the difference?"
"First of all, if he found me here, he'll find me there. At least here, I have friends who can help." I took a deep breath. "Second, it's not just about me. He's taking conduits."
Tobias's eyes widened; he obviously knew what conduits were. "Who?"
"So far? Definitely Millie. Possibly Amber Dorsey. There could be more, but the bottom line is, I'm not leaving Millie like this. I'm not leaving until she's okay, and that's it."
He watched me for a while, his entire being vibrating with tension and worry, and then something in his eyes softened, and he seemed to relax, just a bit.
"Okay," he said simply. "I'm going to poke around, see what I can find out about this guy. I'll come back tonight, let you know what I've found, if anything."
"That's fine, but you can just call me in the morning. I've got plans tonight."
He tensed. "Where are you going?"
I rolled my eyes. "To Betty's." I left out the part where I'd be with Davina. This boat was already rocky. "I'll be fine. We'll talk in the morning."
He hesitated for a moment, then nodded. "Keep your cell phone with you. Don't turn it into a bat."
"Oh, ha," I said.
He pushed up from his chair, and I got up from mine. He looked at me, not moving, and I met his eyes. We held the gaze for a long moment, and my heart started skipping as all the feelings I'd been denying for so long rushed forward, making their presence undeniably known.
Not the time, I thought, and then he said, "We'll deal with the rest of this later, okay?"
I wasn't quite sure what he meant by "the rest of this," but I was willing to let it go, for the moment. I nodded, and watched his back as he crossed my backyard and disappeared down my driveway.
Chapter 11
I stood on my patio for a while. Fifteen minutes or an hour, I couldn't tell, just staring at the corner Tobias had disappeared around, my mind going a mile a minute, trying to assimilate everything that was happening to me into something that made sense.
I wasn't having a lot of luck.
"Liv?"
I looked up to see Peach standing in my driveway, her eyes red, crumpled tissues in her hand.
"Oh, honey," I said, and held my arm out to her. She sniffled and walked up to me, letting me hug her as she cried.
"That son of a bitch," she said, her words muffled into my shoulder as she spoke them.
"Come on inside," I said. "I'll make some tea."
When I came into the living room with the tea, she was slumped down on my couch, playing ruefully with the Tupperware full of Jordan almonds she'd laid on her stomach, scooping up handfuls and letting them fall through her fingers, like big chunks of sand. Peach was petite, but her presence had always made her seem bigger somehow. Now, she looked shrunken, tiny, and spent.
I set her mug on the coffee table in front of her, then took my seat in the floral love seat, waiting for her to start. Eventually, her eyes still on the almonds, she did.
"I asked him," she said. "It was true. Everything Millie said."
I stayed quiet, not sure how to respond. I'd expected that it was true, but also, had some suspicions as to the level of Nick's culpability. I didn't know the extent of Millie's magical influence. Could she have coerced him magically, somehow? Nick may have been kind of a jerk when we were kids, but as an adult, he had always seemed like a good guy to me, and I couldn't imagine him hurting anyone this way, but especially not Peach.
"The wedding's off," she said. "I told him I never wanted to speak to him again."
I hesitated a minute, then said, "What did he say? Did he ... explain why?"
She snorted angrily. "He doesn't know why." She swiped at her eyes. "What is it with men? They always treat these things like accidents. It just happened, baby. It's not my fault. I didn't want to, I slipped and my dick just fell into her, over and over again, and..." She trailed off, her voice crackling with pain and despondency.
"Maybe..." I began, but I didn't know where to go with it. Under any other circumstances, I would be leading the charge to castrate the son of a bitch. But I couldn't help but feel like this particular thing might be a special circumstance. If it was beyond Millie's