by Kate Wendley
He shrugged away from the group then, needing to be away from all this love and perfection. It made him nauseous.
**
Anthony turned to mist and left the club before he did any permanent damage to anyone. He’d made that mistake in his past as well. He was the Master of Atlanta, but sometimes it seemed like all he did was either hurt people or allow them to be hurt.
He flew around the city riding the night breeze, or creating one when needed. He told himself he was checking in on things around his territory, but it was just an effort to distract himself, as if that were possible.
It didn’t even matter that Ethan was involved this time, it still came down to Anthony not being able to make a relationship with a woman work, yet again. This time had felt so real, though, and that’s what irritated him the most. It felt like his eyes had been opened to everything he’d been doing wrong before. He’d been so down about the women in his past, but looking back, those relationships hadn’t even been real. He’d been pretending to be something he wasn’t back then. It was different with Kaia. With her he was himself, vampire and all, and she accepted every bit of it. Even his hideousness.
She made him feel loved.
He happened upon a quiet park with some comfortably dark areas that weren’t overrun with necking couples. Benches circled a large pond with three ducks floating motionless on its calm surface, and only one bench across the waterway was occupied with a couple more entranced with each other than with their serene surroundings.
He materialized in the darkest shadows before striding to an empty seat, and as he sat down, just for the barest fraction of a second, he swore he could feel every blade of grass that bordered the pond. He could feel how thirsty or well-nourished each plant was, and as he turned his gaze around himself, he could even feel the life force of every tree standing tall and proud around him.
And just like that the feeling was gone.
He sat in stunned silence as he tried to figure out what just happened. Even with his senses open wide, which they weren’t just now, he’d never been able to sense things at that level before. He opened himself up to the night to test that, though. Maybe his powers had changed and he hadn’t noticed.
Nothing but the usual happened. He could feel the heartbeats of the ducks and the humans sitting across the pond from him. He could even hear them all breathing. He felt an intermittent, faint breeze and heard traffic in the far background. But that was it. He didn’t feel life in the grass, and in fact the earth just felt heavy and immovable, as always. The trees felt inanimate as well, though more delicate than the earth.
He pulled his power in close again because he’d agitated the ducks, and the human couple was now looking across the pond at him as well. They likely couldn’t see much since they were so far away, and because he wasn’t anywhere near a light. But he didn’t want to be the object of their attention, so he sent a little pulse of power into the night for an ignore spell.
The couple became enamored with each other again, and the ducks eventually calmed as well. If only it was that easy for him to calm himself. He couldn’t deny anymore that he was changing, but what he was changing into was the question. Would it be that awful creature the Vampire Mother was?
He frowned in disgust as he wondered what his life would be like if he turned into that… thing. He wasn’t sure he could bear it. On top of the rest of his lonely life, that just seemed like the ultimate sacrifice. His sanity surely wouldn’t make it through.
He needed a better distraction right now than thinking about what it meant to be a vampire, so he pulled his phone out of his pocket to see if he’d missed any business calls. There were a couple, but he went still when he saw that there was also a message from Kaia. He played it, and in this one she said she couldn’t remember all of last night and again asked him to call her.
He briefly felt bad for forgetting that Winston hurt her. He hadn’t forgotten that Winston attacked her, but he forgot that she didn’t have the healing powers they all did. In his world, when people got hurt, they healed pretty quickly, sometimes instantly, so it made him feel foreign to think about her being hurt. She was human.
And she was playing games with him.
Maybe.
He listened over and over again to her messages. He wanted to be angry at her. He wanted to think she was playing a game with his heart, or at the very least that she was being manipulated by Ethan and that she didn’t want Anthony enough to realize it or even care.
But remembering her soft ways with him, her complete acceptance of him and their incredible nights together, he wanted to believe she was innocent. He wanted to believe she wasn’t just doing Ethan’s bidding so that Ethan could do something horrible to the family while Anthony was distracted.
Most of all, he wanted to believe she wanted him, just like she acted like she did. He wanted to believe she was who he wanted her to be. The person he’d been getting to know. The person he trusted enough to be bare for, both emotionally and physically.
But he didn’t know how to know what was truth and what was a lie with her. His emotions were too wound up and Ethan was too powerful. He could be manipulating him just as well as Kaia.
Most of all, though, Anthony hadn’t protected her. Was it because he was already more of an unemotional monster than he realized? After all, why would he bring her, a delicate human, into the midst of all the powerful creatures that gathered at the club and then leave her alone with them unless he truly was losing his ability to feel? He’d let harm come to her in his home. He felt intense shame at not protecting her, but he was equally troubled by the fact that the thought of protecting her hadn’t even entered his mind.
If he hadn’t let her get hurt, he might’ve still found a way to make things work with her, even as a monster. Things might’ve gone so much differently…
Or not. His job was to protect his family and this entire community, and in the end it didn’t matter what would make him happy. It never did.
