Back in a Spell (The Witches of Thistle Grove, #3)(51)
“Oh, it’ll bother me, no question,” he admitted with a shrug. “But it’ll also be worth it, for you to get to know them.”
“And you don’t . . . you don’t feel like it’s too soon for that?”
He made a face like, What even is time, which, given our circumstances, felt fair enough as an assessment. “I don’t think any particular timeline applies to this, do you? To us? And it’s no pressure, really. But if you do want to come, I’d be stoked to have you there.”
“Well, okay, then,” I said softly, a warm, happy flush stealing into my cheeks. That he would invite me to something like that, despite the harm my family had done to his; that he’d draw such a clear dividing line between who I was and who I’d come from. “I’ll think about it. But, let’s go with a tentative yes.”
17
Offerings of Flowers and Cake
Standing on the Gutierrezes’ welcome mat the next day, with a gigantic orchid arrangement under one arm and a string-tied bakery box of Camelot’s fanciest caramel apple cake under the other, I wondered what in the unknowable cosmos had possessed me to agree to come.
Maybe the Goddess Spell included a mind-addling element that had only just begun to express itself, or possibly—and more likely—I hadn’t given Morty’s considerable charisma and powers of persuasion the full credit they deserved. Because what else could explain my having shown up here of my own free will, to what was functionally enemy territory, about to present offerings of flowers and cake to people who believed my family had been actively trying to encroach on their livelihood? Even if Morty did want me here, how could it be respectful or appropriate to impose on his parents that way?
I took a step back, arguing with myself, half turning away just as the door flung itself open, to reveal . . . no one.
I blinked, wondering whether Morty’s magic was manifesting again in unexpected ways. Then I lowered my gaze to find a tiny girl, with waist-length beaded braids and a maroon corduroy dress under a pink PAW Patrol cardigan, staring up at me with huge, solemn brown eyes.
“Hello, Nina Blackmoore,” she said, with the bizarrely perfect diction of a tiny herald instead of an ostensible five-year-old. “My uncle Morty said you’d be coming today. I saw you from the window, but you looked like you were leaving.”
“Ahhh . . .” I flailed under that unflinching brown gaze, desperately trying to exude the impression that of course I’d been planning to do no such ignominious thing as flee before I even knocked. “Nope, no, here to stay! I brought some presents, too . . . I hope you like caramel apple cake!”
A pearly, baby-toothed smile transformed that serious little face, a deep thumbprint dimple denting one round, light brown cheek.
“I love cake,” she informed me in a conspiratorial whisper, shooting a furtive look over her shoulder like a secret agent. “I’m going to eat a whole bunch of it. Don’t tell my mommy, okay? She’s only that demented about not letting me have sugar.”
The faint brogue that stole into her piping voice made me think she’d heard that expression from someone else—possibly an Irish grandmother less averse to doling out sugary treats, if I had to guess.
“Got it,” I whispered back, giving her a grave nod. “It’ll stay between us.”
Morty appeared behind his little niece, setting a hand on her shoulder. He wore unripped jeans, and a green cable-knit sweater much more conventional than anything I’d seen him in before—along with zero makeup, his fingernails were stripped clean of the chipped dark polish I was so used to seeing on him. Even his hair seemed somehow less unruly. I remembered him mentioning how he made concessions around his mother when it came to gender expression, and ironically, the fact that he also had to accommodate one of his parents gave me a little confidence boost.
If there was one thing I understood, it was having to walk on eggshells, tiptoe around another person’s needs. Maybe things weren’t that different in this household.
“Let’s let Nina in, Sol, okay?” he said, winking at me as he squeezed her little shoulder. “And keep all the heat in while we’re at it.”
“Okay!” She whipped around, braids clicking against each other as she skipped back into the house. “Mommyyyy, Nina Blackmoore said I could have a whole cake! And she’s our guest so you have to let me, that’s the rules!”
Her mother’s response drifted in from the next room, not quite audible but in a distinctly unamused tone.
Morty and I winced at each other as I stepped in, both of us biting back laughter. My first impression of his parents’ home was a balmy heat almost completely alien to me when it came to interiors; I kept my loft at a reasonable seventy-two degrees or so, but I’d grown up in the drafty, chilly palace of Tintagel, which never rose above the low sixties, like we all might melt into some unacceptable softness if we weren’t always kept on ice. The Gutierrezes, on the other hand, clearly believed in having their thermostat set to summer. The warmth only enhanced the savory aromas drifting into the foyer, of simmered tomatoes and garlic and the rich, yeasty smell of home-baked sourdough.
“For the record,” I told Morty, handing my packages over to him so I could squirm out of my parka and hook it on an already heavily laden coat tree, “that is not what I said.”