My eyes closed as I soaked in his warmth, his hands firm without binding, their slow motion against me suddenly taking on a new meaning. I took another breath, and that fast, my desires flipped to another direction. I licked my lips and Trent’s breath quickened.
“You know, we’ve got a good ten minutes until sunup,” he said, his fingers tracing over me and the flimsy nightie I had over here. “They won’t have any real information about Cincinnati for at least twenty.”
I pulled back to see the heat in his eyes, the desire. “We can’t,” I whispered, smiling.
“Why not?”
He wasn’t confused per se, but clearly wary at my smile, and I pulled him closer, turning our embrace less amorous and more friendly. “Because someone is pinching my toes,” I said. Trent hesitated, and I almost laughed. “Really. Someone is pinching my toes.”
Realizing I was serious, he leaned to see around me. “Ray!” he exclaimed, and I held my arms out for the little girl. She was about eighteen months now, sweet with her blanket in her grip, her dark hair carefully combed and her even darker eyes solemn as she pinched my toes for our attention. She couldn’t have been there very long, and her expression was troubled.
“Daddy?” she said, her high voice clear. “Oucy no. No!” she demanded, pointing to the door, now open a crack. I hadn’t even heard her open it, but she was a quiet little thing.
Trent pulled the toddler up, bringing the scent of baby powder and snickerdoodles with her. Dressed and ready for the day, she pointed again at the door, her features tight in distress. I could hear Lucy, her sister, shrilling something in the background as I fixed Ray’s collar.
“What is Lucy doing that she’s not supposed to?” Trent said patiently, and Ray scrunched her face up, clearly wanting to spill the beans but not having the vocabulary yet. “Lucy?” Trent called, loudly, and the little girl’s enthusiastic shouts became closer.
“Daddy!” the toddler cried, shoving the door open so hard that it bounced against the wall and nearly closed again. But the blond, excited girl was already in here, a strip of toilet paper in her grip as she danced in a circle, somehow not breaking it. “Happy birthday!” she shouted, throwing it up into the air and silently watching it drift down.
“Oh my gosh, that’s so sweet,” I whispered, and I swear Ray rolled her eyes.
Lucy clapped her hands and ran for the bed. “Hi, Aunt Achel!” she shouted, flopping against Trent’s knees, making Ray shove Lucy’s hands off him.
I pulled Lucy to me, glad that Trent hadn’t started dressing them alike. Lucy was only three months older than Ray, but their personalities made the difference seem larger. Squishy and wiggly, Lucy bounced in my lap until I penned her in with my arms, bringing the wonderful smell of innocence to me.
“Hi, Lucy,” I said, careful to not talk to her like she was a baby but a real person. “Is that toilet paper? Shouldn’t it be on the roll?”
She slid from me, running to where it lay on the floor and throwing it back into the air with a jubilant “Surprise!”
Trent looked up from playing a finger game with Ray. “There were streamers at a party, and now she won’t leave the toilet paper alone.” Ray held her arms out to me, and I took her willingly. “Ellasbeth is supposed to be watching them,” Trent said, his eyes on the door. “Though to be honest, Quen is keeping an eye on them as well. And Jon. Everyone.”
“You think she’s okay?”
Standing, Trent ran a hand over his chin, mildly concerned. “She’s still fighting jet lag. Maybe she fell asleep reading to them again. Unless she left. That’d be nice.”
“She wouldn’t do that,” I said as I arranged Ray’s very dark hair. I knew that Trent believed Ellasbeth agreed with the elven dewar’s opinion that the world would be better if we weren’t part of it, but I wasn’t so sure. “Maybe you should check on her,” I said, because I sure as hell wasn’t going to. Not in my nightgown.
Trent nodded and held out his hand to Ray. “Ray, where is Ellasbeth?”
Blinking her dark eyes, Ray slid from me. Her hand looked small as it fit into Trent’s. Wobbling only slightly, she looked at the door. “Shhh. Nap,” the little girl said, and I swung my feet to the floor.
“That can mean anything,” I said as I stood and glanced at my phone. It was almost sunup. No time for a shower now. I could do it after the news.
