by Ким Харрисон
He sounded bitter, and I picked at what was left of my toast.
"Monty loved her as much as I did. As much as I do," he reiterated. "He wanted to marry her, but he never asked because he knew she wanted children and couldn't give them to her. It made him feel inadequate, especially when I kept reminding him of it," he admitted, tired eyes dropping in old guilt. "So when she wouldn't follow me to California, he asked her to marry him, seeing as she was going to get the child she always wanted."
I watched his face twitch as he relived the memory. "And she said yes," he said softly. "It hurt more than I like to admit—that she stayed with him and that peon I.S. job he took on a dare instead of coming with me and the chance for a big house with a pool and a hot tub. Looking back, I know I had been stupid, but I left thinking I was doing the right thing."
When desire's sold for freedom/and need exchanged for fame/those choices made in ignorance/turn to bloodstained dreams of shame. Son of a bitch.
His gaze flicked to mine and held. "Monty and your mother would be happy. I was going to California with the band. My child would be raised in a loving home. I thought I had cut all the ties. Maybe if I'd never come back it would have been okay, but I did."
I dabbed my finger on the crumbs and ate them. This all felt like a bad dream that had nothing to do with me.
"So I went on to make it big," Takata said with a sigh. "I didn't have a clue how much I had screwed my life up. Not even when your mom flew out to one of the shows one night. She said she wanted another child, and like a stupid ass, I went along with it."
His eyes watched his long hands, carefully arranging the spoon in the bowl. "That was my mistake," he said, more to himself than me. "Robbie had been an accident that your dad stole from me, but I gave him you. And seeing his eager smile when you were put in his arms made me realize how pathetically worthless my life was. Is."
"Your life isn't worthless," I said, not knowing why. "You touch thousands of people with your music."
He smiled bitterly. "What do I have to show for it? Selfishly now, what do I have?" His hands waved in frustration. "A big house? A fancy tour bus? Things. Look at what I could have been doing with my life—all wasted. Look at what your mother and Monty did."
His voice was getting louder, and I looked past him to the empty hall, worried he might wake her up.
"Look at what you are," he said, bringing my attention back. "You and Robbie. You are something real that they can point to and say, 'I helped make that person great. I held that person's hand until they could make it on their own. I did something real and irrefutable.'"
Clearly frustrated, he slumped with his long arms on the table and stared at nothing. "I had the chance to be a part of what life is about, and I gave it to someone else, pretending to know about life when all I have is what you can get by looking in other people's windows."
Left looking in the window, red ribbons hide my face. I pushed my plate away, not hungry anymore. "I'm sorry."
Takata met my eyes from under a lowered brow. "Your dad always said I was a selfish bastard. He's right."
I moved the spoon in a figure eight. Not clockwise, not counterclockwise. Balanced and empty of intent. "You give," I said softly. "Just to strangers, afraid that if you give to people you love, they might reject you." My attention came up, pulled by his silence. "It's not too late," I said. "You're only, what, fifty-something? You've got a hundred more years."
"I can't," he said, his expression asking for understanding. "Alice is finally thinking of going back into research and development, and I'm not going to ask her to leave that and start a second family." A sigh shifted his thin shoulders. "It would be too hard."
I looked at him, taking my coffee up but not drinking it. "Hard if she said no, or hard if she said yes?"
His lips parted. He seemed like he wanted to say something but was afraid. Lifting one shoulder and letting it fall, I took a sip and gazed out the window. Memories of struggling to live with Ivy and Jenks lifted through me. Jenks was going to be really ticked I'd forgotten him at Trent's. "Anything worth having is going to be hard," I whispered.
Takata took a long, slow breath. "I thought I was supposed to be the font of philosophical wise-old-man shit here, not you."
He was smiling wanly when I looked at him. I couldn't deal with this right now. Maybe after I had a chance to figure out what it meant. Pushing my chair back, I stood. "Thanks for dinner. I have to go home and get some stuff. Will you stay here until I get back?"
