Chapter 11 Gia
ELEVEN
GIA
Gia called Lilly on speaker, and Aurora gave her a rundown of how she’d become a ghost, without any trouble.
See, of course, everyone could hear Aurora. Gia resisted pointing this out.
Aurora’s story didn’t make any more sense than it had the first time Gia had heard it. It was all so fantastical, but apparently, fantasy was real now. Who’d have thought Sam driving for thirty hours straight wouldn’t be the weirdest thing to happen this week?
Wait… If Sam was part of the Lockwood Coven, had she used magic to keep herself going? She must have.
Magic must have helped them evade Franco’s detection the night she escaped.
Blocked the street security footage of Gia getting into the car, or something like that.
Gia almost asked Aurora to explain if such a thing was possible, but stopped herself.
Like hell was she admitting to being on the run from the Italian mob.
Aurora might understand her desperation to escape—maybe even understand her fear—but no matter how similar their situations were, the two of them weren’t the same.
Aurora was a good person, fighting against an evil coven as best she could, while Gia had been complicit in her family’s crimes.
She’d sat around for years, doing nothing, and only ran when the odds tipped ridiculously in her favor.
She wasn’t honorable like Aurora, and nowhere near as daring. No matter how little Gia understood magic or wondered how a ghost was technically alive, there was no denying that Aurora’s willingness to literally step out of her body was brave as fuck.
“You idiot! I told you not to do that spell!” Lilly shrieked. Seemed she didn’t agree with Gia’s assessment.
At least Lilly didn’t question Aurora being alive. Gia gave in and let go of her skepticism, logic be damned, and a fraction of the anxiety she’d been carrying unraveled. She hadn’t wanted Aurora to be dead. It would have broken her heart.
Aurora’s features hardened in response to her friend’s admonishment. “Circumstances changed, Lil. They were going to shackle me to some Nightingale witch. I could cope with the binding, same as ever, but a marriage… There was no time. It was the only way off the compound.”
Gia’s chest tightened all over again. With all the blood blood-binding shit, she shuddered to think what marriage would have meant for Aurora. No wonder leaving her body seemed like a reasonable course of action.
“Fuck…” Lilly sounded just as stricken by the news. “That’s… Fuck your family. I’ll be there soon. What’s the address?”
For her part, Aurora didn’t seem overly emotional given what she’d shared. She glanced at Gia expectantly.
Right. She rattled off the address.
“Susan’s old building?” Lilly asked, surprised.
Would the coven begrudge Susan leaving everything to her? Gia hadn’t considered that. “Susan was my aunt,” she said carefully. “She left the place to me.”
Before Lilly had a chance to enquire further, Aurora cut in. “Be careful of Trey. He’s going to spot you coming in.”
“How will Trey know Lilly doesn’t live here?” Gia asked, relieved they’d moved away from her backstory.
Lilly spoke up. “He won’t know for sure, but he’ll probably scan me for magic and realize I’m a witch.”
“You can’t hide your magic?”
Aurora shook her head, her ghostly hair fluffing around her. “Not easily.”
“I’ll be fine,” Lilly assured them. “I’m good at shielding, and I know he’s there. I’ll be prepared. Him spotting me is safer than asking you to come to me, and having him follow.”
After a quick goodbye, Lilly hung up.
“You didn’t ask about the wine,” Aurora said with a twitch of her lips.
Really? “It didn’t feel appropriate under the circumstances.”
“Your loss. I’m going to watch for Lilly out the window.” Aurora vanished from sight.
“Okay,” Gia said to the seemingly empty room. With nothing else to do, she stood and idly put away the items she’d bought at the deli.
Why was a member of Aurora’s awful coven following her?
Gia wasn’t a Lockwood. If Trey couldn’t be sure who Lilly was, how could he know anything about her?
And why couldn’t Aurora leave? Were they stuck together because Gia was the one who’d found her in the theater?
Like finders keepers? It couldn’t be that simple.
A horrible thought struck, and Gia almost dropped the jar of mustard in her hand. Was she keeping Aurora here?
Despite pushing Aurora away, Gia hadn’t wanted the ghost to leave.
Gia was developing an…attachment. Not a crush.
But something. She couldn’t deny she’d much rather have Aurora around than be alone.
