Hearts Cursed, page 7
Daphne was looking at him, excited expectancy written large on her face.
“Is it really? I mean, there’ll be reporters and people traipsing everywhere.”
She waved that issue away. “The reporters will come, take their footage, ask some questions and then go. We can deal with them.”
“Can we?”
“Of course. And of course, they’ll get the word out.” Her eyes glowed as she began to pace in front of him again. “Just imagine. People will come flocking to see, to share in the miracle. They’ll buy everything we have and we’ll be booked out for the next ten years or more! Not to mention the tourists it will bring to the rest of the county.” She spun to face him. “There’s absolutely no bad.”
Oh, there was bad. Lots of bad. Bad with a capital B. A. D. – as in Bloody Awful Disaster. He just couldn’t explain it to her. The fact she believed it was a Christmas miracle was a miracle in and of itself, so he couldn’t really expect another one to occur. Pity, because he hated to let her down but … “It’s just … I like things how they are.”
Her brow creased as confusion filled her eyes. “But Trip, don’t you see, this could be the start of something big.”
Oh, he saw. He saw more than she could ever know. He’d lived through people finding out a little too much about how the last ‘miracle’ he was responsible for had happened. There’d been excitement to begin with. And then there’d been pitchforks and torches and guns and the air filled with angry, frightened shouting and the acrid smell of thick smoke rising from his house, his pine trees and crops and orchards as they burned along with the field where it had happened.
While it was a few centuries on from that time, people hadn’t changed that much. His Men in Black worries wouldn’t be far from the truth and he would be subject to all sorts of horrible, invasive tests before he could say, “It’s the magic of Christmas, not me!”
He took her hands in his. He had to stop her. “Please, Daphne. I came here to live a quiet life. What you describe … it makes me too uncomfortable. I don’t want it.”
“You don’t want to bring joy to untold masses?”
He smiled crookedly at her. “Does it sound selfish to say no? No, I don’t.”
Her frown deepened. “You know, you don’t have to hide yourself away like this. You have us now to protect you. And I know you love people – I see it every year at Christmas. Whatever happened in your past to make you live like a hermit for the rest of the year … it doesn’t need to touch you anymore.”
He let go of her hands, stepped back. “I just … I don’t want it, okay?” She blinked, obviously startled by his stiff, firm tone. He didn’t blame her – he never sounded so formal. But he couldn’t help it right now. “Please, let’s keep the miracle our secret.”
She narrowed her eyes at him. “And how do you imagine we do that?”
“We don’t tell anyone.”
She sighed heavily. “You know the boys and I won’t say a word if you don’t want us to, but what about their friends? What about our neighbours? They’re going to eventually see it. Not to mention we have the first of our Christmas tree bookings arriving this Saturday. You know a lot of them wander despite us telling them not to.”
He chewed on his lip for a moment. “Well, given the people who’ve booked won’t know that field was washed away a week ago, even if they happen upon it, they won’t think there’s anything miraculous about it.” If they didn’t look too closely and note all the plants that couldn’t possibly have grown there.
She nodded reluctantly. “Okay, well, that might work for them, but what about our neighbours and the boys’ friends? Cutter Thompson can see that field from his back paddock. And you know Gideon’s friends often ride along the lane that runs beside that field when they’re coming over to our place.”
“We’ll lock the gate to the lane, and your boys can tell their friends that I found toxic soil when I was clearing out the field and not to come down there. And in regard to Cutter … I guess we’ll just have to hope he doesn’t decide to suddenly put his cows in the back paddock. In the meantime, I’ll get out there and trim it to try to make it look more normal.” Although he’d have his work cut out for him. From experience, the things grown from his blood were pretty hardy. Even when he’d torn things out in the past, they grew back overnight. But he’d try.
She shook her head. “I don’t understand why you’re so against sharing something as wonderful as this. Particularly at this time of the year.”
“I’m not asking you to understand. I’m just asking you to respect my wishes. Okay?”
Her mouth twitched from one side to the other, and for a moment he thought she was going to argue with him some more, but then she nodded. “Okay.” She waved abruptly at the box that held the inflatable. “You better get on with erecting that, otherwise the Winter Wonderland won’t be finished by Saturday.”
He blushed at the overt reminder of what he’d actually been erecting when she’d burst in. “I will. Thank you.”
She shrugged. “Don’t thank me. I’ve not given up yet.”
He chuckled. “I didn’t expect you would. But I’m not going to change my mind.”
“We’ll see.” She gave him a salute – their little joke because she’d always called him the captain of this mad little ship they called Snowy Hills Christmas Tree Farm.
He did fully intend on inflating the Santa and his reindeers, but as he went to pull it out of its box, the whispers of the daydream came back to him, enticing him like a siren song.
He shook himself, shoving the images away. He had work to do. He couldn’t keep giving in to the pull of the daydream and the need that tightened his balls every time he even thought about the woman and the way she’d looked at him. It was ridiculous really, the randy-teenager-esque bent of his thoughts. In reality, it hadn’t happened like that. He’d been in pain and shocked then worried. And so confused.
