Boundary Born (Boundary Magic Book 3) - Melissa F. Olson Page 0,59

cross-legged on her old bed with her hands raised defensively. “I know, I know,” she said immediately, “I got some splainin’ to do.”

I laughed in spite of myself. “You know what happened with Emil?”

She nodded. “And I’m really sorry. Val and I had no idea he was going to betray you like that.”

I noticed that our birth mother was “Val” now and felt a ridiculous stab of envy. “She must have known he’s not actually our father,” I said.

Sam bit her lip and said nothing. We’d entered into one of those topics she couldn’t talk about. Okay, fine.

“I’m not sure he meant to betray me,” I said, thinking it over. “If he wanted to kill Maven, he could have walked into that room and plunged a stake into her heart before anyone could stop him. If I hadn’t seen his necklace, if Simon and Quinn hadn’t noticed the signs of belladonna, he could have poisoned Maven and waltzed right out of there. We would have assumed she just succumbed to the earlier poisoning.”

“I am so proud of you for using the word ‘succumb,’” Sam said seriously.

I ignored her. “My point is, he made himself sick so he could get away with killing Maven on my watch. He wasn’t trying to hurt me—it was more that I got in the way of his objective.”

“He did send those things to kill you,” she reminded me.

“Yeah, after I’d backed him into a corner. I’m not saying Emil’s a good guy, but he didn’t set out to get me. Whoever he’s working with, their goal is to kill Maven, not me.”

She leaned back with her spine against the wall, and I recognized her expression. Sam is—was—always the charming one, the life of the party. It sometimes seemed like that was all there was to her—charm and good humor. But anyone who underestimated my sister learned pretty quickly that she was also smart and shrewd. “You have to find out who he’s working for,” she said at last.

“Well, duh. Can’t you help me with that?”

She shook her head, looking perplexed. “Even if I was allowed to tell you, I don’t know. I can’t see—” she broke off, tilting her head in that listening gesture. I waited. “Emil’s boss isn’t human, I can tell you that much,” she said. I wondered if she’d been about to tell me that her perception of the living was limited to the Old World. Or to humans. Or to magic? Damn, this was frustrating.

“But it’s a he,” I said. “Male. And he’s possibly our father, right?”

Sam scrunched up her face helplessly. She couldn’t talk about that. I gritted my teeth.

“This is ridiculous, Sammy. People could die if I can’t figure out—”

She said it so softly that I almost missed it. “People have died.”

I froze—and woke up to Lily shaking my shoulder.

“Sam,” I gasped as my eyes flew open.

“Um, no. Lily.” She held up a paper grocery-style bag. “I have books. And Simon brought food from that place you—” She registered the look on my face and went still. “What is it?”

“People have died,” I repeated. I climbed off the bed, only wobbling a little, and staggered into the kitchen. “Si, do you have the newspapers?”

Simon, who was sitting at the table, raised his eyebrows. “In the recycling. Why?”

I went to the cupboard underneath the sink and dragged out the recycling bin. I pulled out the stack of newspapers and picked through them until I had the front section from the last three days. The rest of the stack I let fall to the floor. Simon had been right: there were very few murders in Boulder every year, which meant they would undoubtedly make the front page.

Simon and Lily had spread books about crystals all over the table, but I laid out the newspaper sections right over them. There was nothing interesting on the front pages for Tuesday or Wednesday, but the headline for yesterday’s paper screamed POLICE ON ALERT AS BODY FOUND IN DUMPSTER. I scanned the first few lines, enough to confirm that the story was about the engineer from Fort Collins that Elise had mentioned on the phone.

I mumbled to myself, “Plural, she said people, plural.” Then I glanced up at Simon. He and Lily were both giving me bewildered expressions. “Humor me a minute. Where’s today’s paper?”

Simon went to his messenger bag and pulled out a folded newspaper. “The paper boy leaves it outside the building. I haven’t even looked at it yet,” he said, handing it