“I don’t ever want to go back, Jen. Nan, Mum, Dad, they’re nothing to me now. This is where I belong, this is my family.”
“And what about me?”
Her voice was so small and forlorn, I couldn’t help but sweep her up in my embrace.
“You’ve always loved me for what I am, rather than for what you think I should be. Our relationship will never change.”
She wanted to say something when I pulled back, I could see that, but she didn’t get a chance as a tall dark figure appeared at her elbow.
“Mind if I cut in?” Dave Rutherglen said. I didn’t much like it when she drew away, her expression indicating she wasn’t entirely happy with what was said, but her father, as always, stepped up and made himself everyone’s sole focus. This was where I was supposed to bow or some shit, acknowledge the power that radiated off him. I’d never felt another’s power in the way people described mine, but I felt his. But it didn’t scare or cow me. Somehow, deep inside I knew I was at the very least his match. I stepped up, met him toe for toe, and then held my hands up. An eyebrow jerked up at that, but he put his hand in mine as I put mine on his shoulder, and then off we went.
“You’ve cut quite the swathe, Kira,” he said as we careened around. Where it had been a light hearted, dizzying thing with Jen, this was so much more purposeful. My feet spun on the dancefloor, forcing his to match mine, working us around and around and around.
“Perhaps I have.”
He grinned at that, only the slight rush of his breath indicating that he was struggling a little.
“I look forward to seeing you come to your full powers. I believe it will be most illuminating.”
I shot him the look a million women employed behind the backs of their ‘betters.’ From toxic mother-in-laws to dickhead bosses, to fedora wearing mansplainers to fucksticks who just won’t shut up. I felt a legion of women at my back as I stared him down. I jerked us to a halt. If this was some kind of power play, then we may as well stop fucking about and throw down. This wasn’t Jane Austen or Gone with the Wind. I wasn’t ruled by archaic strictures to keep quiet and hide what I was.
“What do you fucking want?” I asked. I enjoyed watching him trying to pull his hands away and being unable to, the petty pleasure of holding someone against their will making sense of a whole lot of shitty experiences in my life.
“What do I want?” Dave gritted out. “The same thing everyone in your life is waiting for—for you to come into your full powers. They’ve been keeping you in the dark, Kira, feeding you breadcrumbs from the feast, as well as their cocks, stringing you along until—”
“So what do you want to feed me, aside from your cock?”
“The truth, I—”
“Oh, is that what it is? The Morgan Gallup polled, demographically tailored, PR talking pointed truth? What oh so strategic secrets do you want to share with me?”
“Can I cut in?”
There was that cocky little voice again, breaking into my consciousness. When I turned, Rhiannon stood there, hand on her hip, doing her most fashion forward, Regina George look ever. I spun Dave so that he floundered right into her arms, sending both of them tumbling into a heap. I gave that one satisfied look and then stalked away.
Suddenly, I didn’t want anything to do with any of them. A little warning squeaked in the background, that none of this was my normal behaviour, not sweet and compliant, not putting Dave in his place, but that was soon shoved to one side. Something big and hot rose within me, pissed with all the petty douchebaggery. I watched those who truly gave themselves up to the moment, in sexual pleasure or in dance, and saw the pure light that shone within them, but right alongside them were dickheads who just wanted to bring this all down.
People held too tight, forced light feet to slow, speared in too hard and too fast with no thought to their partner’s enjoyment. They used this bright, beautiful thing as yet another weapon against others. I charged through the crowd, the people parting automatically until I got to the very edge and a clumsy foot stomped down on the skirt of my dress. They skittered away quickly enough, but the offending fabric remained, the pretty scarlet somewhat bedraggled now.
Why am I wearing this? I asked myself, instantly met by an array of images of Marlow and his sweet, caring dominance. I felt a little bad when I transformed the dress into a flouncy red frock coat, replacing it with a corset and jeans, along with some bloody granny panties as I was sick of my flaps flying free right about then. I was admiring the sweep of my jacket when Lucas approached.
“So you worked out how to use your powers, then,” he said, looking me up and down. He wanted to touch me, I could feel that, smell that, his pine scent sharp in my nose, but he kept himself apart, arms crossed.
“Powers?” I looked down at the clothes that I’d apparently conjured from nowhere. “I guess I did.”
“I figured you wouldn’t be kept contained. Not quite the tame little girl they think you are. You should come with me.”
I felt his compulsion crackle over my skin like static electricity. It was kind of a turn on.
“Tell me what to do again,” I said, watching my corset.
“Come with me, Kira.”
The tone was more insistent, and I could see actual sparks skate along my skin, my nipples pulling up hard in response. I laughed at it before reaching out and collecting it in the palm of my hand, then letting the little cluster of writhing energy fly free. Lucas sighed, then snatched the ball out of the sky.
“Fine, I can’t make you, but will you please follow me?”
I was Alice, I remembered, and this was Wonderland, so I looked the big burly Knave of Hearts over, shrugged, and went where he directed.
20
“Ohhkay,” I said, looking around me
If I’d had any doubts that this was a magical place, they were demolished right now. I looked around me, front and back, and saw we stood within an open stand of trees, the leaves rustling in a light breeze, falling in gentle spirals, birds flitting between the thick trunks. It made a curious, rambling sort of soundtrack, one that was then punctuated by the sound of a guitar.
I looked back, behind me, expecting to see the dancers and court and the throne, but there were only more trees—that and Lucas.
“I wanted to hate you,” he said.
“Not the kind of words a woman wants to hear from a man in the middle of an empty forest,” I said but he just ignored me, those crackling blue eyes staring.
“I thought you’d be a bitch, be divisive or difficult, but…” He shook his head. “You made this so much harder.”
“If by this you mean killing me and disposing of the body, and by harder, you mean not doing that, then yeah, good call.”
“Don’t make jokes, we don’t have time. They’ll be here soon enough when they’ve worked out what I’ve done. You need to go to them, now, before it’s too late.”
Lightning rumbled in the background, despite the fact that it was a clear night. Lucas looked apprehensively over his shoulder.
“Who’s ‘them’?” I asked, feeling the irritation rise, but he just pointed.
It was the sound I heard first. I dunno if you’ve listened to a lot of blues music, but there’s some that is flashy and virtuoso. Like any musician in the world could compare themselves to some of the big names and find their skills wanting. But there’s another kind—softer, quieter, usually caught by someone in a studio between takes or something. It’s guitar only, no accompaniment to dilute the sound, played with a kind of lazy, indolent skill that masks so damn much.