He sat on the couch beside her, taking her hand in his. “Listen, you asked me not to get personal, and I respected that—even when you literally vanished last night. But things just got personal when you were snatched up by some random guy in the woods. You’re here because of what’s happening to me. I can’t help but feel a little responsible. So spill. Now,” he demanded.
Derrick was right, and if she didn’t tell him, and Escobar came calling… If he hurt someone in Cedar Glen to get to her, she’d never be able to live with it. But if she left and Escobar found her before the full moon, Derrick could die.
Rock, meet hard place.
Disgust crawled along her exposed flesh. God, she hated this. This was a perfect example of why she’d give almost anything to be a human. “I’m a familiar.” She spat the words out as if they were coated in toxic waste.
He cocked a raven eyebrow. “A what?”
Her gaze fell to their hands, where they were connected, noting how easily they fit. “A familiar. We’re like guides for witches. We’re supposed to teach them how to harness their magic, cultivate it. It’s…I know this sounds crazy, seeing as I am one, but I don’t know a lot about it. In fact, I’ve spent all my life avoiding it until…recently.”
Derrick’s disbelief said it all. “Your parents didn’t teach you about it? About your powers? They’re familiars, too, right?”
Her parents. Delicate business indeed. How did you tell a man who loved his family as much as Derrick did that you didn’t exactly come from the Waltons? “They are, and my father tried. Look, my father wasn’t exactly the best of the best in the decent-person category. I watched him do horrible things all my life in order to become a warlock, his ultimate goal being immortality. His quest for that goal was unsavory, to say the least.” As the memories washed over her, she cringed.
He held up his free hand, still caressing hers with the other. “Okay, so if you’re a familiar, you can become immortal?”
“If you steal enough magic from witches, yes. But while my father was motivated enough to do plenty of dirty deeds, he just didn’t have the stick-to-it-iveness to follow through.” Unless it involved a twelve pack of Miller Light, but she left that part out. It was hard enough to admit she came from such filth.
Clearly, Derrick couldn’t fathom a parent as remiss as hers. He’d had some pretty good ones. “What about your mother?”
Martine’s heart tugged. Dianna had come up in her memories a lot lately, but she hadn’t told anyone about her out loud in a long time. “My mother was, or is, an amazing human being. She protected me from my father at every turn. I almost think she didn’t want me to learn to practice magic because she was afraid I’d turn out like my father. My mother hardly ever practiced herself. The trouble is, she’s just attached to someone she can’t seem to break free from.” And that was all he was getting out of her about her mother.
It wasn’t as though she didn’t know her mother was weak where her father was concerned. It wasn’t as if she didn’t realize the word “enabler” came to mind whenever she thought about her. But she loved her—loved her so much she couldn’t bring herself to spit openly on her memory.
“Bad marriage?” he asked, concern and sympathy in his blue eyes.
So, so bad. “Very. Let’s just leave it at this—I resisted my father’s way of life for as long as I could because I saw what my father did to my mother. Until I was forced to make a choice, that is. I hated what my father did to other people in his wish to become immortal. He was cruel and callous and wanted power he just couldn’t manage to gain. If I consider my father and his penchant for abusing his craft, I imagine my mother was afraid I’d be another way for him to get what he wanted. She refused. End of.”
“I’m—”
“No.” She stopped him by squeezing his arm, her eyes finding his full of pity. “Don’t say it. I don’t need anyone to feel sorry for me. Once I left home, everything got much better.”
“If not a whole lot isolated.”
Point for Farm Boy. “Yes. But I was used to handling a lot of things on my own anyway. My father was a black sheep among familiars because of his misdeeds and trickery. As a result, I was painted with the same brush, and I’m okay with that. It taught me how to survive. I stayed away from humans for fear of discovery, and I stayed away from my own kind because they didn’t exactly want me around anyway.”
Derrick’s next question was hushed, soft and low, concern threading through it. “Where’s your mother now?”
Martine fought the scoff. “Still living in Queens and married to my father.”
