“She’s out in the open.” Daisy nodded toward the dogs. “They won’t let anything happen.”
Radar barked and pawed at the door, Ragnar right beside him.
Daisy pulled on the doorknob.
Gavin pivoted and rotated backward, behind the door as it swung open. Footfalls moved across the threshold. The dogs backed off, sitting at attention at either side of Daisy, and were far enough back to be within Gavin’s line of sight. They both cocked their heads, both listening as if they, too, were unsure.
Daisy stood ramrod straight, her face impassive, with the shotgun in her hand. Gavin couldn’t see the other woman. All he saw was that Daisy hadn’t yet reacted to her might-be-mother.
Unintelligible words moved through the door. Clothes rustled and a delicate hand appeared. It glided through the air in front of Daisy and, from Gavin’s point of view behind the door, looked like a disembodied set of fingers reaching out to touch the one person who had, so far, tried to help Gavin understand what was happening around him.
He shouldn’t interfere. Shouldn’t place himself between two Shifters, one whose abilities he’d seen in action, and one who might be able to do anything. But his intuition got the best of him.
Gavin reached for the doorknob to pull back the door. Maybe the woman had the same ability as the enthraller who used the corgi. If Daisy was too caught up in the possibilities of the moment she might not notice.
She might not want to notice. If it were Gavin standing in front of his long-lost mother, he wouldn’t want the moment to burst wide open, either.
Just as his fingers grazed the handle, the door swung fast on its hinges and smacked Gavin in the face. He staggered backward into the wall, his hands coming up to block the door if it swung again, but he doubted it would do any good.
A tiny woman with a messy, curly black ponytail and skin both darker and warmer than Daisy’s looked at Gavin with death in her deep brown eyes.
“Who are you?” She moved as fast as Daisy. So fast she was between them before Gavin inhaled again. “Why are you near my daughter?”
“Mom! He’s a friend!” Daisy yelled. Enough light fell onto her face that Gavin was able to read the clear meaning on her lips.
He heard the Oh my God, Mom, how could you! tone to her voice. This moment mirrored a moment in their past. The woman had tried to stand between Daisy and a man—or men—before, and this action confirmed for Daisy that this woman was, in fact, her mother.
Because only moms did shit like that.
Radar and Ragnar barked.
Daisy’s mother squinted, but she held out her hand. “Cecilia Reynolds.” She continued to stare up at Gavin. “Who are you?”
Daisy said something Gavin did not hear. Cecilia, though, understood, because her face changed from the horizontal scrunched-up appearance of someone pinching lips to the rounded vertical wonder of someone caught off guard. “You’re a normal?”
“Yes.” He didn’t say anything about his aids and prayed that Daisy hadn’t either.
She watched him over her mother’s shoulder, her face full of both uncertainty and hope.
Overwhelmed burst back into Gavin’s mind. Overwhelmed and helpless, both peppered with a light dusting of used. No one who inhabited the “special abilities” spy-world gave a damn about him or any of the other regular people walking around. Why should they? Enthrall them and get them out of the way. Or just take a random bite out of their flesh.
Cecilia turned her back to Gavin. “He can’t…” He didn’t catch any more of her words.
But he knew they weren’t good.
Chapter Twelve
After fifteen minutes of hugs and crying and Cecilia touching Daisy’s face and mumbling in hushed tones Gavin could not understand, it became clear that she either was who she said she was, or she was an exceptionally talented morpher.
Daisy shook her head and said no one was good enough to mimic her mother with the level of precision needed to fool Daisy’s bloodhound nose. But Gavin wondered.
All the weirdness made him punchy. Someone Daisy said was a Fate had hacked his phone and another person with the ability to tell him to die had attacked them outside the Small Animal Hospital and he was supposed to believe “exceptionally talented morphers” didn’t exist?
He did, at least, sign Don’t talk about my aids without Cecilia seeing. And Don’t talk about Rysa. Why, he didn’t consciously know. But his gut did a little wiggle and following his instincts seemed wise.
