Illicit Magic (33 page)

When I opened my eyes again, I was facing the bridge as I intended. I hoisted my bag up on my shoulder and curled the strap of it around my hand. I turned towards the town. Though I was too far to see the house, I didn’t dare look back in case I broke down. Everyone was now safe, and whatever help that had been offered had come and gone. They didn’t need me now. I caused them so much anguish and they all defended me until they couldn’t. The threat was gone and I hoped one day they would forgive me too.

It took me twenty minutes of walking to locate the car rental building that I glimpsed once before, on the day I drove past with Kitty. It was a small building, quite uninspiring but serviceable with a big placard on the front proclaiming “Jackson’s Nationwide Car Rental”. Inside, a pasty-faced clerk sat behind a desk that spanned the length of the office. He was chewing gum, his hair tipping forward over his forehead and brushing his collar at the back as he pored over a car magazine. He’d slung on a tie but the knot was too tight so the tails trailed limply on the desk.

I showed him my new license and asked for a small car, whatever he had. He tapped on his computer keyboard and told me there was a Toyota available, just filled up, quite new, but unremarkable and available all week I was to drop it off at any of their partner agencies. I agreed and as he went to the little room behind the desk to get me the keys, I muttered a little spell. As soon as I left, the computer would “lose” the information entered by the young clerk and when anyone thought to inquire, it would seem like a computer malfunction.

No one would be blamed. I paid for the car in cash for the whole week, even if I wasn’t sure I’d need it that long, and the car would be dropped off in exactly the same condition it was when I hired it. The spells I wove would ensure the clerk couldn’t quite give a description other than I was a “nice local gal”. If I was going to make a clean break of things, I had to start right now on my way out of town.

The clerk showed me out around the side of the building where the car was waiting in a small parking lot. He unlocked it for me and showed me the button to press on the keypad. I thanked him and threw my bag on the passenger side. He watched me with mild amusement as I assessed the automatic gears and worked out if my feet were hitting the right pedals before I fired up the engine and cautiously drove off the forecourt. Turning south, towards the highway that would take me out of town, I saw him give a half hearted wave from my rear view mirror. He would forget my face within minutes.

After a few miles, it occurred to me that I should have probably bought a map and some food while I was still in town so I pulled off at the next exit and found a gas station within a few blocks. I pulled into a parking bay, out of the way of the pumps, and locked the car. I bought a map, a big one covering the country and a smaller, local one for the state, along with a six pack of soft drinks, a chicken sandwich and some snacks to keep me going. Again, I paid cash, and again, the cashier would not recognise me if anyone happened to inquire about an English girl passing through.

I ate the tasteless sandwich in the car, with the engine off, and spread the map out across the wheel, marking off my route by pen. I wished I had thought to hire a navigation system that would just tell me where to aim the car. It probably would have signalled motels too, but
hasty exits don’t always come with the best laid plans
I reminded myself. I folded the map on the seat next to me on top of the blue box, which I patted absently with one hand, like it was a pet. After I ate my sandwich, I got out of the car to toss the wrapper in the trash can. Minutes later, I started up the engine and turned back onto the road, putting my pedal to the metal, as they say.

I knew where I was headed and felt glad that I had, at last, a home to go to. One that was truly my own and where I would, I hoped, be safe. It wasn’t the home I once dreamt about, where Evan and I would be cuddled on a porch together. Hell, I didn’t even know if it had four walls and roof but I did know that it had some significance to my parents once and there had been a lot of love between them, love that kept them together even in their last moments of life.

If anything was a recipe for starting over, that was it. It would, of course, be an absolute bonus if the house I was driving towards had walls and a roof because I wasn’t planning on adding “builder” to the list of things I could do. I also doubted my magic had any power when it came to a hammer and nails.

