Protector(10)

“Left who?” Alex asked. Something was going on here, that was for sure, but he couldn’t begin to make any sense of it. Maybe once Valentina got here and had this Caitlin McAllister put back together, they could figure out just what the hell had happened.

Almost as if his thoughts had summoned her, Alex heard a soft knock at the door to the break room. He went to answer it, letting the healer in. She was a tall, slender woman a few years younger than his mother, serenely beautiful.

“Over there,” he murmured, inclining his head toward the sofa. “Her name is Caitlin.”

That serenity appeared a little shaken when the healer approached Caitlin and realized the wounded young woman in question was a witch, too. Still, Valentina gathered herself and said softly, “Caitlin, I am Valentina. I will need to lay my hand on your wound. Will you allow me to do that?”

Silently, Caitlin nodded. Tears still leaked from her eyes, but she didn’t pull away, didn’t move or flinch as Valentina touched her. And that took some doing, because Alex knew from experience that although Valentina’s healing magic was powerful and effective, it wasn’t pain-free…more like you had to experience all the healing a wound or injury required as she brought her powers to bear. It could be intense.

Caitlin’s small white teeth clamped down on her lower lip as Valentina continued to press her hands against the wound in her side. Gradually, though, the young witch became less tense, until at last she expelled a breath and nodded.

“Thank you,” she said, her voice still hoarse. She placed her hand against her side, against the flesh that had knitted itself together, and gave a small wince. The spot would probably be tender for a few more days. “That’s…amazing.”

“You clan doesn’t have a healer, I recall,” Valentina said, straightening so she could move a few paces away from her patient, her work done.

“No, we all have to get patched up at the Verde Valley Medical Center,” Caitlin replied. Her gaze moved from the healer and came to rest on Alex. “I’m sorry I reacted like that. You’re Alex — the Alex who tried to be our prima’s consort. I should have recognized your name.”

“It’s all right,” he said, vaguely wishing she’d heard of him some other way. Not that there was anything shameful in not being a consort, if it wasn’t your fate. But still…. He shook himself. That wasn’t important right now. “You’ve had a shock. Can you tell us what happened?”

Her entire body seemed to tense, and she winced again. That involuntary reaction had probably hurt a good deal. “I-I’m not completely sure. I mean, I know what happened, but I still can’t explain it.”

Alex flicked a glance at Valentina, and she gave the tiniest lift of her shoulders. She’d healed Caitlin’s wound, but that didn’t mean she had any more idea of who had inflicted it — and why — than he himself did. He offered Caitlin what he hoped was an encouraging smile, saying, “Well, just tell us as best you can, and we’ll go from there.”

She hesitated for a few seconds. “Can I — could I have some water first, please?”

“Of course,” Valentina replied. She went to the break room’s refrigerator, where they kept some bottled water for the store’s employees. After pulling out one of the bottles, she took it to Caitlin, who accepted it with a grateful nod.

She drank deeply, almost a quarter of the bottle. “That’s better. It’s getting the rest of that…whatever it was…out of my throat.”

Alex could feel his eyebrows lift at that remark. What exactly had happened to her?

Now looking a little more composed, Caitlin shifted slightly on the couch so she was sitting more upright. That must have hurt as well, but she gave no sign of being in any pain, save for a quick tightening of her fingers around the water bottle she held. “There were three of them,” she said at last. “I was here with my friends. Roslyn McAllister and Danica Wilcox.” She pronounced the names carefully, as if wanting to drive home that her companions had been fellow witches. “We went out for drinks. Spring break, you know?”

Alex nodded. Of course, he’d never been able to cut too loose during his own vacations, mostly because his getaways in the greater Phoenix area had been made under the watchful eye of his grandmother, and so news of any debauchery he’d indulged in would have reached her ears soon enough. Not that Alex had much taste for debauchery. That had been more Diego’s thing.

The McAllister witch continued, “There were these guys at the bar. They came up to us. Sort of flirting, you know?”