by Kristie Cook
Addie spluttered on her coffee. “Oh, trust me. I don’t think that’s an issue.”
“I don’t know . . . I mean, sometimes I wonder how he can even look at me.” I dropped my voice to a whisper as guilt flooded through me. “I killed his parents.”
“He doesn’t blame you for that,” she said softly.
“Not out loud.”
“Kales, I’m sure that’s not an issue, either. Not for Xandru.”
I exhaled slowly. “Well, there definitely is an issue. It’s just . . .” I couldn’t finish my thought, not sure what words to give it.
“This life is not what the two of you had always planned and daydreamed about before,” she finished for me. “It’s not the vision you’d created in your sweet and innocent minds.”
I slumped back in my chair. “No, it’s not,” I admitted. “Maybe it is me. Maybe it’s everything I’ve been through.”
“It’s getting to you both. He’s been through a lot, too. He lost his world when you left.”
“I know. We both did. I left this town as a young girl who didn’t know half of what was going on behind all the pretty lights and small-town charm. I came back after having my life ripped away from me. Twice.” Once when my parents sent me away with my memories wiped, and once when my gene was triggered, turning me. “And even now . . .”
I swallowed against the lump in my throat. Addie was my best friend, and I should have been able to say anything to her. But what I was thinking felt almost like a betrayal. One I couldn’t bring myself to say aloud.
But she could. “Even now you feel like this life has been forced on you.”
“How did you know?”
She shrugged. “I would have felt the same way. After everything you’ve been through, it’s not surprising. You came back to a life you didn’t remember, only to have two kids and a failing business dumped in your lap. And while you and Xandru always seemed to be meant for each other, that was before.”
“Before I changed.”
“Before both of you did. Before shit happened. Before you both let fear get in your way.”
“I’m not afraid of anything,” I protested automatically. She lifted a brow.
I twisted my hair around my finger. The backs of my eyeballs pricked, but I refused to tear up. Her hand landed on my forearm, and she gave it a squeeze.
“Nobody would blame you if you took off, you know. I’d hate you, but I wouldn’t blame you.”
“I can’t.”
“You can. If that’s what you really wanted.”
“I couldn’t do that to Aurelia and Gabe. They need me . . . The inn does, too.”
“The town would rally around them and make sure they were taken care of. Or you could take them with you. Let them see the world before their genes are triggered. Are you going to trigger them?”
I blew out a breath. “I haven’t even thought that far ahead. It’s not like anybody’s at risk if I don’t.”
Normally, if the moroi gene wasn’t triggered by age twenty-one, the whole bloodline before them would begin to age and die like a human. But there was nobody left before us, no previous generations at risk. And if my siblings’ genes weren’t triggered, they’d continue life as humans, having children with dormant genes that didn’t have to be triggered. That was the life my parents had tried to make for me, before Tase turned me.
“You could take them far from here and let them lead the normal life you were supposed to have,” Addie said. “Get away from all the craziness of this town.”
“Are you trying to get rid of me?”
“I’m trying to point out that you have options, Kales. You don’t have to feel like this is all forced onto you. You can choose this life. I mean, it’s kind of like what you’d always wanted, just a little twisted up. Or you can choose something else. And it’s about damn time my girl was allowed to choose for herself. Wouldn’t you say?”
I looked up and behind her, at the mountain rising high into the sky, a tiny bit of snow left on the tallest peaks. We were surrounded by magnificent beauty in this little box canyon of ours. But there was a whole world out there beyond.
I’d been happy out there before. Sort of.
I’d been happy here. Once upon a time.
“What about Xandru?” I whispered.
Addie gave my arm another squeeze. “I think you have some hard decisions to make. Just remember—you do get to make those decisions. Make them yours and nobody else’s.”
I considered that for a moment. How glorious it sounded to be able to make my own decisions about my life. I’d tried it before, though. I’d had a life I’d created on my own, once. But she was right about my fears. “What difference does it make if my life just gets ripped out from under me again?”
“Oh, Kales,” Addie said with a sigh. “I’ll do my damnedest to make sure nothing like what you’ve been through happens again, but I can’t guarantee anything. All I can say is that you can’t let that fear hold you back, or you’ll never be able to move forward. Take the power you do have and use it.”
Tilting my head, I studied her, letting her meaning sink in. “When did you get so wise?”
She smiled. “My destiny is to be a wise old witch, so I may as well start working on it now.”
“Good thing you have a lot of years before you get to the old requirement, so you can practice the wise part,” I teased.
“Aw, come on. I thought I did good for my first time.”
I laughed. “If imparting your wisdom means leaving your subject more confused than ever, you’ll make a fine wise old witch, Bratty Addie.”
She considered this for a moment and nodded. “I’ll take that. So, you don’t know what you’re going to do?”
I stood and grabbed my nearly untouched cup of coffee. “I’m going to think. That’s what I’m going to do. Because you’re right. It’s time for me to woman up and be the boss of my own life.”
