Chapter 9

...

It was dinner before I knew it. Leech and I had compiled a list of theories a mile long. Even Bryce helped research though he soon gave up on reading through dusty books. He preferred e-mailing people across the country, demanding information. Kristof had disappeared into the ghost realm to see what he could find. Savannah was the only one who couldn't really do anything and even she helped out. Leech had to turn the pages for her, but she read through one of Leech's necromancer books.

Everything was still just theory at this point, but Bryce promised a larger force for when we went back the next day. I didn't like the look on his face when he said he would figure out a plausible lie, but I didn't want to push my luck by arguing. With more guards, we would be able to experiment to our hearts content; the men he sent to investigate that afternoon reported that they had found no disturbances. Sean was going to come over tomorrow morning and help me with any problems that would arise from living with a woman who had gone missing. Bryce had arranged for the extra men to come around four. That would give Savannah time to see her other brother—the one she actually talked to—before heading off for the long walk back.

Around eight Leech declared it was time to eat. I brought the books with me and spread out on the table as the two men got to work cooking. That term might not be very accurate. They spent more time making fun of what the other one was doing than actually looking at the food. If I had been planning to eat in the first place, I would have been upset. Though it was fun to watch.

Eventually, Leech presented it before me. I told them the soup looked delicious. Leech said it was pasta, his expression confused. Bryce handed me milkshake instead, which I took gratefully. I was hungry.

"It's an acquired taste," he explained. To my surprise, the two men actually ate their strange concoction.

Savannah chose to make the meal more difficult by nagging me constantly. Apparently talking to Leech and her father all day was not enough for her.

"Ask Leech about the girly looking mugs he has," Savannah suggested.

"You ask him. He hasn't mentioned a girlfriend yet. She probably moved out."

"Aren't you interested in knowing?"

"You trying to set me up?"

Savannah made a sound in my head that actually sounded like a foot stomp. "Just ask. I want to know. Did you know he has high heels in his closet? Either he's got a girlfriend buried under the gazebo or..."

"I'm not asking him that," I snapped. If he wanted to wear high heels, it was his prerogative. Bryce was looking at me oddly and I blushed, embarrassed to have been caught arguing with a voice no one could see. Aloud I said, "I'm very impressed the two of you can cook. Do you do it often?"

At first I didn't think anything was happening, but then Bryce asked curiously, "Are you blushing, dude?"

Indeed, Leech was turning bright red. "Savannah," I hissed in my head. I should have known she wouldn't just drop it. "What have I tried to teach you about manners? You can't be doing that. Fine! I'll ask him. Anything to help you get over your pathetic crush on Adam."

That would shut her up, if only for a moment. I leaned forward on my elbows and plastered a smile on. "Leech, are you currently seeing someone?"

He glanced to his right, at the empty chair we had reserved for Savannah, and the blush deepened. Bryce groaned, clearly unhappy with this turn of events.

"He's a mechanic, single, lonely and prefers brunettes," Bryce said, bored. Leech glared. Savannah cursed as I tried to look innocent. "He'll bring you fresh flowers on Valentine's day, hold the door open every time and carry you over every threshold you find. Etc. Etc."

"How do you make all that sound bad?" I asked Bryce in wonder.

"We all have our skills. Leech's include enjoying long walks by the beach and candlelit dinners, if you're interested. He does heart to hearts and will never forget an anniversary. Unless the Grand Prix starts that day, but then he'll look so pathetic when he begs you to forgive him that you won't give it a second thought."

Leech actually looked annoyed. "Are you going to stop there? You sure you don't want to give a full dating history?"

Bryce raised his wine glass in a mock-apology. "I was just trying to inform Gillian about your more romantic characteristics. Sue me. Fine. You want me to add in some flaws? Let's see...what Leech does wrong with the fairer sex. Nothing really comes to mind, except he couldn't lie to—never mind."

"To keep her?" Leech put down his fork. "Is that what you were going to say?"

Bryce put down his glass and was suddenly incredibly interested in snagging a cracker from me. He had gone too far—Leech's face screamed that—and he evidently didn't want to make it worse. "Forget it. Gillian, don't we have more spells to talk about or something?"

But it was too little too late. Leech was already turning bright red. The stream of Spanish that poured from his mouth was almost too quick for me to understand. I didn't need to hear the words to know what he was saying. 'What the fuck is your problem?' was probably an accurate translation. I caught something about Lucifer which sort of scared me and something about crazy plans, the general gist being that there was a hell of a lot wrong with Bryce.

