Darkmoon (The Witches of Cleopatra Hill Book 3) (10 page)

I realized then that these must be some of those rogue warlocks Connor had told me about on the drive here to California, the ones who had been turned away from relocating in the Phoenix area. Obviously they had no love lost for Maya de la Paz. And although there had been a few other cars parked here when we got out to head into the restaurant, they all seemed to have disappeared. There was no one around to intervene.

Then again, Connor and I weren’t exactly helpless. After all, we’d defeated a skin-walker.

“I really think you’d better step aside,” I said, making sure my voice sounded cool, confident. “I don’t think you know who you’re dealing with here.” Even as I spoke, I could feel the
prima
energy beginning to uncoil in me, warmth without heat, the power flowing through every limb.

And somehow Connor seemed able to sense it, too. He reached out to take my hand, and it was as if a spark ignited between us, one that had nothing to do with passion and everything to do with power. Never before had a
prima
and a
primus
been able to work together in harmony, and I wasn’t sure what that meant.

I had a feeling we were all about to find out, though.

The lead warlock laughed. “Yeah? And who are you,
puta
?”

“No one you want to fuck with,” Connor said. His fingers tightened on mine, and the power flared in me, searing without burning, coiled, ready…eager.

“Fuck that shit,” the warlock said, raising his own hand.

Of course I had no idea what his power might be, and I wasn’t going to wait to find out. An unspoken signal passed between us, and Connor and I lifted our hands, fingers still intertwined. The energy crackled all through my body, surging through my arm, moving away from me.

A wall of white light seemed to blast outward from where Connor and I stood. It hit the group of young men, crashing into them like a tidal wave into a pier. They were all knocked backward a good five yards or more, and went sprawling on the sidewalk, their bodies limp and unmoving.

Heart pounding, I looked up at Connor. “Are they…?”

“I don’t know,” he said with grim indifference. “And I don’t much care. Let’s get to the car before anyone comes to find out.”

I decided I didn’t really want to argue. After all, they were the ones who’d initiated the confrontation. We hurried to the Cherokee, which appeared completely unaffected by that magical shockwave, and climbed in, Connor gunning the engine and peeling away from the curb before I even had a chance to fasten my seatbelt.

It wasn’t until we were moving up the main street that would take us back to the interstate that I turned to him.

“What,” I asked, “the hell was
that
?”

He could only lift his shoulders in reply.

W
e pulled
into Scottsdale a little after six. The place was still baking — the thermometer on the dashboard indicated it was a hundred and three degrees outside — and I stared moodily out the window as we wound our way along wide streets planted with cactus in the dividers. Palm trees loomed overhead. Everything was extremely manicured, very neat. Not the sort of place you’d expect to find the head of the local witch clan, but then again, I was coming to realize that perhaps the bohemian McAllisters weren’t the norm in the witching world.

Connor took out his phone and made a brief call, saying we’d be there in about five more minutes. “She’s expecting us.”

Of course she was. I wondered what she might have to say about Connor’s and my latest display of power. “Are we going to tell her?”

“Tell her what?”

“About Indio.”

For a few seconds he didn’t say anything, only kept his gaze fixed on the street, eyes hidden behind his sunglasses. “Should we?”

“I think — I think yeah, we should. Maybe she’ll have some insights.”

“Or maybe it’s better that she not know the extent of our powers.”

“Now you sound like a Wilcox,” I said, annoyed.

The barb hit home, I could tell. His gaze flickered toward me briefly before returning to the road. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Just that you tend to be a little paranoid. I meant that as the general ‘you,’” I added, when I saw his lips begin to compress. “Maya de la Paz has been nothing but helpful, and you know it. She has her own kingdom down here, so to speak. She certainly doesn’t have any designs on McAllister or Wilcox territory. So why not take advantage of her age and experience and see if she has any advice to offer?”

At those words, his expression relaxed somewhat. After a brief pause, he replied, “You’re right, of course. Sorry. All those years with Damon….” He let the words die away, but I thought I knew what he meant. Growing up with Damon Wilcox as your older brother would make even the saintliest person suspicious of everyone’s motives.

