Protector (The Witches of Cleopatra Hill Book 5)

by Christine Pope

  Angela stepped forward and spoke quietly, talking about Roslyn’s joy for life, her wonderful voice, her amazing talent with music. And then Caitlin heard the sound of a guitar being plucked, accompanied by her cousin’s pure, clear soprano singing “In the Arms of the Angels,” and she realized someone must have found a recording Roslyn had made and was playing it now from some source she couldn’t quite see.

  It was understanding that she’d never hear that voice again in real life, that she’d never see Roslyn’s big blue eyes dancing with laughter, or the way she’d toss her long honey-colored hair in that artfully artless manner of hers, that finally brought the tears to Caitlin’s own eyes. They streamed down her cheeks, and then it seemed everyone was weeping, mourning the loss of a girl who should never have been taken from them so young.

  And if fury toward Matías Escobar burned in the hearts of some of the people around her, how could she blame them? The same fire burned in hers.

  * * *

  Since Alex wasn’t privy to the goings-on behind the scenes at the Tucson P.D. or the local district attorney’s office, he didn’t know exactly what went down to send Matías and his cronies to the front of the line when it came to them going to trial. Somehow, though, they were arraigned within a few days, with the courthouse date scheduled for only a week or so after that.

  When he’d called Caitlin to give her the news, she seemed relieved but not particularly happy. He hesitated, unsure as to whether he should press her on the subject, but then he decided to go ahead and ask anyway. “What’s the matter? I thought you’d be glad to hear he’s on the fast track to life in prison.”

  A long pause on her end. He wished he could see her face, but she didn’t have Skype installed on her computer, which she claimed was really underpowered, and so they were talking on their cell phones. She’d finally gotten hers replaced after she went home; there had never seemed to be any time to do it during those feverish few days they’d spent together.

  Then she said, “I don’t think ‘glad’ is the right word. Of course it’s good that he was caught and that he’s going to get a dose of civilian justice on top of what Angela and Connor already did to him, but…that won’t bring back Roslyn or Maya. It won’t fix what’s wrong with Danica.”

  Oh, hell. He’d been hoping in the back of his mind, between trying to adjust to a new clan dynamic with his mother at its head, and attempting to focus on work and not the ever-increasing need to see Caitlin while the world conspired to keep them apart, that her friend might be improving. “She’s still having trouble?”

  “Yeah.” A little gust of a breath, as if Caitlin had let out a sigh she couldn’t quite keep in. “I mean, it’s not like she’s in a trance anymore, but she still seems pretty out of it, and I guess she’s been having a lot of nightmares, too. She had to withdraw from school, and her parents just came by yesterday to get the rest of her stuff. They’re thinking about sending her to a therapist, although they’re not sure because no one in either of our clans is a psychologist or anything, and it could get weird if she has to go see a civilian.”

  “Weird” was putting it mildly, Alex knew. There were certain things that had happened to Danica that weren’t exactly proper for a civilian to know, and it was even more awful that apparently her ordeal hadn’t ended when she’d been rescued.

  But because he knew talking about it was painful, he didn’t press for any details, instead asking, “So you’re living in the apartment alone now?” Alex didn’t think he liked the sound of that, although he knew Caitlin should be perfectly safe in Flagstaff. Her cousin Adam was living there with his wife Mason, after all, and it wasn’t as if the Wilcoxes and the McAllisters were feuding anymore.

  “For now.” Another one of those little pauses. “That is, my lease is up at the end of June, so I’ll have to decide by then what I want to do. But luckily, the money from my book sales is picking up, since I just published the final book in my trilogy, and that should bridge the gap. It’ll be okay.”

  This girl never ceased to amaze him. She’d lost her friend, been through an ordeal of her own, and yet seemed to have dusted herself off and gotten back to her writing despite everything. “That’s great news,” he said. “Kind of surprising, but — ”

  “Not really,” she cut in. “I was really close to being done anyway. It seemed like the best thing I could do was focus on the writing…and my classes, obviously. It wouldn’t have been honoring Roslyn to quit any of it. Besides, no way was I going to give Matías that sort of power over me.”

  When she put it that way, Alex could understand how she felt. Letting that warlock interfere with her life any more than he already had would only be allowing him to continue to disrupt her plans and goals and dreams, and clearly Caitlin was a lot tougher than that. He also realized then that, however much he missed her, he couldn’t interfere. She needed to finish out the semester, if nothing else.

  Afterward…well, he had a few ideas about that.

  * * *

  She tried to tell herself that it was all okay, that this separation from Alex didn’t get more and more painful as spring wore on toward summer. True, he had come up to visit as often as he could, and in the beginning, Caitlin had had the selfish thought that she was almost glad she was living by herself now, since at least it meant she wouldn’t have to hide their nighttime activities from anyone else. Yes, it was awkward squeezing in with him in her full-size bed, but still so much better than sleeping alone. But then he’d have to go away again, to attend to his own responsibilities, and she was left telling herself it was okay, that she’d see him again in a couple of weeks. It was never enough, but it was better than nothing.