“You said you had no family.”
“Yep, and I’d say it again. Would you want to claim a man like that as part of your family?”
“Understood. So you know nothing about the lifestyle of a familiar. I don’t get how this connects you to where you are now.”
“I was kidnapped by a warlock.” God. Even with his crazy curse she’d roll her eyes at that explanation.
Derrick cupped her chin, forcing her gaze to his. “When?”
“Six months ago…”
“How?”
“I don’t know exactly how he found out about me. Don’t think I didn’t curse my stupidity for not learning the ways of a familiar, after that. Anyway, he grabbed me at a nightclub I was in, trashed the place, put a spell on me to keep me in shift, and kept me prisoner until someone came along and stuffed me in that Dumpster.”
Derrick’s face went as hard as his eyes. “Kept you prisoner?”
“Ironic, right? Me, the familiar who’s supposed to teach a witch their craft, doesn’t know thing one about witchcraft. It’s laughable. So, yes. Escobar, that’s his name, kept me prisoner in his apartment in a sort of jacked-up version of an enclosed catio, and kept me quiet with a silencing spell right up until you found me. Because I know nothing about magic, which is surely a testament to how stubborn I can be, I was helpless to stop him from keeping me there.”
“Why did he kidnap you? If you can’t help him with his craft, what good are you to him?”
“Ready for more crazy?”
Derrick’s grin was ironic and dimpled and delicious. “I’m the one cursed to die on the full moon if I don’t mate, Pussycat. Don’t go talkin’ crazy to me.”
The tight ball in her chest eased a bit when she laughed. “He sends me off to another realm.”
“To do what?”
“Steal other witches’ magic.”
“For?”
“World domination?”
“Try serious.”
“I am serious. Or rather, it wouldn’t surprise me if that were his goal. The more magic a warlock collects, the greater his chances of becoming immortal. That’s the end game. Immortality. What he wants to do with immortality is anyone’s guess. Why he chose me out of all the familiars in the world…I don’t know the answer to that question either.”
Derrick’s thick brows connected. “And how do you steal it—the magic, I mean?”
Her laugh was derisive and bitter. “Ready for more irony? I have no clue. When he ships me off to the ether, it’s all very vague and floaty, sort of dreamlike, you know? Flashes of colors and sounds, but no definition to them. When I wake up, I’m always back in Escobar’s condo, bloated, like I’m on the verge of giving birth. He waves his magic wand—”
“He has a magic wand?”
“Are you ten?”
Now his grin was sheepish. “Look, ten or two hundred and ten, a magic wand’s a magic wand.”
She couldn’t help but giggle at the boyish look of interest on his beautiful face. “He doesn’t really have a magic wand. He says some words and suddenly, the magic’s gone.”
“So it’s like you swallow the magic? Can I just say how crazy that sounds?”
Martine let her eyes fall to the couch. “Tell me about it. I don’t know why the magic goes where it goes. I just know that’s where it goes.”
“And he’s been sending you off to do his dirty
work for six months?”
God, that sounded weak and pathetic. That she’d allowed someone to take advantage of her abilities for six months because she had no clue how to get herself out of the mess she was in was a sad testament to what her life had become.
“Yes, and the worst of it, or what keeps me up at night sometimes, is I don’t know if anyone’s been hurt by what I’ve been doing—because I don’t know what I’ve been doing.” It made her stomach turn at the very thought, to have fought so hard to keep from participating in a world she wanted nothing to do with, only to become a slave to it.
“Okay, so we think Escobar’s who grabbed you tonight?”
Martine bit her nail and shook her head. “I don’t think it was Escobar. But who else would want to kidnap me? I do know from some of the conversations he’s had in my presence he has plenty of people who follow him around as if he has the answer to the meaning of life, so maybe it was someone who owes him something. But I know whoever it was, Escobar has a hand in this.”
“And the other night when you disappeared?”
