CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

PARTY CRASHERS

STEPTOE SHOWED UP the morning of the big luncheon and dropped eight flash-bangs by my breakfast plate. I’d hoped for more but gave him a bright and thankful smile anyway. “Thanks!”

“Anything for you,” he responded as he disappeared toward the mudroom and the back door. I heard the cot squeak as he dropped onto it, and a soft snore followed almost immediately. He must have been up all night making my ammo.

Mom smiled as she listened and then began to finish her breakfast.

“You’re coming, too, right?”

“I wouldn’t miss it. But I’m taking my own car.”

I considered her. “Why?”

“Because I have a plus one.”

My mind genuinely boggled. “Say what?”

Her smile tightened a bit into self-satisfaction. “I’m picking up someone.”

“You don’t have to drive your car to do that.” My thoughts still scrambled around. She had a plus one? Why? And “Who?”

“You’ll meet him when everyone else does.”

Him? The very word made me narrow my gaze. It had to be that Gregory guy. I said carefully, “Is that wise? We don’t want to violate anyone’s threshold.”

“We won’t be. I don’t think I need to remind you, but all of the people who’ve come into this house in the last year or so, have been friends or projects of yours. With this singular exception. Trust me, he is a perfectly normal person. Is that all right with you?”

“Not exactly. It sounds like you’ve given up on me and Dad.”

“I haven’t given up on your dad as your father, but I gave up on him as my husband months ago. He’s betrayed everything we’d promised each other.”

“I’m doing everything I can.”

“And did that everything include putting yourself in the way of a vampire? I didn’t even know they existed.”

“I didn’t either, not really, and I had no idea—”

Her eyes flashed. “That’s the point. You have no idea of the consequences. You just charged ahead into this totally unknown territory.”

“I should have let the professor burn to death?”

My mother stilled. Her jaw worked slightly before she answered. “Of course not. That is . . . he did, but you saved Brian.”

“I saved them both.”

“By keeping your own counsel, which isn’t as wise as you think it is. I don’t like being left out of your plans and escapades. I don’t want to lose you, too.”

I felt like hitting something, so I slammed the side of my hand on the table, jarring my teacup and saucer. “You’re the one walking away from Dad. I told you I’d fix it—you just need to give me a little time. I will do it.”

“I’m not blaming you for your father’s mistakes and you shouldn’t either. I know you’re trying to find out what happened. But I have to have a future.” She gave a half-smile. “You won’t always be here.”

“So now you’re telling me this new guy is your future??? That happened fast.”

“It hasn’t happened at all! Honestly, are you learning dramatics from Evelyn?”

“Great. You don’t approve of my regular friends, either.”

“I didn’t say that.”

“It seems to me you kinda did.”

“You’re jumping to conclusions.”

My face had warmed and even my ears felt hot. I tried to rein in my anger though not too successfully. “I’m concluding that you don’t trust me to put things right! I’m going to get Dad back.”

My mother sighed. “And I’m trying to tell you that, here or not, I’m not certain your father has a life with me. Have you cured his need for a gambling high?”

“I should think being stuck in limbo for nearly three years would do that.”

She said quietly, “You’d be surprised what the addictive personality will go through to avoid change. I don’t want to argue with you. I know you’re doing all you can. I’m just telling you that it may not be enough for me, that it won’t restore things to the way they were.”

“And you’ve got a new guy.”

“Just a friend.”

“I can hardly wait to see the proof of that!”

She wrinkled her nose. “Rude, as you would say.” She put her fork down.

I looked at my plate where my sunny side egg had gotten mixed up with my potatoes as intended but all of a sudden looked very undesirable. I shifted. I didn’t need our family dynamics screwed in addition to everything else. We’d always had each other’s backs, and she was treating me as a partner—or trying to. “Sorry. We’re both adults here. It’s just . . . odd.”

“I know it’s difficult for you to hear.”

“You’ve got that right.”

Her expression softened a little. “You know we were married just out of college. He hadn’t been hurt yet, and had gotten a job which was more of a sponsorship for his golfing. I started to earn my masters, taking advantage of a fairly good salary he’d begun to earn. We weren’t rich by any means, but we did put a decent down payment on our little house. Then I found out I was pregnant with you.”

I eyed her. “Didn’t they have birth control then?”

“Of course, they did. But miscalculations do happen. You know who saved us?”

“I have no idea.”

