Boundary Crossed (Boundary Magic #1)(13)

“Forced to . . . like, become a witch?”

He shook his head again, his face grim. “Witches are born, not made. Humans who find out have to try to become a vampire or a werewolf.”

“Who enforces that rule?” I asked, frustrated. “I thought you said there was no government.”

“No governing body,” Simon corrected. “But that’s for the Old World as a whole. Individual territories are almost all controlled by one faction or another. You’re in vampire territory, so the vampires have final say on everything.”

“Okay, this is too much information.” I exhaled a long, slow breath, my thoughts reeling. “Let’s just leave it at ‘don’t tell anyone.’ I can work with that.”

He nodded, shooting me a sympathetic look.



John and Charlie lived at the end of a street of very nice single-family houses, the kind where roving packs of neighborhood kids raced from one backyard swing set to the next with no regard for property lines or decorative fences. John’s house was the smallest, a little bit down the road from the main grouping, but still part of the neighborhood. I knew he’d chosen it hoping Charlie would grow up with a lot of friends nearby, to help make up for the fact that her family was missing a key member. The house looked fine from the road—no obvious signs of a break-in. Somehow that didn’t reassure me.

There were a few cars parked in front of John’s house, but they all looked empty to me as we passed. Simon pulled his car over just ahead of them, and I was tugging at the door handle before he’d put it in park. As I pushed open the car door, I finally noticed the autumn chill. It was probably in the low fifties, but the icy wind made it feel colder, especially since I wasn’t wearing underwear.

But then I heard Charlie’s wails from inside the house, and I forgot all about the weather. The sound lifted my spirits—she was alive and in the house. Simon hurried around the car to join me. I’d taken all of one step toward the house when Quinn appeared next to me.

I managed not to smack him in surprise. “Hey,” he said quietly, more to Simon than to me. “I had a feeling you’d show up.”

“Where are they?” Simon said in a low voice.

Quinn nodded toward the house. “Wheaton barricaded himself in the back bedroom with the baby. The door must be pretty solid. Darcy keeps throwing herself against it, but she’s not any closer to getting in.” Quinn frowned for a second, then shrugged. “Must be one hell of a door.”

He gestured toward the left side of the yard. “Victor’s trying to figure out a way into the room from the outside. He’s the bigger threat. I was about to go after him when I heard that piece of shit Chevy you drive. Figured some backup wouldn’t hurt.” I remembered the size of Victor and figured Quinn’s comment was guy-speak for “I’m not quite sure I can take him. Please help.”

“Are we sanctioned?” Simon asked. Quinn nodded, then tossed something to him, which he easily caught. It was a stick. No, I realized, that’s a wooden stake. I almost giggled. These guys were acting like Victor and Darcy really were vampires. My miraculous recovery was one thing—I could get behind the idea that Simon had some kind of wonder drug—but I still didn’t quite buy the whole vampires-are-real business.

On the other hand, I didn’t actually care what they were. I just wanted to make sure they got the hell away from my family. “You have one of those for me?” I asked in a low voice. Sticks or not, at least they were weapons.

“No,” Quinn retorted. “You should hang back.”

“Not a chance. I’m going after Darcy while you two take Victor. That door can’t hold out forever.”

Quinn and Simon exchanged a glance. “She’ll kill you, Lex,” Simon said softly. “Please, please, just wait here. We’ll call you when it’s over, and then you can come get your family.”

I straightened up, feeling ridiculous in my green scrubs. At least I was feeling better. “Thanks, but I’m not really a ‘just wait here’ kind of girl.”

Simon looked pleadingly at Quinn, who shrugged. “She’s a witch problem now,” Quinn said cheerfully. “No skin off my nose.”

Without waiting for a response, I took off for the house as fast as I could, which turned out to be at a sort of mincing trot. I could feel a pull in my back from the stitches. They would need to come out soon, I realized, but although I felt weak and run down, my condition was worlds better than when I’d woken up in the hospital that morning.

When I reached the stoop, I didn’t bother trying to be sneaky. The baby was screaming too loudly for me to hear anything anyway. Instead I just threw open the unlocked front door and beelined toward the first-floor bedroom, the guest room off the kitchen. John was smart—that was the room with the heaviest door and the smallest window. It was where I would have holed up, too.

When I rounded the doorway to the back hall, though, Darcy was nowhere near the guest room door. I froze. Could she have given up? Gone outside to help Victor with Simon and Quinn? Or was she waiting to ambush me? Then Charlie took a deep breath, and in the tiny pause I heard a clinking sound in the kitchen, like someone shaking a piggy bank.

I darted forward, past the locked bedroom door and all the way into the kitchen. The blonde woman from the Depot was standing in my brother-in-law’s kitchen, rifling through the junk drawer in the counter island. She had fished out three keys so far and had them lined up on the counter in front of her. Crap. I’d known John my whole life, and he would never have a lock in his house without also having the corresponding key. One of those was going to work.