by I. T. Lucas
Magnus chuckled. “He was supposed to come, but he forgot and went grocery shopping. He sends his apologies and promises to come to visit later this afternoon if that’s okay with you.”
Ronja glanced at Bowen. “We have a lot of unpacking to do, so maybe this afternoon is not a good idea.”
“I’ll let Merlin know.” Magnus pulled out his phone. “He’s probably forgotten again, but just in case he hasn’t, I’d better text him.”
18
Lisa
Parker was cute, and he was tall, which was surprising given that his mother and sister were short. Maybe he took after his father.
Magnus was tall, but Lisa suspected that he wasn’t Ella and Parker’s dad. Both of them referred to Magnus by his first name, but they called Vivian Mom.
It was like David and Jonah had always called her father Frank.
At the thought, a sharp pain lanced through her heart. She missed him so badly.
“Let’s eat before everything gets cold.” Vivian summoned everyone to the dining table.
“Come sit next to me.” Amanda pulled out a chair.
The seat was right across from Parker, which was going to be awkward given what everyone expected him to do, but at least she wasn’t sitting right next to him.
Had he been told already?
Probably.
He seemed tense, but so was Lisa, even though she had no intention of going through with that. Maybe she should tell him so they could both relax?
But what if he hadn’t been told?
She didn’t want to be the one to do that.
“Ronja.” Amanda leaned over Lisa. “I heard that you have the most interesting talent.”
Her mother smiled sheepishly. “I’m a bit of a conspiracy buff. And my talent lends itself perfectly to my hobby.”
As the two launched into a discussion about her so-called talent, Lisa dug into the salmon dish so she wouldn’t have to look at Parker. He did the same, and they both ate in silence while the adults chatted.
“What about you, Lisa?” Amanda asked.
She looked up. “I’m sorry. What was the question?”
Amanda smiled knowingly. “Are you ready to come to my lab for testing?”
“Sure. But how are you going to test my talent?”
“I’m just going to put you through the regular battery of paranormal tests and see if you have any other hidden abilities.”
“What’s your talent?” Parker asked.
“I’m not sure that I have one, but I think I can sense Dormants and immortals.”
His eyes widened. “That’s awesome. We could really use a Dormant detector.”
Kian chuckled. “Don’t get carried away. Even if Lisa can sense Dormants, they are so rare that there is practically no chance of her encountering any.”
“Can that be a job?” Lisa asked. “Because I don’t mind sitting in coffee shops and sniffing out for Dormants while chilling with a Frappuccino and getting paid for it.”
For some reason, Parker paled. “Can you actually smell Dormants?”
“It was just an expression. I think that what I sense is the affinity between immortals and Dormants, but it’s not something that I smell or see. It’s like a sixth sense.”
He let out a breath. “Yeah, I wondered how you could sniff out anything interesting with your inferior human sense of smell.”
“That’s not a nice thing to say, Parker,” his mother admonished.
“But it’s true.” He looked at Lisa. “You’ll get what I’m saying after you transition. It takes time to get used to all the smells. At first, it’s too much, but then you learn to filter the information and only let in what you need.”
That was her opportunity to let him know that he had nothing to worry about. “I intend to stay human for a few more years. At least until I finish high school.”
He looked down at his plate. “It’s up to you, but I can tell you that I don’t miss being human. I like it better as an immortal.”
Was he disappointed? Maybe he’d been looking forward to inducing her, and she’d just crushed his hopes?
He’d get over it. There was no way she was letting him anywhere near her neck, even though he was kind of cute.
For a thirteen-year-old going on fourteen.
Yeah. Not going to happen.
“How old were you when you transitioned?”
“Twelve and a half.”
“Isn’t that too young? Why didn’t you wait until you were thirteen?”
He glanced at his mother. “It’s a long story. I didn’t want my mother or sister to have to do it before they were ready, which they weren’t at the time, but one of us needed to prove that we were all Dormants. I volunteered to go first.”
“That was brave of you.”
He shrugged. “Not really.”
“You had to fight an older guy, right?”
“Yeah, but I knew he wasn’t going to hurt me.”
“Weren’t you afraid of the transition itself?”
“A little, but Amanda told me that because I was young it would be easy.”
“Was it?”
He nodded. “Except for the pain of growing fangs and venom glands, it wasn’t a big deal.”
Lisa was curious, and she wanted to see Parker’s fangs, but asking him in front of everyone would have embarrassed him. Instead, she waved a dismissive hand. “I’m glad that I’m a girl, and I don’t have to worry about that. But it could have been cool to have fangs.”
“We’ve had two cases of female Dormants growing them after their transition.” Parker shot a glance at Kian. “Is it okay to talk about it?”
“I already know.” Lisa reached for the pitcher and filled her glass with water. “Sari told me about Mey and Jin. She thinks that they are the descendants of a different goddess.”
19
Parker
“I should check on Scarlett.” Parker brought the last round of dirty dishes to the kitchen sink.
With Lisa insisting on helping Ella, Parker had had no choice but to offer his help as well.
“Who’s Scarlett?” Lisa asked.
