Sympathetic Magic (The Witches of Cleopatra Hill Book 4) Read online

  But he’d gotten the drink without further comment, along with his own martini, and brought both drinks back to the booth where she waited. When she sipped at her J&C, as they’d used to call them back in the day, it recalled to mind those times when she and her friends would sneak the booze out of their parents’ liquor cabinets, then take their cans of “Coke” with them when they went to hang out in various backyards during the long, lazy days of summer, not thinking about anything much except their next ramble down to the river, or maybe who was seeing whom and whether any of those romances would last past high school. Back then she’d certainly never thought she’d be approaching forty with not even a cat for company.

  “You’re very far away,” Lucas said, and she snapped her attention back to the here and now, to the somewhat overwhelming presence of the man who sat next to her.

  “Sorry,” she replied at once. “I haven’t had one of these in a while.”

  “And it has that much of an effect on you? You’ve only had two sips.”

  Despite herself, she grinned. “No, not that. We used to drink these in high school. Guess it just took me back.”

  He was watching her closely, dark eyes intent. Another of those not entirely unwelcome shivers worked its way down her back. “I have a hard time imagining you doing anything that…illicit.”

  “Oh, we all had our rebellious stages, I guess,” she told him. “I got over mine pretty quickly, though.”

  “Apparently.”

  An awkward silence descended, while she sipped again at her Jack and Coke, and he took a slightly larger swallow of his martini. Vodka, she thought, judging by the smell, not gin. As if it mattered.

  “I’d expected this place to be more crowded,” Lucas commented then, gesturing with his free hand toward the rest of the bar and the random half-dozen or so patrons it currently boasted.

  Glad of the chance to move on to a more neutral topic, Margot replied, “It will be later. Right now the dance is just getting started. Once the band has done a few sets and they’ve announced the winners of the costume contest, people will start to trickle in here. I’ve heard it can get pretty packed.”

  “Then I’m glad we got here early.” His gaze was warm as he looked at her, and she was uncomfortably aware of just how close he sat, so close she could once again catch the faintest trace of the cologne he wore. She could see how thick his dark eyelashes were, the faint brush of gray at his temples.

  A warmth began in the pit of her stomach that didn’t have much to do with the whiskey she’d just consumed, and she looked away, pretending to gaze at the painting over the bar, the coffered ceiling, so lovingly restored. I shouldn’t have come here, she thought then, but couldn’t summon the will to extricate herself. It would be terribly rude to run out on him now.

  And…she really didn’t want to.

  What did she want? More to the point, what did he want?

  She wasn’t sure she wanted to know the answer to either of those questions.

  Clearing her throat, she asked, “So, Lucas, what do you Wilcoxes do on Samhain? Any particular observances?” Oh, Goddess, that sounded terrible. And judgmental…“you Wilcoxes,” indeed.

  If he saw anything wrong with the question, he didn’t show it. “We’re not really practitioners of the old ways like you are here in Jerome,” he said easily. “We have our solstice observations, but that’s about it. In Flagstaff, Samhain is just Halloween. The clan members with kids that age will be taking them trick-or-treating, I suppose.”

  “Oh,” she said, her tone sounding flat. “Then I suppose Connor will be here with us?”

  “I would assume so. If Angela’s up to — well, whatever it is you do.”

  There was just the slightest hint of a question in his words. “Nothing taxing. The prima decides on the particulars of the ceremony, so I have no doubt Angela will tailor it to her…condition.”

  Lucas nodded but didn’t reply, instead taking another swallow of his martini. Was he wondering if she would invite him? No, that was ridiculous. Have a Wilcox present at one of their most sacred rites?

  Well, Connor is going to be there, and he’s a Wilcox….

  She shoved the thought out of her head. “I fear that’s the last we’ll have of her for a while, because the doctor doesn’t want her that far away as she gets closer to her due date. So much for summering in Flagstaff and wintering here in Jerome.”