  Even more promising, Alex told her in mid-May that he’d submitted his resume to a local station in Tucson, and they were very interested in talking to him about an assistant marketing position. Caitlin had been thrilled for him, although he’d only shrugged and said, “Well, it’s not a job offer. And even if I do get an offer, I still have to deal with my parents and the store.”

  Oh, right, that. “I find it hard to believe that there’s no one else who can manage it,” she protested.

  A shrug. “Manuela could probably do a great job. The real question is whether my parents will let her. She’s not a Trujillo son.”

  Since Caitlin had grown up in a tight-knit clan herself and knew all too well the weight of tradition and expectations, she didn’t force the argument any further than that. She could only hope that Alex’s father would come to realize that his younger son’s happiness was a lot more important than whether a Trujillo was in charge of things at the family mercado.

  It was even more difficult to determine whether anyone in their respective clans was particularly happy about hers and Alex’s burgeoning relationship. Her visions hadn’t gone away — she’d woken up one night after having a nightmare about the hillside beneath Rory Lightman’s house giving way, and phoned her mother immediately. Tricia McAllister had passed on the warning, and Rory got his family out before half the house slid down the hill. At least the incident had proved that Caitlin was willing to do her part as the clan seer, even when off at college in Flagstaff, but she had a feeling they really wouldn’t be thrilled if she announced that her relationship with Alex Trujillo was getting serious and that she might not be staying in the northern half of the state for very much longer.

  She wouldn’t make that announcement, though, because she didn’t know for sure if their relationship really was that serious. Sure, he’d come up and spend a weekend here and there when he could make the time in his schedule, but she really couldn’t count that as an extreme escalation of their relationship. And she couldn’t even reciprocate, because her ancient Toyota could barely make it back and forth between Flagstaff and Jerome. No way could she drive the poor thing all the way to Tucson and hope to have it survive.

  On Memorial Day weekend, Alex made the slog through traffic to see her, since it was her birthday that Sunday. They had a large, nois
y lunch at the Haunted Hamburger with as many family members as they could squeeze in amongst the tourists, but after that Alex took her back to Flagstaff. He seemed unusually quiet on the drive home, but Caitlin didn’t want to make anything major out of that. A few hours spent around her relatives would be enough to wear anyone down, even someone who was used to being part of a large extended family himself.

  After they got back to the apartment, though, and Caitlin got them some iced tea, Alex asked, “So what are you going to do about this place?”

  “What place?”

  “The apartment.”

  “Oh.” She handed him his glass of tea and settled herself down on the threadbare sofa. It seemed Alex had finally decided they were going to have “the talk,” and she wasn’t sure what she thought about that. Or maybe it was more that she did know what she thought…what she hoped for…but didn’t want to admit it to herself. “Well, I can afford to stay, if I decide that’s what I want to do. My parents aren’t thrilled about the whole thing, but no way am I going to bail out with only a year of college left.”

  He appeared to absorb that remark, dark eyes thoughtful. Instead of coming to sit next to her, though, he went over to the sliding glass door and looked outside. The view was about the only decent thing in the apartment; you could see pine trees and a glimpse of Humphreys Peak off to one side. But Caitlin had a feeling Alex wasn’t really looking at the view, no matter how pretty it was.

  Turning around so he could face her, he said abruptly, “I want you to come to Tucson and move in with me.”

  “What?” Even though she’d been halfway hoping he might make such a proposition, now that it had come, she felt blindsided.

  “You heard me.” He moved from the window and stood in front of her, a pleading expression on his face. “We’ve been trying to make this work, but God, Caitlin, you live four hours away from me, and that’s on a day with good traffic. Besides, this place is a dump. Wouldn’t you rather live in my house?”

  Tone wry, she asked, “Oh, so now you’re trying to save me from living in a shithole apartment, Mr. Protector?”

  “Of course not.” His mouth twisted, and before she could even register what he was doing, he’d gone down on one knee in front of her and was pulling a box out of his jeans pocket.

  No — he couldn’t. This was ridiculous. They hadn’t even known each other for three whole months.

  But Goddess…she wanted this. She wanted him. She wanted to be with him.

  Obviously, Alex didn’t think it was ridiculous, even if he did look adorably silly, perched there on one knee in front of her. Voice earnest, he said, “I want us to be together, Caitlin. I want you to come home with me. I want it to be our home. I know you only stayed there for a few days, but the house still feels empty without you.” He opened the box. The ring inside was white gold, with a glittering round-cut diamond in the center surrounded by smaller diamonds.

  It was beautiful. It was perfect. But still she could only sit there, staring at him, all the words she loved so much suddenly deserting her.

  He paused and stared up into her face. “Is it — is it too soon? I’ve been trying to make myself wait, at least until you were done with school, but Caitlin, I don’t want to wait anymore.”

  At last she found her voice. “I don’t want to wait, either. So — yes. Yes. It’s crazy, but yes.”

  That flashing smile she loved so much lit up his face, and he slid the ring onto her finger. It fit exactly right. And that was how she felt about Alex…he fit exactly right.

