Daughter of the Spellcaster (16 page)

“Oh.” Lies, all lies.

“You?”

“Oh, um, I’ve been playing with those photos on Mom’s phone. Want to see?”

“Dying to.” He pried off his shoes. Mud was caked on the bottom. Then he headed into the kitchen and washed his hands. “Can I bring you something?” he asked. “Personally, I’d like a hot cocoa. All this tea we drink around here is fine, but sometimes you just need decadence.”

She smiled, growing warm. Loving him. Then she squashed it all down. “Cocoa sounds great. If you use two packets in a big mug and add whipped cream, it’s even better.”

“I’m all over that.” He rattled around in the kitchen. She took the time to make sure that her recent web search had indeed vanished from the history and then shut the browser down.

A few minutes later he brought in the cocoa, whipped cream piled on top like soft-serve ice cream on a cone. He handed her a cup, and she made a heartfelt “mmm” sound and took a sip.

When she lowered the cup, he looked at her, and there was something beaming from his eyes that looked like adoration. Yeah, he was that good. “How did I ever think...no, never mind.” He reached out to touch the tip of her nose and said, “Whipped cream. Just a little.”

“Oh.” She lowered her eyes. It would be too easy to believe what she was seeing in his.

“What did you find out?” he asked.

Her head came up fast. “F-find out about what?”

“The photos?” He was looking at her oddly, as if he’d totally noticed her defensiveness. She might as well have blurted
“I wasn’t snooping on you!”

Oh, right. She nodded at the screen, where the first image was enlarged but blurry.

He frowned at it and said, “I’m really sorry if this offends you, but that photo gives me the creeps.”

“Why would that offend me?”

“Well, they’re witches. Aren’t they? The fire, the robes, they’re standing in a circle, in the woods, at night....”

“I don’t think they’re witches.” She put her finger on the screen. “No cords. Witches who wear the same ritual robes would more than likely be part of a coven. In most covens there are cords to signify the various degrees. A novice wouldn’t have any cords, but after a year and a day of study, should he or she pass muster, he or she would become an initiate, a first-degree priest or priestess, and would normally receive a cord. A second-degree, or adept, would get a second cord, and a third-degree, or master, would have three cords. Sometimes an elder receives a fourth.”

“Do you have cords?” he asked.

He seemed genuinely interested. He was awfully convincing, if it was all an act. She wasn’t usually easily fooled. “No. Mom and I are—well, not exactly solitary. More a fam-trad. Family tradition.”

“Like Hank Williams Junior?”

She grinned, growing warm again, then forced it away. “We don’t do cords or degrees. We just...
be
.”

“You’re a rebel, even among witches. I should have known. So you don’t think the people in the photo are a...fam-trad?”

“No. Those robes are dark. Formal. But no cords. I don’t think they’re witches at all. I don’t see any of the traditional tools of the Craft nearby. Do you see a chalice or candles, a sword...anything?”

He leaned closer, scanning the screen, and she felt his breath right on that sensitive area where her neck met her shoulder. She wished he would put his lips there instead. No, she told herself, she didn’t.

“Not a pentacle in sight. Just them.”

“We witches like our stuff. We take rattles and drums into circle with us. We wear our pentacles outside our robes, we don’t hide them within, not in circle. And the hoods. The hoods are weird.”

“I can’t see a single face,” he said. “Just those damn hoods.”

“It’s like they planned it that way.”

He nodded. “I’m going to walk back out there tomorrow.
With
the sheriff or
without
him. In between working on our little guy’s room.” He gave her a grin.

“Girl. She’s a girl. I hope you’re trusting me on that as you work on her room.”
And why is he doing all that anyway, if he’s planning to take the baby and leave?

“I’m making it unisex. We don’t want her growing up thinking she has to love pink just because she’s female, do we?”

“You know me too well.” She blinked slowly and pushed her chair away from the desk, then got to her feet. “It’s late. And I get tired really easily these days.”

“I’m not surprised. You’ve been carrying a lot of extra weight around—not just physically, either.”

He straightened, clasped her shoulders, looked into her eyes. “Good night, Lena.”

She could tell that he wanted to kiss her, but he was waiting for her to make the first move, to lean closer or close her eyes, or even just lick her lips. A signal. She sighed, wishing she could trust that his concern for her was real, and forcibly lowered her head.

He let his arms fall to his sides, and she felt his disappointment wash over her.

