Entangled- The Homecoming

by Barbara Bretton

  “Where do you think you’re taking that baby?” The voice was female, gruff, more than a little menacing.

  I spun around, cracking my head on the doorframe as I did. “Take your hands off me!”

  The woman was buried in a huge down parka, her face hidden by scarves and a fur-trimmed hood pulled close. There was something familiar about her but I couldn’t come up with a name.

  “Where are you going with Laria Hobbs?” she demanded, her fingers still digging into my right shoulder.

  “Laria Hobbs MacKenzie,” I said, pulling away from her. “I’m taking her home where she belongs.”

  “Don’t think I’m not onto you,” she said, looming over me like a top-heavy tree about to fall. “You’re not going anywhere until I--”

  “Verna!” A man’s voice stopped her mid-sentence. “There’s a blizzard brewing. Let her get that baby home before the storm gets any worse.”

  Paul Griggs, owner of the hardware store, appeared through a curtain of snow. He was a tall, broad-shouldered man who was the patriarch of the town’s only were-family. I knew that Luke considered him a friend, but after what I heard Janice say this morning, I was no longer sure how deep that friendship ran.

  His wife glared at him, then turned her anger back in my direction.

  “You tell that boyfriend of yours to watch his step,” she said, wagging a bony finger under my nose. “We’re not going to let a bunch of strangers ruin Sugar Maple.”

  “You’re right.” I matched her, glare for glare. “Who needs strangers when you’re doing such a great job yourself.”

  I was shaking by the time I started the car but not from the cold. I had my anger to keep me warm. The baby, however, needed more than that. I turned the heat on full blast.

  “Verna Griggs is a jackass,” I said as I met Laria’s eyes in the rearview mirror. “A total, unmitigated jackass.”

  I can’t swear to it, but I’m pretty sure the baby nodded.

  “And he’s not my boyfriend,” I went on, as I eased my car onto Osborne. “I mean, I’m a little old to have a boyfriend, right?”

  The baby reserved judgment on that one.

  I refused to consider exactly what my relationship with Gavan might be. And what was a “relationship” anyway? We hadn’t slept together. Except for one wildly sexy kiss, we had barely touched. Mostly we talked. Or at least I did. He knew more about me than anyone on this planet. Sometimes I felt like we didn’t even need words to communicate our deepest thoughts. The connection between us was as powerful as it was hopeless.

  As Chloe had made crystal clear to me on more than one occasion, Gavan’s destiny had been decided for him on the day he was born. It was his responsibility to make sure Rohesia’s line went forward into the future.

  And that could never happen with me.

  I was a thirty-year-old, divorced Homo sapiens who had tried for years to get pregnant and failed spectacularly every month.

  Not exactly the heroine of any fairy tale I’d ever read, but at least I knew the truth about my situation.

  Poor Chloe hadn’t a clue.

  Chapter 3

  CHLOE

  I puttered around the shop while I waited to see if Mallory returned for her phone but the sight of the snow, growing heavier by the minute, was making me sick to my stomach with dread and all I wanted was to get safely home as soon as possible.

  Superman is afraid he’ll stumble over a lump of Kryptonite and lose his superpowers. Janice is afraid of thunderstorms and has been known to hide in her coat closet with her basset hound Barney until the storms pass by. Lynette can’t look at a picture of a snake without hyperventilating. (We don’t have snakes in Sugar Maple, but I keep a paper bag handy just in case she needs to breathe into it.)

  Even my husband Luke, a cop who says nothing scares him unless it’s carrying a gun, has been known to go a little green around spiders.

  For me, it’s snow.

  The moment the first flake hits the ground, my imagination goes into overdrive and I see eighteen-wheelers sailing airborne across an eight-lane highway, heading straight for me.

  And that’s just for starters.