"Should you stop him?" Savannah asked me as Leech started going on and on about how Bryce's balls were as shriveled as his heart.

"Bryce isn't," I pointed out. It was almost scary how studiously Bryce was not stopping Leech. He must have understood because he occasionally replied in Spanish, egging Leeh on some more, but for the most part he just kept eating as his friend heaped abuse on him.

"Just because he's an idiot," Savannah muttered.

Finally, Leech slumped down and drained the glass of wine. Bryce poured out another glass and the big man drank that too. Only then did Bryce say anything.

"Finished?"

"Yeah." Leech fidgeted. "Um..."

"You just need to get laid," Bryce said.

"Did you hear that, Gillian? He's asking for volunteers," Savannah said.

"I thought older men were your thing." That finally shut her up. Turning my attention back to my less annoying companions, I found Leech in the middle of an apology. Not to the best friend he had insulted, of course, but to me.

I accepted with a smile. "That's all right. Though next time, I might just hit you with an energy bolt to shut you up."

"Like you could," Bryce shrugged. "Energy bolts are sorcerer magic."

Savannah was easily outraged, but for a second I was a little upset too. Hadn't I pushed a demon off a car using sorcerer magic? Bryce had to have—he had seen. If that's the way he wanted to play this, I could go along. Anything to create a distraction, right?

I pushed back from the table, giving Bryce the most patronizing smirk I could muster. He was much better at them, but it was the trying that counted. Sitting up straight, I rotated both wrists, making a big show of preparing for the spell. Bryce didn't flinch—didn't think a witch would dare harm his precious Nast head. I cracked each finger, just for show and then began to cast, eyes never leaving his.

His pasta exploded everywhere; I wasn't stupid enough to hurt a Nast, however condescending he acted. A smile appeared behind the mess of food on his face, but it was gone as he cleaned himself off.

"Holy shit," Leech muttered from across the table.

He looked fine, apart from a few renegade pieces of food that had lodged themselves in his hair. But he was staring at Savannah's chair in wonder. "Gillian, cast something else."

"Why?"

An impatient look and Savannah's own demand that I do so got me casting. I lit up the candle in the middle of the table. Easy witch magic.

"Again," ordered Leech.

I unlit and lit the candle a good five times before he told me to stop, staring at Savannah all the while.

"An explanation would be nice," Bryce said. "Sometime soon, preferably."

"She flickers when Gillian does magic," Leech said. "Every time."

I thought about my increased strength in the last couple of days. I had attributed that to fighting for my life, but what if I had somehow managed to tap into Savannah's reserves? No wonder she acted like she was invincible. If I had that kind of power on a regular basis I would too.

"And he said I was disappearing until you woke up," Savannah pointed out.

"So somehow you're connected to me?" She already thought she owned me. This was going to be a nightmare.

"Because of the portal?" Bryce asked.

I didn't think so. Why would it be me then? I wasn't related at all to her falling through the portal.

If we were somehow connected I would look a little further into the past for an explanation. Back before my father had died, Savannah had convinced me to try this spell that was supposed to boost my spellcasting ability. She was always after me to try and become more like her.

She had discovered the ritual in a book that she had stolen from an old friend of her mother's. That should have been my first warning sign. Eve Levine had been an excellent mother—but she had also one of the most powerful dark witches of her time. Her friends weren't the savory type. The spell needed two witches—Savannah wasn't stingy. She volunteered to help. We thought the spell had been a failure. I was still weak afterwards, with only a minor improvement. But I couldn't shake the feeling that our current predicament fit the desired results rather perfectly.

But despite how eager I was to get back to researching, I was outvoted. Everyone else was tired. Leech banished me from the kitchen and eager to let the two friends work out whatever, I left, hurrying back to the living room. The television bored me and I didn't want to head over to the bar so I made my way over to the pool table.

The feel of the green felt under my finger tips made me shiver, reminding me too much of home. I sighed, feeling the beautiful wood, and trying not to think too much. I barely heard Bryce come up behind me.

"Have you ever played before?" he asked, starting to pull the balls out of the pockets.

"What was that about?"

For a moment he didn't answer, just went on racking the balls up. But finally, he said, "His wife just left him. I shouldn't have brought it up."

"I missed that one. Why was he so mad at you? You didn't sleep with his wife, did you? Please tell me you aren't that cliché?"

