Jeb's face holds the grim look it usually does, and not for the first time, Beth wonders why he's always so serious. Of course, their situation currently warrants it, and her laughter dies.
“Unforgettable,” he remarks, keeping his eyes on Slade and Gunnar as they travel ahead. He glances behind him in silent communication with Kennet and Calvin as they hold the rear position.
“Well, they slipped me something.”
Jeb stalls, turning to her. “What do you mean?” His hands go to his hips.
He's not going to like this. “They drugged me.”
Jeb whirls, striding fast toward the Bloodlings just ahead.
Beth grabs him. Hothead. “Jeb—no,” she whisper-hisses.
He looks down at her hand, and she can see the influence her touch has over him. His shoulders relax, and his eyes soften as he gazes down at her.
“Why?” his lips thin. “Tell me this instant, or I kill them both. Father or not.”
Beth folds her arms, throwing a hip out. “I was under the influence of whatever it was…”
“You weren't metabolizing it?” Jeb's eyebrow quirks.
“No—I'm half-Reflective, remember,” she says in a low voice.
Beth watches Jeb put the pieces together. “Slade isn't here for reconnaissance,” he says slowly.
Beth shakes her head. “I don't trust him. But that male”—she points at Gunnar—“is my father. And, Jeb, he could have killed me. He is amply skilled.”
Jeb looks after their broad backs, now two dwindling specks. One of the specks stops, and a face turns to regard their delay.
His face fills with suspicion. “Are you certain he's your father?”
Beth's lips flatten. “Yes, and I unwound his weapons tether as a distraction.”
“Ah,” Jeb says in semi-understanding, and a reluctant smile passes for humor across his lips.
“She pants-ed him,” Jacky remarks, moving by them and eavesdropping along the way.
Jeb groans, glaring at Jacky's retreating back. “I can't take much more of this.”
“Tough,” Jacky throws back as he keeps trekking up the steep incline. “You're stuck with my amazing ass.”
Jeb frowns after him, and Beth grabs Jeb's arm. He returns his attention to her.
“Let's go. I don't want them suspicious. We follow them to One. We avoid the slaver—”
“Dimitri?”
“Yes. We get Maddie somewhere safe…”
“And you?” Jeb asks, touching her cheek.
Beth flushes beneath his fingertips.
Jeb visibly controls his breathing. His pupils dilate, those stormy eyes missing nothing.
The silence lengthens as he studies her with a hooded gaze.
“I want you. I can't pretend in your presence, Beth.”
Beth stares, taking in all the signs of his arousal, and is too honorable to dismiss it. “I know.”
“It can't be helped, Beth.”
Reflectives were taught about the power of the soul mate bond. Beth inhales deeply. “Not good timing, Jeb. And for the record, I still can't believe I'm the one.” She laughs nervously and casts a furtive glance at the Bloodlings, who are hiking back to Jeb and Beth's position.
Jeb ignores everyone but her, moving closer still, until their bodies are touching lightly.
“Please, Beth,” Jeb's large hands come down on her shoulders, and she looks up into his eyes.
Jeb is so handsome, looking at him is almost hypnotic. Beth's never really allowed herself the luxury of studying his face. Her eyes trace every chiseled feature. His light gray eyes appear luminescent in the vague light between the open meadow and the deeper part of the woods that begin at the crest of the hill where they stand.
Beth reaches up tentatively and runs her fingers through his newly shorn dark-blond hair. Jeb leans into her caress, folding her smaller body against his own.
They fit together so perfectly, Beth gives a little moan of deep pleasure.
Reflectives are after her. She and Slade have unfinished business. Her father holds more secrets than truths. She understands all this, but Beth will always be that lone female in her mind, abused and unloved, even in the arms of a pureblood Reflective male she could never have dreamed of being with.
Jeb's lips come down on hers. They're as light as a feather and as deep as a bottomless pool. His hands warm the small of her back, his fingers spreading at the hollow as he presses her against him.
Her hands creep behind his neck.
Each second, she feels the heat of her kinship with her father grow as he moves closer.
Yet she doesn't stop what's happening between Jeb and her.
