Tethered 02 - Conjure (25 page)

I trudged into Spellbinding Reads fifteen minutes late thanks to Kace. Butterflies the size of Amazon moths fluttered in my stomach relentlessly. I hated being late anywhere and especially to work. If I were being truly honest though, being late wasn’t the only reason for the moths in my stomach this morning—working with my biological father played a part too.

I replayed the moment he’d told me and felt my stomach churn even more and my palms begin to sweat. There was no way I would be able to dodge the awkward moments that were sure to pile up on me today. A bad day at work was a given. I guess I should be glad I at least started my day well. An image of where I’d been minutes before and what I’d been doing flashed through my mind and brought a smile to my face.

“Morning,” Admer said from where he sat behind the U-shaped desk near the back of the store.

He was busy typing something on the computer. Sage lay sprawled out on the desktop between the stacks of Celtic music CDs and the display of funky lights you could buy for your e-reader.

I plastered a smile on my face that I hoped looked more real than it felt. “Morning.”

Admer paused in what he was doing and glanced at me from over the top of his glasses. “How was your mini-vacation? Did you come to any conclusions?”

“Conclusions about what?” I asked, going for indifferent as I bypassed him and headed straight for the office in the back so I could toss my purse in the desk drawer. I swallowed hard as I waited for his reply, knowing exactly what he’d been referring to, but wanting him to specify more.

“Everything,” Admer said, going back to whatever it was he was typing. “You’ve had a fanatical few days, wouldn’t you agree?”

I came out of the office and back around to the front of the desk where he sat. Sage lifted her head and yawned while gazing at me. Absentmindedly, I began stroking her back and rubbing behind her ears like I did for Binks.

“I don’t know.” I shrugged, not liking this conversation. I wanted to be back at home with Kace, curled up in bed.

“Let me be more direct,” Admer said, rolling the chair he sat in away from the desk. His green eyes locked on mine and I hated being the center of his attention. It was awkward to say the least. “Have you come to any conclusions about the initiation?”

I shook my head. Glad that was where he wanted to start, but frustrated it was all anyone wanted to talk about now. “I still don’t know if it’s the right thing for me to do yet.”

“If you want that tether gone, then it is.”

“And why would that be any of your concern?” I asked, unsure where the bold words had come from, but positive I didn’t care for his sudden change of tone with me.

Admer smiled. It held a menacing feel to it. “Because I’m your father.”

My blood boiled in my veins. I’d never thought of myself as having a bad temper or as being a quick-tempered person. Generally it wasn’t that hard for me to keep my emotions under control, but there were always those moments when something would happen that would just set me off like no other.

This was one of those moments.

“How convenient you’re choosing to start playing that role now that I’m an adult,” I snapped with more venom in my words than was probably necessary to get my point across.

Admer didn’t even blink. The smug, intimidating smile he had plastered on his face stayed intact as well. “If you only knew what I know, than you wouldn’t sound so bad-tempered toward me right now in regards to that.”

“Enlighten me then.” I straightened my back and held his stare dead-on. “Please, explain to me why you let my mother give me up for adoption. Why she left town at all. Why you never told me who you were from the beginning. Should I continue?”

Admer’s face reddened, and I got the distinct impression he didn’t like having someone, especially me, speaking to him the way I just had. A slick sheen of sweat spread across my palms from his intense stare and the turn our conversation had taken. I crossed my arms over my chest and forced myself to continue glaring at him the way that I was.

I didn’t know what I was expecting him to say, which answers he would give and which he wouldn’t, but I did know I was not leaving this shop today without learning something. It was time I finally got some answers, whether he wanted to give them or not.

“I never
let
your mother give you up for adoption,” Admer stated, his voice void of emotion. He’d had a moment to gain his composure once more. “She made that decision on her own. Did I know you were mine? Yes, I did. But knowing that did me no good, not with Talan still in her life. What your mother and I had was a onetime thing, according to her.”

My attitude deflated little by little. “Oh.”

A distant look entered his green eyes, making them seem glossy and strange. “Water and Fire never work in an intimate relationship. Water smothers Fire; it drowns it. Our relationship would have been too much work for her. Being with a non-Elemental was better than being with me, a Water Elemental, in her eyes.”

My eyes skimmed over him, noticing the tension that seemed to tighten his jawline and the way his hands clenched and unclenched above the desk. I actually felt bad for him.

“I never knew exactly where she went. Honestly, I always expected her to come back with you after things calmed down, but she never did,” he said, that glassy-eyed look still present.

“After what calmed down?”

“The unexpected deaths of Talan and Craig. They nearly broke your mother and Susan as well. Following their deaths, Angela became severely depressed and shortly after she packed up and left Soul Harbor without telling me where she was going or what her plans were.” Admer paused. A glimmer of pride, which didn’t seem fitting due to our topic of conversation, flashed across his face for the briefest of moments. “I searched for her, but couldn’t find her for years. I was sure she had struck a deal with the Van Rooyens before she left and had Twila create a concealment spell for herself and you as well. How she managed to have all of the papers with my signature on them without me being there must have been in the spell as well. Working with Theo, I’m sure you understand about their confidentiality code, so Twila was no help in letting me know anything.”

I leaned against the desk, my mind spinning with everything I was learning. Admer had just confirmed what I’d thought: the funeral I’d witnessed in the vision had been theirs. The more I thought about it, the more I understood how something like that could push someone over the edge. But then I remembered the pictures Callie had showed me—how Admer and my mother had seemed to share something for one another regardless of the whole Fire and Water issue.

“I don’t understand why she left without saying a word to you though. It doesn’t make sense,” I said, confused.

“Because she felt I had something to do with Talan and Craig’s deaths. The three of us had been hanging out earlier that day. We’d been drinking. The accident happened just after they’d dropped me off at my house. Angela thought it made me responsible somehow for what happened to them.”

Everything my mother had done seemed so harsh and drastic suddenly.

“That’s horrible,” I whispered.

Admer straightened himself. “Yes well, these are the things that keep life interesting.”

Regardless of how much I liked the saying and his way of viewing the negative in the world, I didn’t know how I should respond to that. The first of many awkward moments I had been expecting today spread between us, and I began straightening the CDs in front of me that Sage had shifted with one of her stretches.

The awkwardness lasted for the entire duration of my shift. I couldn’t have been happier to see four o’clock when it came. Wasting no time saying goodbye, I high-tailed it to the door, exiting Spellbinding Reads without glancing back once.

I sat curled up on my couch with Binks beside me and the zombie book I’d been trying to finish in my hands. Reading was the only thing I felt like doing at the moment. It had always been my escape. I could always disappear from my world and completely lose myself in the chapters of a good book. Right now, this zombie book had me grateful I’d been introduced into a world of magick and not zombie apocalypses.

It was a reminder things could always be worse.

A soft knock at the front door forced me to set my novel down once again. At this rate, it would be the end of the summer before I was even able to make it to chapter twenty. I stood and made my way to the door, nervous to see who stood behind it. I knew it wouldn’t be Kace; he wasn’t supposed to meet me here for another few hours. Theo was ruled out as well, because he never seemed to knock. He simply just let himself in, completely hidden to the human eye. Plus, I’d feel if it was him.

A sudden sting of disappointment slashed through me at the thought of it not being Theo behind the door. I shook it off, feeling guilty for even thinking it.

Gripping the knob, I opened the door. The person standing there both surprised and alarmed me at the same time. Susan stood before me dressed in a yellow floral pattern sundress and brown boots. She had her brown hair tucked behind her ears and an intense expression stretched across her face that I couldn’t quite name. It made her appear older than I knew she was.