“I’m sure you did,” I said, too deep in thought to properly enjoy her embarrassment.
If her grandmother had told her about the guardian, I had to wonder whatelse the old witch might have told her.
Thoughts of Sylvie’s ignorance to all the goings-on diminished greatly. I had to find out what else she knew. Somehow.
“Well, are you him?” she pressed, overcoming the embarrassment with such sudden intensity that I was forced to backtrack. Had she faked it to lure me in?
“I am Lincoln,” I said. “I’m sorry if that’s not the answer you want.”
“Hello, Lincoln. I’m Sylvie.” She lifted her hand.
I didn’t take it. “I don’t want to hurt you again. Static electricity and all that.”
“Right,” she said, dropping her hand.
If she was in full control of her powers, I didn’t want to give her another way in. The surprise she’d shown on that first contact suggested she wasn’t that strong. But I shouldn’t take chances just yet. Though there wasn’t alick of magic to be scented on her. Invisible magic … was that a thing? I made note to ask the elders.
Regardless, her ancestors had tried to take everything from my people, so I could not be too careful. Not right now, with the very thin line I was walking.
And what a line it was. On the one side, my pack and its needs and desires to stay away from the woman, to prevent her from acting against us.
On the other side, the very tempting allure to treat her as just that, awoman
, and take her. Claim her. Have her at my side and under me in the throes of heated passion, her lips on my ear, screaming my name as Itook her.
That was the line I walked, trying hard to balance without tipping over, even as I leaned far to the side. The scent of Sylvie, the cinnamon and lavender combination, was driving me crazy the longer I spent in close proximity to her.
Perhaps it is time to exit the situation before it gets too intense. Before you make a mistake.
“Why are you here?” I asked. “You don’t live in town anymore.”
She searched my face in surprise. “You know who I am?”
“I know you’re Helen’s granddaughter.”
Perhaps it was too much to give away, but I watched her face closely for anything other than surprise. Anger, fear, hate, malice. I detected none of it.
“That’s true. If you know that, you know I came back for her funeral. I need to take care of a few other things while I’m here. She was all I had left.”
It wasn’t a lie, but she was holding back, not telling me everything. It was plain as day in her eyes.
“You’re keeping secrets,” she continued. “You know more about what happened today than you’re admitting. That’s why you said what you said back there.”
I smiled, enjoying the dance, the verbal jousting, attempts to pry and discover what the other knew, or didn’t know. Normally I hated such conversations. But with her, everything was fun.
“You would know all about holding back,” I countered without answering her question.
“Why are you holding back your secrets?” she asked, not bothering to deny my accusation at all. She crossed her arms.
I fought down the urge to stare at the emphasis the movement brought to her chest. Did she do it on purpose? Probably, I surmised. She was a smart woman. But did she know just how close she was to me losing the battle and crossing the line between us? I doubted it.
Her question held such interest, and such naivety, that I couldn’t believe she had any idea what she was getting herself into. Nor was she acting. Not unless she was the best actress on the planet, who had missed her true calling.
No, she has no idea who, or what, she’s descended from, or what I am. I doubt she knows the world she’s trying to push her way into even exists. She’s reaching blindly in the dark.
“Well?”
“Because,” I said, “not everyone is ready to hear them.”
“Not ready to hear them,” she repeated, twisting her mouth as if she’d bitten into something sour. “And when would someone be ready to hear what you have to stay?”
I stared deeply into her eyes. “When they’re ready to believe.”
Sylvie
“When they’re ready to believe. What a crock of shit,” I muttered, the mocking words dying away as I turned onto my grandmother’s street.
Those were the last words the forest-man, a.k.a. “Lincoln” had said to me before he’d gotten in his truck and departed, leaving behind a town in panic. By now they were probably getting torches and pitchforks ready to go on a witch hunt.
There had been a point behind his speaking up like that. I was sure of it. Knowing next to nothing about him or not, it was pretty clear for anyone to see that he wasn’t the type to say words like that on a whim. Something had propelled him to open his mouth.
The question waswhat
? What could have been so important that he would try to drive a wedge between the townspeople? He couldn’t really believe one ofthem was actually some sort of evil. Could he?
And why was he staring at me the entire time before he spoke.
The car bounced slightly as it went up the driveway, tires rumbling over the compacted gravel.
Could he have been insinuating that I’m the evil? That makes no sense, though. I haven’t done a thing to him or anyone in town. It must be something else.
I pulled to a stop in the driveway, staring out the passenger window at my grandmother’s house.
My grandmother’s house.
That thought penetrated deep into my psyche, past the mundane weirdness of the day, striking right at the very center of my being, of who I was. And shattered it.
It wasn’t her house anymore. It wasmy house.
Because she’s dead. She’s not coming back.
That sharp thing that had been sticking into my stomach since the moment I first read her letter chose that moment to twist. Driving itself deeper, it lodged itself firmly, a heavy reminder of that simple fact.
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