  “Well, there are extenuating circumstances on this go-round,” Lucas said, his tone so gentle that she couldn’t take it as a rebuke. Well, mostly. “I’m sure next year things will be on a more or less regular schedule.”

  As regular as it could be with twins. Margot tried to imagine caring for two infants at the same time, but as she was an only child, her imagination rather failed her on that point. The prospect seemed somewhat horrifying to her, but Angela and Connor appeared to regard raising twins as their next great adventure together.

  “I’m sure,” she echoed in absent tones, wondering where she would be a year from now. Here, naturally. Well, not here at the Spirit Room, but down the street at Spook Hall, listening to the same music, watching the same couples get up and dance. Would Adam and his new Wilcox girlfriend be married by then?

  Probably, considering the way these things have been going lately, she thought drearily, and then wondered why that prospect sounded so depressing.

  “Hey,” said Lucas, and Margot looked up from her drink to see him studying her, dark brows pulled together in a worried frown.

  “What?”

  “A woman dressed as a medieval queen and drinking a Jack and Coke should look a little happier than you do.”

  “Well,” Margot replied, attempting to shake off the dark mood, “I am dressed as Eleanor of Aquitaine. From what I can recall, she had quite a bit on her plate.”

  A chuckle. “My history’s a little rusty, so I’ll take your word for it. But…you do seem a little down.”

  Now was the time when she should tell him that how she felt was none of his business. And really, it wasn’t. But…were her feelings written that clearly on her face, even after all the efforts she’d made over the years to cultivate what she hoped was a serene expression that revealed nothing of what might be going on inside?

  Her mouth opened, but instead of letting out the retort she’d planned, she asked, “Do you ever get tired, Lucas?”

  “Tired?” he repeated, lifting an eyebrow. “In general, or of something in particular?”

  “I don’t know,” she said, regretting that she’d ever allowed such an ill-considered remark to escape her mouth. “Of doing what you’re supposed to do.”

  At her words, he gave the faintest of nods, then lifted his martini and took a contemplative swallow. “I have a feeling most people do. But it doesn’t have to be that way.”

  Margot drank some of her J&C before replying, “It doesn’t?” At the same time she thought, Maybe it doesn’t have to be that way for you, because you seem like someone who gets what he wants without even having to try.

  To her surprise, his expression darkened, and he set down his glass, running a finger down the stem as he appeared to measure what he was going to say next. “People think I have it easy because of my gift. But that’s not really true.”

  “Oh, come on,” she said. “Don’t try to tell me it’s some kind of curse to always have everything go right in everything you do.”

  “But that’s just the problem.”

  She widened her eyes at him, and he went on,

  “People think everything works out perfectly for me, that nothing has ever gone wrong in my life, but that’s not the case.”

  “I find that hard to believe.” Sorry, Lucas, but there’s only room for one at this pity party. And no one’s going to attend one thrown for a handsome, rich, successful warlock….

  The heavy lashes dropped, and in that moment it seemed as if the lines around his eyes were deeper than they’d been a few seconds ago. “I’m alone, aren’t I?”
/>
  He’d spoken the words simply, with no attempt at pathos, but she sensed it in him, an echo of the same emptiness she felt. An odd, brief moment of vulnerability, when, from what she’d seen of him, he was the one in the room with the sunniest smile, the ready quip, the air of infinite possibilities. Was that all a façade?

  Margot wasn’t sure how she should feel about that. Despite her best efforts to control it, a wave of pity went over her. No, that wasn’t quite right. Not pity, exactly.

  Understanding.

  But things had gotten intimate way too quickly. She didn’t want to go there yet. Ever, she told herself. You don’t ever want to go there. Not with Lucas Wilcox.

  After sipping at her J&C again, and realizing it was disappearing far more quickly than she’d intended, she said in a purposely light tone, “Well, how alone can any of us be when we’re surrounded by clan members day and night?”

  His expression shifted abruptly at her words, and the easy smile she remembered first seeing across Angela’s dining room table touched his mouth. “That’s for damn sure. At least in Flagstaff we’re sort of spread out. I don’t know how you do it, all jammed together here in Jerome.”

