“Stop!” I cried to put an end to it as she accused me of being anything like her. “I don't want to hear your lies! I just want to know why the hell a fae is standing here, masquerading as the mother who left me when I was little!”
I recalled the ax I’d held when I’d entered and plucked it from its resting place. I was determined to make the lies stop and force the fae liar to tell me the truth.
After all, I could be damn persuasive when I wanted to be, especially when I was interrogating a creature I cared little about. The situation was no different than Ben and his doppelganger. We’d ended that farce by destroying the fae threat, and I could do it just as easily now.
She wasn’t my mother; she was just trying to hurt me, trying to get into my head and fuck with my mind.
Damn tricksters! It’s what they do!
Maybe she knows what happened to Mom! My heart lifted as I considered the facts. Maybe she didn’t leave—maybe she was taken, just like Lou.
Hope tasted acrid on my tongue.
I would make her pay dearly for her choice and force the truth from her lips. I raised the ax and pointed at the imposter. “I know all about doppelgangers. Sometimes they don’t know where their doubles are kept, but sometimes they do. I’ll ask you one time, and one time only. Where is my mother?”
She had the decency to look afraid before speaking. “I know it is hard for you to understand, but I am your mother.”
I can’t be fae. I am not some freak! I’m human!
Evie’s fingers came to rest on my shoulder, and the heat that usually calmed the storm inside me whipped it into a frenzy instead. That word freak was Evie’s kryptonite, and I’d bandied it around in my mind as if it was meaningless. The guilt added new sharp edges to the psychological daggers torturing my heart, and I shook loose of her hold so I didn’t have to feel any of it.
Instead of allowing me to fight the battle with the fae impostor on my own, Evie stepped between us, facing me as if I was the enemy in the room. “Clay, she smells of magnolias, crabapples, and Kwanzan cherry.”
“So?” Why would any of that matter to me? I was almost drawn in by the compassion shining in Evie’s eyes, but she had allowed these creatures into our home, and I couldn’t bend knowing that she betrayed me.
“Magnolias,” she said, her voice low and quiet but imparting the force of the words stronger than if she’d shouted at the top of her voice. The word compelled me back to a time and place so far removed from where we were, to a pair of teenaged would-be sweethearts on their first attempt at a date. A day that had started with magnolias but ended in disaster.
I’d burned with rage then too. The thought that Evie had kept the truth hidden from me, that she’d deliberately concealed her true nature in a bid to capture my interest, had been foremost in my mind and made me lash out with terrible words.
I met her eyes now and wanted to apologize for the hatred I’d spewed at her that day—even though I’d tried to make it up to her ever since. My love for her rushed back into my conscience, and I longed to wrap her in my arms and apologize for all of the hell we’d been through. In the instant my focus was on the past rather than the threat in front of me, Evie gripped the ax and pulled it from my hold.
“There are so many mistakes I have made in my life,” the fae posing as my mother said. Her words were clearly designed to induce guilt, to make me stop and listen, but I refused to listen any more. “But allowing the distance between myself and my precious fledglings is the one I regret the most.”
“Shut up!” I cried. Desperation built in me to reach for the ax and use it to silence the words that hurt so badly. Yet, in my heart something else brewed. Something I refused to allow to take root and seep into my being, but which I was helpless to stop. Understanding. “You don’t get to talk to me.”
“You have to believe me,” the imposter pleaded.
“My mother is not fae.” It’s impossible.
Isn’t it?
Only, Evie had seemed to accept it already. She’d stepped between us so that I wouldn’t hurt the woman. With an ease that I would have thought impossible, Evie had taken this fae at her word.
I moved my gaze back to the woman I loved. The concern she had for me seemed real, but maybe she was lying to me too. I became dizzy as thoughts churned like a whirlpool in my mind.
A severe case of vertigo hit me, and I turned my back on everything. I was unable to take the compassion Evie was trying to offer or the guilt-ridden look of the creature who claimed to be my mom a moment longer. Even as she spoke again, I pushed the thoughts out of my mind as the storm of confusion lashed at me again. Once more, understanding—acceptance even—tried to anchor itself in my body even though I refused to allow it harbor.
If she’s telling the truth, what does that mean? What am I?
One question burned deeper than any other—a question that had haunted me since I was a child, one which I’d never been able to get the answer to. A question I wasn’t sure I had the courage to ask, but was already burning my tongue.
My most painful question raced from the far corners of my mind and was ready on my lips as I spun around to face the creature. “If you really are my mom, then I have one question for you. Just one. Why? Why did you leave us? Why did you abandon your kids?”
Once it was out in the open, I wanted to draw it back again. The words gave the imposter power over me and the knowledge that she was inflicting hurt. I’d given a creature the deadliest weapon they could possess—my pain and doubt.
“I . . . I did not leave.”
“Liar!” The word ripped from my lips, the explosive result of so many lies.
“I had no other choice. Once Troy found out what I was, he stole you away from me. I tried to find you, but he had hidden you all too well. I think that even if I had somehow taken you back, he would have hunted you three to the ends of the Earth. He loved you all so much.
“By the time I was finally able to find you, it was too late. You had already been poisoned against our kind.”
