For Love or Magic (28 page)

I went quiet and waited for him to talk again. It took a while, but he did.

“I apologize for speaking harshly to you. I don't mean to. You did what you thought was best, and you were triumphant. You saved an entire town full of people, and given the choice to do it again, you would do it again. It's who you are, and it's why I—”

He stopped short, gathered himself, then started again.

“It's why I think so highly of you,” he said, very carefully, as if each word was a struggle. I would have felt elated at the confession, except I knew what was coming next. I could see it on his face.

“For years, I felt nothing. And then, one day, I felt
everything.
It was like stepping into the sun after being in a dark room for too long. It blinded me, and it was excruciating. So I moved back into the shadows and stayed there. I maintained a distance between myself and others. It was working out rather well. Until I met you.”

I felt tears pushing at the sides of my eyes, so I clenched a fist to keep control. He had been so strong for me. Now it was my turn.

“You were so charming, so intelligent, so breathtakingly beautiful—”

I snorted, unable to stop myself, and he smiled sadly at me.

“So tragically incapable of graciously accepting a compliment.”

“I mean … thank you,” I said, trying to lighten things a bit.

“Well done,” he said softly, and visibly steeled himself for the rest of it. “Everything happened so quickly, and under such intense circumstances … had we simply met and gotten to know each other like normal people … maybe…” He stared out the window for a moment, then shook his head. “But … probably not. Every emotion is overwhelming for me. Happiness at seeing a friend. Sadness at a television commercial…”

“Oh,” I said. “The one with the puppies and the grandma?”

He smiled. “It's why I gave up my television. It's why I keep myself at a remove from people. I just snapped at you for being foolish and reckless, but that's exactly what I've been. It was so careless of me to allow any of this to happen, and I apologize, Eliot. I shouldn't have allowed it to go as far as it did.” He looked at me, his expression tormented and tired. “Finding you in the town square yesterday, I felt … shattered. I don't know how else to describe it, and the word falls woefully short of the experience. Every part of me now is a ragged piece, and when I feel emotions, they all cut into me. And when I look at you, I feel … emotion.” He sank back into the chair, dropped his eyes, and spoke so quietly I almost didn't hear him. “Do you understand?”

He seemed almost like a little boy. So lost, so vulnerable. And of course, I knew exactly what he was talking about. For those moments, I felt it. Before shooting back into my body, that excruciating pain I'd felt hadn't been mine. It had been his. And if being with me was going to make him feel like that, how could I possibly ask it of him?

It was at that moment, of course, that I broke down. My chin quivered and my eyes filled and tears fell down my cheeks and the poor guy … he just looked wrecked.

“It's okay,” I said. “I'm okay, but you have to go.” I reached over and hit the button by the bed, and Desmond stood up, moving closer.

“Are you all right? Is there anything you need? Are you in pain?”

“I'm fine. I'm fine.” I reached out and grabbed his hand, holding it tight and trying to show in my face that I wasn't angry, that I didn't blame him, that it was okay. “It'll take me a couple of weeks, but I can go back to Massachusetts, or maybe … Emerson's gone now. He's probably left me an estate or something.” I let out a laugh that turned into a sob. “I'm probably rich.”

“Eliot, it's not necessary for you to leave—”

“No, I should. I mean, we can't risk bumping into each other on the street. If I cause you pain when you see me—”

“There will be no risk,” he said. “I'm leaving, tomorrow.”

I blinked up at him, stunned. “But … they're going to need a special doctor, someone who understands…”

“They will,” he said, his face stony. “I have a friend from Niagara Falls, who is both a magical and a physician. He'll be setting up a practice in town. You're well enough that you no longer need me, and everyone should be fine under Beverly's care until he gets here.”

“And now that Emerson is gone, there's no reason for you to stay,” I said, finishing his thought. “And every reason for you to leave.”

