Inherit (19 page)

I contract the
boble
slightly, and slide my cheek past his, wrap my arms around his chest and hold him tight, my arms tucked under the sides of his jacket. I hug him tighter than I’ve been able to hug Bestemor, tighter than I’ve wanted to hold my mother, tighter than I’ve been willing to hug Vee since I started to loosen my hold on her to make room for Zivalus. I fist my hands into his shirt like I’m lost at sea and he’s the driftwood that’s keeping me afloat.

Just when I’m about to sink right into him, Jonas raises one hand and presses firmly on the walls of the
boble
, gently bursting the aura of romance I worked so hard to blanket us in. The rush of noise and cool air shocks me enough that I break my hold. I make a valiant attempt not to actually glow with the red-hot embarrassment that rages through me.

“Sushi?” He vice-grips the steering wheel and stares straight ahead.

I brush my hair back with my fingers and paste on a big, phony smile. “Let’s do it.” I muster as much courage I can. I’m in the mood for comfort and maybe romance, and I can’t imagine getting either one of those things with raw fish.

Chapter 19

I sneak glances of Jonas behind the slick menu pages and swallow around the lump of regret pinching the pit of my throat, scratchy and painful as an awkwardly swallowed-and-stuck Halls cough-drop. He was all over me and willing a few weeks ago, and I was the one pulling away. Now, when he’s the only person who can possibly understand what I’m going through and the only person I want for any comfort, all he’s interested in is introducing me to the raw fish cuisine of my ancestors.

“We should start with cooked stuff.” He squints at the tiny letters on the menu.

“I thought sushi meant raw fish.”

“It’s a shame how little you know about sushi.” He slides a pair of glasses out of his jacket pocket. They’re wire-rimmed and rectangular, and when he puts them on, I wonder if I’ve ever noticed him wearing them before. He looks so different, it reminds me of the time Vee and I bought bright red bobbed wigs and wore them all day with matching boas, just to feel a little fabulous. He flicks his eyes up and registers my unasked question. “I’m farsighted. I usually wear contacts. I know it’s a pretty geeky look.”

“I think the geeky mechanic look is hot.” I flip him a smile across the table and he tosses a big one back.

“You like eel?” His words slip and slide in my ears.

I lean across the table and pull a frown. “Eel?”

He waves his hand back and forth, like a fish swimming in the ocean. “Eel. Long fish that look like snakes.”

“Was that description an attempt to make me want to eat one? Because it’s really not working.” I narrow my eyes and pucker my mouth.

When he smiles his glasses move up a little on his face. “They’re actually a lot more appetizing if you forget they’re scary-looking snake fish.”

I throw my hands up. “Ugh. No more talking about this. You’re making me lose my nerve. Why don’t you just order whatever you think? I have no opinion yet, so it’s up to you to sway me to the raw side.”

“Cooked,” he reminds me. “I want to go slow so you’ll actually want to eat sushi with me again.”

The English tutor in me perks at his use of the prepositional phrase
with me
. He could very easily have left that small phrase out, but he didn’t. I’m trying not to give it too much weight, but my spine tingles as he orders something called unagi, California rolls, ebi and some things off the tempura menu, which he promises will be delicious.

The waitress brings out this long wooden platter piled with bite-sized rolls of fish, rice, seaweed, eel, shrimp, and little fried somethings.

“What is it all?” I point to a pretty little seafood-bound-with-seaweed-on-rice thing.

Jonas shakes his head. “No way. You’ll be prejudiced if I identify them for you. Just tell me what you like the taste of.” He snaps the chopsticks apart and waves them around like he was born with chopstick prosthetics, scoops up a circular-looking something made with rice and seaweed, dabs some green stuff on it, puts a little piece of a pink petal-looking vegetable on top and holds it across the table.

I lean over and open my mouth, and in drops the most amazing mix of tastes and textures my tongue and teeth have ever encountered. There’s something crisp and watery, the chewy, fluffy rice, a little buttery something, the sweet tang of crab and then a strange tingle that makes my nose burn and brings out the subtle sweetness of the roll. My entire mouth sparks alive and salivates for more.

“What do you think?” Jonas asks.

I wave my hand in front of my face because I think I might pass out from taste-bud overstimulation. “I think I must be dead, and this must be heaven.”

