Boundary Lines (26 page)

Chapter 41

“Are you positive?” I asked for about the fifth time. I believed him, of course. I just didn’t want it to be true.

Quinn’s voice was still remarkably patient. “Yes. I’m sure. They’re sure. And they have no reason to lie to me.”

“Right.” I swallowed hard. “Does Maven know? Where is she?”

“She knows, and she went to see Hazel first, out of respect.”

I shook my head, but then a new thought occurred to me. “Lily?”

“I didn’t call her. I couldn’t see any reason to tell her now.”

“Tell me what?”

I jumped; Quinn just looked briefly vexed. The voice came from the other side of the door that led to the rest of the coffee shop. “Could someone unlock this?” Lily called. “And maybe tell me what the hell is going on?”

“I’ve got to talk to Maven about soundproofing the doors,” Quinn muttered, but he went over to let her in. Lily burst into the room.

“Si!” She rushed over to her brother and started wringing her hands, obviously afraid to touch him.

“He’s gonna be fine,” I promised her. “He was given a sedative until Sashi can finish healing him tomorrow. He’s fine.”

Nodding, Lily carefully ruffled her fingers through her brother’s hair, then rested a hand on his shoulder. “Stupid nerd cowboy,” she grumbled at him, but the worry was still written all over her face.

“What are you doing here?” Quinn asked.

“I called Simon and Lex looking for news. When neither of them answered, I figured you’d be here . . .” She looked between the two of us. “Now tell me what I’m not supposed to know.”

Quinn and I exchanged a look, and then Quinn said, “The werewolves picked up a witch scent in Chautauqua, someone who’d been all over there recently, doing magic. We followed the trail back to your sister Sybil’s house.”

“But I just left her,” Lily whispered. “She had three glasses of wine and passed out on my mom’s couch.”

“She’ll be waking up soon,” Quinn said soberly. “Maven went to talk to your mother.”

“Oh
shit
!” Lily looked anguished, her fingers rising to twist into her dreadlocked hair. “I mean, she’s
Sybil
, but she’s still a Pellar! I never
really
thought . . .” She paced in a tight circle, then froze, her lovely face paling as she looked back at Quinn. “Is Maven going to kill my sister?”

“I honestly don’t know,” he said, and his voice was so frank and tired that even Lily believed him.

“I gotta go over there,” she cried. “I gotta talk to them, see if I can—”

“No, you don’t,” Quinn ordered. “They’ll figure out what they figure out. It’ll only make it worse if you’re there.”

Lily glared at him, tears running down her face. “She’s my sister, you prick!”

“I’m gonna go get dressed,” I broke in. I had a feeling I was about to either drive Lily to Hazel’s or physically restrain her from leaving, and I wanted to be wearing clothes when that happened. I wrapped the sheet around myself as best I could and left the two of them to their argument, closing the door to Maven’s office behind me.

Sashi had brought me a spare outfit from her own suitcase, God love her. There was silk underwear, a wireless silk bra, jeans, and a long-sleeved knit T-shirt in an earthy brown. The jeans were a little tight in the thigh and the bra was a little bigger than strictly necessary, but it was close enough. My shoes, which someone had possessed the presence of mind to snatch out of the locker room at Grizzly Springs, were there too, as was my cell phone. Score. When I picked up the phone, I saw that I’d missed a text message seven minutes earlier. It was from John.

911 come over now. EMERGENCY. Don’t tell ANYONE.

I stared at it. And stared at it. Then I called John’s cell, but it went straight to voicemail. So I stared at the message some more. Had something happened to Charlie? It couldn’t be related to Sybil; Lily had just seen her. And it couldn’t have anything to do with the sandworm, obviously, since we’d killed it. What else . . . Keller? Could he have gone to John and persuaded him to lure me over? John wouldn’t voluntarily set me up, but I could see Keller tricking him into setting a trap.

Even if it wasn’t a trap, John wasn’t answering, so there was only one way to find out. I picked up the keys to Maven’s Jeep. I didn’t know what she’d driven to see Hazel—maybe Quinn’s car. It didn’t matter.

