She hooked her legs around him and pulled him down to her. She was so warm—everywhere she touched him, thenumbness receded, feeling roaring back, desire overmastering him.
Make me forget.
He made her writhe and scream, and then he lost what remained of his mind.
It wasn’t until he woke in his bed, bathed in cold sweat, that he remembered what he hadn’t done. The question he hadn’t asked.
Had she been trying to makehimforget?
CHAPTER 3
Perhaps she thought he wouldn’t ask dayside. Or perhaps she intended to lie.
He gave serious thought to calling on her Vows—the one she made to him on his behalf and the one she made to him on behalf of her sister—in order to get the truth. But their relationship, if one could call it that, was built on a foundation of compulsion. He hated to do any more forcing.
No, he would just ask. But he would pay close attention to the emotions bleeding over to him from her, and he would put the question to her again that night. Nothing—nothing—would distract him from that.
He set to work on the R&D he desperately needed to complete and was making no progress on, trying to stave off the feeling that he had doomed the world to destruction on a scale never before imagined.You can’t put the genie backin the bottle. Wasn’t that what he’d told Beatrix about magic?
At five minutes to eight, he came down the stairs and waited uneasily for her in the brewing room, glancing at the pair of to-do lists tacked to the wall. His and hers, though not labeled as such.
Beatrix’s was longer, filled with the brews she would make and he would take credit for. The other listed requests he needed to deal with in person. He crossed out “Aphids—Sederey” and made a mental note to go to Dale Kirkland’s in the afternoon to take care ofhisbug problem.
A knock broke the silence, but he could tell by therat-tat-tatpattern that it wasn’t Beatrix. When he opened the door, there stood Mayor Croft, her former employer, so wrapped up between his coat, hat and scarf that only his eyes and the top of his generous nose were showing.
“Oh, good,” the mayor said, his words muffled. “Could I borrow you for an hour or two? The sidewalks are getting dangerous.”
He supposed they were, considering that he and Martinelli had tripped over them. He could get to Kirkland tomorrow.
“I’ll swing by your store later and you can show me all the spots that need work,” he said.
“It really needs to be now,” Croft said, apologetic but firm. “They’re icing up. Someone’s going to hurt themselves.”
“Wait—do you want me to fix the uneven sections or remove the ice?”
“Well, both, now that you mention it. But I was thinking of the ice.”
“Mayor,” he said, “surely you have a maintenance worker to take care of ice and snow. There’s a limit to what an omnimancer should do in town.”
Croft’s eyes had a pleading look to them. “I know, and I’m sorry, but we simply don’t have the budget for it. I used to do the salting and shoveling myself, but I’m getting too old.”
Peter sighed. How could he say no to that?
He’d already worked a spell into his thin wizard’s coat to make it cold-weather appropriate, so he threw on a hat, scarf and fingerless gloves, ran to consult Brown’s Lexicon for the best spell to deal with ice, and followed the mayor out.
The sleet had stopped and the slushy mix on the ground was just bad enough to make walking a tricky proposition where the pavement angled up or down—which was most everywhere in hilly Ellicott Mills.
“I’m going to need more fuel,” he said, and went to get leaves from the basement, hoping Beatrix would show up and he could have it out with her first. It was unlike her to be late. She would surely arrive any second.
But he filled every one of his many pockets and rejoined Croft without seeing her. They worked their way down his long driveway, Peter casting melting spells as they went.
When they got to the bottom, he turned and saw a flash of red disappearing into the house. Beatrix in her winter coat.
“Mayor,” he said, “I need to?—”
“Ohno.” Croft grabbed his arm. “Miss Sederey’s about to walk down Main Street. She always comes to the store first thing on Mondays. Quick, Omnimancer, before she breaks a bone.”
Peter spared a dark thought for silly girls who didn’t have the sense to delay shopping trips during bad weather. But he didn’t want a broken bone on his conscience—it was heavy enough already—and Beatrix couldn’t go anywhere for eight more hours. They would have this conversation today whether she liked it or not.