  The moment had been lost. For a second or two, Margot regretted her words, regretted being so much of a coward that she couldn’t even handle a minute or two of honest communication with him. But no, it was better this way. Keep it light, and maybe he’d forget how they’d both started to open up to one another.

  “Oh, we’re not all here, Lucas. We have quite a contingent down in Clarkdale and Cottonwood, and also in Camp Verde. There’s even a small colony over in Prescott.” Damn. Why had she brought up Prescott? Most of the time, she did a pretty good job of pretending the town didn’t exist. She didn’t want to think about Prescott…didn’t want to think about him.

  She must have gotten her mask more or less back in place, though, since Lucas didn’t seem to notice anything strange in her expression or tone. “That’s true,” he said. “I guess I just associate you McAllisters so much with this crazy little town that I forget you’ve spread out a good deal.”

  “Not much of a choice there,” she replied. “As you might have noticed, there isn’t what you’d call much undeveloped land around here. We had to go somewhere.”

  “Well, I shouldn’t really be one to talk. The Wilcox clan isn’t exactly confined to Flagstaff, either.”

  The conversation wended its way to safer topics then, as they talked about the places they’d been and seen, and the work involved in keeping the nature of their families’ talents hidden from the outside world. Somewhere in the middle of that conversation, both their drinks ran out, and Lucas got up to fetch them another round. Margot wasn’t sure how good an idea that was, but since he’d managed to slip out of the booth and get halfway to the bar before she could summon the will to protest, she decided to let it go. After all, the drinks weren’t that strong. She felt barely swimmy. A second one shouldn’t be too much to handle.

  A few more people had trickled in during the past quarter-hour or so, and she couldn’t help noticing how the women in the bar watched Lucas’ progress, some of their stares downright predatory. All right, if she allowed herself to look at him objectively, forget that he was a Wilcox, then yes, she had to admit that he was a very handsome man.

  Oh, who are you kidding? she thought. He’s probably the best-looking man you’ve ever seen. Not that it really made much of a difference one way or another. So he was gorgeous. He was also severely off-limits.

  Seemingly unaware of the way the women’s attention tracked him back to the booth, Lucas slid in next to Margot and set a fresh Jack and Coke in front of her. As he did so, several groups of people entered the room and headed straight for the bar.

  “Looks like I made it back in the nick of time,” he remarked, raising his martini toward hers in a mock salute. “Is the dance over already?”

  She never wore a watch, but Lucas’ was visible enough. Something slim and probably hideously expensive, although she didn’t know the brand. “Not at barely nine o’clock,” she replied after taking a quick glance at the time. “The band must be taking a break. I think some people come up here for a drink because it’s faster than waiting in line at the dance.”

  “Makes sense.”

  He drank, and since she didn’t know what else to do, Margot sipped at her J&C and barely avoided a wince. Damn. It tasted as if the bartender had reversed the ratio of Jack to Coke on this go-round. But she didn’t want to make a scene by sending it back, especially since she had a feeling Lucas would try to tease her about not holding her liquor if she protested that the drink was too strong. No, she’d just have to take very small sips and hope he wouldn’t notice that she was taking her time with this round.

  Despite her caution, she could feel the whiskey hitting her, bringing with it a not entirely unpleasant sensation of lightheadedness. When was the last time she’d gotten tipsy? She honestly couldn’t remember. Not at Angela and Connor’s wedding. No, she’d been sober enough then, even though she’d wanted to blame her insanity in dancing with Lucas on being too drunk to know what she was doing. Unfortunately, a glass and a half of champagne wasn’t even enough to make her tipsy, let alone drunk.

  Now, though….

  She wished she’d asked him to bring her some water. Her throat suddenly felt dry, and wetting it too deeply with the concoction before her brought its own risks.

  “…doing next Friday?”

  “What?” she asked, blinking. Damn, once again she’d been off in the clouds and hadn’t heard what he said.