  I wished Luke were home from his business trip. The annual meeting of East Coast Chiefs of Police ended today and he was scheduled to fly home from Philadelphia tonight. At least, that was the plan. I crossed my fingers and hoped this unexpected snowstorm was limited to our small dot on the map. There was so much I wanted to tell him about, especially the spat with Janice. I knew he would find her take on Rohesia’s clan and the effect they were having on Sugar Maple very enlightening.

  I busied myself with some last minute chores, giving Mallory a little more time to make an appearance but it became clear that wasn’t going to happen.

  I made sure calls to the store would be forwarded to my cell, and then I scribbled a note for Mallory, telling her that I had her phone. I dropped the note into a weatherproof plastic pouch, and taped it to the front door. I slipped the phone into one of my tote bags to take home with me for safekeeping.

  The thought of Mallory and Ava driving to Rhode Island without a cell phone unnerved me, but there wasn’t anything more I could do. With any luck at all, they would be sipping cocoa with family before Mallory even realized she didn’t have her phone with her.

  I made sure Penny the cat was settled in and well supplied then tried to text Luke about the snowstorm. I had to hit SEND four times before it went through. (At least, I hoped it went through.) We’d been having a fair bit of trouble lately with power outages, cell phone interruptions, and other annoyances of modern life, which unfortunately coincided with the arrival of Rohesia’s clan. Was it possible their brand of Old Magick was somehow screwing with the grid in ways our twenty-first century brand of magick didn’t?

  I added that to my growing list of worries about the transition.

  I was about to text Luke one more time when he called me.

  “It’s a bad one,” he said after bitching about the cellphone connection. “It started here around nine this morning and it shows no sign of letting up any time soon.”

  A sense of dread washed over me. “Has your flight been cancelled?”

  “Not yet,” he said, “but I’m pretty sure that’s where this is headed. They cut the conference short and we’re all going to the airport to try to get out before they shut it down.”

  I didn’t know what was worse: the thought of him trapped in Philly for another day or risking his life to get home.

  That was a lie. I definitely knew which option was worse.

  “Maybe you should wait it out at the hotel,” I said, barely controlling the tremor in my voice. “You can order a big steak from room service and take it easy.”

  He understood exactly what I was saying and, to my relief, he didn’t argue.

  “Sounds good,” he said, “but it would sound a hell of a lot better if you were here too.”

  “Sweet talk from a cop?” I said. “I think you miss me.”

  He told me exactly how much and why. My bones melted.

  “Still want me to stay the night in Philly?” he asked.

  I looked out the big front window at the rapidly falling snow and sighed. “Yes,” I said. “I do.” The thought of losing him to a bad decision was more than I could handle. The tiny commuter planes that served the area around Sugar Maple and Boston were scary enough when the skies were clear.

  The connection crackled, beeped, and then went flat and silent. I tried his cell but couldn’t hold the signal long enough to get through. It took another five minutes for us to reconnect.

  I told him a few funny Laria stories that only a parent could fully appreciate and promised to email the videos.

  “She misses her daddy,” I said. “Every time she hears a male voice, her eyes go wide and she looks around with such a hopeful look on her face.”

  “I miss both of you,” he said, his voice choked with emotion. “I used to be good at this convention stuff.” He cleared
his throat. “Not so much any more.”

  I waited while he regrouped then told him about my fight with Janice.

  “I’m not surprised,” he said. “I’ve been fielding a dozen complaints a day about Rohesia’s … people.”

  People? I didn’t correct him. I wasn’t sure how to refer to them either.

  “What kinds of complaints?” I asked.

  “Harassment. Minor vandalism. You name it, somebody has complained about it.” His laugh was mirthless. “You didn’t make many fans with your decision to open Sugar Maple to them.”

  “That’s exactly what Janice told me this morning.”

  “I wondered how long it would take her to start pounding you about this.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” I asked.

  “Because so far I haven’t been able to prove any of the complaints.”

  “That’s a good thing, isn’t it?”

