Boundary Crossed (Boundary Magic #1)(50)

As I pulled into my driveway I shook my head, pushing the old hurt away. It had been well over a decade since John and I had spent our one night together. Everything was different now. I was some kind of witch, apparently, and Charlie was a null, and . . . wait. I frowned.

Headlights flashed in my rearview mirror. It was eight o’clock exactly, and Quinn had arrived to pick me up. I got out of my car, and climbed straight into his sedan. “It can’t be a coincidence,” I said after I’d flung myself into the passenger seat.

“And hello to you, too,” Quinn said evenly. He was wearing jeans and his leather jacket, with a white button-down shirt underneath. “What can’t be a coincidence?”

“Charlie being a null, and me being a witch,” I told him. “You said boundary witches were rare, and nulls even rarer. So how is it possible that the two of us are related, and we both have these . . . identities?”

Quinn frowned as he put the car in reverse and began backing out of the driveway. “I don’t know much about probability,” he allowed, “but it does seem unlikely.”

“There has to be a connection.”

He shrugged. “You should talk to Simon about it.”

“Why Simon?”

Quinn looked over at me. “He’s an evolutionary biologist. He studies this kind of thing.”

“Oh. Right.” I had forgotten all about Simon’s day job in my quest to understand his other work. “I don’t think he knows about Charlie being a null,” I admitted. “I’m not sure I should tell him.”

I glanced at Quinn, but his face gave away nothing. When it became obvious that I was waiting for a response, he sighed and said, “You might be right. The more people who know about your niece—”

“The more people there will be who want her for something,” I finished. I nodded. “And although I mostly trust Simon, I don’t know about . . . the rest of Clan Pellar.”

A sly half grin appeared on Quinn’s face, but his voice was nonchalant as he said, “Speaking of which, how did it go with Mama Pellar?”

“Oh, fantastic,” I said sarcastically. “We’re best friends now. I’m going to her house tomorrow so she can braid my hair.”

The grin erupted on his face. “That bad, huh?”

“I take it you know what I am,” I said.

Quinn nodded. “Maven told me when I called to report in last night.” He shrugged. “For what it’s worth, I didn’t know about boundary witches, either.”

“You still could have warned me,” I pointed out. “Before I went to the Pellars’ place.”

“I’m not your girlfriend, Lex,” Quinn said frankly. “If you can’t handle Hazel Pellar disliking you, how can I count on you to help me protect my boss?”

I hated to admit it, but he had a point there. “So you’re saying,” I grumbled, “that I’ll never be a good henchman if I can’t suck it up?”

Quinn laughed out loud, sounding surprised again. I got the feeling he didn’t laugh a lot.

“Tell me about Kirby,” I prompted.

The smile dropped off Quinn’s face as quickly as it had appeared. “Kirby is bad news,” he said shortly.

I waved my hand to indicate that he should continue. Quinn sighed. “Look, when Maven and Itachi moved to Colorado, the vampires who came with them spread out over the state’s bigger cities. I don’t know why Maven and Itachi decided to stay in Boulder, but when they did, Itachi forced a few vampires to move with them. All of the vampires in town are either new, like me, or . . . problematic.”

“What does that mean, ‘problematic?’”

“It’s a ‘keep your enemies close’ kind of thing,” Quinn explained. “Most of the vampires who live in Boulder f*cked up somewhere along the way. Including Kirby.”

“What did he do?”

“He was pimping female vampires out to humans.”

I contemplated that for a moment. “Like, literally pimping? Not a metaphor?” Quinn nodded. “So Itachi is against illegal behavior?”

He started to answer, then reconsidered. “I don’t think Itachi has a problem with prostitution in general,” he finally said. “But Kirby was also pressing the johns’ minds to think they’d gotten laid when they hadn’t. They were paying for nothing.”

I snorted. “Sounds like they kind of deserved it.”

“Maybe,” Quinn allowed. “But it was only a matter of time before one of them realized he hadn’t actually gotten laid and decided to start some shit with Kirby or one of the girls. Part of Itachi’s job as dominus is to stop problems like that before they happen.”

“Dominus? You said that before. I don’t know what it means.”

“Remember when I said vampires have a feudal system of government, at least in this state?” Quinn said. “‘Dominus’ is the Latin word for the upper class of vampires.”

“What class are you?”

“Villani,” he said shortly. “The servant class.”

“How many classes are there?”

“Technically just the two. New vampires are all villani. Once you’re strong enough to start making your own baby vampires or strike out on your own, you become a dominus. Some vampires never leave the villani class, though.”