Page 41 of Bent Out of Shade
How much had she blabbed? I swallowed the sour metallic taste in my mouth. “Well, then I’m glad that’s handled. May we leave?”
He swept out a hand. “By all means. Good night, Sadie.”
“Goodnight,” she said timidly.
I hustled her to the car, not speaking a word until we pulled into a late-night drive-thru, and I ordered a burger and fries.
“Can I get something?” she said.
“One tap water,” I said into the order board microphone. “Tepid.”
“Jeez, Mom. We weren’t going to get drunk or high or anything.”
I inched forward, waiting behind a truck at the pickup window. “Getting drunk is way down the list of dangers you faced.”
“Sure, there are vamps and stuff.”
“And stuff.” I pointed at her. “That’s exactly why children aren’t allowed there.”
“I’m not a child! We were just talking about how wild Blood Alley must be, and when I mentioned that I’d met Mr. BatKian?” She gave a one-shouldered shrug. “I said we should check it out and look around.”
“I hope it was worth it,” I said darkly.
Sadie threw up her arms. “Sorry that I’m not your perfect daughter all the time and dared to do something that wasn’t even risky compared to what some kids at my school get up to. Mr. BatKian had promised not to hurt me or my friends, remember? Besides, you had no problem when I protected you and Dad by nulling some guy’s magic, but I sneak out one time and you freak. Make up your mind,” she added in a mutter.
I paid for my food and parked in the lot. “Remember that night Mr. BatKian came over to set the ward? At first you thought he was so cool, but then he got mad and scared you.” I crammed food into my mouth, speaking over the rumble of my stomach. “Sneaking out, wanting to impress a new group of friends, I understand all that, but you can’t apply Sapien laws to the Ohrist world. You haven’t even had your powers for a month, and you’ve known about magic for barely longer than that. Yet instead of thinking through the consequences of crossing someone who you’d seen was dangerous, you chose to impress your new friends.”
Sadie toyed with the lid of her take-out cup of tap water, while I barely tasted the meal and had to muscle it down through a chest that felt made of lead.
“Do you understand how badly this could have ended?” I said. “Strike that. How badly it did end? You owe him a favor.” I wiped my fingers on a crumpled napkin. “Be grateful he sees you as a kid.” My voice grew soft and I blinked away the dampness in my eyes. “Don’t be in such a rush to grow up, because when magic ends your childhood, it ends it hard.”
“Like when your parents were killed,” she said snarkily. She put her water in the cup holder. “Maybe if you hadn’t kept secrets from me my entire life, I’d make smarter choices instead of doing the best I can.”
I dug my nails into my palms at her attitude, but she wasn’t wrong. The thing is, she wasn’t necessarily right either. Sadie had wanted to impress a new group of kids. This totally normal teen behavior was on her, but maybe if magic wasn’t a shiny novelty, this particular situation wouldn’t have arisen. That was on me and the choices I’d made, believing them the safest—and only—option for my family.
Eli and I had done our best to keep her carefree for as long as we could, but tonight had changed that even more than when she’d nulled the powers of the man from the Consortium. Exhausted, I longed to pull her into my arms and hang on tight.
I dumped my half-eaten burger in the bag and held out my fries for her to share.
Even through the anime makeup her two freckles high on her left cheek peeked out, she slouched in that familiar way with her right shoulder higher, and the part in her hair was as crooked as always, yet when she nodded and reached for the food, her eyes were weary and strained from this new understanding of the world.
She was unhurt and with me. For now, that was enough. Child or adult, she’d always be my baby.