  “There’s more,” he said. “I think their magick is screwing up the power grid. It’s affecting Wi-Fi networks and power sources in Pine Notch, Birch Hollow, Green Grove, and as far away as Mountain Ridge. Whatever they’re doing, they need to stop ASAP.”

  “I don’t think they’re doing anything specifically to screw with our electronics,” I said. “I don’t think they even know what generates our power.”

  “That’s even worse,” Luke said. “Maybe you could devise a stronger spell to keep it all under control for the time being.”

  “Unfortunately I still don’t understand the way their magick operates,” I admitted. “Lilith and I have been working on a spell that would contain the energies within our town limits, but we’re not there yet.”

  “Remember Joe Randazzo?”

  “That’s one heck of a non sequitur,” I said.

  “Do you remember him?”

  I barely suppressed a major eye roll. “Like I could forget the most annoying man in Vermont.” Randazzo was head of the County Board of Supervisors and a major thorn in Sugar Maple’s side.

  “He fielded some complaints about a large group of homeless men, women, and children camping in the woods around Sugar Maple. They were described as wearing robes and blankets and looking like members of a cult.”

  I groaned loudly. “I thought Rohesia understood they needed to lie low for the time being.”

  “She might understand the problem, but she hasn’t done anything about it. Ask Wendy if Gavan can convince them they need to stay away from strangers until they get up to speed with the twenty-first century.”

  My husband had a point. It was hard to blend in when you dressed like runaways from a Renaissance Festival.

  “I’ll try,” I said, “but no promises. Wendy’s been a little pre-occupied lately.”

  I wasn’t sure if the sound I heard was a snort or a problem with the connection. My money, however, was on the former.

  “Speaking of Wendy,” he said, “did she make it to your workshop before the snow started?”

  “She showed up at ten a.m., sharp,” I said, pausing for dramatic effect. “Twenty seconds later so did Gavan.”

  “What do you think is going on with those two?”

  “Pretty much the same thing you think is going on.”

  “Whatever,” he said. “I’m glad she’s there. Let her drive you and the baby home.”

  “And leave the car here?”

  “We’ll dig it out in the spring.”

  I laughed out loud. “Too late. I sent Wendy home with the baby an hour ago.”

  “Why didn’t you go with them?”

  “I had to close up.”

  “She couldn’t stay and help out?”

  “Luke, she offered but I told her to go.” I was a mother now. Making sure our daughter got safely home was paramount.

  “So why are you still there?”

  “Is this an interrogation?” I shot back. I told him about Mallory and the forgotten cell phone. “I was giving her a chance to double back for it.”

  “Unless she’s crazy, she won’t be coming back for anything,” he said. “This is going to be a bad one. You’ve waited long enough. You need to go home.”

  Home.

  I would never get tired of hearing that word.

  “You’re right,” I said.

  “Text Wendy when you’re on your way,” he said, “and then text me when you get there. If you have any trouble, blueflame Paul Griggs. He has a truck with a snowplow. He’ll come and get you.”

  After what Janice had told me about the anger brewing in Sugar Maple, I wasn’t so sure of that, but telling Luke the rest of the gossip could wait until later.

  Romance isn’t always flowers and chocolates. I had spent most of my adult life immersing myself in romantic movies, romance novels, and silly love songs. My idea of true love had been tied up with grand gestures and flowery pronouncements that were more for social media than they were for real life. Who would have guessed that sometimes the most romantic thing a man could do was worry about you?

  By the time I finally turned out the lights at Sticks & Strings, it was clear Luke was right. This wasn’t going to be an ordinary snowstorm. The winds had picked up significantly, whipping the heavy downfall into an aggressive adversary whose main purpose was making sure you couldn’t see a foot in front of you.

  “What the heck is going on?” I muttered as I waited for the car to warm up. This was leaf-peeping season, not ski season. I had thought I would have at least a few more weeks before I had to start my annual worrying.