“Bullshit!” Tears burned in my eyes, but I wouldn’t give her the satisfaction of watching them fall. I turned my back to her and Evie, refusing to look at the pain and compassion etched on their faces.
I held it together for as long as I could as she spoke, but it quickly became too much. I wanted to curl into a ball and shut the world out.
The days after she’d left played over in my mind—screaming at Dad to bring Mom home, begging him to find her. Then, I was seven, putting on a brave face and pretending that I didn’t care when no one was there to comfort me after I’d smashed my chin against the vanity and had to clean both the wound and the mess by myself so that I wouldn’t get in trouble. Then, I had just turned seventeen and had genuine feelings for the first time ever—all over a certain new redheaded beauty at school—and had no one I could talk to about it.
Had the fae court of Evie’s ex-lover taken my mother away and denied me those things and so much more?
Evie and the fae spoke some more, but I worked on blocking it out. Then something the imposter said broke through the noise of my confused thoughts. “I am very concerned for her welfare. I know how much Louise suffered at their hands—”
I refused to acknowledge more lies. “No, you did that! Your kind did that!”
Stories from my childhood, words whispered by Lou in the darkness as she talked about what they’d done, all struck me with the force of a bullet through the heart. I fell to my knees as memory after memory assaulted me.
“They cut her,” I murmured, reminding myself of all the things they’d done. “They sliced open her skin. They cut into her. Day after day. She was a fucking child. She didn’t deserve it. She didn’t deserve any of it.”
The door clicked shut, and I turned to see the imposter had gone. A second later, Evie’s warmth surrounded me. I didn’t want it. I wanted clarity not compassion, but being near her was too special to push her away again. She wanted to comfort me, and I couldn�
�t deny her that.
When she asked if I wanted to talk about it, I knew I didn’t. I wasn’t sure of anything at that moment, except one thing. I wanted to feel something else, anything other than this fucked-up pain brought on by the damn fae. I needed to lose myself inside of Evie’s heat and forget all about our visitors and the bullshit that had followed.
Pushing all hate and doubt to the back of my mind, I tried to get lost in her. I threaded my hands into her hair, guiding her closer as I tasted her lips. Ready for more, longing for the oblivion that only she’d been able to deliver to me, I carried her across to our makeshift bed and pushed her to the mattress. In an instant, I had her naked beneath me. The feeling of sliding into her drove all the issues out of my mind, and I was able to just concentrate on the deliciousness of having her pinned beneath me.
My hands explored her body as my mouth tasted her skin. I was relentless and punishing, driving harder and harder to keep everything at bay. The heat that encapsulated me felt too good to stop, and I needed to feel good again.
To feel anything again that wasn’t pain or confusion.
By the time I collapsed on top of her, panting and exhausted, I’d almost forgotten about the visit. As soon as it all began to flood back into my memory, Evie was there waiting to accept me into her arms. We laid that way for at least an hour—neither of us talking, both of us lost in thought—before my mind had finally settled enough that I could risk voicing my thoughts without spewing hatred. Instead of words, she offered me what I needed: space to process the impossible notion that the information might be correct.
“What are you thinking about?” I asked her oncethe thoughts racing in my own mind became too much to bear.
She twisted her head so that her lilac irises, filled with pity and pain, with understanding and fear, met my gaze. “I’m just trying to remember anything that I learned from the fae that might help us in this situation.”
“Situation? That’s an interesting way of putting it.” I wondered whether my angry words earlier had hurt her. If they had, it wasn’t intentional. At least, not once I’d calmed enough to see the reality that she hadn’t known anything about the guise of our visitor. Whatever the imposter’s plan was, Evie hadn’t been involved in it. Or at least, I was willing to believe that.
“Sorry, I couldn’t think of a better word.”
“You believe her, don’t you?” It was barely a question; the way she looked at me confirmed it long before her words ever did.
“I do.”
As the conversation continued, one thing echoed in my mind. She believed Fiona.
Should I?
If I did believe her, if I could find some way to reconcile the fae with the mom I’d lost, what did that mean? What did it make me?
For the rest of the night, while Evie and I moved through our normal routine, my mind raced. It bounced between doubt and rage, anger and acceptance.
One second it made perfect sense. Everything about Fiona just fit with my memories. The next, it seemed crazy. After all, they were the memories of a toddler, how reliable were they really? And how easy would it have been for a fae doppelganger to duplicate it. Ben’s doppelganger had been an almost perfect replica; why would Mom’s be any different?
Despite my own spinning thoughts, I glanced at Evie as she prepared our meal and wondered how she felt about the return of her fae ex.
Is she happy to see him again? Some part of me even wondered whether she regretted leaving him to return to me. After everything that we’d been through and my harsh words earlier, I wouldn’t have blamed her if she did.
Evie seemed to understand when these types of thoughts crossed my mind and would brush her fingers over the back of my hand, run her fingers through my hair, or wrap her arms around me.
“You really think I should talk to her?” I asked as I placed a small portion of the meat remaining from the last time we’d gone hunting into the frying pan.
“It’s your choice,” she said after a thoughtful moment. “If it’s worth anything to you, I really do believe her.”