Chapter 4
Xandru
Calling it quits for the day, I locked up the workshop at Roca Metal Works and strode the sloping gravel driveway toward the house. Dad had built our log cabin-style home at the eastern end of Mills Avenue and built the shop up the hill, closer to the banks of Bels Creek, which twisted and turned along the bottom of Mt. Sousa. He claimed being close to the creek’s icy water was more efficient for our work, but manipulating metal was our gift. We rarely used fire or had a need for the cold water to set our designs.
I’d always believed the real reason was to have a better viewpoint to look down at the town—rather than them looking down at us—but as I made the walk by myself in recent months, I began to think that maybe he simply enjoyed the beautiful view. Right now, the trees were all filled out and various shades of green. In barely more than a month, the aspens would be bright gold surrounded by the reds and oranges of maples and oaks. Not long after, I’d be looking down on a winter wonderland. Maybe my dad did have a soft spot in that icy heart of his.
I’d just reached the back deck with a cold shower, a colder beer, and a call to Michaela on my mind, when my phone buzzed with a text.
AB: We need to talk.
Me: Did he go?
AB: Yeah. He’s done. Something’s not right tho
Me: Give me 15
I rushed through my shower, my mind flipping through a dozen things that could have gone wrong at Tase’s check-in with the Court today. After throwing on a T-shirt, jeans, and boots, I hurried out to my truck. If it weren’t for human eyes, I could have been downtown in five seconds by foot. Instead, the drive took five minutes because of the 15 mile-per-hour speed limit of the residential streets. I found Addie Beaumont pacing impatiently outside the back of City Hall, and she jumped into my passenger seat when I pulled into the parking lot.
“Didn’t go well?” I asked, shifting into park before turning to face her.
She pushed her glasses up, the light of the afternoon sun glinting on the stone in her nose, frustration painted on her face. “What d
id he do?”
“Hmm . . . you’ll have to be more specific. Which time?”
“I don’t know, Xan. Any time!” She threw her hands into the air. “It’s a good thing they had me renew the protection spell, because I swear he was resisting it.”
I arched a brow. “Tase is resisting your magic? The magic that’s keeping him from going off his rocker?”
“Not completely resisting, but definitely trying. And not him, not on purpose. It’s the curse, I think. It’s growing stronger. Something’s changed in the last eight weeks, since his first check-up.” Worry filled her eyes. “I tried to cover it up, but there’s a chance my grandmother sensed it. If she did . . . if she thinks she needs to start doing the spells herself, she’ll notice. And then if she says anything to the rest of the Court . . . if they think he’s getting worse . . . they’ll start taking further action. You have to tell me if he’s done . . . something.”
I shrugged. “He’s a grown man. I can’t babysit him twenty-four seven.”
“Please. Anything you can think of. The more I know, the better the spell I can create to protect him.” Pausing, she angled toward me more and tilted her head. “Did something happen in Montrose maybe?” she fished.
I played innocent. “Montrose? Why would you think that?”
“Stop being a pain in my ass!” Addie lifted her hand from her lap, holding it in a fist. Not in a threatening way. At least, not in a traditional threat. “I have all sorts of ways I can force an answer out of you,” she said through clenched teeth. “Don’t make me use them.”
“You would use magic on me? You’re that serious?”
“I’m. That. Serious.”
I stared at her for a moment. “Why?”
The question seemed to catch her off guard. Her fist dropped a few inches. “What do you mean?”
“Why are you so dead set on helping him? After what he did to your best friend and her family? After everything he’s done to you?”
She looked away, gazing out the windshield for a moment before looking me in the eye. “You know why. I’m a masochistic schmuck. Now, are you going to help me save your brother from an imminent execution, or what?”
“I’m not sure there’s anything I can do.”
“Tell me everything that happened in Montrose. He told the Court about the girl and being set up, but I don’t think we got the full story.”
“Really?” I was surprised he’d told them anything.
“By the way, you will have to babysit him now, because he’s not allowed to leave town without a chaperone. Specifically, you. Not if someone’s trying to set him up to kill.”
Fucking awesome. As if I had nothing else to do. Of course, I’d been going with him on every trip out of town since then anyway, but being ordered by the Court made me want to do the opposite. Blame the Roca blood.
“So you know he drank some human blood?” I said.
“No! How much?”
Oops. “I don’t know. She’d already bled out some, but she was unconscious by the time I pulled him off.”
“Damn it. Damn him! He said he restrained.”
I snorted. “Hardly. But do you really think he’d tell the Court otherwise?”
“He could have at least told me.” She sighed, then nodded. “Okay, that explains a little more. I guess the curse could have gained some strength from a certain amount of blood.”
“He didn’t even come close to draining her, and that was over a month ago.”
“Yeah, I know,” she said with another heavy sigh. She watched her hands in her lap, her finger tracing over the stones in one of her many bracelets, her teeth working on her bottom lip.
“What are you thinking?”
She looked back up at me, then out the window again, then back at me. “Did he . . . did he kill anyone then? Human, specifically?”
I exhaled sharply at the blunt question.
“You’d tell me if he did, right?” she continued. “You have to be honest with me, Xandru. It’s the only way I’ll know how to formulate the best potion or spell.”