His eyes crinkle at the corners behind the wire rims of his glasses. “Glad you said that, because you have no idea what you’re talking about yet. Open.”

I know that we are going out as just friends, and I respect the fact that Jonas doesn’t want to bring yet another shieldmaiden into his life. But it would be so much easier to concentrate on our non-relationship if he didn’t feed me the food of the gods, help me master chopsticks with an actual smidge of elegance, and sneak little heart-stopping smiles and looks my way across the table. How could any reasonable girl resist swooning?

Before I can begin to really and truly curse my crappy lack of romantic luck, our evening is interrupted by the irritating wiles of a pink-haired witch. My ears roar like I’m next to the ocean, and I want to grab her by her perfect golden shoulders and shake her until she tells me where Loki is and what she did to my grandmother. But I know no good will come of that, so I keep still and wait for her to screw up. I’m more powerful than she thinks now, and I’ll be happy to strike, cobra style, when she least expects it.

“Jonas, what is a sexy young magus like yourself doing with this little whiner?” She flutters her big, purple-contact-covered eyes and flicks her French manicured fingers so close, I wish I had Mr. Miyagi dexterity and could snap her with my chopsticks. Unfortunately, I can barely keep them in my fingers without catapulting them across the table.

“I’d hardly call one of the most advanced shieldmaidens in our coven a whiner. And I’m no magus.” He slides his glasses off of his face and tucks them back in the pocket of his jacket, and I’m sad to see the secret Jonas hidden again. I wish my shieldmaiden talents ran along the line of shooting fireballs instead of making shields, because Sakura would be flambé right now.

“What’s a magus?” I ask Jonas.

“Is there anything you
do
know?” Sakura snickers.

“A male witch. A helpmate of the shiledmaidens. And not me.” Jonas addresses his chopsticks and the small smear of wasabi left on his plate instead of me.

“You can’t deny what you are forever, Jonas. One day you’ll have to give up being a good, hardworking,
boring
everyman and accept your true power. When that day comes, I’ll be happy to talk to you about what it feels like to embrace who you really are.” She smiles hypnotically, like those pyramid-scheme gurus who fleece huge audiences of shaking, crying proclaimers.

“Don’t you have someone else to irritate to no end, cuz?” I clutch the chopsticks in my fist so hard they break in half.

“Why would I irritate anyone else in the whole world when you’re such an easy target?” Sakura pops a hip on our table. “So here’s the deal, sweetie. I’m having some…issues. And I hear you are, too. Bestemor just hasn’t been herself lately?”

I jump up, rattling the table, broken chopsticks brandished like weapons I’m not remotely afraid to use. “Where the hell is Loki and what did you do to Bestemor? Tell me!” So much for keeping my cool. Sakura knows exactly how to wriggle under my skin.

“Loki is being cared for the way that’s appropriate for the Kochi family’s highly valued kitsune.” A triumphant smile spreads over Sakura’s perfectly pinked lips. “And Bestemor will be just fine again, once you learn to work with me instead of standing in my way.”

I’ve never had such a powerful urge to spit in someone’s face. “You promised you wouldn’t hurt Bestemor if you got Loki. You promised you’d leave her healthy. Now you have Loki and Bestemor can barely get out of bed. What more do you want?”

“I wanted Kaji for the family, to bring pride to the Kochi name once more after your father disgraced us!” Her cold calculations are all tearing apart at the seams. She’s so furious, her violet eyes bulge and she bares her teeth like a junkyard dog.

“What did my father do?” I toss the chopstick fragments on the plate, and they mirror how I feel; broken, useless, splintered. “I don’t know anything about him, so you tell me. What did he do?”

“He’s your father. You ask him.” She shakes her head. “Honor means nothing to you people. Family means nothing to you people. Yet Sofu was going to trust our most valued kitsune to you. For what? You never even contacted him. You never even paid him the respect he deserves. You treated Kaji like a lowly pet.” The gold of her eyes makes a halo behind the purple contacts. “I need her. And she needs you. I thought I could do this without you, but I can’t, so we need to make peace, no matter how rude and stupid you are.”

“Make peace?” I snort. “I’m getting Loki back, Bestemor will get better, and I’m sending your skinny ass back to Japan and out of my life!” That last sentence comes out slightly louder and shriller than I meant it to.

