Page 31 of Wind Called

“Well, it still makes sense to contact the elders first,” she said, even as she hoped Marc wouldn’t find it awkward to be talking to his grandmother about this stuff. To Bellamy, Tricia was just one of the elders, someone she hadn’t had much need to communicate with, except at communal events like the big McAllister Thanksgiving and Christmas potlucks.

But she was Marc’s grandmother, and maybe he didn’t want her to know that things were starting to get serious with one of the McAllister witches.

If they even were serious. Yes, she and Marc had kissed the night before, and merely sitting across the table from him like this was enough to send a happy little thrill through her every time their eyes met, but it was still early days for the two of them.

However, he showed no sign of hesitation when he said, “You’re right. Maybe it would be better to talk to your clan elders before we go over their heads and speak with Angela and Connor. Besides, it seems as if Allegra Moss has been an elder for a long time, right? If anyone might know something about this, she should.”

Bellamy supposed he had a point there. Allegra had been an elder since before even Angela was born, which meant she’d been overseeing the McAllister clans’ doings for more than fifty years.

And it wouldn’t be smart to dismiss Levi, either. Although his soul inhabited a human body, he was still something just slightly other, so he might have some unique insights into the problem as well.

“We can call your grandmother after we eat,” Bellamy said. “And then go from there.”

She hoped she didn’t sound too disappointed as she spoke. Sure, this was much more important, but she’d really been looking forward to an afternoon tasting wine with Marc and pretending that the rest of the world didn’t exist.

“Sounds good,” he agreed.

The waitress came back with their food then, so the next few minutes were spent digging into their meals…and trying to pretend that their plans for the day hadn’t just been upended. Instead, they talked about other points of interest around Sedona that Marc might want to visit while he was staying here.

“What about hiking?” he asked, his tone a little too deliberately casual.

Judging by the way he’d posed the question, he was probably hoping she’d tell him she was an enthusiastic hiker…and was also steeling himself for disappointment if it turned out she was a much bigger fan of the great indoors.

“How can anyone live around here andnotwant to go hiking?” she replied, and then did her best to hold back a smile when he practically sagged with relief.

“That’s what I was hoping you would say.”

“You hike a lot in Tucson?” she asked, genuinely curious. “Isn’t it really hot?”

In between bites of breakfast burrito, he assured her that, while Tucson was pretty much a furnace in the summer, you could still squeeze in an hour or so of hiking if you started early enough — and also that you could go up to Mount Lemmon, part of the Catalina range, where temperatures were usually about twenty degrees cooler than the valley floor.

It sounded like fun…even as she privately admitted to herself that she still thought the hiking around Sedona must be a lot better.

“And even though I have to work tomorrow through Saturday,” she said. “The earliest I start is noon, which would give us plenty of time to go for a hike. Want to try the Devil’s Bridge tomorrow?”

“Sounds ominous,” Marc said with a grin.

“Well, I wouldn’t advise falling off, but the view is amazing. And with school starting up now and more people staying closer to home base, it probably won’t be too crowded.”

“Then I’d love to try it.”

There. They’d made plans for tomorrow with not a hint of awkwardness. Marc sure didn’t give the impression of anyone who planned to disappear any time soon, and Bellamy could visualize the two of them going for a hike every morning — and maybe having breakfast afterward — before she had to head into work. Since she had to be on shift until nine on Tuesday through Thursday and then until midnight on Friday and Saturday, that didn’t leave a lot of time for socializing.

When she’d been handed her schedule, she hadn’t thought much about it, knowing she didn’t have what anyone could call a social life, so it hadn’t mattered that she’d be working late every night.

Now, though, she found herself chafing at all the current restrictions on her time, which was stupid, right? Hadn’t getting hired as the assistant manager at Sedona Vines been her dream job?

Well, it had when she didn’t have anyone in her life. Now, though….

Now she would just have to suck it up. Yes, she was having fun with Marc — despite all the witchy complications that seemed to have cropped up over the past couple of days — but she couldn’t allow a good time to get in the way of her career. Soon enough, he’d be back down in Tucson, and it would be stupid for her to do anything that would jeopardize her position at the wine tasting room.

They talked about the various trails they could try, and then, once they were done with their food, Marc got out his phone so he could text Tricia and see if there was a time when they could meet with the elders.

It appeared fate had stepped in to give them a reprieve, though, because he set his cell phone down on the tabletop and frowned slightly.

“My grandmother says Allegra’s down in Phoenix for the day. I guess she has some kind of eye condition that none of the healers have been able to fix, so she has to go see a specialist once a month. But they can talk to us tomorrow.”

“It’ll have to be in the morning,” Bellamy reminded him. “I have to be at work at noon.”

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