  He pulled her toward him, and she was kissing him, and then they were on the rug and their clothes were being flung this way and that, and his mouth was on her, his fingers stroking her, and at last he was inside her, and she knew this was the most perfect thing in the world, being with Alex, knowing he loved her and would always, always make sure she was safe.

  Afterward, once they’d gotten themselves more or less pulled together, they settled back down on the couch, Caitlin with her head on Alex’s shoulder. She knew she should call her parents to tell them the news, but she wanted to work out a few more things first.

  “What about school?”

  “Transfer to U of A. It might be a little hard this late in the game, but my clan has a few people who work there. I’m sure some strings can get pulled so you can still start in the fall.”

  The McAllisters weren’t all that good at string-pulling, so she’d have to take his word for it. But the University of Arizona was an excellent school, and most of her coursework should transfer straight over, since both universities were part of the same system. And if she ended up having to take an extra semester to get caught up, well, it wouldn’t be the end of the world. After all, she’d be living with Alex. That would make everything a lot easier.

  But still, her conscience pricked at her. She’d just come to terms with being the McAllister seer, and now she was going to pack up and go off to de la Paz territory?

  “The clan elders won’t be happy about their seer going to live outside McAllister lands,” she said. “I mean, I’ve just started really functioning as a seer, and now I’m going to bail completely?”

  Alex lifted an eyebrow at her. “You’re going to Tucson, not Siberia. And this is the twenty-first century. Haven’t your clan elders heard of Skype? Facetime? Email? I don’t know, a telephone?”

  She stuck her tongue out at him, and he laughed.

  “Now you’re just teasing me.”

  “Maybe I am, a little,” he admitted. “But you brought it on yourself.”

  That could be true. But she had one last question to ask. “What about a job?” she asked.

  “What about it?”

  “I won’t feel right, freeloading off you.”

  At that remark, he pulled away slightly and gave her a very direct look. “First of all, Caitlin, I wouldn’t call going to college full-time exactly freeloading. Besides, I thought you said your book sales were picking up.”

  “They are,” she admitted. It wasn’t as if she was going to hit the New York Times bestseller list anytime soon, but her monthly earnings had inched past fifteen hundred dollars or so.

  “Well, then,” he said, as if that covered everything. “It’s not like I need you to help me with a house payment or anything, and if you’re earning your own money, then you’ll be able to buy the little things you need for school and whatever. Isn’t that enough?”

  She watched him carefully for a few seconds. He was telling the truth. All he wanted was her with him. Nothing else. No strings.

  “I love you, Alex Trujillo,” she said.

  Another of those blazing smiles. “That’s the first time you’ve told me that.”

  No, that couldn’t be right. But she reflected on the time they’d spent together and everything they’d talked about, and she realized she never had said those three important words aloud. She’d thought them plenty of times but never quite got the nerve to say “I love you” to Alex, always telling herself that it was too soon, that they needed more time together. A silly notion, really, to believe that you had to spend a set amount of time with someone before you could take that next step. She’d known almost from the beginning that there couldn’t be anyone except Alex, that through all the fear and terror and worry, he’d been there for her, the one person, the one true match to her soul, that she’d thought she would never find.

  Taking his hand, she pressed it against her cheek. “Well, I do love you.”

  “Oh, I know. And I love you, too. I think I was in love with you from the moment you collapsed in my arms in the store.” She gave him a disbelieving look, and he went on, “It’s true. I didn’t know who you were or what kind of trouble you were in, but I was…drawn to you, I guess. And even though I knew I had other things I should be focusing on during that whole nightmare, I couldn’t stop thinking about you. About being with you.”

  Caitlin could understand those feelings all too well, because she’d been thinking the same thing ab
out him. What they shared wasn’t exactly like a consort bond, because that sort of connection was only for a prima and her soul mate, but it seemed something almost as powerful had brought her and Alex together. Her mother had said it was like that for witches sometimes, that they were somehow able to recognize in another person the quality that would make them their perfect pairing, but Caitlin had dismissed the notion as overly romantic, and had thought it couldn’t actually be like that in real life. Not when she’d had such bad luck before when it came to men. Or guys, she amended mentally. Before Alex, they were all just guys.

  He was something different, though. Something special.

  She tried to keep her tone casual as she said, “I couldn’t stop thinking about you, either, but I just thought it was because of your outstanding gorgeousness.”

  “Oh, now you’re going to give me a swelled head.”

  “That’s not such a bad thing,” she responded, moving her hand down to the crotch of his jeans.

  He gusted out a breath. “That’s dangerous, Caitlin.”

  “I know,” she said. But he made no move to rub against her and escalate things. She withdrew her hand and asked, “What is it?”

  “You’re going to think it’s crazy.”

  “I grew up in Jerome, Alex. It takes a lot to make me think something is crazy.”

  Smiling, he took her hand and kissed it. Shivers ran down her spine, and she could feel her pulse beginning to speed up. Funny how even the little things he did could cause such a strong physical reaction in her.

  “The next time we’re together, I want it to be in the house. Our house. I know it’ll take a while to make the transition, but — ”

  She leaned forward and kissed him. “I don’t think it’s crazy. Besides, I know you hate how your feet hang off the edge of my crappy little bed.”