“I definitely understand that,” Cass said softly, reaching for the key around her neck and rubbing it between her fingers.
“You and your aunt seem like you were close. I can see why.”
Cass nodded. “Yeah. She taught me so much, but I feel like she left me with more questions than answers. All this about the warren, and being a caretaker… she never told me anything about it. I never knew that she was keeping so many secrets from me.”
“Is that out of character for her?” Matthew asked.
“I thought so. But maybe I didn’t know her as well as I thought.”
“Maybe she had a reason for doing it the way she did,” Matthew suggested.
“Maybe.”
“Well, at least you’re not alone in trying to figure it out.”
Cass couldn’t meet his eyes. She looked around, trying to keep her gaze focused on anything other than Matthew beside her, just a hand’s breadth away. That was when she noticed Tucker, standing stock-still a few feet away from them, staring at the mushrooms at the end of the fallen tree and pointing with his front paw.
A second later, she saw what he was pointing at: in between the natural orange mushrooms sat a mushroom-capped gnome. It was taunting Tucker, making faces and jeering.
Matthew followed Cass’s gaze but saw only the dog. “He’s doing it again,” Matthew said. “Pointing at nothing. Cowering before his own shadow.”
“He’s not pointing at nothing,” Cass said.
“He’s not…” Matthew broke off, suddenly realizing what Cass was getting at. “You mean—there’s something there?”
“Yup. A gnome.”
Matthew’s jaw worked soundlessly as he processed this. “You mean Tucker can see fae?”
“Looks like.”
Matthew considered for a moment. “Do you think all dogs can see them, or just some?”
“I have no idea. I’ve never had a dog before,” Cass answered.
Matthew sighed. “You know, Laney or Taryn could have told me this before. They’ve both seen how skittish Tuck is. They probably thought it was funny, the brats.”
Cass tried to resist chuckling. “I’m sorry,” she said.
Matthew’s grim expression began to crack. “Typical, isn’t it?”
“I’m beginning to think it is.”
They held their serious expressions just a moment longer before bursting into laughter that echoed across the clearing.
* * *
By late afternoon, Cass’s calves were killing her and she was beginning to doubt that there was such a thing as a warren, at least here in these woods. The trails had turned out to be a veritable maze, with numerous forks and intersections along each one. To keep from backtracking down paths they’d already traversed, Matthew snapped a picture at each intersection—which turned out to be a good idea, since more than once they followed one fork, then another, and suddenly found themselves back at the first one.
Not long after lunch, the path they’d been following led them back to the house, emerging in the back garden on the second-from-right trail. “You were right about it going around in a circle,” Cass said.
They’d decided since it was only one o’clock that they’d try one more trail, the second-from-left fork. Just like the first one, this too was intersected with other paths, some of which they’d already traversed down. Close to the house, some of these trails led to gardens like the dilapidated rose garden Cass had found on her first night in town; but farther out, any clearings they encountered were just patches of overgrown grass that could be natural or something man-made that had been abandoned long ago.
Either way, there was no sign of anything out of the ordinary anywhere. Cass hadn’t even noticed many fae around today, and her skin had been decidedly goosebump-free—apart from those times when Matthew got too close to her, and Cass had a sneaking suspicion that her reaction had little to do with her so-called faery blessing and everything to do with Matthew.
As if it’s not bad enough that he’s basically the hottest guy alive, Cass thought to herself when they reached a part of the trail too narrow for them to walk side by side, and Matthew instinctively moved in front of her with Tucker, as if to look out for any potential dangers that may lay ahead—giving her, once again, an unobstructed view from behind, of which she doggedly refused to take advantage. It’s that he’s basically the perfect guy. Nice, smart, funny, and he knows about fae and believes in faery blessings?
Fate was a cruel mistress.
“It’s a little bit steep up ahead,” Matthew said, stopping to look over his shoulder at her. Cass peered past him and saw that the trail did indeed slope downward at a somewhat sharp angle, made worse by the presence of tangled roots poking out of the dirt and curling blackberry vines covered with thorns. Although the property was dilapidated in many parts, most of the trails were pretty clear, leading Cass to believe Alexandra was still either walking the property herself or having a gardener tend the trails up until shortly before her death. But this trail had clearly not been used in some time.