Trent’s frown took on a shade of concern. “I’ll be right back,” he said, starting for the door. “Lucy? Where’s your mommy?”
“A-a-a-a-asleep!” Lucy crowed, throwing her toilet paper banner again and watching it drift down. “Surprise!”
Trent held out his other hand. “Show me?” he asked, and she jumped over to him, her dress flying up to show her tights.
“Come on, Daddy!” she said, dragging him off.
Ray turned before they left, and I made an open-and-closed hand wave to match hers. Ducking her head shyly, she trailed along behind Trent, leaving the door open. I didn’t mind, but I did put on a borrowed robe before I scuffed into my slippers. I could hear Quen talking to Trent, and I wasn’t quite up to more people yet. The morning garden beckoned, a gray patch of solitude and calm after Lucy’s exuberance, and after a look at my phone and the time, I shuffled to the big French doors. I wasn’t going out into the living area until Ellasbeth knew I was here.
Besides, if there was a real problem, Quen or Jon would be on it. It might look as if the girls had been wandering the upper floor unattended, but both Jon and Quen were big on letting the girls explore freely within sharply defined boundaries. Either one wouldn’t have a problem letting them walk in on me and Trent—each for different reasons.
Lucy’s shrill voice was punctuated by masculine rumbles as I hit the code at the box by the door and opened it. The first breath of morning damp cooled my flush as I recalled the pandemonium the first time I’d opened it without the code. Birdsong and what might be the clatter of pixy wings drew me out onto the sheltered patio. There was a small koi pond with steam rising from it, and tidy flower beds carefully raked and put to bed for the coming winter.
I wrapped my arms around myself as the coolness slipped up my legs. A soft scuff yanked my attention to the small patio table for two, and I jerked to a halt. “Al?” I said, fear for being coated in mystics flashing through me. I froze, unbelieving, as he stood, clearly having been waiting for me out of sight of the door. At least I hope he’d been out of sight. “What are you doing here?” I warily shuffled closer in my slippers and robe, having to trust that he wouldn’t come here, out of his way, to choke me to death. “And in a suit?” I added, thinking he looked dashing, though very different. He wasn’t trying to kill me. That was good, right?
He looked up from the hat in his hands. “I didn’t change for you,” he said, his proper British accent only a hint, and I nodded, more nervous yet. The tight pin-striped suit gave him almost a forties look. He’d trimmed his physique as well with a narrower waist and shoulders not as thick. It made him appear younger, less mature, more hoodlum, but not quite a thug—the hairstyle shifted it to professional? Professional what, though? I wondered as my eyes slid from the hat he placed on the table to his shiny shoes. The demon did like his shiny shoes, stylish hats, and glasses that he really didn’t need.
“It’s a different look for you,” I said, and he sniffed.
“Not everything I do revolves around you,” he said quickly, as if I might think he was softening to me. “I have my reasons.”
“It looks great, but I thought you looked good before,” I said, and he hesitated as if never having considered that. Remembering where I was, I glanced back at the open door and inched closer. “What are you doing here?” And how long have you been here? Did you look in the window? Did you see me happy with Trent and his children beside me?
Al’s gaze was on the door when I turned back around, and my eyes narrowed in mistrust. “I want to ask you a few questions,” he said. “Is now a good time?”
It wasn?
??t, but I went back and shut the door. “You put Ellasbeth to sleep, didn’t you.”
He smiled, and I knew it was the same old Al despite his new look. “Was it you who destroyed the back end of your church?”
“No.” What is his game? I wondered, arms over my middle again.
“Was it . . . Trenton Aloysius Kalamack?”
“No,” I said again, coming closer until only feet separated us.
“Tell me about it in your own words.”
Tell me about it in your own words? I stood before him, head cocked. “Why?” The scent of burnt amber was almost nonexistent, and I wondered how he could lose it so fast when it always took me a week of showers.
“I want to know.” Nose wrinkling, Al flicked something away from me. “Disgusting creatures,” he muttered, and I backed up, thinking he was talking about the mystics.