“I can’t explain that either. I don’t know what happened to me from the time I left your bed until I woke up in the middle of the woods where Jerry found me.” And the fire. Don’t forget the fire, Martine.
“So Jerry did know what happened to you,” Derrick said, his mouth now tight.
“Please don’t be angry with him. I asked him not to tell, and he only agreed with a promise that I’d tell you. Eventually, anyway.”
“And when you woke up naked in the middle of the forest, what next?”
She shrugged her shoulders. “It was the same as it was when I used to wake up at Escobar’s. I woke up with a belly full of magic.”
Derrick scrubbed a hand over his jaw. “And the magic is where…?”
She winced, remembering the amazing display of light and sound. “I expelled it when I remembered the words Escobar used to use to take it from me.”
“Don’t make me pull teeth here, Martine. I want to help. I really do, but you have to tell me everything. Where did the magic go?”
“I set some trees and shrubs on fire with it, but I swear I didn’t know what would happen when I actually expelled it. I…don’t know what I thought. I just knew I had to get it out.”
“Because?”
“Because it’s not like Escobar uses it for good if he’s stealing it, right? So I have to go with the assumption that he’s collecting it for some evil deed he’s planned, like the fruition of his immortality. I don’t want it if it’s going to hurt someone. I just wanted it gone.”
“So we have to assume he knows where you are? I mean, if he sent you to get him more magic.”
“That’s where I’m iffy. Escobar didn’t have to be in close proximity to me in order to ship me off to the realm. One minute I’d be in my catio, as he called it, not having seen him in some cases for days, the next I’d be in the realm. Then I’d end up right back where I started and he’d extract the magic. What worries me is the extraction. He’s going to want what he sent me to the realm for, Derrick. I don’t want to be in Cedar Glen if he’s going to come looking for it. He took out an entire club when he snatched me up, wiped everyone’s memory of it happening, and restored order to it before anyone was the wiser. Do you want that to happen to Cedar Glen? To the people who live here?”
She shivered all over again, but Derrick rubbed her arm, soothing her. “So we have a magic-stealing, kidnapping warlock on our hands.”
“My hands,” Martine stressed, a tear threatening to fall, her eyes and throat burning. “This is all mine.”
Derrick shook his dark head, running a finger over her cheek. “No. You’re here because of me. This is ours, Martine. If not for my curse, you’d still be at Escobar’s.”
“So you don’t want me to go?” She was astonished. She’d want her to go.
“Um, no. And before you say it, it isn’t just because you hold the key to me breathing.”
Looking into his eyes, she asked before she had the chance to temper her words with caution. “Then what is it? Why would you want me to stay if there’s a possibility I could put everyone around me in danger?”
He looked right back at her. “I like you. People I like, I don’t want to see in danger.”
Martine’s heart clenched and relaxed. “Thank you.”
“Aren’t you going to say you like me, too?”
“Is your self-esteem account running low today?” she joked, still warm from his admission.
“Nope. But if you don’t like me, too, I’m dumping you back at the 7-Eleven.”
Her head fell back on her shoulders when she laughed, light and easy. “Oh, all right. I like you, too.”
“Good. That settled, there’s something I need to tell you, too. But let’s do it over dessert. I have some cheesecake and I’m pretty sure I have a bottle of wine that’ll work with it somewhere. You in?” he asked, his eyes lighter now.
She took the hand he offered, the tingle running up her arm making her shiver. “Cheesecake and wine? Are you kidding? I’m in.”
So in.
And it wasn’t just because of the allure of dessert and booze.
Chapter Eleven
Over cheesecake and wine, Derrick told Martine what happened with the guy in his bar, forcing himself to pay attention to the conversation rather than the press of her tempting breasts against her flimsy nightgown.
An odd protective feeling crept over him as she’d told him about Escobar, followed swiftly by sharp rage that someone had dare touch his life mate…er, guest with benefits.
He knew squat about magic and witches, but he’d be damned if he’d let someone turn her into their personal lackey.
Nibbling her last bite, her full lips enveloping the fork, Martine asked, “What did this guy look like?”
