Protector (The Witches of Cleopatra Hill Book 5)

by Christine Pope

  Caitlin nodded but didn’t say anything.

  “We could go out, or we could go straight back to my house and fix something there. I have some carne asada in the fridge — we can have a little barbecue. Does that sound okay?” Was that too casual? He was desperately trying to sound normal, even though nothing about this situation was even close to normal.

  Another nod. Then she said, her voice small, “I’d rather not go out. I don’t have my I.D. or anything….” She let the words trail off, but he got her meaning. If anyone probably needed a drink right about now, it was Caitlin McAllister, and she sure wouldn’t get it at a restaurant, not without being able to prove she was over twenty-one.

  “No problem,” he said with a grin, backing the Pathfinder out of its space so he could head out onto Sixth Avenue. Since she was still looking tired and worried, and he wanted to see her smile, he added, “I promise I won’t card you.”

  And she did smile at that remark. Just a little, not much more than a lift at one corner of her mouth, but it was a start.

  He hoped someday he’d be able to make her smile for real.

  6

  They drove for a while, far longer than Caitlin had anticipated. For some reason, she’d thought Alex’s house would be closer to the store, but that didn’t seem to be the case. Maybe he’d wanted some separation between his home and his work. Since it was dark, she couldn’t get more than an impression of businesses of all types sliding by past the car windows — restaurants, medical buildings, a mall, the inevitable Starbucks, grocery stores and drugstores and auto parts stores. At last they were turning, moving into a more residential area where the road sloped upward almost imperceptibly. Did he live up in the hills somewhere? She had to admit that her knowledge of Tucson and its environs was basically nil; since she hadn’t been the one driving when she came to town, nothing had left much of an impression on her.

  Finally, they turned into a housing tract, one composed of large, new-looking homes, or at least as best she could tell in the subdued street lighting. After winding through a few more streets, Alex pulled into a driveway, then touched the remote clipped to the sun visor of his SUV. A garage door began to open, revealing probably the most spare and uncluttered garage Caitlin had ever seen. Almost everyone she knew in Jerome used their garage for storage, not to actually put their cars in.

  But that didn’t seem to be Alex’s mode of operation. He parked the Pathfinder in the right-hand bay, close to a door she presumed led into the house. “Here we are,” he said, quite unnecessarily, but she figured he spoke more to fill up the silence than because he’d expected to startle her with that revelation.

  “It’ll be good to get out of the car,” she replied. “I think I’ve spent most of today driving around.” Which, she realized, was only the truth. First the drive from Flagstaff to Jerome, then Jerome to Tucson…and then to Scottsdale and finally back down here. Hard to believe she’d done all that in the space of a day…and harder yet to believe everything that had gone on during those few short hours. Her mind had a hard time acknowledging that she really had just set out from Flag earlier that morning.

  “Well, stretch your legs all you want,” Alex said, then headed back to the cargo area so he could retrieve her luggage.

  Caitlin felt as if she should protest, should tell him she could take care of that herself. But she realized Alex was only trying to help. Anyway, she was tired. Exhausted, really. If he wanted to carry a couple of suitcases, she should let him.

  So she remained silent as he got out her two bags, then waited as he went past her and led her into the house. As she followed him, she had to prevent herself from gawking at the place like some rube from the country who’d never been to the big city before. The place did look practically brand-new, and so did all the furniture. Travertine floors, and bronze and alabaster glass light fixtures, and — well, it was about as different from the big Victorian house she’d grown up in as a person could imagine. And she wouldn’t even bother to compare it to the shabby apartment she shared with Danica. The garage here was nicer than that.

  Feeling somewhat cowed, she tagged along while Alex led her into a largish bedroom furnished with an oak daybed and matching dresser and nightstand. He set her bags down on the floor, which was covered in a fine-weave Berber carpet. “Here you go. I hope it’s okay.”

  Hope it’s okay? She cleared her throat and replied, “It’s nice. I mean, really nice.” As soon as the words left her mouth, she wanted to kick herself. “Really nice”? Seriously?