“I can’t hear them,” I rushed to say. “And I didn’t call them to me.” I shut my mouth, thinking that to tell him they’d showed up when Cormel had threatened Trent was a bad idea.
Al’s jaw tightened, and I felt a pang at his disgust. “Ah, it was one of the vampire camarillas,” I said to distract him. “Cormel made a deal with the elf dewar that if they got rid of Trent and me, the elves would bring their souls back from the ever-after.”
“So it was Cormel’s men?” he said.
I licked my lips, remembering Al had seen Cormel last night outside Junior’s. “No.”
Al sighed and clasped his hands before him. “No proof. That should be your middle name, Rachel Mariana Morgan.”
Why is he even interested in this? “Look,” I said, thinking this was a lame excuse to check on me, but it was better than choking me to death. “They were vampires,” I added, and he made talking motions with his hands. “Bis snagged one and Trent got a confession.”
“A forced confession means nothing,” he said, and I wondered if the demons were working on some point-of-law thing they wanted to use somehow.
“Why are you badgering me?” I asked, and he casually sat, tugging at his sleeves before remembering the lace was gone.
“You’re very defensive,” he said. “I’m simply ascertaining what happened that morning.”
Yes, but why? He waited silently, and I finally said, “There was a mix of vampires from a lot of camarillas. No one took responsibility, but last night Cormel said the attack was his effort to remind Trent and me of our place in life.”
Goat-slitted eyes unfocused in thought, Al steepled his fingers. “This was last night?”
Someone has been watching old Godfather flicks, I thought as I nodded, and then I said, “Yes,” when it became obvious I needed to actually say it. “I didn’t blow up my church, but I did take advantage of it to pretend to be dead.” I leaned one palm against the table, shivering as the cold from the iron seeped into me. “Why are you here?”
His lip curled, and I forced myself to stay unmoving as he flicked nothing off me, his finger just missing my robe. “I thought you might be interested in seeing what happens to the surface demons when the sun rises.”
I glanced at the house, imagining Ellasbeth’s reaction if I came in with him. It might be worth the fallout. “That’s why I’m up at this godforsaken hour. You want to come in and watch the news with us? Quen makes a good cup of coffee.”
Al blinked, quickly regaining his aplomb. “No, thank you,” he said, the barest shifting of his feet giving away his surprise. “I thought we could do this out here.”
“Sure,” I said softly, then stiffened when Al spoke a word of Latin, gesturing with his usual flair. It lacked a little something without the lace and velvet, but his eyes still glowed with the pleasure of doing something no one else could, and I tightened my hold on the ley lines as a sheet of black-tinted ever-after coalesced into a hunched shape right there on the patio.
Crap on toast, it was a surface demon, and I reached out to circle it.
Al was faster, and a second sheet of power snapped shut around the surface demon with a solid thump I felt in my soul. “Nasty little bugger,” he said, both feet on the floor as he scooted to the edge of the metal chair and peered at it, elbows on his knees and head tilted.
Uneasy, I inched closer. The surface demon hissed wildly, pounding against the wall even as smoke curled up from his fists. Or maybe it was a her. This one had hair snarled down to her waist, and a decidedly delicate cut to her jaw—even if spittle was dangling from her chin.
“Who is that?” I whispered, and I stopped short, not having realized I had moved to stand right next to Al as if wanting his protection.
Al’s expression was closed. “I’ve no idea. Newt gave it to me.” His gaze lifted to the sky lightening in the east. The tops of the trees were already glowing, and it wouldn’t be long before we had our answer.
“Look, the sun,” Al said as if it wasn’t obvious. “Let’s see how well the elves have fucked this up.”
I was holding my breath, and as the sun touched the top of Al’s containment bubble, the surface demon hissed, hunched as if afraid. Eyes wide, it went silent for three heartbeats, and then without fanfare, it vanished.
“Hot damn!” I exclaimed, spinning to Al. My lips parted. His eyes were closed, and his jaw was clenched as if expecting to be whipped. “Al?” I whispered, and they opened. Slowly his tension eased, and he exhaled, fingers shaking as he hid his hands behind his back.
