Bedeviled

by Maureen Child

  “She’d kill me.” She swallowed hard, felt a trickle of fear slide through her and then curled against Quinn’s broad chest again. So much was happening so quickly. “Then send me home,” she said. “I miss my daughter. I need to see her, Quinn. I need to be with her.”

  “I can’t, love,” he told her, and she heard the unspoken apology in his voice. “To send you back to your home now would be even more dangerous for you than staying here. If Mab discovers Maggie she would use you to stop your sister.”

  “But Eileen—”

  “Is safer without you at her side, drawing Mab’s interest. Only wait awhile longer,” he promised, bending his head to kiss her gently. “Be strong for just a little more time, Nora. Soon this will be over and you can return to your life.”

  Return to her life. Go back to Castle Bay. To Eileen. To Maggie. And leave Quinn behind? God, she would miss him. Miss what she’d found with him. How would she ever live the rest of her life not seeing him, feeling him? Yet maybe he didn’t feel the same.

  “Are you so eager to be rid of your hostage?” She whispered the question, half-afraid of his answer.

  “I’ve never been less eager about anything in my far too long a life,” he told her.

  She smiled. Knowing that he cared for her didn’t solve anything, but it made her feel a little better. “This is such a mess, isn’t it?”

  He tucked her head beneath his chin and stroked her back with his strong hands, soothing, reassuring. But Nora’s mind whirled on.

  How could she leave Quinn? How would she survive losing him? But she couldn’t stay with him, either. Eileen shouldn’t grow up in Otherworld. She deserved a normal life. And Nora wanted to give it to her. As much as she cared about Quinn, Eileen had to be her priority.

  But until she went home again . . . Reaching up, she wrapped her arms around Quinn’s neck and pulled his mouth to hers. When he kissed her the doubts, the fears, the worries slid from her mind in a river of fire so deep and hot, Nora felt as though she were combusting.

  After several long moments, she pulled her head back, looked into his beautiful eyes and said, “Why don’t we go to bed and you can make me just a little more Fae?”

  “Good idea.” He swept her up into his arms, and as he carried her to his bed Nora let herself believe that there would somehow, some way, be a happy ending to all of this.

  “So that’s the story,” Maggie said a couple of hours and a bottle of wine later. She drained the last drop or two of chardonnay, then carefully set her glass down onto the coffee table and glanced at Claire. Her friend looked a little blurry.

  “And quite the tale it was.” Claire took the last swallow of her wine, leaned back against the couch and stretched her legs out in front of her, jostling Sheba. “Sorry, you lazy dog, you.”

  “Yep, everybody’s sleeping but us. Eileen’s asleep in her bedroom, Bezel’s curled up in his tree, Sheba’s practically unconscious, and snoring to boot, and Culhane? Probably sleeping in the arms of his bitch queen. The bastard.”

  “All men are dogs,” Claire said with the careful diction of the quietly drunk.

  “The thing is . . .” Maggie stopped, fought the fuzz in her brain, then scowled, trying to remember what she’d been about to say. Then it came to her. “The thing is, I still want the Faery rat bastard, you know? I mean, he’s lying to me and dragging me into a huge mess and I still want to crawl up onto his lap and—”

  “Take pity on the celibate,” Claire pleaded. “No word pictures, if you don’t mind.”

  “Right. Celibate. Too bad you’re not Catholic. You could be a nun.”

  “I don’t think they take witches.”

  “Probably not. What the hell am I going to do?”

  Claire reached out from her spot on the floor, set her empty glass beside Maggie’s, then patted her friend’s hand. “You’re going to fight Mab and become queen.”

  “In one version of the future, sure,” Maggie said, wishing suddenly that the fireplace her grandfather had built was actually a working one instead of being a hidden wine refrigerator. On a stormy night a fire would have been more comfort than the clank and moan of an ancient furnace. Yet having extra wine handy was its own kind of comfort.

  She looked at Claire then and voiced her real fears. “But what about the other futures I’ve gotten glimpses of? The ones where I lose and everybody dies? God, the images are so real they terrify me.”

  “I know. I only caught a glimpse or two, and they did the same for me.”

  “Oh yeah. I forgot you can ‘see.’ ”

  “Isn’t that nice?” Claire murmured, licking a stray drop of wine from the rim of her glass. “See? You’re not acting different around me now that you know. . . . You’re a good friend, Mags.”

  “Yeah, I’m the best. Just ask the pixie sleeping in my tree.” She laughed suddenly, worry dissolving in a happy mist of wine. “I’ve got a pixie sleeping in my tree. How weird is that?”

  Claire rested her head against the couch cushion. “Strange indeed. But couldn’t you have found a nice pixie?”

  “Are there nice pixies?”

  “How the bloody hell should I know?” Claire giggled, snorted, then waved her empty wineglass. “I think I need some more.”

  “Good call.” Maggie crawled over to the faux fireplace, yanked on one of the decorative irons, and a panel slid open to reveal the minifridge stocked with white wine. Because, really, who needed red?

