Boundary Born (Boundary Magic Book 3) (6 page)

C
hapter 9

“Son of a bitch!”

My eyes flew open and I grabbed the throw pillow beneath my head and flung it as hard as I could at the armchair, causing several dog heads to lift in confusion as they assessed the room for threats.

I threw a second pillow. Ask Emil what he
what
? What he wants from me? What he plans to do now that we’ve met? What he looks for in an ice cream topping? “
Dammit
, Sam!” I said aloud.

I’d done enough research on boundary magic by now to know that back in the day, it was mostly used for predicting the future or seeing things you couldn’t see from your own vantage point, like an event on the other side of the world. But how did talking to ghosts help if they only spoke in riddles that I put together after it was too late?

What bothered me most about Sam’s “advice” was the part about figuring out my mission. I’d done that, hadn’t I? Charlie was my mission. Keeping her safe, keeping her alive, that was all that mattered. So what was Sam talking about? Something else I was supposed to be doing at the same time? But then why would John be involved?

I eyed the couch, but I was out of throw pillows to chuck. There was nothing to do but get up and get dressed for work.

The rest of the day was blissfully uneventful. I called Quinn’s body shop, and his contact promised they’d have the Jeep as good as new by late afternoon. They would bill Maven directly, and even drop off the Jeep in its usual parking spot behind the coffee shop. I was a little amazed at the speed and service, but for all I knew Maven had pressed everyone at the garage to give her special treatment.

I had an afternoon shift at the Depot, but business was slow with all the students obsessing over finals, and I got to spend a quiet afternoon restocking shelves and solving simple problems for the cashier. Customer’s coupon won’t scan? No problem. Give me bad coupons over snake monsters and paternity issues any day.

In between customers and restocking, I couldn’t stop thinking about Emil’s visit. Even setting aside whatever Sam had been trying to tell me, I had no idea what our biological father wanted from me. If his goal had been to let me know he wasn’t a deadbeat who’d abandoned Sam and me, the message had been received. But what if he wanted a relationship? How would that even work? I’d heard of adopted kids who found their biological parents (or vice versa) but those stories were always about children or petulant teenagers, not witches in their thirties. If Emil wanted to spend time with me on holidays or . . . I don’t know, go to baseball games or something, I had no idea how to handle that.

Besides, I
had
a family. A really great family. And two jobs, and a vampire boyfriend. Even if I wanted to spend time with Emil, where would he fit into all of that? I could just picture my mother’s crestfallen face if I told her I wanted to start prioritizing time with the biological father I’d just met.

Sam’s voice spoke up in the back of my mind. I never knew if this was her actual spirit talking or my subconscious’s interpretation of what she would say, but I’d gotten used to it.
Setting aside what he wants from you,
what do you want from him?

That was the problem, wasn’t it? I had no idea.

The sun wouldn’t set until nearly eight, so I had time to kill after my shift ended at five. I had originally planned to go home and work out before getting ready for date night, but while I was still brooding at the Depot I got a whole series of silly texts from my cousins Anna and Elise. They were at the Pearl Street pedestrian mall, getting manicures at Ten20 and shopping for a birthday present for Elise’s girlfriend Natalie. Now they were demanding that I join them for dinner. They sent increasingly silly threats—one involved breaking into my house and putting my underwear in the freezer—until I had to text my surrender. Vampires can’t eat anything other than blood and a few sips of water, so I couldn’t imagine Quinn taking me out to dinner for date night. I might as well eat. Smiling, I turned the car toward downtown.

Only a year earlier, I would have blown off my cousins, certain that they were just throwing me a pity invite. I’d felt that way a lot in the months after Sam’s death—not just grief-stricken, but rudderless and resentful. The army had spit me out, Sam was gone, and I was an empty shell. I just assumed any request for my presence was made out of guilt or obligation. Who would actually want to spend time with someone who so obviously couldn’t get her shit together?

Really, it was Charlie who had saved me. Keeping her safe from the Old World had given me something to focus on, and then I’d been pulled into this whole other life. Quinn and the Pellars and Maven and the other vampires, a big new world of complications.

