Night Magic (23 page)

“Not anymore.” He had the flash of an idea. A great idea. He could make up everything up to her, starting now. Jane was shy. She might not agree to his plan. It was going to require some help from his sister and some stealth. “I have to admit it was kind of fun watching you and Drew grow from scrawny annoyances into young women. And then Drew got into fashion.”

“Boy, did she.” Jane shook her head. Kemble could see her struggling to make conversation when she no doubt wanted to run screaming through the room. “She went through every extreme. This steak is really good, Kemble. I don
’t think I’ve ever had a steak like this.”

Jane was playing right into his hands. “Who was your favorite of the designers she wore?” He was being so clever. He cut another piece of meat, nonchalantly.

She looked confused. Adorably confused. God, he was a cad for having hurt her. “I don’t know. Everything Drew wore would totally overwhelm me. Pale shadow, remember?”

Hmm. Slight roadblock. “I remember you two went to some fashion show or other in Paris. She wrote me an email about it.”

Jane shook her head. “Au contraire. We hit every design house in that city. And there are a lot of designers based there.”

“So, did you try anything on?”

Jane shook her head. “Oh, no. I only liked the dresses she sent away immediately.”

Jane had just admitted she liked dresses. Now he was getting somewhere. “Tell me more.”

Jane looked out over the gardens. “There was one, I think it was at the Carolina Herrera showroom. Or maybe Gucci? It had. . . .” She caught herself. “Never mind about that. We’d had chardonnay at lunch and were having a very silly afternoon.”

Score! He now had something he could do for Jane. And maybe it would just begin to make up for how stupid he’d just been.
He had to start somewhere.

He cut another piece of meat. Plans formed in his mind even as she looked out through the twilight settling over the gardens to the sea beyond, no doubt mourning dresses lost because she wouldn’t take Tremaine charity and couldn’t see herself as the beauty that she was. He’d call Drew tonight. She’d be better at arranging this than he would. Jane was going to have the dress of the century for the exhibition gala tomorrow night.

Jane pushed her plate away. “How did we get off on fashion anyway?” She took a big breath and let it out.

*****

What she wanted to say was that she knew he was distraught about not getting magic. And that she was sorry. But she couldn’t torture him with that. His expression tonight was a stark reminder, though that the haze of bliss she’d been floating in was one-sided. This day would have been perfect if she’d been able to share it with a man who felt the same. She’d gotten her true love. It should have been a happy ending. But it wasn’t, because he didn’t share it. All she could hope was that he wouldn’t become bitter, hating her for not being the one he wanted.

But that was for another day. She had to put away
the pain of knowing and try to make him as happy as she could, even though it would never be enough. Jane felt far older than her thirty years suddenly. Her life had always been half an idyllic dream—living at the Breakers in a loving family with no money problems and a magical destiny, and half the nightmare of living with an alcoholic and mentally ill mother who hated her even though she was trying her best to provide for them both with her photography. Like one of those ancient coins of Janus, the god with two faces, she was torn between her two realities. Now the two halves of her life were merging. Her situation with money and her mother had been resolved, thanks to Kemble. But the Clan was hunting Tremaines, the peace of the Breakers was cracking under the strain of trying to protect its inhabitants, and she might be bringing unhappiness to the one member of the family she loved the most. It was if she was the poisoned apple spoiling the barrel.

She could practically hear Lanyon saying, “So suck it up.” That was what you did when life got complicated. You just went on and did the best you could.

Kemble gave her a shy smile. “Oh, I don’t know.”

Jane frowned. She’d lost the thread of the conversation. Oh, he was responding to her jibe about talking fashion. Why ever did he look so
. . . so hopeful? “So . . . what’s up?”

“I’m starting to like having time off, that’s all.” And he wouldn’t say anything more.

Later that evening, as she finished cleaning up the kitchen (which she’d had to insist on) she realized Kemble had disappeared. For a split second, she thought he’d just gone into the TV room. But he was in his office. She could practically feel him there. Probably working again. What was she going to do with that man?

She wiped her hands and stalked down the hall to the room he’d chosen for his office. Why he needed an office here when he worked so much over at the Breakers, she had no idea.

“Yoo-hoo,” she said, standing in the door. He was hunched over the computer, typing furiously. “Disobeying Brian?”

He looked up at her. “Actually, I was not. I like it when you’re severe with me though.”

Drifting in, drawn to him, she managed a smile. Suck it up. “I could be very severe.”

“Ooooh. As in ropes and a paddle?”

“If you want.” She tried to look blithe as she approached his desk.

“Jane, you have hidden depths.” He glanced to his computer and then clicked a key.

When she got to the desk the screen was dark. What was he doing in here if he wasn’t working? Would he lie to her? He scooted back his chair and pulled her into his lap. It was natural to put her arms around his strong neck and nuzzle under the collar of his shirt. He smelled wonderful. She had to just concentrate on Kemble. And whatever piece of himself he could give her, well, that would be enough.

When she sat back, he pulled her in for a kiss and she knew just what they’d be doing for the rest of the evening. She hoped it would drain the well of tristesse she’d been trying to put a cover on all evening. She had a lifetime of not being quite enough for him ahead of her. She’d better get used to it.

*****

Drew slumped over in her seat by the fire in the living room of the Breakers and put her head in her hands as the vision enveloped her. Hospital green. Gleaming linoleum. People dressed in white pants and turquoise flowered smocks. From far away she heard Tam
my exclaim and rush to help her, and Michael tell her that it was just another vision and they had to let it play out. She felt his arm around her shoulders. Then she heard no more, felt nothing but the vision.

