Ungifted

by Kelly Oram

  Everyone stood there gaping at me in stunned silence. I didn’t understand what their problem was. I know I’d freaked when Andrew admitted what he’d done, but ultimately it was good news. I was relieved.

  “Don’t you get it?” I asked. “No one is trying to kill me anymore. I’m safe now. In fact, I’m even safer than I was before because I’ve been placed under the protection of Andrew’s coven. He’ll be watching out for me now, just like you guys. And, let’s face it, now that I’ve accepted everything, I’m even more of a draw to the resistance, and I’m a huge target for the council. I need all the protection I can get.”

  “Grace, I know what you’re thinking, but Andrew De La Cote isn’t on your side,” Ethan said. “If he really has developed a fixation—”

  “You don’t even know if he has!” I shouted. “I know he tried to kill me, but you don’t understand. Even if he does get a fixation, he won’t hurt me. He won’t. I seriously don’t understand how you can all stand around and condone murder!”

  Preston sighed. “You’re too kindhearted to be supernatural, Grace. Our world works differently than yours. It’s dangerous. Sometimes you have to kill your enemies.”

  I was horrified, and they all knew it.

  “Sorry, Gracie.” Cynthia tried to comfort me.

  “No! Even if that is how it works in your world, we’re not to that point yet. I haven’t even talked to him.”

  “It won’t matter,” Ethan said.

  “Look.” I tried to rub the tension out of my head. “I’ll go over there and talk to him. I’ll lay everything on the table and then tell him that if he doesn’t leave me alone, I’ll have to get the authorities involved. The supernatural authorities,” I amended when Ethan started to argue.

  “No, Grace. You can’t get the council involved. They can’t know about you. If Andrew bothers you again, then I’ll kill him. End of story.”

  “Fine!” I screamed in frustration. “You threaten him however you feel compelled. But you have to give him the chance to do the right thing first. You can’t just go slaughtering a bunch of people because one guy is kind of a creep.” I took a breath and then steeled my gaze. “Take me to Andrew’s house,” I demanded.

  Ethan crossed his arms over his chest defiantly and stared me down with a scowl on his face. There was no way he was going to give in.

  “Take me there now, Ethan, or I’ll wait until my father’s home and invite Andrew over for dinner or something. I’m pretty sure Dad won’t object, and you won’t be there to stop me.”

  Ethan spouted every curse word in the book but opened his car door for me. “Are you trying to get yourself killed?”

  “I’m trying to keep anyone from getting killed.”

  “If he even looks at you funny, I will kill him. I will kill them all.”

  Ethan looked so determined that some of his glory started to shine around him. I had no doubt his threat was real.

  “He won’t,” I promised.

  “Okay, everybody settle down,” Caleb said quickly. He threw an arm over my shoulder. “Why don’t we all discuss this seriously before anyone goes barging into a vampire lair?”

  “Yeah, Grace,” Cynthia added, shuddering. “Be reasonable.”

  “At least tell us what happened with Andrew that makes you think he might have a fixation,” Preston added.

  I sighed and sat down in the passenger seat of Ethan’s car. I let my sore leg stretch out of the door in front of me. Everyone gathered around me as though I were about to tell a good story around the campfire.

  “So what happened?” Preston asked after I’d hesitated long enough.

  I grimaced and pulled the scarf off my neck. Aside from the puncture wounds left by Andrew’s fangs, half of my neck was bruised a deep, dark purple. “Andrew bit me.”

  I didn’t realize how strong a reaction I would get from Preston and Caleb, or I would have explained first. As it was, they saw my neck and almost went ballistic. Cynthia had to grab on to them both and order them to calm down, or they would have shifted into their wolf forms right there in the parking lot.

  I quickly assured them that I was okay and started from the beginning with my dad’s campaign and how Andrew’s father got involved. Once I’d finished, there was a long, tense silence.

  Eventually Caleb broke it. “And you won’t let us kill him?” he asked incredulously. “Sorry, Gracie, but the guy’s not getting away with this.”

  “He’s not a threat.”

  “The hell he’s not!”