  Lucas gave her a curious look, but only said, “Next week is the first Friday art walk in Sedona. I was asking if you were doing anything next Friday.”

  The truthful answer was that no, she wasn’t doing anything at all…or at least nothing she hadn’t done thousands of times before. Puttering in the garden and maybe doing some sketches of the fall foliage, tidying the house, walking over Jerome to make sure all the subtle little illusions she’d set out were still there and doing their job of pointing the tourists and any other outsiders away from places the local witches didn’t want them going. It was a great way to keep in shape, that was for sure, hiking up and down all those steep, narrow streets. However, it certainly wasn’t anything she absolutely had to do that day.

  She hesitated for a long time. The question had been phrased in the gentlest of ways, but Lucas was still basically asking her out on a date. She couldn’t go on a date with him. Totally out of the question.

  “I have a lot I need to do here, actually,” she said, and took a fortifying sip of her Jack and Coke so she wouldn’t have to see his reaction.

  “Connor’s going to have some new pieces at Red Rock Illuminations. He can’t really do a big opening right now, what with Angela needing to stay in Flagstaff after Samhain, but these are paintings no one’s seen before. I think it would mean a lot to him if there were some family members there to support him.”

  Oh, very clever. Couch it as doing something for Connor, rather than going out on a real date. “I — ”

  “It’ll be fun.” Lucas was holding his martini glass but not lifting it to his lips. Instead, he kept his gaze fixed on her, even as his mouth quirked. “You know, fun? Remember what that is?”

  “I’m well aware of the concept,” she snapped.

  He didn’t reply, but his gaze clearly said, Are you?

  “Fine. I’ll go.”

  Was ever an offer of a date accepted so grudgingly? Lucas didn’t seem to mind, though, but only smiled and said, “Great. It starts at five, so I should pick you up around four-thirty — ”

  “No,” she said, and his eyebrows went up again. “I mean,” she went on hurriedly, “it’s silly for you to drive all the way out to here to get me. I’ll meet you in Sedona. Just let me know where.”

  He hesitated, then said smoothly, “Well, if we’re starting in uptown, then you could park in the structure at Sinagua Plaza and meet me ou
t front there.”

  Thank the Goddess he wasn’t going to press the issue. At least if she had her own car there, she could make a quick getaway if necessary. And if any other McAllisters showed up, well, she could think of some way to spin it — after all, there wasn’t anything so strange about one of her clan’s elders going to support their prima’s consort at his art exhibit, even in the company of Lucas Wilcox. He did seem to act as a sort of informal clan elder himself, and so the whole outing could be seen as two peers working together for the good of both their clans. Perfectly logical.

  Unfortunately, she had a feeling neither of her fellow McAllister elders would view the situation in quite the same way, were they to discover her plans.

  4

  Margot agreeing to go out with him on the gallery walk was miracle enough. The even bigger miracle was that she hadn’t called sometime during the intervening week to cancel the whole thing. He’d been expecting the call the whole time, actually — oh, sorry, Lucas, something came up. I hope you understand — and had mentally rehearsed his replies so his disappointment wouldn’t be too blatantly obvious. Even worse would have been a text, since that would have made it clear that she didn’t want to talk to him at all, not even long enough to shoot him down one last time.

  But she hadn’t called, or texted, and now he stood here in their designated meeting place, on the steps of the plaza as people streamed around him, talking and laughing, all intent on their various destinations. The sun had already disappeared behind the buildings on the west side of the street, and the air was cool. Well, probably downright cold to the people who lived here in Sedona or came from farther south, in Phoenix and Tucson, but to him it just felt pleasant, refreshing. Maybe as the evening wore on, he’d button up his black wool overcoat, but in the meantime he’d left it hanging open.

  And there she was, moving through the crowds, a shawl in warm autumn hues thrown over her long dark dress. She’d pulled her hair back, and he felt a little twinge of disappointment. Her hair was so lovely when she let it flow loose over her shoulders.