Chapter 12
He was worried about the victims who’d been testing positive for Arcanavirus, and he wasn’t sure what was happening or how to figure it out.
He’d brought the list of victims to Ward Campion to see if he could find anything that connected them, just in case.
Villanova had refused to authorize it, but he didn’t care.
If he could keep this from happening again. Keep his people from being put at even more risk.
“Rayn, can I talk to you for a minute?”
Ward’s voice pulled me out of the memory, and I gave myself a bit of a shake, blinking to force my eyes to refocus on the world in front of me.
“Yes, of course,” I replied, half-automatically, not wanting him to realize I’d been pulled into yet another memory.
Detective Maza’s, I thought, although he’d left unhappy because Ward hadn’t been able to tell him more than he already knew.
He’d been here more than a week ago—I guess I just hadn’t touched that particular pen since then.
“My office, please?” Ward said, interrupting my thoughts.
I nodded, numbly pushing myself to my feet—I felt a strange sort of disconnect from my limbs for a few moments after coming out of someone else’s thoughts. Not long, usually. A few seconds for a short memory, like that one. A handful of minutes for something longer.
I managed not to stumble or wobble on my way down the hall, following Ward into his office.
“Get the door?” he asked, and I obediently closed it behind me. It wasn’t until that moment that I wondered if I’d done something wrong. Maybe he’d somehow found out that I’d been slipping into Raj’s dreams. Or maybe a client had complained about how I’d handled a call or email or—
“Have a seat,” he offered, and I sat in one of the chairs against the wall. He had two more comfortable chairs there, and two more meeting-type chairs across the office facing his desk. He rolled up in front of me.
“You’ve probably noticed that Mason and I have been… in and out a bit more than usual lately.”
It was true, although I hadn’t really thought all that much about it.
They did have client meetings, séances on location, consulting gigs, and meetings with Lost Lineage that I knew about, but they also sometimes did things that I wasn’t responsible for managing.
Trips for research, for instance. Favors for people they knew.
Things for Jackson. Medical appointments.
That sort of thing. It wasn’t really my business why they’d been out.
But I nodded, since Ward seemed to be waiting for a response.
“Well,” he said, and a smile started slipping across his lips. “It’s because we’re going to adopt.”
I blinked. I probably could have guessed that, given some of the memories I’d accidentally stumbled upon here and there from him or from Mason, but I’d been too distracted by everything else to actually think about it. But that wasn’t a bad thing, was it?
I knew I was supposed to say something. “That’s good, right?” I asked, a little nervous I was reacting wrong.
But Ward laughed a little. “Yeah, it’s good,” he replied. “Although it’s a lot of meetings. And paperwork. And about a million other things that you wouldn’t think would be required to take in a kid whose parent can’t or won’t take care of them.”
“Like what?” I asked before better judgment could tell me to keep my mouth shut.
But Ward smiled again. “Finances, medical history, testimony from pretty much everyone you know over the age of thirty.” Which didn’t include me. “Legal history, which is honestly the biggest pain in my ass.”
“Why?”
Ward sighed. “Not that he’d ever been charged with anything, but Mason’s been arrested a couple of times.”
“For what?” I asked, startled. Mason was not exactly the law-breaking type.
Ward rolled his eyes. “Attempted murder, once,” he replied.
“Of who?” I asked.
“Me.”
“What? When?”
“Before we met,” he replied. “He didn’t attempt to murder me, obviously, but the shitheads in Hanover County PD didn’t bother to ask me first.”
“Did someone attempt to murder you?” I asked him.
His eyes were sharp. “The ghost who put me in this chair,” he replied grimly.
Oh. I nodded. I remembered that part. I hadn’t known what had happened to Mason, but that’s how I’d found Ward to begin with—because he’d gotten tied up with that ghost, who had himself been a death witch, and because I was also a death witch, I’d been able to feel that there was something wrong.
I couldn’t tell what, but I could tell there was something.
I’d sensed Ward’s magic trying to stop what the ghost’s death magic was doing and found him through his dreams.
And then begged him to help me—which is how he, Mason, Beck, and Hart had found and shut down Tranquil Brook.
“But it will work out?” I asked, referring back to the adoption.
