Darkangel, Christine Pope [ebook reader screen .txt] 📗

Although working at the store had certainly never been my raison d’être, the defection still bothered me. It was as if now that I was prima, my aunt was trying to distance herself from me.

All the more reason for us to have a talk.

Since I wasn’t that hungry, I made myself some toast and finished my coffee, then headed upstairs to get myself together. It was a bright, clear day, but cold, with a brisk wind coming from the east. After I showered I put on a thick mohair pullover I’d found in a thrift shop down in Cottonwood — “it’s so retro!” Sydney had exclaimed — along with my favorite jeans and boots. As a concession to Aunt Rachel’s sensibilities, I finished off the outfit with some lip gloss and my favorite silver hoop earrings, then headed down to the store.

Of course I told Tobias and the other bodyguards where I was going, and they dutifully trailed after me, then parked themselves in the donut shop across the street. I really didn’t see what possible trouble I could get into in the distance between the house and Aunt Rachel’s shop, but I did have to admire their efficiency.

She gave me a surprised look when I entered the shop. “Hi, hon, but I told you that you didn’t have to come in today.”

“I know.” The place was empty except for the two of us; midweek like this, most tourists wouldn’t come by to shop until after lunch. “I wanted to talk.”

“Talk?” Suddenly her hands were busy, rearranging a display of small tumbled semiprecious stones. “What did you want to talk about?”

“Yesterday…and a few things Margot Emory told me.”

“You talked to Margot?”

So apparently I was able to keep a few things secret in this town. Then again, Margot had never been the type to share confidences…unless they were being dragged out of her. “Yes. She told me stuff I’d never heard about the Wilcoxes. Also a few things about this whole consort business. Things it might have been nice to know.”

My aunt’s expression grew guarded. “Such as?”

“The reason why the Wilcoxes wanted to grab Aunt Ruby in the first place…wanted to grab me. And how I don’t have to be holding out for a consort. Yes, it’s preferable, but it’s not exactly a do-or-die situation like the way you’d always explained it to me.”

She wouldn’t meet my eyes, instead got out from behind the counter and began, quite unnecessarily, to make sure all the books in the rack on the far wall were lined up properly. “You know it’s important for a prima to have her consort. Not just for her, but for all of us.”

“Important, yes, but it’s not the only way.” On the walk down here I’d told myself I needed to stay calm, to not fling accusations at her, but now I could feel yesterday’s anger bubbling up again. “Here you were standing on the sidelines, being all rah-rah every time a candidate came up to see me, but never once in the past year did you tell me that we would manage without a consort, that just settling for one of those candidates would be enough to protect me from the Wilcoxes.”

At that she did finally turn to face me. Her hazel eyes glittered — not with tears, but her own particular brand of anger. Hands on her hips, she retorted, “Settle? Settle? The prima of the McAllisters should not have to settle! All right, it might have protected you from the Wilcoxes, but what about the rest of us? A prima without a consort isn’t strong enough to protect her whole clan, or didn’t Margot tell you that?”

“She said it wasn’t optimal, but she also didn’t make it sound as if the world was going to cave in, either.” Since that particular remark didn’t get a response, only a continuing irritated glare, I added, “And since she’s a clan elder, I figure she must know what she’s talking about.”

“And I don’t, I suppose.”

“I didn’t say that.”

“So what are you saying, Angela?” She moved away from the bookcase and went back to her fussy tidying-up, as if those few minutes of angry eye contact were about all she could handle.

“I’m saying that you were so busy protecting me that you didn’t give me a chance to make any decisions for myself! Maybe it would’ve helped me to know that Damon Wilcox wanted me because he knew as primus he could force me to be his whether or not he was my consort.” The horrifying dream-memory of his mouth on mine, his hands grasping my arms, swam up behind my eyes, and I blinked it away. I couldn’t let myself think about that right now. “Shit, you knew what he looked like — you recognized him back in Phoenix. And yet I had no clue. He could’ve walked up to me in Wal-Mart down in Cottonwood, and I would’ve thought he was just some random guy trying to hit on me in the freezer section.”