His hands close on her ribs, and he lifts her, crushing her against him. Her hands move to his face, hard beneath her fingertips, his mouth so tender against her lips.
“Jeb,” she breathes against him.
“I know.” Reluctantly, he releases her, setting her gently on the ground. He taps his forehead against hers then turns to face the approaching Bloodlings.
Slade stomps toward them, and Beth moves to stand in front of Jeb.
His face is contained thunder. “You delay us.”
“You don't own me, Slade,” Beth says.
Jeb moves to go around her, and she stays him. She will never hide behind a man. Beth is a Reflective, and this Bloodling will not harm her. She doesn't trust Slade's motivations, but she doesn't think hurting her is within him.
Slade smiles, and Beth fights not to squirm beneath a gaze that feels as though it bores holes into her very soul, ripping apart the sinew from the marrow, separating her heart from her mind.
Beth's breaths grow shallow as they stare at each other. Her body heats.
“Beth,” Jeb calls, and he sounds worried, faraway.
Slade moves slowly toward her, and Beth sways. Even as Jeb's kisses burn on her lips, she feels the pull to Slade.
“What's happening?” Beth asks softly as though in a stupor.
“Blood call,” Slade replies in his smooth voice. “All female Bloodlings will respond to an unmated male.”
Beth hears his words then shakes out of the strange thrall.
Jeb is holding her arms, his own looped through hers.
“What—what happened?” she asks in a voice that doesn't sound like hers.
Jeb shakes his head. “I don't know, but one minute you were”—he glares at Slade—“with me.”
Her embarrassment flares to life again.
“And in the next, you were going to him. Not like it was a choice, but as though you were in a trance.”
Beth relaxes against Jeb. He's safe. Reliable.
Her eyes narrow to slits of distrust. “You're using Bloodling trickery.”
Slade leans forward, and Jeb pulls Beth backward.
He grins, his dark eyes locking with Beth's gaze. “It is no trick.”
Without another word, he turns back to where Gunnar stands beside Maddie.
Beth watches his fluid departure and shivers. “I am starting to rethink this jump, Jeb.”
“I hear you, Beth.” Jeb turns her slowly in the opposite direction and points to where they came from.
Beth can just make out the roof of her domicile, a flat black square floating over the rolling hills they just traversed.
Movement catches her eye. There are people there, moving like ants over a favorite hill. Many.
The Reflectives have come.
“Jeb…” Beth clutches her stomach. Panic spreads through her belly like a moth's wings.
“We can't fight them all, Beth,” Jeb says softly. “I need to get you somewhere safe until there's new leadership.”
“They must hate me so much,” Beth says sadly as she watches them scurry around her home.
But Jeb surprises her by shaking his head. “It's not hate.”
Their eyes meet.
“It's want,” he says with grim certainty.
Jeb grabs her hand, and they quickly hike the hill, follo
wing after the Threes and Bloodlings.
She glances back once. The ants appear bigger.
Beth's never been so happy for the lack of reflections between here and her domicile.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Merrick
Lake Crystalline isn’t crystal at all. Lily pads are scattered about its edges like a hasty sewing job done by Mother Nature. A sluggish spring beneath the lake feeds just enough fresh water for it not to stagnate, leaving it murky, its depths uncertain.
Kennet and Calvin jog to Jeb and Beth's position. Jeb glances at them then shifts his gaze to Beth, who is deep in conversation with Maddie.
The discussion looks heated.
The Bloodlings stand together, and Jeb questions the decision to jump to One again. His ears catch the muted sounds of stealth.
His fellow Reflectives approach while he second-guesses all the choices he has—and the ones he doesn't.
Reflecting to One is the best choice among bad ones.
They could jump to another sector other than One. But the Reflectives advancing upon them will not be as willing to go to One. There, they would be outnumbered by nightlopers and right back in the mess they'd fought their way out of. Jeb thinks they'll forgo that honor.
Kennet claps him on the back. “I used the pulsenoculars. Ryan is not among them.”