Just as if it was real.

Turning, she headed up the stairs, checked quickly on her mother—who was sound asleep—and went into her room. As she closed the bedroom door behind her, she glimpsed that shadowy form, now so familiar, lurking near her window. She waved dismissively at it. “Go away. I’ve got no patience for you tonight.”

Do not trust him.

She had accompanied her command with a flick of her hand, as casually as she would tell a dog to “go lie down,” and she had fully expected the house ghost to comply.

But he hadn’t. He’d pressed his message into her mind instead. And that made her stop in her tracks. Since when could a ghost refuse to obey the command of the home owner—particularly if that home owner was a witch?

She blinked at the shadowy form, wondering for the first time if it was really a ghost at all...or something else. Because a ghost should have vanished almost before she had finished telling it to. Oh, it might have come back later, but...

This dude was breaking the rules. “What are you?” she asked.

You must send him away. Send him away now.

“I asked you a question,” Lena said, her voice soft but firm. “You’re not a ghost at all, are you? What
are
you, then? And why are you here?”

No reply.

“I command you to answer me. What are you, and why are you here?”

It refused to respond. She felt its resistance, like a solid brick wall, and then she felt more. Anger. Rage. Menace.

The child in her belly kicked her so hard she gasped in pain and pressed her hands to her belly. And then there was a rush of silence, of emptiness, and she knew the being had gone.

11

T
he shadow dissipated, vanished. Just like that. Lena rubbed her arms and decided a major house cleansing was in order. She was no longer comfortable with that dark presence hanging around.

Moreover, she was sick to death of beating around the bush with Ryan.

He had gone to bed. She’d heard him come up while she’d been arguing with the ghost, or whatever it was, in her room. So she flung her door open and marched across the hall, opened his without knocking and walked right in as if she owned the place—because she did.

He looked up fast, his expression guilty again. He’d been reading in bed, and she was stunned to see the titles, not only of the book in his hands but the other three lying open, facedown, on the bed beside him. Every single one was about the practice of witchcraft.

He set the books down as she frowned at him. “You okay? Is your mom—”

“Fine, I just— What’s up with the books, Ryan?”

He shrugged. “Like I told you, I want to know about...you know, what you believe in. And you got so suspicious when I asked you that I figured I should just find out for myself. Seemed like everything I could ever want to know was probably in those books up in the attic, so I picked a few that looked interesting and brought them down for some bedtime reading.”

She drew a deep breath, sighed and reaffirmed that honesty was the best policy here. Because what if he was being sincere? What if he really meant it when he said he wasn’t the man he’d been pretending to be?

Moving closer, anger dissipating, she sank onto his bed. “When we were kissing before, and your phone rang...”

“Yeah?”

“It was a lawyer.”

He blinked. “Yes, it was. How did you...?”

“The phone was practically under my nose and I saw the caller ID. “

“Oh.”

She swallowed hard, lifted her chin and went on. “I looked the name up online tonight. I know it was really awful of me, snooping like that, but I had my reasons. He practices family law, Ryan.” She watched him closely, probing his eyes, waiting for the guilty reaction, but there wasn’t one. “Are you planning to fight me for custody of Eleanora?”

He blinked three times, slowly, and then he smiled. “Eleanora? That’s what you want to call her?”

She lowered her eyes, trying not to sigh in frustration. “That’s her name. She sort of...told me.” Glancing up at him nervously, she added, “But if you don’t like it...”

“I think it’s beautiful.”

“You do?”

“Maybe I can pick the middle name?”

Shrugging, she chose not to answer. “What about the lawyer, Ryan?”

“Paul is my best friend. My only real friend, I guess. He happens to be a lawyer, but he’s not working for me. Not in any way, Lena.”

“Then...then you weren’t discussing a father’s rights with him?”

“No. I wasn’t.”

Lena frowned. That meant Bahru had lied to her. But why?

“Paul has a side project going with a small group of engineers and inventors, and I’m funding it.”

She set aside her concerns about Bahru, for the moment. “I didn’t know that.”

“No one knows that. I’ve kept it very quiet.”

“But why?”

“Frankly, because I was still trying to keep my facade intact. You know, unattainable, irresponsible, self-centered playboy. It would have blown my image. And besides, I didn’t want my father or his boards of directors swooping in trying to take it over.”

She was even more interested now. “You think they would have done that?”

