Gone were his chubby cheeks and black-rimmed glasses. His freckles had paled, but they still splashed across his face in russet flecks. The watery blue eyes he used to weigh the world through before snubbing reality in favor of burying his nose in a fantasy novel had darkened, sharpened. Contacts? Either way, the contrast was eerie.
A black suit molded to his body, all six feet and change of it. Dark auburn hair brushed his wide shoulders, a carefree style that contradicted the stick I knew to be clenched firmly between his butt cheeks. Full lips tilted down at their corners, shielding his perfect smile, a masterpiece of orthodontics, and his square jaw flexed until I wondered how many retainers he’d gnawed through since the days when his dental appliance used to spend weekends in Maud’s guest bathroom next to mine.
Linus wore a perfect mask of boredom, but his eyes gave away his turmoil, gleaming with bitter emotion I was unable to decipher. I sucked in a shocked breath as wisps of black shadow fanned his pupils, sending a million thoughts tripping through my head.
Son of a biscuit. Linus had bonded with a wraith. There was no other excuse for the darkness in him.
A tendril of curious magic caressed me from shoulder to fingertip, drawing my gaze to his, and it was as though that roiling blackness in him had recognized me and reached out its spectral fingers. Jerking back to attention when Linus turned his head, I replayed the Grande Dame’s words. “Lessons?”
“Yes. Lessons.” She rose in a fluid motion. “Wide gaps were left in your education. Linus will tutor you until you’re up to speed.” She straightened his tie. “He’s quite brilliant, you’ll find. Takes after Maud in so many ways.”
Linus watched his mother fuss without blinking, and I flashed back to a dozen half-forgotten memories of the young boy he had been standing with the same stiff back while she cooed over him. He must have worked up an immunity to her hovering by now, much the same as the Pritchards had with their mother.
“Are you packed?” She flattened her palms against his lapels. “Is there anything else you need?”
“Arnaud loaded my bags into the car earlier.” He caught her by the wrists and took a half-step back. “Anything I’ve forgotten can be couriered over later. I’ll be across town, Mother, not across the world.”
Boaz smothered a laugh and coughed Momma’s boy into his fist, but I didn’t find any of this funny.
“Bags?” I glanced between mother and son. “What bags?”
“Linus will be staying with you,” she announced. “He can take up residence in his old room. I assume it’s as he left it?”
“No.” I pushed to my feet, grateful I could stand without wobbling. “He’s not welcome in my home.”
Linus wore a masterful poker face, but the wraith had tipped his hand, and I recognized him right back.
“You’re hardly in any position to argue.” She faced me and anchored one hand on her hip. “Linus will stay with you at your home, or you will stay with us at mine.”
Abandoning Woolly wasn’t going to happen.
“He broke into my house,” I snarled. “He hurt her. And he stole my parakeet.”
A thin line formed between the Grande Dame’s perfect eyebrows. “I fail to see your point.”
Boaz tightened his grip on my shoulder, anchoring me before I committed murder for real.
“I would never hurt Woolly.” Linus linked his hands behind his back. “The sigil I used was one Maud taught me herself. The house was incapacitated, yes, but there was no permanent damage done.”
“You released a wraith in my house.” I laughed maniacally. “That hurt her, and it could have hurt me.”
The snarl Boaz released from over my shoulder would have intimidated a lesser man, but Linus ignored him.
“The wraith was under my control,” he explained slowly, like I should be anything other than terrified to find myself on the wrong side of one. “You were never in any danger.” He leaned down and bussed his mother’s cheek. “I’ll call when I’m settled.”
“Be careful,” she said softly. “This won’t end with Volkov.”
“I can take care of myself.” Linus dismissed her concern with practiced ease then crossed to me. “More than that, I can teach you to defend yourself. That’s what you want, isn’t it?”
More than anything. Just not enough to kiss his feet for offering. I had already been kicked in the teeth while I was down plenty, thank you very much.
“Trust me when I say I want to be your guest as much as you want to host me. The harder you work, the sooner I can return to my home and my life, and the sooner you can transition into the next phase of yours.” He offered his hand. “Do we have a deal?”
“Fine.” I took his hand, and his long fingers wrapped around mine, his skin cool as the grave. “But if you ever violate the sanctity of my home again—”
“You are in no position to issue threats,” the Grande Dame murmured silkily. “Goddess-touched or not, if you harm my son, I will break you into tiny pieces and shove those through the grate in your old cell for the mice to feast upon. Do you understand?”
Muscles fluttered in Linus’s jaw, the black in his eyes coalescing. “Mother.”
“Very well.” An indulgent smile spread her lips. “Handle matters how you see fit.”
“Thank you,” he said to her, but his eyes never left my face. “You have nothing to fear from me.”
“I’m not afraid of you.” For some reason, that made his lips twitch in what passed for a smile.
Boaz placed his hand on my lower back. “Are you ready to leave?”
I studied Linus for another moment before I nodded. “I thought you’d never ask.”
Twenty
Linus took one look at Wilhelmina as Boaz and I climbed on then slid into the idling sedan with Mr. Hacohen. The driver pulled out behind us and followed us to Woolworth House. No sooner had Boaz turned up the driveway than his phone started going bonkers. He was hitting redial before we parked.
While he talked, I watched the driver carry Linus’s bags onto the porch while the man himself stood on the lawn and gazed up at Woolly with fondness that made me feel a skosh better about having him as a house guest.
“That was Heath.” Boaz followed my line of sight and grimaced. “We’ve got a case in Raleigh that needs our attention.”
“You’re leaving already?” I transferred my frown onto him. “I was hoping to get another day at least.”
“Sorry, Squirt.” He tugged the ends of my hair. “Duty calls and all that.”
“Don’t have too much fun with your new partner.”
“I won’t.” He radiated smugness at my snappish tone. “She’s married.”
“Oh.” That absolutely was not relief coursing through me. “Guess you’ll have to get your jollies elsewhere.”
“Guess so.” He gazed down at me, paying particular attention to my jeans, like he had an idea about where said jollies might be found. “Are you sure you feel safe being alone with Linus after all he’s done?”
I worried my bottom lip between my teeth. “I’m too valuable to the Grande Dame for him to lay a finger on me.”
“It’s more than that.” He tugged on the end of my braid. “He knows a workaround for your wards—”
Linus must have walked over while Boaz and I were saying our goodbyes. As usual, his presence had rendered everyone else invisible. I really had to work on my situational awareness skills.
“I’ll show you what I did to Woolly and how tomorrow, Grier. We can work on ways to shore up her wards so that it can’t happen again.” Ignoring a black look from Boaz, Linus gestured toward her wards. “We also need to discuss your vandalism problem.”
Vandalism was a pretty word for the ugly act of disfiguring my home. “Woolly is my top priority.”
“I can help you make the necessary repairs,” he offered. “She will require new wards.”
“Not if you’re the architect.” To create a new design, you must also understand how to deconstruct it, and I wasn’t about to hand him an all-access pass to Woolly’s defenses.
“Consider it your first assignment.” He rubbed the stubble across his jaw. “We’ll start with one of my designs, and you can unravel it until you learn the underpinnings. For a final exam, you can construct your own wards, and I’ll launch an offensive to test them.”