“Why?” Even though I’d asked it before, I still couldn’t understand how Evie had so much faith that what the fae had said was the truth. Was I just so blinded by prejudice that I couldn’t see it?
“There are just too many things that make more sense if it’s true.”
“You honestly believe that I could be part . . . fae?” I could barely force the poisonous word through my lips. They’d done so much. Hurt so much. How could any part of me be that vile?
“I don’t think she has a reason to lie.”
“I just don’t believe it,” I said. The justifications for why it had to be a lie kept spinning through my head, and I tried to plead my case. “I can’t. I mean just the idea of Dad being with a fae is ridiculous. He wouldn't be that irresponsible. That stupid! He’s always warned me how dangerous they can be.”
Despite the situation, Evie’s face held a trace of amusement when she said, “Just like you knew how dangerous phoenixes are?”
“That’s different.” I couldn’t believe she would even compare the two. She was good. Her kind were protectors. The sunbird wasn’t evil, even if most of the Rain still believed she was.
“How?”
I didn’t understand how she didn’t see it was different. Even if I’d been wrong about Evie, I was weaker than Dad. That had been proven time and time again. I wasn’t cut out for a life of killing the way he was. Scrubbing my face with my hands, I blew out a frustrated breath. “It just is.”
She reached for my hand and drew it to her face to offer me comfort. “If it’s true, it doesn’t change who you are.”
“No, just what I am.” It changed everything I believed in. Everything I knew to be true. “It makes me a freak.”
The instant the word left my mouth, I wanted to reel it back in. It had slipped from me without thinking, but it was a word that had so much power to hurt Evie.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I wasn’t thinking.”
After a beat, where it looked like she was trying to pack away the hurt the word had caused her, she squeezed my hand.
“You know it doesn’t change how I feel about you.”
Her compassion was killing me. The first time we’d been through something similar—the day we’d shared our first kiss and the sunbird had ignited Evie’s blood—I’d burned with rage and had hurled horrible insults at her.
Now that the tables were reversed, she just took in all in her stride. Despite using the one word that could hurt her, she’d chosen to ignore it and offered me her love in return. It was just in her nature to take it in stride, but there was more than that. Her love for me made me feel like shit.
Evie went on to remind me that there were bigger things than me in the mix. The fae’s daughter had been kidnapped by the Rain. It wasn’t hard to imagine the sort of treatment she’d be getting. What could I do to help her though? I hadn’t stepped foot in Bayview, the New York headquarters, in years. It wasn’t like I could waltz in and stage a rescue attempt.
Even if I could, why should I? If the fae girl had been captured, she must have done something to prompt it.
Except, that wasn’t always the case. Evie would have been dragged there just because of the sunbird within her. Was it so hard to believe that an innocent fae could have been dragged there? Was there even such a thing as an innocent fae?
Even long after I’d settled in bed, I couldn’t figure out whether I should have faith in Evie’s belief in Fiona, or if I should believe in my father’s commitment to the Rain. I might’ve been foolish enough to fall in love with someone who wasn’t human, but I couldn’t see Dad making the same mistake.
Could I?
So much that had happened between us in the past few years made me unwilling to trust him, but was it really possible for him to be capable of that ultimate betrayal. If it was true, if I was part-fae, he’d spent the better part of my life convincing me to hate that piece of myself.
For me.
I held her tightly and allowed her gentle voice and soft words to send me into a blissful sleep.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
MY MOTHER STOOD over me, blonde curls framing her face. A soft blue light radiated around her; almost seeming to come from within her. Eyes of the brightest blue—the color of the sky on a cloudless day—were darkened by sorrow as she looked down on me.
A profound sadness settled over the moment.
I reached out for her, but she turned away.
Don’t go! The words were on my lips, but what came out instead was a sobbing cry and a strangled, “Momma.”
“Clay, baby,” she murmured, “it’ll all be better tomorrow. I promise.”
I reached out for her, but I was stopped by white bars blocking my way. She was abandoning me.
Again.
A gasp of air was drawn from my lips, and I stretched out again.
I fell forward and rolled onto my stomach. The movement caused me to awaken and the dream, or maybe memory, faded almost instantly. All that remained was the lingering image of Mom’s sad eyes and the ache in my chest at the thought of her giving up on her family—on me. I reached for Evie, meaning to guide her body closer to me, knowing that her presence would be able to calm me. Instead, I found only an empty space.
The low fire burning in the fireplace gave just enough light to fill the small space and confirm I was alone. Memories of waking to gunshots and screaming months earlier haunted me, and my heart began to race in my chest as I recalled her panic earlier in the day. The potential return of her supernatural stalker had been overshadowed by the revelations, but waking alone had put it firmly back in my mind.
I stood and wrapped the blanket around myself, feeling too desperate to find Evie to even get dressed. Rushing to the door, I only stopped when I spotted the shadows of Evie and her fae friend, Aiden, through the window. The two of them were sitting on the stairs, completely unaware of my presence—and utterly ignorant of my aching chest, racing heart, and lingering concerns.
Court the Fire (Son of Rain #3) Page 15