Maybe it had to do with what the “angel Fate” had texted after Rysa vanished. The whole Stay silent or they will see you seemed to apply to this situation, as well.
Or maybe the aids were filling his brain with subtle, unconscious cues. The stuff that all the studies he’d read for his psych course said were the basis of gut feelings and intuition. The thought calmed him somewhat, showing that science could, and had, explained some of the weird shit around him.
The dogs didn’t quite seem to believe Cecilia, either. They watched her carefully, all three lined up next to Daisy with their ears perked and their bodies on high alert. Cecilia waved away their reactions as normal and said she “respected animals” too much to enthrall them. But, again, Gavin wondered.
Cecilia dropped onto one of the stools next to the island. Turned out she’d left behind an important artifact with a Shifter group called “the Seraphim” when “the shit hit the fan.” Now she needed Daisy’s help to get it back.
“Why?” Gavin sat on the stool in front of his now stone-cold eggs and avocado dinner. His stomach growled and he absently pushed his food around the plate with his fork.
Daisy stopped digging in her cupboard when he asked. She stood up straight, her face stern, and looked between him and the woman who might not be Cecilia Reynolds.
Her might-not-be-mom grabbed a banana from the fruit bowl and slowly peeled it down one side. “Because, Gavin—that is your name, correct?” She made a show of angling her body so he could read her lips.
“Yes.” Don’t wear it out flitted through Gavin’s head and he knew he smirked, which probably wasn’t the best move.
Cecilia smirked back at him. “Because Fates who want to harm my daughter have become… active again. And the… item … I left behind will protect her.” Dark, dark eyes glared at Gavin over the smirk. Eyes full of a lifetime’s worth of fuck you as if this woman was, on some level, daring him to interfere.
And yet the constant low hum of feminine vulnerability still permeated her voice.
Why should he take on killer Fates? The one telling him to stay silent was bad enough. Though the stay silent message seemed, at the moment at least, to be good and helpful.
“If this item is as valuable as you say it is, why did you leave it behind?” Asking questions wasn’t the same as interfering. Nor was it giving out information.
“I originally ran with the item because it distracts Fates. I drew them away from Daisy.” Cecilia looked a little too proud of herself. “The Seraphim offered protection. They guarded me while I regained my strength.”
Gavin wanted to make sure he’d picked up at least some of their conversation correctly. “But you said that they’re now in chaos.”
“An operation fell apart. The players involved could not pivot toward a more gainful option.” Cecilia sniffed. “Or so the chatter indicates. They’re paying the price.” She sniffed again.
“And now they are no longer strong enough to guard you from these Fates, so you sought out your daughter. Whom you haven’t contacted in nine years. Because you need her help.” Fates or no Fates, Gavin did not like how Daisy’s mother responded to difficult situations.
First she yanked Daisy out of Australia and dropped her into San Diego. Then she ran off and abandoned Daisy when these bad Fates first appeared. Now she showed up with some story about how her hiding wasn’t going to help anymore and that Daisy needed the item that attracted them in the first place.
Cecilia waved her hand at Gavin’s face
as she turned toward Daisy. “He’s a normal…”
Gavin didn’t catch any more of what she said, but he could guess: “What does he know?” Which was most likely followed by a “We need to go now.”
But he did pick up one tidbit he suspected Cecilia had not meant for him to hear: “… Rushmore…”
Her voice buzzed through the kitchen, a low hum of need that seemed to Gavin to be genuine. But genuine need did not necessarily mean genuine intentions. The underlying drive to get Daisy out of her house felt hidden.
Which was, he realized, what drove his distrust.
But perhaps for the few hours he’d had superhero tech in his ears he’d been overestimating what he could do. Why did he think he understood the small emotional hints in a person’s voice? Why did he feel as if little noises allowed him to build a mental picture of a space?
What, exactly, was his brain doing with all this new information? Was his intuition truly coming from small, still clues or was he making shit up?
How the hell could he possibly be correctly interpreting what he heard? It was as if fate had tuned the software for his…
Shit, he thought. Fates. Because Fates did this to him, which meant that someone who could see the future thought he had a part to play.
