Desire Awakened (Aaron's Kiss #13) (23 page)

“Not many do. But that is no reason for you
to be in here sentencing her before her trial. Right?”

Lawna looked at her again before fluttering
her wings and landing on Logan’s finger he had put out for her.

“My son is looking for you. He said that you
were going to teach him the way of the seed. May I come along?”

The door shut between them before Megan
could speak to Logan. She called his name, but he didn’t return.
After a few minutes, she leaned back against the wall and wondered
why she was being treated like this.

As soon as they found her paperwork, she was
going to be set free. Then she’d show them all what she was really
like. Moving her legs in front of her, she looked at the small
chain on her ankle and smiled. If only they knew what the little
charm held. Watching it twinkle in the light from the window, she
thought of the plans she had for the book now hidden there.

“I’ll show them what a person of my talent
can do with such a thing.” Megan rolled her foot so that the charm
was lying flat against her skin. She saw that if she looked close
enough, she could see the title. And knew that soon she’d be able
to leave here with it.

~~~

Logan was exhausted. They’d been over the
apartment four times…and nothing. Then when they’d found her second
bolt hole, they’d gone over it at least a dozen times. It just
wasn’t here. He sat down on the steps to the apartment and decided
he was too tired to think. He looked up when Lizzy sat next to
him.

“We can try again tomorrow. I don’t know
about you, but I don’t think I can look around in her nasty crap
again tonight.” He pulled her to him and held her. “Logan, do you
suppose she never had it in the first place?”

“I don’t know. But I think the Fates think
she does, and they gave me this boost to find it.” Or at least he
thought that’s what they’d done. For all he knew, this could be
another wild goose chase. He looked at the roll off trash dumpster
that had been delivered that morning. “We haven’t even put anything
in it in the event that it might be hidden in something we can’t
see. I’m so afraid of failing them.” He didn’t know what would
happen if he failed, and he was pretty sure he didn’t want to find
out.

He watched Lizzy roll the ring he’d given
her this morning around her finger. As if she felt him ready to
explain that he’d get her a nicer one again, she turned in his arms
to look up at him. “I wouldn’t trade this one for all the money in
the world. It’s perfect.” She stood up. “Now, we have to go home.
The trial is in the morning and I, for one, am looking forward to
it. Come on, we’ll read Mathew a story and go to bed.”

He walked with her to the car and thought
about the book again. He knew that it was with Megan and that she
had hidden it in a spell or something. He climbed into their new
car and drove back to the house. He thought about what Lawna had
told him yesterday.

“She’s got magic but she can’t use it here,”
Lawna had said.

“I don’t understand. What kind of magic and
where does she get if from?” He thought about his question and
revised it. “You said she has it but you don’t say how she has
it.”

“The castle. It’s powerful all by itself to
protect the queen and king. Any magic that isn’t yours isn’t
used.”

He had to think about that and thought he
had it by the time he’d taken her to where Mathew was by the pool.
“You mean if I came here with pure magic that I was born with,
that’s the only magic I could use?”

“And the room where the trial will be held
will render all magic useless.” She looked thoughtful. “Well,
except for one. There was Sam. Her mind was her magic, and the
queen wasn’t able to take that away without harming her. Sam can do
much with her mind.”

So an empath could use her magic. Logan
didn’t have a clue why that seemed important, but he kept coming
back to that. He looked over at Lizzy as they neared their home.
“Are you an empath?”

“Yes I am. Why do you ask?” She smiled at
him and he could see her exhaustion. “Are you planning a big take
over and need to control someone?”

“Lawna said that Sam was an empath and that
she could use her magic in the courtroom. Can you?”

“Yes. But you do realize that you’re an
empath as well. And as a member of the courts, you could use any
magic so long as you don’t aim anything at Mel or Shamus. What are
you thinking?”

He wasn’t sure and told her that. “But I
have a feeling that Megan has the book on her somewhere. I know she
was searched, but there is something too… She just acts like she’s
untouchable.”

“It would have to be small and coated in a