Some of the tension riding his shoulders eases with the news. However, Ryan’s absence just means he could crop up like a weed somewhere else, most likely when Jeb needs him the least.
“Principle dammit.”
Kennet gives a grim nod, folding his arms. Calvin keeps vigil over the growing contingent of Reflectives behind them.
“How long?” Jeb gives him a sharp glance.
Calvin's brow knots, worry on every line of his face. “Five minutes or so.”
They need the wind at their backs from a jump. They should not be standing around, discussing the shit reflection offered by Lake Crystalline.
Slade and Gunnar approach, and Jeb automatically assesses them. Six feet, seven. Two hundred eighty pounds. IQ one hundred thirty-five. His eyes sweep to Slade. One hundred forty for him.
Jeb scowls; a smart enemy is a challenge.
“Picking us apart, Reflective?” Gunnar's inky eyes rake over Jeb.
He doesn't bother answering with a lie. “Yes. I am Reflective.”
“Save the spiel,” Slade says, raising a hand to ward off Jeb's words before he can utter them. “We both understand the esteem in which you all hold yourselves.”
His obvious disdain for The Cause makes Jeb's blood boil.
“Then you should understand how deadly serious we are about seeing The Cause through.”
Slade’s and Jeb's gazes collide. The Bloodling parts his lips with an almost-inaudible hiss.
Beth walks up with Maddie and Jacky. She looks between the two of them and says, “We don't have time for male posturing.”
Jacky points a finger at Jeb and Slade. “Yʼknow…”
“Quiet, Jacky,” Kennet says.
He flips his bangs out of his sweaty face, kicking a loose pebble toward the sludge of the shore. “If we had some more chicks here, there'd be enough hens to offset all the roosters. Yeah.”
Everyone ignores him.
“This is the best reflection we have.” Jeb looks at Gunnar, who jumped using rushing water, and cocks an eyebrow, asking silently for confirmation he can jump the group.
“For proximity,” Beth adds.
Gunnar shrugs. “It can be done, though it is blind water.”
Blind water means that the Reflective cannot see where it will take a jumper. Ascribing a human sense to an inanimate object is not uncommon, but it is odd to hear Reflective phrases and references coming from Gunnar the Bloodling. Judging from Beth's expression, his words strike her the same way.
“I'd give anything to go back to Earth,” Jacky comments sullenly.
“Too risky,” Kennet says, frowning. “Every Reflective who follow us can jump that in their sleep.”
“You guys just have the one lake on a shifter world?” Jacky asks in the general direction of the Bloodlings.
“Sector One,” Beth corrects automatically.
Jacky shrugs, tossing his long bangs again. “God. Okay, let's get this over with and get our asses kicked in the sandbox, because—yeah—it was so fun before.”
Maddie shyly takes Jacky's hand, and Gunnar's brows drop over his black eyes.
Jacky stares him down. “She's my friend, so back off.” Gunnar looks as if he’s about to say something. “She's not into violence. Ya dig? So there are no points for you vamping all over my ass. Just saying.” He scowls at Gunnar.
Jeb interrupts, “We need to jump or stay and fight.”
Gunnar silently walks to Beth and holds out his large hands. After a moment's pause, she slides hers inside his.
Jeb slides a finger through her belt loop, and Kennet places his hands on Maddie. Calvin does the same on Jacky.
Slade rests his hand on Gunnar's shoulder, and Jeb focuses all his anger on Slade.
His answering smile mocks Jeb.
Jeb looks away as familiar heat engulfs his feet. A slow smolder rises up his legs and flings itself to his extremities. He gifts his reflective energy to Beth, as do Kennet and Calvin. The power of the jump swamps their small party as it passes from person to person in a loop.
Jeb hears the Reflectives crashing through the brush that borders the lake, and he scoops out the last of his energy from deep inside, trusting Beth. Trusting her as one would a partner.
The water is suddenly much clearer. And Jeb's next breath is heat edged in ice.
His lungs buck at the familiar beginnings of the jump, then the lake rushes toward him—but not all of it, just the tips of the barest of the waves. Tired sunlight strikes their undulating movement and is refracted back at them.
