by Amie Gibbons
And he hated me for it.
And for being Southern, blond, conservative, etc.
Thomas flinched as I took a step toward him, and his chest moved in obvious deep breaths as he looked over at AB.
She stared at him.
She’d had such a hard time looking him in the eyes after things broke open with them last year. She wasn’t great with eye contact anyway.
But now?
Now she looked mesmerized. Like she couldn’t look away even if she wanted to.
Whatever crisis was going on here, she was going to fall apart afterwards.
I knew it.
Knew her.
She’d switched into problem solving mode, and she was going to stay in that while we dealt with it, the traumatized part of her shoved down and quiet.
But as soon as this was all over?
Whatever this was.
She was going to be a mess.
And even staring into his eyes right now, she knew it.
I could feel that she saw the fallout ahead.
She just didn’t care.
And she was drunk.
“Thomas,” I said.
He nodded, looking over at me.
“You stay away from anything in my head,” he said, pointing a finger at me, voice as sharp as when he was fighting with AB. “I mean it, Ariana. I don’t want someone reading my thoughts or anything.”
“He’s scared.”
Grant’s voice in my head made me jerk.
How long had he known how to do that!
Was he getting lessons from Carvi?
My heart squeezed at the thought of the two men I missed most in the world, the two men who’d abandoned me, working together.
And leaving me out.
“Yeah,” I said silently, “got that. You picking up anything else, sir?”
“He doesn’t trust you. Doesn’t trust women. Thinks you’re going to use whatever you see in there against him.”
I shrugged. Couldn’t do much about that.
I could do my best not to invade his privacy any more than I had to though.
“Thomas,” I said, “would you feel better if Grant came with me?”
Thomas’s eyes went wide. “Can he do it? By himself?”
Grant shook his head.
No more explanation needed, apparently.
I’d almost forgotten Grant did that.
“But I can pull him in with me,” I said. “I know how to do that. So you’ll have some gender support, or whatever.”
Thomas licked his lips, nodding his head slowly. “Is there any other way to do this?”
“No,” Grant said, staring the slightly taller man down. “We’re wasting time.”
Thomas crossed his arms, glaring at Grant.
Neither broke their stare.
We so did not have time for this.
Who knew how much time we had till whatever it was struck?
Who knew if it had already or not?
I mentally shook my head.
No, I was keeping a mental eye out. Nothin’ new had happened.
Unless, of course, it was blocking my magic from seeing it.
I couldn’t call out, so who was to say it wasn’t shielding itself from me?
Grant was able to.
“Thomas,” I said, “we need to get this done, and fast. I don’t know how long we have, or if this thing’s already done whatever it came here to do. So, please?”
His hand shook as he held it out to me, and I took it.
Technically, I didn’t need the physical contact. Not anymore. But if it made him feel better, I’d do it.
I grabbed onto Grant mentally.
Easy enough, since he was already reaching out for me.
I focused on Thomas.
On the blood and magic in his veins.
On whatever it was that made him him.
Flash.
The world didn’t fuzz like it used to before I knew how to control my powers and visions would just happen, with no rhyme or reason that I could see.
Now I could put myself on the scene, seeing it play out on the first level of the astral plane, pausing and rewinding as needed, just like a movie.
The smell hit me first and I flinched, turning it off before my mind could comprehend what that was.
Bodies.
Unwashed, unhealthy bodies.
Misery, waste and death lying underneath it.
I blinked in the bright light as the stench stopped its assault on my nose, and I was able to focus on other things.
And then wished I hadn’t.
People milled around us in the bright sun, some carrying what looked like packages.
Others pushing wheelbarrows with dead bodies.
All ridiculously thin, skin almost translucent.
The starvation and dehydration obvious.
The ones walking the packages in a line went from a truck into a solid looking building.
I sobbed, covering my mouth.
I didn’t need to be psychic to know what time period in Germany we were in.
A hand fell on my shoulder and I covered it with mine, holding on with everything I had.
Suddenly very glad Grant had come along.
“Ariana,” Thomas said in a very small voice, “can we move to the important part? I don’t want to see this.”
“I’m guessin’ a grandparent was here,” I said, unable to speak above a whisper. “Guard or prisoner?”
“Both,” he said roughly. “Family legend. Grandpa was a guard. He fell in love with a gypsy brought to the camp. He saved her and-”
The vision jumped, and we were in a small bare bedroom.
Palatial compared to what the prisoners had.
Two people lay on the small bed, staring into each other’s eyes.
The woman was beautiful.
Wavy black hair that probably reached her knees when she was standing framed a face with high cheekbones, a defined chin and nose, and giant brown eyes.
The female version of the just this side of pretty Thomas.
And everything in me recoiled against her.
She practically glowed.
With a green, boiling light.
“That’s not a gypsy,” I spat. “That’s a Fae.”
The vision jumped, telling me things in clips.
The man getting the woman he loved, the woman now pregnant with his child, out of the camp.
