The Reluctant Goddess (The Montgomery Chronicles Book 2) (26 page)

Lucky me.

C
HAPTER
T
WENTY
-S
IX

I wanted to bite the hand that scratched me

A norther had swept down into Texas overnight, bringing with it brisk winds and cold temperatures. Thanksgiving was just around the corner and the weather seemed to announce it in a Texas version of autumn.
 

Thanksgiving was not my favorite holiday. Neither was Christmas. I didn’t like the Norman Rockwell happy family idea of gatherings, only because my own family was so far removed from that image as to be laughable. Whenever we went to Nonnie’s house, my mother was petulant, her vampire husband was silent, and my grandmother did a lot of banging and clanking in the kitchen.
 

I knew why, now. She despised vampires, yet my mother dragged Paul over to Nonnie’s house on every occasion, almost like she dared her mother to say something.
 

Was my mother right? Had the witches killed Paul?
 

This year should prove to be interesting. My mother was on the lam. My grandmother was juggling a line between making her coven mad and acknowledging me. I didn’t have a home. No doubt Dan had some great celebration, complete with venomous mother. But would he this year, with his sister missing?
 

When we stopped in front of my grandmother's house, Dan surprised me by undoing his seatbelt.

"It's really better if you stay here," I said. "I doubt if she's going to welcome a stranger with open arms."

"I'm not leaving you alone," he said. "Not now and not in the future. Get used to it."

"So you're turning into an alpha male now?"

He grinned at me. "I've always been an alpha male," he said. "I just hide it better than most. None of this I'm Tarzan, you Jane stuff."

“Like Mike,” I said. “By the way, where is he?”
 

“Sleeping. He was up late last night.”
 

I eyed him. “A date? With a certain vampire?”
 

His grin widened. “I’ve been asked not to tell you, to prevent a certain gloating.”
 

I smiled. There, just a little gloating. I couldn’t help but wonder if Kenisha was the reason for the smiles I’d seen on Mike’s face. He looked completely different when he was in a good mood. He wasn’t nearly as scary.
 

Dan opened the door for me and stood there until I finally got out of the car. He held my left elbow in his palm as we made our way up the walk.
 

In deference to my grandmother, I’d worn a long blue skirt with a matching jacket and my white lace blouse. In deference to the fact that I might have to run for my life (always a consideration), I wore my sneakers.
 

I really shouldn't have been able to feel the heat of Dan’s hand through the material of my jacket, but I did. I was acutely aware of him, not only as an alpha male but as a handsome man, one who still intrigued me.

I had slept beside him all night and nothing had happened.
 

Seriously, was I stupid or what? Yet now was not the time to think about sex. Really. Not when I was going to see my grandmother.
 

I would've felt a little better going around to the back of the house. At least there I hadn't been zapped. But Dan walked to the front, rang the bell at the porch door, and stood there smiling at me. No doubt he was trying to be reassuring, but he didn't know that a few weeks earlier, I had been rendered unconscious by a spell on this very threshold.

When my grandmother appeared, I looked up at her. “Is it safe?”
 

She nodded and stepped back.
 

I walked past her and into the house, entering the room my grandmother called her parlor, the first time I had ever done so without being invited. This room was for funerals, notice of dread diseases, my initiation into Rainbow Girls, and the night of my graduation from high school when my mother had been blessedly absent.
 

The couch and chairs were upholstered in a gold brocade that had been popular during the seventies. Gilt framed bucolic scenes of landscapes from another century and country dotted the walls. Round tables sat beside the chairs and another, larger round table was in front of the couch.
 

The room smelled of dust and roses. I wondered how long it had been since my grandmother had washed the white lace curtains. Maybe I should volunteer to do it, or hint that her sisters of the faith could pitch in. The tables were polished, however, to a high sheen, and each of the knickknacks were dust free.

All of the lamps in her house were made of porcelain and the ones in the parlor were no exception. She didn’t like brass or silver for some reason. Nor did she have any little statues or tchotchkes made of anything other than porcelain. I’d never considered it before, but now I wondered if her dislike of metals and square tables had something to do with being a witch.

My grandmother entered the room, both hands clenched in front of her, followed by Dan. He dwarfed the parlor with his presence.
 

Nonnie sat in the corner of the couch, looking small and frail. I didn’t want to ask her the question, but I didn’t have a choice.
 

“Did you send the witches to me, Nonnie?”

She blinked at me. “What do you mean, Marcie?”
 

“Three witches came to me last night, Nonnie. A hologram. To warn me or to scare me, either one.”

“This happened in your home?”

I shook my head. I hadn’t told anyone I was staying at the castle. When I told Nonnie now, she turned and stared at Dan.
 

Dan met her eyes and didn’t look away. Nor did either of them explain the silent stare.
 

He was sitting on the chair opposite my grandmother, one knee have drawn up, a wrist casually resting against the arm, as comfortable in Nonnie’s parlor as he’d looked in the back of the Rolls. His dark blue suit favored him, although I wouldn’t have advised him to wear that red and white striped tie. He looked like he was running for office.
 

I think I liked him better in blue jeans with that swagger he had when he walked. Pure Texan. Now he could have come from anywhere: New York, Pennsylvania, even Washington.
 

I finally sat on the opposite end of the sofa from Nonnie. I dug my hand into my skirt pocket where my phone was, fingering my go-to wallet as I felt the rising tension in the room.
 

