Joshua’s eyebrows snapped together. It was cold out, but not freezing. Joshua had been completely comfortable wearing a cotton button-up shirt over his Kiss the Cook tee just minutes before, but the ground here felt like it was waiting for the snow to start. He looked at the girl in his arms again, the one whose secrets he’d known even though she never told him, and the coyote who looked ready to tear him from limb-to-limb for touching her.
“You talented girl,” he said, a slow smile spreading over his face. “You beautiful, amazing, talented, selfless girl.” He couldn’t stop himself from placing his lips on her forehead, even with Charlie growling in his ear.
Never being around a Thaumaturgic who had drained herself before, Joshua wasn’t sure how to proceed. After some debate with a Shifter who couldn’t reply, he settled on pulling Charlie’s shirt over her own clothes, wrapping her legs in his button-up shirt, and rolling up Charlie’s pants and placing them under her head. He went back to the car to grab the blanket he always kept in the trunk, running through ideas in his head, but as he was heading back something grabbed his attention. He stood and stared at the ground for several moments, trying to figure out the difference. It wasn’t something so obvious as dead grass and living grass, but somehow there seemed to be a line in the dirt so to speak. On one side, the grass looked weaker, less vibrant, and on the other, there was a luster that couldn’t be hidden by the night sky. He knelt down and placed a hand on either side of the barely visible line and the temperature difference was obvious. On Maggie’s side, the side with the barely-surviving grass, the ground was chilled to the point it hurt his hand to touch it. On the other, warmth reigned.
“I’m moving her,” he told Charlie, who had stayed to guard the girl. “She’s drained too much of the earth here.” Proving he was starting to understand like a human a bit more, or that he could see Joshua’s resolve and knew better than to get in the way, Charlie let Joshua lift Maggie off the ground and carry her out into the main part of the park. It was a risk, he knew it, but trees lined three sides of the open area, and the fourth spilled out onto the parking lot where only Joshua’s car resided. Still, he hoped this would work quickly, before a friendly neighborhood police office came by and asked what exactly he was doing with an unconscious girl and a coyote.
When he put her on the ground, he didn’t re-cover her. Instead, he exposed as much skin to the earth as he could, knowing that like Talley, Maggie’s powers required touch to work.
Color didn’t return to her cheeks for another thirty minutes, and Joshua worried it wasn’t going to work, but finally her eyelashes started to flutter. “Charlie?” she forced out the moment she could, and in the space of a heartbeat, he was there, nuzzling her and letting her hands brush weakly through his fur.
“Miss McCray. How nice of you to join us.”
The shock of hearing Joshua’s voice had her sitting up a little too quickly for someone who had been completely out of it just moments earlier, and Charlie snapped his teeth at Joshua in warning.
“Here, let me help,” he said, sliding an arm around her waist so she wouldn’t fall back. “How are you feeling, Mags?”
Her eyes were unfocused as they looked up into his face. “What happened?”
Joshua smiled down at the girl even as Charlie gave him the coyote death glare. “Well, my dear, it seems you have bent the laws of physics to fix your boyfriend here. Quite the amazing feat, I must say. I’m very much impressed.”
“Charlie…” she looked around frantically, her shoulders dropping with relief when she met the gaze of the coyote who sat by her side. Again her fingers went to his coat, brushing and easing away the aggression in his canine body.
“How did you do it?” Maggie froze mid-brush, and he clarified. “I mean, I understand what you did, but how did channeling all that energy turn our Charlie boy here into a real Shifter?”
Her eyes narrowed on him. “You know what I can do?”
“I’m Joshua. Information is kind of my thing.”
She seemed to accept his answer, although somewhat reluctantly.
“There was something blocking him from accessing the energy from the earth. He couldn’t complete the Change without it, so I gave it a push.”
From the state of the ground in a twenty-foot radius from where he found her, Joshua was willing to wager it was one hell of a push.
“Something was blocking him?” He looked at the coyote in question. “Sure it wasn’t someone?”
Maggie tilted her head in confusion. “But who would want to block Charlie? Who could even do that?”