A fierce, determined woman was exactly what Gia needed, even if the last thing she wanted was to develop unrequited feelings for a ghost.
But Gia’s private urge to keep Aurora around couldn’t have trapped her. The things Gia wanted didn’t just happen. Her desire to avoid the Lockwoods wasn’t coming to fruition.
“Lilly’s here,” Aurora’s disembodied voice announced a short time later. “Trey doesn’t seem to be paying her much attention. He’s already looking at his phone again.” She seemed to sigh in relief even though, as a ghost, she didn’t need to breathe.
The soft, airy sound sent a shiver down Gia’s spine, and she did her best to ignore it. Reacting to every little thing Aurora did wasn’t helping her attachment.
Soon, Lilly was knocking on the door, and Gia went to let her in, a now-visible Aurora at her elbow.
Gia opened the door, and a tall, curvy woman with brown skin smiled and introduced herself. Gia returned the pleasantries and invited Lilly inside.
Lilly’s attention landed on Aurora. “Fuck, you look wild.”
The ghost huffed and floated over to the couch. “It’s not a look I’m planning on keeping.”
“Glad to hear it.” Lilly turned serious. “Your stalker noticed me, but didn’t seem poised to pounce.”
“I saw. Can you detect any wards on the building?” Aurora asked.
Gia shut the door.
Lilly frowned in concentration for a few moments. “No. Susan’s wards must have broken when she passed away, and no one else from the coven lives here. I’ve never actually been inside her place before.” She glanced around the bare room.
“You weren’t close?” Gia asked.
Lilly shrugged. “I’m new to the coven. Relatively speaking. I’ve only been a Lockwood for a few years. The elders are welcoming, don’t get me wrong, but I wasn’t looking to get involved in leadership and didn’t see them outside meetings and coven gatherings.”
Interesting, but coven politics weren’t the most pressing thing at the moment. “What are wards?”
Lily’s brow furrowed. “They’re protective spells.”
Was that all she had to say? Gia hated being left in the dark. “What do they do? Protective how?”
Lilly frowned, her gaze darting to Aurora, then to Gia. “How have you never heard of wards?”
Gia’s cheeks flamed. “Because as far as I was concerned, magic wasn’t real this morning.”
Lilly’s eyes widened. “But Susan was your aunt.”
Aurora floated closer to Gia, and she wished she didn’t find it comforting. “Gia didn’t realize she had extended relatives until recently,” Aurora explained. “I told her magic is hereditary, but—”
“But it’s not.” Gia’s whole body heated, a sweat breaking out on her palms. “I’d know if I had magic. It’s not possible.”
Lilly’s wide-eyed stare locked on Aurora.
“I can’t sense magic in this form,” Aurora said as if Lilly had asked a question.
Gia’s heart rate spiked as both women looked at her. “I don’t have any magic, so it doesn’t matter.”
“I can sense magic,” Lilly said way too carefully. “Gia…you do have magical power. I can feel it.”
Gia swallowed a biting remark, her fists clenching. “No, I don’t. Wouldn’t I know if I had magic?”
“Not necessarily,” Aurora said, but Gia couldn’t bring herself to look at her. “Finding out later in life happens. Especially when witches are disconnected from their magical family members.”
Gia’s eyes itched, and her throat burned.
“But if I had magic, couldn’t I use it? Wouldn’t I—” Have been able to escape?
Have had a better life? Stopped my father from hurting people?
Stopped my headaches from ruling my life?
She choked on the unsaid words. “Wouldn’t I have noticed if I had powers?
Shouldn’t it have been obvious? Things exploding when I was mad or something? ”
“No.” Lilly’s shock was replaced with concern. “Magic can’t do anything unless you call on it. Casting spells is intentional. You can’t accidentally use magic. But if you know what to look for, you can find it within yourself. Witches learn to tap into their power from childhood.”
This could not be happening. How could something this integral to who she was be hidden her entire life?
“You said your biological father wasn’t who raised you,” Aurora said. “Did your mother ever say anything about him?”
“She might not have known he was a witch, depending on the circumstances,” Lilly added.
“My mother died when I was five.”
“I’m so sorry.” To her credit, Aurora looked it. “But that could have contributed to you not knowing you were a witch. Your mother might have been waiting to tell you.”
“I don’t think so.” Gia’s mother couldn’t have known, could she?