Not really sexy at all.
Yet, his mind kept pushing him to go there with the memory of that moment.
He tried to ignore it, but it kept calling to him. Calling to him, and without realising, he was falling … falling …
Chapter
Eight
The last week had been filled with nothing but frustration and false leads. The reference book had sent Ilia and the others to books that referred to events that were similar to what she’d seen Triptolemus do with his blood in that field. It was comforting to know she didn’t have to worry about the evils of blood magic, but so frustrating to not find anything else.
There seemed to be nothing about what had happened after Demeter had removed his memory and taken much of his magic. Demeter’s spell was effective in hiding him from everyone – including his own daughter. But they had to follow the leads even if they were centuries old, because they had nothing else.
Tamuel and Korinna went rushing off to check out the leads. They visited old churches, libraries and places of power across Europe and North and South America in search of more information. But they discovered no clues as to where Triptolemus might be now.
The desperation and hopelessness in Korinna’s eyes every time they came back with nothing made something inside Ilia ache. She found herself rubbing her hand over where the HBG was embedded in her chest, blaming the ache on Clodia shifting and pounding at her prison in the gem even though she knew that wasn’t it.
This was about the glow that kept appearing, the sensation like a small burn, growing larger and hotter with every false lead, every distraught expression Korinna tried to hide. It was made even worse by the fact she was hiding knowledge of that entry about Triptolemus and his line being God Killers and how that possibly tied her to them. She wished she could tell them because, while it might not help find him, it would give Korinna some clarity about why this had happened.
But she couldn’t. The consequences would make things so much more complicated and difficult for her with what she must do in the future. And ultimately, it would hurt them all more than her hiding it from them would. What they didn’t know couldn’t hurt them, right?
The only thing she could do was to go back into the dream-vision over and over, trying to see something that might give her a clue as to where Triptolemus was now. But she found no new information or anything that might lead to some. The only thing that going back into her memory of her astral trip to him did was to fill her with an itchy longing every time she remembered how he’d looked knelt on the ground staring at her with those gorgeous eyes; eyes that made the cold she’d built up around her heart melt.
If that wasn’t bad enough, she itched to touch his face, to brush over the bristles of his beard – hardly more than a few-days’ worth of growth. She longed to brush her thumb over his plump lower lip, then follow with her lips. At least, that’s what she’d done in her dreams every night since, and multiple times when in moments of despair she allowed herself to sink into daydreams that echoed the vision, but were hotter. Sexier.
Far sexier.
It actually infuriated her, the fact she kept losing herself to those stupid, hot daydreams. She wasn’t some randy teenager. She was thousands of years old. At least, her spirit was. This body was only eight months old in a corporeal sense.
But that was neither here nor there.
She had learned long ago how disastrous giving in to hormonal lust was. Everything that had gone wrong in her life could be blamed on the fact she’d fallen head-over-heels in lust – she’d stupidly thought it love – with Mars and in doing so, set off a cascade of actions that had started with her father taking her boys from her and casting her, and them, away because of his fear, and bringing her and her mysterious witch heritage to the attention of Tiberinus.
So, these useless, stupid, tempting feelings she was experiencing weren’t going to go anywhere or help with anything. She had to ignore them.
But, by the damned Gods, it was getting harder and harder as each day passed, and she didn’t know why.
The only good thing about spending so much time in the library was that she didn’t have to participate in any of Jules’ Christmas plans – cookie and cake baking, painting new Christmas baubles for the various trees around the house, an endless viewing of every Christmas movie on all of the streaming services, and the constant singing of carols that were played non-stop during the day, piped through speakers that seemed to have appeared in all main rooms of the house.
Every morning, Ilia turned on stealth mode, getting up super early to race from her room to the kitchen to make her coffee and grab a piece of toast, and then race down into the library as quickly as she could before Jules or anyone else made it downstairs. And when they came down to the library, any time Jules or any of the others started to mention Christmas and family and tradition, she mysteriously had something to look up in the stacks and rushed off.
But waking morning after morning frustrated from sexilicious dreams, which really didn’t help with quality sleep, was exerting a toll.
A week after she’d had the astral vision of Triptolemus using his blood to grow things, she woke, more tired than before. The struggle to pull her mind out of the sensual fog the too-hot dream created meant she stayed in bed long after her alarm went off. Then she spent longer in the shower than she meant to, trying to wake herself up – and trying to get rid of some of the sexual frustration with a bit of self-help. The end result of this was that when she made it downstairs to the kitchen, Jules was already there with Dawn, getting breakfast. Bas was there too, helping. Both looked up as she entered, smiling.
“Good morning,” Jules sing-songed.
“Is it?”
Dawn, who was in her father’s arms, cooed and did her grippy hand-wave thing, her smile bright as her dad placed her in her highchair. “Someone is a bit slug-a-bed this morning,” Bas said, his voice low and rumbly.
She waved at Dawn, somehow managing a smile for the baby before turning to the coffee machine. “Just need coffee,” she mumbled, trying to ignore the chirpy Christmas carols ringing through the kitchen from the speaker that unfortunately sat over her favourite kitchen appliance.