“The lawyer thinks so, yeah,” he replied, and the smile returned to his face. “There are several potential kids—well, babies. We’ve been pre-approved, we just have to visit with the families and hope that at least one of them approves of us, too.”
“You’re adopting multiple kids?” I asked.
“Not all of them will probably want to give their kids to us,” he replied. “So we’re upping the odds that one of them will say yes by asking multiple families.”
“Oh. So just one?”
“That’s the plan,” he replied, smiling again. It was clear he was excited about it. “I just wanted to let you know that Mace and I will be gone a bit more often—and since Beck is gone a lot anyway, I don’t want to make you have to hold down the fort by yourself if you’re not comfortable with that.”
I didn’t really like being alone at Beyond the Veil when clients or potential clients came in and they got annoyed that I couldn’t immediately help them, but as long as people were polite and just let me make them appointments, it didn’t bother me.
And it made it more likely that I could get homework done at the desk if we didn’t have people coming and going all day.
“I don’t mind,” is what I said out loud.
“If you would still like me to be here.”
Ward shrugged. “Honestly, I don’t much care either way, but Mason thinks it’s a good practice to keep regular business hours even if we’re not here, so if you don’t mind…”
“I don’t mind,” I repeated.
He smiled at me again. “Great. I’ll try to let you know when we’ll be out, but sometimes things come up last-minute.”
I nodded. It honestly wasn’t all that different from normal—because they could get called out by Detective Maza or by Hart and Raj at pretty much any moment, anyway. “Okay,” was what I said out loud. “Thank you for telling me.”
Ward’s smile softened a little. “Thanks for being flexible, Rayn. I know… that’s not always the easiest thing for you.”
I felt myself flush a little, then just nodded, unsure what to say.
Ward took pity on me. “That’s all I’ve got for you,” he said. “Unless you have any questions, you can go back out.”
I nodded again, then stood. “I—hope everything goes well,” I said, feeling like I had to say something.
It was apparently the right thing, because Ward grinned. “Thanks,” he replied as I left the office. “Me, too.”
I was out of things to make for dinner, so I grabbed my stack of tote bags—most of which had been stolen from the giant collection of totes at Beyond the Veil that we kept getting from companies as promotional materials or which Mason acquired from various conferences at which he’d been invited to speak—and headed the handful of blocks to the grocery store.
I hated getting groceries, mostly because anything I bought I had to carry, and groceries get heavy very quickly when you’re carrying three or four bags per shoulder.
I was aware that I could probably get a ride-share to pick me up, but that cost money, and I didn’t have all that much of that, despite the rent-controlled apartment I’d secured courtesy the psychic placement branch of social services.
I had enough to get by and occasionally splurge on restaurant meals or a new videogame.
But I didn’t have enough to ride-share every week or two to get groceries when I was capable of carrying them. I just didn’t like doing it.
I also dislike the process of shopping itself.
I don’t like having to follow the organization of the grocery store aisles, and I inevitably end up having to go back to an aisle I’d already been through because I missed something on the list. I also disliked the process of having to decide between types of things—if I needed peas, there were multiple brands in multiple sizes, and having to consider both the per-unit price (which sometimes varied by weight or volume or count) and the capacity of my smaller-than-standard freezer and refrigerator.
Once I’d managed to gather a bunch of frozen veggies, a few frozen pizzas, canned soups, tomato sauces, and beans, cereals, rice, pasta, and the small amount of fresh produce I could justify within my budget, I added some cheeses, milk, and bread.
The bags were extremely heavy, but I could carry them—although I also knew that I might end up with a smattering of broken blood vessels across my shoulders.
Even though I have more bulk and muscle than I had four years ago when I was released from Tranquil Brook, I’m still not exactly fleshy pretty much anywhere, so the pressure of the straps against my bony shoulders and collarbones often burst the blood vessels close to the surface.
I was sweaty and sore by the time I staggered into my kitchen, dropping the bags heavily on the counter and table.
With a sigh, I started by turning on the oven and setting aside a frozen pizza, then began putting everything else away.
Hungry, I washed and ate an apple while I waited for the oven to finish preheating, tossing the core just as it let out the beep that told me it was ready.
I put in the pizza, set the timer magnetized to my refrigerator, and then sat at the table, trying to convince myself that I really should do what I was contemplating.