Darkangel, Christine Pope [ebook reader screen .txt] 📗
- Author: Christine Pope
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“What, you don’t think you’re going to have a celebratory dinner with Rachel after this candidate proves he’s the One?”
I shot Kirby a very sour look. “I’d say the odds of that are roughly the same as me getting elected President.”
“Hey, you never know.” With a visible show of reluctance, he put the pizza box back in the ancient Frigidaire. “Did you need something?”
“He wants a Coke.”
Another grin. “Well, at least he didn’t ask for a beer.”
“I didn’t offer.” I took the cold can of Coke from Kirby. “And hands off that pizza. I’m serious.”
“But I’m hungry.”
“Then have some cheese and crackers or something. There’s some white cheddar in there, and I have crackers in the pantry.”
“If I must.” He heaved an exaggerated sigh, then extracted the package of cheese and shut the refrigerator door.
Any longer, and Griffin Dutton would know I was stalling for time. So I left the kitchen and headed back to the parlor, where I found him looking around at all the new furniture and the art on the walls, most of which was from local artists and was all original. I could practically see the dollar signs in his eyes as he mentally added up what it all must have cost.
“Your Coke,” I said, and extended the hand holding it.
“Thanks.” He took it and popped the tab, then took a few large swallows. “That’s better. It was kind of a long drive.”
I only nodded. Yes, it was, but I’d had candidates come a lot farther than that, so I feared my expression wasn’t entirely sympathetic.
If he noticed, he didn’t give any indication. Instead he gazed up at the ceiling, which had been painted a soft cream color, and then around at the deeper toast hue on the walls. “Been doing some work on the house?”
“Some,” I admitted. “It was very retro, and not in a good way. I’m not big on florals.”
“Hmm.” He drank some more Coke, then set the can down on the coffee table.
I immediately swooped in and relocated it to a coaster.
“Oh, sorry,” he said, although he didn’t sound all that sorry…more amused by my anal-retentive protecting of the table.
Once again I thought this would be a whole hell of a lot easier if I could have a few drinks before forcing myself to go through with this ridiculous ritual. On the other hand, I didn’t think there were thick enough beer goggles in the world that would make me believe kissing Griffin was a good idea.
“So…” I said. I really didn’t want to kiss him, but I did want to get this over with.
“So…” He moved closer to me.
I sighed. “Just go ahead and do it.”
A lot of guys probably would have been put off by my tone. I’d already taken the measure of this one, though, and he wasn’t seeing me. He was just seeing the prima of the McAllisters and her big house and the position he’d have as her consort. Boy, was he in for a disappointment.
He leaned in and pressed his mouth against mine. That was it — no reaching up to caress my cheek, no finesse at all. Just lips against lips. I suppose he thought he didn’t need to do anything else, because if he turned out to be the one, the spark would start on its own.
Of course it didn’t. Thank the Goddess, I thought. Bad enough that I should have to kiss him at all, when I’d been spending my days mooning over Chris Wilson. But it hadn’t worked, so I started to pull away immediately.
“Sorry — ”
I didn’t get out anything else other than that, because he’d grabbed me by the shoulders and pulled me back toward him, forcing my mouth open with his tongue. He tasted of Coke, and I gagged. This time I didn’t even have to invoke the Goddess. Even as my mind cried out a “no!”, an invisible force grabbed hold of him and pushed him away from me with enough force that he tripped over a footstool and went tumbling to the floor. In the process he knocked over the fireplace tools, which hit the slate hearth surround with a clatter.
Almost at once, Kirby and the other two bodyguards, Tom and Alison, came running. They took in the scene before them and then hurried over to me.
“What happened?” Kirby asked, as Griffin shook his head, as if to clear it, then began to push himself up to his feet.
“That crazy bitch attacked me, that’s what happened.”
At their prima being called the big “B,” all three of them frowned. Tom, a heavy-set man in his middle forties, said, “You might want to reconsider what you just called Ms. McAllister.”
Griffin matched their scowls with one of his. “Well, it’s the truth.”
“I was defending myself. We did the kiss, it didn’t work, and I guess he didn’t like it, because he decided to stick his tongue down my throat. So I…did something about it.”
“I think you’d better leave,” Alison said grimly.
Griffin glanced from her to Tom to Kirby, who was looking angrier than I thought I’d ever seen him. Actually, before that moment I wasn’t even sure Kirby could get angry.
“Fine,” Griffin said. “Like I want to be part of this freak show anyway. She’s not even good-looking.”
After delivering that parting shot, he stalked out of the room and into the foyer. The front door banged a few seconds later.
The three bodyguards just stared at me. I hesitated, then went over to the footstool and righted it, putting it back in its proper position. “I’m going upstairs,” I told them, and walked with as much dignity as I could muster to the staircase in the foyer. I went upstairs, closed my bedroom door behind me, and threw myself down on my bed, where I wept stormily and wished this would all be over.
On Thanksgiving most of us converged on Spook Hall for a huge, rowdy McAllister feast. They’d been doing this ever since I could remember; Aunt Rachel had once told me it was Great-Aunt Ruby’s idea, that after spending Thanksgiving going from house to house so she could try to see everyone, she put her foot down and said we should all gather in one place and save her some work. So we shopped like we were buying food for a soup kitchen or something, making the run to Prescott so we could go to Costco and the Trader Joe’s there, and then set up the long tables in the hall with warm russet tablecloths and centerpieces of autumn flowers.
The kitchen was large, but even so we did a good deal of tripping over one another. My aunt supervised, more or less, since she was an amazing cook. Some turkeys went in the oven, and others were smoked in the smokers across the street at the English Kitchen restaurant. My specialty was homemade spiced cranberry sauce, so I handled that and tried to stay out of the way as best I could.
We really hadn’t discussed my disastrous encounter with Griffin Dutton, but I noticed that she hadn’t sent any more candidates my way after that. Thanksgiving was late this year, so there were only three weeks until my birthday at that point. Both she and I — and the entire clan — were aware of the rapidly approaching deadline. We couldn’t not be. But either she’d decided to let the universe handle it from here on out, or she thought she might as well leave it alone until after Thanksgiving. I wasn’t going to question her actions, mostly because I was just relieved to not have another candidate shoved down my throat. Literally.
It was mainly women in the kitchen, but that didn’t mean the men got off scot-free. From the hall came scraping sounds as they brought out the long racks of chairs and started setting them up. There was another group congregating across the street, ostensibly in order to keep watch on the turkeys in the smoker, but I had a feeling there was more beer drinking than turkey-watching going on there.
All around me was the chatter of cheerful voices and the warm, rich smells of turkey roasting and pies baking. Everyone looked happy, glad to be surrounded by family, glad of the opportunity to share in the world’s bounty. I knew I should be feeling the same way, but I didn’t.
Suddenly the kitchen felt stifling. My cranberry sauce had more or less gelled by then, so I turned off the gas and moved the pot to the back burner. “I need to get some air,” I told Aunt Rachel, and then hurried out of the kitchen and threaded my way through the tables to the front door.
It was one of those beautiful late autumn days, the air cold but the sun warm, the sky deep sapphire punctuated by downy white clouds. I took in a deep breath, raising my face to the sun and the wind, and headed down the side street in an attempt to get away from the hustle and bustle.
“That’s quite the shindig you’re putting together in there,” came Maisie’s voice from a few feet away.
She hadn’t been there a second earlier, but that was sort of how she did things. Just
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