Derrick shrugged, pouring her another glass of wine if only to watch her swirl it around in her mouth and lick her lips with the tongue that had done some pretty amazing things last night. “Tall, lanky. Maybe six-foot, sandy brown hair. Well-dressed, had on a suit.”
Twirling a strand of her hair around her finger, she shook her head, making a face. “That’s not Escobar by a long shot. He’s short and fat and sort of looks like a cherubic troll with the strength of ten oxen. Short and round are two of the best adjectives I can think of for him.”
“But could it have been someone he sent in to find you?”
“Anything’s possible, especially with the amount of magic he’s collected. He can cloak himself, too. Take on anyone’s façade. For a time anyway, until the magic wears off. He also sells the magic sometimes, too, by the way.”
“Like a bookie?”
“It is a little like that. If he gives someone some of the magic he’s accrued, they owe him. So maybe he sent someone in who owes him. But how could he have possibly found me in the first place? Does he have some kind of tracking spell on me? It’s not like Cedar Glen is an obvious conclusion to draw. I’d never even heard of Cedar Glen before you. Maybe he found me through the magic itself?”
He shrugged, far more concerned than he was letting on, or than he was allowing himself to admit even to himself. “I know zero about magic and witches and warlocks.”
She grinned. “That makes two of us.”
“So you really shunned your fellow familiars?” He found it almost impossible to wrap his head around. Impossible and sad. As far as he was concerned, she had a pretty cool gig in terms of her magic. Maybe that was the twelve-year-old in him talking, but he also didn’t know what he’d do without his roots, his family.
“I did everything I could to stay far away from all things magical. I shifted only when I couldn’t stand the pressure of it anymore, and I stayed out of my father’s line of vision as often as possible. He was mostly too drunk to care what I did, and my mother didn’t force the issue as a way to compensate for my father, I think.”
Derrick’s chest grew tight when he thought of little Martine,
afraid of an abusive father with nowhere to turn. “Straight up, I’m going to tell you, I can’t imagine a life without my family. They’re loud, nosy, intrusive, but I need them as much as I need to breathe. I’m sorry you don’t have the same thing. I’m sorry everyone doesn’t.”
Her smile was sad and distant now. Maybe the first sign he’d seen that she might be a little sorry she didn’t have those things, too. “You can’t miss what you don’t know. Though, I will tell you, you’re very lucky to have the support you do. So give your mother a break, huh? I know what it’s like to have a mother who loves someone unconditionally—to a fault. Your father was nothing like mine, if what everyone’s told me is true. Be glad of that much, and let your mother be.”
“So your mother…you haven’t seen her in a long time.”
Martine sighed, her soft lips turning downward. “I just couldn’t watch it anymore. He was destroying her day by day. My entire life was spent walking on eggshells, with her holding my hand and leading the way. I wanted to live out loud, and you couldn’t do that with my dad around. He was always too drunk and ornery. The few times my mother really let loose were so few and far between, if I thought back on them, I could probably remember every tiny detail. My mother was a vibrant woman when my father wasn’t there to suck her spirit out of her. Maybe that’s why I’m so free in other areas of my life.”
Derrick’s hands clenched into fists, his lips tight when he asked, “Did he hit you? Your mother?” Because he’d hunt the motherfucker down and kill him with his bare hands.
Whoa, buddy. Where’d that come from?
She shook her head, stamping her index finger on the plate to gather the leftover crust crumbs. “No. He never hit us. He was just ugly and cruel and bitter, and he took that bitterness out on us every day.”
He relaxed back in his chair. “So the let’s-not-get-personal thing comes from your childhood.”
“Ya think, Dr. Derrick?” She laughed. “I say we stop talking about my childhood and let me figure out what I should do next to keep all of you safe. You don’t want Escobar here, Derrick. You don’t. He’s a power-hungry monster. Not to mention, a pretty powerful warlock.”
What's New, Pussycat? (Wolf Mates Book 2) Page 12