witches of cleopatra hill 07 - impractical magic Read online

  Relief seemed to ripple over her. “Oh. I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be.”

  A shake of her head, and a long lock of hair slipped over her shoulder. Where else but southern Arizona could a woman be comfortable wearing a sleeveless dress while sitting outside at nine o’clock at night in early November? “Well, still. I am sorry when I hear that anyone has had to go through that.”

  Tone slightly teasing, he said, “What, the McAllisters don’t believe in divorce?”

  But she didn’t smile. “It happens. Not as often as it does with a lot of other families, though.”

  “What about you?” Maybe he shouldn’t have asked, especially since Jenny did seem pretty unattached, but he wanted to know. Just because she was flying solo tonight didn’t mean she might not be going through her own breakup.

  “Never married.” Her tone was short, as if she was only answering because she knew it would be rude to ignore his question. “Never came close, actually.”

  “Really?”

  This time she did smile, if somewhat ruefully. After swallowing some more champagne, she said, “You sound surprised.”

  “I am. I mean, don’t take this the wrong way, but you’re kind of amazing.”

  “How could a woman take a compliment like that the wrong way?”

  “You’d be surprised.” Since her glass was almost empty, he refilled it, then topped off his own drink.

  After sending him a grateful glance, she drank again. At the rate they were going, he might have to go in search of more champagne soon. Not that he would have minded, but he still had to drive home after this. “Well,” she said, then paused, “I’m glad you think I’m amazing, because you’re kind of amazing yourself.”

  Maybe that was the champagne talking, but Colin couldn’t help feeling right then that he was damn glad he’d crashed this wedding after all, even if he hadn’t been able to discover a single out of the ordinary thing about Alex Trujillo or his new bride. Well, except that she had a cousin who made every woman Colin had ever dated look like a sack of potatoes. “Now you’re just messing with me.”

  “I am not,” she said indignantly. “Sometimes I forget that there are real people in the world. Interesting people.”

  “There aren’t real people in Jerome?”

  She waved a hand. “Not — well, it’s hard to explain. And I probably shouldn’t be explaining it to a ci — ” Her words broke off then, and she shook her head before tipping about half her glass of champagne down her throat. “Never mind me. It’s been a long day.”

  “True.” He allowed himself another sip of champagne, knowing it would probably be his last. The drive from the hotel to his apartment wasn’t that far, but he didn’t want to take any chances. “So maybe I should let you crash. Sounds like you’ve earned it.”

  Disappointment flickered in her eyes. She hesitated before saying quickly, as if pushing herself to get the words out before she lost her nerve, “Do you live close by?”

  No, she couldn’t be asking…could she? “Uh…pretty close. About ten minutes away.”

  Another pause. Then she said, “You want to get out of here?”

  There was only one correct answer to that question. He grinned at her and said, “Absolutely.”

  4

  Too much champagne. Way, way too much champagne. Jenny knew that somewhere in the back of her mind, the part that was still functioning, but she didn’t much care. Colin asked her about her car, and she told him that she was staying here at the hotel, so it didn’t matter if she left it behind. He looked relieved by her reply, but also sort of nervous. Had it been a while for him, too? He’d mentioned being divorced, but of course she had no idea how long ago he’d split from his ex-wife.

  She pushed that thought to the back of her head as she followed him out to his car. It didn’t matter who he’d been with in the past. Well, maybe it did, but she’d make sure he used protection.

  This was crazy. Totally crazy.

  But then she was getting into a dusty black Honda Accord, and he was apologizing about the car. As if she cared. She liked him because of his smile and the sound of his voice and because it seemed as if he was listening to her, really listening, when she talked, instead of looking impatient and wondering when she’d shut up so they could get on with the important stuff. Anyway, if he was divorced, he’d probably been set back financially by the whole thing. Again, not his fault. And she wasn’t a Wilcox, all wrapped up in material stuff like big houses and fancy cars. Maybe not all of them were like that, but she couldn’t deny that Jerome would turn lousy with BMWs and Mercedes and Land Rovers whenever the Wilcox contingent came up for any kind of social gathering.