“Who indeed.” He met the coyote’s green eyes, and the defiance there was all he needed to know he was right. Joshua had only ever known the broken Charlie, and had seen him break even further when they buried his brother, but looking into the eyes of the coyote, he finally understood the sadness and worry on the faces of all the other members of the Alpha Pack when they looked at their friend. The Charlie Joshua knew was missing something, and this was it. The coyote. The part composed of instinct and emotion. It was a wild thing, unpredictable and uncontrolled.
Joshua prayed he was here to stay.
Just hopefully not forever.
“Do you think he’ll be able to Change back?” he asked. Traditionally, the human form was the one Shifters preferred, but he didn’t know how much of Human Charlie was left in the beast who still lifted his lip to show off his impressive fangs every time Joshua was brave enough to look at him. If the coyote had taken over completely, was it possible for him to do the same thing the human side had done to him? Could he hold off the Change and silence the human voice in his head forever?
“I’m not going to let him hurt like that again,” Maggie said, cutting off his thoughts. “When he starts Changing back, I’ll make sure he finishes.”
Charlie growled, and Joshua thought about doing the same.
“You’re spent, kiddo. There will be no more magic mojo from you tonight.”
She rose her chin defiantly and narrowed her eyes on him. “I will do what I have to do to get him through.”
“This girl is under my protection as a Stratego and an Immortal,” he told the coyote. “If you force her to hurt herself any further, I swear to God, I don’t care who you are, I will take the vengeance of the Lord out on you, and there won’t be a damn thing you can do to stop me.”
The coyote lowered his head to the ground, but it wasn’t a sign of submission. The pose said, I agree with you, but don’t think you can threaten me, asshole. I will pounce on you and have your windpipe stuck in my teeth before you can say, “Down, boy.”
Joshua reevaluated how much he wanted this Charlie to stick around.
Over the next hour Joshua found both Charlie and Maggie something to eat and even convinced Maggie to take a few bites while Charlie scarfed down an entire turkey. After finding out which house was hers, he broke in and grabbed her some warmer clothes. He was trying to talk her into getting a few hours of sleep before dawn came when his phone beeped.
Joshua knew something was up when he’d sent a text to Scout’s phone to let her know Charlie was okay and got a “K” in response. Scout didn’t do one-letter texts, and she certainly didn’t do them over something as important to her as Charlie’s well being. No response would have meant she’d Changed and was without opposable thumbs, but a one-word text? She was human and busy.
Not a good sign, and neither was the “we need your forensic expertise” message he was looking at now.
“You think you can handle the rest of this on your own, Mags?”
Two sets of eyes - one coal black and the other green as grass - looked up at him as if he was less than bright. “We’re fine,” Maggie said as if it was obvious. He thought about mentioning how she was in a coma when he got there and Charlie had spent over an hour in excruciating pain before that, but decided against it. Charlie was considerably calmer than when he’d arrived, but Joshua didn’t think it was wise to taunt him.
&nb
sp; “Well, if you’re sure,” he said, pulling himself up off the ground, “it seems I’m needed elsewhere tonight.” He pointed a finger at Charlie. “You will do whatever you can to protect her, understand?” The coyote growled, and Joshua swung his finger to the Thaumaturgic. “And you will not over-extend yourself again.”
“We’re not children.”
“I’ve got t-shirts older than the two of you.”
“That’s only because you’re older than dirt.”
He smiled at her gumption and leaned down to give her a kiss on the forehead just to piss off the coyote. “Take care of each other,” he said, knowing they would.
Chapter 26
Maggie hadn’t meant to fall asleep. Honestly, she didn’t think it was possible. But once Joshua was gone, the night became quiet, and the fatigue she’d felt from draining herself earlier came back with a vengeance. She’d only meant to close her eyes and rest for a few minutes, but the next thing she knew someone was calling her name softly as warm hands caressed her shoulder. Early morning light stung her eyes as she tried to shake off sleep.
“Hey, beautiful.” Charlie’s face, his very human face, smiled down at her.