The thought of Evan set the waterworks going again and this time, barely forty miles out of town. I had to pull over to let the gasping, wracking sobs heave from me as I gripped the steering wheel like it was a life belt. I snivelled into my sleeves and wiped my eyes with the backs of my wrists as I wondered where the hell Étoile and Seren had taken him and whether he was still alive. I wondered if the pain in my body would ever lessen and since the pain was the last connection I’d had to him, would I even want it to? I forced my tears back down. If I let the great chasm of grief inside me – all that desperation and sadness and that awful aching need to have Evan with me – open up now, I would surely fall apart.

“Pull yourself together,” I sniffed, trying to make my voice stern and pep talk myself into business. “Put on the radio. Get back on the road.”

I twizzled the dial until I found a radio station that was playing something upbeat and fired the engine back up. I turned on my indicator, edging back onto what I still considered the wrong side of the road. I didn’t think I had any tears left in me which was just as well because with the mileage I was going to put in over the next few days, I wanted to be wide awake and alert.

I drove all day until I was tired enough to pull into a motel and sleep for a few hours. After a vending machine breakfast the next morning, I was back on the road and drove for several hours until I spotted the next large town. I circled until I could find another of the chain rental places. This one was next to a car dealership. I didn’t stop, but noted the location and drove on a little further.

My next objective was a bank. I withdrew a chunk of the cash in my account. It was no small sum and the teller was awkward about giving it to me, but she did so nevertheless and I stuffed it into my bag. I would work out what to do with it later, but right now all I could remember was Étoile’s warning that it was possible to track people electronically. I couldn’t afford to leave a trail for myself by using my bank cards.

I wasn’t sure I wanted to be found. I wanted a life. And until then I would be paying for everything by cash.

I drove back to the rental chain building, parked and took my bags out, one now loaded with cash. I went inside to return the keys and was quick to place my hand on the computer when the clerk wasn’t looking. He was surprised when the machine seemed to combust, little sparks exiting the monitor. I heard the computer fizzle angrily under the desk.

“Good job you paid already,” he said, giving the monitor a pointless slap, perplexed at the computer’s sudden demise.

“Absolutely,” I agreed, forcing a perky smile onto my face as I watched a news item run across the screen. “Three women have been found burned in New England towns with sinister messages left at the scenes” said the recap rolling across the screen. I felt my breath catch as a shiver spread through me and my smile faded.
The Brotherhood had made it to America, and the prognosis was surely not good.
Aware that the clerk was watching me, I thanked him for his time and hurried out.

I took a Greyhound bus for the next few hundred miles, partly doubling back on myself to confuse any potential followers, my bags safely stowed next to me in the seat. I slipped off at a large town and took a cab from the bus station to the nearest reputable car dealership, according to the cabbie.

I took an hour to circle the cars, asking a few questions from an eager middle-aged salesman and eventually bought a small car with some of the cash. It wasn’t new but it had low mileage and a good service history. I took the keys and paid them extra to fill the tank.

I drove for the rest of that day, the cash tucked away in my bag. By the evening, I was familiar with the new car, had tuned the radio, and adjusted the seat until it felt comfortable to me. It had a CD player and I reminded myself to get some CDs to stash in the glove box. It was the first time I’d ever owned a car and it seemed exciting that I could just point and go as I desired. Even driving on “the wrong side” was starting to feel natural with practice.

It took me a day longer than I estimated to get to my destination. That was partly my fault for missing a couple of exit signs and driving further than I had to only to double back. I slept in little motels in towns that were only names on a map. They were comfortable, unremarkable but safe and I could shower and rest. I ate from service stations and fast food places. By the third day, my body started to hate junk. I craved fruit and had to circle around to find a market to buy a bag of apples. I stopped off to eat one in the pretty town square with an immaculate lawn and flower beds, flanked by shops painted every shade of pastel. There was a gazebo in the middle and they seemed to be holding some sort of fete. It was pretty and genteel and I hoped the residents were happy there before I slid back into the driver’s seat and left as quickly as I had arrived. As per usual, no one remembered me as soon as I was gone and that was how I wanted it to be.