“Should we turn back?” Matthew asked.
Cass hesitated. She didn’t relish the idea of tramping through those thorns; but on the other hand, what if the fact that this trail was so clearly unused was a sign that they were close to the warren? If Alexandra had had a gardener tending the other trails, maybe she’d had them avoid this one to keep them from disturbing it.
“Let’s keep going,” she said at last.
They picked their way cautiously down the slope. Tucker seemed to be having an easier time of it than the humans, trailing ahead of them as far as his leash would allow and then stopping to look back at Cass and Matt, his stub tail wagging cheerfully.
They were about halfway down when Cass’s stomach began to twist in warning. She stopped abruptly at the sensation. Matthew glanced back at her. “You okay?” he asked.
“Yeah,” she said, trying to sort out what the feeling was trying to tell her. Were they in danger? Or did this just mean that the warren was close?
She took one more step forward. As she did, she caught a glimmer of movement near her feet, a streak of green. And then her foot caught in a thorny tendril of blackberry and she stumbled.
Matthew dropped Tucker’s leash and lunged forward to steady her, but his own quick motion threw him off balance and when Cass tumbled into him, their feet tangled. The two of them tripped and stumbled down the slope, Cass’s feet falling out from under her, her hip painfully impacting the rocky slope. They skidded a few feet before sliding to a stop near the bottom of the slope, a cloud of dust rising off the trail.
Cass’s heart was pounding so hard that it felt like a few moments before her ears stopped ringing and her brain caught up. She blinked a few times to get her bearings. Tucker was leaping around them in circles, barking and frantically nudging them with his snout.
“It’s all right, buddy,” Matthew said, his voice shaky. He reached out a hand to stroke the dog, who licked his fingers. “We’re all right.” He turned to Cass. “Well, I think we are. Are you okay?”
Cass took a shuddering breath and tried to assess herself. She was covered in scratches and scrapes, and her hip was definitely bruised from the angle at which she’d fallen; but nothing seemed broken or too badly damaged. “I’m okay. Are you?”
Matthew nodded and laughed sheepishly. “So much for my smooth attempt at catching you.”
Cass laughed as well. “You did great. I’m just sorry I dragged you down with me.” As her senses caught up with her, she noticed his proximity to her on the side of the slope, their legs still brushing against each other. The way his face hovered just over hers, close enough to touch. Before she knew what she was doing, she’d reached out and put her hand on his cheek. “You’ve got dirt on your nose,” she said quietly, brushing it off with her thumb.
His golden-brown eyes held hers a moment longer. Then he leaned down and kissed her.
Emotions erupted inside of Cass like fireworks
as his lips met hers, spreading from her stomach and rippling throughout her, warmth coursing through her veins. Somewhere, far off in the back of her mind, she remembered the dream. The love and trust and familiarity that had consumed her dream self when Matthew was beside her. But now it was amplified. It was like the dream had been a mirror reflecting this moment—beautiful but distant. As strong as she’d thought the feelings in her dream had been, they were nothing compared to now. She pulled him closer, her arms wrapping around his neck, the kiss deepening, and she realized with certainty that she never wanted to let him go. That realization hit her harder than the impact from their tumble down the slope. She was falling, falling, crashing…
Crash.
Abruptly she broke away from him. He blinked in confusion as she disentangled herself from him, jumping to her feet and brushing the dirt off her knees. Her legs wobbled, still unsteady, but she resisted the urge to sit back down.
“Cass,” Matthew said, regaining his voice. “What’s wrong? Are you okay?”
“I’m sorry,” she said, staggering the rest of the way down the slope. “I can’t. I’m sorry.”
“Wait, Cass.” Matthew stood, reaching out a hand toward her. “Let’s talk about this.”