“I made cinnamon scrolls,” Jules said, pointing at the table. “Help yourself. That is, of course, if those two have left any.”
It was then she noticed Tamuel and Korinna sitting in the breakfast nook, sharing a kiss, a plate full of cinnamon scrolls before them.
“Looks like they haven’t got to them yet,” she said, turning away from the sight. Just in time to see Bas lean in to give Jules a kiss, his hands cupping her face in a way that spoke of love and adoration.
Hells.
She was in couples purgatory. Their loved-up antics were another reason she really didn’t want to participate in all the Christmas goings on. Or keep hanging around like some sad third wheel after she’d separated herself from Dawn.
Seeing them and their happiness made her feel like shit. Not because she begrudged them their felicity, but because of the jealousy that speared through her every time she saw couples being all coupley.
That was when she noticed the coffee machine hadn’t been turned on. Crap. It would take at least fifteen minutes to warm up to a point where she could make a decent coffee. She flicked the button on, dithering. She really didn’t want to stay in the kitchen with the loved-up couples and happy family going on all around her while Christmas assaulted her every which way she looked, but she needed her coffee.
Shit. She couldn’t even go to the cafe a few blocks away to get one because it was too far from Dawn. Maybe she could take Dawn for a walk?
She glanced back, trying to avoid seeing Jules and Bas, who were still kissing. By the looks of things, Dawn hadn’t had her breakfast, which meant there was no chance she could take her for a walk.
Shit-crappity-fuck! She turned back to the coffee machine, staring at it, wishing it would hurry up. She snorted, knowing it was a ridiculous thing to do. Wishing for things had never got her anywhere.
She almost felt like crying. She just wanted her Gods-damned coffee and to disappear down into the library.
Rage began to simmer in her chest, the glow starting to shine.
Fuck!
She snapped her arms around herself to try and hide it. She couldn’t let the others see – they’d ask questions and get worried and would want to help and they already had too much going on to waste time on some stupid glowy power that kept emanating from her chest when she couldn’t control her emotions.
She had to get out of here. She turned to leave, and almost bumped into Jules. She hadn’t even noticed the other witch coming up behind her.
“Ouch!” Jules said, shaking her hand. Then eyes widening, she said, “Ilia. Your chest!”
Crap! The rage was swept away in a rush of panic. The glow went along with it.
“Are you okay?”
“I … I’m fine.” She looked past Jules, thankful everyone else was too busy to notice what was happening.
“Is that the HBG doing that?”
Hells. She wished it was. It would be simpler to admit to that than the truth. She couldn’t outright lie to Jules though – she was already lying every time she reported she’d found nothing new about Triptolemus – so she hedged by saying, “No. It just sometimes happens. Something to do with my body still trying to get used to Dawn’s powers.”
“Oh. But … it doesn’t hurt?”
“No. As I said, I’m fine.” She turned to leave.
“Ilia. Don’t rush off, please. You’ve been working too hard – all of us have. So Bas and I have decreed this is a morning off for all of us. We’re going to bake Christmas cookies for the neighbourhood party this weekend.”
“We?”
Jules gestured behind her at the others in the kitchen. Tamuel and Korinna were still kissing. “Even grandmama is helping. When she gets back from the meeting with the Coven representatives overseeing the Yule celebrations.”
A prickle started behind her eyes at the generosity of spirit that made Jules always want to include her. But … “I don’t want to intrude on a family thing.”
“Intrude? Why would you be intruding?”
Ilia waved at them all, her gesture taking in the kissing couple and Bas, who was now feeding Dawn her cereal. “You’re all family and … I’m not. It doesn’t feel right.”
“But you are family. Of course you are.”
She edged away a little, not liking the bright look in Jules’ eyes. “No, I’m not. I’m just the unfortunate hanger-on you’re stuck with for now because I’m magically attached to your daughter.”
Jules sucked in a breath, her hand going out towards Ilia. Ilia stepped out of reach so the other witch’s hand just hovered between them. “None of us think of you like that.”
“I do.” She looked away, unable to meet Jules’ eyes, to see the slight trembling of her mouth. “You’ve all been so kind, but … I’m not your family. And you’re not mine. My family died long ago. It’s foolish to try to pretend otherwise.”
“Do you truly feel like that?”
“I do.” Without another word – and without her coffee – she turned and ran out of the kitchen. She’d not wanted to hurt the other witch, but she was horribly afraid she had. However, it was too late to take back what she’d said. Even if she apologised, it wouldn’t undo the truth in her words.
She couldn’t take that back, no matter how she tried.
More out of habit than anything else, she headed to the library, almost tripping down the stairs. It wasn’t until she got to the bottom that she realised she’d been so upset, she hadn’t raised her shields. She tried to do so now, but was too upset and the glow started up in her chest.
Shit. Shit.
She didn’t know if the glow was the reason, but, despite the temptation of her without a shield, the library ghosts stayed away, as they’d been doing ever since she’d used her magic on them.