  Either Alex didn’t seem to have noticed the inanity of the remark, or was telling himself she’d had a rough day and so couldn’t really be expected to be all that eloquent. He went on, “The bathroom’s across the hall. There’s soap and clean towels, but if you need anything else — ”

  “I’m fine,” she said quickly. “I have all my shampoo and stuff.”

  “Then how about some dinner?”

  A few hours ago, she would have said she never wanted to eat again. Now, though, her stomach was telling her that it needed something to keep going. She wouldn’t be much use to Danica and Roslyn if she was so faint from hunger that she couldn’t concentrate.

  “Sounds great,” Caitlin replied, and Alex smiled.

  “Then let’s get that going.”

  She trailed after him as he headed down the hall and then back into the huge space that seemed to be a combination living room/dining room/kitchen. Down a short hallway off to one side, she spied what seemed to be the family room, as one wall was dominated by a large flat-screen TV.

  How much had this place cost? She was the first to admit she didn’t know anything about real estate, beyond what she could afford for half-rent on a dumpy two-bedroom apartment, but she guessed it had to be a lot. Did managing a grocery store really pay that well?

  Not that she would ever ask such a rude question. No, she waited off to one side, near the enormous granite-topped breakfast bar, and watched as Alex pulled a paper-wrapped package of meat from the refrigerator. “We’ll go outside to grill this,” he told her, then seemed to give the lightweight cotton top she was wearing a second look. “It gets cold pretty fast once the sun goes down. Do you have something to put over that?”

  Despite how hungry and tired she was, and the way the ever-present worry for Danica and Roslyn kept pushing at the back of her mind, Caitlin couldn’t help smiling. “I’ve been living in Flagstaff. Anything above sixty is going to feel downright balmy.”

  Alex didn’t argue, but only grinned in return. “If you say so.”

  They went outside, to an enormous covered patio with ceiling fans and spot lighting built right into the roof. It was furnished out here, too, with an outdoor sofa and chairs and cocktail table, and a little ways from that, a round table with four chairs. A pool glimmered blue-green in the dusk, and the whole place looked like something out of a magazine.

  Ignoring all that inviting furniture, Alex headed straight for a big stainless-steel barbecue and popped open the lid. “The carne asada cooks pretty fast, so we won’t have to wait too long.”

  That sounded good. In fact, it sounded so good that her stomach growled. Chagrined, she clapped her hands over her belly — as if that would shut it up — even as Alex chuckled.

  “Not a moment too soon, I guess.” His expression sobered, though, as he asked, “Do you want to sit outside, or should we eat indoors?”

  “Eat out here,” she said. To her, the air wasn’t chilly at all, but gently cool, soothing on her skin. And if it did get too cold, well, she could always run back inside and grab the denim jacket she currently had folded up inside her suitcase. “You have a gorgeous view.”

  And it was gorgeous — the faintest glimmer of dying sunlight still etched the very edge of the horizon, while above big, bright stars were beginning to glitter in the velvety dark blue sky. The faint outlines of jagged mountains were a deep black against navy, giving structure to the night.

  “Okay.” He paused, then aske
d, “Can you keep an eye on the meat while I run inside for a few things? Just flip ’em after a few minutes.”

  That sounded easy enough. Anyway, she’d babysat plenty of burgers at McAllister Fourth of July gatherings in past years. “Got it,” she said, picking up the tongs Alex had left sitting on the slate counter to the right of the built-in barbecue.

  He gave her a thumbs-up and went back inside. Was it strange that she felt this easy around him? Her surroundings were like nothing she’d ever experienced before, or even imagined, but despite that, she wasn’t uncomfortable. It felt good to stand here and smell the unfamiliar spices rising from the sizzling meat, to have the mild air flow over her bare arms. She could almost forget what had happened to her earlier that day.

  Almost.

  Even though she knew she was safe here, her entire body tensed as she recalled the way Matías’ black eyes had mocked her, the way he had held her. She had gotten away, true, but what was he doing now to Danica, to Roslyn?

