Her expression blanked, and I wondered if she was trying to figure out if it was a joke. Above us, the eavesdropping pixies shot out of the trees, arrowing for the chimney and vanishing down it as if someone had shouted “Honey!”

From inside, Ivy’s voice rose. “Nina! No!”

I stood as the torn leaves drifted over us. “You had to wake her up,” I said bitterly, then strode to the steps. Ivy might need some help. “Stay out here!” I told Ellasbeth. “You’re too angry to be around her right now.”

“Rache!” Jenks shouted from inside, and I took the stairs two at a time.

I yanked open the back door, reeling as the vampire pheromones hit me like a wall. My hand clamped to my neck and I staggered through the living room, other hand on the archway, to look into the kitchen. Ivy had Nina pinned front-first to the wall, Nina’s head turned to me as Ivy wrenched the woman’s arm up behind her. There was a huge knife in Nina’s hand, and I felt myself pale. Both women’s eyes were black, and Ivy looked scared that she might hurt Nina.

“It’s okay, Nina. Breathe,” she said as she struggled to keep Nina unmoving. “Look at me. I’m not angry. Breathe.”

“Morgan,” Nina snarled, a heavy intelligence glittering in her eyes. “Tell Tamwood to let me go.”

“It’s Felix,” Jenks said, and I pushed up from the archway and edged inside. My pulse pounded. The elegant, young Hispanic woman with her face pressed into the wall struggled, and Ivy slipped a foot between hers, ready to pull her down. I could see the sick master vampire in Nina’s stance, belligerent and angry that Ivy, a living vampire, had managed to best him, even if he was in the body of a weaker, inexperienced woman. It had been weeks since the master vampire had taken Nina over. But how? All the undead vampires were sleeping!

“Let me go. I can help!” Nina shouted, the domination in her voice coming out in a frustrated howl. She wiggled again, and Ivy yanked her foot out from under her. They both hit the floor, chairs sliding out of the way as they fought for control of the knife.

“I’m sane, I tell you! I need Nina!” Nina screamed as Ivy got the knife. With a backward flip of the wrist, she flung it into the wall where it stuck, quivering. “Let me go! I am cognizant. I’m not ill!”

Tears fell freely from Ivy as she pinned Nina to the floor. “Fight him, Nina. You can do this. You can! You’re stronger than him, and it pisses him off that you know it!”

“Get off!” she howled. “I’m no longer ill! I can help, but only if I’m in Nina!”

Hair falling to hide her face, Ivy leaned low over her. “I love you, Nina. Don’t believe him. He lies. He can’t hurt you if you push him out. I’ll keep him away. I promise. I promise. Just get him out!”

The soft scuff behind me gave me warning, and I spun, trying to force Ellasbeth back. Any more fear in the air might give Felix the strength to completely break Nina’s mind.

“I told you to stay out,” I hissed, pushing her into the hall.

“Oh my God!” Ellasbeth said as Nina bucked to get Ivy off her.

“I’m not sick! With Nina, I can help!”

Ellasbeth’s face was white, and she looked into the kitchen as I shoved her into the living room. “This is a madhouse!”

Right now, I couldn’t argue with her, but she’d caused the problem to begin with. “We told you not to wake her up,” I said as I finally got the woman into the living room. “Sit down and shut up.” I pointed to the couch, and she sat.

Shaking, I went back in case Ivy needed me. They’d sat up, Ivy’s long legs wrapped around Nina as she held her unmoving before her in her lap. Nina’s hair was everywhere, mixing with Ivy’s, the ponytail long gone. I could tell just by Nina’s snarl that Felix was still in her.

“Together,” Ivy breathed, the strain showing in her arms as she held Nina unmoving. Tears made her cheeks shine, and I ached for her. “I will let go of you as you let go of him. I know he fills you with power, but you have to let him go,” she demanded. It was an addiction on both ends, and Ivy had survived both its presence and absence.

“Ah, Ivy?” Jenks said, his dust a thick, dark green falling from the overhead rack. “Is that such a good idea?”

I looked at my shoulder bag. My splat ball gun was in it, but before I could move, Ivy whispered, “I trust you.” She kissed her, and then let her go.

