Darknight (The Witches of Cleopatra Hill Book 2) Read online

  I’d need that strength to keep myself from having flashbacks to the way Connor’s hand had wrapped around my wrist, the heat of his flesh against mine, the way I had wanted to give in. It was the worst ache I’d ever felt, that need for him.

  And it didn’t seem as if it was going away any time soon. If ever.

  Time ticked by. The clock on the table told me it was now past one. Connor probably had enough to keep him busy, I supposed. After all, it was only four days until Christmas. Outside, people were probably navigating the icy streets looking for those last-minute gifts, or getting together with friends, or shopping for their holiday meals, or any one of a number of things people did while getting ready for the big day.

  Dimly, I realized it was my birthday.

  No, you will not cry, I told myself. It’s just a day, one out of three hundred and sixty-five. No big deal.

  Easy to say, I supposed. But the more I tried not to think about it, the more my thoughts kept tugging themselves back to the plans Sydney and I had made. I was going to meet her in Cottonwood for some girl time and manicures, and then that night we’d go with Adam and Anthony to the Hoppy Grape Lounge in Sedona for drinks and appetizers. It would have been safe; I would have been with Adam by then, no longer a target for Damon Wilcox’s plotting.

  Instead, here I sat.

  I bit my lip. Hard. Not enough to draw blood, but it began to ache as soon as my teeth let go. But at least the pain kept me from giving in to the tears that threatened to fall.

  Below me, I heard the door bang open, followed by a heavy stomping of feet on the stairs. “Connor!” Damon’s voice bellowed.

  Oh, shit. I scrambled to my feet and backed away from the door, grabbing the empty plate and glass as I did so. Frantically I looked around, but of course there was nowhere I could go. Even if I’d wanted to climb out the window, there was no way I could do that, spelled as it was.

  “Connor!”

  More than any other time in my life I wished my McAllister blood had given me a power stronger than speaking with the dead. Teleportation sounded pretty damn good right about now.

  The doorknob rattled, then again, stronger this time. Out in the hallway I could hear Damon curse, and the next thing I knew there was a blast of searing light and a burst of acrid-smelling smoke, and the door swung inward. The Wilcox clan leader stood in the frame and glared at me, and I had to force myself to stay where I was, to not take a step backward. That would only be an admission of weakness.

  After an entrance like that, I halfway expected Damon to be wearing his black robes from the night before. Actually, he looked pretty much like what you’d expect from a man out and about on a freezing Saturday afternoon — black overcoat, jeans, heavy-duty dark shoes that weren’t quite hiking boots but were close.

  “Where’s Connor?” he demanded.

  “I don’t know,” I said, as steadily as I could. Upset as I was with Connor, in that moment I really, really wished he were there to act as a buffer between me and his clearly crazy brother. “Down in the gallery?”

  “I checked.” For the first time his gaze moved past me to the narrow bed — made up, yes, but hastily. It was pretty clear that I had slept there the night before, and the open duffle lying at its foot with my toiletries sitting on top only further proved that I’d taken up residence in this room and not Connor’s. Damon’s mouth tightened. “Made yourself at home, I see.”

  I didn’t dare more than a lift of my shoulders. Even though I knew I was safe enough from being bound to Damon Wilcox, that didn’t mean I wasn’t still afraid of him. He’d already shown that he had very little regard for anyone’s well-being other than his own.

  As he opened his mouth to speak, I heard footsteps on the stairs once again, hastening upward as if they belonged to someone fearful of what they might find. A second or two later, Connor appeared in the doorway, features tight with worry. They cleared somewhat as he spied Damon standing a safe distance from me. Well, more or less safe. It was clear he could do quite a bit of damage from several feet away.

  “Where the hell have you been?” Damon demanded, rounding on his brother.

  “Out,” Connor said shortly.

  “I can see that. We need to talk.” His gaze flickered toward me and then back to Connor. “Downstairs.”

