Chapter 17
SEVENTEEN
Ididn’t want to leave Wesley at the hospital. I kept looking over my shoulder, my chest tight, as Galen dragged me away. He stopped for ice cream at one of the tourist shops on our way home. I wasn’t much in the mood for ice cream when he handed me a container in our living room.
“I’m not hungry,” I said dully.
“Do you want me to take you back to the hospital to have you checked out?” he challenged.
I perked up. “We’re going back to the hospital?”
“No, but I’m worried that you of all people don’t have an appetite.”
I scowled. “There’s an insult buried in there.”
“You always want ice cream.” He tapped the side of my container. “Eat it. For me.”
“That’s playing dirty.”
“Just eat it.”
I pulled off the top, assuming Galen had gotten Superman ice cream. The island didn’t have my favorite — apparently it was regional — so I’d switched to Superman because it was the closest thing. It was blue.
“What … ?” I stared at the ice cream as if it were an alien.
“That’s your favorite, right?” Galen suddenly looked concerned. “Blue Moon. I didn’t get it wrong, did I?”
Tears pricked my eyes. Sure, it had been an emotionally exhausting day — several days actually — but I wasn’t a crier by nature. Before I knew it, tears were sliding down my face.
“No!” Galen started to panic. He put down his ice cream, chocolate chip cookie dough. It was always chocolate chip cookie dough. “I’ll go back and get you something else. I thought you would be happy when you found out I asked Marcia to order Blue Moon just for you.”
He hopped to his feet. “I’ll go get the Superman.”
I grabbed his arm. “I want the Blue Moon,” I assured him. “I just … I’m not sure anyone has ever done anything this nice for me before.”
That did not assuage Galen’s anxiety. “This had better not be the nicest thing that anyone has ever done for you. You deserve the world. This was just supposed to be fun.” He sent me a rueful smile. “I was saving it so you would feel so grateful things would inevitably turn romantic.”
I laughed. It wasn’t hard to picture him hatching the plan. “Thank you.” I spooned up some of the ice cream and tasted it under his watchful eye. Then I sighed. “Just as I remembered.”
“That’s good, right?”
I filled the spoon again and extended it to him. “Want to try it?”
“Another night.”
I didn’t miss the way he eyed the ice cream as if it were going to kill him. “It’s good,” I insisted. “Baby, I’ll be honest with you.” He tilted his head, as if debating. “That looks like somebody found a bunch of Smurfs, threw them in a blender, and called it ice cream.”
I looked at him in dumbfounded disbelief. “That is a really dark thought.”
“That’s not ice cream to me.” He gestured to his container. “This is ice cream.”
“That’s the only ice cream you eat,” I said. “Have you ever tried another?” I tried not to take his refusal to taste my ice cream personally. Blue Moon you either loved or hated. He had to at least try it before he declared he hated it.
“I’m sure I have,” he replied. “I eat vanilla ice cream with pie and birthday cake.”
“But when you go to get ice cream, it’s always chocolate chip cookie dough?”
He shrugged. “It’s always been my thing.”
“I’m going to see if I can find some Mackinac Island Fudge,” I announced. “It’s like chocolate chip cookie dough but better. You might like that.”
“Why do you have to get me a new ice cream when I have a favorite?”
“You got me new ice cream.”
“Because every single time we go to the ice cream shop you mention that you miss it. I don’t want you to miss out on anything.”
The sentiment was sweet but I laughed. “It’s just ice cream. The Superman is close. It’s not as if I was going to decide I couldn’t stay here over ice cream.”
“You’re missing the point.” He was stern. “I don’t ever want you to go without anything. Living on an island, it’s not always easy to get the things you need. If I can make your life better, even if it’s a little thing, I’m going to do it.”
I swallowed the lump in my throat. “This is definitely the nicest thing anyone has ever done for me.”
He scowled. “Stop saying that. Although … .” He seemed to reconsider. “I’ll show you something even nicer when we get upstairs. How does that sound?”
“Like a good idea.” I dug into my ice cream with gusto. It really was as good as I remembered. “Did Marcia give you grief about ordering it?”
He bobbed his head. “But she put it in the case right after she got it. She assumed you’d be the only one eating it. That was weeks ago.”
There seemed to be more to the story, so I waited.
“She called me two hours after she put it out to warn me not to bring you because she had to order more,” he continued. “It’s turned out to be a big hit. She ordered a lot of it the second time; it came in yesterday.”