“I’m sorry,” she cried again, her voice breaking on the last syllable. She took off at a run down the trail. She didn’t know where it led, but she couldn’t think about it now. She couldn’t think. She couldn’t stay. If she stayed near him a moment longer, she knew she wouldn’t be able to leave. And she had to. She had to.
For his sake.
She heard Matthew calling out to her as she ran, heard Tucker’s barking grow more distant. But she didn’t look back.
To her relief, the trail led back to the main crossroads without any other forks to confuse her. She ran back to the house, but she didn’t go inside. She didn’t want to hear if he rang the doorbell, didn’t want to see him drive away. Instead she hid in the solarium like the coward she was, slumping into a wicker chair between two enormous potted plants—a bit on the shriveled side, since she hadn’t been the best at remembering Connie’s instructions to water them—and praying she wasn’t visible through the large clear glass windows that encased the sunroom.
She pulled her knees up to her chest and buried her face in them, her shoulders shaking with the force of her sobs. Why did I do that? she thought over and over, although she wasn’t sure what the source of her regret was. Going out into the woods with Matthew at all, even though she’d known her own growing feelings for him were a problem? Touching his face like that? Kissing him back?
Or running away from what her heart so intensely longed for?
Her head was pounding by the time her tears ran out, and she was starting to get cold. She’d left her cardigan in Matthew’s hiking backpack, so all she had was her short-sleeved T-shirt. She lifted her head, noticing that the sunlight reflecting into the solarium had turned orange. It was almost sunset. Matthew surely had left by now. There was no way he could have gotten lost; the trail led right back to her aunt’s house. She considered going to look and see if his truck was gone, but the thought of accidentally running into him again after the way she’d just acted was too humiliating. She couldn’t face him again, not after that. Even if she found some way to explain it, just seeing him would be painful to her.
The sound of approaching footsteps made her freeze, and she shrank deeper into the plush cushion on the wicker seat. But then the source of the footsteps entered the solarium. It was Lily, smiling cheerfully.
“Hey, Ms. Cass,” she said, waving. Then, as her eyes adjusted and she took Cass’s disheveled appearance in, she asked in alarm, “Are you all right?”
Cass cleared her throat, wiping her face quickly with the back of her hand. “I’m fine. I just tripped earlier.”
“Oh no! Did you hurt yourself?” Lily asked, coming over to sit on the floor near Cass’s feet and looking up at her.
“No,” Cass replied quickly. “Did you have fun at Wildlife Safari?”
“It was so much fun! They had giraffes and zebras and elephants—and you won’t believe how many fae I saw! They were playing with the animals! I wish I could have told Amelia about it.”
Cass was only half listening, but she gave Lily a sharp look at that. “You haven’t said anything to her about your abilities, have you?”
Lily rolled her eyes in annoyance. “No. I already told you I didn’t. But I don’t think it’s fair, Ms. Cass! All your friends know. Ms. Emma and Ms. Hudson and Mr. McCarthy—”
At the sound of Matthew’s name, Cass visibly winced. She didn’t mean to; it was an involuntary reaction, but Lily caught it all the same.
“Are you sure you’re all right?” Lily asked.
“I’m fine,” Cass snapped, more harshly than she meant to. “Seriously, Lily,” she added, trying to deflect the subject away from herself, Matthew, or, heaven forbid, herself and Matthew, “you can’t tell Amelia.”
Lily refused to be deterred. “What happened today? Did you find the warren?”
Cass shook her head, getting to her feet and pushing past Lily to go stand by the window. Her foot brushed Lily’s knee as she went by. She peered out into the yard, but couldn’t see her driveway from here. “Did you see if there was a truck parked in the drive when you got here?”
Lily didn’t answer for a long moment. Finally, quietly, she whispered, “Why?”
Cass glanced over at her, brows furrowed. “Why what?”
Lily sniffled, and to Cass’s shock a tear slipped down the little girl’s face before she could wipe it away. “Why did you run?”
Cass stared at Lily, her jaw dropped. “Lily, did you read my thoughts?”
“You love him, Ms. Cass,” Lily said softly. “Why are you hurting him? And yourself?”