He watched a cloud trace across the sky, first blocking, then freeing the stars behind. His experiment with loving Kaia had been a short blip in his long life, and he’d known all along it would only be temporary. There had never been even a chance of her becoming part of his life for real, so there was no reason to be upset over her. It was over now and it was time to get back to his duties.
Even so, he spent the rest of the night and early morning replaying her messages over and over again, finding bitter comfort in the sound of her worried voice.
Chapter 32
Kaia went to bed feeling horrible. It hurt when she breathed and the huge bruises on her torso were so tender, she could barely move without making herself feel sick. An angry bruise on one of her arms was almost as tender and just as colorfully black and blue. And as if that wasn’t enough, the tape on the giant bandage on her neck kept getting stuck in her hair every time she moved her head.
Worst of all, Anthony never called or came over. She tried him a couple times but he never picked up and didn’t call back either, which definitely wasn’t like him.
A tear fell down her cheek. This was the first night in over three weeks that she hadn’t talked to him and it felt like crap. Maybe he still thought he’d interrupted something between her and Ethan last night, but that was just stupid. Trying to figure out what was going on was giving her another headache, so she decided to go to bed.
**
Kaia dreamed of her parents again. It was a familiar dream, one of heartache and abandonment. She’d had this dream so many times she didn’t even wake from it right away.
She was in a hospital and had somehow found out her parents were actually still alive. She was an adult in this dream, her current self, and they’d been living their own lives this whole time, having completely forgotten about her all these years.
Her heart raced in hope and longing. She’d finally found her parents! She’d finally found two people in her world that surely loved her and wanted her in their liv
es. But the doctor told her they’d been in a terrible accident, and her parents had no idea who she was.
That didn’t make sense to her. It couldn’t be true, and she struggled to get past him and the nurses to go see them. She was just sure that once they saw her they’d remember her and everything would be right in the world again. All the pain and humiliation of her past would be forgotten once her real family was back together.
The doctor and nurses kept talking to her, asking her to sign paperwork and listen to all the treatment options they were describing. She physically struggled past them with the only goal in her mind that of seeing her parents for the first time in years and getting them to remember her.
She finally made it to their room just after the thing she dreaded most happened. They both died just before she was able to reach them. Horror filled her soul. She’d never get to actually talk to them and get to know them or find out what they were really like. She’d never even get to hear the sounds of their actual voices.
She stood in their room, stunned beyond words that she’d been so close to finally being happy again and being part of their lives… and it slipped away in front of her eyes. All that lay before her now were these stranger’s empty shells.
Her heavy tears finally woke her from her dream. She rolled painfully onto her back and stared at the darkened ceiling while the tears kept coming.
She didn’t bother feeling sorry for herself. She was more upset that she’d had the dream than what the dream was actually about. She’d dreamed about a lost chance at talking to them so many times. So many times she dreamed that they’d just forgotten about her, that they just needed to be reminded and then they’d love her again because she knew in her heart that when they’d been alive, they’d truly cared.
She’d had this horrible dream most often when she was living with her aunt and uncle and their terrible boys. No one had ever loved her in that house and she hated her life back then more than anything. She alternated a lot between hating her parents for dying on her and abandoning her to those awful people, and then feeling guilty for ever being mad at them in the first place.
She’d had years to block out memories of her old life, though, and hadn’t had this dream in a long, long time. That she was having it now made her heart ache because it meant she truly felt like Anthony was gone. Whatever feelings of love and affection she’d felt from him would never come her way again, just like her parents love for her was gone. Her gut suspicions and little nagging doubts were manifesting for her in her sleeping mind in the most familiar way it knew how to.
She realized now that she loved Anthony, and maybe he could’ve grown to love her, but he didn’t want anything to do with her anymore. Even when Ethan came over tonight to check on her, he’d been too evasive about him. She wasn’t stupid. She knew she’d been dumped. She just hadn’t expected it, not yet anyway, and not like this.
She cynically thought that if there was anything good about all this, it was that at least she hadn’t told Anthony about her past because then she would’ve worried about him using that information to hurt her even more. She knew from personal experience that people could be viciously vindictive, and her anxiety over her uncle or cousins ever finding her again outweighed Anthony’s irritation about her not sharing her past with him.
But she still missed him. Heavy tears fell down her cheeks and soaked her pillow as she tried to numb herself to her heartache.
**
Anthony silently stood at the edge of a field under a full moon watching werewolves race past him. It would be a strange sight to see if he hadn’t already witnessed it more than two thousand times, give or take.
Even before he became the Master of this territory he was already used to watching over the were-animals as they shifted and ran together once a month. His father insisted, just in case something happened. That’s what the family was for. Vampires cared for the shapeshifters, both financially and otherwise. In exchange, as many shifters as were needed would volunteer to let the vampires feed from them, and the rest would watch over the vampires during the day when they were dead to the world.