“And you didn’t think I was up for ice cream yesterday,” I guessed.
“I don’t think either of us were.”
We ate in companionable silence. I was the one to break it. “Where do you think Wesley was?”
“I’ve been thinking about it, but there are too many options.”
“Yeah. That’s where I’m at,” I agreed. “I don’t think he was in that building the whole time.”
“I have to check with the grounds crew tomorrow. Normally there’s someone there three days a week, if only to check the gate and the window to make sure everything is still secure.”
I slowly spooned more ice cream into my mouth and thought about our options. “What if we were to hex the cemetery to alert us whenever anyone enters?”
Galen gave me a sidelong look. “I’m not sure I understand,” he said. “Why would we do that?”
“Someone put Wesley in the cemetery. I very much doubt they did it during the day — that would be too risky — so they had to do it at night, right?”
“I guess, but the zombies are active at night.”
“Maybe that doesn’t matter to a dhampir.”
“You’re assuming Declan did this, but he’s on another plane.”
“That doesn’t mean he can’t come and go.”
“The plane Clive went to was only supposed to have one-way doors from the island.”
“I returned.”
He worked his jaw, quiet for several seconds. “Maybe the rules have changed. Maybe Declan was trapped there for years but managed to find a way to open a different door.”
“Okay.” I nodded. “Then why does he want me?”
His answer was instantaneous. “A power boost.”
“Why?”
He hesitated.
“Don’t think about it,” I ordered. “Go with your gut instinct. I want to hear what you think.”
“He’s dying,” Galen replied. “Jareth told you that Declan’s biggest problem was that he wasn’t immortal like a true vampire.”
“Lilac told me vampires aren’t really immortal,” I argued. “She said they eventually grow bored with life and want to rest.”
“That’s probably accurate but that’s a choice. Vampires can live as long as they want.”
“And the dhampirs can’t,” I mused.
“No. I think being a dhampir is a better deal. You can be out in the sun more. You have a long life but not an endless one. You can still eat steak.”
He made a compelling point. “Maybe it’s not about the immortality so much as what it represents,” I said.
“And what’s that?”
“Declan has daddy issues. He came here to seek out Jareth because he wasn’t getting anywhere with his own father.”
“He sought out Jareth because he wanted ideas on how he could extend his life,” Galen corrected.
“But he would have gone to his father first,” I argued. “He wouldn’t have even known to go to Jareth if he hadn’t gone after his father first.”
“I guess that’s a fair point.”
“Did Jareth’s brother live here?” I asked. “I’ve never heard anything about him. I didn’t even know he had a brother.”
“I never met him. My mother might have. I vaguely remember her telling a story about meeting him at a dinner party.”
“What was her opinion?”
“What is my mother’s opinion on anything?” Galen scowled. “She didn’t like him. She thought he was crass and rude. She said he walked around with a goblet of blood, which she found gauche.”
I wrinkled my nose. “That’s disgusting.”
“My understanding is that Jareth is the exact opposite of his brother.”
“I like Jareth,” I admitted. “He’s a little creepy — like, I wouldn’t want to cuddle up with him on a dark and stormy night — but he’s a good person.”
“He’s a vampire, and vampires are always scary. Jareth is always respectful, however, and he has a good work ethic.”
That was high praise from Galen.
“We might need to go back to Jareth at some point,” he continued.
“If you think he might open up to you about his brother, I’m guessing that’s not an option,” I countered.
“What makes you say that?”
“He was uncomfortable talking about him. It was obvious he was upset.”
“Maybe he was upset at the thought that Declan was back. You said that Jareth was under the assumption that Declan was gone for good. The possibility of his return might have been too much for him.”
“Jareth doesn’t strike me as the sort who panics,” I argued. “He was thrown. I think he’s trying to figure out his own way to get to Declan.”
“Which is another reason we should be working with him. Jareth and Declan would make for an interesting matchup, and it is his fight if he wants it.”
My brain was starting to hurt. “We need to know where Wesley was. We need to know how he got from his ranch to the cemetery.
“I don’t think he was there the whole time. He was somewhere else. We need to figure out where and why. My mother seemed surprised when I said that I thought Wesley was on the other plane. Maybe he never was.”
Galen opened his mouth, then shut it.
“You don’t think that’s my mother,” I guessed. I felt a small tug in the vicinity of my heart when I said it this time.