“My dog.” Parker wiped his hand with a dishtowel. “Do you want to meet her? My house is next door.”
Why the hell had he offered that?
The idea was to get away from Lisa, so he could stop sweating and thinking about his damn fangs elongating, not to prolong his suffering.
“I would love to.” Lisa smiled. “My parents never allowed me to have a dog, but I always wanted one. How big is she?”
“Scarlett is a golden retriever, so she’s not small, but she’s not huge either. You'll like her.”
“I’ll just tell my mom that I’m going to your house.”
His throat suddenly felt dry. “Okay.”
Hopefully, Lisa’s mother would say that she needed help unpacking, and that Lisa couldn’t go. The problem was Amanda, who was sitting right next to Ronja and had a dangerously smug expression on her beautiful face.
Please, merciful Fates, don’t let Amanda make embarrassing comments. If she winked or smirked, he was going to die.
“I’m going to see Parker’s dog,” Lisa announced.
Her mother looked up and smiled. “Have fun, dear.” She shifted her eyes back to Amanda.
Parker stifled a groan. Didn’t she need help to unpack?
“You should take Scarlett for a walk and show Lisa the village,” Magnus suggested.
That could work. He could claim to be cold and pull his hood up to hide his face. “Would you like that?”
“Sure.” Lisa walked up to Syssi and Kian. “In case you are not here when we come back, thank you again for inviting my mother and me to live in your village and giving us this amazing house.”
“You’re welcome.” Kian cracked a rare smile. “I hope you enjoy living here.”
“I’m sure I will.” She waved goodbye and headed for the door.
“Kian likes you,” Parker said as they went down
the stairs. “He usually smiles only at Syssi.”
“Really?” Lisa seemed surprised. “He smiled at my mom too.”
Parker stopped before the gate to his back yard. “Scarlett might jump on you, but don’t get scared. She just wants love.”
Lisa nodded. “I won’t. My friend Roxie has a German Shepherd who weighs a ton, and he always jumps on me. I learned to brace for impact.”
“Then you’ll have no trouble with Scarlett. She’ll also try to lick your face, so be ready for that.”
Lisa laughed. “I love doggy kisses.”
Hell. Why had that comment made his fangs twitch?
Behave! he commanded them, but as usual, they ignored him.
He would have to pretend to be angry to explain them, and that sucked. Parker wanted Lisa to like him, not think that he had anger issues.
As soon as he pushed the gate open, Scarlett barreled into him. “Calm down, girl.” He patted her head while avoiding her tongue. “I want you to meet my new friend, Lisa.”
As if she understood what he’d said, Scarlett paused her efforts to lick his face and turned to look at Lisa with a big doggy smile.
“She’s adorable.” Lisa crouched.
Letting go of him, Scarlett dropped down, trotted over to the girl, and started sniffing her.
“Can I pet her?”
“You’d better, or she’ll feel offended.”
While Lisa and Scarlett got acquainted, Parker took the leash off the hook by the gate and attached it to Scarlett’s collar. The moment the clip clicked into place, the dog bolted toward the walkway, pulling him behind her.
“She seems so excited to go for a walk.” Lisa fell in step with him. “Why do you need a leash, though? She seems friendly.”
“She is, but if I let go, she might chase a squirrel and get stuck in a bush.”
“Do you have a fence around the village?”
“We do, and it has motion-activated surveillance cameras mounted on it. It’s very safe here.”
“I bet.” Lisa stuffed her hands into her pockets. “Kian had me enrolled in the Zelda Meyer high school. Do you know if it’s any good?”
“It’s one of the best college prep schools in California. It’s pricy, but the clan covers the tuition, so you don’t need to worry about it.”
“I know. Kian told my mother.” She cast him a sidelong glance from under her pale eyelashes. “How come you are homeschooled?”
“It started because I arrived in the village in the middle of the school year.” He hesitated before telling her the real reason.
It wasn’t a secret. He just didn’t like talking about it. But it was better that she heard it from him than from someone else.
“Also, I couldn’t leave the safety of the village because my family and I needed to disappear. We were supposed to be dead.”
Her eyes widened. “Is that what the clan does to erase transitioned Dormants from human records? Are they going to do it to my mom and me?”
“I don’t think so. We were a special case. Ella was kidnapped and sold to a Russian mafia boss. The clan got her out, but before they could do that, they had to ensure my mother’s and my safety so the mobster couldn’t use us as leverage against Ella. The best way to do that was to make it look as if we died in a car accident.”
She blew out a breath. “That’s one hell of a story. Are you allowed to talk about it?”
“I am, but I don’t like doing it. It was a nightmare that I don’t want to relive. Well, most of it was. Magnus was the one bright spot.”
She nodded. “I get it. Where did your mom meet him?”
“He was sent to protect us while the clan rescued Ella. They fell in love, got married, and here we are.”
“What about your dad? Does he know that you are alive?”
“He died a long time ago when I was still a baby.”
Lisa looked down at her feet. “I’m so sorry to hear that. My father died too.”
“I heard.” He put a tentative hand on her shoulder. “It’s so damn unfair.”
