The Accidental Familiar (Accidentally Paranormal Series Book 14) (18 page)

“That entire waste of a tree is about me?”

She grinned, pointing to the highlights of his life’s history in one paragraph. “
Si, señor
Ricardo Delassantos—who, by the way, was born in a small town in Mexico to Delfina and Eduarte Delassantos—moved to America with his parents when he was just a year old. Broke his leg when he was eight after jumping off a swing in the park, attended Kendall High School, was voted best all-around athlete, and graduated with high honors.”

His face said he was impressed. “Absolutely true.”

“Went on to attend Princeton University, where Mr. Fancy-Schmancy worked his way through school by slinging hash at a local diner and working for a moving company. Graduated with a degree in engineering, loves vintage cars, dabbling in the stock market, and ice hockey. Some of his favorite things are: horror movies, hot dogs, chocolate fudge brownie ice cream, pears, animals of all kinds and the color red.”

Rick grinned, the deep grooves on either side of his face flashing as he reached over her arm and tapped the papers again. “All very accurate. Though, I waffle between red and blue.”

“Wait, it also says you like Brussels sprouts—as in, you eat them, willingly?”

He chuckled, leaning his arm on the back of the couch so close to her shoulders, she almost couldn’t think. “With relish. I mean, not actual relish, but you know. I dig a good Brussels sprout.”

Poppy made a gagging noise and wrinkled her nose. “Ick. Though, I admit, I love sardines.”

Now Rick made a gagging noise with an exaggerated shiver. “Fish in a can is disgusting.”

Laughing, she said, “So it also says you worked your way through Princeton? Who does that and doesn’t die from sleep deprivation?”

He winked, absently twisting a strand of her hair around his index finger. “This guy. I’m not saying it was easy, and I did get a partial scholarship, which helped, but it’s where I always wanted to go to college. So I made it a priority.”

“A man with a goal. I admire that.” And she did. Anyone who stuck out more schooling after graduation was a saint as far as she was concerned.

“You had a goal, too. A goal you’re still working toward.”

Poppy snorted, making a face. “That’s really generous of you, but I think my goal was a little less realistic than yours. Or a lot. The chances of me becoming a huge star have narrowed to nil at this point. Plus, look at me, then look at you. We can hardly compare the two. I’m thirty-four, and I have nothing. You’re thirty-five, and you have everything.”
Everything.

He leaned back, the red shirt he wore gaping at the throat to reveal his smooth chest. “Everything is subjective. I have a lot of work to fill my days, but not a lot else.”

“You do work a lot. You could certainly use some balance. Like the occasional party or two.”

“I think Avis has that covered for the both of us,” he joked, and there was no malice to his words.

His words were fond, and that made her squirm. She’d
bet
Avis had it covered. Scumbag…

“So you met Avis at Princeton, right?”

“Yep. He was an exchange student from London. We hit it off from day one.”

“What? Like in polo class or something?”

Ugh. His loyalty to Avis troubled her deeply. Something in her wanted to scream, “He’s a fraud!” but she had no proof to back that up, and if she was to get to know Rick, she had to know and accept everyone in his life, too, until she had some kind of proof her intuition wasn’t just a fluky result of becoming a familiar.

Rick barked his laughter. “Not exactly. More like English Lit, and he was way better than I ever was at that class. Our professor was one tough dude, but Avis charmed the stodgy right out of him.”

“So was it some crazy coincidence you ended up finding another warlock at a place like Princeton?”

“I’m pretty sure it wasn’t a coincidence. The powers that be are good at putting our kind together to keep us with others who are like us.”

Like us.
He’d said that with vague disdain. She needed to find out what his dislike of magic was about. What had happened to make him so bitter? She didn’t want to read about it, she wanted him to share. His hatred of magic was part of what made him tick, and she wanted to understand.

“So does Avis hate magic like you, too? Did you bond over that?”

“Nope. Avis is all about the magic. He’d love it if we were able to do more. But as you know, our female counterparts are the real warriors in our world.”

Poppy grinned harder. “Ah, and you say that without malice. I like it.”

“It’s how we’re raised from birth.”

“So Avis enjoys the use of his magic?”

“Almost to his detriment and it always involves a woman. Though, in his defense, when he came to Princeton, he’d been hurt pretty bad by a relationship.”

