by Maia Dylan
Chapter 3
“Jesus, Parris,” Rhys grumped with a frown. “I just can’t fucking read you at all. Are you playing me for a sucker or not?” Rhys sighed as he squinted at the board in front of him, trying to determine if what he was seeing was real or not. “Quixotry? Really? I only have the one challenge left, but I am pretty damn sure that is not a word. All right, I challenge you, give me the goddamn dictionary.”
With a devilish grin, Parris handed him the pocket dictionary, and Rhys felt his heart flutter a little at the small smile she gave him. Damn, she was so damn beautiful that she had him almost star struck. It had been just over a week since they had found her behind their shed, and she had spent that time in the hospital under Chris’s care.
“It comes from the word quixotic, which means being foolishly impractical especially in the pursuit of ideals. It is defined by rash, lofty romantic ideas or extravagantly chivalrous actions.”
Parris’s voice had his heart stuttering again. The first time she had ever said his name, Rhys had felt the bottom slide out from his world, and this beautiful woman became the center of it.
Grinning, Rhys flicked through the pages of the dictionary, fighting to keep the desire he could feel building within him at bay. He and Jase had both agreed that they would take their time and allow Parris to get to know them, despite how difficult not letting her see what she meant to them was.
When they had got to the hospital on the day they found her, Melaina had already been there. After what Ty had told them about her, Rhys had assumed that there would be an argument and a fight for them to stay by Parris’s side. It hadn’t exactly turned out that way. Melaina had waited until they reached her in the hallway outside the examination room where Chris was seeing to their mate.
Melaina Christakos was a beautiful woman, with long dark hair that she wore in a thick braid over one shoulder. She had electric blue eyes that seemed to track them as they made their way toward her. Rhys was prepared to lay money on the fact that she knew where everything and everyone on that ward was. She was tall, at least six foot, and built in a way that would normally have Rhys showing more than just a passing interest. But since he’d met Parris, Rhys’s interests were now completely focused on her.
The look on Melaina’s face had them both stopping in front of her. It was not so much what the look told them, but it had more to do with the fact that her eyes changed right in front of them, but not in the way of a shifter that they were familiar with. This was something different. It looked as though her pupils simply ballooned and covered her irises, making her normally bright blue eyes appear almost black.
Melaina stepped right up to them and never took her gaze from them. “Parris is awake and talking with Dr. Carson. She is about to undergo a barrage of tests, and despite her courageous exterior, I know she’s scared, and this puts me in an awkward situation as I have to leave town for a few days in the morning. So, before I allow either of you to take even one step into that examination room and introduce you to a woman I consider my sister, I have a couple of questions that I need to ask you both.”
Jase gave a curt nod, and when she turned and stared directly at Rhys, he also nodded.
“When I was speaking with Ty on the phone earlier, one of you mentioned that Parris was your mate, is that correct?”
“Yes,” Rhys answered honestly at the same time as Jase.
Melaina’s eyes seemed to narrow, but the eerie darkness that seemed to swirl within them never altered. A few seconds later, she nodded as if satisfied with something. “Good. You should know that Parris has not had an easy life, not through any fault of her own. She has simply been the victim of circumstance and has had to endure a lot of shit from people. She carries a lot of scars, both physical and psychological. Can you both deal with that and help her to heal?”
Despite the concern and anger Rhys felt rising within him on hearing about their mates scars, he and Jase said yes at the same time again. “Can you tell us what happened to her?” Rhys asked quietly, wanting as much information as he could get on their mate so he could do exactly that. Help her heal.
Melaina frowned, and despite the odd change within her eyes, Rhys saw them fill with sadness. “That is not my story to tell. Parris is a unique individual who gives one hundred percent of herself to people that she trusts. Gain her trust, and she will tell you her story. Last question. As she is your mate, would you die for her? Protect her from anything and anyone?”
Rhys frowned at that question but again answered honestly. “I would protect her with my life.”
“Melaina,” Jase said and then waited until she turned her complete attention on him, “we have only just met Parris, but the Quickening hit and told us everything we need to know about her. She is ours, as we are hers. We will allow nothing and no one to hurt her.”