Takata's eyes went wide in question. "What are you doing?"
I set my bowl and plate in the sink before I wadded up my napkin and threw it away. "I have to make up some spells, and I don't want to leave my mom alone, so until she wakes up, I'm going to work here. I need to run back to the church for some stuff. Will you wait until I get back before you leave?" Can you do that much for me? I thought bitterly.
"Uh," he stammered, long face empty as he was caught off guard, "I was going to stay until she wakes up so you don't have to come back. But maybe I can help you. I can't cook, but I can chop herbs."
"No." It was a little brusque, and seeing his hurt, I added gently, "I'd rather spell alone, if you don't mind. I'm sorry, Takata."
I couldn't look at him, afraid that he would know why I wanted to spell alone. Damn it, I didn't know how to trade summoning names with a demon, but I knew it involved a curse. Takata, though, was wincing for an entirely different reason, apparently.
"Could you call me by my real name?" he asked, surprising me. "It's kind of stupid, but hearing you call me Takata is worse."
I paused at the door. "What is it?"
"Donald."
I almost forgot my misery. "Donald?" I echoed, and he flushed.
He stood, reminding me of how tall he was as he awkwardly tugged his T-shirt down over the top of his jeans. "Rachel, you aren't going to do anything stupid, are you?"
I stopped looking for my shoes when I remembered they were at Trent's. "From your point of view, probably." Al had tortured my mom because of me. There were no marks on her, but the wounds were there in her mind, and she'd taken them for me.
"Wait."
His hand was on my shoulder, and when I stared at him he let go.
"I'm not your dad," he said, gaze lighting on my neck with its bruises and bite marks. "I'm not going to try to be your dad. But I've watched you your entire life, and you do some of the damnedest things."
The feeling of betrayal was rising again. I owed him nothing, and I couldn't see him in my life anywhere. It had been hell growing up having to be strong for my mother because she couldn't handle things. "You don't know me at all," I said, letting a sliver of my anger show.
His brow furrowed, he tried to reach out, then let his hand drop. "I know you will do anything for your friends and those you love, ignoring that you're vulnerable and life is fragile. Don't," he pleaded. "You don't have to take this on all by yourself."
My anger flared, and I tried to rein it in. "I wasn't planning on it," I said bitingly. "I do have resources, friends." My arm came up and I pointed deeper into the unseen house. "But my mother has been tortured for almost thirteen hours because of me, and I'm going to do something about it!" My voice was rising, but I didn't care. "She suffered as that bastard pretended to be my dad. She endured it knowing that if she let him out of that circle or walked away, he might come after me. I can stop him, and I will!"
"Lower your voice," Takata said, and I just about lost it. Jaw clenched, I got in his face.
"My mother isn't going to live her life hiding on hallowed ground because of something I did," I said, more softly now but no less intently. "If I don't do something, next time he might physically hurt her. Or start taking it out on strangers. Or maybe you! Not that I give a flip."
I headed out into the hall. His footsteps were heavy behind me.
"Damn it, Rachel," he was saying. "What makes you think you can kill him when the entire demon society can't?"
I sco
oped up the keys by the front door where I'd left them, sparing a thought that the I.S. was probably looking for Trent's car by now. "I'm sure they can," I muttered. "I think they simply don't have the guts to do it. And I never said I was going to kill him." No, I was just going to take his name. God save me.
"Rachel."
He took my arm, and I halted, looking up his height to find his expression pinched in deep concern. "There's a reason no one hunts demons."
I searched his face, seeing me in it everywhere. "Get out of my way."
His grip tightened. Grabbing his arm, I did a quick ankle tuck and sent him down, resisting the urge to follow it with a fist in his gut—or somewhere a little lower, maybe.
"Ow," he said, his eyes wide as he stared at the ceiling, one hand on his chest as he tried to catch his breath and figure out how he got on the floor.
I looked down at him and his shock. "Are you okay?"
His fingers prodded his lower chest. "Yeah."
