by W. J. May
“Oh yeah? And what might the boys be doing?”
Molly started to answer, then stared with a worrisome expression at the dog. “You’re not, like…trying to poison her, are you?”
Rae glanced over, then shook her head. “I tried to conjure her some treats. Might have been a few too many. She’ll be right as rain in no time.”
“You didn’t,” Molly said chidingly. She snapped her fingers and the puppy dove into her lap, staring up with an adorably martyred expression. “Rae Kerrigan, how many times do we have to tell you? Stick to drugs, dresses, and drinks. How dare you turn your evil onto this poor dog.”
As undignified as it was, even she had to grin as Annie leapt up and planted a huge, wet kiss on the side of Molly’s neck, effectively destroying her carefully selected blouse in the process.
“We might have to get one of these,” she murmured, shooting little sparks into the air for Annie to chase. “Something for the baby to play with…”
Rae looked up with a start. Four minutes, this time. It had only been four minutes that she’d forgotten about the fact that her own life was never going to be the same. “Do you think that would work?” she asked innocently, trying to keep the rabid curiosity from her voice. “Do puppies do well with kids?”
Molly shrugged. “Some of them certainly do. We had a dog growing up. Granted it was bred to fit inside a handbag, so I’m not sure how much damage it could actually do.”
Rae stifled a grin. Of course it was. She was also willing to bet that the poor animal had been the victim of all baby Molly’s first ventures into the realm of styling and cosmetics.
“At any rate, we’ll have Julian looking ahead every step of the way.”
It was like a lightbulb went off inside Rae’s head. Filling her with almost painful relief while simultaneously stopping her heart with the utmost dread.
Oh crap! Julian! She forced a tight smile onto her lips and kept watching Molly. This is going to be like the engagement all over again! How could I be so stupid?!
As Molly continued babbling on about how she fully intended to take advantage of their friend’s clairvoyant power Rae’s eyes flew to the door, staring with such intensity she was surprised she couldn’t see through it and all the way down the hall.
He’s going to see it! If he hasn’t already. Crap! He’s going to find out before I can even tell Devon!
“Molls,” she interrupted suddenly, “is Devon downstairs?”
Molly paused long enough to pull in a breath. “No, he went out with his dad on a walk this morning. I was going to try to follow along and eavesdrop, but they looked super serious, so I went back inside.”
Rae leaned back against the headboard, staring with a worried frown at the bed. “That was very noble of you.”
Molly nodded cheerfully, then continued on with her one-sided spiel. The monologue had now shifted to the topic of children’s play clothes. There was a chance it could go on for hours.
He won’t even mean to see, it’ll just happen. There’s no way to stop it. It’s a miracle he hasn’t already. Or maybe he has…
Rae pulled her knees up to her chest with a thoughtful stare, nodding whenever it seemed appropriate to punctuate the unending stream of talking from the other side of the bed.
Her only bit of luck was that Julian had a lot on his mind. After psychically connecting with a homicidal psychopath to see the end of the world, he’d come to... only to find himself staring down the barrel of a gun. It was enough to distract any sane person the following morning.
But, strangely enough, Rae was willing to bet that’s not what had him so aloof and distracted.
He hadn’t been the same since finding out about the connection between Simon and his father. Since the day he’d gone on a rampage through the house, only to come to physical blows with his best friend.
It was like getting just a glimpse into the tragedies of his past made them all the worse. After all, this was a man who could literally see anything. Whose unlimited access to the past, present, and future put entire worlds at his fingertips. He had grown unfamiliar with mere glimpses and half-truths. He needed the entire story. Needed to know what had happened, from start to finish.
So that he could get some kind of closure. So he could begin to move on.
“—which led me to question the exact nature of a ‘romper,’ but it’s…” Molly trailed off suddenly, staring down in alarm. “Rae, what the hell happened to your bed?”