  No way of knowing, if the visions chose not to come. And she’d already discovered that they would only appear on their own timetable, and not hers.

  Scowling, she flipped the meat over. It did look close to being done, probably because it was cut so thin. She’d had carne asada before, in quesadillas and burritos and whatnot, but never like this, plain.

  Or almost plain. She saw Alex coming out through the sliding glass door, his hands full with a tray that held not just plates and napkins and flatware, but also bowls of what looked like cut-up cooked peppers, rice, some kind of cheese…and a bottle of wine and a couple of glasses. Thank the Goddess.

  “You were busy,” she said as he started setting everything out on the patio table.

  “This?” His shoulders lifted. “Most of it’s just stuff from Trader Joe’s that I nuked.”

  “Well, it still looks good.”

  He came over to her then and cast a practiced eye over the skirt steak sizzling away on the grill. “Speaking of which, that looks about done. Let me dish it up.”

  She handed over the tongs, and he picked up the carne, then deposited it on a plate. Standing this way, he was very close to her, and she shivered. In a good way…but still.

  Seeming to notice, he inquired, “Getting cold?”

  “No,” she said hastily. “Just hunger pangs, I guess.”

  “Well, let’s fix that.”

  They went and sat down, and he dished some rice and beans on her plate, along with a tortilla.

  “I usually roll it in a tortilla and put some peppers on top. It’s good that way.”

  Caitlin thought that sounded better than good, so she assembled her food the way Alex had described while he busied himself with uncorking the wine and pouring some into her glass.

  “I hope you’re okay with the wine. Back in the car, it sounded as if you were worried about getting something to drink.”

  Wincing, she said, “I hope you don’t think I’m a lush.”

  “Hardly.” He flashed her a smile, then added, “I don’t know too many people who wouldn’t need a drink after what you’ve been through today.”

  Maybe that was true. Right now she felt like a coward for sitting here on this fabulous patio and sitting down to eat with an equally fabulous guy. She should be doing something, shouldn’t she? There had to be something she could do to help her friends.

  Problem was, there wasn’t much she really could do. Not until that third eye of hers…or whatever it was…woke up and started giving her some of the information she so desperately needed.

  “Possibly,” she allowed.

  Alex seemed to sense her internal turmoil, because he leaned forward slightly and said, “I know this must be hard for you, but really, I think the best thing to do is relax as much as you can. Worrying won’t change anything.”

  That was probably true. And it seemed the quickest path to relaxation was drinking some of that wine, so she lifted her glass. “Okay…I’ll try.”

  “That’s a start.” He raised his glass and clinked it against hers, as if sealing some sort of agreement.

  She took a sip. Wine was sort of a part of Verde Valley culture, but her parents had been strict about her not drinking before she turned twenty-one. It hadn’t stopped her from trying alcohol, of course, since not everyone in town was as uptight on the subject of underage drinking, but she’d never been one of the party girls, the ones who managed to get wasted at almost every high school get-together. Anyway, no one drank wine at those parties. Beer and tequila shots and sometimes whiskey, all of which she’d thought were pretty nasty. Margaritas were a different story, but no one bothered with mixed drinks when it was so much easier to get drunk on the straight stuff.

  This wine, though…it was smooth and dark and rich, and sent a comforting warmth down her throat. Some of the tense, knotted-up sensation seemed to leave her neck and shoulders, and she pulled in a breath.

  “Better?” Alex asked.

  “Starting to be,” she replied, then sipped again before setting the glass down so she could get to work on that carne asada. Drinking too much on an empty stomach could be dangerous for a number of reasons. She sent a sidelong glance in Alex’s direction, but he seemed intent on his food as well, eating a forkful of black beans before returning to his own rolled-up tortilla filled with meat and roasted peppers.

  They ate without speaking for a few minutes. He seemed to sense that she didn’t want to talk. Or at least, he was willing to sit back and let her initiate the next round of conversation, for which she was grateful. There were so many things she did want to talk about, but wasn’t sure how to begin the dialogue.