“Aunt April. She baby sat you for two years while I finished school, and then your Dad hurt his shoulder, and we had to start over. Luckily, my masters gave us some stability, and his sponsorship was with a local insurance company that took him on as an underwriter. She kept everything on an even keel. Sometimes she came to our home and sometimes I dropped you off at hers, the one with the greenhouse we both loved.” The one she’d had to sell to pay off her own gambling debts. That vice ran deep in the Andrews bloodline.

“I don’t remember her at all.”

“No. Your father put some distance between us when he had to take a real job. I could never understand why. She came through when we needed her again, though.”

That she did. Our creaky, quirky old house was one of the few investments she’d been able to hold onto, or we would have been truly homeless. I stabbed at my plate again and decided to change subjects. “We have enough serious worry with Evelyn swooning over Hiram.”

“We certainly do.”

We continued in silence while I wondered if I had a plus one. Carter, if available. I hadn’t heard from him over the past few days, so I had no idea. Not that I needed company or an escort, but it would have been nice to have the moral support I suddenly felt that I desperately needed. I dropped a toast corner to Scout, knowing it would never hit the floor. My mother left me alone at the table.

I wouldn’t tell my father. I don’t know what the two of us would have to go through to get him out of limbo, but worrying about my mother wouldn’t help either of us.

My phone sat on the kitchen table, showing me that the weather would be very chilly but no snow or ice, having thawed out the day before. I decided to take Scout along with me and texted Hiram to ask if it would be all right.

He answered immediately with permission, adding, “Bring Carter, too.”

I returned, “Carter goes where Carter wants to go.”

He sent me back a winking emoji, and I signed off at that.

That left me with a few hours to kill while waiting to go.

Evelyn texted twice so I talked with her, to calm her down. Told her to lay off the caffeine, but I don’t think she took my advice.

One of those invite notices appeared on the front porch from the Society reminding me that I had a schooling meeting the next day. I considered it for a long moment before ripping it into confetti, dumping the bits into the kitchen sink, and setting them on fire. I didn’t want anyone to have any doubt about my reaction to the summons. If they couldn’t protect students like Sophie, I no longer wanted anything to do with them. The Society faced corruption from the inside out, and I didn’t want to be involved. The professor had been right in his summation about them. If I had to go through every miserable book stored in the boxes in the cellar, I’d school myself on what I needed to know. I had those three new spells under my belt, and there were more where those came from.

My room smelled like dog. Normally, not an unpleasant smell, but since he was going to a party that afternoon, I decided a bath would be in order. He still fit, more or less, in the humongous sink/tub in our laundry room, so we trotted in there and lathered up nicely. Luckily, Labs are water dogs, and he loves it, rain or shine, although he would much rather I turned on the sprinkler and let him romp through it. The wintry day, however, suggested that our sprinkler fountain might freeze in midair and be relatively useless.

Scout did not, in any way, shape, or form, like the hair dryer. I didn’t scold him much, and even laughed when I got his lips splayed out, baring his teeth, as if he faced into the wind. He chuffed at me when I was finished and went to sleep under the kitchen table, head on paws and facing pointedly away from me.

Nobody liked me today, it seemed. “Fine,” I told him. “Going upstairs to dress.”

I chose leather pants to go with a nice silk blouse, and a weather-wise coat that had seen better days but would be warm and comfortable, and I’d shed it when I got in the house anyway. The flash-bangs went in an inner pocket meant for sunglasses. I could hear Mom fussing around a bit in her room and getting ready to leave.

She gave a faint goodbye, and then I heard her car start up. So she wasn’t even letting the plus one come to the house first?

I frowned at myself in the bedroom mirror and arranged my hair about my face and shoulders. Brunette, as always, and the light dusting of freckles that sunnier months gave me had faded over the season. Maybe I should coax Evelyn into giving me highlights. That might be interesting. Blonde or purple? I’d distract her with that query if needed.

I’d just slipped my feet into some nice ankle boots which I rarely wore, and which I kept on the top shelf in my closet, away from enthusiastic puppy teeth, when my phone buzzed with a text. I smiled as I read it to myself. Carter, on the way over, asking if I thought he’d forgotten?

I might have, but I wouldn’t admit it. I sent him a few hearts and a bunch of smiley faces.

It was nice, I told myself as I put my phone away that neither of us took the other for granted. Scout and I waited at the front windows for his car to pull up and then ran out before he could open his door, our breaths white and misty on the afternoon air. The sky glittered a brittle blue, not a cloud in sight besides the ones we were making.

Scout hopped into the back seat as I scooted in, the heater warmth hugging us close.

