The Wicked (Elder Races #5.5)(2)

“Yes, you did great,” said Grace cheerfully. “In fact you did so well, I think you’ll be ready to watch Max on your own in only sixteen or seventeen years.”

“There, you see,” said Phaedra as she turned to face her father. “Your concerns were for nothing.”

Khalil’s eyes narrowed and his expression turned guarded. He looked from his complacent, arrogant daughter to Grace’s compressed, mischievous expression, then to Max. He opened his mouth and shut it again.

“Silence is a wise choice,” Grace said to him. “She’ll figure it out eventually.”

Olivia burst out laughing. Exhausting though it could be, she loved this wacky household. It was completely different from her quiet life back in Louisville. Her job was demanding and she enjoyed her life, but the most exciting thing that happened in her house was when she gave catnip to her nine-year-old cat Brutus.

Khalil held his hands out for the baby. Max had jammed a forefinger up one round nostril. He stuck out his tongue and, grinning, blew a raspberry as Grace set him on his feet. Then Max high stepped his way over to Khalil, who swung the baby into the air and settled him in his lap.

Olivia noted fondly, and not for the first time, how much Max had changed in a year, but then they all had. Max was twenty months old, a healthy chunk of boy. At five years old, Chloe had started kindergarten, and normally she loved it, except when something exciting was happening at home.

But the biggest change Olivia saw was in Grace. The previous year, when she and Grace had become friends, Grace had been pale and tense, with shadowed eyes and lines of pain and exhaustion on her face. Grace was a good ten years younger than Olivia, but a year ago she had looked older.

Last year, Grace and her niece and nephew had lived in their old family home in Louisville, Kentucky. She had been recovering from the same car crash that had killed her sister and brother-in-law and left her with a permanent disability. She had also been struggling to come to terms with the Power of the Oracle, which she had inherited when her sister died, along with a mountain of debt.

Now Grace had regained her health. She would never lose the limp. Her knee had been too badly damaged, and at the time of the injury, she hadn’t had access to high cost, premium magical health care. But despite that challenge, she looked happy, truly happy. The hollows in her face had filled out, and she was vibrant with color, with strawberry-blonde hair, sparkling hazel eyes and lightly suntanned skin.

By comparison, Olivia felt as if she looked like Grace’s older, duller sister, with her short chestnut hair, gray eyes and pale skin that did not suntan well. It wasn’t that she looked bad, she thought. All of her features were regular sized and in the right place, and while she had a sprinkle of freckles across her nose and cheekbones, they were acceptable enough. She just didn’t look interesting, not like Grace’s colorful, fiery blaze.

It seemed a metaphor for the difference in their lives. Even though she was young, Grace had already lived a life filled with heartache and drama, and she was involved with Khalil in a seriously smoldering love affair.

Olivia had lived a perfectly normal childhood. Her parents had paid for her to go to college. She did well, garnered some scholarships, studied magic, and directly out of school she had walked into an excellent job as a reference librarian at the Ex Libris Library in Louisville. There was nothing wrong with any of that, just as there was nothing wrong with her looks, except she had the nagging suspicion that she lived a boring life, and that she herself was a boring person.

Olivia didn’t know all the details, but somehow Grace’s troubled finances had smoothed out too. As Oracle, Grace had received a large cash contribution from a petitioner, and she received a regular monthly stipend from the new consulting agency that the Wyr gryphon Rune Ainissesthai and his Vampyre mate Carling Severan had established. All Olivia really knew was that Grace and the agency had worked out some kind of sliding scale fee system, so that she could still act as Oracle for those who did not have the ability to pay while the agency collected fees from those who could.

All of that translated into a sprawling ranch house on the beach, with a fenced in yard so the children could play in safety. And there was love in this house, so much love, Olivia felt privileged to witness it. Grace and Khalil’s relationship was so strong she could only imagine what it must be like to have such a relationship in her own life. They doted on the children, who thrived under such care. Their house seemed constantly full of Djinn, who either visited, brought gifts or bargained for healing that only Grace could give them.

Even Khalil’s daughter Phaedra, while spiky and unpredictable, seemed to relax and enjoy the atmosphere and the children when she came to visit. Olivia wasn’t sure what she thought about Phaedra, but at least the Djinn treated Max and Chloe with gentleness.

While Khalil bounced Max on his knee and Grace helped herself to breakfast, Olivia ate the last of her muffin. Phaedra stood nearby, her head cocked and diamond eyes piercing as she watched them.

Grace had told Olivia about the first time she had met Phaedra. Her eyes had been as black as twin oubliettes. The Djinn had been tortured and confined by her mother for so long, it had twisted her spirit. Now, thanks to the help that Grace had given her, her spirit was healed and straight again. But that didn’t make her any easier to get along with.

Grace said to Phaedra, “You can sit down, you know. Eat something. Drink some coffee. Pretend to enjoy it, join in small talk.”