“If they thought they could make a profit off it? Sure they would. And it’s not that kind of a project. It’s not about profits. Not yet, anyway. Maybe someday, but the important thing is to get it up and running.”

Sinking onto the edge of his bed, she let herself indulge her curiosity. Everything about him was fascinating to her, especially now that she was—maybe—seeing the real Ryan. “What kind of project is it?”

He closed the book with a snap and set it aside, then yanked his laptop from the nightstand and opened it, excitement glittering in his eyes. A few keystrokes later she was looking at a full-color drawing of a sprawling field filled with solar panels.

“Solar farms, but with a twist. Paul’s group is buying up land with excellent sun exposure all over the country and installing these solar panels that follow the sun’s motion across the sky.”

Lena frowned in thought. Not because of what she was seeing on the computer but because of what she was seeing in his eyes. Something she had never seen before.

He spun the laptop toward him again, clicked a few more keys and spun it back. Now she was looking at schematics or blueprints or something, and it was completely Greek to her.

“This is the home conversion kit, the key to the whole thing. The batteries that store the excess energy will be small and affordable, unlike the bulky, pricey ones available up to now. Plus they’ve come up with these conversion kits that they’re going to provide free of charge to every household within range of the solar farms. The goal is to make everyone in the immediate vicinity of our farms one hundred percent solar by the end of the first five years. The people would pay only for the energy, not for the equipment. And we’d guarantee to keep even that cost capped at whatever the big power companies are charging. But that means the initial funding really has to come from investors. The start-up costs, the equipment costs, the research and development, and then buying the property, all that is expensive.”

“Millions.”

“Billions,” he said. “But if we passed that cost on to consumers, no one would be willing to convert. Most couldn’t afford it even if they wanted to. This way the investors take it on the chin, absorb the loss and accept that it might be up to twenty years before we can expect to see any of this even begin to turn a profit.”

“Then why do it?” she asked, watching his face, awaiting his answer.

“Somebody’s got to
.
” He shrugged. “I don’t want my father’s money. I’d give it all to Paul if I could.”

She was completely stunned. “How long have you and...Paul been working together on this?”

“Five years. But I only handed over the big bucks last year.”

“I wish you’d told me.”

Sighing, he closed the computer. “You worked for Dad. You were his PR wizard. Him getting involved in something like that would have made for excellent press. I just...didn’t want that.”

“You didn’t trust me.”

He lowered his gaze, so she knew she’d nailed it.

“But it was more than that. I told you, I pretty much haven’t told anyone. This was
mine
. My own thing. I wanted to keep it that way. And Dad had taken enough from me.” He rolled his eyes. “I mean, not
from me,
but—”

“That’s exactly what you meant.”

He frowned.

“I get it, Ryan. I don’t think
you
do just yet, but you’re getting closer.” She put her hand over his. “I’m sorry I jumped to the wrong conclusion. So then, you’re not planning to fight me for custody?”

He met her eyes, held them steadily. “Losing my mother was the worst thing that ever happened to me, Lena. I would never deliberately put my own child through that.”

She believed him and nodded to tell him so. “Okay.” And then she smiled a little. “Okay.”

He seemed relieved. She got up from the bed, ridiculously glad she’d decided to just be direct and ask him for the truth instead of keeping tight-lipped and making flawed assumptions. “Thanks for telling me about it, Ryan. And you can trust me to keep your secret until you’re ready to go public.” She smiled again. “But when you do, man, is New York society in for a shocker. ’Cause you’re right about one thing—this is going to set your irresponsible, lazy, entitled image on its head.”

“I don’t care what New York society thinks about me. I really don’t.”

“Good for you.” She nodded slowly. “Good for you, Ryan.” Then she indicated the books. “If you want a little more info on magic and ritual, let me know. Okay?”

“Thanks.”

She backed out of the room, pulling his door closed behind her, and then stood there for a long moment, just feeling.

A huge weight had been lifted from her shoulders, that was the first and clearest sensation making its way into her awareness. She believed him. She knew, though, that there was more. Lots more. His issues and feelings about his mother, his father, even Bahru, were all tangled up with this new zeal for her and the baby. And though that interest might be real, it wasn’t...gut-deep. It was all mental. He wanted them on a practical, logical level. But she still didn’t feel it was coming from his heart.

And though she would far rather err on the side of believing in him completely, she still sensed he was holding something back, maybe keeping a secret.

But it was progress, that was for sure. It was progress.