  “Okay.” By his apparent air of unconcern, it was clear he had a lot of experience managing his brother’s rages. He shot me the briefest of glances, as if trying to ascertain for sure that I was all right. I gave a tiny nod, then went and sat down on the bed, trying to appear as collected as he was.

  They both left, Damon not giving me a second glance as he shut the door behind him. I forced myself to remain sitting on the bed for a moment to give them enough time to get downstairs, but I knew I couldn’t stay there. I had to find out what had sent Damon hastening over here, clearly intent on confronting Connor about something.

  After I thought a safe interval had passed, I got to my feet and opened the door. The knob was still warm to the touch, the lock clearly blasted beyond repair. I shivered. And that was just something Damon had done hurriedly and in anger. I really didn’t want to think about what he was capable of with a chunk of preparatory time behind him.

  The hallway was empty, of course, but I hadn’t expected to see them up here. I tiptoed down the corridor, then paused at the top of the stairs. The place wasn’t so big that I couldn’t hear them from this location, and I didn’t dare get any closer.

  Damon’s voice, tight with rage. “…were you thinking, leaving her alone?”

  “The wards you set are working just fine. She couldn’t get out.”

  “Yes, they’re working to keep her in the apartment. But she still managed to do a good bit of damage. You know who I just had a visit from?”

  Silence. Maybe Connor had shaken his head, but since I couldn’t see him, I didn’t know for sure.

  “The elders of clan McAllister…accompanied by Maya de la Paz.”

  “Oh.”

  “I’m going to leave aside the fact that they came to my house. Maybe that’s better — at least because it’s Saturday, they couldn’t come barging into my office on campus. Do you want to know how they figured out that they should come straight to me?”

  Another pause, and then Connor replied, “Well, it’s not that big a leap to think of you when their prima goes missing, is it?”

  “Maybe not. But I doubt they would’ve worked quite this fast if the girl’s aunt hadn’t gotten an email forwarded from a friend, an email saying that Angela McAllister was here in Flagstaff.”

  “Oh.”

  “Stop saying that. You sound like an idiot. Of course, who but an idiot would let that girl roam around freely so she could lay her hands on his laptop and get a message out to her family?”

  Despite myself, I felt almost sorry for Connor. Maybe he’d been careless, but he didn’t deserve to have his asshole brother calling him an idiot. And Connor was right — of course everyone’s suspicions would’ve landed right on Damon Wilcox when I disappeared. It might have taken them a bit longer to put two and two together, but….

  I was sort of impressed by how quickly they’d gotten here, though. It had been not quite three hours since I’d sent that email, and it took almost that long to get here from Phoenix even in good weather. Maya de la Paz must have hit the road almost the minute she got the call from my clan. I wondered if it had been Aunt Rachel who’d made the call, or whether one of the elders had contacted the de la Paz prima. Not that it really mattered. The important thing was that they’d come. Maybe rescue was closer than I’d thought.

  Voice even, as if he’d suffered this sort of abuse many times before and no longer cared, Connor said, “So what did you tell them?”

  “Nothing. I said I didn’t know what they were talking about, and that they were trespassing on our land and breaking the pact to stay out of one another’s territory. What proof do they have, really?”

  “None, I suppose.”

>   “Exactly. And I put out the call as soon as they appeared, so Marie and Lucas and a few others showed up to lend their support. The McAllisters had to back down, even if they did have Maya de la Paz with them. She’s too shrewd to start an all-out clan war, although she did tell me this was not the end of the matter.”

  “So it’s all okay, then.”

  “No, it’s not okay. I’ll ask again — what the hell were you thinking? And you clearly left her alone again after that…not to mention that it’s obvious you didn’t do what was expected of you and seal the deal.”

  You didn’t have to be a rocket scientist to figure out what he meant by “seal the deal.”

  For the first time, Connor’s voice held a touch of anger. “I’m handling it, okay?”

  “Are you? It doesn’t look that way to me.”

  “I’m handling it.”

