to the Spirit Room and have a drink.”

  That sounded even less appetizing than standing and talking to him in the pouring rain…or at least far more dangerous…but the only way to say no was to be downright rude, and he didn’t deserve that. “Okay,” she said reluctantly, and buttoned up her raincoat. Her dripping umbrella was still downstairs in the short tiled corridor that led to the back entrance, so she’d have to fetch it on her way out.

  They said their goodbyes to Tobias and Rachel, then went down the stairs to the ground floor. As it turned out, Margot didn’t need her umbrella after all; when Lucas opened the door for her, the whole world was dark and dripping, but the rain had stopped falling. Above, a gibbous moon flickered in and out of the fast-racing clouds.

  “I didn’t plan that, you know,” Lucas said, almost as soon as the door shut behind them.

  “I know.” She tightened her grip around the umbrella, not looking at him. “That was Rachel’s doing. I guess she wanted to make sure we could get along like adults.”

  “Which we did.”

  “Yes.” They’d been walking down toward Hull Avenue, and she realized she was unconsciously heading back toward her place. That wouldn’t do at all. No way was she taking Lucas Wilcox to her house. She stopped on the corner and said, “Look, Lucas — ”

  “She told me.”

  “What?” Margot replied, taken aback by the interruption. “Told you what?”

  “About Clay. About how you wouldn’t give anyone a chance after that.”

  Fury burned through her then, which was good, because the air blowing in from the north was cold, so cold, and she needed the fire in her veins to combat it. “She had no right to tell you that.”

  “She said it was fairly common knowledge among your clan…at least, the people who were old enough at the time to understand what was going on.” His mouth twisted, and he added, “If it makes you feel any better, she tried to warn me off.”

  “She didn’t do a very good job of it,” Margot snapped, and began walking again.

  Of course he didn’t take the hint, but kept striding along behind her, like a stray dog that thought it would get a good m
eal if it followed her home. She stopped again, this time in front of Spook Hall; no events were planned for this Saturday night, so the building was dark and empty.

  “Lucas, I’m going home. I’m sorry you drove all the way down here for nothing, but — ”

  “It wasn’t for nothing. Rachel fed me a very good meal.” He stood there, staring down at her, and once again she could feel her cheeks flush, could feel a tingle move over her at the intensity of his gaze. Damn it, why was it so hard to be indifferent to him, when she’d become an expert at freezing out any man who evinced so much as a modicum of interest?

  “Well, then,” she said, attempting a tone of brittle carelessness. She wasn’t sure how well the comment went over, though.

  He didn’t move, didn’t blink. “Just tell me one thing. One thing, and then I’ll leave you alone. Okay?”

  “Okay.” That sounded safe enough. She hoped. Anything to get him to back off, to let her retreat to her lonely little shell where she didn’t have struggle with her body’s unwelcome responses to a man who was utterly wrong for her.

  “Tell me you felt nothing when I kissed you.”

  Oh, Goddess. One lie, and she would be rid of him. The trouble was, would he believe it?

  She took in a breath, expelled it, and said, “I felt nothing.”

  For the longest moment, he didn’t reply. Then, “You’re lying.”

  Now was the time to protest, to say of course she wasn’t lying. But that would only be piling one lie on top of another, and for some reason she couldn’t bring herself to do that.

  “So I’m lying. It doesn’t change the fact that this is impossible, and you’re being impossible.” She turned on her heel and began walking again, not bothering to wait for his reaction. A second or two later, she heard the sound of his footsteps behind her. So he really was going to follow her all the way back to her house.

  Would she have the courage to shut him out?

  As they walked, the rain began to fall again, lightly at first, and then with increasing strength. Grimly, she popped open her umbrella and hastened her strides. By the time they reached her front porch, the rain was falling in sheets, and Lucas’ hair was plastered to his scalp, the water sluicing off his leather jacket. Of course she couldn’t leave him outside in this.

  “Come on in,” she said with some irritation. How like him to force her into taking him inside her home. Then again, it wasn’t as if he’d brought the rain. That wasn’t his talent, after all.

  Unless his talent made the rain come so she’d be compelled to offer him shelter. Damn. She really had no idea how far this gift of his extended, how much it pushed and pulled on the world around him to make it form to what he wanted.

  There was a coat tree in one corner of the tiny entry, so she unbuttoned her raincoat and hung it up, then watched as Lucas divested himself of his rain-slick garment and draped it from the arm of the coat tree next to hers. With one hand, he reached up and pushed his sodden hair off his forehead.

  “I’ll get you a towel,” she said crisply, going down the hall to the linen closet. After fetching a spare hand towel, she returned to the foyer and gave the towel to him.

  “Thanks.” He immediately began blotting his hair, getting rid of the worst of the moisture. His shoes were dripping, too, so Margot went on,

  “Take those off, and bring them into the living room. I’ll get a fire started, and you can set them on the hearth to dry off.”

  She could only hope that by being as brisk and businesslike as possible, he’d understand that she was only doing these things because she didn’t want him to be uncomfortable or catch cold, and not because she was encouraging him in any way.

  How successful she was, she didn’t know, but at least he was silent as he slipped off his loafers, then followed her into the living room. At this time of year, she always had logs stacked and ready to go, since the nights were chilly, and her hundred-year-old cottage had its fair share of drafts. One flick of her finger toward the hearth, and the fire blazed up at once, warm and inviting, banishing the drafts for the moment.