Daisy told him to “stay off their radar.” Too late for that, he thought.
So what piece on the chess board was Gavin? A pawn, for sure. Everyone was a pawn. But maybe he could be a knight. As long as Cecilia wasn’t a bishop.
The dogs padded over, all looking for reassurance. The one Gavin suspected was Ragnar leaned against Daisy’s leg while Radar settled next to Gavin, though the big dog didn’t lean in. The corgi parked herself right in the middle of the entire group and looked up at the two humans with big brown puppy eyes.
The dogs didn’t know any more about what was happening than he did, yet all three placed their trust in Daisy. And, oddly, Gavin.
He scratched Radar’s head. “This past week I’ve felt like I’ve been standing on a beach watching the ocean recede. I couldn’t leave, couldn’t ask for help. Was the tide pulling out the water? Was I safe? Or was I about to drown in a tsunami?”
Gavin glanced between Daisy and Cecilia. “So I did my best to find some sort of shelter. To ignore the threat I couldn’t run from and go about my life.”
Cecilia was proof the wave crashed in and was about to suck him out to sea, but he didn’t say so. The situation wasn’t about him. It wasn’t about Rysa, either, for that matter.
Gavin just watched Daisy do the exact same thing he’d done when that Fate messaged him. Overwhelmed and utterly terrified, he still managed to “warrior-up” to the best of his ability.
Daisy’s shiver and body hardening told Gavin that a wave had just crashed into her. A different one than had crashed into him, but from the same storm. They were in this together, Gavin, Daisy, and the three dogs. They were standing close enough on the beach to offer each other help, even if the storm sent different sneaker waves toward each of them.
What Cecilia was doing, though, he didn’t know.
“Daisy helped me understand, at least somewhat, what’s happening.” Gavin touched her elbow. His aids gave him a small advantage, but everyone around him carried weapons of mass destruction in their fingertips. And their voices. How could he help without putting himself in danger?
He had to help. Someone needed to keep an eye on the might-not-be-Cecilia.
He glanced down at the dogs. They had advantages, too. Speed. Teeth. Growls and barks. But, like him, they could be easily manipulated. He’d seen it in action.
“I want to come,” he said. “I want to help.” He had to do something, not simply wait around to be buried under a three-story wave of death.
Daisy touched his arm. A tingle spread from where her fingertips caressed his skin and he couldn’t stop a small grin from creeping over his lips. Or the silly, stupid pretty female touch from bouncing around inside his skull.
Daisy must have read his expression because she grinned, too. “We’re going to have to figure out how to undo your animal enthralling.” She shook her head. “Can’t have you hooting at your patients, can we, Dr. Bower?”
Some of Gavin’s sense of being overwhelmed eased when he laughed, but not all of it. What they were about to do might be more dangerous than everything he’d faced up to this point.
“It might be useful if I go into pediatrics.” He did his best not-enthralled hoot. “I’m entertaining, no?” He scratched at his head and let a high pitched hee-hee.
“… into a monkey?” Cecilia looked incredulous.
A tense laugh bubbled out of Daisy, one she obviously tried to restrain, and it came out a snort. Radar and Ragnar barked.
Daisy couldn’t hold back her emotions any longer. She leaned forward, into the island’s countertop, and a loud laugh-cry burst from her open mouth. “Mom! Why…”
“Hey, hey…” Cecilia rounded the other side of the island and squeezed Daisy’s shoulder. “I’m sorry, honey…”
Gavin didn’t catch the rest of Cecilia’s statement, but he did pick out her intent: This was the life of a Shifter. Shit storms happen, but Shifters were strong enough to weather everything.
“We’ll go together,” Gavin said. They needed to get out the dog’s food and—
“You stay here.” Cecilia pointed a stern finger at Gavin’s nose.
“But—”
She turned to Daisy. “You figured out how to enthrall…”
He tried to argue. Tried to remind Daisy that he had an advantage. But it turned out she agreed with Cecilia.