  She pulled out one of her favorites, closed the panel, then scootched back to her spot on the floor. Then all she had to do was wrestle with the bottle opener, struggle with the damned cork and splash more wine into her and Claire’s glasses.

  “Mission accomplished,” she said, and grabbed her own glass to take a healthy swallow. If only the other mission she faced were as easily dealt with.

  “See, the whole problem is . . .” Maggie paused for a fresh gulp of wine. “It all comes down to me, Claire. Win or lose, it all comes down to me. How is it fair that I’m in charge of what happens to the world?

  “If I win, there’re still problems; I get that. But if I lose . . . I see people—my family, even—dying in those dreams. That future could happen, too.”

  “It won’t.” Claire sighed a bit, took a sip of wine and added, “I saw danger for you, Mags. You and Nora and everyone else. But I didn’t see death.”

  “Doesn’t mean it’s not there.” God, could she be more depressing? “This seriously blows. I hate being depressed.”

  “Let’s see if I can just get another peek.” Claire closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and silence purred into the room as Maggie waited. And waited. And waited.

  Finally she shoved her best friend. “Hey, no falling asleep while I’m in a depression!”

  “I’m not sleeping, you silly cow,” Claire told her, eyes still closed. “I’m reaching for a vision. Looking for a sign.”

  “Oh. Okay. Good. Search away.” She let her gaze wander the living room, the familiarity of it all sliding into her like a virtual hug.

  Hug. Culhane. Sex. Damn it. Even when she was allowing herself to wallow in self-pity and depression it didn’t take long for thoughts of her sexy Faery to rise up. Ooh. Rise up. There’s an image, she thought, and smiled at her mental picture of a fully risen Culhane stretched out across her bed.

  “God, I’m a slut,” she muttered.

  “True, but keep it down, will you?”

  “Right, right.” Maggie took another drink. “The Great and Powerful Claire needs silence for the hocus-pocus.” She frowned. “Why is that, do you think? If you need quiet, why aren’t witches born deaf? Wouldn’t that make it easier? Or are earplugs enough?” She swirled the wine in her glass and watched it shine in the lamplight. “Good thing I’m only destiny’s bitch and not a witch—rhyming!” She grinned to herself. “Because it’s never quiet around here.”

  “Truer words,” Claire mumbled, eyes still closed.

  “Right. Sorry.” Maggie clamped her lips shu
t, but then she couldn’t drink her wine, so that didn’t last long. Still, she managed to keep quiet for another minute or two. Then Claire broke the silence herself.

  “It’s not clear.”

  “Hmm? What’s not?” Maggie blinked at Claire, willed her familiar face into focus and then held her breath. Her best friend’s eyes were open and the normal blue was gone. Now those eyes churned with silver, sparking with some inner light Maggie’d never seen before. Just another spot of weird in a life that was suddenly way too full of it. “Claire? Did you know your eyes are silver?”

  “I can see, but the way’s blocked. The images changing.” Her voice had changed, too. Going soft, with a thread of steel underneath. “You can win, but not as they think you will. Not as you fear you will. There’s a battle. There’s pain. There’s . . .”

  Her eyes snapped back to normal.

  “There’s what?” Maggie demanded.

  “I don’t know. Visions ended. Ooh. More.” Claire took her glass and drank a long gulp of chilled white wine.

  “Well, what kind of crappy vision is that? Just the trailers? Not the end?”

  Claire shrugged. “I told you, it’s not like I’ve got satellite reception or high-def or something. I get what I get when I get it.”

  “Very helpful.”

  “Hey, at least in my vision you lived.”

  “True.” Maggie’s stomach released one of the tension knots. Didn’t make a huge difference, but at this point she’d take what she could get.

  “Y’know, Mags,” Claire was saying between chugs of wine, “if it’s okay with you I think I’ll stick around. Stay here with you and Eileen till this is done.”

  “Okay, but why?”

  “I’ll feel better if I’m close. And maybe perx . . . pox . . .” She stopped, rubbed her tongue across her front teeth and tried again. “Proximity to you will bring more visions.”

  Outside, a storm raged in the night, wind buffeting the glass, rain slapping against it like eager fingers tapping. There’d been more winter storms in the last couple of weeks than Maggie could remember seeing in years. Coincidence? She didn’t think so. But the cold and the wet were outside. Inside she was warm and half-tipsy, sitting with a friend who was willing to put her own life on hold to help Maggie.

  “Thanks,” she said, resting her head on the couch cushion behind her again. “I appreciate it, though Bezel won’t be happy.”

  “Another plus,” Claire said with a laugh as she lifted her glass in a toast.

  “I suppose, all in all,” Maggie agreed, clinking her glass to Claire’s, “it could be worse.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  Naturally, Maggie’d jinxed herself.

  She had tempted the Fates with that it-could-be-worse shit, and now worse was here.

  The morning had started off all right, considering that Maggie had a headache the size of Oregon. But most of the storm was gone, leaving only a cold wind and a few black clouds behind as a reminder.