  Snow was beautiful, but it wasn’t my friend. I had lost my parents in an auto accident on an icy road when I was six years old. Our daughter Laria came into this world in the back of our SUV during a terrible snowstorm ten months ago. The persistent sound of heavy snow lashing against the car windows was quickly getting under my skin.

  Don’t get me wrong. I like making snowmen and having snowball fights as much as the next person. I also like sitting by the window with a pot of hot chocolate and a lapful of knitting, watching those big, beautiful white flakes turn our landscape into a wonderland. I’m a Vermonter, born and bred, and I celebrate all the good things every other Vermonter associates with snow: skiing; skating; snowboarding; and sledding.

  But when it comes to climbing behind the wheel of my car and heading out onto the skating rink known as the streets of Sugar Maple, all bets are off.

  I start to sweat. My hands shake. I gasp for air like I’m breathing underwater.

  And that was while the car was still in park.

  I’m not exaggerating when I say my old Buick was built like a tank. This was one of those “they don’t make ’em like that any more” vehicles people joke about but secretly admire. At least, that was what I told myself. Unfortunately it wasn’t built to drive through a blizzard with a freaked-out driver behind the wheel. I shifted into drive and eased onto Good Way. I was pathetically happy to see I was the only fool on the road.

  Our cottage was at the opposite side of town, at the edge of the woods. Although it was less than a ten-minute drive in good weather, this time I wasn’t sure I’d make it home before nightfall.

  The shops were all closed tight against the storm. No tourists anywhere to be found. Not even a low-flying spirit en route to the Inn. My windshield wipers had a hard time keeping up with the relentless fall of snow obscuring my vision. No doubt about it: we were fast approaching whiteout conditions. Snow brought with it a combination of beauty and treachery that would have been seductive if it didn’t scare the daylights out of me the way it did.

  I ignored stop signs. I was alone on the road and those skidding, sliding stops made my stomach turn inside out. Besides, I was married to the chief of police and I was reasonably sure I could talk myself out of a ticket if I had to. I was willing to take that chance. Especially since Luke was also the entire police force.

  It was slow going through the snow-hushed, soundless town. My tires struggled to gain purchase. Familiar landmarks seemed to appear and disappear through the thick
curtain of blowing snow. It felt like I was the only one left in a vast, icy world.

  Every winter you hear a story about a family who got stranded during a blizzard with only their car for shelter. I devoured those stories. I even took notes. What would I do in the same situation? Did I have what it took to survive?

  Which was probably why you’d find reflective blankets, flares, kitty litter, bottled water, and freeze-dried beef stew in my trunk in July.

  Okay. I admit it. I get a little melodramatic when it comes to snow and ice but there was no denying the slow trickle of sweat working its way down my spine as I white-knuckled my way toward home. I actually considered sliding into some snow-laden hedges and calling Paul to drive me home.

  I slid onto Osborne and slowly rolled toward home. Our cottage was nestled at the edge of the woods, just deep enough to be nicely secluded from nosy neighbors. It was one of the first structures built in Sugar Maple, long before we had a bustling business district that brought in tourists. And long before we had paved roadways.

  It was only mid-afternoon, but the town was shut down tight. The tourists had fled for the safety of motel rooms in adjacent towns, hunkering down for the duration. Our townspeople, usually no slouches when it came to storm management, were nowhere to be seen. There was something downright apocalyptic about the scene that set my nerves on edge.

  The fact that I couldn’t get a signal on my smartphone didn’t help matters. I had tried to text Wendy before I left to let her know I was on my way, but the signal was non-existent. Despite the fact that Sugar Maple was pretty much situated in the middle of nowhere and surrounded by mountains, our cell service had always been pretty good. Or at least it had until Rohesia and her clan arrived.

  Luke was right. I had been treading softly with the newcomers, cutting them some slack as they tried to fall into step with the strange new world in which they found themselves. I needed to redouble my efforts to either tame their Old World powers or help them adapt those powers to our 21st century world. Either way, they couldn’t keep screwing up the grid or it wouldn’t be long before our secret was out.