She shrugged. “Nothing that I can do about it, right? He’s gone, and I have to deal because my mother needs me to be strong.”
“I don’t remember my dad, but Ella was older when it happened, and she helped our mother a lot, so I get why you feel like you need to be there for her.”
Lisa drew in a shuddering breath. “Let’s not talk about depressing stuff. Let’s talk about school. Do you still need to hide from that mobster? Is that why you can’t go?”
“It’s no longer an issue.” He waved a hand over himself. “I’ve grown a lot, and I don’t look like I used to back then. Besides, the asshole had a stroke, which he unfortunately didn’t die from, but he stopped looking for Ella. It’s probably safe for me to go to school.”
“So why didn’t you?”
“I had a study buddy that I didn’t want to leave behind.”
She frowned. “But there are no other kids your age in the village.”
“You’ve met Wonder, right?”
Lisa nodded.
“She had some catching up to do, so we studied together, and I helped her with math.”
“Are you still studying with her?”
He shook his head. “She’s doing fine on her own now.”
His stupid crush on Wonder had been the reason he’d continued being homeschooled, but since his damn fangs had started acting up, he had to stop studying with her.
“What grade are you in?”
“I’m studying on a tenth-grade level.”
“Impressive. You’re a year ahead.”
“It’s easy when I can go at my own pace.”
“Still, not bad, Parker.” Lisa really looked impressed.
He felt like he’d just grown an inch. “Thanks.”
“If you enroll in school, we can be in the same class.” She eyed him from under lowered eyelashes. “Our parents can carpool.”
He’d thought about going next year. Joining mid-semester would be awkward.
“I’ll think about it.”
“Come on, Parker.” She put a hand on his arm. “You are stuck in a village full of adults. You need to get out there and socialize.”
Even though he wore a long-sleeved shirt and a sweatshirt over it, her hand felt like a brand on his skin, and his damn fangs started itching again. “It’s not as easy for me,” he admitted. “I’m still struggling with my damn fangs. They have a mind of their own and decide to elongate whenever. It’s enough that I have a slightly upsetting thought, and they punch out.”
That should cover him in case she noticed them.
“Can I see?” She looked at his mouth.
Pressing his lips tightly together, he shook his head.
“Are you embarrassed by them? Because I think having fangs is super cool. And if anyone notices, you are allowed to thrall them to forget what they saw, right? Can you do that?”
“Magnus is teaching me, but it’s difficult to do with no humans to practice on, so I don’t even know how good or bad I am at it. I’m a good compeller, though. I can compel people to keep their silence.”
“So, if anyone sees your fangs, can you compel them to forget what they saw?”
“Not really. I can try, but it’s not going to be as good as thralling the memory away. I can compel them never to mention it, but that’s still not as good as thralling. Those who saw the fangs would act scared around me, and people would start asking them why they reacted like that, and that’s messy. Magnus would have to come in and erase their memories.”
“You can practice thralling me if you want,” she offered.
His heartbeat accelerated. “You would trust me to do that?”
She shrugged. “You seem like a nice guy, but for safety reasons, Magnus should supervise. I don’t want you to mess up my head.”
“Right.” He winced. “That’s another issue. Thralling should be limited, or it can cause damage. Compelling works differently, and it’s not as dangerous
.”
“Are you sure about that?”
“Kalugal is a master compeller, and he says it’s safer.”
“Can he make people forget things?”
“I don’t know. I didn’t think to ask him.”
“You should.”
For a long moment they continued walking in silence, but surprisingly, it wasn’t awkward. Lisa was easy to talk to, and she wasn’t judgmental.
“How come Wonder needed to catch up on basic education?” Lisa asked.
“That’s a good story.”
“Can you talk about it? Or is it a clan secret?”
“Everyone in the village knows, so it’s not a secret.”
“Then tell me.”
“Wonder is ancient. In fact, she’s older than the Clan Mother. They used to be best friends back when they were both teenagers.”
Lisa gaped. “No way.”
“And that’s not even the best part of the story.”
20
Anastasia
“It’s not a date,” Ana told her reflection in the mirror.
So why had she done her hair and put on makeup?
To boost her confidence, that’s why.
If she was going to convince the guy that Safe Haven was where she belonged, she needed to put on her attorney persona, and that woman had always been well put together and elegant.
Regrettably, she had very little to work with. Her old wardrobe had been left behind together with the life she hadn’t wanted to live, and she was limited to what members of the community were allowed to wear. White and pastels were the only approved colors, and despite the free-love culture, the outfits had to be modest and simple.
There were no divas in Safe Haven.
Well, except for Emmett.
Their leader was a showman, and his white gowns were over-the-top theatrical, but they were still simple and modest, so he wasn’t breaking his own rules. On someone else, that would have looked ridiculous, but in her opinion, Emmett pulled it off handsomely.
Sam probably didn’t think so, and he most likely found many of the community’s practices and rules objectionable. She might have a hard time convincing him why they were needed. As an outsider who hadn’t come to find himself, he wouldn’t be open to Safe Haven’s ideology, and she wasn’t going to proselytize or try to persuade him to join, only to explain why she’d chosen it.