He was in my way, and I waited for him to move. "You want to know what it's like to have kids?" I said as he sat up. "Some of it's letting your daughter do stuff you think is stupid, trusting that just because you can't do something doesn't mean she can't. That maybe she's smart enough to get herself out of the trouble she gets herself into."
I felt my focus blur as I realized that's what my mom had done, and though it had been hard and left me knowing more than a thirteen-year-old should, I was better able to handle the bigger dangers my thrill-seeking tendencies got me into.
"I'm sorry," I said as Takata pulled himself backward to lean against the wall. "Will you watch my mom while I take care of this?"
He nodded, his dreadlocks swinging. "You bet."
I glanced past the high window in the door to guess at the time, but at least now I could spell at home. "Get her to my church a few hours before sunset," I said. "If I'm not there, Marshal will be if I can get ahold of him. He's a target now, and you, probably. I'm sorry. I didn't mean to put your life in danger." No wonder he hadn't told me I was his daughter. It wasn't anything that would help extend his life.
"Don't worry about it," he said.
I hesitated, my stocking feet silent on the carpet as I fidgeted. "Can I take your car? The I.S. is probably looking for Trent's." A smile curved his thin lips up, and still sitting on the floor, he dug in his pocket and pulled out his keys to hold them up to me. They were foreign and heavy, keys to who knew what.
"I never thought I'd ever hear you asking for my keys," he said. "It's Ripley's—don't go running any red lights."
I fidgeted some more, then pulled my hand off the doorknob and crouched to see him face-to-face. "Thanks," I said, meaning for everything. "Don't take this like I'm forgiving you or anything," I added, then gave him a tentative hug. His shoulders were bony, and he smelled like metal. He was too startled to do anything back, so I stood and walked out, shutting the door carefully behind me.
Twenty-four
A bright glow from the noon sun filled the kitchen, and I sat with one elbow on the table, my forehead cupped in my hand. The other hand, the one with the demon mark, was firmly on the cool glass of the scrying mirror. From the open kitchen window came the sounds of pixies at play. I was exhausted, having missed out on almost an entire night of sleep. And Minias, the demon from judicial hell, was not being helpful.
"What do you mean, you won't do the curse?" I said aloud so Ivy, sitting on the counter by the sink, could hear at least one end of the conversation. "It was your idea!"
A ribbon of irritation-colored thought slipped through my mind, followed by the eerie sensation of words not mine in my head. Al cut a deal two days ago. He agreed to stand trial, so he's out on bail.
"Trial?" I yelped, and Ivy uncrossed her legs in a show of worry. But Al being out for two days would explain how he'd had time to create a disguise to look like my dad. I hadn't wanted to go to the demons but if Ceri twisted the curse, one of us would have to take on the smut—assuming she would still do it—and if I went through the demons, I could negotiate the smut away. That Minias was reneging on our unfinished arrangement ticked me off. "When is his trial?" I asked, trying not to freak out.
I pressed my hand harder into the scrying mirror when Minias's presence seemed to fade while he presumably searched for the answer. I was very glad the calling glyph worked when the sun was up. Actually, this was the best time to use it since Minias couldn't follow the connection and simply…appear.
Here it is, came Minias's bothered thought, diving through my idle musings like ice water. He's down for sometime in the thirty-sixth.
I closed my eyes and struggled for strength. "The thirty-sixth. Is that this month?" We only had thirty-odd days a month, but they were demons.
No. It's the year.
"Year!" I yelped, and Ivy's face pinched in worry. "This isn't fair! You came to me. I said I'd think about it. I thought about it. I want to do it! He's terrorizing my mother."
Not my problem. Al is functioning within the law, and everyone is happy. You'll get your say in court after he does, and if it's determined he broke his word to you, Newt will put him in a bottle and that will be the end of it.
"I won't survive twenty years waiting for him to come up on the docket!"
It's not an important case, and you'll have to wait, he said. I'm busy. Is there anything else you want to bitch about?
"You little will-o'-wisp of a ghost fart," I snarled, borrowing one of Jenks's favorites. "I know who's summoning him. I can't touch him because summoning demons isn't illegal."
