at the head of an empty row of seats. Actually, the three rows after that one were empty, too, no one wanting to get too close to us. Nerves wouldn’t let me sit, and we clustered together in the aisle. As Pierce and my mother made small talk, I scanned the rising rows for Trent.
Ivy leaned in, smiling with her lips shut. “You look green. You want me to go up there with you and hold your hand?”
“Can’t you be nice to me for once?” I said, and she laughed. “Trent isn’t going to show,” I added, wondering what my mother was telling Pierce. His eyes were wide, and my mother’s expression was intent.
“Is that necessarily a bad thing?” Ivy asked, and I tried to decide if she was joking.
“I’m worried about Jenks,” I said, and she nodded. “Has he called?” I asked for the umpteenth time, and she shook her head, eyes falling from mine.
I thought of my phone, in my bag, wondering if I should turn it off. I didn’t want to miss Jenks’s call if it should come in. A flash of guilt hit me. It was too late now to call Bis, too.
A stir at the door we had come in caught my attention, and I turned away when the man my mom had threatened came in, pointing our way. “Don’t look,” I told Ivy, thinking that they were going to haul her out, but my fear vanished in a wash of elation when the familiar clatter of pixy wings sparked through me.
“Jenks!” I exclaimed, suddenly feeling ten feet tall as I saw the glint of pixy dust. I didn’t care if people were staring and whispering loudly. I waved like a fool, grinning when a bright sparkle at the top of the theater dropped to us.
“Oh my God, Jenks!” I said, elated and feeling the size difference between us keenly as he came to a pixy- dust-laden halt in the center of our group. He was smiling, a long tear in his black sleeve and his hair matted, but he was okay. “How did it go? Are you all right? Where’s Trent?” I asked, wanting to give Jenks a hug but having to settle for extending my hand for him.
Jenks nodded to everyone, zipping around Ivy to wreathe her in silver sparkles. “I’m good,” he said, wings moving well and clearly overflowing with energy. “You’ll never believe it, Rache,” he said, eyes sparkling with news. “Trent’s here. He’s in the bathroom with Lucy.”
“Lucy?” I asked, wondering if Ellasbeth had a younger sister. “What did you do?”
Jenks landed on my hand, then sprang into the air, unable to contain himself. “You’ll never guess!” he said, darting back and forth. “The guy is slicker than toad snot. Trent is—”
“A daddy,” Ivy interrupted, her gaze fixed on the door we’d come in.
I spun as Jenks yo-yoed up and down, shrilling so high and fast I couldn’t understand him. My eyes bugged out, and beside me, my mother swore. “No. Friggin’. Way,” I said.
Trent was on the threshold in his usual thousand-dollar suit, rearranging his badge and surrounded by too many women. One was jiggling a fussing infant. A girl from the looks of the sweet little bonnet.
“No. Friggin’. Way!” I said again, touching gazes with Ivy before I looked back and saw Trent take the baby. My eyes widened. She was his?
“Yes, way!” Jenks was saying, and Pierce sighed, dropping back a step. “I about crapped my pants when I found out. No wonder Trent wouldn’t spill. That’s his kid. His and Ellasbeth’s. That’s what he was doing, Rache! We were baby snatching! Like elves used to in the old days!”
Pierce seemed bored by it, but my mother was melting into a puddle of anticipation, her hands almost outstretched, as Trent made his way to us.
“It was some ancient elf quest to prove himself and become a man. He had to steal a baby and not get caught,” Jenks said, still too excited to land anywhere, and I couldn’t look away.
“He stole her!” Jenks said, finally landing on my shoulder. “Right out of her crib. Like in the old days when they would leave changelings, but Trent only left a crumpled bit of paper in the crib. Rache, he sang this weird little song, and she just woke up and loved him.”
I had to admit that Trent seemed to know what he was doing as he patted the little girl to make her stop fussing. He looked up, his eyes meeting mine still holding a blissful happiness tempered with a severe protectiveness. “He traveled three thousand miles to steal a baby?”
“
I licked my lips, and Pierce moved to make room for Trent. The next elf generation. Lucy was the beginning. That’s what Trent had meant. And it was because of me? No, it was because of Trent, Jenks, Ivy, and me. We’d done it together.
The noise of the auditorium seemed to fade as Trent scuffed to a halt before us, his ears red as he met everyone’s eyes. “Trent?” I managed, and then my mother broke down.
“Ohhh, let me hold her!” my mom exclaimed, hands reaching out.
Immediately everyone relaxed. Trent’s attention fell from me, focused entirely on his little girl as my mother came close. “Ms. Morgan,” Trent said, his hands changing position as he carefully moved his…daughter? “She’s a temperamental little thing. She might not like you.”
“Of course she’ll like me,” my mother huffed. People were watching, and onstage, the last of the coven members had assumed their places. My mother took Lucy, and the little girl began to cry, green eyes spilling over as she refused to look at my mother, searching until she found Trent, then making a face as if she’d been betrayed.
“Oh, dear,” my mother said, jiggling her carefully, knowing that it was a lost cause. “Such a beautiful thing you are. Don’t cry, sweetie. Your daddy is right there.”
Jenks was laughing—not at my mother, but at my and Ivy’s shocked expressions. “You’re a dad?” I tried again, and Trent shrugged, his attention lingering on my dress.
“It happens.”
“Rachel, you take her,” my mother said, clearly uncomfortable. “She might like you.”
“No. Mom, no!” I protested, but it was my mother we were talking about, and it was either take the baby or have her hit the floor. I had no choice, and as Trent stiffened, I found I was holding another person in my arms. I couldn’t look at her as her blanket fell away, scared almost as she cried, but I held her against me, and burn my toast if I didn’t jiggle a little on my feet. She was kind of soft and squishy, but she fit nicely against me. I gave another hop, and when I looked into her eyes, she quit crying.
Trent’s hands dropped from where he had been going to snatch her away. Pale eyebrows up, he said, “She likes you,” as if he didn’t believe it.
“Of course she likes Rache,” Jenks said belligerently, leaving me to hover before the baby and make her sneeze from his silver pixy dust. Cooing, Lucy flung her hand out—searching for Jenks, probably—but latching on to my finger instead.
Her tiny hand gripped mine with a surprising warmth, and in a shocking wash of emotion, I felt everything I knew shift. The scent of cinnamon and baby powder hit me, and as my eyes widened, my heart melted, making room for her. As I gazed into Lucy’s green eyes, and seeing her pale hair and perfect face, it was as if something had flipped a switch in me. I’d held babies before. Hell, I’d babysat for my old friend at the I.S., but this small person holding my finger had looked to me for protection from the noise, the crowd, and the frightening sparkles of pixy dust. All of a sudden, I didn’t want to give her back.
My gaze came up, fastening on my mother. Unshed tears made her eyes dark. She was gazing at Lucy with longing, remembering Robbie and me. When she glanced up, I gave her a rueful smile. Damn it, she’d given me Lucy for just this reason. It wasn’t an elf thing, it was just…life.
“She likes you,” Trent said again, but he was reaching for her, jealous maybe.
“Perhaps she knows you helped her survive,” Ivy said from the background.
“Look at her ears, Rache,” Jenks said as he returned to my shoulder, and I moved away from Trent. “You gotta look at her ears.”