mixture of silver and gold. Her magic can be hidden behind that,
but I don’t think she’s strong enough to hold it. Someone else
could have given her the book hidden behind that sort of magic. She
would be able to open it, but not…”

He looked over at her when she stopped
talking. He waited, knowing that she was working something out or
speaking to someone else. He pulled into the driveway and sat with
her. Sara came out of their house with Mathew at her side. She’d
been watching him for them. When Lizzy turned to look at him, he
smiled back at her.

“I might have an idea where she got the book
and how she’s hiding it. I have to talk to Lawna in the morning.
She’s putting the grass to bed and will be in the courts
tomorrow.”

He nodded as he got out. Fairies put the
flowers to bed at night and woke them with kisses in the morning.
He’d seen them do it. Otherwise, even with all the other things
he’d seen, this would be hardest for him to believe. Millions of
them flew over the fields spreading dewy drinks and kissing them.
Their colors were so brilliant it nearly hurt his eyes to watch
them. Then at night under the light of the fireflies that did the
same, they gave them a drink then kissed them to sleep. It was the
most beautiful thing he’d ever seen.

After putting Mathew to bed, they went to
their room. Most of their things were still in boxes that they’d
bought them in. Bags lined the walls of more things. The only rooms
that were completely set up were the kitchen out of necessity and
Mathew’s room. The living room had furniture, but it wasn’t in any
sort of order, and the television that they’d bought was still
sitting in the box on the floor, the hanger to hold it on the wall
in place, but nothing else. Their dining room was a shambles of
empty and full boxes, chairs sitting atop one another, and a large
table that was so covered in framed pictures, plates, and stereo
equipment that he had no idea what it looked like. He sat on the
bed and nearly fell asleep.

“Logan, lay back and I’ll strip you
down.”

He heard her voice, but was nearly too out
of it to think what she was saying to him.

“Lay back.”

He felt her hand on his shoulder and let her
lay him back. He opened his eyes twice when Lizzy said his name,
but other than an occasional grunt, he said nothing to her. When he
felt the covers over him, his entire body went limp, and then
nothing more.

Lizzy watched her mom. She’d agreed to help
her with this and seemed genuinely excited about it. As she came
out of the cell after getting Megan ready for the trial, Genese
turned to wink at her. She looked like she’d found what they
needed.

The little fairy had been her friend since
she’d been a child. She’d also spent some time with her mom when
she’d been held in these same cells a very long time ago. She had
been a spy for them all night. Lizzy just hoped that it was
something they could use. As much as she loved the little person,
she could be a tad on the annoying side when she was onto
something.

As the troop of guards walked by her hiding
place, Genese flew from her mom’s shoulder to hers. As soon as the
others were clear, she spoke to Lizzy. It took her ten minutes to
calm down.

“She’s nuts. I’m not kidding you, Lady
Lizzy, she believes herself to be above all this because she was
thrown from the kingdom unjustly. Unjustly, she thinks? I was
there. I saw what she did to her poor parents. If I would have said
those things to my own mother, she’d tan my hide good. I’d not be
able to sit for a month. And when I did, it would have to be on the
softest petals. I have a bed made of daisy petals. They are so soft
and warm. I would have loved a rose petal to cover with, but
they—”

“Genese.”

The little fairy snapped her mouth closed
with a smile.

“You find anything in there other than the
fact that she’s nuts?”

“Oh aye, my lady. She has a scent on her
that is weak, but I can smell him. The one who is the tree.” She’d
said this so softly because she, like most of the smaller beings
that lived there, was afraid that Sherman would return someday and
make them all pay. “She has a bit of his magic on her.”

That’s what Lizzy had thought. Before she
could ask her where she’d found it, Genese told her that they
should go. She started down the hall toward the courtroom and went
to sit with the rest of her family. She was glad that Mathew was in
school. This might just be too much for him to hold as a
secret.

There was every living being in the room.
Some even spilled out into the halls and on the lawns surrounding
the room. Lizzy knew that they had come to see how the woman who’d