  A few more sips of wine gave her the courage to ask, “Alex — what’s going on with your grandmother? I mean, I’ve heard Angela talk about her, and — ” Caitlin wasn’t sure how to say, and she sure never mentioned how sick your prima was, so she let the sentence break off half-finished.

  But he seemed to know exactly how she had intended to finish the thought. Brows drawing together, he drank some more of his own wine, then replied, “We’ve been trying to keep it quiet. Most of the time there isn’t all that much interaction between our clans, so it wasn’t that difficult. And for the past few years my mother has been handling some of the ‘go-between’ kind of stuff for our prima anyway, so if Angela called to get permission for you and your friends to come down to Tucson and spoke to Luz instead of Maya, no one would think it was that strange.”

  He paused, and Caitlin held herself still, waiting for him to go on. From the way his fingers clenched the stem of his wine glass, and the way he wouldn’t quite look at her, she could tell this was difficult for him. This wasn’t just his prima he was talking about, but his own grandmother.

  “I suppose it started about four months ago…right after La Día de los Muertos.” The dark eyes slanted toward her. “You know what that is?”

  “The Day of the Dead,” Caitlin said promptly, recalling the candles lit for loved ones now gone, the sugar skulls she and Roslyn had bought from a vendor at the Tlaquepaque Village event a few years ago. “They have a festival in Sedona for that. I’ve gone a few times, when it didn’t conflict with our Samhain observances.”

  “Right. So some years my family would go up to Scottsdale to take part in the rituals there, and sometimes we would stay down here, depending on what everyone’s schedules were like. Last November we stayed in Tucson, mainly because there are more and more people who aren’t willing to make the drive, and my mother, as the prima-in-waiting, handles things here.” He toyed with the handle of his fork, but Caitlin could tell he didn’t seem terribly interested in eating right then. “The next day we got a phone call from my Aunt Francesca, who said my abuelita had had some kind of seizure and that the healer was with her but couldn’t seem to figure out what was wrong.”

  “That must have been frightening.”

  “It was. We all went up to Scottsdale, but by then the seizure had passed, and Maya seemed a little better.” He shook hi
s head. “‘Seemed’ being the operative word. She had another seizure soon afterward, began growing weaker, and yet still the healer couldn’t find anything wrong. Valentina, who’s our healer down here in Tucson, couldn’t seem to figure it out, either. But she’s younger than Alba, who’s been the healer in the Phoenix area since long before I was born, and so she insisted that the prima go to a hospital for tests.”

  In Jerome, the McAllisters had been without a healer for long enough that using civilian medical facilities was something no one thought twice about, but Caitlin supposed she could see why it might be an entirely different prospect for a clan that had never been forced to rely on modern medicine. Voice quiet, she asked, “Did they find anything?”

  Another head shake. This time he abandoned the fork and picked up his wine glass instead, took a fairly healthy swallow. “Nothing. They tested for cancer, for epilepsy, for Parkinson’s and diabetes and a bunch of other things I can’t remember, and nothing. Not one of those tests turned up anything. At last she said it was enough, that she wasn’t going to be poked and prodded anymore. That was about a month ago. And since then….” He set his glass down and stared off into the distance, although it was dark enough by now that Caitlin wasn’t sure what he could be looking at. “Well, you saw her. That’s where it stands. She’s not getting better. Every day, she gets a little bit worse.”

  And how horrible that must be for him. For his clan as well, but Maya was more than just his prima — she was his grandmother. Losing Great-Aunt Ruby had been terrible for the McAllister clan, but more because everyone knew their safety then depended on Angela, who’d been roughly the same age Caitlin was now when she had to take over as prima, than because it was a tragedy to lose someone at eighty-eight, someone who’d lived a full life. No, Angela’s youth had been the real issue; most of the time, a new prima was much older, had a family and a life of her own before she was asked to assume the role of leader of her clan. At least in the de la Paz family, Luz seemed ready to take over for her mother, even though she shouldn’t have had to worry about doing so for another ten or fifteen years.