Rae snapped out of her trance to follow her friend’s gaze. Aside from the watery scorch mark burned into the center of the mattress, the entire thing was plastered with random bits of tape and gauze, discarded souvenirs from Beth’s efforts the previous evening.
“Oh…” Rae glanced down at her arms in surprise. Little Annie must have had a busy night, because there wasn’t a single bandage left intact. “That’s…I can explain that.”
Molly’s eyebrows lifted as she gave her friend a suspicious look. “Are you and Devon getting into some weird bondage thing you haven’t told me about?”
A scarlet blush heated Rae’s cheeks as she hurried to pick up the pieces. “No! We’re not into—”
“Who’s into bondage?”
The girls looked up as Angel breezed into the room, looking like she’d fallen straight down from heaven just to talk about sexual fetishes. She tossed back her white hair and perched beside them on the mattress, cocking her head to the side with a sparkling smile.
It never ceased to amaze Rae how such stunning contrasts could exist in a single person.
To start, Angel was beautiful. And not in a casual way. Not like when you’d flip through a magazine and stare briefly at the faces of the lovely girls inside. But in a way that was impossible to forget. That earned an instant place in your memory. Searing itself into your mind.
There was a lightness about her. From her ivory skin, to her sapphire eyes, to her slender, delicate frame. Right down to her tinkling laughter. The girl was a nymph. A little fairy princess.
But for every bit of lightness, there was darkness there as well.
Angel didn’t laugh at the same things as the rest of them. Basic humor was often lost, while the things she found amusing were strange and sometimes cruel. That delicate frame was as lethal as it was lovely. Rae had seen her end a man’s life with the mere touch of her hand.
And it took only a breath for those twinkling eyes to go cold. For all the light to die out, leaving nothing but a geographically misplaced assassin in its wake.
And yet…there was Julian.
The love between them wasn’t just inspiring, it was transformative. With a single kiss, Angel had seen one door close while another opened in its place. Showing her a future she never knew she could have. A life she’d never even known she wanted.
He was the only thing in the world who could make those eyes go tender. Who could soften the disjointed exterior to a point where she could actually thaw. Where she would actually try.
And she did try. In her own, neurotic way.
Still, it was impossible sometimes not to wonder, if it hadn’t been for Julian, whether Angel would have died back at the factory. Fighting for the other side.
That’s the same thing you could say about Gabriel, Rae chided herself. If he hadn’t fallen in love with me, he would’ve killed me instead. Me and all of my friends.
It was with a smile that she greeted their resident sociopath, watching with silent eyes as Angel perched cheerfully upon the mattress and started playing with her dog.
“Jules and I tried that,” she said conversationally, flipping the puppy over. “Bondage, I mean. It turned out different than we thought.”
Leaving them to stew in that unsettling thought for a moment, she looked up with a smile.
“Actually, that’s what I came here to talk to you about. You know his birthday’s coming up in a few weeks, and I wanted to do something special. Something more than just my usual sex him into a coma sort of thing.” She misi
nterpreted the looks on their faces entirely, and hurried to correct herself. “Of course, we’ll do that, too—”
“Enough!” Rae held up her hand. “We don’t need to hear about all of that.” On her other side Molly shook her head at the mattress, pursing her lips to hide a smile.
Angel nodded swiftly, and pushed her hair behind her ears. “Anyway, I tracked down a first-edition book of poems by Alfred, Lord Tennyson. His favorite.”
Rae leaned back in surprise. She had been expecting a bazooka. A parachute. A mythological creature that incinerated anything it touched. At any rate, she hadn’t known Tennyson was Julian’s favorite poet.
“There’s a handwritten inscription inside, and Jules is going to love it.”
“How the hell are you going to pay for something like that?” Molly blurted. “It has to be thousands and thousands of pounds, and I thought Cromfield tied up all your money—”
Rae pinched her hard in the side, but Angel didn’t seem to mind. She gazed at the redhead for a moment, then turned back to the dog. “I’ve been working on it for a long time,” she said simply.
