One by one the women who were important in Chloe’s life took our baby into their arms with whispered words and a gentle kiss. Not a bad way to start life. I had half expected Laria would sleep through the whole thing, but she was awake and very still, watching the proceedings with interest. Being passed from woman to woman didn’t seem to bother her a bit. Most infants would be screaming their lungs out, but not my kid. She was a trouper.
Finally Lilith held out her arms for the baby. She whispered something to Laria, same as the others had, but this time the baby seemed to pull back. Lilith didn’t react. She smiled sweetly and placed a kiss on Laria’s forehead, then returned her to Janice’s arms with the words, “A wise woman sees the future in the eyes of a child.”
Janice nodded and held her heartdaughter close to her chest and if I didn’t know better I would think the wisecracking hairstylist was crying.
Hell, I practically was myself.
Music started up again from behind the gazebo and the sound of the children’s voices raised in song joined in. I didn’t understand a word, but nothing new about that. There was a common language among magicks and it definitely wasn’t English.
I sneaked a peek at my watch. Not because I was bored but because my folks were due to arrive around noon. We still had time, but they needed to move this thing along so I wouldn’t have to explain it to my staunchly Irish Catholic family.
The music stopped again. The children’s voices faded away.
I was half expecting a
Lion King
moment, but Janice continued to hold Laria close against her chest as she spoke to the crowd assembled on the green.
“A new soul is a blessing to us all and in return we bestow our blessings on Laria, child of Aerynn through Chloe. May she know only joy. May she live in the light of love and peace.”
Janice turned toward Chloe, whose beautiful face beamed with pride.
“Come forward, Chloe, and be mother to the child Laria.”
Chloe looked toward me, and damn, it was hard to see her through the sudden tears that filled my eyes. Whatever residual longing I might have still had for the world outside Sugar Maple faded away. I was where I was meant to be.
I nodded. Chloe smiled and took a step toward Laria and Janice. Before I could grasp what was happening, she let out a sharp cry of surprise and flew backward into poor Midge Stallworth and the two of them fell to the ground in a tangle of arms and legs.
I was halfway to Chloe when she suddenly leaped to her feet, brushed the snow from her black coat, then helped Midge up from the snowdrift they had landed in.
“Well,” she said with a self-deprecating laugh, “it’s not like you guys don’t know I’m a klutz.”
The assembled crowd laughed with her in sympathy, but the buzz of whispered comments began to spread through the crowd like a virus. My fists clenched at my sides as I steeled myself for some snarky cracks about Chloe, but what they said shocked the hell out of me.
. . . the baby has magick . . . one week old . . . it’s a miracle, that’s what it is . . . no child has ever shown so much power so early . . . and she’s three-quarters human . . . can you imagine what a force she would be if only Chloe had mated with one of us? . . .
Didn’t they remember their own history? Laria didn’t have magick. Serious magick didn’t flow into a Hobbs woman until she fell in love and that was a hell of a long way away.
I turned around and shot my best cop look at the crowd in general. This was my home, too. Whether or not they liked it, mortals were here and we weren’t going away. Chloe was half human. I was full-blooded. Our daughter was more human than magick. Those were the facts and I was getting a little tired of the constant jabs at our shared lineage.
The buzz faded away and I focused back in on what was happening within the circle.
I figured we were almost at the finish line and was surprised when our newest residents, the Fae contingent from Salem, made an appearance. At least that was what Paul Griggs told me, since as a mortal I couldn’t see them at all. They gathered overhead like a giant cloud of glitter in every color of the rainbow, then swooped down, swarming Chloe and Laria, knitting a lacy pattern of pink and yellow and blue and violet glitter chains around them. Chloe’s eyes were damp with tears and she looked deeply moved by the gesture. Hard to believe that less than one year ago we had been engaged in a battle to the death with these same creatures.
“And now we have reached the end of our festivities,” Lilith said, her lovely face aglow with happiness for us. “Let’s all join hands and raise our voices in the Sugar Maple anthem.”
I don’t sing. And I’d heard Chloe in the shower so I knew she didn’t sing, either. But we launched into a rousing version of the anthem anyway, which was followed by “The Star-Spangled Banner,” which was followed by cheers and applause and more happy tears from this crazy gathering of faeries and sprites and witches and werewolves and vampires and shapeshifters and trolls and one very happy sorceress.
And the best part? So far there still wasn’t a MacKenzie in sight.
21
MEGHAN
James pulled onto the shoulder a few feet in front of the “Welcome to Sugar Maple” sign.
“This is as far as I go.”
Megan heard his words through the heavy fog of sleep. Yawning, she forced herself to sit upright and open her eyes.
“How long was I out?” she asked, running a finger around the corner of her mouth where a patch of dampness had accumulated. Drool. Yeah, that was hot. She hoped he hadn’t noticed.
“Long enough,” he said. “You missed breakfast.”
That woke her up the rest of the way. “You ate breakfast without telling me?”
“I tried, babe, but you were out for the count.”
She glanced up at the welcome sign. “Why are we stopped here?”
“I told you. This is as far as I go.”
She waited for the punch line, but there wasn’t one. He didn’t say a word.
Even in unforgiving daylight he was perfect. Chiseled face, even features, thick glossy hair, seductive icy blue eyes, body to die for. A little self-absorbed, but that was to be expected. Most gorgeous men of her acquaintance spent a fair amount of time at the mirror and James was no exception.