"I didn't sleep with Claire," he snapped. "I just knew it was going to happen, he didn't believe me and he's pissed that I was right."

He almost sounded as if his feelings were hurt. That was easy to fix. Picking up a cue from the wall and walked over to stand in front of him. "Speaking of cliché...you wanna teach me how to play?"

Leech came in eventually and told us Kristof had headed off to talk to someone. Now that the thrill of coping a feel had worn off, Bryce challenged his friend to a game. Leech did the gentlemanly thing and invited me to play as well. I was abysmal. Bryce teased me and then convinced Leech to play for money. Bored, I threw in fifty bucks and demanded to be allowed to play. Leech refused, but Bryce insisted. Bryce broke. Leech let me go next. He never even took a shot.

I grinned triumphantly at them as I gathered up the money. Bryce shrugged off the loss with the ease of someone who had money to burn. "A little short for a pool shark, aren't you?"

"Don't worry, Bryce. I could teach you if you wanted," I responded. Leech was still staring at me with an awed, slightly shocked look.

The expression on Bryce's face that made me shiver. But I got back to racking up the balls, offering them a chance to try and win their money back. They didn't succeed.

...

Leech brought the blankets back out for me and wished me good night. I watched him as he left, all broad angles and bulging muscle. I had to admit, the view was nice. And he was nice. He was kind and caring and sweet and vulnerable right now. It would be nice and easy with Leech. I sighed and plumped up the pillow.

"I'm surprised you haven't jumped him yet," Savannah said, polite as ever.

"Because I'm not you. I don't just see something I like and take it."

Savannah's response was mainly a huge guff of laughter. When she finally recovered, she asked: "Why do you never like the nice ones?"

I rearranged the pillows better. "I do so like the nice ones."

"Name one boyfriend, or whatever you call the guys you sleep with, you've ever had that was nice. Or not some sort of freak."

"Just because Jack was..." addicted to heroin "...a loser doesn't mean all my boyfriends suck."

Not that they were upright citizens or anything. Jack had actually been the best, the sort of guy you could bring home to mom, you know, if your mother wasn't an evil slut. Sure, he had been my Hebrew T.A. at the time, and the needle marks on his arm were sort of conspicuous when he wore short sleeves, but he was smart and funny and if the smack didn't kill him, he was going to have a hell of a future. Whatever. Jack and I worked as well as we did because we never pretended to care about each other. We had sex, I passed Hebrew, he had clean needles. Win-win.

"All your boyfriends suck, Gillian," Savannah said, her tone final. "And yet you still don't like the nice ones."

Because they were boring. But I didn't say that, because I did so like the nice ones. I had turned over a new leaf, once Jack had dumped me. Yeah, it sucked getting dumped right before mid-terms by a junkie you were enabling, but I was over it. It had been good for me. I was now free to go forth and find a nice, normal boyfriend.

Like Leech. I could do Leech.

"Have you been around here a while?"

"Dad kind of wanted to stay around Bryce. Not that he would say anything, but I could tell. So we stayed in the corner and talked. I wanted to say goodnight before I took off."

"That was nice of you. Did your Dad tell you what's up with Leech? Because Bryce said his wife just left, so if you wanted, you could have him on the rebound. Or I could have him. I haven't decided yet."

Savannah was not so easily deterred. "Gillian, what are you doing?"

"Going to bed?" I said as innocently as I could.

She didn't buy it for a second. Good for her. "With the evil half-brother. And his best friend. Which, by the way, is probably a really stupid idea. And please don't try and deny it. I'm not an idiot. You have shitty taste in guys."

"I thought you liked Leech."

"It's Leech you're more interested in?"

"Yeah." But I had to force the word out. There shouldn't even be a contest. I hated myself, for almost falling back into the old patterns, with the insults and the hate. I'd done that too many times. I could choose the right thing, the good thing, for once. Why couldn't I?

Savannah wasn't an idiot. But I broke the communication spell before she could continue. I didn't want to hear it. I knew what I should do. A good girl would go to bed. Savannah would march down the hall and tie Leech to the bed. And me, Gillian MacArthur? I decided to take a long, cold shower.

The hallway was dark and I moved slowly through it, careful not to crash into anything. I couldn't deal with the both of them at the moment. Not when Savannah had ruined my beautifully constructed denial.

That's when I smelled smoke.

It was my duty to go investigate. It wasn't like I planned for it to be coming from Bryce's bedroom.