  “So can most witches do that?” Lucas asked, towel still pressed against his head as he settled down on the couch, which wasn’t much bigger than a love seat and creaked faintly under his weight.

  “Can’t you?”

  “No,” he replied, giving his hair one last blot. He looked down at the towel as if not quite certain what he should do with it, so she let out a sigh and retrieved it from him, then folded it and placed it on a corner of the hearth. “I’ve seen Connor do it, and Angela do it, and of course Damon could. Some of the other Wilcoxes, too, but not all. And the McAllisters?”

  “Some can, some can’t.” She shrugged. “I’d say it depends on the strength of your primary talent, but I know yours is fairly powerful, even though it’s not as obvious as some others.” Since she was being forced to play hostess anyway, she asked, “Do you want some hot tea or coffee? You got pretty soaked out there.”

  “Coffee,” he said at once, and she wasn’t sure whether she should be relieved or not. It would take longer to make, which meant more time spent away from him in the kitchen, where she could try to get her roiling thoughts together. On the other hand, an offer of coffee usually meant some lingering, as her coffeepot made far more than her teapot did.

  Well, not much she could do about it now. She went off to the kitchen, wondering what on earth she’d gotten herself into.

  * * *

  Lucas watched Margot leave the room, while at the same time trying his best not to seem as if he was watching her. She wore a pair of slim jeans tucked into high black boots and a snug-fitting black sweater, and he couldn’t help but admire the view as she walked away from him.

  But then she was out of sight, so he transferred his attention to the room around him. Unlike Rachel’s apartment, the chamber where he sat was almost plain, each item in it clearly chosen to be in one particular place and that place only. Over the fireplace was a plein air–style painting of a stand of cottonwoods. A local artist? Probably. In the center of the mantel was an old copper bowl containing pinecones that smelled faintly of cinnamon, and to either side of that were copper candlesticks with half-burned ivory tapers sitting in them. Wooden blinds covered the windows, and a worn Persian rug in shades of brown and muted blue and rust covered the wooden floor.

  There was something peaceful about the place, quietly welcoming…very unlike its owner, he thought with a quick quirk of his lips. It was all very clean and neat, too, which he liked. He could remember a few dates ending badly because he’d gone home with a woman and discovered that her house was a disaster. Maybe that shouldn’t matter, but he liked order, and apparently Margot did, too. And obviously she hadn’t been expecting company, which meant she kept her home like this all the time.

  He heard her moving around in the kitchen and wondered if he should have offered to help. Probably not — he’d gotten the distinct impression that she was glad to get away from him to make the coffee. So he’d let her have her space…for now. Their conversation wasn’t over, not by a long shot.

  It did hearten him that she hadn’t been able to maintain the lie, hadn’t been able to deny the spark that had flared between them the previous night. At least now he understood why she was so reticent to get involved with anyone, but that didn’t mean he intended to back off. One bad experience shouldn’t be enough to affect your entire life. He wondered why none of the McAllister men hadn’t attempted to approach her after a reasonable period had passed. Yes, she could be a damn prickly woman when she wanted to be, but she was also strong and smart and beautiful. Surely they couldn’t be that cowardly.

  No, that was probably too strong a word. But it seemed obvious enough that no one had wanted to make the effort. Lucas would consider that a damn shame, except that their reticence had allowed Margot to remain single all this time. He supposed he should be thanking them for leaving her alone.

  She reappeared holding a silver tray laden w
ith one of those old-fashioned cowboy-style coffeepots, a pair of sturdy brown-glazed mugs, and a little pot of milk or cream and a small bowl of sugar cubes.

  “I thought you didn’t drink coffee,” he pointed out, even as he lifted a carved geode candle holder out of the way so she’d have room to set the tray down on the table.

  “Usually, I don’t.” With the coffee service safely in place, she came and sat down on the couch — at a safe distance, about as far as she could get from him without actually climbing over the sofa’s arm. “This was my mother’s, but she got an automatic coffeemaker when she moved out. I keep it and some fresh coffee around just because Bryce likes it, and sometimes I have meetings for us elders here at the house.” Her mouth tightened for a few seconds, and then she went on, “Anyway, I didn’t have any cream, so I hope you’re okay with milk.”

  “Not a problem,” he said. “I take it black anyway.”

  Her nose wrinkled, but she just nodded and filled one of the mugs, then the other. As she busied herself adding so much milk and sugar that her coffee was probably more like coffee-flavored ice cream than the real thing, Lucas repressed a smile and took the mug clearly intended for him, wrapping his hands around it to get rid of the last of the chill from the rainy walk over here. With no milk to cool it down, the coffee wouldn’t be drinkable for a while, but he didn’t mind. That simply gave him more time to linger on the couch here with Margot. At the moment, he couldn’t think of anyplace he’d rather be.

  He couldn’t say the same for her, though. Now that she was done doctoring her coffee, she perched on the edge of the couch a few feet away from him, blowing on the steaming contents of her cup in what seemed to him a desperate attempt to avoid conversation.

  It’s not that easy, Margot, he thought, although he blew on his own coffee a few times as well, just to be companionable. “I really didn’t mean to barge in on you,” he began.

  “Here, or at Rachel’s?”

  “Both, I suppose, although that one’s all on Rachel as far as I’m concerned. I just wanted to talk to her.”