“Okay,” she said carefully. “I get it. You need to gear up before you meet the family. We can wait a few minutes before we jump in. I don’t know about you, but I could use a drink or ten before I meet the family, and I’m related to them.”
Still nothing.
She tried again. “They probably have a bar in town. We could stop and get some fortification.”
She might as well have been talking to the welcome sign. Funny how chiseled features could turn to stone when you weren’t looking.
She struggled to keep her voice even. “I really don’t want to be the last one there.”
He turned to her, his piercing blue eyes hooded and unknowable. “You’re not listening. This is as far as I go.”
“We didn’t come all this way for us to stop here.”
“Nobody is stopping you from being with your family.”
“Wait a second.” She tried to collect her thoughts, but they had scattered like scared mice. “This isn’t a joke?”
“It’s no joke.”
“You’re just going to leave me here.”
“Afraid so.”
“You won’t even drive me to Luke’s place?” She had a lousy sense of direction. She’d be wandering that stupid town for hours.
“For the fourth time, this is as far as I go.”
“And you waited until now to tell me.”
“I didn’t know myself.”
“Okay,” she said, relaxing, “now I know you’re kidding.” Nobody sane would drive across two states on a Sunday morning in December to pull a stunt like that.
“Listen,” he said, drumming his strong fingers on the steering wheel, “either get out or come with. Your choice.”
There was no choice. Not anymore. She gathered up her stuff, slid out of the car, then slammed the door shut behind her.
“Want me to come back for you in a couple hours?” He looked as relaxed as if he had spent a day on the sofa watching football. “We could head up to one of those ski resorts you were talking about.”
“What I want you to do is go fuck yourself.”
“I’ll come back,” he said, laughing, “and when I do you’ll be here.”
Throwing her tote bag at him as he drove away was a ridiculously stupid thing to do, but it felt good even if it did miss the car by a mile. This was why she didn’t believe in owning guns. If she’d had a firearm on her, he would be lying dead right now in a pool of his own blood and she would be dancing around his corpse.
Maybe not dancing, but it would definitely be a while before she felt any remorse.
The son of a bitch had her car.
22
CHLOE
I was so busy congratulating myself for making sure the Presentation ceremony was over before the MacKenzie clan descended on us that I totally forgot about the buffet Janice and Lynette were hosting at town hall in less than an hour. The entire village had been invited and, trust me, the entire village was going to show up.
The residents of Sugar Maple never missed out on a free meal and if there was the slightest possible chance that some good gossip might break out—well, try to keep them away.
“We’re screwed,” I said to Luke as we raced around the cottage, picking up laundry, scanning for dust bunnies, making sure the litter boxes were clean. Not to mention seeing to it that Laria was changed, fed, burped, and dressed in her most adorable handknits. “Our worlds are about to collide!”
“I thought they’d already collided at the shop after Thanksgiving.”
“Not like this they didn’t. Every single resident of Sugar Maple is going to make sure to show up and check out your family and I can’t do a thing to stop it.”
He looked like he was enjoying himself, which only upset me more. “Another blizzard?” he suggested. “Or you could take out the bridge. That usually works.”
“Don’t be a wise guy.”
“I was trying to be helpful.”
“If you really want to be helpful, see if you can find the BSJ Janice made for the baby.”
He stared at me like I was speaking a foreign language, which I guess I was. Knitting does have a language all its own. “The pink-and-purple-striped sweater with the fancy buttons.” I spared him the story of Elizabeth Zimmermann and her amazing one-piece garter stitch jacket that had been delighting knitters for decades.
Wonderful handknits had been arriving from just about everywhere. Long-time customers, newbies, old friends, and even some people I didn’t think liked me all that well—they had taken up their needles when they heard I was pregnant and created garments that literally took my breath away.
Laria would be the best-dressed infant in New England and maybe the Mid-Atlantic and Canada, too. She had received sweaters, socks, caps, heirloom-quality blankets, squishy stuffed toys, soakers, mitts so tiny they made me laugh every time I looked at them. And no wimpy baby pastels for my daughter! She would be garbed in every color of the rainbow if my friends had anything to do with it.
Luke came back with the BSJ, a pair of adorable purple angora booties, and a soft cap that somehow captured all of the colors on a very small scale. We struggled a little getting those tiny arms into the equally tiny sleeves of the jacket and our eyes met over our daughter’s squirming body and for a moment I swear time stopped. Not in the magick way, but in my heart.
“I know,” he said, as my eyes filled with tears. “I feel it, too.”
“I keep thinking I’m going to wake up and find out this is all a dream.”
“This time last year we were just getting to know each other.”
“And falling in love.”
“You took some convincing,” he said. “I fell in love with you the moment I saw you.”
“You said I was asleep on the sofa with my mouth open, snoring like crazy.”
“So maybe I like women who snore.”
I could feel my heart growing two sizes larger inside my chest, like the Grinch’s heart on Christmas morning.
It was a good feeling, but there was no time for sentimental walks down memory lane. We had a baby sorceress to finish dressing and a human family about to descend on us any minute.
“I’m going to send out a group blueflame,” I told Luke, “and make sure they all know your family will be at the party. I don’t want anyone getting crazy and doing something I can’t explain short of shock treatment.”
My head spun at the thought of how many things could go wrong. The group blueflame was my last chance to head trouble off at the pass and keep some of our more colorful residents from putting on the kind of show not meant for human consumption.