  A silence that felt painfully long, although I knew it only had to be a second or two. Finally, Damon said, “You’d better be. If you can’t rise to the occasion, then maybe I should step in.”

  My blood went cold, even as Connor replied, his tone as frosty as the ice-covered streets outside, “You’re not her consort. I am. Leave it alone.”

  Another one of those agonizing pauses, until Damon said, “I will…as long as you don’t.”

  Then I heard the door slam. At the same time, a weight I hadn’t even noticed up until that moment seemed to lift from my chest. The primus was gone.

  And here I was, standing at the top of the stairs, just waiting for Connor to discover me. I hurried back to the guest room and closed the door, then went to the bed and sat down.

  A minute later, I heard his voice outside. “It’s okay to come out.”

  Since I didn’t know what else to do, I got up and opened the door. Connor stood a foot or so away, clearly making sure I had enough room to get out without having to brush past him. I said hesitantly, “He sounded…upset.”

  Those sculpted lips, the ones I had to try very hard not to think about kissing, tightened briefly. “Yes, he was, but I have a feeling you listened to the whole conversation, so no need for me to go into the gory details.”

  I opened my mouth to protest, saw the warning look in his eyes, and decided I’d better quit while I was ahead. Instead, I told him, “I didn’t mean to get you in trouble. I just — ”

  “You just wanted to let your family know you were all right. It’s fine.” He hesitated, as if he wasn’t sure what he should say next, then lifted his shoulders. “Actually, I hoped you’d find my laptop and get a message out to them. Not that it would make this all better, but at least they’d know you were alive, right?”

  “You — ” The words couldn’t quite assert themselves, I was so flabbergasted by his remark. After taking a breath, I asked, “You meant for me to contact them?”

  “Like I said, I didn’t want them to worry. I wasn’t really expecting them to drag Maya de la Paz into this, but — ”

  Right then the cell phone in his pocket went off. He dug it out of his jeans — it was a sleek silver iPhone — answered with a brief “hello?”, then listened as a frown dug itself into his brow. “Okay,” he said finally, “I’ll be down in a minute.”

  “Your brother?” I asked.

  “No. That was Joelle, my assistant in the gallery. The client I was wooing all morning came back and is about to buy the piece, but he wants my assurances as to its potential to appreciate in value.” Connor shook his head. “The guy’s supposedly buying it as a Christmas present for his wife, but he still wants to make money on it. Anyway, I need to go handle things. Make yourself at home — but you’ve already sort of done that, haven’t you?”

  Without giving me a chance to reply, he turned and hurried down the stairs, leaving me alone.

  Again.

  3

  Turquoise

  Strangely — maybe because I’d been fairly caught using Connor’s laptop — I had no desire to do any more snooping. Instead, I wandered downstairs, found a glass in one of the cupboards, and filled it up with water through the refrigerator door. He seemed to prefer bottled water, but I’d always drunk water like this when I was at Sydney’s house and didn’t see the harm.

  A clock of burnished copper on one wall told me it was now almost two-thirty. I wondered how long the transaction at the gallery was going to take. As long as it took, I supposed. Since I’d just purchased several large original pieces myself, I knew Connor wasn’t talking about a few hundred dollars here.

  I knew I should just sit down on the couch and turn on the TV, and try to disengage my brain for a while. The wards on the apartment were too powerful for me to overcome, and I’d already contacted my family. My available options weren’t what you could call vast.

  But that visit from Damon had filled me with nervous energy, and so I went to one of the two large windows on the street side of the room and looked outside. The day was still bright, although I noticed the sky had begun to be dotted with large billowy clouds. More snow on the way? I didn’t know enough about the weather patterns in Flagstaff to say for sure. All I knew was that it was much colder here than in Jerome, and the city got consistent snowfall, whereas in Jerome it was still something of a special event when it snowed and actually stuck to the ground for a while.