Anthony’s father had been gone for years now, who knew where, so Anthony was free to lead however he saw fit. He preferred practicality and order, though, so he continued many of the practices and traditions his father had started.
The wolves were always so excited at full moon. As soon as their bodies finished contorting into their animal forms, the pain most of them endured just moments before was immediately forgotten as the thrill of the chase took over. They took off running as fast and hard as they could, a form of magic calling out to them that Anthony would never quite understand.
But even watching and feeling all this incredible energy out here tonight, his mind was on Kaia and how her absence in his life was tearing him up inside.
Sensing nothing out of the ordinary now that the shifters had all shifted and were running wild through the forest at the ranch, Anthony left. He had research he’d been putting off while he’d been spending time with Kaia and decided to work on it tonight while the club was mostly quiet.
But back home, he was irritated that his thoughts kept drifting to Kaia and wondering if she’d call again. He put his phone away and wandered around the building instead, looking for repairs he could add to the list of needed maintenance. It felt better to keep his attention on the things in his life that he could actually control.
By the time he went to bed for the day, he wanted to smash his silent phone to bits.
Chapter 33
Anthony was in a much better frame of mind tonight. With or without Kaia in his life, he was Master of Atlanta and knew he was good at it. Time to get back to focusing on his strengths.
The maintenance crew at home did a mostly good job of keeping up on needed repairs, but maybe it was time for a little remodeling as well. Anthony would need a daytime liaison to help answer contractor questions, so Zach was it. He liked to meet new people, and was usually good at understanding what Anthony wanted.
He didn’t seem entirely focused on what Anthony was telling him tonight, but that was all right. He’d also typed up his list of maintenance and building improvement projects. He just wanted to talk it out with Zach in case he had questions before the work was sent out for bids to the supernatural community.
“I noticed there are water stains on the carpet inside the back door of the building next door. I’d like−”
He startled when his phone abruptly started playing Kaia’s familiar ringtone. He pulled his cell out of his pocket in irritation, intending to mute it and go on with his meeting with Zach, but the sight of her name on his caller id, along with the sweet melody he’d chosen for her brought forth a rush of emotion. He was tired of all this drama, though, and welcomed the cool feel of uncaring power that surged inside him at the same time. It was constantly looking for an outlet and tonight it helped quench the heat of feelings that just the thought of Kaia always stirred up.
But it didn’t entirely overpower his emotions. For instance, he couldn’t force himself to mute her song that kept playing, and felt a pang of sadness when it stopped. He placed his phone on the desk in front of him, staring it down like it’d grow feet and run away if he took his eyes off it. When the voicemail indicator popped up, he breathed a sigh of reluctant relief.
Zach carefully asked, “Why don’t you talk to her?”
“No.” Anthony didn’t want to have this conversation, and it irritated him that he could feel Zach poking and prodding through their blood connection, obviously trying to get a better sense of Anthony’s mood.
Zach sighed and the silence between them became tense. “Anthony−”
“No.”
“You’re miserable, man. I’m sure she is, too.”
He stared hard at his desk as a rush of rage overcame him. He quickly reached for his connection to Zach and Sebastian both and put up a wall. He didn’t need a mother hen in his life. He needed respect and privacy.
Zach’s alarm at their severed link was thick in the air. “Anthony?”
He briskly picked up his phone and put it in his pocket, then tidied his desk before standing to leave.
“Hey dude, you ok?”
Anthony finally looked at him, the war waging solid and heavy inside him between his emotions and his barely controlled power. “You’ll oversee getting these repairs done?”
“Yeah, but hey. What’s going on?”
“Pardon?”
“Buddy, if you want to talk, I’m here for you.”
“Talk about what?”
“Kaia.”
Zach was obviously unaware of how close Anthony was to either letting loose a torrent of anger, or an explosion of energy that would wipe his friend off the face of this earth. He struggled to keep a block on his blood connection as well as his temper.
“That’s over. I have work to do now. I’m heading out for a meeting.”
“Hey! Come back here!”
He stopped and gave Zach a look that for some reason made him pale. The reason didn’t matter to him so long as he remembered that Anthony was not someone he had the right to order around.
When Zach didn’t say anything else, Anthony left.
**
He headed to Midtown for a meeting with Sid Lantrey, a shifter he used as an adviser for tax planning. Being immortal unfortunately didn’t mean he could stop paying taxes, it just meant he had to get creative over the years with whose name his assets were actually in. He also had to structure the ownership of everything in a way to minimize his liability, ensuring the family had enough money to continue to survive and be taken care of, hopefully indefinitely.
The meeting went well and he was pleased with Sid’s careful analysis of the family’s tax situation. Sid was a top financial planner in the state and Anthony paid him a hefty fee for his studious attention to his portfolio of assets.