Back in the main room, Quinn and Lily were still arguing over whether Lily should go to the farmhouse. “I have to leave,” I broke in loudly.

Both of them stopped talking to stare at me. “
Now
?” Lily said incredulously.

“It’s a family thing,” I said apologetically. “I’m sorry, I can’t say more.”

The two of them shouted for me to stop, but I kept right on walk
ing, all the way out the back door and over to the Jeep. As I turned the
key in the ignition, the passenger door jerked open and Lily hopped in.

“Lily, I have—”

“To go, yeah, I get it. Wherever you’re going, I’m going with you. I can’t sit in there arguing with Quinn for
one more second
. He’ll keep an eye on Sashi and Simon.” She buckled her seat belt resolutely.

I didn’t move. “You can’t just invite yourself—”

“It seemed like this was urgent,” Lily interrupted me again. “Or at least I’m assuming it was, if you were willing to walk out on me in the middle of a crisis. Do you really have time to argue about it?”

I sighed and put the Jeep in reverse. “No, I don’t. But you’re staying in the car.”

“Fine. Where are we going?”

I told her.

The cul-de-sac was quiet, but I parked a few houses away anyway, and took the keys with me in case Lily had any bright ideas about driving it to the Pellar farm. She pouted at me and held up her cell phone. “Okay, okay. Call me if you need me. I’ll be using produce to save the world from a zombie plague. And obsessively calling my mother over and over until she answers.”

I tried to run straight inside, but John had installed a new front door since the break-in, and I didn’t have the keys. So I pounded on the front door instead, and when I didn’t get an immediate reply, I rang the doorbell. About twenty times. Nobody answered.

I had just stepped back, and was scanning the front windows for the best one to break, when the new door finally popped open, revealing a very sleepy-looking John. “Lex?” he said blearily. “What are you doing here?”

“You texted me,” I said, panting with adrenaline. “You said ‘911.’
So I came. Where’s Charlie?”

His face morphed into utter confusion. “She’s in the kitchen with Sarah. She had a bad dream, so we were going to make her some warm milk. What text?”

I stared at him for a second, puzzled. What the fuck was going on?

Without another word, I handed him my cell phone and strode past him into the kitchen. From the hallway I could hear a woman’s voice cooing at my niece, and part of me relaxed a little. Was it all a misunderstanding? I hadn’t known that John and his girlfriend had progressed to sleepovers, and I didn’t love it, but everything sounded okay.

About two steps before I reached the kitchen, though, I realized that I recognized the voice that was humming to Charlie. I rounded the corner and saw her, wearing a pretty white nightgown, rocking back and forth with my niece draped over her shoulder. John’s cell phone sat right in front of her.

I started forward, but she held up her free hand. “That’s far enough. Let’s keep your hands where I can see them, shall we?” I froze, and Simon and Lily’s eldest sister smiled at me. “Hello, Lex.”

I swallowed hard. “Hello, Morgan.”

Chapter 42

“Did you just call her Morgan?” John asked, stepping into the kitchen behind me. “This is Sarah, my girlfriend.”

“That’s not her name,” I said softly.

“Well of course it is,” Morgan laughed. “Oh, I’m sorry, I see the confusion. My full name is Morgan Sarah, I just prefer to go by the latter.”

“That’s probably it then.” John went around the kitchen island to peck her on the lips. “How’s my girl?”

“She passed out again, of course,” Morgan/Sarah said with false good humor. “Right when I had the pan all ready.” She took a step to the right so we would both see the cast-iron saucepan full of milk on the stove.

“Of course,” John said, picking up an apple from a bowl on the island and shining it on his shirt. He moved it toward his mouth to take a bite.

“John,” I said in a low voice. “You need to take Charlie and step away. This woman is not who you think she is.”

My brother-in-law’s hands went still and he shot me a bewildered look. “Lex, what are you talking about? I saw the message on your phone, but it’s just some weird fluke. Charlie is fine.”

