A Passion for Potions (Petalfall #1)

25. Twenty-Five - A Helping Hand

Twenty-Five - A Helping Hand

Ana

My mother is impossible.

Two nights “gallivanting” meant she was ready to physically restrain me if she needed to. Not that I was going anywhere, but she was on high alert. The moment I moved, she moved too.

Now, as the clock ticks past midnight, I sit on my bed in the dark, fully clothed and staring disconnectedly at the floorboards.

Mina needs to figure out what she wants to do with her life. If she had somewhere to go, I could leave, too.

I dream of turning the ugly room tucked into the rafters of the shop into a bedroom. It’s not much larger than this space and I’d have to get creative if I wanted a kitchen…

It is certainly not big enough for two.

Tonight had been a reminder that if I leave first I had better be prepared to take Mina with me.

Our mother isn’t... cruel, she’s simply careless.

I stretch out my shoulder in the silence and try to gather my shattered focus.

It’s harder to put up with her now... now that I know what I could be doing instead.

A soft tapping echoes and I stand, shoulders drooping. I am too tired to have whatever conversation she has in store for me.

But when I get to the door, I stop. The taps aren’t coming from it... I look to the windows, nothing.

The only other option…

My closet is slightly ajar and when I go to it, Viggo peeks in from the manor.

“Hello, sweetling,” he says with a smile.

The difference in the light between our two homes makes his eyes glow brightly.

I lean against the wall even though I want to pry the door open and escape to them. “Are you spying on me?”

He shakes his head, shaggy bangs brushing over his face. “I’ve come to give you a gift.”

“I like gifts.” I like the two of them better.

“Can I come in?”

I nod, stepping back and he comes in and... closes the door.

“Viggo…”

He catches my hand and raises my knuckles to his lips. “Don’t worry, sweetling, I haven’t trapped myself here.”

He sweeps me against him, arm tight around my waist, and when he kisses me, I could almost forget where we are.

Goddess, the two of them make me long to be reckless.

But when his grip loosens and we both have a chance to breathe, I ask, “Does Penny approve of this visit?”

He smiles but there’s something mischievous about it... like a little boy who hasn’t been told no, but certainly hasn’t been told yes either.

“He’s perfectly fine with the two of us spending time alone together.”

“Why does it sound like you’re trying to get around answering my question?”

“Because he probably wouldn’t be happy to know I’m here right now.” He brushes my hair over my shoulder. “He’s afraid I’m going to smother you.”

“After what I put up with tonight, I might ask you too.” I pick up my pillow and offer it to him, but he tosses it back onto my bed.

He glances toward the door. “Locked?”

I shake my head. “It doesn’t have one.”

“Then we’ll have to be very quiet.” He picks me up and turns, pulling me down on top of him on my bed. “Will you think I’m silly if I tell you I missed you?”

“No.” I kiss him and hope he’ll realize how much I missed him too.

“We’re going to have to be very quiet.” He slips free the tie that holds my bodice closed.

“You’re going to have to keep your teeth to yourself,” I say, nipping his lip. “If you bite me right now, I know I’ll scream.”

“If we wake up the rest of the house, would your mother be so scandalized she’d demand we marry?”

I shake my head. “She’d break every piece of wooden furniture in this house trying to stake you.”

There’s a snap and a gasp and I sit bolt upright, shoving Viggo to the bed, half behind me. But it’s only Mina, dressed for bed and clearly in a mood to chat.

Relief only lasts a minute, because Mina isn’t going to tell our mother, but I can already tell, her wide eyes and vaguely shocked smile... she thinks Penny—Edric—is hidden behind my skirts.

“Mina, you need to go.”

She nods, clutching her shawl more tightly around her, and for a moment, I think we’re safe, but then her gaze shifts and her brows pinch and I look down to where Viggo’s hand holds my arm.

Gray skin, dark nails... very definitely not an elf.

“I need you to keep this a secret.” I say, swallowing and feeling like my corset is laced a little too tight.

“A secret from who?” She asks and for the first time in my life, she looks disappointed in me. “Edric? Because I’m not…”

“No.” I hold my hand up, and hush her. “Everyone but Edric.”

That makes her brows pinch even more.

“Mina, this is Viggo.”

He sits up and offers her a small wave.

“Hello, Mina.”

The soft smile that had started to creep onto her lips disappears and she goes pale.

“A vampire ?” She hisses and I see her reach for the door knob, and then go slack.

Viggo is out of my bed in an instant and catches her before she falls to the floor.

“Sorry,” he offers me an apologetic smile. “I couldn’t let her get out the door.”

“I understand. What did you do?”

“I took the last hour of her memory.”

“That long?”

His smile is tight when he says, “I’ve been told I’ll be able to take shorter increments in a hundred or so years.”

He lifts Mina up and places her on my bed, scowling down at her. “I should go.”

I nod and wish I could go with him, but, “I should stay with her, just in case it doesn’t work.”

“It always works,” he says, ruefully. “Even when I don’t want it to.”

He pulls something from his pocket, small and wooden.

“I came to give you this.”

“You came to give me a hand?” I ask, smiling at the double meaning.

He holds it up as if I hadn’t already seen it and then puts the flat end—where the wrist would be—up against the closet door, just above the door knob. And when he pulls back, the door opens to the warm light of their home.

The hand comes loose a moment later and he places it in my palm. “It’s a piece of Dorrian. You can always come to us, no matter where you are.”

There’s a sound from the other side of the door, like a throat clearing. “Oh, it has to be a solid wood door, no glass, no metal bars through the wood. But it will work on any door that fits those requirements.”

Viggo leans close, kissing my cheek. “Don’t lose it. I only barely convinced him to give it to me.”

He glances at the bed where Mina sleeps. “I am sorry about that.”

“It’s okay. Tomorrow I’ll make sure she changes her mind about you... without knowing that you exist yet.”

“Thank you.”

He kisses me once more and slips back into his home, leaving me in darkness once again.

I turn back to where Mina slumbers, already twitching.

Maybe I should go to them... they don’t kick in their sleep.