I nodded but didn’t say anything else. Just as well, because we pulled over then, coming to a stop in front of a sprawling Santa Fe–style adobe house with stately saguaro cacti planted in the front yard, along with several varieties of lower, more sprawling succulents blooming in vivid hues of yellow and hot pink. I undid my seatbelt and got out, glad of the chance to stretch my legs at last.

The heat hit me like a wall, though, feeling almost like a physical weight on my chest. True, I’d been to the Phoenix area several times before, but those McAllister expeditions always happened sometime between November and March, either after the endless scorching summer or before it had a chance to begin. Not that we didn’t get hot in Jerome in the summer, but not like this.

Connor seemed singularly unaffected by the heat, though, moving smoothly around the rear of the SUV to join me on the sidewalk.

“How come you’re not even breaking a sweat, Flagstaff boy?” I asked as we headed up the front walk.

“I lived down here for four years, remember? I’m used to it.” He paused and amended, “Well, used to be used to it. I’ll admit that I don’t miss the heat too much, now that I’m back in Flag, but I can live with it.”

I didn’t know why anyone would want to, but I just shrugged, reaching out to push the doorbell. About a minute later, a tall young man around Connor’s age appeared at the door.

“Come on in,” he said. “She’s expecting you.”

The enormous door of carefully aged wood, banded in black iron, didn’t open onto an entryway as I’d expected, but rather a large courtyard laid with red sandstone flags. A fountain splashed into the hot, still air, and vivid flowers bloomed from hanging containers of brightly painted Mexican pottery.

We followed the young man — who I thought I recognized as one of the “bodyguards” Maya had brought with her to Connor’s gallery opening in Sedona — through the courtyard and on through a second, equally enormous door into a high-ceilinged foyer. In here the air was cool and friendly, obviously the product of a very hard-working air-conditioning system. From the entry, we went into a large living room decorated with heavy hacienda-style furniture. Faded Persian rugs covered the red-tiled floor.

Maya rose from one of the leather couches and came toward us, hands outstretched. “Connor, Angela, so good to see you…together.”

From her emphasis on the last word, I gathered that she’d known about our separation. Who exactly had been her informant, I didn’t know, although I had a feeling it was probably someone in the McAllister camp and not the Wilcox clan. “Thank you for letting us stop by,” I said, not wanting to jump right into Connor’s and my relationship status.

“It’s no problem, and not too much out of the way for you, I hope.”

“No, not at all,” Connor said. “We’ll just get on the 101 Loop and head home from here.”

“Ah,” she replied, dark eyes twinkling. “And where exactly
is
home for you two?”

Trust Maya de la Paz to get right to the heart of the matter. But I wasn’t going to let her distract me from the true reason for our visit. “Jerome, Flagstaff,” I said shortly. “You know. Actually, though, Maya, I wanted to ask you something.”

“And it must be important, or you could’ve simply asked on the phone, rather than driving all the way here. Ah, here are the refreshments,” she put in, smiling as the young man returned with a silver tray laden with a pitcher of lemonade and three heavy hand-blown glasses, rims tinted cobalt blue. “I thought you might be thirsty after your long drive.”

“Thanks, Maya,” Connor said, reaching out for one of the glasses and handing it to me, then taking one for himself.

“It’s nothing. I’d invite you to stay for supper as well, but I can tell from the look in Angela’s eye that she’s on a mission, and will want to be on the road once your business here is finished.” Her dark gaze sharpened, even as she took a sip of her lemonade. Setting the glass down on a sandstone coaster, she asked, “And did you find what you were looking for in California?”

“Sort of,” I hedged. Yes, I’d lectured Connor about being truthful and not hiding things, but now, with Maya’s shrewd eyes studying my face, I wondered how much I should really tell her. After all, this was Wilcox and McAllister business. The de la Paz clan really had no stake in this game. Then again, we probably wouldn’t have even been able to go to California if Maya hadn’t put in a word for us with the Santiago family there. Beside me, I could feel Connor shift, hear the leather squeak faintly under his weight, and I could tell he was waiting, too, wondering how much I planned to reveal.