Maybe this was a lead to why she was so turned off by Avis. Maybe it was nothing more than he was a womanizer. “Interesting. What happened?”

“He’s never really talked about it much, other than saying someone he loved deeply burned him.”

Rolling her eyes, she wrinkled her nose at Rick. “I’m so surprised you never talked about it. Men.”

“It’s just not how we roll,
bonita
.”

The word
bonita
reminded her of his very light, only occasionally detectable accent. “So you came from Mexico with your parents at a year old. Yet, you still have a hint of an accent.”

He bobbed his head, his dark hair falling toward his chin. “Though both of my parents spoke English fluently, they encouraged me to speak Spanish at home. I think it sort of stuck with me. It reminds me of them, I guess. It gets thicker when I curse in Spanish.”

His parents, both deceased; felt like a sore subject. Maybe one best left for another getting-to-know-you session. They were in a nice, noncombative place right now, and while she was all for pushing him to open up to her, she wasn’t for pushing him over the ledge.

Instead, Poppy asked the question burning on the tip of her tongue ever since she’d picked up the Rick Manual. “So it says here Yash was the name of your last familiar. Mind if I ask what happened?”

Because he hadn’t said a word about any other familiar in his life. In fact, she hadn’t even thought about asking if he’d had others.

But this Yash was listed as his familiar since Rick was a child. He was her predecessor. Surely he had something to say about him?

Yet, that was the moment Rick tensed up, his body language changing in the blink of an eye as his fingers tightened in a clenched fist and his jaw hardened. “I don’t mind if you ask, I’m just not ready to answer.”

Oh, okay. Here it came. That close-mouthed, withdrawn, I-can’t-go-there-just-yet shtick. She braced herself when she said, “Look, we can keep things as superficial as you’d like, I guess. We can talk about your love of heinous little balls of green puke. We can talk about Princeton. We can talk about ’56 Chevys. But we can’t really understand each other, really get to a place where I understand your reactions and motivations, if you don’t divulge.”

Instead of loosening up, he became more rigid and unyielding, letting go of the strand of her hair he’d been playfully twisting around his finger and sitting back against the couch.

“Yash is a closed subject.”

As Poppy was about to get more insistent, the doorbell to the shed rang, startling her.

“Got it!” Nina bellowed, her husky voice ringing through the small living room.

As they both sat in tense silence, Poppy simmering and Rick clamping his lips up tighter than if a vise had been slapped on his mouth, Marty, Wanda, Carl, and Calamity were all sound and motion, welcoming someone inside.

A pretty woman with round glasses, her chestnut hair in a fishtail braid over her right shoulder, held out her hand to Poppy. “Hi, Poppy. Sorry it took me so long to get here, but as you know, blood moon prep is upon us. Some patients are more freaked out than others. Anyway, I’m January Malone. A therapist and a witch.” She followed her introduction with a smile, making her pretty face even prettier.

Poppy hopped up and took her hand, smiling in return. “You’re the person who referees between these two, right? Where’s your headgear?”

January grinned, crossing her arms over her chest, the sparkle of her wedding ring offset by the purple sweater she wore. “I left it in the car,” she said on a chuckle but then her nose wrinkled. “Calamity?”

“Yeah, Doc?”

“You smell that?”

Calamity circled January’s ballet-slippered feet. “Pizza. I smell pizza. With anchovies. Did you and Mr. Doctor have pizza for dinner?”

Bending at the waist, the doctor scooped up Calamity and tipped her chin. “Mr. Doctor doesn’t eat food, remember? And that’s not what I mean. Sniff Poppy.” Holding the cat up, she put her directly in front of Poppy.

Calamity took a deep whiff, her whiskers tickling Poppy’s face. “Ooooh. Aw, yeah. Damn, Doc. That’s what I was afraid of. It ain’t good at all. I was hoping I was wrong, but Rick smelled it the other night, too. So we called you to be sure.”

Panic began to swirl in Poppy’s belly as she looked from January to Calamity and their stricken faces. “What?”

January set Calamity down and took Poppy’s hand. “Why don’t we sit?”

Rick, who had risen when January entered, stuck his hand out. “Rick Delassantos. Pleasure to meet you.”

January took it and gave it a firm shake then turned her gaze back to Poppy. “Can we sit?”

