Ridge’s warm hands closed gently around Kat’s shoulders and drew her away from the bed. “Give Grace room to work, babe.”
As Kat watched anxiously, Grace’s fingers began to glow. Sparks spilled from her flesh, dancing over Mary’s body, cutting spirals around the woman’s still arms and legs, circling her head in a halo of light.
Kat caught her breath. Grace’s magic had made her believe in witches, but actually seeing the otherworldly light show at work around her own mother was something else again. This is real. All of it. Vampire knights, witches, Merlin, all of it. Real. “Is she going to be all right?” Grace grunted, but made no answer, an expression of deep concentration on her face.
“I think we’d better go downstairs and wait,” said the dark-haired stranger who’d accompanied Grace.
“It’s not a good idea to distract her when she’s doing work this delicate.” Kat looked up at him. This man must be Grace’s husband. Which made him . . .
Her knees went weak.
Ridge caught her forearm and steadied her. “You going to be okay?” His steady green gaze was dark with compassion.
Kat took a deep breath and blew it out, managed a quick nod. As Ridge guided her toward the door, her gaze fell on a small pill bottle beside the bed. She scooped it up and was not surprised to find it empty.
A glance at the label confirmed her suspicions.
Sleeping pills.
“Dammit, Mom.” Anger stiffened her back. Kat pulled away from Ridge’s supporting hand and stalked out to clatter down the stairs. “God forbid she leave another bloody corpse for me to find. This is the third f**king time she’s pulled this stunt.”
Kat didn’t look back to see if the men were following her as she made for the kitchen. They’d need coffee to get through this. At least, she would; she had no idea what stressed vamps drank.
Besides, there was something soothing and familiar about the ritual of making coffee. At least it gave her something to do with her hands.
“I gather this has happened before,” Lancelot said as she put the pot on to brew.
Kat glanced over at him. He was almost ridiculously handsome, with dark, thick brows arching over eyes the color of warm sherry. His hair was thick and curly, his cheekbones broad, his nose narrow over a wide, curving mouth. It was obvious why her mother had fallen into bed with him twenty-six years ago.
It was impossible to think of him as her father. For God’s sake, the man looked only a few years older than she was. Thirty or so, tops, though she knew he had to be sixteen hundred years old, at least.
Yet as she studied him, Kat realized there was something vaguely familiar about the shape of his face.
Damn, he looks like me. She saw a softer, feminine version of those angular features every time she looked in a mirror. The shape of his eyes and chin, the curve of his mouth. Yet because he appeared to be only a few years older than she was, strangers would probably mistake him for her older brother.
“Kat,” Ridge prompted her softly, “do you know why your mother would do something like this?” She went to the china hutch for the sterling silver coffee set her mother used for guests, then added three cups and saucers and carried the heavy tray back to the central island where the coffeepot hissed.
“I had a sister.”
“I remember,” Lancelot said unexpectedly. “Mary mentioned her. She was a little girl at the time. Seven or so. She was spending the weekend with Mary’s ex-husband.” A deep frown line formed between his thick brows. “The divorce had just been finalized.”
Which was why Mary was out getting drunk. “Karen had a stormy childhood. Spent a lot of time shuttling back and forth between her father’s house and Mom’s. Me . . .” Kat managed not to let her gaze slide toward Lancelot. I had no father. “I stayed with Mom all the time, which became kind of an issue. Karen accused Mom of favoring me, but Mom said it wasn’t true. Said I was just younger, needed her more.” She shrugged. “It got really bad when Karen hit eighteen. Typical teenage stuff.
Beer, boys. Lots and lots of really bad attitude.”
But Kat had worshiped her beautiful big sister anyway. Cheerleader and boy magnet, Karen had been as blond and popular as a living Barbie doll. Ten-year-old Kat had probably annoyed the daylights out of her, constantly tagging at her heels. “There was this boy. She said his name was Jimmy Chosen, and that he was a college senior. Mom tried to get him to come to the house, but he kept making excuses, ducking her invitations. That really set off all her mommy alarms.”
“I’d imagine so,” Lancelot said.
“Then, that Christmas Eve, Mom found a package of condoms in a pocket when she went to wash Karen’s coat. It all hit the fan. Lots of screaming, lots of crying. Mom threatened to throw Karen out if she kept dating Jimmy.”
“Probably not the best way to handle the situation,” Ridge observed, moving over beside her.
“No, which is just one of the reasons Momma periodically tries to eat entire bottles of Seconal.” Kat gave him a slightly bitter smile. He brushed a comforting hand across the small of her back. Feeling oddly soothed, she continued, “I heard Karen get up before dawn Christmas morning and attempt to sneak out of the house. I got up and begged her not to go—I was afraid Mom really would throw her out. Karen threatened to kick my ass if I ratted on her. Swore she’d be back in an hour, long before Mom woke up. So I went back to bed.” She stared down at her own reflection in the shining surface of the coffeepot without really seeing it. “I wish to God I’d been the little snitch Karen always swore I was. If I had been . . . ”
She broke off to transfer the coffee into the silver pot, then picked up the loaded tray and led the way into the living room. “By the time two hours had passed, I knew Karen was in serious danger of getting caught.”
Sitting down on the couch, Kat began to fill the delicate cups. Ridge sat down next to her as Lancelot took one of the armchairs. “We lived in one of those lakeside developments then, very upscale. I knew Karen liked to meet her boyfriends out beside the lake, where there was a shady stretch of grass. So I went to get her.”
She glanced up. Lance was watching her, his gaze brooding. “The day before, I’d seen a dog dead on the highway. Been hit by multiple cars, I guess. Probably a truck or two. Its body was all ripped up, red ropes of . . . Well.” Her voice sounded distant to her own ears. “Karen lay on the grass in her favorite picnic spot. And I thought when I saw her that she looked just like that dog. I wouldn’t have known who she was if it wasn’t for her long, pretty blond hair. I recognized the hair.”