Spellcrossed (13 page)

“I know you love him, child. And I know you believe Rowan is a miracle worker. But there are some miracles even Rowan cannot achieve.”

“How do we know until we try? We have to try! Doesn’t he deserve the chance to lead a normal life?”

“Locked up in that apartment with Rowan for months? For years, perhaps? This is the kind of life you want for him? For both of them?”

“He’ll get better.”

“But he will never be as he was. That man is gone, Maggie. Can you accept that?”

Rowan’s arrival spared me from answering.

“He’s asleep?” I asked.

Rowan nodded. “He’s exhausted.”

“So are you,” Reinhard said. “When did you last eat?”

“Yesterday. I think. Jack finished the last of the food this morning. That’s why I had to bring him here tonight. Helen…we always kept snacks in the green room refrigerator.”

“Cake and cookies,” Reinhard said with a disapproving frown.

“I know. But after all he’s been through…”

“Tell me,” I said.

“Let it wait, Maggie. Just until tomorrow.”

“Rowan is right. Your father is alive. He is safe. As for what happens next…”

“I won’t let you send him away!”

“Our return affects everyone on staff,” Rowan said. “And everyone deserves a say in…what happens next.”

“I will call a meeting. For eleven o’clock tomorrow morning.” Reinhard frowned. “Bernie cannot be there. We cannot speak openly—”

“Bernie?” Rowan interrupted. “Bernie Cohen?”

“He has taken on Helen’s jobs—publicity and program.”

“Bernie Cohen…back at the Crossroads…”

“Yes. Well. I will deal with Bernie. Somehow. Can you leave Jack alone for an hour?”

“If we hold the meeting in the green room or the Smokehouse. Somewhere close where I can feel him if he needs me.”

“The Smokehouse, then. I will stop by before the meeting. I would like to examine him. He seems remarkably healthy, but—”

“Would you stop arranging things?” I exclaimed. “I
need to know what happened to him. Nothing you tell me will be as bad as what I imagine. Please.”

Rowan and Reinhard exchanged glances. Then Reinhard sighed and nodded. Rowan led me over to Reinhard’s stage manager stool and eased me onto it.

“I don’t know how long I searched for him in Faerie. Months, probably. None of the clans I visited had heard of any human who’d been adopted. And I couldn’t feel Jack’s energy. At first, I thought he might be too far away for me to sense. Then I realized I’d stupidly overlooked the obvious.”

“The obvious?”

“The older Fae can always sense when a human has breached the borders of Faerie. But none of the elders I spoke to had detected such an intrusion. That’s when I thought of the Borderlands. It’s a place between the worlds. A sort of…buffer zone.”

His grim expression made me ask, “Is it…awful?”

“Some of it is as beautiful as Faerie. But its magic is wilder. You can be walking through a darkened thicket at moonrise and suddenly find yourself on the brink of a sunlit precipice. Even time seems to follow no rules. That’s why it seemed that only a few months had passed while I was searching for him.”

He hesitated, clearly reluctant to say more. Then he took a deep breath.

“The Borderlands draw the darkest elements of Faerie. Guardians, we call them, for they keep out hapless trespassers from both worlds. But some use their power to lure the innocent and the foolish. Once inside the Borderlands, few manage to escape.”

Until now, I’d been terrified about the ordeals my father must have undergone. Rowan’s haunted expression made me wonder what he’d had to endure in order to find him.

“These…creatures,” Reinhard said. “Could they have followed you back here?”

“No. I sealed the portal behind us and warded it against intruders.”

“And Daddy?” I prompted. “How did he survive there for so long?”

“Jack was no hapless trespasser. He had prepared for his crossing. He brought extra clothing, a medical kit, cooking utensils, a tarp—anything and everything he could fit into that backpack.”

Mom protesting that we were only going away for the weekend and couldn’t possibly need everything he was stuffing into suitcases and carryalls and shopping bags. Daddy invariably responding, “Be prepared. That’s the Boy Scout motto.”

“Once his food ran out, he hunted and fished. Gathered fruits and nuts and berries. Much as I did during my early years in this world. He hid from the dangers as best he could. And when he discovered that the magic was wilder in some places than others, he sought out the pockets of relative safety. Most of all, he clung to his memories. He read—and reread—the few books he’d brought. Recited his old theatre monologues. Sang show tunes. In spite of everything, I think he was relieved to find the Borderlands. To know that the things that had happened to him here were real. That he wasn’t crazy.”

Lying in bed, listening to the muffled shouting. Cringing when I made out his words: “I am not losing my mind! I’m finally beginning to see things clearly!” Pretending to be fast asleep when Mom eased open my bedroom door to check on me.

“I couldn’t leave him in the Borderlands. My clan would never accept a…damaged human. And if I’d taken him to Faerie, I knew I’d never convince him to leave.”

No. He had sacrificed everything and everyone he loved in his search for Faerie. Once he found it, he would never give it up.

“So I have thrust both of us upon you. I hope you can forgive me.”

“Forgive you?” I echoed. “You came back to me. You brought my father back. Nothing is more important than that.”

Rowan’s sweet smile faded when he noticed Reinhard’s dubious expression.

“Nothing,” I repeated firmly, “is more important than that.”

“Nothing is more important than that.”

She loves me. After all this time, she still loves me. She is still my Maggie. As long as I have her, I can accept the rest. Even the loss of my theatre.

Of course, no one expected me to return. Those empty wooden hangers in my armoire brought that home far more powerfully than their incredulous looks.

At least they didn’t throw out the contents of my desk. I’ll have to ask Maggie to buy me a new journal. For tonight, I will make do with blank paper.

If only my mind were equally blank.