A hospital waiting room rose around her, as clear as if she were standing there. Ahead were double doors, and she knew what she wanted was behind them. She pushed through the double doors. Beyond was an ICU. Beds in a circle. A doctor came up. He had one of those funny hats they wore to surgery. A mask dangled from his neck. “Who are you here to visit?” He looked grave. Drew knew that wasn’t good. But she didn’t know whom she was here to visit, so she couldn’t answer him.

Drew moved forward, but it wasn’t like she was walking. More like drifting slightly above the linoleum floor, like you do in dreams. She was drawn to a bed across the circle. She recognized Kee’s fall of dark brown hair and her mother’s black knit dress. Part of her was thinking that she was probably really going to hate this vision, knowing that it was a vision, and part of her was wondering whom they could know well enough to visit who would be in a hospital. Wouldn’t her mother just Heal Edwards and his men (now that they knew about her power), or Mr. Nakamura? And none of her family had ever been in a hospital. Why would they? Who was in that bed? Kee and her mother blocked her view.

At least whoever it was, was alive. So this was better than the vision of the funeral.

Kee was staring down at the occupant of the bed. Her mother was holding the patient’s hand. It was a big, male hand. Her mother turned her face up to Drew. She looked horrible. She’d been crying. Her eyes were red and there were dark circles under them. She looked much older than she did today. Whom would her mother cry for like that?

The sound of her own huge gasp brought her out of her trance. She jerked upright as though she’d been underwater until her lungs were bursting. Michael gathered her into his arms, holding her head against his chest and murmuring soothing words. It was a minute before she could catch her breath. Lanyon was standing over her. Tris and Maggie were coming in from the kitchen, looking worried. Kee and Devin crouched on another sofa, gripping each other’s hand
s.

“What was it
?” Tammy asked. “What did you see?”

What could she say? That sometime in the future, she didn’t know when, someone they all knew and probably loved, a man, was in a hospital bed and was
gravely ill? It could be one of the men in this room. She couldn’t just blurt out that one of them was going to be gravely ill. Or dead. God, was this the precursor of the funeral she’d been seeing lately? Someone was going to die. Someone they all cared about. And she didn’t know who. That meant she couldn’t say anything. Every one of them would start guessing who it was. Fear, pain, anxiety for themselves or the ones they held dear would result. Why should anyone else live with that? She knew firsthand what it could do to you. Drive you nearly mad.

The hospital, the bed, the faces kept echoing through her mind. Wasn’t her mother older in the vision? Yes. There was no question about that. So it wasn’t going to happen right away. She took a breath. That made her course clear.

“I don’t know,” she said slowly. “It was just a swirl of colors. Not . . . not bad. Just exhausting.” She looked to Michael, pleading with her eyes.

“Let’s get you home,” he said, reading her like a book. He held up a hand when Tammy started to protest. “No more questions now, guys. She’s been having trouble controlling them lately. She just needs more rest.”

Drew was embarrassed as heads nodded in concern. She’d just lied to them. She hid her head in Michael’s shoulder as he led her from the room.

The cold sea air hit her when they stepped out the side door to the path over to their house. Would it ever get easier to live with the “gift” she’d been given? When she’d actually been of some use to the family as they rescued Devin and Kee last fall, she’d been hopeful that she would. She’d saved lives, and her direction had ensured the demise of those things in the gardens. That was good. But seeing visions she could do nothing about, that didn’t give her enough information even to be useful to the family
—it just seemed like torture.

*****

Morgan sat near the dimly lighted displays of the Talismans. She was most comfortable in their immediate vicinity. They made her feel alive, flush with power. The others in the Clan had started to feel their powers grow as well, just from proximity. Jason no longer had to touch something to Cloak it. And Rhiannon could start a rain shower with the flick of a finger.

Morgan was flipping through the pictures of Thomas on her iPhone
, trying to pass the time until the next portion of her plan ignited. The boy had a delightful body. Looking at those pictures never failed to get her juices flowing. Perhaps she needed to take a consort. Even when she brought Thomas here, he wouldn’t be available for that kind of use, though she could think of other, very stimulating games to play with him. Now that she was younger, she needed a sexual outlet. Not one of the Clan. That would only cause internecine squabbling. No, just a regular, non-magical male with an attractive body that was strong enough for hard use.

Hardwick came in with a sheaf of papers, head down. No one wanted to test whether
Hardwick’s powers were expanding. The pain might just drive mad anyone who dared. She’d have him find her a boy toy, but he was busy with other things, or should be.

“
What have you found?”

“
I had some luck. They just confirmed that the site near the ancient city of Amphipolis, three hundred seventy miles north of Athens, really is the tomb of Alexander the Great.” He flipped through his sheaf. “Cambuskenneth Abbey is said to house the remains of William Wallace. Apparently the monks had to gather the pieces from points around Scotland after he was drawn and quartered. And Genghis Khan is buried in Mongolia at what was once his palace. That one is about a hundred and fifty miles east of Ulan Bator.”

“
What the hell is Ulan Bator?” she barked. But she was secretly jubilant.

“
The capital of Mongolia, as it turns out,” Hardwick replied, unruffled. He glanced up at her from his sheaf of papers. “You’re not even likely to get a complete set of bones, you know.”

“
Doesn’t matter,” she said, thrusting herself up to pace to stand between the cases that held the Sword and the Wand. “I’ve grown in power.” The electric energy of the Talismans seemed to actually course through her veins. She breathed in, inhaling power.

“
What will you do with them?” Hardwick asked. As always, it wasn’t a challenge, more curiosity.

“
Why, build an army, of course. Nothing can happen with the Talisman until Saturday actually, I suspect. So you have time to start planning a world tour.”