Maggie scrambled up. “Oh, God. I’m so sorry, Charlie. I didn’t mean to fall asleep.” Her hands brushed down his strong arms as if she might find a patch of fur or some other part that had gone wonky during the Change. “Are you okay?”
One hand came up to cup her cheek. His eyes were locked on hers, and in them was something she couldn’t name, but it took her breath all the same. “I… I am…” He smiled, a bright, amazing, true smile, and then those gorgeous lips were on hers.
They’d only kissed two times before, and both times she’d kissed him. Not so this time. This was Charlie’s kiss, and she was lost under the power of it. He nibbled at her lips, teasing her mouth open before taking it deeper. The heat of his mouth warmed her so much she forgot the frosty November chill that had numbed her fingers and nose. His hands roamed over her as if memorizing the curve of her shoulder and line of her back. Her own hands found their way to his bare chest, worshipping the silky warmth they found there.
“Maggie,” Charlie moaned, his breath coming in hard bursts.
Feeling even more powerful than she had commanding the earth the night before, she trailed kisses down his neck and settled in at the place where it connected to his shoulder.
“Jesus,” he muttered. “We’ve got to stop.”
“Why?” she asked, moving to the other side.
His fingers dug into her hair, gently holding her in place. It took several kisses for him to answer. “Because we’re in a public park?” It came out like a question, and at the word “public”, Maggie knew the answer. She pulled back, not at all surprised her breathing was even more erratic than his.
“This probably isn’t the best place for this, huh?”
He gave her another smile, and she marveled at how it transformed his face. She’d thought she’d seen glimpses of the real Charlie before, but now she knew better. “I can hear people waking up and moving around,” he said as if it was perfectly normal to be able to hear inside people’s houses. “Someone will be walking a dog or taking a morning jog soon, and if it’s all the same to you, I’d rather not give them something to share with all their friends and enemies on the internet.”
Maggie spent the rest of the day waiting for the robot to slowly start taking over, but it never happened. She’d been disappointed the night before when Coyote Charlie insisted on sitting obediently by her side instead of going off and showing her some of the wild emotion she’d been so eager to see, but it turned out seeing it in Human Charlie was even better. His smiles were dazzling, and his laughter was so rich and earnest she could feel it lifting her own mood somewhere beyond the stratosphere. When they’d gone to the pawnshop she discovered his anger to be a quiet and terrifying thing. Luckily, the guy working the counter felt the same and let them take her china for the originally quoted three hundred instead of the forty percent mark-up they tried to charge.
The transformation seemed magical, which made Maggie worry the spell might eventually break and leave her with the robot. It made her want to stay in Monarch forever, but she knew it wasn’t an option.
“We need to go,” Charlie announced, walking into her bedroom where she was looking for the copy of Kabuki she wanted to lend him. “How soon can you be ready?”
“My stuff is packed and ready to go.” She didn’t bother telling him it’d stayed that way since they arrived. Maggie didn’t trust her mother to not do something stupid that would end with them storming out at a moment’s notice.
Charlie crossed her tiny, crammed-pack room in two long strides. “I’m sorry,” he said, his palm once again cradling her cheek. In the hours since sunrise, she’d discovered it was his preferred way to have a conversation with her. It was quickly becoming hers, too. “Something has come up, and they need us back at the farm.”
“Is anyone…” She cleared her throat, unable to ask the question she’d been forming. “Is everyone okay?”
“As far as I know. Someone tried to run the Alphas off the road, and Joshua says they have some information they’d rather not share over the phone.”
Maggie could tell he was worried about the same things she was. It might have been selfish, but she sent a plea out into the universe that everyone was alive and well, not for their sake, but for Charlie’s.
The drive back to Kentucky was mostly quiet and done at speeds which should have gotten them carted off to jail for reckless endangerment, but they pulled into the long drive leading up to the house without seeing any flashing blue lights. Charlie sprinted around the truck, pulling open her door before she could get her seatbelt undone. Once she was out of the vehicle, he gathered her hand in his. It wasn’t a particularly sexy touch, just two hands clasped onto each other, but it felt more intimate than any of the kisses they’d shared.