  Jenny didn’t know Tucson at all, had let her phone guide her into the hotel’s parking lot through the directions on Yelp, so she had no idea where Colin was taking her. It was crazy to be going home with a guy she’d just met, someone she knew nothing about. He didn’t look like a serial killer. But then, did they ever?

  Her gift wasn’t telling her anything, either. Gift. There was a joke. More like a curse. All witches and warlocks had a special talent, something stronger than the simple magical gifts of being able to light a candle with their minds, or draw simple circles of protection, or brew up a tea that would knock a cold out of your system in nothing flat. Her brother Adam was a weather-worker, and poor dead Roslyn had had the gift of singing perfectly on pitch, of hearing a song once and being able to interpret it without a single mistake ever afterward.

  Whereas she, Jenny — well, people in the clan called her a mind reader, but that wasn’t really what she could do. It wasn’t like when you saw psychics on television or in the movies, and they could know what people were thinking practically word for word. Most of the time, she couldn’t hear people’s thoughts any better than someone who had no witch blood at all. But every once in a while, something in her mind would flare into life, and it was as if she could see into the minds of everyone around her, could understand every single thing they were thinking. As if she was standing in the television department at an electronics store, and all the TVs would come on at once, blaring their programs at maximum volume in the sort of cacophony that made her ears want to bleed.

  She hadn’t had an episode for more than a month now, and had been worried the whole time during the wedding that her gift would turn on her, and she’d be treated to a simulcast of all the wedding-goers’ thoughts while she was trying to make sure Caitlin’s day went off without a hitch. That hadn’t happened, though, which was part of the reason why she’d been throwing back the champagne. Relief, and also the knowledge that when she was tipsy, if her talent did trigger for some reason, it would come through somewhat muted, the alcohol blunting the effects of the brain cyclone.

  No wonder she’d had no desire to live anywhere except Jerome. It was so tiny that she could manage a lot better than if she’d been living someplace densely populated, like Phoenix.

  Or Tucson.

  If she could look into Colin’s mind right now, what would she see? Satisfaction that he’d managed to score what looked like a sure thing? No, that didn’t seem right. His voice sounded friendly and relaxed as he talked about Tucson, and how he knew some fun places to eat if she was going to be sticking around for a few days…but she could also see the way his fingers tapped on the steering wheel. He was nervous. If he’d had as much to drink as she had, maybe he’d be a little less tense, but then he wouldn’t have been in any shape to drive.

  They pulled into the parking lot of a large apartment complex. She couldn’t see much of it, except that it was ringed by palm trees, but something about it felt shabby, not kept up as well as it should have been. Maybe his divorce had been an expensive one, and this was all he could afford.

  She told herself that she should be the last person to judge a place based on its outward condition. True, her flat over the art gallery was very nice because the woman who owned the building was from Scottsdale and sort of anal-retentive, but
a lot of Jerome, especially once you were off the main drag, had passed shabby years ago and was now well on its way toward ramshackle.

  Colin parked in a covered space toward the back of the complex. “I’m on the second floor,” he said, then shot a worried glance at her sandals, now back on her feet. She might have been well on her way to being drunk, but at least she hadn’t forgotten to put her shoes back on before following Colin out to his car. “You going to manage those stairs okay?”

  “I’m fine,” she replied, although she wondered if she would in fact be able to manage. Three-inch spike heels weren’t exactly in her repertoire on a regular day, let alone one where she’d probably drunk the equivalent of an entire bottle of champagne by herself. But fortune favored the bold, right?

  She pushed the car door open. Colin, looking vaguely alarmed, hurried out of his own side of the car so he could be there for her when she launched herself outside. Good thing, too, because she wobbled the second her feet hit the pavement.

