Protector

Chapter 2-1

2

Alex Trujillo shoved the clipboard under his arm and went back to the stockroom. Just as he’d expected, the bags of rice Luis said he couldn’t find were stacked right where Alex had known they would be, on the rack on the west wall. He tried not to sigh. It probably would have been easier if Luis was actually that stupid. He wasn’t, though…just lazy. And because he was Alex’s cousin, Alex couldn’t exactly fire him.

Just another day at Mercado Trujillo.

For most of his life, Alex had known this was where he’d probably end up, but that didn’t mean he had to be happy about it. His one chance at escape had been that kiss with Angela McAllister. If he’d turned out be her consort, he would have been up in Jerome…doing what, he wasn’t sure…but at least it wouldn’t be managing the store that had been in his father’s family for three generations now.

But he hadn’t been Angela’s soul mate. No, that role had gone to Connor Wilcox, of all people. Lucky bastard. It wasn’t as if Alex had thought he was in love with Angela or anything. He barely knew her. What he’d seen, he’d liked, and at the time he’d thought they could have been good together, if fate or the Goddess or whomever had seen fit to smile on their pairing. She’d been destined for other things, however, and so Alex had let it go. Mostly.

It wouldn’t have been so bad if his brother Diego could have shouldered part of the burden here. He was the oldest son, after all, and so he really should have been the one to take over the store, or at least the larger part of managing it. But last year he’d finally gotten around to getting married, to a woman whose family owned a vineyard down in Bisbee, and he’d gone to work there instead, using the excuse that Letty was an only child and that he was needed to help shoulder some of the burden.

Burden, Alex thought. Yeah, it must be really rough to spend your whole day tasting wine.

Intellectually, he knew there was more to managing a vineyard than that. And Diego’s new wife was a civilian, which meant Diego had to be on guard all the time. Letty knew about the de la Paz clan, that her husband’s family wasn’t exactly typical, but her own family didn’t have a clue about the de la Pazes. And they needed to be kept in the dark, for obvious reasons.

“Besides,” Luz Trujillo had pointed out to her son, probably trying to be helpful but in fact just making things worse, “why did you get those degrees in marketing and communications, if not to be more valuable to the store? I’m sure you’ll have all sort of ideas!”

He’d had ideas once. Unfortunately, none of them really applied to running a neighborhood mercado, even if said mercado had a thriving side business that most of its regular customers didn’t know anything about. Through a side door that most civilians thought led to another stockroom or possibly an office, you went into a second store, smaller, but stocked with the sorts of items the witches and warlocks in the area might need: crystals and other stones of power, herbs and floral essences, candles and saints’ icons and all manner of arcane items. Luz Trujillo, whose gifts included a facility with minor illusions, had cast a spell on that doorway so the civilians never quite noticed the parade of people going in and out during the hours the mercado was open for business.

“Luis,” Alex said to his cousin, who was lurking in the dry goods aisle, attempting to look busy but really eyeing a pretty girl who was inspecting the spice display, “the rice is on the shelf to your right as you go in the stockroom.” He’d tried to sound mild, but he couldn’t help letting an edge creep into his voice as he added, “The same place it’s always been.”

The girl giggled, and Luis gave Alex the evil eye. At least he didn’t argue, though, but headed back where he was told, albeit with excruciating slowness.

And that’s the problem with hiring family, Alex thought. Things would have been so much easier if he could have just gotten some regular help around the place.

Frowning, he emerged from the dry goods aisle and began walking toward the front of the store. His frown deepened, though, as he heard gasps and murmurs from up near the entrance. In the next moment, he saw the source of the disturbance: a young woman with long red hair was staggering toward him, eyes blank, glazed. For a second or two, he wondered if she might be drunk, or possibly high, and then he saw the stain of bright blood against her pale blue gauzy top, the way that blood had run all the way down her side and onto her jeans. And in that same instant he felt the slight tingle that told him he was in the presence of a witch, even as she reached out with a b****y hand to grasp him, her hoarse voice pleading for help right before she slumped into his arms.

He couldn’t stop to think. The better place to take her would be the hidden side of the store, the one where the witches shopped, but he wasn’t sure his mother’s spell could hold up, not with so many curious eyes on him. So he lifted the strange young woman, saying to the clerk, “Manuela, call 911!”

Since Manuela was another witch, she would know he didn’t really want her to call emergency services, but instead their local healer, who lived approximately ten minutes away. She nodded, picked up the phone, and made a show of dialing 911…but instead was putting the call through to the healer. Luckily, this wasn’t the first time the clan had had to indulge in this sort of subterfuge, so the healer would know to come right away, no matter what Manuela might be saying on the phone.

Without pausing, Alex went on into the stockroom and through it, to the small break room at the back of the building. He laid the wounded witch on the couch there, then hurried to get some towels from the supply closet. After wetting a washcloth, he went back to the sofa before gingerly tugging her shirt upward a few inches so he could wipe away the blood and see where she was hurt.

And there it was — a small but deep gash in her left side, piercing the smooth, pale skin.

A knife wound. s**t.

He’d never seen her before, but, judging by the warm red hair that flowed over the shabby pillow where her head currently rested, he guessed she must be a McAllister. Most of them tended to be much fairer than the members of the Wilcox clan.

“Who are you?” he wondered, belatedly realizing he’d spoken the words out loud.

Her eyelids fluttered, and she stared up at him, face white and taut with pain. Then she seemed to focus on his features, and a spasm of panic went over her. She pushed at his hand and tried to sit up, wriggling away from the washcloth he had pressed against her side.

“Hey,” Alex said, wondering what in the world had set her off. Yes, she’d been attacked, but even in her wounded state, she had to sense that he was a fellow witch and that he meant her no harm. “Stay still. You’ve already lost enough blood.”

“You — you’re one of them,” she whispered, her voice cracking with fear.

“One of who?” he asked. “I’m — my name is Alex Trujillo. I’m Maya de la Paz’s grandson.”

That declaration seemed to calm her a little, although he noticed that she remained wedged up against the other end of the couch, as far away from him as she could manage. “Maya?” she echoed.

“That’s right, Maya,” he said, attempting to keep his voice as calm, as soothing, as he could manage. “She’s helped your clan before. You’re a McAllister, right? What’s your name?”

“C-Caitlin.”

Her voice shook, and her entire frame was wracked with shivers. Going into shock, probably. There was a blanket folded up at the top of the storage cabinet here in the break room. He should get that and cover her up. The healer would be here soon, but —

“Do you want a blanket, Caitlin?”

She nodded, and seemed relieved when he moved away from her to the cabinet. When he came back, he was careful to avoid touching her as he spread the blanket over her. With shaking fingers, she pulled it up to her chin.

He knew he should really be holding that washcloth up to the wound in her side to slow the bleeding, but he also knew that whatever had happened to her, it was traumatic enough that she seemed to be having difficulty recognizing a friendly gesture. Instead, he moved a foot or so away, then told her, “The healer is on her way. She’ll have you fixed up in no time.”

The smallest of nods. Her eyes, a clear, mesmerizing blue-green, seemed to be fixed on the window in the wall opposite, and as he watched, he saw tears fall from them and slide down her pale cheeks. “I left them,” she whispered, her voice ragged.

“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.”

“Your 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.