.5 To Have and To Code (27 page)

Nell stood up and walked to the window, a stray sniffle sneaking off into the dusty corner.  “Maybe he has Dad’s eyes.”

Retha smiled and said nothing.  They both knew that wasn’t true.  The child who might be—was the spitting image of Daniel.

-o0o-

He knew it was bad the moment he opened the door.

Her eyes held fire and fury—and they wouldn’t meet his.  “I decided I was right the first time.  I need you to go away.”

What the hell.  “You came to my house to tell me that?”

If she gritted her teeth any harder, they were going to break.  “Yes.”

Anger exploded down Daniel’s veins, looking for vengeance.  “You’ve thrown me out of Realm, out of the Dungeon, out of Sammy’s wedding, and now you walked all the way over here to throw me out of your life?”

Defiant eyes met his.  “Yes.”

He couldn’t hold back the slashing knives.  “And you still think
I’m
the one who runs?”  White-hot heat nearly incinerated his self-control, even as her cheeks paled.

He aimed the next strike—and then fifteen years of gaming saw the truth.  He stared at her, temper gone.  This wasn’t how The Wizard fought.  She never left the battlefield.  He remembered a thirteen-year-old girl and her last stand in Maze Wars.  Old, sneaky librarians might run and hide and fight another day—but his fire mage?  She fought to the death.   Stood at a friend’s wedding, insisting on joy, even as her heart broke.  Nell Sullivan didn’t walk away from a fight—and she didn’t throw anyone else out of one, either.  “What’s really going on here?”

She looked off to the side, face trying to hide in shadows that didn’t exist.  “We’re done.  I wanted you to know.”

The sadness in her eyes was killing him.  “You’re breaking up with me?”

“Yeah.”

Weren’t women supposed to want to talk stuff like this to death?  “Do I get a reason?”

Her eyes just got sadder.  “No.”

It was like facing home plate with an invisible batter.  Daniel hurtled around in the confused mess of his mind, trying to figure out what pitch to throw.  And decided he didn’t like the rules.  With as much gentleness as he could find, he reached out for her hands.  Held on when she tried to pull away.  And waited until her eyes met his.  “Please.  Tell me what’s gone wrong.”

She stood for an eternity, watching their fingers linked together.  “You’re supposed to get mad because I’m being a prickly shit and let me walk away.”

“Yeah.”  He tried to keep the grin to himself.  “I got that part.”

Her nod was barely visible.  “You get me pretty well.”

The “but” hanging in the doorway was the size of Nevada.  He waited for it to land.

When she looked up again, her eyes were back to shooting fire.  No, scratch that—it was her hands.  Sparks flew up from her fingers, still twined with his, sizzling between them.

He gritted his teeth and held on.

“You get me.”  She yanked her hands out of his and held them to the sky.  Two streaming columns of fire shot out, along with enough heat to make his skin crackle.  “But you don’t get this.  You don’t get the magic.  It freaks you out, makes you scared.”

“Damn straight it does.”  He grabbed her wrists, fury rising to fight the fear.  “You hold lightning in your hands, woman—that should scare any sane person.  Hell, why doesn’t it scare
you
?”

He read the answer in her eyes.  It had, once.

And it gave him the words he needed.  “You learned to make peace with what’s inside you.  I need you to give me that same chance.  Quit running away.”

“I can’t.”  Fire spent, she touched her hands to his—and then slid out of his grasp.  Lithe and graceful, she moved out of reach, into a beam of light reaching through the leaves of the old, gnarled tree that guarded his front stoop.

He watched from the shadows.  Her hands trembled.  And even in pain, she sought the light.  Heat.

He walked down and took a seat under the tree.

She clenched her fists once—and then sank to the unkempt ground, still wrapped in a sunbeam.  Slowly, she settled her chin on her knees.  And then she spoke.  “My mother has an unusual and sporadic kind of magic.  A form of precognition.  She sees glimpses of the future.”

Daniel leaned into the tree at his back and tried to remember he lived on planet Earth.

“Some aren’t true.  What she sees doesn’t always happen.”