“There, you see?” he said confidently, but what I’d seen was his fear. “Typical elven sloppiness. Rachel, if you are ever that careless, I’ll strangle you with your own charm.”
“Al . . .” I touched his shoulder and he jerked away. This was why he was here, not to show me the flaw in the elven curse. He’d been afraid, and I was the one he’d come to. “You weren’t sure if you could stay,” I said, and his eyes flicked to mine.
“What? Nonsense,” he grumbled, taking his circle down with an unnecessary wave of his hand. “The elves haven’t crafted a decent curse in three thousand years. Pull up your second sight,” he said, grimacing at empty space. “What a nasty piece of work. I was never for their creation in the first place, but you do have to admire the pure savagery of it all.”
He’d once told me demons had created vampires, which would in turn mean they’d created surface demons, and feeling uneasy, I pulled up my second sight. It wasn’t hard to do, but I didn’t do it often, not liking the red-smeared, gritty vision overlaid on the green of reality.
Sure enough, the surface demon was there among the sparse grass and sunbaked dirt that existed this far out from the city center. It howled soundlessly at the sun, clearly not happy to have been forced back. Hissing, it turned to Al and myself, and I dropped my second sight to become invisible to it. “Holy crap on Velveeta toast,” I whispered, shaken as I imagined this happening everywhere as the sun slowly crept across the surface of the world.
“Just so,” Al said, a hint of what might be sympathy in his voice. Shaking, I felt my way around the table to settle in the second wire chair. There were going to be lots of unhappy vampires. I had a feeling that I wasn’t going to get to muck out the church with Jenks and Ivy today. This was bad. If the vampires had been ticked at me before, they’d be doubly so now, blaming me for the elven failure since Landon had set me up to take it.
“That is what happens when you try to tweak a well-crafted curse,” Al said, flipping his hat. “It’s always better to start from scratch than mend flaws created by a modification.”
“What about the vampires who found their souls last night?” I asked.
“They are soulless again,” he said, attention distant as he flipped his hat to land squarely on his head. “The long undead will be most unhappy that their headlong rush to their demise has been interrupted. I predict that by noon, the elves will be spelling to bring their souls back again. They want the old undead gone, and this is the easiest way to do it.” He set his hat on the table between us. “But you already knew that,” he said, voice low. “Killing them w
ith a kindness. Perhaps elves are more like us than they wish to admit . . .”
I rubbed my forehead. The sun was barely up and I was tired already. I needed to call Ivy. “This isn’t my problem.”
“Of course not.” Al stood and brushed at his coat, watching the way the sun hit the fibers. “There’s a way to save them, the undead I mean.”
I looked up, hesitating when I realized some of the threads in his suit sparkled. “How?”
He twirled his hat, running it down his arm, across his back, and down to his free hand where he caught it and jauntily placed it on his head. “If you break the path between the two worlds—”
“I’m not going to destroy the ever-after. It will be the end of all magic,” I interrupted.
“Why not?” He eyed me speculatively. “You’ve seen Cincinnati without her undead. You can end it all right here. Break the lines and no one goes in or out. You might learn to like living without magic. It may be the only way to survive us coming home.”
He meant the demons, and my arm dropped, chilled against the cold metal. “Why are you concerned about Cincinnati or the vampires?”
“I’m not. I simply don’t want to go back.” He turned to me. “Ever.”
If he was proposing an end to magic, it was a good bet he had a way to fix it. “Then maybe you should try playing by our rules.”
“Maybe we already are,” he shot back.
“Right.” Mistrusting this, I leaned back in my chair, tugging my robe closed when it threatened to fall open. “So I break the lines to keep surface demons out and you here. Everyone is mad at me.” I hesitated as he beamed at me. “Except the demons, who set themselves up as king.”
“That’s about it.”
“You do it. I don’t have time to learn a new life skill,” I said, and he put a hand atop the table, leaning over me with his breath smelling of Brimstone.
“You are the only one with mystics in her.” He took a breath. “Rachel.”
I put a finger on his chest and backed him up. “So now mystics are a good thing?”