I knew I hit the small town of Wilding before I had consulted the map or spotted a sign. There was something about the town that enveloped me the instant I drove into the town limits.

I had to pull over a couple of times and try and guess where I was and eventually, with the lack of landmarks, I just gave up and drove into town. I parked outside a diner on what seemed to be the main street of the attractive town. It had an old world feel to it with its hand-painted shop signs and storefronts. It was past the lunch hour inside and the waitress was hovering by the counter, chewing on a pencil, while she watched the last of the straggling diners. She took one look at me and the address I had scrawled on a piece of notepaper and pursed her lips in thought for a moment before writing down some directions on a napkin.

“Not many people head out that way, honey,” she drawled, tucking a piece of bleached blonde hair behind her ear. Her embroidered name plate read “Darla.” “It’s not a big residential area.”

“But this house is there?” I replied, checking the address again and Darla’s directions.

“Well sure it is, honey, or I couldn’t have told you where it was, and real pretty it is too. And there’s another one right across the street, but that’s all.” Darla flicked a finger at my notepaper. “What you doing, going out there?”

“I might be living there.”

“There’s a lot more nicer places in town, you know. With bars and shops and stuff a pretty girl like you needs. You bought that place? You could probably get a good price for it. I hear it comes with some land.”

I smiled at her. “I best check it out first.”

“Sure, honey, you do that. You come on back soon and tell me how you like it.”

I nodded and stuffed a couple of small bills in the tips jar Darla had sitting on the counter, seeing as I hadn’t ordered anything and she hadn’t insisted on forcing a menu on me. When I got back to the car I almost regretted not taking a seat at the counter and getting something to eat, but I was hungrier to see the house. I drove away from the route I’d taken in and followed Darla’s directions back out of town.

Being on the smaller side of towns, it wasn’t complicated to follow her directions and I was on the right road in minutes. I passed through town and followed the tree-lined street past the occasional house and a building that I guessed was a bar with several cars parked outside. The boarding spread across the building read “Loup Garou”. I would have to look that up, I thought, storing the unfamiliar words away in my mind as I turned my eyes back to the road.

My parents’ house was exactly where Darla said it would be and was, as she said, real pretty too. With no cars in the vicinity, I didn’t bother with the turn signal, but drove off the tarmac onto the dirt drive that curved towards the house.

The house was set at a right angle to the road with a carport off to one side but I parked right in front. It was a ranch house with white clapboard, just one storey high and a wide porch with spindle rails and four steps leading up to it. The front door and windows either side looked out over a large, neatly kept lawn and the porch seemed to have been swept recently. The only tyre prints on the drive came from my own newly purchased car. I wondered what it would be like to marry, or raise a family there, and the pain cut through me like a knife as I shoved the memories of Evan firmly into a corner of my mind.
If he lived, I would find him one day.
I clung to the idea like a security blanket.

I unclipped my seatbelt and rummaged in the blue box for the small envelope that held the key, then, leaving everything else inside, I stepped out to look around.

The afternoon sun was high in the sky and I held a hand like a visor over my face. I breathed in the fresh air, which carried with it the scent of grass and pine. Something in the atmosphere tugged at my psyche.

About a hundred yards away, and across the road, stood another house. It was similar to this but with a second storey and situated so as to face the road. There were a couple of chairs parked on the porch, one rocking slightly in the breeze and some tubs of greenery. A wind chime hung from the porch rafters that tinkled in the gentle breeze and the sound made me smile. Parked furthest from the house was a truck, a small blue car next to it and then, a little way back, the shiniest motorcycle I had ever seen. That house was clearly occupied and I wondered if it had been they who swept this porch and kept the lawn tidy. As I watched, a man sat up in one of the chairs. He looked at me for a long moment before raising a hand. I waved back.

I turned from the neighbouring house, walked around the car and skipped up the steps and paused.
I could feel the magic
. I could sense it more decisively here, but just as I began to wonder about it, I felt the magic flitter around, recognise me then recede and fade until it had gone. Instinctively, I understood.