Blood Witch_ Book Three - Cate Tiernan [42]
All right, I finally said to myself. I’m not hurt.
When I lifted my head, I thought I saw the briefest flash of two red taillights, vanishing into the night.
My eyes narrowed. So . . . it had been a real car after all.
With a trembling sigh I turned off the engine. Then I threw open the door and hoisted myself out of the driver’s seat—no easy feat, considering Das Boot was skewed at a crazy angle. It was hard to concentrate, but I called on my magesight and peered down the road in the direction that the car had disappeared. All I saw, though, were trees, sleeping birds, the faint glow of living nocturnal creatures.
The car was gone.
I leaned against my door, breathing hard, my fists clenched inside my pockets. Even though I was pretty sure those lights hadn’t been magickal, the fear didn’t subside. Somebody had run me off the road. Das Boot was hopelessly lodged in the ditch. A lump formed in my throat. I was on the verge of bursting into tears, shaking like a leaf. What was going on? I remembered the runes I had drawn on the dash right before the wreck, and now I redrew them in the chill air around me. Eolh, Ur, Rad. The brisk movement helped calm me slightly, at least enough for me to try to figure out what to do.
Actually, there was pretty much only one option. I had to walk the rest of the way home. I didn’t have a cell phone, so I couldn’t call anyone for help. And I didn’t exactly feel like waiting around in the darkness on this frozen, lonely road all by myself.
Heaving open the driver’s door again, I fished inside for my backpack and carefully locked Das Boot. I shook my head. It was going to be a long, miserable march to my house. But as I heaved the backpack across my shoulder, a flash of dim light illuminated the snowflakes around me, and I heard the faint rumble of a motor. I turned to see a car slowly approaching ... from the same direction the lights had vanished.
The flash of relief I’d briefly felt at the possibility of being rescued evaporated as the car rolled to a stop, not fifteen feet from where I stood. The headlights weren’t nearly as bright, but for all I knew, this was the same car. Maybe the person driving had decided to turn around and finish me off, or—
My insides clenched. The license plate, the grating of the tan BMW . . . I recognized it even before the passenger window unrolled. It was Bree’s car.
Bree looked across from the driver’s seat, her eyes outlined in black, her skin pale and perfect. We regarded each other silently for a few moments. I hoped I didn’t look as freaked out and disheveled as I felt. I wanted to radiate strength.
“What happened, Morgan?” she asked.
I opened my mouth, then closed it. My eyes narrowed as a horrible thought struck me. Could Bree have been the one who’d run me into the ditch?
It was possible. There were no other cars on the road. She could have made a U-turn up ahead and come back to see what had happened to me. But . . . Bree? Hurt me?
Remember what you heard in the bathroom, a voice inside chimed. She gave your hair to a witch. Remember.
Maybe things had changed permanently. Maybe Bree no longer cared about me at all. Or maybe Sky Eventide had put her up to this—as a stunt to scare me, the same way that Sky had forced her to turn over a lock of my hair. A thousand thoughts pounded against my skull, aching to be let out, to be heard: Oh God, Bree, don’t let them fool you! I’m worried about you. I miss you. You’re being so stupid. I’m sorry. I need to talk to you. Don’t you know what’s happened to me? I’m adopted. I’m a blood witch. I’m Woodbane. I’m sorry about Cal—
“Morgan?” she prodded, her brow furrowed.
I cleared my throat. “I hit a patch of ice,” I said. I gestured unnecessarily to Das Boot.
“Are you okay?” she asked stiffly. “Did you hurt yourself?”
I shook my head. “I’m fine.”
She blinked. “Do you want a ride home?”
I took a deep breath but shook my head again. I couldn’t get into her car. Not when she might have been the one who had run me off the road in the first place. Even though