Molly blushed, and stared down at the bed as Rae graciously rescued the conversation.
“So what did you want to talk about?” she asked kindly. “I think the book’s a great idea.”
She had spent enough time with Angel over the last few months to have grown incredibly attached, despite her rather strange proclivities. They two had bonded more than Rae sometimes realized, and one way or another it was clear to see the girl was trying.
Angel nodded again then fiddled nervously with her hair, looking uncharacteristically uncertain. “The thing is, the seller won’t take cash. And that’s all I have. He wants a check.”
Her lovely face darkened with frustration and, unless Rae was imagining it, the slightest hint of shame. To have her brilliant birthday surprise thwarted by the fact that she’d been raised by a psychopath, beneath a cemetery, without access to a bank account.
Rae and Molly melted at the same time. As capable and exasperating as Angel could be, moments like this made it impossible not to feel utterly protective of her at the same time.
“What can we do?”
Much to everyone’s surprise, it was Molly who asked the question. Rae cast her a sideways grin as Angel lifted her head with a tentative smile.
“If I give you the cash, will you write him a check?”
Molly nodded soundly. “I’ll do one better than that. After we pick this thing up, I’ll take you to my bank and we can set up an account for you there as well.”
She clearly thought it was a brilliant idea, but Angel dimmed a little at the thought. Rae swooped in for the save. “I think…we should probably take things one step at a time.” While she was sure that Angel could produce enough of the necessary documents to get past bank security, she wasn’t sure if any of them were remotely valid. “You know, stick to activities that don’t require a passport or birth certificate.”
Angel scoffed good-naturedly, pushing to her feet. “Rae, if you don’t think I have a passport, you’ve massively underestimated me. I have twelve.”
She made no mention of the birth certificate.
Rae flashed her an easy grin, but grew thoughtful as she watched Angel sweep back down the hall. It wasn’t until she’d reached her own bedroom door that Rae called out to her once more. “Hey, Angel. This is really sweet. What you’re doing for Jules. It’s…it’s a good thing.”
She didn’t want to appear condescending. That’s the last thing in the world she wanted. But she didn’t want the moment to go unnoticed, either. It was a positive step. She was proud.
Angel paused in the doorway, and tossed back her long white hair. “Well, when you love someone, it’s the simplest thing in the world, right?” Her eyes softened with a fleeting smile. “Seize every day. Don’t waste a single moment.”
The other girls froze behind her as she pushed obliviously through the door.
“Or so my books on human behavior tell me…”
It wasn’t until the door swung shut that Molly and Rae turned back to each other, staring with wide, disbelieving eyes.
“She never says what I think she’s going to say,” Molly muttered incredulously. “Never.”
Rae didn’t move. She was still staring at the door.
“A first edition Tennyson. Handwritten inscription.” Molly lay back on the bed, scooping Annie up to dance her around. “Do you think she robbed a bank?”
Rae’s eyes glowed as she stared down the hallway. “You know what? I think her gift is that she didn’t.”
* * *
Rae didn’t end up going down for breakfast with the others. When Annie barked and cried to go on a walk, she handed her off to Luke instead. In a rather strange turn of events, she had found inspiration in the most unlikely of places.
And she wasn’t going to let that inspiration go to waste.
“Rae?”
She sat straight up on the bed as Devon’s voice echoed up the stairs. “I’m up here!”
A second later, far too fast to be plausible, he appeared in the doorway. There was a strange flush to his skin, and a glowing smile stretched across his face. “I did it,” he said before she could even ask. “I told my dad we were getting married.”
Rae pulled in a quick breath and nodded, trying desperately to keep the words inside. All day she’d been waiting for him to get back, never abandoning her post on the bed, never faltering in her courage. She had completely forgotten about Devon’s epic walk with his dad.
“It was just…perfect.” He fell on the bed beside her, automatically avoiding the scorch mark without having the presence of mind to ask where it came from. “It went exactly the way that it was supposed to have gone. You know, if we were a normal family.”