You should go into politics and get a law passed, Minias said, and when I took a breath to protest, he snapped the connection.
I jumped, catching a yelp of surprise at the abrupt sensation of half my mind vanishing. It wasn't really, but I'd been functioning with an expanded capacity and was back to normal.
"Damn it all to the Turn and back!" I yelled, then shoved my scrying mirror across the table to thunk into the wall. "Al cut a deal. He's out on bail and free to harass me all he wants. By the time his ticket comes up on the docket, I'll be dead and he can say anything he wants."
Ivy's expression took on a look of pity, and she drew her knees up to her chin. "I'm sorry." She had been treating me differently since our coffee in the mall. Not standoffish exactly, but a bit hesitant. Maybe it was because our relationship had changed. Or maybe the shift was because I had smacked her into the wall and almost fried her.
"It's not fair!" I exclaimed, standing up and stomping to the fridge. "It's bloody hell not fair!" Furious at my helplessness, I yanked open the fridge and grabbed a bottled juice. "I find out who's summoning Al," I said as I turned and tried to get the stupid thing open. "And then I can't arrest him. I agree to exchange names with Al, and they change their mind."
"We'll work something out." Ivy looked at the archway and put her feet on the floor.
"His court date is in the thirty-sixth," I said, still struggling with the lid. "I don't even know when that is. And I can't get the damn lid off this juice!"
Slamming the bottle down on the center counter, I stormed out, headed for the living room. "Where's the phone?" I barked, though I knew where it was. "I have to call Glenn."
My bare feet slapped on the hardwood floors. The soothing grays and smoky shades Ivy had decorated the room in did nothing to calm me. I snatched up the phone and punched Glenn's number in from memory.
"I had better not get his voice mail," I grumbled, knowing he was working today. It was the day after Halloween and he would have a lot of cleanup to do.
"Glenn here," came his preoccupied voice, and then a startled, "Rachel? Hey, I'm glad to hear from you. How did you do making it through Halloween?"
My first nasty words died in his concern. Leaning against the fireplace mantel, I let my tension go. "I'm fine," I said, "but my mom spent the night with my favorite demon."
The silence was heavy. "Rachel. I'm so sorry. Is there anything I can do?"
I brought my head
up when I realized he thought she was dead. "She's alive," I said belligerently, and I heard him exhale. "I know who's summoning Al. I need a warrant for Tom Bansen. He's an I.S. boy, if you can believe it."
There was no answer, and my blood pressure spiked. "Glenn?"
"Uh, I can't help you, Rachel, unless he's broken a law."
My hand, gripping the phone, started to shake. Frustration knotted my stomach, and that combined with the lack of sleep had me at my rope's end. "There's nothing you can do?" I said softly. "Nothing you can dig up on this guy? The coven is either trying to kill me under the I.S.'s blessing or Tom's a stinking mole. There's got to be something!"
"I'm not in the business of harassing innocent people," Glenn said tightly.
"Innocent people?" I said, waving at nothing. "My mom is going to be hospitalized in the funny farm because of last night. I have to stop him now. The freaking bureaucrats have him out on bail!"
"Tom Bansen?"
"No, Al!"
Glenn took a slow breath. "What I meant was if you catch Tom in the act of sending Al to kill you, I can do something, but it's hearsay right now. I'm sorry."
"Glenn, I need some help here! The only options left to me are really ugly!"
"Don't go after Bansen," Glenn said, his voice carrying a new hardness. "None of them, you hear me?" He sighed, and I could almost see him rub his forehead. "Give me today. I'll find something on one of them. That widow is probably a good bet. Her file is as thick as her late husband's."
Frustrated, I spun to the high window and the red leaves still clinging to the tree. "My mother is sedated on her couch, and it's my fault," I whispered, guilt just about breaking my soul. "I'm not going to wait around for him to start on my brother. I have to be proactive on this, Glenn. If I'm not, everyone I care about will be killed."