Well, nothing for it. The story would get out sooner or later.

“I found out my father is a Wilcox,” I said boldly.

That did seem to surprise her; she blinked, and the strong black brows — unmarked by gray — lifted slightly before she replied, “Indeed? Well, that does put a different…perspective…on things.”

“Just a little,” I remarked, my tone wry. “And I was thinking — well, hoping, I guess — that you might know what happened to him.”

“Why on earth would I know that?”

She’d replied coolly, with only a hint of question in her voice, and so it was difficult for me to gauge whether she really didn’t know anything or whether she was stalling me for some reason. “Well, Connor told me on the drive that a while back you’d taken in some refugee witches and warlocks from California, and so I thought maybe….” I let the words trail off as she continued to stare at me blankly. Then her mouth, still full and pretty, twitched a little.

“Oh, my dear, that was only a few years ago.”

“I know, but — ”

“That was the first time I allowed anything like that,” she cut in, the interruption so gentle that I couldn’t really be upset by it. “And — no offense to you, Connor — while I did allow Connor to have a residence here for a few years while he was going to school, there is no way I would allow a Wilcox to live in my territory permanently.”

“Maybe you wouldn’t have even known he was a Wilcox,” I said, desperation beginning to seep into my voice. “He was using the last name of Williams at the time. Andre Williams.”

She shook her head. “My dear, I would have known he was a Wilcox at once. I’ve been
prima
of this clan for more than thirty years. There isn’t much that gets past me.”

No, I supposed there wasn’t.

Connor laid a hand on mine. Just that gentle pressure made me feel a little better, even though it couldn’t erase all my frustration. “And would you know if a Wilcox passed through your territory, even if he didn’t stop and ask to stay?” he inquired.

“Of course. I could sense when you were here in the valley, although your presence was not at all disruptive. It was more like…a small blip on a radar screen, I suppose. And much stronger when your brother came here last November.” She paused then, a small frown tugging at her brows. “Now that I think of it, there might have been something, many, many years ago.”

“Long enough ago that I would have still been a baby?” I asked eagerly. If Maya had sensed my father moving through her territory, at least it would tell me that he had come back to Arizona after leaving California.

“It might have been around then.” Another hesitation, one she attempted to mask by picking up her lemonade and drinking some more of it. Then she went on, “I reached out to some of my clan members, our defenders, to investigate, but whoever it was, they were gone from our territory before we could catch up with them. And since pursuing someone beyond the borders of our clan lands is not something we would ever do, we let the matter go.”

Maybe it had been Andre — my father — driving through Phoenix and its bordering communities as quickly as he could, knowing he didn’t have a lot of time before the de la Paz contingent figured out he was there. A speeding ticket would probably be preferable to getting caught by a group of hostile witches and warlocks. In my mind I saw him racketing down the highway in a beat-up Jeep, black hair blowing in the wind. Silly, I supposed; that Jeep of his could have been brand new back then, and of course I had no idea whether he cut his hair short or wore it long.

“Heading north?” I asked.

“I don’t recall. Probably.” She set down her tea and made an odd little wave with her hand — a gesture of frustration, maybe. “At the time I was just glad that I did not have to force a confrontation. Your brother, Connor, was difficult enough to deal with, but your father…no.”

Of course. This had been so long ago that Jackson Wilcox would have still been in charge of that clan. Damon would have only been a kid in junior high.

But I didn’t like to think about that, because pondering Damon’s past only made me realize he’d been a boy once, full of his own hopes and dreams for the future, before the dark fate hanging over his clan had twisted him into the man he became. A man who should have been in the prime of his life, and was now dead.

Something very like the first beginnings of tears seemed to tighten my throat, and I swallowed. I couldn’t possibly be weeping over Damon Wilcox, could I? I could blame my emotions on pregnancy hormones, but I thought there was more to it than that.

Maybe I was just worried about what would happen to Connor if he lost me to the curse. Would he pick up his life and move on, focus on raising his child, or would he succumb to the same black plotting that had taken over Damon’s life?