Was I better off? That, I couldn’t answer. But I did know that I could go enjoy my cousins tonight, when a year ago I couldn’t.

I found a metered parking spot downtown and walked through the pedestrian mall to meet Anna and Elise. It was a beautiful spring evening, and there were plenty of people out strolling the shopping district. I paused for a moment to smile at the kids climbing on the big stone-and-metal animal sculptures near the toy store. I’d brought Charlie here back in March. She’d clambered up and down the statues for over an hour, and I’d had to bribe her with ice cream when it was time to go. God, I missed her.

Something in my peripheral vision sent up a red flag in my mind. I twisted my head, expecting to see someone staring at me. Nothing. I scanned the crowd of shoppers, but no one froze or quickly turned away. So why did I suddenly have that familiar panicky feeling that there was a target on my back? I stayed there for a long time, scanning the crowd with heightened awareness, but I didn’t see anything that could explain my sudden paranoia. It was maddening, but eventually I had to just move on.

The moment of panic made me late, and Elise and Anna were waiting for me outside Illegal Pete’s, a burrito joint right on Pearl Street. Anna was twenty-seven and just finishing up a graduate degree. She had a big heart and had spontaneously developed a New Age streak as a teenager. Elise, on the other hand, was a uniformed officer with Boulder PD and my closest cousin in age and temperament. Both of them had the Luther biological trademarks of dark brown eyes and honey-blonde hair, although Elise’s was cut short and Anna’s flowed down her back. They looked like they could be sisters, and I felt a stab of displacement.

Shake it off, Lex
, I told myself. Emil’s arrival was getting in my head.

As we stood in line to order, they showed me the scarf they’d found for Natalie, the criminologist who Elise had been dating for the last six months. I gave my approval, and Elise told us about the birthday dinner she’d planned for the following night. “If I don’t get called in for overtime,” she added. “Nutjobs are coming out of the woodwork this week.”

We had to stop talking to place our orders, going down the line to customize our burritos and quesadillas, but while we were waiting to pay, I asked Elise what she meant.

She made a face. “Nothing, I’ve just had two shifts in a row where I had to take a guy to the psych ward at BCH.”

“Homeless people?” I didn’t want to pigeonhole, but the homeless led really difficult lives. Elise had told us before that some of them acted crazy now and then to get a warm bed for a few nights. Then again, it was May.

“One was, but the other was just some dude, like twenty-six, decent job, girlfriend.”

We collected our food and made our way to a table in the front, but not too close to the windows. My cousins automatically gave me the seat against the wall, a tiny courtesy that never failed to move me. “So what made him a nutjob?” Anna asked, looking curious.

“He just sort of lost it. Raving, waving his arms around, frothing at the mouth, trying to attack anyone who came near him.” She reached up and pulled back her bangs, displaying a small purplish bruise. “I got this when he backhanded me.”

Anna made a sympathetic noise without putting down her quesadilla. I hurried to swallow my own bite of veggie burrito so I could ask Elise, “Did you say frothing at the mouth?”

“Yeah, you know, white spittle. I’ve been spit on before, but this was very . . . dramatic.”

My brow furrowed. Could this be related to the animal attacks? For the first time since Lily had used the word “rabies,” I wondered if the crazy animals might have a connection to the Old World after all. I made a mental note to ask Simon as soon as possible. Meanwhile, there could still be a garden-variety scientific explanation.

“You should talk to Jake,” I said to Elise. “He’s seen a few animals with some weird virus that made them do the same thing. One of them was a fox that trashed my basement. Maybe it’s related.”

Elise looked skeptical. “Isn’t it like, next to impossible for humans and mammals to get the same diseases?”

I shrugged. “What’s the harm? It’s not like Jake’s gonna yell at you for asking.”

Elise snorted at the idea of Jake yelling at anyone for anything, but she agreed to give him a call. We spent another twenty minutes gossiping about the family. Our cousin Brie was having another baby, which no one had really seen coming. Elise’s younger brother Paul had recently decided to move to New York to pursue his music, and my aunt and uncle were not thrilled. In their defense, pretty much all of the Luthers had settled within an hour of where we were sitting. We’d all gotten spoiled by family dinners, well-attended celebrations, and a complicated, good-humored tangle of exchanged favors for childcare, pet sitting, and the lifting of heavy objects. It was weird to think of one of us moving away for good.

