by Lori Drake
Without thinking, he retreated back down to Emma’s body, shrinking back into her like a budding flower starting to open and then abruptly changing its mind. As he settled into her again, reeling, the summoning sensations misted away. He was left with nothing but Emma’s aches and pains, her bone-deep weariness. The summoning had stopped. Or had it?
He tried it again, letting himself drift up out of Emma’s body. Again, those little hooks sank into him, grasping at the edges of his ephemeral existence. He shrank back down into Emma again and opened her eyes.
“Emma? It’s okay, you’re safe,” Joey said, reaching for Emma’s hand to give it a gentle squeeze.
Chris squeezed back, his eyes finding Joey’s. “It’s still me. There’s a problem.”
Frowning, Joey released Emma’s hand and sat back. “What now?”
“Tasha’s summoning me. Hardcore. But apparently she can’t touch me when I’m in Em.”
“Is it the amulet?” Joey said, her eyes darting to the pendant resting on Emma’s chest.
“I dunno,” Chris said. “Maybe. I have no way of knowing when she started the summoning, but I think she’s been at it for a while. I put the necklace on when we got in the car…”
“You haven’t heard from her since you’ve been in Emma’s body, have you?”
“Radio silence.”
“Hmm. I guess you’d better stay put then,” Joey said, but from her wrinkled brow he could tell that she didn’t like it.
He didn’t like it either. “I can’t. She needs to sleep, and process what’s happened. But if I leave and Tasha gets her hands on me… I may not be able to keep Em’s location a secret. It’d put everyone helping her at risk.” The idea of Tasha getting her filthy magical hands on Joey filled him with anxiety. His hand crept toward Joey’s again, his wolf instincts crying out for contact to soothe his inner turmoil. This time she let him hold it while she thought. Willing or distracted, it made little difference to him in the moment.
Joey was quiet for a time. He watched her think, wondering what was going on behind those beautiful brown eyes. When she glanced over her shoulder at Dean, the medium held up his hands. Chris had forgotten all about him, standing quietly in the background as he was.
“No. Absolutely not,” Dean said.
“Come on, Dean… it’s only for a little while,” Joey said. “That high muckity-muck witch is coming to meet with Mom in less than an hour. Maybe she can help.”
“No,” Dean repeated, firmly.
Joey shot the medium a pleading look. “Please, Dean. You told me I could have ten minutes. I’m not asking for much more than that.”
A muscle in Dean’s jaw twitched. He folded his arms, presenting every appearance of obstinance, but sighed after a few seconds. “Fine.” Pushing off the wall he’d been leaning against, he stalked to the bed and stood at the foot of it, looking down at Joey and Chris. “But no funny business,” he added, giving them both a significant look. “No means no, got it?”
Joey actually flushed; Chris was pretty sure it was anger rather than embarrassment.
“Got it,” Chris said, then vacated Emma’s body once more. Tasha’s summoning washed over him again, but this time he zipped over to Dean in a flash and dove into his body before it could fully take hold. It worked, and he once again found himself looking out through Dean’s eyes. The transition was disorienting, being on the bed looking up one moment and standing at the foot of it looking down the next.
He wasn’t the only disoriented one in the room for long. A quiet groan sounded from the woman on the bed. Her eyes fluttered open a moment later.
“Hey, welcome back,” Joey said. Emma made an alarmed sound and tried to sit up, but pain flared on her face. She gave up and slumped against the pillow again.
“Where am I?” Emma asked, looking around. “What happened? Oh god, Cheryl!” Her eyes snapped to Joey. “Was it a dream? A horrible, horrible nightmare?”
Joey shook her head, laying a hand on Emma’s shoulder. “It wasn’t a dream. You’re at my parents’ house.”
Emma closed her eyes again, but grief was etched on her face. In the pause that followed, Chris walked around the bed to stand closer. By some unspoken agreement, he and Joey left Emma alone with her thoughts until she was ready to continue.
“How—how did I get here?” Emma asked next. “The last thing I remember—” Her breath caught in her throat and she began to tremble.