  “I wish I’d have known all this last night,” Preston interrupted in an impressively calm manner. “I could have brought it up at the pack meeting.”

  Cynthia saw me frown and elaborated. “The meeting of our pack’s leaders. Not the Boy Scouts,” she said, snickering. “Preston turned eighteen yesterday, so he gets to sit at the grown-up table now.”

  “Happy birthday,” I said automatically.

  Preston lost focus for a minute and gave me a smile. “Thanks. I didn’t really get to celebrate it, but it’s good to finally be treated like an adult.”

  “That’s a bummer,” I said. “Eighteen’s kind of big. You should celebrate it. I don’t have anything to do tonight, so if you want, I’ll take you to dinner. I know that’s not much of a party, but I’m sure we could find a tacky restaurant where the staff sings to you over a sparkling volcano of chocolate.”

  Preston had already started to move on with the conversation, but my answer stopped him short. In fact, it stopped everyone. Even me. I’m not sure where that came from. I’m never so brave.

  “Or not. Sorry.” Everyone was staring at me in so much shock that I wished the floor would just open up and swallow me. “I didn’t really mean anything by it. I was just saying it’s your birthday…Never mind.”

  “No!” Preston said quickly.

  “Okay.” Ouch. Remind me never to do anything like that again.

  “No, I mean yes! I was just really surprised by the offer. But yes, that sounds great. I’d love to go to dinner with you tonight, Grace. Thank you.”

  And now I was blushing again. “Okay.”

  Everyone stared at me with surprised and curious expressions—except for Caleb. He looked more like he was pouting.

  “What?” I shrugged defensively, hoping my angry expression would deter everyone from how embarrassed I was. “I get lonely when my dad’s out of town and I don’t exactly want to spend the nights home alone right now. Andrew knows my dad’s gone until Thursday. He won’t hurt me, but that doesn’t mean I want him showing up at my house while I’m by myself.”

  “My pack really needs to know about this.”

  “How much does your pack know already?” Ethan asked. “Do they know about Grace?”

  “We couldn’t exactly keep Caleb’s biting her a secret, so they pretty much know everything there. They also know all about the Supreme High Councilor and the Chosen One. One of the guardians came, like Duncan said, and told us the whole story.

  “What they don’t know is that there might be a connection between the Chosen One and Grace. The guardian who came didn’t know about Grace, and I didn’t volunteer up the fact that she and the Chosen One apparently look enough alike for the girl’s own boyfriend to make out with the wrong person.”

  He’d said this last bit very dryly, and Caleb frowned again. Preston gauged my reaction, which no doubt involved a lot of blushing, and then added, “I didn’t mention Grace’s infatuation with Russ Devereaux, either.”

  I about died.

  “So does the pack know about Russ, then?” Ethan asked. Whether because he refused to let the conversation wander, or was being nice and trying to spare me any further humiliation, I wasn’t sure. Probably the first one.

  “Not everything. Apparently Clara passed his message on to her mom, and the higher-ups in the resistance got together to discuss him. He wasn’t lying about almost being killed last week. He should be dead right now. Simone said no magic on Earth should have bee
n able to heal a wound like his.

  “Russ also wasn’t lying about being innocent. Simone said his father’s been using him as a pawn his whole life, and Russ doesn’t have a clue what he’s really capable of. She said that if he’s here without his father it’s because something went very, very wrong between them and that the resistance should use that to their advantage. She said we need him. So that’s when I told the pack about meeting him and Duncan.”

  Caleb hooted with laughter. “Oh man, I wish I could have been there to see that! Did they freak or what?”

  Preston smirked. “I thought they were all going to piss themselves when I told them Duncan offered Russ a position in the guardians, and then made me vow to protect him when he refused to return to the consulate.”

  “Do they know about Jackson?” Cynthia asked quietly.

  Preston sobered immediately. “No. They have no idea. I stayed far away from that subject. All I did was try to fill in the pieces of the story that Duncan and Russ were talking about. From what we can understand after hearing the guardian’s story, Russ and the Chosen One—”

  “Dani,” I interjected. “Russ calls her Dani.”

