Blood Ties (20 page)

Adrian and I got comfortable on the TKTS bleachers. I wondered how the crowd would react if they knew there were a couple of genuine witches amongst them—one of whom was going to save them from becoming part of a human buffet.

“The technique of charisma is actually quite easy,” said Adrian. “You’ve heard photographers telling models to make love to the camera? Well, that’s basically all you do with humans. You must visualize your target falling in love with you. Pretend with your mind’s eye that you’re making love to them. And be the best sex they’ve ever had.”

“So I just close my eyes and imagine someone crushing on me.”

“Not exactly. You have to be adept enough to visualize it with your eyes wide open. No matter what or who is physically in front of you, disregard what you really see. Instead see them making you their lover, savior, whatever. You will basically become the erotic projection of their god. Watch.”

Adrian directed his glance at an old woman. There was no doubt she was a tourist. Her ill-fitting Velcro sneakers aggravated her bulging varicose veins, forcing her to take a break on the bottom bleacher. She took off her sun visor—yellowed from an overabundance of facial oil—and wiped her brow. Then she rifled through her fanny pack and pulled out a small map of the city. As she read the directions to her next stop, Adrian uttered a spell through his smile like a ventriloquist: “Know who I am. I’m passion’s key. You can’t help it. You want me.”

“That’s fucking corny as hell,” I said.

“Maybe, but it works.”

“Do spells always have to rhyme?”

“It helps, because nature likes rhythm.”

The old lady looked back as if someone had called her name. She searched the crowd with her eyes and deadlocked on Adrian’s. In the throes of a hypnotic trance, something drove her to climb the bleachers. She pushed the heads of random people out of her way as she let her internal homing device lead her. As if something clicked in her head, she plunked down right in front of Adrian and leaned back on his knees. Adrian’s charisma was driving her subconscious impulse to touch him in any way she could. Finally she turned around. I was freaking out at how she just stared at him.

Adrian puckered his lips and gently blew like he was blowing the seeds off a dandelion. The old woman simply got up and went back to the bottom bleacher. She snapped out of the enchantment and was left scratching her head with a befuddled look on her face.

“Wow! That was amazing. Can you do that with anyone?” I asked.

“Sure. But the results depend on the intellectual capability of the receiver. The less intelligent the victim, the more effective charisma is. Intellectual people are more difficult to influence. Independent minds fight manipulation. That’s why the masses can never be
real
witches. Yes, they can dabble in magic. However, their nature is to believe what they see and what they are told. Television makes it way too easy for me to do what I do.”

Even though I was enjoying my lesson, I thought I had covered these bases with Addison. “So glamour and charisma are the same thing.”

“Charisma and glamour have much in common. Both are based on illusion. There are key differences, though. They work on different levels. Glamour brings about material illusions, the third dimension. That’s why you were able to turn into a cat, so to speak. Charisma is abstract and takes advantage of one of the most powerful forces on earth: sex.”

“So I can use glamour to stay beautiful and young forever?”

“If you continue using the same glamour effect, it will become permanently etched on you. Unfortunately, youth and beauty are glamour’s exceptions. No one, not even witches, can stay young and beautiful forever. Witches still age, and our looks wither, even though at an extremely decelerated pace.”

“What a cruel irony.”

There was another paradox at hand. I was deeply in love with James. However, the more Adrian talked, the more fascinating he became to me. I found him to be well spoken, knowledgeable, and capable. The Bolingbrokes had underestimated his ability. He turned out to be a pretty good teacher. Still I remained cautious and heeded James’s advice to avoid his direct gaze.

I was eager to give charisma a go. I rubbed my hands together and asked, “Can I try?” I could tell Adrian was attempting to look deeper into my eyes.

“That’s what we’re here for,” he said.

We walked down the congested sidewalk. At the horizon of the sea of people, I scoped out a man in a Valentino Newman suit. He carried a Montblanc briefcase in one hand and a Carve club sandwich in the other. I recited Adrian’s spell and made sure to smile. Smiling, Adrian said, was one of the best ways to entice people.

The man stopped in his tracks and dropped his lunch right on the sidewalk. He swung around as he looked through the crowd. His prominent, fishlike eyes landed on me. He tilted his head to the side and grunted: “Hmph.” He swiveled back around and continued on to his destination.

Adrian put his hand on the small of my back. “You got it. You’re a natural,” he said in a breathy voice.

We went on for hours, spellbinding men, women, children, even a sewer rat. I finally understood why James said to use magic sparingly. The charisma drained me to the point where I could no longer garner any magical response.

“You’re tired. Let’s go back to the house and get you rested,” Adrian said.

I think I was turning green from exhaustion and the noxious fumes from the buses didn’t help either. As we waited to cross Broadway, Adrian took my hand. I didn’t know what to make of that. Was he just helping me because I was tired? Or was it something else?

I didn’t have too much time to think about it. As I was about to step off the curb, a bat-out-of-hell taxi nearly took me out. It got so close to me that its wind shear billowed up my shirt when it passed. Adrian yanked me back and took me into his arms. At first I didn’t notice that he had rescued me. I was too busy screaming epithets at the long-gone taxi driver.

“Are you alright?” Adrian asked. He stood back and examined me for injuries.

After the last “stupid-ass shitface motherfucker” slipped from my mouth, the reality of what had happen set in. I didn’t have to worry about Catherine. Fucking traffic was going to get me first. I shook my head in response to Adrian’s question. He pulled me in close to his body and swayed in an effort to relax me. I started to feel better, but then panicked when realized I was too comfortable in his arms. A tiny sexual rush shot through my body, and I shamefully let go of him.