Cass felt like she’d been slapped. When she finally regained her voice, she snapped, “It’s rude to invade people’s minds like that, Lily.”
The girl crossed her arms and glared back. “It’s probably rude to see people’s futures, too, but you can’t help that, either.”
Her first instinct was to tell Lily to get out. But when she opened her mouth to do so, she found she couldn’t get it to form the words. Her anger melted. She was too tired to be angry at her. Especially since her words were all true. She was tired. So tired of all of this. She went back to the wicker chair and sank into it.
“Please tell me, Ms. Cass,” Lily murmured into the silence. “I’m not a little kid. You can tell me.”
Cass sighed, squeezing her eyes shut. “A long time ago…” she finally said, her voice thick. Her eyes stung, and she took a deep breath to keep more tears from leaking out. “A long time ago, I was engaged. That means I was supposed to get married.”
“I know,” Lily said.
Cass nodded. “But my fiancé… he didn’t believe in fae or the Sight.”
“Did you tell him?” Lily asked.
“That’s not important, okay?” Cass snapped, but then she sighed. “I did tell him eventually. I had a premonition that something bad was going to happen. A lot of times when I get the premonitions, I just get a bad feeling in my stomach and I don’t know what it means. But sometimes I’ll get a stronger one, one that actually shows me what will happen.”
She opened her eyes, looking at Lily. The girl was watching attentively.
“That night I had a dream. I dreamed that if Jeremy—my fiancé—if he took his motorcycle out that day, he’d get into an accident. I was really worried, so I told him.” She swallowed. “He didn’t believe me, even after I explained to him about my Sight. In fact, when I told him that, he laughed in my face. He told me I was being ridiculous. So he went out on his bike. And sure enough… he went off the road on the Angeles Crest Highway.”
Cass closed her eyes, remembering the way her heart had dropped out from under her when Jeremy’s mom had called and told her he’d been in an accident. The despair that had overwhelmed her, because she’d warned him an
d he had just laughed. He hadn’t believed. Just like everyone else, he hadn’t believed. And it had nearly killed him.
“It was a miracle that he didn’t die,” she said, “but he was paralyzed from the waist down. And… he blamed me. When he was finally awake in the hospital, when he saw me, he told me to get away from him. That I was a freak. I thought, okay, he’s upset. I’ll just give him some time to process it. I tried going back a few times, but he just got angrier every time he saw me. So finally… I gave him back his ring. Emma kept insisting that he just needed more time. That he’d call when he came to his senses. But he never called.”
In the months following the accident, she’d blamed herself even more than Jeremy had blamed her. What was the good of having an ability like this if no one believed you? It would be better not to know at all. She’d spent agonizing hours wondering if her warning had done more harm than good. Had he been more reckless, more cocky, in an attempt to show her and her stupid premonitions wrong?
“But Mr. McCarthy isn’t like that,” Lily said quietly. “He believes in the fae, and he believes in our gifts. If you told him, he wouldn’t ignore you. He’d probably be extra careful to do what you told him.”
“And what if it didn’t help? What if the stuff he did to be more careful wound up being the thing that put him in danger to begin with?” Cass asked. “Then I would still have caused him to get hurt.”
“But what if your warning would actually save him?” Lily countered fiercely. “What if the whole point of your power is to be able to help people, and what’s hurting them is the fact that you’re keeping everything secret?”
“You don’t understand,” Cass said, her voice rising angrily. “You’re just a kid, Lily. You don’t get how the world works.”
“You’re just being selfish!” Lily snapped, jumping to her feet and putting her hands on her hips. “You’re telling yourself you’re doing this to protect him, but you’re just trying to protect your own feelings. You think if you don’t let yourself love anybody, then you won’t get hurt if something bad happens. But that’s just being a selfish brat. And you think that you can fix my powers by teaching me to be selfish, too. But I would rather hear everyone’s thoughts forever, no matter how loud they are, than be as selfish as you are!”
Alexandra's Riddle (Northwest Magic Book 1) Page 14