Carter grinned at me. “I should think you’d be a little more careful about what car you’re getting into.”

“Right, huh.” I fussed for a moment because I hadn’t discussed the taunting mail delivery from the Butchery.

Like the sun lion that seemed to be his magical alter ego, he sensed my nerves. “What is it?”

“Is it possible to let something in just by saying its name once?”

His amber gaze locked onto me. “It could be, if the being were powerful enough. I’ve only heard of it once or twice. For instance, if you were to think of our friend and sometimes nemesis, he could appear, but it would be extremely rare. I’d ask why you’re asking, but I think I know. Who are we talking about?”

“I don’t want to say.”

He leaned out and fished a pocket notebook out of the car console. “Write it down.” He pushed the notebook into my hands.

I frowned down at it. “In blood?”

“Great gods, no.” Fumbling about, he found a stub of a pencil and gave that to me, watching as I started to write Nicolo.

He grabbed my hands before I got more than Nic down. “Stop.”

I looked up. “Seriously?”

“Extremely seriously.” He pulled the book and pencil away from me, muttered a few words and a golden blaze flared out. When it receded, he put everything back in the console. “And that was undoubtedly how the minion got into your house. Why were you even aware of his name?”

“Morty’s journals. He speculated that my father had gotten involved.”

Carter pointed through the car windshield. “When you have the Sight, drive down Monument Boulevard someday. You’ll see shadows where there should be none, draped about most of the statues. Upon the flags that shouldn’t be flying anymore because they represent a heritage that we need to leave behind. He uses our past, our guilt, and misguided pride against us. He’s ensnared most of this state. We’re fighting our way through, but it’s like slogging through red clay. Nothing good comes from that Master.”

“So I should stay away.”

“You need to be told that?”

A bit of shame arched through me. “No. Not really. But what if he’s the only way I can get my father freed?”

“He would never give you the information you need. The only thing we can do is destroy him and hope that unbinds all that he rules.”

“Could that happen?”

“Maybe. It isn’t certain . . . and it would take an army, Tessa, one I’m not sure I could raise. He’s been entrenched in the South for, probably, centuries.”

I thought of all the bodies/souls I’d seen twisting on meat hooks in the Butchery when I had been trapped. “Bigger than the Mafia? Or a drug cartel?”

“Not necessarily bigger but more buried and infinitely more powerful. Let me think on this a bit, and don’t you dare go acting on your own.”

“I won’t.” But something twisted inside me, and I thought: unless I have to. Unless that’s what it took to change what I had done to my father and save him.

To distract myself, I leaned over so we could kiss. I loved the way my mouth melted into his, and the sensations sang all the way to my toes and back, comforting and sizzling all at the same time. When he leaned away from me to put the car in gear and pull away from the curb, all I could think of was that we should kiss more often. The thought occupied me the whole way across town to Hiram’s home.

Make that estate. We parked at one end of the circular drive, where there was just enough room, the rest of the area already occupied. I saw a lot of SUVs, tires and fenders spattered with dirty ice and dripping dry. We got out with Scout trotting at our heels, stopping once or twice to throw his head up and smell the air. Trees peppered the lots everywhere on the street, evergreens straight and limber, their branches clear, their bodies tall against the wind and weather. I could smell a bit of sap myself, against the crisp afternoon. I liked the neighborhood and wondered if any of the clan lived here besides Hiram.

Evelyn must have been stationed at a window, waiting for us, because she rushed out before we were more than a third of the way to the door. She looked gorgeous, fitted slacks, a fitted coat with a beautiful blouse underneath, her hair knotted in fashionable braids, and her eyes shining with excitement. She reminded me of Christmas mornings and Santa. I dropped a hand to Scout and softly told him “Off” so that he wouldn’t bounce up in similar joy.

Evelyn got in between us and locked her arms in ours. “Isn’t this place fantastic? It looks and feels like Hiram.”

“It does.” Carter shot me a look over her head, and I gave a little nod. Yes, Evelyn knew more than she did before I had talked with her, but I had no idea if she’d discussed it with the Iron Dwarf at all or not.

“You’re the last to get here, and I think we’re all ready,” she bubbled and gave my arm a squeeze before breaking free and breezing toward the open door.

“I’m not sure if I’m ready for this,” I said, but Carter laughed at me. I found it funny as well, and when we entered the doors, we were both grinning from ear to ear.

And then I saw my mother and her plus one across the foyer and vast living room of Hiram’s home.