  Bezel, of course, was in top form, ordering her around, making her practice until her fingertips were singed from the thousands of lightning bolts she threw. She’d run what felt like hundreds of miles, doing circles around the yard. She’d punched and flipped and kicked until every square inch of her body was pleading for rest.

  And that was when all hell broke loose.

  “Oh, let her sit down for a moment, you ugly pixie,” Claire demanded from the sidelines.

  “I don’t hear witches,” Bezel retorted, covering his big ears as he made a la-la-la-la-la sound to illustrate.

  “But if Maggie’s tired, how can she fight?” Eileen asked, enjoying her unofficial break from school.

  What with the Gray man showing up the night before, Maggie was too nervous about her niece’s safety to have Eileen anywhere but home. Although maybe she’d be better off away from Maggie completely. But Maggie couldn’t stand the thought of that, so until this mess was over one way or the other, as far as the school knew, the girl had the flu.

  “You think Mab’s gonna give her a time-out?” Bezel countered. “Culhane’s gonna owe me big for this. Kids and witches and part-Fae pains in my butt. My life sucks.”

  “Yours sucks?” Maggie asked between gasping breaths.

  “Fifty-five percent of all heart attacks in women are caused by overexertion,” Eileen said.

  “Huh?” Maggie looked at her and slapped one hand to her chest, as if she could stop a heart attack before it started.

  “She’s not having a heart attack,” Claire soothed.

  “Let’s see some fire bolts,” Bezel ordered.

  “Twenty-seven percent of all heart attacks go unnoticed. Until it’s too late.”

  “HUH?” Maggie was wheezing now and seriously rethinking the whole keep-Eileen-at-home thing.

  “It was you.”

  A new voice. From behind her. Deep. Dark. Gravelly and filled with menace. Maggie’s blood turned to ice in an instant, and the chatter in the yard dropped away as if it had never been. She so didn’t want to turn around.

  “Ah, crap.” Bezel scuttled closer to Maggie. “It’s a demon. A big one, too. Don’t go nutso on me now. Just kill it so we can get back to training.”

  “Get away, pixie,” the big voice said. “This is between me and the bitch who killed my mate.”

  “Oh, fabulous,” Claire muttered.

  “He’s a demon?” Eileen asked.

  “It wasn’t my fault,” Maggie said, and turned to face an absolute giant of a guy lumbering toward her. Seriously big. Seriously mean-looking. And seriously pissed. Just perfect.

  “You killed her,” he said, and as he came closer he allowed his human mask to slip a fraction.

  Maggie had the sense of gray skin, yellow teeth, and claws that looked as sharp as razor blades. He was big, and he was determined to kill her. Her life just kept on sucking.

  “I had to. She was eating my ex-boyfriend and about to eat me.”

  “She stops on her way home for some fast food and dies for it?” He shook his head and bunched his fists together, slamming them against each other at the knuckles. “I don’t think so. I gave her that Fae power for our anniversary. You took it; now I’m gonna get it back.”

  Good God.

  He charged. Maggie pushed off the ground, floated high enough to clear his head, then landed again. Excellent.

  “You’ve learned to use it,” he said. “Good. Makes this more interesting.” Then he pulled a gold ball from one of his pockets and flipped open the catch. “I’ll trap the power here when I’m done with you.”

  When she was dead, he meant. Well, hell. No way was she going to die in her backyard in front of Eileen, for God’s sake. Hadn’t she just blasted a bad Fae the night before? Hadn’t she stood there, proud and triumphant, basking in her own sense of pride and Culhane’s admiration? She was Maggie, hear her roar.

  But just in case, she sent a quick, silent prayer to whatever gods might be listening. Never hurts to cover all your bases.

  The demon smirked at her, then sent a quick look at everyone else in the yard. “Stay out of this, all of you, and you might not die.” Pausing, he tasted the air and smiled grimly. “I can smell power that isn’t the pixie. . . .” He focused on Claire for a long moment, then sneered. “Witch. Pixies and witches and wannabe Fae. This’ll be easier than I thought. You bunch stay put, and I’ll let you live.”

  “Big talk from a walking dust bunny,” Bezel called out.

  “Way to go, you little tree rat,” Maggie told him. “Piss him off some more, why don’t you?”

  “Kill it already,” Bezel shot back.

  Claire didn’t say a word, just pulled Eileen behind her and gave the demon a glare to match his own. Then she glanced at Maggie. “Do it, Mags. For all the worlds. For yourself. Prove you can do it.”

  Easier said than done. But what choice did she have, really?

  He ran at her again, and she dipped out of his reach, but she wasn’t fast enough to avoid the scrape
of his claws across her shoulder and upper back. Pain erupted just beneath her skin and fed the flames of anger building within. “Damn it, that hurt!”

  He grinned at her, a broad smile that held no humor but plenty of malice.

  “And my shirt’s torn!” The soft cotton fabric was flapping in the wind, and she waved her arm to demonstrate. The scrape on her back stung, her shirt was ruined, and Eileen was probably terrified. Anger churned through her, and Maggie let it build. Use what you’ve got, Maggie, she told herself, and take this creep out.