Galen looked conflicted. “I don’t know what’s better for you at this point,” he admitted. “You seem to need it to be her. If it’s not, it’s a cruel attack.”
“That would be right up Declan’s alley,” I said.
“It really would.”
“But?” I prodded.
“There are questions.” He held out his hands. “I haven’t figured out how it being your mother benefits him. It doesn’t all fit together yet. I also haven’t figured out how faking it benefits him.”
I spooned up the last of my ice cream and put the empty container on the coffee table. “It is a lot to consider,” I said.
“It really is,” he readily agreed, angling himself to loom over me. I had to lean back on the couch to see his face. “We’ve thought about it enough for one night. Let’s think about something else.”
“Oh, yeah?” I said on a laugh. I knew exactly what he was getting at. Playing the game was half the fun. “What did you have in mind?”
“Well, for starters, show me your tongue.”
“What?”
“Is it blue?”
“Probably.”
“I might not want to eat a Smurf, but you look good in blue.”
That made me laugh hard. “Is that so?”
“Why don’t you come upstairs and I’ll show you.”
“Sounds like an absolutely fabulous idea.”
GALEN WORE ME OUT. I EXPECTED to slip into a black abyss of sleep and not emerge for eight hours. Instead, I dreamed.
A dark shadow chased me on a dead plane, whispering enticements and threatening to kill everybody I loved if I didn’t do what it wanted. It never told me what it wanted. It was a frustrating experience, which had me waking in an even darker mood than normal.
“Nice face you’ve got there,” Galen said as I grumpily rolled to rest my cheek against his shoulder. He put his arm around me. He had his phone out and was working.
“I’m not in the mood to be funny,” I warned him.
“And here I was just about to get out my big rubber shoes and red foam nose.”
I narrowed my eyes. “Clowns are never funny.”
“I agree. That doesn’t change the fact that you’re crabby.”
“Sorry.” I sort of meant it. “I had a dream. It seemed to go on and on forever.”
“I’m guessing it wasn’t good.”
I told him about it. He frowned almost immediately.
“He didn’t tell you what he wanted you to do but threatened you anyway?” he challenged.
“I don’t think it was really him,” I replied. “It was my subconscious trying to work things out.”
Galen was dubious. “You’ve had prophetic dreams before. He could be trying to contact you from a different plane. What better way to get his point across than to access your dreams?”
Again, that was a good point. “I don’t know,” I said finally. “I don’t know anything, and it’s getting really frustrating.”
“Well, we’re going to start figuring it out.” Galen sounded sure of himself, which made me suspicious in an entirely different way.
“How?” I asked.
“We’re bringing in the whole team, Aurora, Brody, and Lilac.”
“And Booker,” I added absently.
“If he must be part of the team,” Galen replied in a withering voice.
I rolled my eyes. “The fact that the two of you insist on keeping up this charade is really weird,” I said. “You’re not fooling anyone. We all know you’re best friends.”
“We are not.”
“You’ve admitted it before.”
“Was I drunk? You know you can’t take the word of a drunk.”
“You were sober. I’m not having this argument again. I’m going to get you and Booker matching leather Best Friends Forever bracelets, and you’re going to wear them.”
“That sounds like something I would never do.”
“Oh, it’s happening. Otherwise we’ll never play the blue tongue game again.”
“Ugh.” Galen slapped his forehead. “You always know exactly where to hit me.”
“Just out of curiosity — and I’m not casting aspersions on your plan — but what do you think our friends can do?”
“Every community has legends about dhampirs. The sirens have their own stories. So do the cupids. I’m hoping someone has a story about Declan … or the identity Declan likely went under before he returned to the island.”
“I guess it can’t hurt. Are they coming here?”
He shook his head. “We’re going to Gertie’s restaurant. We can talk freely there.”
I was ravenous. “How much time do we have?”
“Enough time to play the blue tongue game.”
“I’m out of ice cream.”
“I’m going to buy enough to keep in the freezer at all times. That was a really fun game.”
“I’m glad you liked it.” I glanced at the clock on the nightstand again. “We should call about Wesley.”
“I’ll do that,” he offered. “You hit the shower. You take longer to get ready than I do.”
“Okay, I know there was an insult buried in that.”
“You can spank me for being a jerk later.”
“You’re buying breakfast too.”
He smiled. “Deal.”