* * *

The crack of dawn found Ryan kneeling on the damp ground, digging in the soft soil and tugging out the magic blade. He had the box open beside him, because he didn’t want to handle the thing too much this close to the house. Lena had said the key was practice. So practice he would.

He tugged the knife out of the cold, wet earth still encased in the sock he’d used as a temporary sheath. Then, holding the toe of the sock, he more or less poured the blade out into the box, managing not to handle it much in the process. Even just nudging it with his fingertips to get it into place for transport made him jumpy.

But no flames shot from the thing, and he sighed in relief.

It was only seven, and barely light outside. He’d noticed that the women tended to get up and around by nine, and today had been no exception. No one else had been awake yet. He had time to work with his dagger. Besides, he’d been wanting to get back to those woods where Selma had been wandering to see what he could see in the light of day.

It had grown colder overnight, so the rain had turned to snow. But now the sun had returned, and the temps were already above freezing. The dusting of snow that had fallen overnight wouldn’t cover much—assuming anything was left—and it would probably be gone within a couple of hours.

Clutching the box under one arm, he walked around the house and down the driveway to the dirt road that flanked the field and then the woods on the left, opposite Bahru’s cottage. He had to walk right past the place but didn’t sense any movement from within. Maybe the guru was still asleep, too. He hoped so. He wanted privacy for this.

The field was mostly weeds and dead grasses, stiff and brittle now. It had been a vineyard once, and he could easily visualize it being one again. Grapevines abundant in neat rows, lush and deep, dark green leaves, heavy bunches of purple fruit dangling, glistening with morning dew.

It was a nice vision, one he would like to see realized.

If he wound up staying.

Hell, he’d pretty much given up the idea that he would be living anywhere else. If Lena and his child were here,
he
would be here. If Lena wanted them to be together as a family—well, he could get into that. It made sense. They got along, they had great chemistry. He honestly loved being around her.

Yet, when he thought that way, there was a part of him that wrapped itself up in emotional Kevlar. As if just thinking along those lines made him vulnerable to the same old patterns his life had shown him so far. People didn’t stay. He had to keep that in mind right from the get-go, so it wouldn’t hurt as much when they checked out.

He never wanted to feel again what he’d felt at the death of his mother. He never wanted to feel the way he’d felt when his dad just up and left him.

But mostly he never ever wanted the death of one person to have the same life-altering impact on him that the death of his mother had had on his father. It had destroyed him.

He would never let that happen to him. Never.

The field gave way to trees, white birch and pine, looking like a Christmas card. He kept walking until the dirt road ended in a T junction at the pavement. Then he turned left, walking along the front edge of the woodlot until he reached the spot where Selma’s car had been parked. The tire tracks were deep enough to still be visible on the soft shoulder. He left the road, hopped the shallow drainage ditch and entered the woods right where she must have.

Only a few steps in, he had to stop for a minute just to indulge in the sensory feast of this place. There were so many birds singing that it was hard to believe it was real. It felt like an overly ambitious Disney soundtrack, but it was real. There were squawks and caws, but also tiny little flute solos and full symphonies being played just for the sheer joy of it. And the smells! God, he’d never breathed such delicious air. The pines and their tang, and the rich, earthy scent of damp soil and decomposing twigs, leaves, conifer needles and cones, all mingled with every breath. He wished he could bottle that smell, but he knew he couldn’t, because it was all tied up with the coldness of the air and the touch of the morning sunshine. And you couldn’t capture that.

This place was amazing. No wonder his father had wanted his grandchild to grow up here.

After basking in his surroundings for a couple of minutes, he shook off the pleasure and continued on. He had a two-pronged mission this morning, and he hoped to get back to the house before anyone knew he’d been gone, so it was time to get moving.

He followed the occasional print where Selma’s small foot had sunk deep enough into the soft, wet earth that an impression still remained, and when he couldn’t find any more prints he chose a landmark: a pine tree that stood taller than those around it and had a large bird’s nest way up near its crooked top. From there he walked in increasingly larger circles, keeping the tree as his center, in hopes of finding anything that might qualify as a clue.

On his third circle, he did: a charred log that stood in sharp contrast to the dusting of white snow clinging to one side of it and to the ground nearby. Moving closer, he bent and brushed the snow away. No question, the log had been burned. And as he explored the area around it, he found other partially charred branches and several blackened coal-sized chunks on the ground.