“Wait!” I cried out, reaching to tap a line as Nina sprang from her, spinning into an ugly crouch.

Ivy reached out a trembling hand. “Nina. I love you. Leave him.”

“No!” Nina howled, the sound raging from her with the strength of the undead, and then her tension broke and she collapsed.

Ivy lurched forward. Catching Nina, she pulled the woman to her, rocking Nina, gentling her head to her shoulder and whispering. Nina stiffened, and then she began to cry in great gasping sobs.

“He came!” she cried, words hardly recognizable. “Ivy, he came in my dreams. I didn’t even know. I can’t do this anymore! I just want it to stop!”

I exhaled, shaking as I wiggled the knife out of the wall and set it lightly in the sink.

“You didn’t hurt anyone,” Ivy was saying, holding her gently now. “It’s okay.”

“He wanted me to kill you!”

Tears still spilling from her brown eyes, Ivy took Nina’s face in her hands and smiled at her. “You didn’t hurt me. Look at me. Look at me!” Nina’s sobbing hiccups eased, and she blinked tearfully at Ivy. “It’s okay,” Ivy said firmly, even as moisture shined her cheeks as well. “I’m so proud of you.”

It was over, and as Nina continued to cry, I went to get her a glass of water. “That was fun,” I said as the tap ran, then looked up as Ellasbeth was suddenly in the doorway, an unusual silence in her stance as she took everything in, the chairs knocked aside, the knife in the sink, the women sobbing on the floor—one in relief, one in love. Maybe now she understood. Maybe now she’d know Ivy was trying to save a strong, intelligent woman from a circular trap. And if she didn’t, then the hell with her.

“I told you not to wake her up,” I said, fingers trembling as I turned off the water and took the glass to Nina.

Ivy slowly stood, extending a hand down to help Nina from the floor. “It wasn’t her fault,” Ivy said, and Nina bobbed her head, thanking me as she took the water and gulped at it.

“Jenks, go open the front door,” I said as I shoved the window open all the way. “We need to air the place out.”

“Got it,” he said, then darted off to work the series of pulleys Ivy had come up with for him to open the heavy oak door.

Ellasbeth still hovered in the doorway, a new understanding in her. “I’m sorry.”

Ivy’s expression was empty. “It wasn’t your fault. He attacked her in her sleep.”

“Still, I’m sorry. I didn’t know.”

It was the first honest thing I thought I’d ever heard from Ellasbeth, and I almost liked her as I leaned against the counter and just . . . breathed. “You did good, Nina. It won’t be so hard next time. I promise.”

Nina managed a smile. “Thank you.”

There were tears in Ivy’s eyes as she helped Nina to the table, tears and love for both of us. The love for me in the past, and the love for Nina in the future. And somehow, as the four of us women slowly picked up the threads of our lives and began to awkwardly weave them anew, it didn’t hurt anymore.

Eight

Ray was a comfortable armful of quiet as she sat on my lap in the kitchen, her eyes on the book that Lucy had brought in from the toy box I had for the rare occasions that Trent brought them to the church. Even the distraction of Jenks’s kids couldn’t take her attention from the picture book. Still, she didn’t reach for it when Lucy ran to me, collapsing on my knees in excitement and a bid for my attention.

“Sasha!” the little girl said brightly as she shoved the book at me and ran out.

“That’s the name of her pony at the Withons’ estate,” Quen said, and I scrambled to catch it before it slid to the floor. Only now did Ray reach for it, and I shifted her so she could hold and turn the pages herself. I didn’t think Ray’s reluctance to reach for the book earlier was because she was afraid of her sister, but simply knowing that her distractible sibling would keep it if Lucy knew Ray wanted it too.

“I didn’t think horses were that important to the Withons,” I said, and the man turned his attention from his daughter to the hallway. Ellasbeth and Trent were having a chat in the back living room, one that was probably long overdue, and their voices were a soft murmur.

“The pony was my idea,” he said, his motions smooth as he moved deeper into the kitchen. Quen wasn’t small, but a person tended not to notice him unless he wanted to be noticed. Both he and Ray had dark hair, uncommon to elves. It might be a remnant from the elves’ recently dropped tradition of hybridizing with humans, but I doubted it. Quen was one of the most elven elves I knew, clever, powerful in his magic, and graceful beyond reason.