Joey stroked her hand, soothingly. “Chris put you to sleep,” she said. “You were out of your mind with grief, and gathering enough magic around you to do some serious damage.”
“Chris?” Emma’s voice had a dreamlike quality to it as she lifted her eyes. She wasn’t looking at Chris, though. She was looking at Dean. “He can do that?”
“Yeah,” Chris said. “Actually, I’m doing it to Dean right now. He loaned me his body.”
Emma’s brow furrowed. “You were inside me?” she said, taking it in stride but clearly not happy about it. Her eyes narrowed fractionally. “Controlling me?”
Chris nodded, shooting her an apologetic look. He knew she had issues with men trying to control her, and this time it was entirely too literal.
Joey stepped in. “It was the only thing he could do to stop you, and after you got arrested—”
“I got arrested?” Emma sat up suddenly. She swayed where she sat, an arm shooting out to steady herself on Joey’s shoulder.
“Yes,” Chris replied. “But we got you a great lawyer, and he got you out. That’s really all you need to worry about right now. I know you just woke up, but your body didn’t get any sleep last night. You need to rest, Em. You’ve got your cloaking amulet on, so Tasha can’t find you. In the meantime, we’re working on a plan to take care of her. You can weigh in when you wake up.”
Emma looked from one concerned face to the other, sighed, and eased herself back down again. “I feel like shit,” she mumbled. “Do you have any aspirin?”
Chris and Joey exchanged a glance. In all Chris's life, he’d never used the stuff. It just wasn’t strong enough; his wolf constitution would burn it off before it had any effect. He wasn’t sure if they even had any in the house, but it would be easy enough to obtain some in any case. It’s not like she’d asked for heroin.
“We’ll get you some,” Joey said. She tried to stand but Emma held on to her hand tightly.
“Don’t go, please. Just sit with me for a while,” she pleaded, quietly. “I don’t want to be alone.”
“I’ll go,” Chris said, laying a hand on Joey’s shoulder. She shrugged it off, but glanced his way and gave him a curt nod before turning back to their friend.
Dismissed, he let himself out of the room and closed the door quietly behind him. As he headed down the hall to start checking medicine cabinets that were largely devoid of medicine, he lamented the wide gulf that had formed between Joey and himself.
Somehow, he had to make things right with her before he left this world.
27
Joey turned and put a shushing finger to her lips when the door opened. It had only been a few minutes since Emma drifted off to sleep. Chris approached quietly with a bottle of aspirin in one hand and a glass of water in the other. Of course he remembered the water. He was thoughtful like that. She smiled, then remembered she was still mad at him and shut it down.
After consulting the directions, Joey left two pills on the nightstand with the water and took the rest of the bottle with her as she headed toward the exit. She wasn’t sure if aspirin overdose was fatal, but she didn’t want to take any chances.
They stole from the room, quiet as church mice. Once outside, he turned to her.
“Joey—j”
“Not here.” She grabbed his arm and towed him a few doors down, where she shoved him into an empty guest room. Once behind closed doors, she rounded on him. They both spoke at once.
“How dare you!“
“I’m sorry.”
Joey folded her arms and shot him
a withering glare, all the more annoyed that he didn’t wither under it. “You’re sorry? That’s the best you can do? For fuck’s sake, Chris.”
“What else do you want me to say?” he asked, gazing at her earnestly.
He had a good point. A frustratingly good point. Off the top of her head, all she could think of was what she didn’t want to hear from him. Excuses. Appeasements. God forbid, declarations of love. What did she want him to say?
“Tell me why,” she said, folding her arms and regarding him sternly.
“Why what?”
Joey’s hackles rose. “What the hell do you think? Why are you apologizing if you don’t know what for?”
He held an appeasing hand up. “I think you need to take a deep breath.”
“Screw you. Don’t tell me what to do. I’ve had a lot of time to think about this, Chris. A lot of time I could’ve been talking to you, but you didn’t tell me you could do this!” She gestured at him, indicating the body he was currently inhabiting.
He winced. “It’s complicated.”