We went silent for a bit, my hand clutching his as I tried not to cry and failed miserably, knowing this was probably the last time I'd ever see him. He reached out and touched my face and when I looked up at him, he looked like hell. His face was stony, but his eyes were hot with pain, and it hurt me just to see it. I couldn't imagine what he was feeling, how terrifying it must be to know that if you felt anything, even happiness, it would sear through you like a hot poker.

There was a gentle knock on the door, and we released our hands. Beverly walked in, saying, “Sorry that took me so long, honey, but I had a kid got knocked in the head with his own magical baseball bat and we have to heal the stupid just the same as the smart.” She saw my expression then, and her eyes shot up to Desmond. “Doc? Everything okay?”

Desmond kept his head lowered. “She's on track for a full recovery. She should remain on observation until tomorrow, and then she can go home.”

With that, he handed the notebook to Beverly and walked out the door. Beverly glanced down at the notebook, a look of confusion on her face, but jerked her head back up when I broke out into unrelenting sobs.

“Oh, honey.” She walked around and sat down on the bed next to me, pulling me into her arms. “Oh, shhhh. I know it's scary being all cooped up. You should have seen me after my C-section. I cried for three days straight, and the nurses were…”

She kept talking, running her hand over my hair and getting me tissues, just talking endlessly, somehow understanding on instinct that what I needed at the moment was to think about anything other than my own consuming sadness.

 

Chapter 16

“Well, that's the stupidest line of bullcrap I've ever heard,” Stacy said, stabbing a hot dog off the grill and stuffing it into her bun. We were at Liv and Tobias's, celebrating a return to what passed for normalcy in Nodaway Falls with a barbecue. Liv handed out margaritas while Tobias manned the grill; apparently, Stacy's job that day was to be pissed off at Desmond.

“Asshole just got me to like him again, then he just takes off and leaves town, abandoning you?” Stacy rolled her eyes and sat down on the Adirondack chair next to mine. “I'm telling you, if I had any idea where that limey butthole went, I'd hunt him down and beat the hell out of him.”

“It's weird,” Liv said, taking a sip of her margarita. “You hating him isn't that much different from you forgiving him.”

“Stacy is a complicated woman,” Leo said, taking a bite of his burger. “It's why I love her so much.”

“Look, it's okay,” I said. “We weren't even really a thing. We were—”

“If you say ‘just friends' I'll smack you,” Stacy said. “And it's not okay for him to leave you like that. If he'd just allow himself to feel
something,
if he'd sit down and get it all out with a good cry like Leo does, he'd be fine.”

Tobias snorted, and Leo shot Stacy a look. “Hey.”

Stacy patted his knee. “It doesn't take away from your masculinity, honey. It takes strength to cry, and feel your feelings, and deal with whatever's bugging you. That makes you manlier than any of these other guys.”

At this, Tobias's posture straightened. “Hey.”

“All I'm saying,” Stacy went on, “is that Desmond's problem isn't from the potions. It's from being Desmond. Hell, when he saw Eliot, the woman he
loves,
lying on the ground, dead as a doornail, he didn't even cry. Seriously, what the fuck?”

“He didn't love me,” I said. “It never got that far. We were just—”

“Don't say it,” Stacy warned. “I'll have to kill you and I'm starting to like you a little bit.” She went quiet for a moment, then shook her head and said, “I don't care what you say, that man loves you. Maybe he didn't cry, but I saw the look on his face, and it wasn't the look of a man who had just lost his favorite piece of ass.”

“Stace,” Liv said, warning in her voice, and when I looked up, she was shooting a worried expression my way. I smiled at her, as much as I could.

“It's okay,” I said. “Really, I love reliving this whole thing. Can we do it some more?”

“Sorry.” Stacy patted me on the knee so I would watch as she stuffed her hot dog in her mouth, shutting herself up. She smiled around a mouthful of food, and everyone groaned and laughed.

“You are disgusting,” I said.

“I'm adorable,” she taunted back, mouth still full.

And I had to admit it; she was.