A nonprofit. Had I remained here, it could never have happened. Helen would not have allowed it. She knew I could play no role in a theatre where accountants issue paychecks to employees with Social Security numbers.

Foolish to have expected everything to remain the same, to imagine that I could simply pick up the threads of my life again. Places change. People change. Even Maggie. She is stronger now, more confident about herself and her place in the world.

What a colossal irony that she has taken my place.

How could I have ever imagined that she would be content to be my assistant? But that was the play I wrote in my head. I would direct the shows. She would work with the actors, doing her list thing, helping them with their music. We’d work together and live together and love each other. We would give Jack a home and he would grow strong in mind and body.

A pipe dream. The kind of happy ever after found in musicals.

She is still my Maggie. But I am not the same Rowan Mackenzie. Can she really love a penniless beggar with nothing but the clothes on his back? A man as ill equipped to deal with this world as her poor damaged father?

If only I had never left.

If only I had given up the search sooner.

I could have returned months ago. And faced Maggie without shame and told her without lying that I could not feel his presence in Faerie. I would still have my theatre and my life.

My first completely unselfish act and look how it turned out.

I mustn’t blame Jack. It was my choice to leave, my choice to search for him. He would not have been there in the first place had I protected him all those years ago.

I failed him then. I will not do so now.

The staff will let us stay. Maggie will insist on it. And when Maggie Graham digs in her heels, she is as immovable as the Green Mountains.

And then?

I must help Jack heal.

I must help Maggie succeed.

I must find a new purpose, a new life, a new place in this world, just as I did more than two hundred years ago.

And never allow Maggie to suspect how much that prospect terrifies me.

LIVING IN THE SHADOWS

A
S I STAGGERED FROM THE PARKING LOT with the first four bags of groceries, the stage door banged open and my father poked his head out. He surveyed the picnic area, the Smokehouse, and finally craned his neck to study the sky. Then he bounded out of the barn and sprinted toward me.

I felt like I’d stumbled into
The Twilight Zone
again. Although his clothes were still ragged, the terrified Rip Van Winkle was gone, replaced by a smiling stranger, white hair secured at the nape of his neck, white beard and mustache neatly—if inexpertly—trimmed.

My delight faded as he wrested a bag from my hand and began rummaging through it.

So he’s more excited about the groceries than you. Just be grateful he isn’t cowering under the table.

“Jack!” Rowan called as he hurried toward us. “We’ll unpack the groceries upstairs.”

“There’s more in the car,” I said.

“I’ll get them!” Daddy replied.

I watched him race toward the parking lot, still shocked by his transformation. If Rowan could accomplish so much in a single night, I’d have my father back before the end of the season.

As I turned to thank Rowan, his gaze rose abruptly from my legs to my face. I wished I’d worn something
flirty, fun, and fabulous instead of throwing on shorts and a T-shirt. Then his desire flashed through me, and I decided that shorts and a T-shirt were just fine.

His lips brushed my cheek. I heard his deep intake of breath. Then he suddenly recoiled.

“Did you cut yourself?” he demanded.

I shook my head before I remembered. “I nicked myself shaving. How did you—?”

“The iron. In the blood.”

“You can smell it?”

“I just wasn’t prepared.”

In spite of his reassuring smile, his face was even paler than usual, and he kept swallowing as if he might vomit.

“But people cut themselves all the time. And women…” Heat burned my cheeks. “Women…bleed. Every month. Not old women, but…”

“I understand the female reproductive cycle, Maggie.”

I envisioned him retreating to the cottage every time a woman got her period. But if he’d done that during my season, he never would have gotten around to directing.

Rowan cleared his throat. “I’m usually careful to keep up my…shields.”

Now all I could envision was some
Star Trek
character shouting, “Red alert! Shields up!” And menstruating women bouncing off them like ping-pong balls.

What is wrong with you? Focus!

Which wasn’t easy on two hours of sleep and five cups of coffee.

“So you left your shields in the apartment today?”

“Not exactly.”

I tugged my ear. “Sounds like…? Three syllables?”

“I wanted to smell you.”

Six rather surprising syllables.

“I know that sounds disgusting, but—”

“It’s sweet,” I replied and smiled at his astonishment. “Did I smell okay? Other than the blood?”

“You smelled wonderful.” He closed his eyes, his expression dreamy. “Something ambiguously herbal in
your hair. The dusty fragrance of lavender permeating your shirt. Lemongrass soap. A salty hint of sweat. A sweet whiff of baby powder…”

“All that? In one breath?”

He regarded me through heavy-lidded eyes. “The musk between your legs. And your scent. Sweet and spicy. Like ginger.”

“My perfume,” I managed.

“Yes. But it’s also you. Your essence.”

I took a shaky breath and let it out. So did Rowan. Then he said, “We’d better help Jack.”

We found Daddy bent over the open trunk of my car. He straightened as we approached, a guilty expression on his face as well as a great many crumbs.

“I said we’d unpack upstairs,” Rowan reminded him.

Daddy muttered a protest, spewing crumbs everywhere. “It’s Entenmann’s crumb cake. My favorite!”

“Mine, too,” I said.

“But you bought English muffins, right?”

“And new clothes.”

“Good thing. I’m a regular Raggedy Andy. I hope you bought clothes for Rowan, too.”

Belatedly, I realized that he was still dressed in the stained and wrinkled clothing I’d seen last night.

“Mine seem to be…missing,” Rowan said.

“Missing?”

“Along with my toiletries. Jack and I showered with Joy this morning. The dishwashing liquid, not our state of being.”

“You don’t have any clothes?”

“I imagine Janet or Reinhard cleaned everything out.”

“And left the fucking dishwashing liquid?”

Daddy hooted. “That’s what I said!”

I scowled and heaved two bags out of the trunk. “Let’s get this stuff inside.”