Read Online Family Magic by Patti Larsen - Free Book Online

we are being welcomed home.”
    If she poured it on any thicker, no one would
be able to keep dinner down.
    Guess that was just me. There were murmurs of
welcome.
    Several people stepped forward to speak to
the Moromonds. Mom took her place beside me again and fixed a smile
on her face as the coven greeted their newest members.
    “I don’t really have to marry him, do I?” I
whispered to her.
    Mom’s lips twitched. She shook her head ever
so slightly. “Honey, can you ever forgive me? Honestly, it was so
long ago... I wasn’t even sure Batsheva remembered, and you were a
baby then.”
    “Yeah, I got that from Sassy,” I told her,
keeping a smile on like her. “Do they really have to join?”
    “Yes, Syd, they do.”
    “Just as long as lover boy knows to keep his
hands to himself,” I told her.
    She choked on a laugh. “I don’t think you
have to worry about that,” she answered. “Somehow I think he was
less enthusiastic about the whole thing than you were.”
    “Like that’s possible,” I answered. A frown
followed. Hey, wait a second. He didn’t want to marry me? Jerk.
“Thanks a lot. Not good enough for him or something?”
    Mom shot me a look of humored
exasperation.
    “Well aren’t you the end all,” she said, eyes
sparkling.
    “What?” I answered, trying not to be
offended.
    “Never mind,” she said. “I love you,
Syd.”
    I turned back to the action and caught Quaid
watching me again. This time, I smirked at him.
    Funny, he wasn’t smiling anymore.
     
    ***
     

Chapter Eight
     
    I waited until everyone left to retreat back
to my room. It was almost dark by then. I undressed, digging out my
favorite grubby pajamas, dropping my clothes on the floor out of
the habit of pissing off my mom. I knew she would glance in on me.
I heard the long sigh of suffering she would heave at the unruly
pile of clothes. I flipped open a textbook, trying to study and
sighed myself. Damn, she was good. Even in my imagination, she
could make me restless with guilt. I threw aside the book and
glared at the pink chandelier. I slouched out of bed, put the
clothes away, and went back to studying, feeling decidedly
huffy.
    It didn’t take me long to concede defeat. I
sucked at chemistry. I was about to toss the book across the room
when I felt a surge of power so strong it shook the house to the
foundations.
    I leapt to my feet, out my door before I knew
I moved. I took the stairs three at a time, practically flying. I
made it to the basement doorway ahead of the typically timely
Sassafras. He ran at my heels as I pounded down the steps and hit
the floor, freezing at the bottom.
    My mom sat on her backside on the edge of the
pentagram, the remains of her casting strewn about her. Her clothes
smoked from the dispersed magic. The shocked look on her face would
have been funny under different circumstances.
    Sprawled across from her, equally as
startled, lay two vampires. Which would have been an event in
itself if these particular vampires didn’t live in our
basement.
    My Uncle Frank, forever preserved at boyishly
handsome, with his sense of humor intact, flashed my mother a grin,
showing fang.
    “Morning, Miriam,” he said.
    Mom shook her head as if to clear it, the
last of the smoke dissipating.
    “Frank!” She said. “Are you all right?”
    Uncle Frank patted his hands over his black
hair, plain white t-shirt and torn, faded jeans.
    “Looks that way,” he said. “Sunny?”
    Uncle Frank turned to the beautiful blonde
vampire beside him. She smiled at Mom and me, her own delicate
canines careful hidden behind plump lips. Sunny always tried to
pass for living and breathing.
    “Wonderful,” she said in her vibrant voice. I
didn’t have the heart to tell her no matter how hard she tried her
voice would peg her as undead every time. Nobody sounded that good
unless they had help.
    And, yes, Sunny was her real name. Most
unfortunate for a vampire, but she thought it was funny.
    I crossed the pentagram, feeling