Her mouth tightened. “That would never have happened. Even he wouldn’t be so bold as to come into our territory like that.”

“He didn’t seem to have any problem in Phoenix.”

“Because it’s not our territory — it’s the de la Pazes’.”

“Oh, whatever!” I crossed my arms. “You know what I mean. It was that whole protecting me thing again. For some reason you didn’t want to give me even that little piece of information. How can I make the right choices and do the right thing if I’m working in the dark? I’m the prima of this clan now, not some girl you can keep bundled up in bubble wrap for the rest of my life.”

The bells on the front door jingled, and Tobias entered, holding two go-cups of coffee. Only a very stupid person could have overlooked the tension in the air, and Tobias was definitely not stupid. He glanced from Rachel to me and back again. “Everything okay in here, ladies?”

“Fine,” my aunt and I both snapped simultaneously.

He looked supremely unconvinced, but only went over the counter and set the two cups of coffee down on it. “I’ll just leave these here for you, then.”

“Thanks,” the two of us said, and he sent Aunt Rachel a searching glance before giving the smallest lift of his shoulders and heading back outside.

We both ignored the coffee, although it smelled good, its heavy, rich scent mingling with the spicy smell of the potpourri sitting in a basket on a high shelf.

“Anyway,” I added, since it seemed clear she was keeping herself from saying anything else…saying something she’d regret, possibly, “Adam and I have talked it over, and if a consort doesn’t materialize before a week from tomorrow, then we’re going to…well, you know. Be together.”

That did shock her. She set down the rag she’d been using to wipe off a display of wood carvings. “You what?”

“You heard me.”

“So you’re just going to throw everything away to be with someone I distinctly remember you saying you had absolutely no interest in?”

“What exactly would I be throwing away?” I could not understand her reasoning. “At that point the only thing I’ll be throwing away is a virginity that’s not such a great asset, considering it’s the one thing Damon Wilcox seems to want. Get rid of that, get rid of him. It seems pretty simple to me.”

She went very still, staring at me as if she’d never seen me before. “Do you love Adam?”

“Of course I don’t,” I said in some impatience. “But I like him, and he’s a McAllister, and being with him certainly seems a better alternative than spending the rest of my life looking over my shoulder.”

“You might think that now,” she replied. Now her tone was sad, the anger somehow ebbing away. For the first time ever I thought she looked old, the lines around her eyes etched a little deeper than they’d been only moments earlier. “But you don’t know what you’d be giving up.”

“And what would I be giving up?”

“The life you should have had.”

Watching her, I thought then that she was talking of something far beyond me. I didn’t know if I should prod her any further. This confrontation had already hurt enough…probably because we so seldom quarreled. But the scab had already been peeled off the wound; walking away now would only let it heal halfway, if that.

“Are you telling me that because you really believe it…or because you think that’s what happened to you?”

A stony silence. She went back to wiping off the wooden figurines, head down. Her eyes would not meet mine. Our roles might have been reversed — she the silent child, I the scolding adult. That wasn’t how I’d intended things to progress, but I didn’t see a way to back down now.

“Look, I get it. You would never talk about what was going on in your personal life when my mother showed up with me, and I suppose that’s your business. But it was a huge disruption. You think I don’t know that?” My throat was tightening now, but I gave a little cough and forced my way onward. “I’m pretty sure that getting a baby dumped on you wasn’t something you planned, and I know you’ve said over and over that having a family of your own was never in the cards, but I’m not sure I believe that anymore. You don’t want me to make a foolish decision now because you feel as if you’ve thrown away your own life, and that would just negate the sacrifices you’ve already made.”

“I do not — ” she began, but I cut her off.

“Yes, what you’ve done to raise me was incredible, and you’ve done an amazing job, but it was always focused on me. Maybe there were others who would’ve taken me in, but you wouldn’t allow that, since you were my aunt, my closest relation.”

She said nothing.

“I’m not marrying Adam because I want