In my corporate life, I’d gotten into the habit of dispensing with a purse when I went on calls. Instead, I tucked a small leather case into my pocket containing my driver’s license, a debit and credit card, and twenty dollars in cash.
 

“Would someone tell me what’s going on?”
 

Nonnie finally glanced at me. “I have no power to do such a thing,” she said.

“Maybe not alone. But what about with your coven? Your sisters of the faith?” I asked.

She shook her head. “We have never even attempted such a thing. We used to call it distance viewing. Some call it visitation. We have never done one. To do so requires a great deal of preparation.”

“What kind of preparation?”

“A snip of hair. Or something from the person who is being visited.” She looked at me. “Has anyone taken anything from you?”

I thought about being unconscious in the hospital room at the castle. Anything could have happened then.
 

I glanced at Dan. “Is Dr. Fernandez a witch? A warlock? Whatever a male witch is called?” I hadn’t had a headache around him, but I’d been given pain medication at the time, too.
 

Nonnie smiled. “A male is called a witch, just like a female. We don’t practice discrimination.”
 

Dan shook his head. “He isn’t a witch.”
 

"You must've been around someone with the power to summon,” Nonnie said. “Like him.”
 

I blinked at her.

“Dan isn’t a witch.”
 

I would have known. If nothing else, I would have had a headache around him, but I didn’t feel anything around my grandmother, either. Why not?
 

Nonnie didn’t answer, just stared at Dan again.
 

“She doesn’t mean me,” Dan said. “She’s talking about my mother.”
 

“Your mother?” I glanced at him.
 

“What is your mother’s name?” Nonnie asked.
 

When Dan said her name, Nonnie nodded.
 

“I know her. She has the power.” She turned to me. “She must have taken something from you, Marcie. It’s the only way the spell can be cast.”
 

“My mother wouldn’t have done anything. She’s forbidden to use her powers when she’s in my home,” Dan said.
 

I held out my arm and pushed back my sleeve. The welts hadn't disappeared, not like the scar on my leg which was growing lighter each day. These marks were still red and angry looking.
 

“Do tell,” I said to Dan.
 

He looked at my arm, then met my eyes. “I didn’t know.”
 

“Neither did I. You didn’t think it important enough to tell me that your mother was a witch?” I asked.

I could have zapped him right at that moment. I wanted to. Instead, I looked away, concentrating on the view through the lace curtains. From here I could see Mr. Guajardo’s Victorian home, a mammoth three story house that had been built for the nineteenth century’s large family. He was the only one who lived there now.
 

Telling me about his mother earlier wouldn’t have solved anything, but I was getting tired of Dan playing Charlie Chan and being all inscrutable. He didn’t share information.
 

My irritation could have so easily been translated to power, but I took several deep breaths until I had my temper under control. I could be reticent, too. I hadn’t told Dan that I’d zapped Maddock last night.
 

Nonnie stood. "Come,” she said, "I'll make a poultice for you."

With a look, she commanded Dan to remain in the parlor. Let’s put it this way, I wouldn’t have followed her. She was scary mad, but then, so was I.
 

I knew I had a little bit of reserve about Dan. Maybe it was being turned into a vampire. I didn’t trust anyone as completely as I once had. I didn’t know, until now, that he evidently felt the same about me. Or maybe he just chose to protect his mother.
 

What was it about mothers?

My own had no love lost for me, which was just as well. Demi was little more than an incubator for me, the chicken to my egg. Once I'd been hatched, I'd pretty much been on my own. From Nonnie I’d gotten affection. That emotion had never come from Demi.
 

Dan's mother wasn't afraid of me, but she made no secret that she didn't like me. Would she have felt the same about any woman staying at Arthur's Folly? Was she the protective type?Or just a witch? Why had she sent a trio of witches after me? I didn’t need any more complications in my life right now.
 

“Give me your arm, Marcie,” my grandmother said when I entered the kitchen.
 

I knew better to argue. Nonnie, witch or no, had persuasive powers. It would just be faster to let her treat the welts. Who knows, maybe they were still there because of witch magic. Maybe her witchy poultice was just what I needed.
 

“She has my DNA now, doesn’t she?”
 

Nonnie waved me down onto the padded bench in the corner. I took off my jacket and extended my arm. She brought her first aid kit to the table, sat and contemplated the welts.
 

“She will not be able to perform another distance spell on you,” she said. “But she may be able to do some other damage.”
 

She pursed her lips and shook her head, universal signs of disapproval.
 

“I didn’t know she was a witch, Nonnie.”
 

And I was going to talk to Dan, really talk, when I had gotten over being mad.
 

“I’m not angry at you, child, but at myself.”
 

That was new.
 

Nonnie opened a dark green bottle and poured something that smelled like mint on my arm. Instantly, the welts seemed to fade, the coolness a pleasant feeling. She placed a large gauze bandage on the welts and pressed the green bottle into my hand.
 

“I should have prepared you better. You need to be able to recognize those of the faith if, for no other reason, than to protect yourself.”

That sounded too much like vampire orientation to be comfy.
 

“I get a headache,” I said, trying to remember the night I’d met Janet. I’d had a low grade headache, but I put it down to the stress of trying to kill Maddock. But being that close to Janet should have made my head really throb. Unless, of course, there was something at the castle, some technology involved in lessening a witch’s influence.