A lie danced on the tip of my tongue, but Addie was right. The more knowledge she had about what she was working with, the more accurate her magic would be. If she and the rest of the Luna Coven, all powerful mages, knew what had gone into the curse itself, they could have developed a counter to it. But they didn’t know. Putting in temporary blocks was the only remedy they had for now, but those wouldn’t work if not done properly.
“I don’t know,” I finally admitted. Her face fell, so I quickly added, “But I don’t think so. I wasn’t with him the whole time while he looked for whoever had left the girl. He said he didn’t find anyone, and I never smelled or sensed anything that made me think he was lying. Besides, they were supernatural, so it wouldn’t have affected him, even if he did. That’s the best I can tell you.”
She blew out a long breath, as though she’d been holding it since asking the question. “Okay, I guess that will have to do.” She glanced at the City Hall building. “I need to get back inside. Court’s about to reconvene. Busy night. Oh, hey, there’s Michaela.”
I followed her gaze out the windshield to see my girl round the corner to the back of City Hall. She looked sexy as hell dressed in a skirt and jacket, her dark hair pulled up in a twist, and her long legs seemingly endless in those heels. I suppressed a great urge to jump out of the truck, run to her, and sweep her into my arms, every bit of me wanting to go all Neanderthal and claim her as mine. But I knew that was the last thing she’d want. I’d been doing my best to hold back and give her as much space as I could possibly stand. If it were up to me, we’d have sworn vows by now and be spending every waking moment in bed. But I’d promised myself I wouldn’t pressure her.
Addie did what I couldn’t—jumped out of the truck and rushed over to Michaela. The two talked for a moment, then looked over at me. Michaela waved and started walking toward me. I slowly edged my way out of the truck seat and sauntered over to meet her.
“Hey,” she said.
“Hey, yourself. I was going to call you as soon as I was done with Addie. See if you wanted to grab a pizza at Napoli’s.”
She looked over to where Addie was slipping through the metal door at the back of City Hall, plain as could be except for the moon emblem embossed into it. Dad’s work. “Oh, well, I’m glad I caught you here then. I won’t be around tonight.”
“No?”
Her gray-green gaze came back to me. “No, sorry.” She motioned toward the metal door. “I’m meeting with the Court.”
Something flickered in her eyes that made my stomach drop and a lump form in my throat at the same time, but I couldn’t say what. I cleared my throat, but my voice still came out hoarse. “About what?”
She gnawed on her bottom lip. How I wanted to be the one gnawing on it. “Um . . . well . . . about my future. And Aurelia’s and Gabe’s, too. You know, what’s next for us. Where we go from here.”
It took everything I had to keep my expression neutral. But . . . what the fuck did that mean? Where was she planning to go? Away again?
“What our options are,” she added, and that just about undid me.
Options? What kind of options? My chest ached with the desire to tell her there was only one option: me. Nothing else mattered. But she’d had enough forced on her in her life. I wanted to be her choice. And if I wasn’t . . . well, I’d survived the first time she left. Not well, but I had. I could only hope I could handle it again.
“I see.” I smiled for her as I pushed a lock that had popped out of her twist behind her ear. “You have every option you want, Kales. Don’t let them choose for you.”
Her eyes darkened for a moment, but then she returned my smile with an appreciative one. “Thank you, Xandru.”
She tilted her face up and lifted on her toes at the same time—even in heels she was nearly a foot shorter than me. She pressed her lips against mine and lingered for a long moment before she turned away and hurried
for the metal door that led to the meeting room of the Court of the Sun and the Moon.
My very favorite people, said no Roca ever.
Once in my truck, I considered going home for that cold beer, but decided to head to the Dirty Knuckle instead. I drove down Fourth Street almost to the entrance to the ski resort. The lifts ran on the weekends during the summer for those who wanted to go up the mountain to enjoy the view and a bite to eat at the snack shack Tase had built up there, but they were closed today. That meant the Knuckle wouldn’t be as busy as the Haven Saloon on the square, where both locals and any tourists would gather. I had enough noise in my head. I didn’t need it all around me, too.
The lighting was dim, and the air cool and welcoming. I grabbed my usual stool at the bar and shot the shit with Rhys Graywalk, the fae owner, whom I didn’t usually see behind the bar. Everett Weston came in and straddled his own favorite stool two down from mine. We had a few beers and shot a couple games of pool. Everett was easy to hang out with. He didn’t feel the need to fill every moment with conversation, unlike the girls when they were here, and was a no-drama, no-bullshit kind of guy. Unlike my brothers.
When I left a few hours later, I admittedly didn’t take the most direct route home. I meandered my way through the streets with the windows down, turning down Main Street and slowing to a crawl as I neared the inn.
“Are you stalking me?” a familiar voice called out from the sidewalk.
Shit. Hadn’t meant to get caught.
I pulled over to the side of the road in front of Madame Tahini’s and the pawn shop, where Michaela stood. She opened the door and slid into the passenger seat.
“Court just got out, and I was on my way home. Give me a lift?”
I smiled as I looked through the window at the inn across the street. “Any time, my lady.”
When I pulled into the driveway and parked in front of her cottage thirty seconds later, she didn’t immediately move to get out.
“So . . . did you find out your options?” I asked, turning toward her.