It wasn’t often that Rae heard Devon wax on about being normal. Out of everyone in the gang, he was the one most taken with the fact that they had the ability to stand out. It wasn’t until very recently, until he and Rae got serious, that he’d ever considered another option. And even now, Rae was pretty certain that his idea of a ‘normal, married life’ involved some sort of torpedo-launcher in the garage.
That’s okay. Mine does, too.
…right next to the baby stroller.
“Dev, that’s wonderful!” she gushed. “I’m so happy for you!”
Devon flashed her a grin before settling back on the bed. His eyes danced and glowed as he remembered, folding his hands behind his head as he stared up at the ceiling with that same smile. “He asked me when it was going to be, and I told him as soon as possible. He even asked me if you were pregnant.” He let out a short laugh. “If that’s why we were doing it so quickly.”
Rae’s blood ran momentarily cold, and she glanced at him out of the corner of her eye. “Well, it’s not a totally outrageous question—”
“No, of course it isn’t! That’s the point!” Devon was on his feet again before she could stop him. Before he even noticed that she was reaching out to take his hand. “Everything about it was perfectly normal, Rae. He asked all the right questions. Said all the right things. Like…normal parent things to say. He’s never really done that before. Not since I was a kid.” He chuckled again, running his hand through his hair as he paced in front of the dresser. “Asking if you were pregnant, I almost lost it right there…”
Rae pulled in a sudden breath and sat bolt upright on the bed, making up her mind right then and there. There wasn’t going to be some big reveal. No onesie embroidered with ‘future little fox,’ or ultrasound picture tucked inside his wallet. Angel was right.
When you loved someone, it was simple. There was no time to waste.
“Devon…I’m pregnant.”
Chapter 3
Rae wiggled her fingers under the blanket, worried she’d accidentally used her father’s tatù and frozen time again. Devon hadn’t moved an inch since she told him. He hadn’t even breathed.
“…Devon?”
He came out of it with an almost silent gasp, jerking back to life like he had indeed been stuck by some invisible force. Or a time freeze. His eyes were enormous, wider and more dilated than Rae had ever seen them. One foot was still raised an inch or two off the floor to complete the step he’d been taking.
But still, he said nothing.
It was like he was waiting for something. For her to retract it. Or deny it. Or laugh. Or simply finish the sentence in a way that would make the whole thing make sense.
Thoughts raced through her head. Suddenly she was sixteen again, in her second year at Guilder, in love with Devon. She had a feeling she was about to actually freeze time as she played the memory back through her head. They were in Devon’s dorm room, and Rae had tried out Desiree’s tatù. They’d been kissing, things were building up, and the conversation turned into an argument. She wanted more, but he apparently had to pull the responsibility card and stop the action. She bit her lip as she remembered…
What had she said to him? What’s wrong with messing around a little?
He had held her and told her he wanted to take things slowly. Then she’d confessed to him that she’d used Desiree’s tatù. He’d laughed at first and then started pacing the room, mumbling about not ready to be a father, not ready to have the Council find out. What else had he worried about? How people would react? Treat them? Treat their make-believe child? The danger they would put themselves in?
The memory raced through her head. She’d pressed him. Asked him if he was scared of her. Wondered if she was the result of his worst fears. The evil of two tatùs mixed together.
They’d argued if children were born evil. Or if evil was a result of one’s environment. Devon had broken her heart a little that day when he said there could be a gene that predisposed them to do wrong. And that environment could be what brought out their wickedness—or kept it tucked away.
She held her breath as she remembered what she’d said back to him. “So, logically, if one day we got married and decided to have children, our child would most likely be good—look at you and me! Even if there’s a hint of my father’s genes, he or she could still be a normal, happy person.” Hadn’t she spent most of her life terrified she was suddenly going to turn into her father? To simply wake up one day and have morphed into a monster overnight?