  “Okay,” Preston said. “Russ and Dani were raised in some tiny town with no other supernaturals except Alexander Devereaux. Russ and Dani were inseparable. Devereaux manipulated their feelings for one another in order to secure their loyalty to him. He also never told either of them that Dani was a supernatural. She was raised human, and because he didn’t want Russ to know the truth, he held back on Russ’s training. He purposefully told Russ the bare minimum about the supernatural world. He had some crazy scheme that no one ever really figured out—just that it involved Russ, Dani, and the Angel of Death. The guy’s hard core crazy, and Russ never had a clue.

  “So when the council took Dani, who was basically the love of Russ’s entire life, it messed up Devereaux’s big plan and everything hit the fan. Russ was betrayed by his father, and watched his girlfriend get tortured and brainwashed so badly that she turned her allegiance to the people who kidnapped her. She even fell in love with the guy she was forced to marry.”

  “Damn,” Caleb muttered.

  “No kidding,” Cynthia agreed.

  Even Ethan said, “Poor bastard.”

  I didn’t say anything. I couldn’t. There were no words to express what I felt right then.

  Preston gave us a minute to let it all sink in and then said, “Russ Devereaux has no family, no friends, no home, and blames all his problems on the council. He’s vulnerable, desperate, extremely powerful, and knows more about the Chosen One and the Seer than probably anyone else on the planet. The resistance is chomping at the bit to recruit him.”

  “Never gonna happen,” Ethan said. When Preston frowned, Ethan shook his head. “You were there. The guy’s got major trust issues.”

  “Rightly deserved trust issues,” Cynthia grumbled.

  “That makes it even worse,” Ethan told her. “I can’t blame him, either. If I were him, there’s no way I’d ever join either side. He’s a loose cannon. In fact, I don’t understand why Duncan Moore would trust him so implicitly after all that. Russ’s obviously got a huge chip on his shoulder and doesn’t show any kind of loyalty to anyone.”

  “And what I don’t understand,” I interrupted, “is why all of you trust this Duncan guy so much when he works for a council you despise. Seriously. ‘Yes, sir, thank you, sir, it would be an honor, sir.’ I swear, it’s like he’s freaking Superman or the Almighty.”

  “Duncan Moore is a legend,” Ethan said. Even now he was defending the guy vehemently. “He’s been with the council longer than any of the actual council members—like, a hundred and thirty years. He was offered the vampire seat on the council but chose to stay with the guardians because he prefers working with the people. He’s known for his kindness and generosity and easygoing nature. Everyone respects him. Rumor has it he’s more influential than even the Seer.”

  “And he’s a fierce fighter,” Preston added. “He’s the only vampire in the guardians because he’s one of the only daywalkers in existence. He’s been around so long that he’s been able to train with many of the greats—marital arts masters, boxers, war generals…”

  “I heard he even spent a few years with the Dalai Lama,” Cynthia said.

  “Dalai Lama nothing,” Caleb chimed in. “I heard he got to train with the Angel Michael himself.”

  “That’s a lie!” Ethan said, laughing. I was startled. It’s not often that Ethan Dunn laughs.

  “You’re such a moron, Caleb,” Cynthia agreed. “The Angel Michael? You’ll believe any bull anyone feeds you.”

  They were getting off topic now, so I tried to get serious. “Okay, so what you’re saying is, he really is a god.”

  “Probably the closest thing you could get to it,” Caleb agreed easily.

  “And so if The Duncan Moore thinks Russ is special—”

  “Then we should be kissing Russ’s butt in a major way.”

  “That’s definitely what the resistance thinks,” Preston said, sobering the mood as only Preston can do. “The resistance wants him badly, and they’ve asked the five of us to try and help them.”

  “Us?” Cynthia asked.

  Preston shrugged. “He came to us. We’re his age. We’re the best shot they’ve got at gaining his trust.”

  “Right.” Caleb snorted. “Were you paying attention at all yesterday? Russ Devereaux doesn’t trust any of us any more than he trusts the council.”