Chapter Thirteen
Breathing, once again, happened through closed-off nostrils. Gavin’s face pressed into soft, tightly-woven fabric. At least this time he heard himself snoring.
And heard Daisy’s landline ringing. His eyelids blinked against the heavy blue upholstery of a couch. And, again, pink glimmered in the window opposite where he lay.
Dawn. In the living room of Daisy’s house. On the dog-butt-smelling, uber-expensive, microfiber softness of nice furniture. Gavin lay on his face on the couch but he wasn’t alone.
The phone stopped.
Two German shepherds and one corgi cocked their heads and licked his ear and arm.
Daisy had enthralled him. Again. And left him with her dogs.
Cecilia had convinced Daisy that it was for her own good. And she’d convinced Daisy to leave the dogs.
Why would Daisy leave her dogs behind?
He sort of remembered arguing. Images of Daisy and Cecilia yelling fizzled behind his eyes. He remembered dogs barking and puppy claws clattering on the tile of Daisy’s kitchen. Words about how sorry she was but her mom was right. He couldn’t come along. And they didn’t have time to convince him respectfully, like normal people would.
Nor did they tell him where they were going, but he remembered Cecilia saying “Rushmore.”
Were they on their way to Mount Rushmore? If they left last night and drove the entire way, they’d be close. It was, if he remembered correctly, about a ten-hour drive.
His hearing aids were still in his ears, so at least they didn’t cripple him. Slowly, he wiggled an arm out from under his chest. His biceps tingled and the numbness made his fingers burn, but at least he was alive and Daisy hadn’t completely wiped his memory.
Gavin sat up. Blood drained from his head and he swooned. The world pitched, a groan puffed out over his parched tongue, and he flopped against the couch back.
Enthrallings give you a hangover. Gavin rubbed his face. Good to know.
What the hell had he gotten himself into?
Shifters and Fates slapped him against the wall like he was the human equivalent of a handball. Smack! Gavin bounced off Rysa’s life. Rysa, his friend who was off playing house with a dragon and hadn’t even had the decency to at least send him a text.
Another smack! And the already-moving-too-fast Gavin bounced off Daisy’s life. Daisy, who seemed to hold
some respect for normal people but let her surly maybe-mother convince her to enthrall Gavin into “behaving.”
Smack! Death threats. Smack! Spyware in his ears. Smack smack smack!
At least he’d finished all his finals and hadn’t signed up for summer courses this year, so he had that going for him.
Good to have something. Not like he could help Daisy anymore.
Radar or Ragnar licked his cheek. He could barely tell them apart when he concentrated, and right now he didn’t have the brain space for the dogs to occupy.
Part of him felt as if he’d let Daisy down. Here he’d been handed tools to get the job done and instead of living up to his potential, he’d let her tell his brain to smile and be happy and go to sleep, you’re not good enough.
You have a disability, young man. You’re confused. You need to stay with your education so you can at least win at being a doctor.
Gavin closed his eyes and let his head flop to the side. His stomach grumbled. He hadn’t had a real meal since lunch yesterday. Thirst made him lightheaded. And he suspected he needed a shower. He probably smelled worse than the dogs.
The corgi barked. All three dogs were probably as hungry as he was.
He scratched the top of her head. Daisy had left him in charge of her dogs, which must mean something. To her, they were family.
More family than that woman she ran off with last night.
“I think she likes me, guys.” Gavin chuckled. “Since I’m her go-to dog sitter.” The gorgeous woman with the weird-as-fuck family and the superpowers left normal-boy Gavin to tend to her most prized puppies.
He ended up helping after all.
Gavin dropped his head between his knees. The room flipped in his perception, becoming an upside-down version of itself, and he stared at dust bunnies and dog toys under the couch. The dawn light snuck past his foot and across the normally dark area, coating the quarters and abandoned rubber bands with its too-early light.
Quarters, pennies, paperclips, a rawhide chew, at least three tennis balls, and what looked like a cocktail napkin from a bar.
Bonds Broken & Silent (Fate Fire Shifter Dragon Book 4) Page 27