It had only been a week since the magical world had broken open at Nodaway Falls, and somehow, most things were oddly normal. Amber had taken over my job at Happy Larry's and it was a perfect fit. She was mean to the patrons and made an absolute ton in tips, without having to be constantly corrected by my father. She did show up at my place with flowers when the news came that his body had been found in a hotel room in Buffalo, which I thought was nice, and some evidence that he'd had a good influence on her, at least a little.

Meanwhile, a lawyer had been in touch with me, and while I was still living off my Happy Larry's tips at the moment, it did appear that Emerson's life insurance and estate were going to keep me in lights and dog kibble for the rest of my life. I was in no rush for it, though; I didn't have any big plans.

I hadn't seen Judd since the day I died, and that was okay. I missed him, sometimes, a little, but I was glad he'd finally gone toward the light. Maybe he and Emerson were out there on the other side, having the dead-guy equivalent of a beer. I had no idea if that was even possible, but the idea made me happy.

“Watch out, everybody. The party is
here
!”

I looked up to see Peach, Nick, and baby Josie coming through the back gate. Peach looked amazing; five days past giving birth, and she was already moving faster than I was. She had dragged me out at five in the morning that day to go on a training run.

“It'll be mostly walking,” she'd said. “Hardly any running at all. I'm still getting back into shape.”

I almost died. She didn't break a sweat.

“Here she is,” Peach said as we all gathered around her, admiring the baby. Only Peach and I knew that Josie was sort of named for me, which was fine by me. I'd had enough of people making a big deal over me during the past week. Between saving the town, being abandoned by Desmond, and my father's body being found, people had been very attentive, and it was making me a little tense. I was glad to shower some attention on baby Josie and have it not be all about me, for once.

“There's the woman of the hour!” Nick said, and came over to give me a quick peck on the cheek. “We were really sorry to hear about your dad, and … well … everything.”

“Thanks, Nick.” I wanted to throw the attention back on baby Josie, but Liv was giving me an expectant look, and it was time to get something over with. “But now that I've got your attention.”

Liv walked over to stand next to me. We had talked about this earlier, and she had been the one to encourage me to do it with everyone there as support. Still, it felt a little weird, but then again, it had been a long time since I'd had family. It would take some getting used to.

“I came here, just a few weeks ago, an unemployed widow, dead broke, my magic gone, with nothing to my name but a broken-down shack, a crappy truck, and a deaf dog.” I glanced over in the corner of the yard, where Seamus was happily chewing on the rawhide bone I'd given him to keep him busy while we ate. “Now I'm … well, I'm still unemployed…”

“Yeah, cry me a river, heiress,” Stacy said.

“… and I'm still
widowed,
” I said, punctuating the word to humble Stacy. From the shameless way she grinned up at me, it didn't work. “But now I have friends, and I don't need to define myself by what I've lost anymore.”

“Oh!” Peach put her hand to her mouth and teared up. I smiled at her as I reached into my front pocket and pulled out my wedding set.

“Liv came up with an idea for me, and I think it's a good one. So if you'll just…” I set down my margarita and held the ring set with my fingertips, so everyone could see. I willed the magic through me, to the metal, bending and twisting it easily, until the two thin, gold bands wrapped around each other at the middle and formed the shape of two butterfly wings on either side, with the tiny cubic zirconia (which Judd had always insisted was a real diamond) accenting the tip of one wing.

“Oh, wow!” Peach said. “That's so cool how you've got the wings hinged together like that!”

Liv smiled at me and held out her hand. I put the little butterfly into her palm and watched as she closed her hand around it. Little sparks of yellow danced over her fingers, and when she opened her palm, the butterfly took flight, bouncing around the backyard for a moment before zooming into the sky.

“Oh, Jesus, you guys, what the hell is wrong with you two?” Stacy dabbed at the edge of her eye with a napkin.

“Yeah, and
I'm
the one who cries all the time,” Leo said, nuzzling her as she leaned her back against his chest.

Liv put her arm around my shoulder and rested her head against mine as we watched the last glint of the butterfly disappear into the sky. I picked up my empty margarita glass and said, “Someone's got to fill this for me, now.”