Her magically calling out to nudge the other guards into changing their routes to check.
Them catching Thomas’s grandfather as she escaped into the woods. Her planting it in his brain that she’d tricked him, she’d never loved him, and she was the one who’d turned him in.
She’d wanted him to know he’d been betrayed.
Not in any kind of revenge for being caught in the camps; she could’ve escaped any time with her magic.
Because she enjoyed his pain.
She’d been there to feed on human pain.
The pain from the prisoners was amazing, and she’d gorged herself.
But nothing beat the sweetness of utter heartbreak born of betrayal.
It was like a giant cake to her.
The grandfather had been tortured and hung as a traitor.
Other snippets popped up.
Her leaving the baby at a church, with a note saying the father was a guard at the camp who’d died helping her escape, and it was too painful for her to keep the baby, but she wanted him to have his father’s name of Muller, and to know where he came from.
The young man, spitting image of Thomas, falling in love with the woman I recognized from a past vision as his mother, and them deliriously happy and getting married.
Her getting pregnant with Thomas.
And starting to unravel.
The magic in the baby she bore too much for her human mind to stand.
The Fae magic growing in her body driving her mad.
The damage staying, long after her son was born.
/> Her husband turning abusive and finally leaving when he couldn’t take her crazy anymore, having no clue it was he who’d driven her insane.
Blaming her for him getting so angry he’d hit her.
Blaming her for the darkness he hated in himself.
I opened my eyes in the real world, and Thomas collapsed in a heap on the floor, bawling in a way I’d never seen a grown man cry.
At least, not where others could see him.
“Thomas!” AB fell on the floor next to him, wrapping her arms around his shoulders and hugging him tight.
He leaned into her, and she stroked his hair, whispering it was going to be okay.
The part of her that cared about him taking over the second she saw him in pain.
The others looked at me after a moment of adjusting to the grown man crying on the floor.
“Fae,” I said, trying to keep the bile out of my tone. “He’s a quarter Fae. His grandma was some kind that fed off pain.”
If AB wasn’t in Florence Nightingale mode, and the side of her that hated him had been in the driver’s seat, she would’ve said something snarky like, “That’s explains a lot.”
Or at least thought it.
But right now, all she cared about was comforting him.
Cuz he was in pain.
And she couldn’t stand to see him like that, just as much as she couldn’t stand the pain he’d caused her.
What a mess.
For all we knew, Thomas’s Fae powers getting into AB’s system were what made her nuts around him in the first place, and what made her crazy about him even while she was traumatized and hated him at the same time.
Not that the trauma from a guy she’d liked and lost it to wouldn’t have been enough to cause that by itself.
“It was me,” he sobbed. “My mom. It was me.”
“I don’t understand,” AB whispered, stroking his back. “Thomas, I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“My mom went crazy because she was pregnant with me,” he said through the tears. “Because I’m magic, and she couldn’t take it. She wasn’t just nuts. It was because of me. My magic in her drove her insane when she was pregnant with me.”
AB held him tighter. “No, no, that’s not your fault. You were a baby. That’s like blaming a baby for the mom having postpartum depression. If anything, this was your dad’s fault.”
She pulled a little packet of tissues outta her purse and handed them to him, keeping one arm around him.
Thomas wiped his eyes and blew his nose, then shook his head. “He didn’t know he was magic. He was like me. But…”
“But he was half Fae,” I said softly. “And your mom was a null.”
I paused for a beat, then said, “Just like AB.”
Thomas jerked away from AB, staring up at me from the floor. “You mean… I…?”
I held up my hands. “I don’t know. I don’t know how much of… er, you in her, sorry guys, would make her batty, but it could explain a lot.”
“I’m not batty!” AB said, and I flinched.
Right. Bad wording.
“I’m traumatized,” AB snapped.
“You’re hugging and handing tissues to the guy who traumatized you,” I said, propping my hands on my hips and staring her down.
She glared at me, rubbing Thomas’s arm like she was daring me to comment.
“We’re getting off topic,” Grant said coolly as Thomas shrugged AB off and stood up.
She stood, staying right next to him.
“Right,” I said. “It’s not really relevant right now. What is relevant is Thomas is a forth Fae. Which means whatever did this is one. Which means we are all in very big trouble. If it’s a Fae, it’s up to something seriously nasty.”
“Well that’s bigoted of you,” a voice said.
Chapter three
She was tall, around five-eight, with brown eyes behind black, square glasses that looked like they were more for show than for prescription.
She had stick straight blond hair to her shoulders, a heart shaped face, and was a few pounds over what I’d consider attractive, but the silky silver dress she wore hid it well.
She had money, based on her tasteful four-inch pink Jimmy Choo’s and matching purse, Prada, if I had to guess.
And she had power.
Grant had his gun out and on her before the second it’d taken me to assess her had passed, and AB was on her feet, pulling her little push knife outta her purse a moment later.
Just following Grant’s lead, cuz she had no clue what this woman was.