After spending the whole afternoon thinking about Emil Jasper, this casual time with my cousins was a nice reminder that I already had a place where I belonged.

Well, as long as I didn’t tell them any details about my job, my new friends, or my boyfriend.

Anna announced that she had to pee and took off for the restaurant’s iffy bathroom. While we waited, Elise surprised me by asking if Quinn and I wanted to go out to dinner with her and Natalie sometime. “Nat really likes you, and I’d like to get to know Quinn,” she said.

My thoughts briefly tripped up on the idea that someone else at the police department liked me. Then I absorbed what she was asking. “Uh . . .”

“I—uh, that’s really nice, but I’m not sure,” I stammered.

Elise gave me a concerned look. “You never bring him to family stuff. You guys are still together, right?”

Before we were really dating, I
had
brought Quinn to my dad’s sixtieth birthday party, months ago. But my family hadn’t had any contact with him since, and for good reason. I gave Elise the same statement I’d given everyone in the family for six months now. “Yeah, we’re together, but it’s pretty casual.”

Unlike my parents or my other cousins, however, Elise wouldn’t take my word for it. She raised an eyebrow, putting on what the rest of us called her cop face. “Is he married?”

“What?”
I cried, genuinely insulted. “Of course not! How could you even think that I—”

“You’ve been together for like six months,” she said matter-of-factly. “Yet you barely seem to spend time with him. You act like it’s this temporary relationship, but your face gets all girly whenever you mention him.” She shrugged. “Ergo, married.”

“No,” I said through my teeth. “He is not married. And you take back what you said about my face.”

Elise’s probing look didn’t waver. “Is he homophobic?”

“Of course not!”
Geez.
She’d managed to offend me three different ways in the space of two minutes.

“Great, then we’ll do dinner,” Elise said with a sweet smile. “I’m camping this weekend, but maybe next weekend?”

“Uh . . . I’ll have to check my schedule,” I said, fidgeting with my shirt and pushing my hair behind my ears. I’d been wearing it down more, now that I wasn’t seeing much of Charlie. She considered my hair her personal toy property.

“Hey, you’re wearing the earrings I got you!” Anna exclaimed, returning from the bathroom. She pointed at my earlobes, and I automatically reached up to touch one of the little studs she’d given me ages ago, when I was home between tours. They were in the shape of tiny curled-up griffins. My cousins didn’t know about my tattoos—I wasn’t sure how my family would take the fact that I suddenly had full-on ink sleeves covering my forearms, so I’d kept them hidden.

For a second I was
this close
to blurting out, “That’s funny, Sam was just talking about griffins today.” My brain caught up to my mouth just in time. “Yeah. I love them,” I said instead.

“How come I never got a spirit animal?” Elise complained. “You only assigned one to Lex.”

“Um, because you guys gave me shit for years for even bringing up the words ‘spirit animal’?” Anna retorted. “Besides, Lex is special. She needs a griffin more than you do.”

Elise rolled her eyes in a dismissive, Anna’s-being-Anna way and started gathering up her jacket and bag. But I looked at my younger cousin with new interest. I’d always assumed she’d decided griffins were connected to me because of the whole army thing—in mythology, griffins symbolized courage and boldness, which was soldier stuff. Meanwhile, Sam had told me that griffins were the guardians of priceless treasures. I’d associated that with protecting Charlie. “What do you mean, I need one more?” I asked Anna.

“We talked about griffins when we were studying heraldry—you know, coats of arms and symbols and stuff,” she said. “Griffins were drawn to powerful monsters, and they stood for military strength and leadership. I just thought you could use one.” She grinned, gesturing at my earrings. “Or two.”

“Huh.” All along I’d associated myself with the griffin, but Anna had been barely thirteen when I’d gone to Iraq. She had hoped for a griffin to watch over
me
. “Thank you,” I said sincerely. “That means a lot.”

It was only when I was walking back to the car that I considered the rest of her words: griffins were drawn to powerful monsters. Like Maven? Or Quinn?