“This woman has been lying to you,” I said desperately. “Please, take Charlie from her. You have to trust me.”

His brow furrowed, and he opened his mouth to answer—but then the saucepan of hot milk struck him square on the back of his head.

John’s eyes rolled up as he crumpled forward, smacking his forehead on the counter as he went down. “No!” I cried out, starting forward to help him. Morgan held up a warning finger, stopping me in my tracks. Charlie was stirring in her arms. The witch whispered some soothing words to her, and my niece snuggled into her neck.

My fists clenched, and for a moment the only sound in the kitchen was the drip-drip-drip of the spilled milk. At that moment I hated her worse than I’d hated any person in my entire life.

“It was you,” I growled. “All this? The ley lines?”

“Calm down, Allison,” Morgan said in that same soothing tone. She opened the drawer in front of her and pulled out a 9mm Sig Sauer. “I would hate to have to use this on someone.”

The sight of a sidearm that close to Charlie made me go cold.
Stall for time,
I told myself. Just about the only thing I could do was stall for time and hope Lily got bored and came in, or John woke up. If he was still alive. I swallowed my pride and tried to modify my tone to sound awestruck. “How did you activate the ley line?”

Morgan snorted, hard enough to make her perfect cascade of earth-mother hair tremble. “I have you to thank for that. Really, everything that’s happened is
your
fault, Allison.”

“How do you figure? And stop calling me Allison.”

Her eyes hardened. “Of course, I’ve known for a long time that I would need to be more strict than my mother: her peace-and-love hippie shit was great once upon a time, but the real world is much harsher than that now.” She cuddled her head against Charlie’s. “Still, I was planning to bide my time until our contract with Maven was up, but when you showed up with your
complete
lack of control and your ridiculous amount of death magic, trying to poison the clan, I had to move up my time line.”

“The spells?”

She glowered at me. I’d interrupted her. “I asked around,” she snapped. “There’s a storage facility in San Diego where we keep the oldest spells, the stuff nobody bothers with anymore.” She shrugged. “A full week buried in dusty boxes, but I had to do it. I couldn’t risk you hurting someone.”

“Me?!” I cried, tilting my head toward John. “I haven’t hit anyone with a pan today, Morgan.” Sure, I’d killed a giant snake monster, but still.

Morgan shrugged, unruffled. “Sacrifices have always needed to be made for the greater good,
Allison
.”

“And is John one of those sacrifices?” I countered.

She looked down at him, like she’d genuinely forgotten he was there. “No. Just a means to an end.” She bounced Charlie lightly in her arms. “I needed a contingency plan, just in case the werewolves didn’t invade, or you threw a wrench in things, which of course you
have
.” She sighed. “Maybe I should have shot you right away in the beginning. Saved everyone the trouble.”

“How exactly do you see this going down?” I said quickly.
Keep her talking
. “You kill me, you’ll go to jail.”

She gave me an annoyed look. “Come on, now. Don’t insult my intelligence, not when I’m holding this
cute widdle baby
,” she kissed the top of Charlie’s head.

I thought my own head might explode when I saw that, but I kept my mouth shut. Seeing that I wouldn’t take the bait, Morgan sighed and waved the Sig at the back door. “Bad guys came in, hit John, and shot you. I managed to hide in the bathroom with the baby. End of story.” She leveled the weapon at my head.

“And Charlie?” I insisted. “If I’m going to die, at least let me know what’s gonna happen to my niece.”

She thought for a moment, then set the Sig back down in front of her, bobbing her head in concession. “Fair enough. I’m not a
monster
. You’ll be happy to know that I have no real interest in Charlie, and no intention of interfering with her upbringing. After I shoot you, she and I will just make a quick run to the coffee shop to shoot Maven before we go to the police station.” She looked down at her nightie. “Should I change first, do you think, or will this be more sympathetic?” I just stared at her. “Anyway, in a week or two I’ll quietly break up with John, and Charlie will go on living her life. Unless I need her again. Of course, there are a number of vampires and witches who know of her existence now; I can’t help that. Maybe John can get a security system or something.” She shifted Charlie in her arms and picked up the Sig again, pointing it at my head.