Lilly raised her hands like she was trying not to spook a wild animal. “We don’t know your family, and aren’t trying to rewrite anything. But you possess magical power, and we can teach you to use it if you want.”
Gia collapsed onto the couch. Use magic? She could learn to cast spells? Lilly had said wards were protective. Could she use her magic to keep herself safe? To keep the Balzanos away?
Absurdly, the idea made Gia want to punch a hole in the wall. She’d had this power the whole time and not known. Her life could have been so different.
Regret and longing for what could have been threatened to crush her, clawing at her insides and shredding her heart. But Gia could still have a better life. Even if she wished she’d discovered magic a decade ago. Now was better than never.
Maybe she had the power to stop her father’s growing empire after all. Maybe…
Ice formed in her veins. “Could not knowing I have magic make me sick?”
What if her headaches were her magic? What if having power and not using it was what was wrong with her brain? It would explain why every doctor was so baffled by her condition.
Aurora perched beside her on the couch, her form flickering as concern lined her face. “What do you mean, sick?”
Gia’s insides twisted, but there was no point keeping it to herself now. “I get headaches. Really bad migraines, and I black out. I lose time and can’t remember anything after the pain sets in.”
“Your magic wouldn’t do that to you,” Aurora said, her voice firm.
But how could she know? “What if the headaches are my magic trying to escape?”
“Magic doesn’t do anything unless you actively ask it to,” Lilly said again. “I’ve never heard of a witch experiencing adverse effects because they possessed magical power they didn’t use.”
Gia’s heart sank. Having an answer would have been such a fucking relief. “Could the headaches and memory loss be a spell someone cast on me?” That made even more sense. No wonder medical professionals couldn’t help her.
Aurora and Lilly shared a look.
Lilly shook her head, seeming uneasy for the first time.
“Unless someone was there, casting a spell on you every time you got a headache, it can’t be a spell, and witches can’t alter memories, period.
Our power can do a great many things, but we can’t craft illusions strong enough to result in memory loss. ”
“How do you know someone didn’t cast a spell on me once, when I was ten, rather than every time I get a headache? It could have been causing my headaches ever since. Memory loss could be my body’s response to pain rather than directly caused by the magic.”
Lilly crossed her arms, her features twitching with alarm. “I can check if any curses or spells are lingering on you. But it’s highly unlikely someone could have cast a spell that lasted from your childhood until now. The amount of power they would have needed…”
“Well, it can’t be someone casting spells every time I get a headache.” Gia was alone when the headaches hit often enough. These days, her family was never far, but she’d had headaches in the middle of class before. Unless… “Could someone cast a spell on me if they weren’t with me?”
“Giving physical symptoms from afar is complex and difficult to pull off,” Aurora said. “But we can check you to be sure.”
Lilly nodded. “Give me some of your blood, and I can examine it. Any spells cast on you in the last few weeks will register. Have you had a headache recently?”
She hadn’t had a blackout since running from her family. Her heart skipped, but it was probably a coincidence. She’d gone weeks without a migraine before. “The last one was nearly two weeks ago.”
“It should still register.”
Gia ran a hand through her hair. She hadn’t missed the part where Lilly said she needed blood, but she had to know. If this was what had been wrong all these years… “Tell me what to do.”
All Lilly needed was a tiny amount of blood. Gia pricked her finger and let a few droplets fall into a bowl, then watched as Lilly muttered, waving her hands over the blood. Aurora sat so still, she might as well have been frozen.
After a few minutes, Lilly met Gia’s stare. “I can’t detect any spells.”
“You’re sure?”
She nodded.
Gia fought her disappointment.
Aurora frowned. “Isn’t this a good thing? It means no one in your life was lying to you and hurting you behind your back.”
Except her family had lied and hurt her all the time, right to her face, just not physically. “You’re right,” Gia said, not wanting to get into it. “I can’t see anyone in my life having magic anyway.”
Franco Balzano didn’t need magic. He had enough power already, wielding fear like a weapon.
Imagine how much worse it could have been.
Lilly scooped up the bowl and stood. “You can go to an apothecary if you’re after herbs to help with your headaches. Even though magic wasn’t the answer, it can still help.”
Gia almost said no, then caught herself. “Maybe. Magic is about the only thing I haven’t tried.”