But Retha had seen something.  And whatever it was had Nell Sullivan ready to kick him to the curb.  The leash on his temper strained.  “You’re getting rid of me for something I haven’t done yet and might never do?”

Confusion hit her eyes—and then frustrated sorrow.  “No.  It’s not you.”  Nell took a deep breath.  “She says I will have a child.  A very powerful, very magical child.  The strongest witch in generations.”

He tried to wrap his head around magic that could see the future.  And then forgot all about that as he connected the rest of the messy, nasty dots.  The leash snapped.  “And what, I’m not daddy material for the next Merlin?”

She winced as if he’d hit her.  And then her fury rose to meet his.  “Nobody is.  Do you know when my mother told me all of this?”

He gritted his teeth as energy swirled, determined to hold his ground in a firestorm. 

“Two hours ago.”  She was on her feet now, a warrior looking for a fight.  “She saw this child-who-will-be on the day I was born—and for twenty-seven years, she didn’t tell me.”

He wasn’t following, but Retha Sullivan’s love for her children was blindingly obvious.  “Maybe she was trying to protect you.”

“Of course she was,”  Nell hissed at him through gritted teeth.  “She knew this would trash my life.  And you know what?  She was right.”

Some key piece of this was still failing him.  “You don’t want a baby with that kind of power?”

“No one would.”  Her voice ached—with what, he didn’t know.  “Magic is dangerous.  It’s not all parlor tricks and stupid brother practical jokes.  A child with that kind of power will be at awful risk every day of their life.”  Breath rasped from her lungs.  “Every single day.”

A spike punctured his lungs.  It was a burden he couldn’t begin to fathom.  He got to his feet and reached for her, seeking to hold.  Protect.  Anything.

And wrapped around air as she pushed away.  He felt something rip inside him.  “You don’t think I could handle that.  If it happened.”

She met his eyes now.  “I’m the strongest witch of my generation.  You can’t handle
me.
”  Her voice wavered.  “And I couldn’t handle it alone.”

Time froze, an agony of pain, horror, and not-quite-enough trust. 

And then she turned to go.  Watching her walk away, one quiet foot in front of the other, was the loneliest thing he’d ever seen.

Daniel tore in two, instincts screeching at his walloped heart.  And let her go.  For now.

Chapter 19

Nell wandered listlessly onto the baseball diamond.  Fire power had deserted her miles ago, along with anything that remotely resembled the will to fight back against the forces pounding her life into smithereens.

She spied an old, dusty ball in the dirt behind second base and picked it up.  It looked about as bedraggled as she felt.

“Need a catcher?”

She spun around at the strange voice behind her, squinting into the sun.  The sunny, gentle feel of his mind clued her in first.  “Pedro, right?  The terminally injured second baseman?”

He stepped out of the sun’s rays, smiling.  “Yup.  Ankle’s all better.”

A spark of humor found its way through the wet, gray blanket smothering her soul.  “You must have excellent nurses.”

“Something like that.”  He walked over to shortstop and held up his hands.

She tossed the ball, a soft lob that had him grinning.  He returned it at a much sharper speed.  The sting in her fingers felt good.  She settled into the easy rhythm of throw and catch.  “How come you’re wandering around deserted baseball diamonds?”

“I was on the hunt for a miserable first baseman, but it looks like I found an unhappy witch instead.”

The incoming ball nearly took out her nose.  Nell ducked and backhanded it, glaring.  “What am I, the talk of the locker room?”  She knew it was wrong as soon as the words came out.  Pedro’s mind beamed the same loyalty and love she’d always read in Sammy’s.  Best friends, then.

He didn’t answer.  Just kept fielding her throws and tossing them back.

She didn’t want to let the temper go—it made her feel more human.  “Sorry.  I’m cranky, and you were dumb enough to walk over here.”

His lips twitched.  “Duly noted.”

Back and forth the ball went, her body beginning to feel its attachment to earth and sky again.  Baseball therapy.

“He’s not talking.”  Pedro spoke casually, eyes on the ball.  “But he’s at least as cranky as you are.”