  “Ah,” Preston said. “Very true. But he’s got a major soft spot for our little Gracie.”

  All eyes were suddenly on me. “N-no he doesn’t,” I stammered. “I remind him of the girl who broke his heart. He looks at me like it causes him physical pain to be around me.”

  “Sometimes,” Preston agreed. “But other times…”

  He didn’t finish his sentence. How could he not finish that sentence? Other times what? Did Russ really see more than a shadow of his Dani when he looked at me? Could that ever even be possible? I didn’t want to get my hopes up, but my heart was already racing.

  Cynthia smiled at me in a way I recognized as her crazy-matchmaking-scheme-in-the-works look. “You’ll win him over, Gracie,” she assured me. “Don’t worry.”

  I was so embarrassed. She made it sound like I was desperate for a hookup. I snuck a glance at Preston and then regretted it. He was doing that Analyze Grace thing again. Probably wondering how I could ask him out one minute and then daydream about Russ the next. I couldn’t blame him. I was wondering that myself.

  “That is, if I ever even see him again,” I muttered. “It’s not like he left a number.”

  “Oh, you’ll see him again,” Preston said. “Trust me, Grace.”

  Preston was right. I did see Russ again. He was passed out on my couch when I got home from school that day. I stumbled through the door rather ungracefully, followed by the four people who’d become my entourage lately. They were, as was most common for them, arguing loudly. Ironically, it was my shushing everybody that woke Russ.

  “Sorry,” I said. “If you want to go back to sleep, you can crash upstairs on my bed. We’ll be quiet.”

  “Well, most of us,” Cynthia corrected. “Caleb is incapable.”

  One guess which ones had been doing most of the arguing.

  “How’d you get in here?” Ethan demanded.

  Russ sat up and groggily rubbed the sleep from his face. He’d been out long enough that his shaggy, light-brown hair was all matted down in the back. When I realized I was imagining running my hands through it I shook my head and quickly said, “Magic, I assume.”

  Russ nodded and pointed a finger at me. “What she said.”

  “Aren’t you a little concerned that he just broke in?” Caleb asked me.

  I shrugged. “I offered him my couch, didn’t I?”

  “Yeah, but still…,” Ethan said.

  I shrugged again. “Better him than Andrew.”


  The mention of Andrew De La Cote made everyone in the room except Russ fall quiet. Ethan looked angry with me, but then what else is new? “You didn’t seem so able to joke about that last night.”

  I clammed up immediately. The awkwardness between Ethan and me had been bad before, but after having spent the night together it was practically unbearable.

  “It wasn’t a joke,” I said.

  Why couldn’t I ever sound angry like he did? All I ever sounded like when I talked to him was afraid or apologetic. But I wasn’t apologizing! I hated that he was always so critical of me. As if he should have any say on how I conduct myself?

  “Only two people have ever broken into my house, so when I came in and found it was Russ instead of Andrew, I was honestly relieved to see him. Plus, I’d already extended him the invitation. You wanted to know why I wasn’t upset about him being here, well, that’s why.”

  Ethan was annoyed that I had a comeback to his scolding. He wasn’t finished with his lecture. “You don’t take your safety seriously enough.”

  Okay, that did it. I could get angry now. I was so sick of his bossy attitude. “Last night a vampire tried to drink my blood,” I said, laughing a little like a crazy person. “The way I see it, if my guardian angel can’t manage to keep me safe, then what am I, the pathetic human, supposed to do about it?”

  “Grace—”

  “No, really Ethan, please, tell me what the proper way to react to something like that is, because they don’t exactly cover it in school.”

  “Grace, stop. I wasn’t saying—”

  “No, I won’t stop! Last night I was too scared for you. Today I’m not scared enough. Nothing I do is ever good enough for you, and everything I say is wrong. I swear you would rather I just take a dive off the deep end. Maybe I’d be a little more tolerable to be around if I were strapped to a hospital bed somewhere, completely gorked out on medication.”

  Ethan let out a frustrated breath and glared at Cynthia. “I can’t talk to her,” he muttered, storming into the kitchen.