Or why she was such a danger.
“Hey, now,” the woman said, holding her hands up, eyes wide. “I’m not the bad guy.”
“So you’re not the one who put the spell over this place?” I asked, resisting the urge to pull up my skirt to get to the gun resting against my thigh, carefully disguised by layers of loose, thick cloth.
“No, I am,” she said, voice shaking, “but I swear, I just want your help.”
“Why knock them out?” Grant asked.
At the same time, I said, “With what?”
I looked at him, but he kept his eyes on the Fae.
“I…” She looked between us, licking her lips. “Yes, I’m half Fae, but I’m not evil or anything. I… I need your help catching someone evil.”
She stared me in the eyes.
And my heart squeezed as pain flashed through her.
Pain no one else could see.
The same kind AB and I had both suffered from.
Crap.
“Answer. The. Question,” Grant said, slow and clipped.
“I…” She looked at him then back at me. “I need your help.”
“Okay,” I said, keeping my voice soft. “But for me to help you, you’ve gotta tell us what you did to these people, and why.”
“Can… can we talk in private, please?” she asked.
“No,” Grant said before I could say anything.
Her eyes darted as she lowered her hands, wrapping her arms around herself.
“Grant,” I said mentally.
“Not happening, Ryder,” he said.
I sighed.
“What’s your name, honey?” I asked out loud.
“Emily,” she said, still holding herself. “Emily McMill. I really don’t want to talk about this in mixed company, but I need your help catching someone who… hurt me.”
My heart broke for her.
Because I knew what she meant.
“You still haven’t answered my question,” Grant growled, gun still leveled on the girl.
She flinched, and I nodded.
He had a point.
“Emily,” I said, “why did you knock everyone out?”
“I…” She licked her lips again. “I was afraid you wouldn’t help. You have to understand, I’ve done my research.” Her voice picked up speed, the same way mine did when I was excited or upset. “I know you hate Fae. I wanted to make sure you’d help. I didn’t hurt anyone though. I didn’t want to hurt anyone. And I’ll take them right out of it, soon as you agree to help me.”
“You did this to extort her?” Kat jumped in, making me jerk. “And you expect her to help after that?”
“Yeah, kidnaping doesn’t make for the best first impression,” AB said.
“Not extortion, or kidnaping!” Emily said, voice rising. “A trade. Just in case. Please.” She looked me in the eyes. “Please. I’m desperate. I don’t know where else to turn.”
She burst into tears, shaking so hard I half expected her to shatter.
Thomas shrugged off his suit jacket and walked up to her, putting it around her shoulders.
She looked up with tear-filled eyes and gave him a small smile.
He rubbed her arms through the cloth, then backed up, holding his hand out.
“Thomas,” he said.
“Emily.” She held the jacket in place with one hand and shook his with the other.
Shards of jealousy-ed
ged panic shot into my side, and it took everything in me not to look over at AB as she watched the exchange.
“Please, please don’t lose it now,” I mentally pleaded with her.
But of course she didn’t hear me.
The mental speech thing didn’t work on nulls.
Or at least, I didn’t know how to do it. The only one I knew who could was Carvi.
Grant cleared his throat, and Thomas turned to look at him.
Grant still had his gun on Emily, but he’d had to walk around a few steps to keep the gun trained on Emily and not Thomas.
Thomas had just walked in front of a gun?
How stupid was he?
He was a gun guy too, so he should’ve known better, but for some reason he’d put himself in the line of fire.
Literally?
That didn’t make sense.
Dan and Jet both had their guns out too, but pointing down at the ground.
Ready to come up if the stuff hit the fan, but not ready to kill.
But Grant was.
Which said something in and of itself.
This girl wasn’t an obvious threat, and she looked small and vulnerable wrapped in Thomas’s big jacket.
But Grant wasn’t takin’ his gun off her for a second.
And despite everything that’d happened between us, I trusted Grant.
“You put a spell over this place to knock everyone out but me,” I said. “And you did it just in case I wouldn’t take a case? Wouldn’t it make more sense to ask me first, and then go to extortion?” I asked, keeping my voice light and gentle.
“You don’t understand,” she said, sounding even more desperate. “I was… this man… he can’t get away with this. He can’t.”
“With what?” AB asked.
I looked over, and AB’s eyes were wide and searching the air.
She’d had so much to drink, if we didn’t get some water and food in her soon, she was gonna be sick.
And right now, she was happy about that, because it kept the pain she’d be feeling right now otherwise squelched down tight.
“I…” Emily squeaked. “He…”
She burst into tears.
Thomas looked around, rushing over to the receptionist’s area and grabbing the desk chair.
He rolled it over and held it out for her.
She sank into it, still sobbing, holding the jacket tight around her.
“It’s okay,” Thomas said, “take your time.”
“This would be easier without him pointing a gun at me,” she said with a gulp. “But really, I don’t even care if he shoots me. It’d be easier than living right now.”