“I know my rows with James are disturbing to you. I guess I act that way because I like you. I like you very,
very
much.” Adrian said. He paused for a moment to gather his thoughts. “Tell me something. If James weren’t in the picture, would I have a chance with you?”

Deer in the headlights! Deer in the headlights!
I absentmindedly patted my head, searching for those antlers. I had to think fast. Adrian would know if I wasn’t telling the truth. I had to be super careful with my response. “It wouldn’t be appropriate for me to answer that question.”

He gave me a knowing grin. “You already did.”

Look, I had found Adrian sexually appealing from the start. I couldn’t fool myself by pretending I didn’t. James, however, was the man for me, and I had no desire ever to cheat on him—especially with Adrian.

Nonetheless, I was fully aware of Adrian’s growing compulsion toward me. He might as well have been a pyromaniac with a pocket full of matches.

And I was the paper.

I felt so guilty about my fleeting lust for Adrian in Times Square. And I was hoping like hell that James would be nowhere in sight when we got back to the house.

Adrian drove well below the speed limit in an obvious ploy to increase our time together. He reached over and lightly touched my knee.

“Thanks,” he said.

I put his hand back on the steering wheel. “For what?”

Adrian playfully smirked at my modest gesture. “For trusting me.”

We made no more effort at conversation all the way back to Aunt Evelyn’s house. The only sound in the car was KJOY 98.3 playing an eclectic mix of artists including Eric Clapton, Shakira, and Taylor Swift.

When we arrived at Aunt Evelyn’s, I could see James waiting on the front porch.
Damn it
. Now I had to pretend nothing had happened, and I was for shit when it came to lying. James walked toward the car while Adrian took his time parking it. Adrian wasn’t being at all subtle about his intentions to incense James. No matter how kind he had been that day, his base character still was operational.

James hurriedly opened my car door and helped me out. He kissed me with such passion his body was shaking. It felt so good, I dug my fingernails into his arms.

“Are you alright? You’re okay?” he asked.

I was still trying to recover from that flaming-hot kiss. “Yeah, I’m great now,” I said, my body all wobbly.

Adrian slammed his car door. “Why wouldn’t she be okay? Do you think I would hurt her?”

James tuned Adrian out and focused on me instead. “You’re two hours late. I tried to call. Why didn’t you answer?”

I looked at my phone and saw he had called three times. Did Adrian use charisma to make me miss the calls? After switching to another screen, I realized I had accidently sent all calls straight to voicemail.

I said, “It was my fault, James. Everything’s fine. And I did great today.”

Adrian winked at me. But this time he wasn’t so irritating. I had seen another side of him today. A vulnerable side. The one that had been living in his brother’s shadow. No, I didn’t want a relationship with Adrian. He was no James after all. But I did have a new understanding of him, whereas James still had the same one.

“Grace, Aunt Evelyn wanted to see you as soon as you got back,” James said.

That may have been true, but it was
truer
that James wanted to have some privacy and to fuck up his brother. I truly didn’t want a fight to break out on my account.

“I can stay out here with you, babe. Aunt Evelyn won’t mind,” I said, trying to divert his attention to me.

James kissed me again while keeping his furious eyes on Adrian. Then he said, “Grace, just go inside.” Aunt Evelyn crossed in front of the window at that very moment, giving credence to what James had said. “Go get yourself something to eat. You look pale.”

“Yes, Grace. Get some nourishment. We’ve got to make sure our girl is well taken care of,” Adrian interjected.

I had a decision to make. The first option was to stay there and amp up a volatile situation with my very presence. The second was to go inside and let these two men beat their chests and get whatever agitation they felt out of their systems. I opted for choice number two.

“I’ll be waiting for you inside. Don’t make me wait too long,” I told James, and hurried to the house, though I stopped on the porch so I could hear their conversation.

“Did you do it?” James demanded.

Adrian played dumb. “Did I do what?”

“Charisma. Did you use it on Grace?”

“It really burns you up that she actually could’ve had a good time and learned something today. Really? Do you find me so inept you believe I can’t do anything?”

“Adrian, she is too—”

“Too what? Too nice to me? Too kind to me?”

James curled his lip. “Too good for you.”

“Did it ever occur to you that she may like me too? Or that I might sincerely care for her?”

I knew from James’s face that was a real concern for him. And he saw in Adrian’s eyes something he’d never seen before: affection for another person. Adrian was still a manipulative cad, but he did have a soft spot for me.

“I will ask you one more time, Adrian. Did you use any charisma on Grace?”

Adrian stepped into James as he savored the moment. “I didn’t use charisma on Grace. It wasn’t necessary.”

A hellish rage surged through James’s body. I could see he wanted to go all apeshit on Adrian. Adrian may have been asking for it, but I didn’t want his blood shed over me.

Just then Aunt Evelyn stepped onto the porch. “James, where’s Grace?”

She couldn’t have come at a better time. Her soothing yet commanding voice gave James the impetus to draw upon his own phenomenal self-control and bring himself down.

He lowered his voice so Aunt Evelyn couldn’t hear. “I’m letting you be. Not for you, but for Grace, the woman I love.
My
woman,” he said to Adrian.

“You might have Grace all caught up with you now. But I want her too. Enjoy her while you can,” Adrian responded.

James had never had to think of Adrian as any sort of competition before. However, Adrian had never had a good enough reason to challenge James until now. Love is a potent motivator that inspires idlers to become conquerors.

Chapter Twenty

There is no hunting like the hunting of man, and those who have hunted armed men long enough and liked it never care for anything else thereafter.

—Ernest Hemingway

“T
ake the Sunrise Highway exit,” Catherine told Nick. Chetan woke up from his catnap just as the off-ramp dumped them onto a busy street. He looked out the window and surveyed the surroundings. “So this is Massapequa.”