Sorceress, Interrupted - By A. J. Menden Page 0,15
I know which the EHJ prefers. Though, with the choice between me and a never-aging tease willing to use her beauty to get whatever she wants, I don’t understand it. You certainly wouldn’t be my first pick. Not as caretaker to a potentially scary little girl.”
Tease? While it might be somewhat true, I didn’t like that this seemed to be all he saw when he looked at me. And I also didn’t like that I was starting to care what he thought. “I may have done a lot of questionable things in my long life, Cyrus, but I’ve never gone to jail for any of them. You, my friend, have.”
“And no one wants a convicted felon watching their kid. I know.” He glared at me. “Are you coming to headquarters or not?”
I pretended bored acquiescence. “Fine. When you sing my praises like that, I guess I have no choice.”
He shook his head. “I’d love to know what the Old One has on the reclusive Fantazia to make her get up off of her lazy ass to go and take care of his kid. And to make him trust you,” he added.
How Cyrus went this long around the EHJ without hearing that I’m the Reincarnist’s daughter, I’ll never know. But since I always like having the upper hand, information-wise, I just smiled and said, “That’s for me to know and you to never find out.”
He smiled, a wicked grin that hinted at more than a little mischief. A girly side buried deep inside of me wanted to giggle nervously in reaction. I smothered it. “You’d better hope I never do. Because having any dirt on you, Fantazia, is the sweetest jackpot of all. As I already know.” Was it my imagination, or was there a little bit of heat burning in those dark blue eyes?
I dropped my gaze from that dark, hot look and bit my lip.
Oh yeah. The birthday thing was going to come back to haunt me.
CHAPTER FIVE
“Good, you’re here.”
I was greeted by a frazzled-looking Mindy. She held a sobbing Emily in her arms.
“I leave you alone for five minutes and look what happens,” Cyrus joked.
Mindy shot him a dark look. “She’s just upset because Lainey left. She’s still not used to her mom being one of the ones to go off on missions.”
“Mommy!” Emily was sobbing. “I want Mommy!”
“Shhhh,” Mindy said.
“Shouldn’t that maternal instinct be kicking in for you?” Cyrus asked.
“Shouldn’t self-preservation be kicking in for you?” Mindy shot back. “Or do you have a death wish, saying stuff like that to a pregnant woman?”
“Whoever said self-preservation was my strong suit?” Cyrus shot me a wink.
Mindy just shook her head. In a brighter voice she said, “Look who’s here to play with you, Emily!”
The child swung her head in my direction. “Fay.” She seemed a bit happier, but still wasn’t over her mother’s departure.
“Fay’s come to play with you while Aunt Mindy does monitor duty for Mommy and Daddy and Uncle Paul and Aunt Selena and Uncle Toby.”
“I wondered if you’d be staying off the battlefield,” I said. “I didn’t think a pregnant woman should be out on the front lines.”
She made a face. “Now you sound like my husband. No, I’m staying here and helping Paul coordinate teams over the headset. But I can’t exactly do that with a crying kid on my lap, so . . .”
“That’s why I’m here,” I finished, scooping Emily out of her arms. “Come on, kiddo, let’s go to your room.”
As I started to leave the room, I turned back. “So, who are they fighting?”
“Edgar Ragde,” Cyrus said. He was headed for the other room, probably to watch professional wrestling like he’d claimed. Men in tights beating each other up? That’s like a normal Monday night for heroes and villains. Didn’t quite see how that was pleasurable or escapism. Maybe it was because the ending was predetermined.
“Mr. Paranoia?”
“He’s finally gone from paranoid to just plain psychotic,” Cyrus added. “He escaped from jail and is using his magic to attack anything that moves.”
“It was a short trip for him,” I mused. Edgar was a magic-user who believed he had more power than he actually had, and that everyone was out to get him because of it. Everyone was out to get him, but mostly because he was superannoying. Still, he took paranoia to new heights, going after civilians and such. That’s why he’d gone to jail in the first place: insisting some guy on the bus was threatening him. Magicked him up