“No, it’s not. You took over Dean’s body and pretended to be him. Twice, that I know of. You deliberately deceived me. Why?”
“I didn’t mean to deceive you.”
Joey barked a laugh. “You didn’t… hah!”
Chris's eyes narrowed, his expression darkening. “You think that’s funny?”
“I think it’s absurd!” Joey tossed back. “But you have my attention, so tell me. How is it that you didn’t mean to deceive me?”
He frowned at her, but began to explain nonetheless. “The first time I took over for Dean, it was entirely by accident. When I realized what I’d done, I went back to apologize to you because we’d just had that big blowout. But you assumed I was Dean and I was so overwhelmed that I couldn’t think of anything but how nice it was to be alive again, to see you again.” He reached for her hand, but she took a step back, remaining out of reach. He grimaced. “I left as soon as I could.”
Joey took all this in quietly. Thinking back, he had tried to extract himself. It made sense, except for… “And the next time it happened?”
“I saw you and Dean dancing and,” he paused, clearly choosing his words carefully. “I acted impulsively, and I’m sorry. Everything is so intense on the astral plane. I don’t know if it’s just the nature of the place or what Tasha did to me but everything I feel is amped up to eleven and my impulse control is… not what it used to be.”
Joey narrowed her eyes, but nodded. It was time to let him off the hook before they were forced to talk about what she really didn’t want to talk about. Her thoughts rolled back to her conversation with Sara. Forgiveness isn’t a crime. “Apology accepted.“
“Just to be clear, I’m not apologizing for kissing you. Only for letting you think it was him.”
Groaning inwardly, Joey rubbed her forehead. “Okay, fine. Whatever.”
“You don’t want to yell at me about that too?” he said, lifting a brow.
“No,” she said, perhaps a little too firmly. “What’s done is done. Let’s just put it behind us okay?” It was so weird looking at Dean but knowing it was Chris behind his brown eyes. A slow smile spread across his face. She didn’t like the look of that smile, or the glint in those eyes.
“You don’t want to talk about it,” he said, looking far too smug. “Because you liked it.”
“I did not!”
“Now who’s deceiving who?”
The fact that he was moving closer didn’t register with her until he was right in front of her. She took an involuntary step back, but it wasn’t in her nature to retreat. Not from him. Not from anyone. “I said I forgive you. Don’t push your luck.”
“Do you have any idea at all how long I’ve wanted to kiss you?” he asked, closing the distance again. Undeterred. “It was better than I’d ever imagined. You can lie to yourself if you want, but you can’t lie to me. I was there, and I know how you reacted.”
“I thought I was kissing Dean!” Joey objected, but she was on shaky ground and she knew it. Even now, her body was responding to him in new and unexpected ways. Whether it was his aggressiveness or proximity, she couldn’t be sure. All she knew was she wanted to kiss him, wanted to feel again what she’d felt that night. Her mind scrambled for a way out. “For the first time since you died, something felt right. How could you do that to me? I thought I was really connecting with someone.”
He gazed at her for a long, thoughtful moment. “You were, Joey. Just not with who you thought.”
Something low in her belly tightened and she fought back a groan. She didn’t realize she was backing up until she fetched up against the door. He was still right in front of her, and in that moment she finally started to feel something besides ill-founded desire: trapped. That familiar sense of panic rose within her. Her breaths quickened and she shuddered involuntarily.
Anyone else might have easily mistaken her reaction for rising excitement, but Chris stepped back, giving her some space. Closing her eyes, Joey leaned against the door and sucked in big gulps of air until the moment passed.
“How did you know?” she asked. Her eyes found him leaning against the dresser when they opened.
He shrugged, regarding her with obvious concern, but kept his distance. “How could I not know?”
“We can’t do this,” she said, thinking more clearly now that she had some space and a few lingering endorphins from her near-panic attack. “We’re not doing this. You’re dead, Chris. Let me go.”
“You first,” he said quietly.
Joey slammed the door behind her as she left, trying to convince herself she was storming off and not fleeing.