If she hadn’t already seen their vehicles in the six-car garage, Maggie would’ve known the rest of the Alpha Pack was already back the moment they opened the door. For a group of people with super-hearing and animal-like grace, they were a noisy bunch.
They were making their way towards the living room when a small blond person stepped out of the kitchen and directly into their path. She looked to be around nine or ten. She stood just a few inches shorter than Maggie, although she seemed to be trying to make up for it with the mass of curls piled high on top of her head. Her blue eyes widened in alarm for about a half-second before she launched herself at Charlie’s waist.
Once she released her hold she looked up at him with prepubescent ire. “You weren’t at Thanksgiving.”
“Sorry about that, munchkin,” Charlie said, rubbing his hands over her tower of hair and causing her to shriek. “Maggie needed a ride home to see her family, and I figured no one would notice if I went missing.”
The girl rolled her eyes, and instantly Maggie knew who she was. “Yeah, no one would notice. Especially not your gramma, who had to say, ‘I wish my Charlie was here,’ every five minutes.” One hand went to her hip as she poked Charlie in the chest. “You should be ashamed of yourself, Charlie Hagan. Your gramma is old, and we’re supposed to be nice to old people.” Apparently finished with the scolding, she turned and brought her full attention to Maggie.
It is stupid to be scared of a child.
Still, Maggie had to force herself to hold her ground.
“Who are you?” the mini-Scout asked as if she already knew she wouldn’t like the response.
“My apologies,” Charlie said, affecting a British-like accent of sorts. “I shall give the proper introductions. Miss Angel, this is Maggie Mae McCray. Maggie, this is Angel Donovan, the third of the overly sarcastic Donovan siblings.”
Angel cut Charlie a look, but her focus remained on Maggie.
“Maggie Mae McCray? That sounds like a nursery rhyme name.”
“And Angel sounds like the sort of name belongin
g to a kind, loving child instead of the complete opposite, yet here we are,” Joshua said, stepping into the hallway. The past twenty-four hours had been noticeably hard on him. His eyes were bloodshot and sporting dark circles, and his face looked even more gaunt than normal. He almost looked as old as he actually was.
“Ignore him. He’s an idiot,” Angel said, stomping on Joshua’s toe. He let out a string of nonsensical words, letting the world know she’d hit her mark. “So… Maggie Mae…”
“Maggie works just fine.”
“Are you are werewolf, Maggie Mae?”
Joshua and Charlie were just as shocked by the question as Maggie. “Werewolf? What kind of crazy talk is that?” Charlie asked in such an overly exaggerated fashion even the absolute last person on earth who might believe in supernatural creatures would take pause.
Joshua was a bit more helpful.
“Somebody has been watching Netflix without parental supervision again, hasn’t she?” he asked, giving her head a condescending pat.
Angel ignored them both. “You don’t look like you would be a werewolf,” she said, cocking her head to the side as she studied Maggie. “You must be whatever Talley is.”
Maggie couldn’t think of a single thing to say. Fortunately, she didn’t have to since Angel had grown tired of that topic and moved immediately onto something else.
“That dress. Vintage or retro?”
“Vintage?” Maggie hadn’t meant for it to be a question, but this little girl was confusing. “It was my grandmother’s.”
Angel nodded her head as if Maggie had passed some sort of test. “I like it.”
“Thanks.”
“No problem,” Angel replied before turning to Charlie. “Your girlfriend is nice and she dresses well. I like her.”
Maggie started to correct her, but was cut off by Charlie’s “Me too.”
As far as declarations of love and conversations on defining the relationship went, it wasn’t exactly what most people would define as romantic, but Maggie decided the words “me” and “too” would forever be the most swoon-worthy she’d ever heard. She was feeling all sorts of happy, warm feelings when Liam stepped into the hallway. He looked like he hadn’t slept in days, and Maggie thought it may have been an accurate reflection as he looked at the odd gathering happening as if he was hallucinating.
Fragile Brilliance (Shifters & Seers) Page 22