  At once his arm went around her waist, steadying her. Much better. It actually felt really good to have him holding her like that. He seemed strong. Steady. Even so, she knew there was no way she was going to make it up the stairs in those damn shoes. Not unless he carried her, and she didn’t think they were quite at the point in their relationship where she could ask such a thing of him.

  Oh, but sleeping with him is an entirely different matter, the more or less sober part of her mind jeered at her.

  Well, it was different. She wasn’t the type to regularly indulge in one-night stands — actually, this would be a first for her — but expecting a guy you just met to carry you up an entire flight of stairs was a bit much.

  So she said, “Hang on a sec,” and bent to undo the buckles on her ankle straps. Luckily, Colin held on to one arm while she performed that maneuver, or else she probably would have lost her balance and done a complete face plant right there on the walkway. Then she straightened up, shoes dangling by their straps from one of her fingers. “There we go. All better.”

  Colin’s expression appeared dubious to her, but maybe it was just the crappy sodium vapor lighting in the parking area. It tended to make everyone look pretty ghastly. He didn’t say anything, though, but only kept his steadying grip on her arm as he guided her along the sidewalk, then up the stairs.

  Jerome had more than its fair share of stairs, and she’d negotiated enough of them while in a less than sober state that she could manage well enough, now that she wasn’t wearing those three-inch torture devices. Those damn things were going up on eBay the second she got home.

  “I wasn’t really expecting company,” Colin said as he inserted his key in the lock to the apartment’s front door. “But I don’t think it’s too much of a disaster.”

  “Don’t worry about it,” she replied breezily, although she found herself hoping that his bedroom wasn’t a complete mess. Having sex while surrounded by a guy’s dirty socks and discarded beer cans wasn’t exactly her idea of a good time.

  To her relief, the apartment he escorted her into was a little cluttered, with books and actual magazines and newspapers scattered on the coffee table and the table pushed up against one wall in the dining area, but it didn’t look dirty. He headed toward the kitchen, saying, “Do you want some water. Or” — a brief pause, as if he’d realized he probably shouldn’t be making the offer but didn’t have a graceful way of backing out now— “maybe some wine? I think I have a bottle of chardonnay stashed in here somewhere.”

  “Chardonnay,” she replied at once. Another mistake, no doubt, but if you were going to do the whole drunken one-night-stand thing, you might as well go for the gold.

  A nod, and he started rummaging around in the refrigerator. Jenny heard bottles clinking together and guessed they were beer. Actually, a beer sounded pretty good, but she still possessed enough of her faculties to know that drinking beer on top of all that champagne was a spectacularly bad idea.

  He emerged with a bottle of pale straw-colored wine, along with a pair of stemless glasses, the kind you got when you did a wine tasting, although she couldn’t quite make out the logo on them. Some kind of a hand, maybe?

  After clearing a space on the coffee table, he set down the bottle and the glasses, then pointed toward the well-worn leather couch. “Have a seat?”

  She plopped herself down, then dropped her sandals off to one side of the sofa. Colin sat down as well before getting to work on removing the cork from the bottle. The label wasn’t one she recognized, although it had a hand on it, just like the glasses. So he must gave gotten them at the same place.

  Raising an eyebrow, she asked, “Su Vino?”

  “They’re in Scottsdale,” he explained. “You probably don’t see too much of their stuff up in your neck of the woods.”

  “No,” she said. “In Jerome we try to buy as much of the local wines as we can. Although I won’t say we don’t cheat and get the cheap stuff at the grocery store as well.”

  “Sounds familiar,” Colin said with a grin. “I don’t go around loading up on Su Vino, but my parents belong to their wine club, so they tend to slip me a bottle or two when they come visit.”

  “Oh, do they live in the Phoenix area?”

  “They do now,” he replied as he poured about an inch of wine into each of the glasses in front of them. “I was born here in Tucson and went to college here, but then my father got a really good job opportunity up in Tempe, so they’ve been living up there for about the past five years.”