Word of the San Diego coven’s representatives’ arrival rolled through the house like ripples on a pond. Chris sat in the guest room with Emma, reading a book while she slept, when Ben stuck his head in to tell him the news. He didn’t know where Joey had gotten off to after their little heart to heart and hadn’t gone looking for her either. She clearly needed some space, and while his time left on this Earth wasn’t unlimited he could afford to give her a little.
As soon as he heard the news, he headed for his mother’s study, but found the door already closed. Knowing better than to interrupt, he parked on a padded bench in the hallway to wait. Surely, someone would need him—or Dean—eventually.
It turned out to be sooner rather than later. After only a few minutes, the door opened and Joey stepped out. Finding him sitting in the hall, she blinked and then chuckled.
“Well, that was easy,” she said, smirking as she motioned him inside. “Her Majesty summons you.”
“I heard that!” Adelaide called from the next room. Joey rolled her eyes and held the door open while Chris stood and went inside.
All eyes turned to him when he entered. His mother sat behind her big desk, of course. Their guests, both women, sat in wing-backed chairs across from her. The guests were as different as night and day. One had a smooth, unlined face that still bore the spark of youth, with autumn flowers plaited into her wavy brown hair. The other was older, mostly grey-haired with a wrinkled countenance he recognized immediately.
“Aunt Cathy?” he exclaimed, eyes darting from the grey-haired woman to his mother and back again.
“Hello Chris,” Cathy said, flashing him that warm smile he knew so well. Cathy and his mother had been friends as long as he could remember. Hell, she’d probably changed his diaper a time or two.
Speechless, he stood there dumbly while Adelaide rose from her seat and approached him, pulling him into a tight hug.
“My dear boy,” she said, so softly that only he—and possibly Joey—could hear. He hugged her back, her familiar perfume tickling his nostrils. Adelaide drew back after a long moment, took his face between her hands and looked deeply into his eyes. “It is you, isn’t it?”
“Yeah,” he said, finally finding his voice again. “It’s me, Mom. Where’s Dad?” It was beyond strange for him to be absent for this meeting.<
br />
“Seeing to Plan B,” she said quietly, then turned to address her guests before he could ask what exactly Plan B entailed. “I suppose Catherine requires no introduction. Gretchen, this is my son, Christopher.”
The younger witch’s eyes unfocused as she studied him for a long moment in silence. Uncomfortable under the scrutiny, Chris shifted his attention to Cathy and offered her a smile.
“High Priestess Catherine, is it? I’m honored,” he said.
Cathy’s lips twitched into a grin and she winked at him, pointing at Gretchen.
Chris's brows lifted in surprise, but he swiftly transferred his attention to the younger woman, whose hazel eyes came into focus again as he did. Her captivating eyes held a depth of wisdom that belied her youthful appearance, but she showed no hint of annoyance over his error.
“The honor is mine,” Gretchen said. “I’ve never met an astral walker before. Curious.” She and Cathy leaned their heads together, conferring quietly.
It was hardly a statement that inspired confidence in the coven’s ability to help. Chris swallowed, wishing he could hear what they were saying. Alas, he was limited to Dean’s disappointingly human hearing so he stood there awkwardly while Adelaide returned to her seat and the witches whispered among themselves. Joey took up a position beside him. He glanced at her but she ignored him, eyes forward.
“Josephine, you may continue,” Adelaide said.
“Actually,” Gretchen said, straightening in her chair. “I’d like to hear from Christopher.”
Adelaide dipped her head and gestured for them to proceed.
“Your sister told us of your delicate matter,” Cathy began.
Gretchen smoothly picked up there. “What can you tell us about the one that binds you?”
“Her name is Tasha,” he said. “I don’t know much about her, honestly. She’s usually the one asking the questions.”
“Questions about what?” Gretchen asked, making Chris wonder just how far Joey had gotten in the story before they’d called for him to weigh in. He cast a sideways glance in her direction, but her eyes remained forward. Even in profile, she looked annoyed. She didn’t like being upstaged by anyone, even him.