  The streets below were even busier than they’d been that morning, which made sense. All the shops would be open now. I saw people carrying a lot of bags and packages. Strangely, I didn’t notice much in the way of decorations. In Jerome there were holiday lights everywhere, with a good many of the houses with a single lighted “Ho” in their yards or attached to walls and fences. Just our silly in-joke, a crack about the town’s bustling red light district back in the day.

  I realized then that I’d never asked Maisie what she thought about all those “Ho”s with the Christmas lights attached to them. Probably just as well.

  But here in Flagstaff I didn’t see much sign of holiday cheer, except in the people themselves, who appeared festive and happy enough. They had friends and families to shop for, places to go, people to be with. It all looked so normal. Then again, the vast majority of the city was normal. I was sort of hazy on Flagstaff’s actual population, but it was of course many, many times the size of tiny Jerome. There, half the residents were McAllisters. Here, even if there were a good many more members of the Wilcox clan than there were in my own family, they’d still constitute a tiny minority.

  They could probably get away with a lot, using the anonymity of a large population to conceal them.

  Seeing all those people intent on their own business didn’t cheer me up, though. Sighing, I went and sat down on the couch. In that moment, I could only think of the clan elders, returning to Jerome empty-handed, and how disappointed my aunt and Adam and so many others must be. I didn’t see how they’d thought they could ask Damon Wilcox to just hand me over. Maybe they’d thought they could get reason to prevail. Unfortunately, he was the polar opposite of reasonable.

  And what now? I had no idea. Damon had said Maya wouldn’t risk a clan war, and if she wouldn’t, that meant the McAllisters’ hands were effectively tied. There was no way they could take on the Wilcoxes without allies. But Maya had also said this wasn’t the end of it. What did that mean?

  Once again, I had no answer. There had been clan wars back in what Aunt Ruby had referred to as “the old country,” but she’d been very vague about what such warfare actually entailed. “We left those things behind,” she told me once when I tried to press her on the matter, and that seemed to be the end of it.

  However, it wasn’t too difficult to figure out that a war between witch clans would no doubt attract a lot of attention, the sort of attention we all — even the Wilcoxes — tried very hard to avoid. So maybe Maya and the elders were trying to see if there was another way to get me back, one that wouldn’t involve magical pyrotechnics. But did they even know where to find me? They’d obviously known where Damon lived, but Connor could be an entirely differe
nt story.

  As if thinking of him had somehow summoned his return, the door to the apartment opened, and he came in, stopping a few paces away from where I sat on the couch. I still wouldn’t call his expression or posture exactly relaxed, but he did seem a little less tense than the last time I had seen him.

  “You made the sale,” I said.

  “I did.” He pushed his hair back from his brow. I found myself wondering what those sleek, heavy locks would feel like slipping between my fingers, and once again my heart sped up.

  This was getting ridiculous.

  “Congratulations, I guess.”

  “Thanks.” He stood there watching me for a few seconds, then added, “I’m surprised you’re not watching TV or reading or something.”

  “I was people-watching,” I replied, with an off-hand gesture toward the window.

  “Maybe you saw my client, then. Uptight-looking jerk in a gray coat, drove off in a silver Audi SUV?”

  Despite myself, I smiled. “No, I must have missed him.”

  “You didn’t miss much.” Turning from me, he went into the kitchen and got himself some water.

  I watched him — really watched him, trying to study his expression, his stance. He was still doing that thing of looking at me without actually looking at me, and while I understood his reason for doing so, it still felt odd, as if he were only partially present in the room.

  “This isn’t going to work,” I said.

  That did make him raise his head. For a second his eyes met mine before he glanced away. “I don’t know what you mean.”

  “I think you do.” I got up from the couch and moved toward the kitchen, although I stopped in the dining area. That way there would still be a safe distance between us. “Maybe it could have worked, if you’d been honest with me from the beginning.” At that comment his eyebrows lifted, and I said, “Okay, maybe not from the very beginning. I can see why you wouldn’t want to admit you were a Wilcox at the Halloween dance, right when you were smack in the middle of McAllister territory. But you could have told me in Sedona. That’s neutral ground.”