  “Ah,” Jenny said. Would it be rude to ask what his father did? She wasn’t sure. So much of civilian life seemed to revolve around where people worked and what they did for a living, whereas in the witch clans, the jobs people held — if they worked at all — were mostly for show, or protective camouflage to explain their financial status. There was the occasional exception, like Alex, who really did seem interested in having an actual career rather than something that would let him pass for normal in the “real” world. “So you weren’t interested in going with them?”

  A shrug. After taking a sip of his wine, Colin replied, “Well, by then I’d gotten married, and we were trying to make things work here, so….” The words trailed off, and he drank some more chardonnay. “Obviously, that didn’t end so well, but I didn’t have any desire to leave Tucson. This is my hometown.”

  “Oh,” Jenny said, knowing even as the syllable left her mouth how flat it sounded. She should have thought of that, realized that five years ago Colin would probably have been in his late twenties and making a life of his own. Civilians weren’t as hung up on making sure their families stuck together, and people were free to go their own way. The alcohol must have fried her brain even more than she thought.

  Besides, it was stupid beyond belief to be disappointed by his comment that he wouldn’t want to leave his hometown. They’d spent, what, a couple of hours together, max? Not exactly enough time to be planning a future together and picking out china patterns. Since she didn’t know what else to say, she picked up her own glass and took a large swallow of wine. Even in her fuddled state, she could tell it was good, crisp and without the oakiness you got from a lot of chardonnays. “Well, Tucson seems nice,” she added, realizing how limp the words were.

  “Very different from Jerome, I’m guessing.”

  “Yes, but then, pretty much everything is different from Jerome. It’s sort of a one-of-a-kind place.”

  “True.”

  They lapsed into silence then, and Jenny sipped her wine again, wondering if he was going to make a move after all, and what she would do if he didn’t. He sat there next to her in his slightly rumpled sport coat, his hair looking a little mussed, and he was so sexy — and so completely unaware of his own good looks — that she knew she was probably going to jump on him anyway if he didn’t put down that damn wine glass and….

  He did set down his glass. In the next moment, he was plucking her glass from her fingers, putting it next to his on the coffee table
. And then he was leaning in, his mouth very close to hers, hazel eyes gleaming with need, and yes, some hesitancy, but it wasn’t enough to stop him from closing the gap between them, his lips brushing against hers.

  Ah, Goddess, about time. She loved the shape of his mouth, how it seemed to match up perfectly with her own lips. He tasted of chardonnay and champagne, light and intoxicating, sweet and sharp at the same time. Warm, welcome heat flowed through her, making her lightheaded. But no, she’d already been a little bit dizzy. This was different, though, sweeping her away with the sensation, her body somehow knowing this was exactly what she needed.

  She slid down against the cushions, and he was on top of her, his hands cupping her face as he kissed her over and over, his need clearly as urgent as hers. Maybe once they were done she’d have the courage to ask him how long it had been since his last time. Months and months for her…no, wait…it had been almost a year. She’d broken up with Daniel right before she quit working dispatch for the Cottonwood P.D.

  And she needed to stop thinking about that. Just focus on Colin, on the delicious taste of his mouth, the slight scratch of his stubbled cheek against her skin. He moved lower, trailing kisses down her neck, and she couldn’t help moaning then, because he’d hit her right in the sweet spot, right where her entire body would react in chills and a flush of heat.

  Then he was pushing himself up off the couch, pulling her with him. She knew where he was headed, knew she wouldn’t utter a single word of protest. This was why she’d come back to his apartment with him, after all. At least he was being considerate, and wasn’t going to try this on the couch. Not that it wasn’t fun to have sex in new and exciting places around the house, but she’d always preferred that the first time be in a real bed.

  They stumbled down the hall and into a dark room. He didn’t turn on the lights. Was he shy about that sort of thing, or was he being considerate because he didn’t know whether she was body-conscious? Either way, she thought she liked him more because of it. Anyway, enough light trickled in from the hallway that she could more or less see what was going on.