“Since when can you do magic?”
“Morgan—”
“Don’tlie to me,” she said. He paused at the lobby door, probably because of how much bitterness she had packed into those four words. “Is this what you’ve been hiding? Why would you lie to me about this when youknow—”
Her head throbbed. She saw one Hudson and then two Hudsons and then one again. She clenched her eyes shut, desperate to keep her lunch down.
“The health center,” Hudson repeated. “Then we can deal with—whatever that was.”
Ellory nodded wearily and let him carry her into the light.
23
The nurse put Hudson in charge of monitoring Ellory for the next twenty-four hours, assuming that they were together and ignoring their fervid protests to the contrary. Ellory was given Tylenol and a lecture from Hudson before he took her to the student center, where she received a six-pack of ginger ale, an ice pack, a bottle of water, and a second lecture. She let Hudson preach about the dangers of leaving her phone behind, because they were in public and she was more concerned with checking every nook and cranny for more masked figures. But as soon as they were back in the car, she glared at him.
“You can do magic,” she accused, “and you didn’t tell me.”
Hudson paused with his hand on the keys. Instead of starting the engine, he dragged that hand over his face. “I didn’t know.”
Violet-gray clouds had overtaken the once-blue sky. Gentle rain began to fall, plinking against the roof like an intermittent drumroll. They were still in the parking lot of the student center, but the streets had emptied in light of the weather. There was no one to witness Ellory and Hudson in his Barracuda, arguing about theesoteric turn their lives had taken, and there was some comfort in that. Ellory opened her water, downed her pills, and stared through the wet windshield.
For a while, the raindrops provided the only sound.
“I didn’t want to watch you die,” Hudson murmured. “But I was too far away to do anything about it…until I wasn’t.”
“Yeah, I understand that,” said Ellory, remembering Malcolm Mayhew and the murder she couldn’t prevent. Her frozen limbs had forced her to bear witness to something that haunted her to this day, and she wouldn’t wish that on anyone. “What I don’t understand ishow. How could you not have known? How could you listen to everything I told you, everything I experienced, and not…?”Confide in me, too.Ellory’s throat was tight with an emotion worse than anger. She was hurt. Hurt that he hadn’t trusted her the way she’d been forced to trust him.
No, she hadn’t been forced. She’d wanted to. Maybe she’d even needed to.
“I’ve always believed in the unbelievable,” said Hudson, “but it feels different when it’sme. Surely you can understand that, too.”
Ellory knew he was referring to how hard she had fought against the idea that she might have magic, even after she’d accepted that magic did exist. But it still wasn’t enough to mollify her. He could have shared his suspicions. He could have admitted he had questions at all. He could have done anything but show up to help her again and again while keeping such a large part of himself hidden from her.
If he could cover this up, what else was he hiding?
He knew her, but had he ever allowed her to know him?
Hudson started the car. She stared out the window as they pulled onto Falstaff Road, driving south back to Moneta Hall. Soon, hewould foist her off onto Stasie—or, more likely, Tai—and go back to ignoring her, leaving her frustrated under the guise of letting her rest. He was reliably unreliable, while she had been attacked for the second time this month by people who wanted to silence her at any cost. Ellory’s eyes traced the angles of his face in the mirror the graying sky had turned her window into. Rain carved his reflection in half, making him look like both monster and man.
“What were you doing at Moneta?” she finally asked. “I thought you were busy ‘studying.’”
“Boone told me you’d left theCommuniquéoffice, but you weren’t answering your phone. I…worried.”
“Tell Boone to mind his own business.”
“I mean, I’m the one who asked how you were doing, but I’ll relay the message. Why weren’t you answering my calls?”
Ellory remembered again that her phone was still—hopefully—in a heap on the sixth floor with the rest of her things. She had put it on Silent before going to the newspaper office. “Why would I? You said you were done.”
“Morgan,” he sighed.
“Don’t. Don’t talk to me like I’m the problem.”
“No, I—you’re right. I’m sorry. I did say that. And I shouldn’t have. That’s why I was asking about you. I come with a peace offering.”
Hudson tipped his head toward the back seat, where each turn caused a stack of books to slide from one side of the vinyl seating to the other. A battered tote bag was on the floor; it had clearly made a valiant effort to contain the books before sinking out of sight, defeated. It was joined by a pair of black soccer cleats, tied together by the laces, and Hudson’s Montblanc sling, each pocket zipped tight.
“I pulled these from my shelf because they mention secret societies and esoteric traditions. Maybe you’ll get more out of them than I did.”