Jonas jumps up and stands his full, towering, lumberjack height and tries to nudge us out of the restaurant. From the corner of my eye, I see the manager and the hostess tripping over each other to get to us. Jonas drops a few bills on the table, and we make a straight, fast line for the door.

There’s a guy on a silver crotch-rocket waiting in the parking lot. Sakura swings her leg over the bike and stares me down. “I’ll be in touch. If you want your grandmother to get better and your mother to leave, I’d advise you to work something out with me.”

They peel out and Jonas and I follow before the owner manages to take us to the back by our ears and make us wash dishes, or whatever they do to disruptive dinner guests.

“Your cousin is crazy,” Jonas growls.

When I look at the speedometer, I’m shocked Jonas is doing the limit exactly. It feels like we’re speeding. I think it might be that he’s so keyed up, it feels like we must be hurtling down the road.

“Last time you gave your opinion about my cousin, you were going on and on about how pretty she is.” I look at him sidelong.

“Very pretty. And very crazy.” He never takes his eyes off the road. “She can’t control Loki.”

“I gathered that. If she thinks I’m going to help her, she’s insane. Especially after what she did to Bestemor. I wonder how she did it. That’s the thing that makes no sense at all. She was raised by people who not only believe and love all this stuff, they practice it all the time. She knows a ton more than I do. So why does she need me? Why can’t she control Loki herself?”

“I think it has to do with the fact that you’re a stronger being than she is. And it could have to do with your mixed blood. If your other shields are half as powerful as the
boble
you made in the truck for me, it’s possible you’ve locked access to Loki’s powers just by bonding with her.” His fingers drum on the steering wheel. “Also, don’t get upset about this, okay?”

Why is it that the moment someone asks you that, you always get instantly upset.

“Your grandma might just be getting older. I’m not saying Sakura didn’t do something. But she might’ve also just seen a weakness in your armor. She knows how much you love Bestemor, and she knows how ill she’s been.” He glances over with a quick, nervous look.

I’m not hearing this. I’m not. If Bestemor is under a spell, I can break it. If Bestemor is just getting ill, getting older? I can’t even finish that thought. “Look, I’d rather just focus on trying to help do what I can for her. If I’m wrong, fine. But I need to try.”

I say ‘fine,’ but I can’t even contemplate what it means if I’m wrong.

“Alight.” He nods and holds his mouth tight, like he’s telling himself not to argue with me.

I soak in the jagged lines of his profile, the wide set of his shoulders, the sure flex of his hands on the steering wheel. Jonas radiates power. Otherworldly power. “You know a lot about this. Sakura called you a magus like it’s a fact.”

Jonas takes a long, steady breath in through his nose and blows it out of his mouth. “Let’s not go there.”

“Let’s,” I counter. “Look, you were the one who was spying on me all those years for your gram. You helped me find Loki when she was lost. You helped Bestemor, you saved me in gym class, took me to your aunt. If you didn’t want to go there with me, maybe you should have turned tail when you had the chance.”

“I knew I should have stayed away from all this,” he mutters.

“Okay, then you should have. But you didn’t. You made that decision, not me. So help me now, Jonas. If you can help me, I need you. I need all the help I can get.” I feel my throat tighten when I think about the stakes. “Even if I was too proud to ask, I’ll do anything for Bestemor. Anything. Please.”

“I want to help you. I do. It’s just that I’ve been there before, and it’s happening now with all kinds of paranormal powers. We’re entering into this new age, this new time when people are ignoring pretty ancient rules, intersecting with different kinds of magical cultures. People like you, mixed magic people, have the potential for incredible power, but it’s dangerous. It can suck you in. And sometimes it gets to be like an obsession, okay? Maybe Bestemor can be helped. But if she can’t, if this is just the course of her natural life, you have to know your own limits, alright? Otherwise you risk destroying yourself because you’re pushing too hard for an answer.”

My one possible ally is ditching me. “I get it. It’s a huge thing for me to ask you. I didn’t mean to put you on the spot.”

“That’s not it at all.” His voice is tired. “I just want you to understand what you might get pulled into. It can get bigger than you’d imagine before you know what the hell’s happening. And it can be really dangerous. And destructive.”