“I thought by making you hate me,” Dane continued, dragging my gaze to him, “and if you remember, I did my best to make certain you thought everyone here felt as I did, you would never show up at the Animus. I hoped that your anger would hold when Gretchen told you to find answers, you needed to come to the Animus.”
While that made sense, kind of in the holy-crap-are-you-kidding-me kind of way, one thing still didn’t add up. “But if you believed that, why did you send Kipp away? If you thought there’d be no danger in it all and I wouldn’t come here?”
A long pause followed as Dane gazed at me knowingly, but Gretchen broke the silence by answering on a gasp, “Because, what if he’s right—what if someone killed Alexander to ensure you didn’t come here?” Her voice trembled and she stared at me with a worried gaze. “You’re now surrounded by people who are very skilled with magic and could put Kipp in danger. What if they could use your desire to help him against you?”
I glanced at Kipp, and his tight expression matched my current mood. “Yes, I’m right there with you.” Seriously, when would I hit the light at the end of the tunnel, instead of living in the tunnel that didn’t end!
With frustration lacing through my veins, I turned to Dane. “But why, once you knew I was here and might be in danger, did you send a note, be so cryptic, and not just tell me?”
He lifted an eyebrow. “Would you have believed me if I told you?”
“No,” I responded without pause, since I wouldn’t have believed anything that came out of his mouth, but there was still a problem to all this. “You could have told Amelia and got her to tell to me.” Not that I would’ve totally believed her either, but if Gretchen had, then maybe I would have.
Dane’s eyelids lowered, raw pain seeped into his expression as he looked at Alexander. “Amelia cannot take on anything else. She’s not holding up well. Yes, she knows of my suspicions, but I’m trying to keep her out of it. I don’t want to involve her any more than I already have.”
“Poor, darling,” Alexander whispered.
Dane inclined his head in agreement, then said to me, “I left the note for you because that night I sensed magic used in the house. Magic that wasn’t there before.” To Alexander, he said, “Much like when you would put protection on the house, as if a spell surrounded the home or someone in it.”
“What spell?” I gasped.
“One to control me,” Kipp stated.
My head whipped to him so fast it hurt my neck, and I was off the bed, standing in front of him in a split second. “What do you mean, control you?”
He looked down at his hands, studying them with a frown before lifting his gaze. “I have a feeling someone is responsible for why I’m standing here now, when I didn’t want to be.”
My eyes widened in full understanding, now comprehending Dane’s worry. If a spell existed to force someone, like Alexander, into the Netherworld, of course, a spell existed to pull a ghost out. “Someone forced you to come back?”
“I suspect so,” Kipp replied.
“But why would someone do that?” I spotted Dane near the doorway of the bathroom as he turned to pace in the other direction. “I’m already here, so what would be the motivation? If they wanted something from me, as in—use Kipp against me somehow—they could’ve already done so. Why control Kipp now? It makes no sense.”
Silence greeted me, since it appeared everyone was fresh out of answers. Frustration etched into Dane’s features and I assumed he had wondered the same question. The irritating part in this all—we still had no damn answers, only more questions.
After a long pause, I couldn’t stand the silence any longer and focused on what truly mattered. To Dane, I asked, “If someone has used a spell on Kipp, does that mean he’s in serious danger?”
Dane strode toward the spot Kipp stood in. “My first instinct is to say yes, but he’s here and not trapped somewhere. No one has confronted you and demanded anything, so I suspect he’s safe.”
“Maybe they still plan to do that,” I grumbled, knowing there had to be a good reason someone brought Kipp back. “Well, can’t he just go into the Netherworld? Sure, they can call him back again, but can’t we find a spell to keep him safe somehow?”
“Not fucking likely, Tess.”
I startled at Kipp’s low angry voice and when I looked at him, I discovered a harsh scowl on his face. “What? That makes sense. We have to beat the person to the punch, so to speak. They might want to use you against me, but it doesn’t mean I’ll allow it.”
He leaned down into my face, his frosty presence chilled my skin, and he stared at me dead-on. “If you think I’m going to leave you now, after hearing that someone has put a spell on me to somehow exploit you,” his eyes blazed, “think again.”
Part of me was ready to spit out a huge argument to get him to agree, but the other part knew better. He’d never leave me now. So, I changed tactics to find a way to keep him safe and asked Alexander, “Are you safer in Caley’s body?”
“Safer?” he repeated.
I nodded, totally confirmed this was a viable solution to our problem, even if I had no idea if Kipp would agree. “Yes, can anyone spellbind you if you are in a real body?”
“Ah, I see where you are going with his.” Alexander’s eyelids lowered in disappointment. “Sadly, I’m not any safer from magic in Caley’s body. Even if Kipp found a body to enter, a spell could still affect him. Besides, it appears that the spell is to call him forth—”
I didn’t need him to finish. “Meaning, if Kipp entered a body, the person could simply call him out.”
At Alexander’s nod, Kipp cursed, low and frustrated. “Right now, I’m safe. Don’t focus on me. I don’t feel any different at all. We’ll come to that concern if it happens—we need to keep moving forward, Tess.”