Beth and Gunnar grab the shattered reflections and share the power among the ones who can't jump.
The noise falls away as the roar of the jump overwhelms the sound of Jeb's own blood pumping in his veins. Their collective power snaps like a finely honed instrument, and Jeb moves his hold from Beth's belt loop to her hip.
Fire and ice assail them from all sides, then they're falling onto the beach on One. He thought he'd never revisit the sector. Jeb's first searing breath chills, and on the second, he stands, taking in the view of a lake much clearer than Lake Crystalline. This one sparkles like captured diamonds.
“It's so pretty,” Maddie says, gazing around.
Gunnar moves up behind her and rests his hand at her neck with familiarity that Jeb doesn't like. “There is much beauty in this sector.”
Jacky snorts, and Maddie gives him a vague frown. “Listen, Mad, maybe vamp dude is kinda hot—I don't know—but this place”—Jacky gestures around him at the arid and mountainous region—“has got some bad juju.”
Her eyes dance nervously around them, as though monsters might tear out of the ground at their feet. “Is it worse than Papilio?” she asks.
Kennet, Calvin, Beth, and Jeb exchange looks full of mutual regret. There was a time when Papilio would have been hailed as the safest and most moral sector of all.
It's a claim they can no longer make.
“Yes,” Jeb says, because it's true. The Reflectives they left behind have lost focus without Rachett. Still, nightlopers and Bloodlings don't run rampant in his home world.
Jeb looks to Gunnar and Slade to defend their sector. But Jeb's earlier intellectual assessment holds true. Both Bloodlings are of superior intellect and avoid entering into a pissing match.
Gunnar tilts Maddie's chin up and looks deeply into her eyes. “It is true; Papilio is dangerous in a way it was not before. However, there are creatures here without code or honor.”
Slade's faces harden at the other male’s words, but he doesn’t deny it—because he can't.
“I want to go to Earth,” Maddie admits quietly, then sucks her lip between her teeth to quiet
its trembling.
Jacky jerks his arms dramatically, letting his hands slap his thighs.
Kennet gives him a look of warning.
Gunnar shakes his head slowly. “No, little hopper. The big bad hoppers will surely follow you there. Have they not discovered you are capable of jumping?”
Maddie appears too shaken by all the change to notice Gunnar's overt condescension, and she shakes her head. “No. I came to Papilio, Ryan went crazy, and I hid. I don't think anyone had time to identify what I was. And now, I'm not just a Dimensional. I'm a jumper—Reflective—whatever. And some blood thingy, too.”
Gunnar's brows pop. “A blood thingy?”
Maddie nods.
“Three lingo, dude. Catch up.” Jacky seems to consider, thumb to chin. “Or maybe just chick chat. Yeah.”
Jeb fumes. Threes.
“A hidden female Reflective in their midst,” Slade says thoughtfully, ignoring Jacky's sideline comments.
“So there's two of you?” Slade asks, glancing between Beth and Maddie.
Beth nods. “Madeline is untrained, and she has been through a lot for someone so young.” Beth doesn't expound on the atrocities of the young woman’s childhood.
“I hate to break it to you guys, and I shouldn't be the one thinking about our mutual protection and that, but I think we've got company. Time to move to plan B.”
Jeb whirls, and the air above the lake grows heavy, lit with obscure opaque vapor.
“They follow,” Gunnar says, eyeing the coalescence that precedes a jump.
“Someone is.” Maddie backs away from the lapping water.
“Come.” Slade sprints up the sand dune embankment.
Beth and Jeb look at each other, a silent hesitation gripping them both. In the end, they run after him. Jacky and the two Reflective warriors follow closely at their heels.
Gunnar swings Maddie onto his back with a stern, “Hold on.”
Seagrass-like fronds beat at Jeb’s pants as he moves swiftly up the incline and crests the hill.
Despite the uphill run, no one is panting. All the species are in top condition; even Jacky seems to flourish on One.
Together, they turn, checking to see who follows.
Jeb couldn't be more shocked.
“Oh, my Principle!” Beth cries, rushing pell-mell back down the embankment.
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