“There’s just one problem with that plan,” said a voice just over my shoulder. “Maven isn’t at the coffee shop. She’s at the farmhouse accusing Sybil of all your crimes.”

Lily. Behind me, she stepped forward out of the shadows, and I silently moved aside to let her in.

Instinctively, Morgan pointed the weapon at the new threat. “You’re going to shoot me too, big sister?” Lily snapped. “Am I going to become another casualty in the Morgan Pellar world domination plan?” Her voice was raw with pain.

Morgan wrinkled her nose. “Really?” she said to Lily. “The farmhouse? Drat.” Her lips worked a little, like she was trying to get a bad taste out of her mouth. “I had hoped she wouldn’t get that far, certainly not this quickly.”

“You framed Sybil,” Lily said. Tears were running down her face. “You’re setting her up to take a fall for you.”

“All I did was ask her to do a couple of spells for me,” Morgan said airily. “That ley line spell has to be renewed every night, and I have things to do. Anyway, Sybil doesn’t know anything, and Maven should be able to smell that on her. I doubt she’ll
kill
Sybil.”

“What is
wrong
with you?” Lily whispered.

Morgan looked genuinely angry at that. “I am
trying
to take care of you,” she hissed, with a little stomp of her foot. “Isn’t that what you’ve always wanted, Lilith? For all of us to take care of you, let you be the free-spirited wild child? You want to go flouncing around teaching
yoga
and following your
passions
, well, this is what it costs.” She tilted her head at me. “I’m not going to let her destroy our clan while you’re off picking daisies.”

“Look at what you’re doing right now!” Lily cried. “What would your kids say about this? Your husband?”

Morgan rolled her eyes, but I didn’t hear her response. I had a really bad idea. Like, really bad. But it was the only idea I had, so what the fuck, why not run with it? “So shoot me,” I said very loudly. The Sig swerved back toward me, as confusion erupted on the faces of both Pellar sisters. “Lily can keep her mouth shut. She knows how to go along with things. I’m close enough to Charlie, it should work.
Just shoot me
.”

“Lex—” Lily cried.

“Shut up, Lily,” Morgan snarled. “Okay, fine,” she said to me. She thumbed the safety off the weapon. “You asked for—”

There was a blur of motion, and then Clara was there, coldcocking Morgan right on the fucking chin.

She had to slow to human speed when she got close to Charlie, but she still managed to wrench both the Sig and the baby away from Morgan as the witch tumbled to the ground.

Charlie woke up with an annoyed squall, and I rushed forward and scooped her up, hugging her to my chest. “Wek!” she cried, because my name is tough to say when you’re not even two. I held out my hand, and Clara handed over the sidearm. I hit the button to release the magazine, letting it fall onto the floor.

“You couldn’t have come in a bit earlier?” I said to her.

“Safety was on,” she said with a shrug, and this time I heard the slight Eastern European accent. “I know guns. No danger with the safety on.”

“She had Charlie!”

“You heard her,” Clara contended. “No harm to baby. Baby was fine.”

Lily had gone over to check on John right away, which I appreciated. “He’s breathing,” she reported. “But his pulse is weak. He needs to be in a hospital.” She turned around to face her sister, but Morgan was already struggling to her feet. Her nose was pouring blood and she screamed in frustration. “You ruin
everything
!” she yelled at Lily. She took a step toward her little sister, and I moved backward, getting out of the way so Lily could back up.

To my surprise, though, Lily held her ground. In fact, she raised one hand and yelled something, and I saw the same saucepan that had been used to attack John go flying across the room to strike Morgan in the stomach, knocking her backward with such force that the older woman left a dent in the cupboard. Morgan’s eyes went huge with surprise. “How . . .” she gasped.

Lily’s smile was ice cold. “Apex magic.” She reached into her jacket pocket and held up the little journal that Simon had left in the Jeep. “I’d say you should try it sometime, but I’m not sure you’ll live that long.”

“Bang,” Charlie said happily.