But Poppy shook her head, jamming her hands into the pockets of her jeans. “Nope. Just hit me with it. I can take it.”

Nina gave her a thump on the shoulder as Carl grabbed her hand with his stiff one and tucked her near. “Sit, kiddo. Don’t be a fucking hero.”

Now her stomach twisted into a knot so tight, she thought her belly might explode. “Just say it.”

January put a hand on her shoulder and squeezed as she looked her straight in the eye. “You’re surrounded by hatred right now.”

Hatred? Her chest grew tight as her legs grew wobbly. “And?”

“And it wants you out of the picture.”

Now her throat dried up, too, and her heart began to crash against her ribs. “Like, out of the picture move to Canada? Or out of the picture as in it’s curtains for you?”

Now January planted both hands on her shoulders as Rick pressed his hands into her waist. “As in, out of the picture someone wants you dead.”

“
I
think I need to sit,” Poppy murmured, reaching blindly for the first thing to support her, but Rick grabbed her around the waist from behind and brought her back to the couch, setting her down and sitting next to her.

He grabbed her hand and looked to January, who’d taken the armchair opposite them. “Do you know the origin of this hate?”

She shook her head, her eyes sympathetic and round behind her glasses. “I don’t. I can’t pinpoint it. I might be able to summon something with a spell, but whoever is behind this won’t easily be revealed.”

Marty slid a cup of tea in front of Poppy. When she didn’t respond, she physically took her hands and placed them around the cup then sat on the side of the couch and wrapped an arm around Poppy, letting her chin rest on the top of her head. “Drink, honey. Drink and breathe,” she whispered.

So in this crazy new society, and in her deep desire to understand these people whom she’d call her own, she decided to face this head on and not only attack it but understand it. “Please explain what you mean when you say I’m surrounded by hate. I don’t understand how you can see something like that.”

“As I said, I’m a witch, Poppy. I can see auras, and your aura is mingled with someone else’s. But sometimes, because I’m certainly not the most powerful witch, I can’t always see the person belonging to the hateful aura unless they’re right in front of me. Like, in your case, your aura is light and breezy. You’ve had hard times, but your passion, your creativity keeps you tethered to the joy of life. You never give up. You have a good heart. You’re loyal and kind, hardworking. You throw yourself into whatever it is you do, and you do it with all your heart. You’re all things good, and when I look at you, I see that—so clearly, so brightly. There is no malice in you.

“But there’s an aura, one lurking in the shadows of your own aura, and it’s angry. So angry. I’d go so far as to say malevolent. It’s ugly, and for whatever reason, it wants something extinguished to feed its anger. I suspect this is why you were launched into the woods the other night. It was an attempt to purge hatred—to appease it. It’s a temper tantrum of sorts.”

A shiver assaulted her, threading throughout her body in tremors. “So what do I do? How do I combat this hate? One I can’t see? Who could possibly hate me enough to want me dead? I mean, sure, there are people who don’t like me. We all have our haters, right? But this is a little extreme, and I’m going to be honest—no one has attempted to take my life until I got here and became one of you.”

“I won’t lie, Poppy. Your new world, Rick’s world and mine, is filled with plenty of good, but there’s also bad, too.”

Yeah. This was so much good. “Which leads me back to my original question. What do I do to stop this? Will there be more attempts on my life?”

“Not if I can help it,” Rick said, his face a tight mask of anger.

“This is my fault,” Calamity said mournfully from her feet. “All my damn fault. I’m sorry, Poppy. So damn sorry.”

Closing her eyes, she reached down and scratched Calamity’s ear. “No blame, Calamity. It was an accident. I know that.” Then she lifted her chin. “So auras and evil on the back burner for a second, how did I turn Rick to stone and tear up his ceiling in his kitchen with just the wave of my hand? I thought you guys had all the power and we were just supposed to advise you? Why is mine so strong?”

Smiling, January leaned forward, her eyes twinkling from behind her frames. “Because sometimes, when a match like yours is made, it’s fated, and you get the double-whammy effect. Rick’s magic, plus your very new, very fragile and out-of-control magic, make for some very solid magic.”

“Hah!” Calamity chirped, jumping to the kitchen island where Nina sat and lifting a paw. “Up top, Half-Breed. I knew it! The two of you together are magic times ten!”