“I didn’t want their horsemanship to suffer in the time spent away from home,” he added as he clasped his hands behind his back, stoic as he waited for Ellasbeth to say what she wanted so he could, hopefully, take her back to the airport.

I smiled as Lucy ran back in, blond hair flying. “Belle!” the excited toddler shouted, dropping a sparkly fairy doll on Ray’s book and running out, pixy girls in tow. Ray promptly threw the toy after her and returned to her book. The tension from the back room was ebbing, but I was still glad that Ivy and Nina had excused themselves shortly after Trent’s arrival. Belle, too, had retired to the garden. The wingless fairy was a brilliant strategist, but she was pretty much helpless against the grasping toddlers, especially when Rex, Jenks’s cat, had dumped her to hide under my bed at the first little-girl “Here kitty, kitty.”

“Jenks, stay in here,” I said when the pixy rose from the windowsill to follow her out.

“I can’t hear crap from here, Rache,” he muttered as he landed on my shoulder. Ray looked up when his dust fell on her fingers. Slowly she turned her palm up, mesmerized at the spot of sunshine she could touch.

“That’s the idea.” I’d watched Ellasbeth turn green when the girls had greeted me with enthusiasm, then white when they’d toddled off to the toy box, clearly knowing where it was.

Quen smiled thinly, finally lowering himself to sit on the edge of a chair beside the fridge. “Any problems while I was gone?” he asked, looking at Ivy’s new monitor in envy.

“Apart from the recent magic misfires and no functioning undead vampire in the Cincinnati area?” I helped Ray turn the page, and she sang out, “Thank you,” charming me with her little-girl voice. “No,” I said softer, the scent of her hair tweaking my maternal instincts. “Mr. Ray and Mrs. Sarong have started campaigning for their picks for the next mayoral battle, and there’s been some noise about the parks Trent made in the abandoned warehouse district being better used for commercial, meaning gambling. Couple of death threats with low credibility, but I forwarded that to you.”

Quen squinted as he noticed the scratches Bis had made on the ceiling. “Thank you.”

His attention fell to Lucy as she ran in and dropped a train book on Ray’s lap. “No!” Ray demanded, shoving it off, but Lucy was gone.

I leaned to pick it up and set it on the table, now cleared of any and all FIB-gathered evidence. “It’s been my pleasure. I’m glad you’re back, though. These misfires and increased vampire violence have problem written all over them.”

“You think the two are linked?” he asked, his concern obvious, and I nodded.

From the back room, Ellasbeth’s voice rose in hurt. “I’m staying until this matter is settled. If not with you, then downtown. There’s one decent hotel in Cincinnati. The service is lacking, but the food is bearable.”

“I didn’t say you weren’t welcome; I asked you to not antagonize my staff,” Trent said. “Maggie has been with me since my parents died. She’s not an employee, she’s family.”

“I’m sorry. I wasn’t aware,” Ellasbeth said softly, and I winced. She was being very contrite—meaning she was up to something.

Lucy came back in, and Ray looked up in annoyance at the glitter ball in her hands. “I’ll take it, Lucy,” I said, and laughing, the little girl threw it, watching it bounce on the floor before running back into the living room. The ball rolled to a halt and Quen scooped it up.

“How’s the weather on the coast?” I asked, wishing they’d hurry up.

“The lines are intolerable. I’d do this for the girls, no one else.” He shifted the ball in his hands, watching the glitter move before he set it on the table beside the book of trains. His expression froze when Trent said, “I’ll have your room refreshed immediately.”

Jenks snickered, and Ray patted the dust suddenly spilling over the book. She looked up at him, beautiful as she smiled and held a small hand up for him to land on.

“My room?” Ellasbeth said. “Trent, I was hoping—”

Her voice cut off at his soft comment, and I cringed. TMI. I was getting too much information. I knew her moving back in with Trent was inevitable, but did she have to bring it up where I could hear it? But remembering how she’d flashed that never-returned engagement ring, she probably did.