killed her own father had fared. And to see justice done. Mel and
her grandmother were seated with several other members of the
court, and the Fates sat in the row in front of the table. The
stand where Megan stood was surrounded by Tess and her men.

Megan did look like she was above this. She
looked like she was bored almost, and that she had better things to
do than to stand here with all of them. When she looked at her,
Lizzy could feel her hatred as if she was touching her with it, and
Lizzy shivered from it. When Logan took her hand, she felt much
better.

Mel called the courts to order, and Megan
was told to stand and listen to her crimes. She stood slowly and
yawned before she finally looked at Mel and the rest of them. Mel
wasn’t amused.

“You’re brought here today to face the
crimes of treason against the royal family, theft of property of
the kingdom, murder of a being, using dark magic when—”

“I did not murder anyone.”

The courtroom murmured when Megan cut off
the queen.

“You can’t charge me for something I had
nothing to do with. Those wolves were killed by another pack, not
by me.”

“You were warned, were you not, that they
were on other pack alpha’s land? And you were told that they were
to leave the property immediately and that fines were to be paid.”
Megan nodded, but before she could speak, Mel held up her hand.
“You’ll not interrupt me again, Megan the Black, or so help me I’ll
make you regret it.”

Megan closed her mouth and Mel continued.
The list was long as she named each member of the pack that had
been killed and their ages. Most, Lizzy realized, were pups not
much older than twenty-five. After Mel named each member, she asked
their former alpha to stand and repeat what he’d been told by alpha
Wolfe.

“He told me that if I didn’t bring them
home, it was within his rights to kill them.” The man pulled at his
collar. “I told him that he could have them. That I had washed my
hands of them. I also told him that if there were fines to be paid,
that the woman here owed them to him.”

He pointed at Megan, who stood up, but sat
back down quickly when Tess turned to her with her blade drawn.
Several people laughed, and that seemed to make Megan more pissed.
When she sat down, Lizzy watched her as she played with a chain
around her ankle.

“As for the use of dark magic in the new
world, there are crimes against nature and one of the royal family
within those crimes. With your sentence of being barred from here,
you were expressly forbidden to use any magic at all that wasn’t
your own. And as you had none when you left here, any and all magic
was against the law.” Mel pulled out a file and looked down at it
before looking at Megan again. “Do you have anything to say before
I list these crimes against you as well?”

“Yes. You’ve no right to keep me here. I’m a
land owner of my own right, and as your own rules state, I’m human
and can’t be tried here.” She stood up. “You said you’d look into
that for me. Was that another lie, or did you find my statements to
be true?”

“You know as well as anyone in this room
that I cannot lie. And as I said I’d take care of looking into it
for you, I did. There are no records indicating that you own
anything. No land, not even an apartment that has your name on any
of the records that I could find.”

“You do lie or you fixed it so that I was
erased from the records.” When she tried to move toward Mel every
warrior surrounding her drew their swords, but Megan was blind to
that in her fury. “Logan was supposed to go there and make his
claim, but he didn’t, and that woman at the courthouse said that if
he didn’t show, my bid would be next. He wasn’t there.”

“And where was he if not there? How do you
know that he didn’t show up and make his claim? Were you
there?”

Lizzy held her breath, hoping that Megan
would confess.

“You seem so sure of yourself, Megan, or is
this another one of your puffed up stories?”

“He was with me when the time came. He
couldn’t have been there because I had him chained to the wall in
my basement. I wasn’t there either because I was with him, making
sure that I could win against him and Lizzy.”

The room became silent and when her dad
nodded to her, Lizzy stood up, walked to the table, and handed the
file she’d held to Mel. With a quick wink, she turned to face the
crowd. “My mate had come to an agreement with my father and his
group. They had signed off on a partnership the day before, and in
doing so, made Madison Dixon, lawyer for the firm of B.L.A.C.K.,
able to represent Logan. She was able to secure the buildings on
that—”