That didn’t make her feel any better.  “He’ll get over it.”

“Probably.  He’s a pretty resilient guy.”

She shot him a look, the kind she used to keep her little brothers in line.

He grinned.  “One day soon, I should introduce you to my little sister, Becky.  She’s got great glares too.”

Dammit, she’d tossed the man to the curb.  The last thing she needed to be doing right now was falling in like with his friends.  “Look, it’s complicated and I can’t really explain it to Daniel or anyone else in a way that will make sense.  But magic comes with baggage, and sometimes the cost is really high.  It’s not his job to pay it.”

Pedro snorted.  “Gee, where have I heard that before?”

Huh?  Nell frowned, not understanding the sudden edge in his mind.  They weren’t talking about her and Daniel anymore.  “Sorry, not following.”

Pedro walked over and took a seat on second base.  He looked up in her direction.  “I love a woman who carries a gun.”

A cop.  Nell flinched.  Magic wasn’t the only life with a high price.

“She gave me that same line.”  He traced circles in the dirt with his finger.  “Told me it was hers to carry, and I should go find some nice safe girl and make nice safe babies.” 

He hadn’t left his cop—she could read it in his thoughts and in the steady love shining from his eyes.  “Guess it didn’t work, huh?”

“Nope.”  He waited a beat.  “It won’t work with Daniel, either.  He’ll be back once he works off some of his temper.”

Her insides clenched.  “I don’t want him to come back.”

“Bullshit.”  Pedro looked up and grinned.  “That’s an official psychological diagnosis.”

Jeebers.  Meddling apparently wasn’t the exclusive domain of witches.  “Aren’t you supposed to talk to people gently on couches or something?”

He laughed, the kind of easy, low roll that told her a lot about how he’d survive life at the side of a woman armed and dangerous.  “The people who most need my advice tend to avoid the couch.”

Yup.  Class A meddler.  She was fond of him already.  Nell scowled, mostly for form.

“I don’t know what your life holds any more than I know that for Chloe.”  Pedro’s eyes were suddenly sharp and intent.  “But I’m guessing witches don’t walk alone any more than cops do.”

He was a damn good guesser.  She nodded, looking at all the interlocking circles he’d drawn in the dirt.

Pedro dropped the ball in the center of one of the circles and stood up.  “If I had to have anyone at my back or at my side, it would be him.”

-o0o-

Riding in circles had to be a pretty decent definition of crazy.  Daniel had passed the basketball court twice, the pool hall three times, and he’d cycled past the Sullivan house too many times to count.

Clearly he was a guy looking for trouble.  And one having a hell of a time waiting for a pissy witch to come to her senses.

He turned down the alleyway, annoyed with himself and seriously steamed at the world.  And nearly rode down an old guy in a straw hat.  Pebbles sprayed as he jammed on his breaks, narrowly missing the fence and one very displeased cat.  “Shit, sorry about that.  You okay?”

The straw hat tilted up, revealing amused eyes underneath.

Daniel cursed—he knew those eyes.  Apparently trouble had found him.

Michael grinned and held out a hand.  “You looked a little lost out there.”

Dammit, riding in circles wasn’t meant to be a spectator sport.  “Doing some thinking.”

“I bet.”  Michael opened the back gate and led the way into his garden.

Daniel had no idea why he followed.  But if he was going to have a really bad morning, at least he should get some answers out of it.  “What do you know about this prophecy thing that has Nell totally freaked out?” He was too damned tired and cranky for small talk.

Michael picked up his tools, walked to a little shed in the back, and sat down in a creaky old rocking chair.  “You’ll probably want to ask Retha about that.”

Daniel didn’t want to do any such thing.  “I don’t think so.”  He took a seat on a lopsided stump and looked at Nell’s father.  “You’re not a witch, are you?”

Michael pushed with a foot to set his chair rocking.  “Not so far.”

“So how do you live with all this?”

“Same way any guy survives life with a woman.”  Michael’s eyes twinkled.  “Beer, sex, and keep the freezer well stocked in chocolate ice cream.”