A few seconds after that declaration from his brother, Melaina blinked, and her eyes returned to their normal blue. “Thank you both for answering those questions honestly. I’ve only been aware of shifters for a little over a month now, since I—well, let’s just say got to know my sister’s mates. Until that moment, I thought that the only true paranormal aspects of this world were the produced in laboratories at the whim of crazy assholes.”
Rhys shot a quick, confused glance at his brother and saw that Jase wore the same expression. There was a story there, too, he was sure of it, and Rhys for one would dearly love to hear it. “That’s fine, Melaina. It’s obvious that you care about Parris. We do, too. We just want to make sure that she’s okay and then be here for her if she needs us.”
Melaina frowned and tilted her head slightly as if the concept of caring was unusual. “I-I guess that works out fine then. I need to ensure that Parris is not left unprotected in my absence. Despite everything in me telling me to trust no one, I am stuck between a loaded gun pointed at my head being held by a man with a hair trigger and a hard place. Parris is going to need people who can care for her while she gets better, and she will definitely require protection until I can…fix it so that she’s safe.”
Jase reached out a hand and stopped her with a hand on her right arm just as she was about to turn to walk into the examination room behind her. Rhys’s jaw dropped open when, in a move that was faster than he had ever seen a human move, Melaina had Jase’s wrist in her left hand, and she had turned it, twisting it at an angle that was sure to hurt, while with her free hand, she braced against his shoulder for extra leverage.
The three of them stood frozen like that for a few moments. Rhys knew that Jase could have broken the hold easily given his shifter genes, and judging by the blue flashing in his eyes, his wolf did not like being forced to hold back.
Rhys raised his hands to show he meant no harm and stepped forward, figuring her would need to finesse the moment a little. “Melaina, I know that Jase can be a prick sometimes, and I have bloodied his nose on more than one occasion for being one, but he would never lay a hand on you, or any woman, for that matter, in anger.”
Melaina dropped the hold and stepped back a moment later, allowing Jase to stand and turn so that he faced her again. His eyes were no longer flashing.
“I know you don’t know us or have any reason to trust us,” Jase said as he, too, raised his hands in a nonthreatening manner. “But from the conversation you and Ty had this afternoon, you’ve known him for a while. Men in his pack were raised right. Hell, if our mother thought we so much as made you even think we were about to physically hurt you, she would take us out back and rip us a new asshole.”
Melaina barked a laugh at that, and the shock on her face had Rhys fighting to hold back a wince. This was a woman not used to laughing.
“Sorry, Jase, but the men in my life have always used physical means to get their message across. I hope I didn’t hurt you.”
Jase frowned. “No, you didn’t hurt me, but I would dearly love to meet the men in your life to show them how to communicate better. This brings me back to why I wanted to stop you before
we head in to see Parris. You said you were going to fix things so that Parris remained safe. I was simply going to offer you help to do that. If you ever find yourself in need of assistance”—Jase reached into his back pocket and pulled out one of their business cards—“call us. We’ll be there.”
Melaina had smiled gently at the offer and tilted her head slightly in acknowledgment. Rhys didn’t think she thought much of the offer, and he had a pretty good idea that she was not going to them up on the offer.
“Did you find it?”
Parris’s silky smooth voice brought him out of his thoughts, and he looked up into her expectant face. Damn, she was beautiful. Shaking his head to clear the lust, he scanned the page he had been looking at and found the word he had been searching for.
“Shit,” he groused, “it exists. Quixotry. It is defined as behavior inspired by romantic beliefs without regard to reality.”
Parris giggled, and Rhys shifted to ease the pressure on his rapidly swelling dick.
“Ha! You should have trusted me. Would this face lie?”
Rhys laughed at the innocent expression Parris attempted but couldn’t pull off given that she was still grinning like a cat that caught the canary. “So that gives me a total of one hundred sixty-eight points and puts me well and truly in the lead. You have no chance, and I win. I remain the Scrabble champion of the world. You may bask in my awesomeness and hope that some of it rubs off on you.”
Rhys laughed as he helped to clear up the Scrabble game pieces and then placed it in the cupboard beside her bed. As soon as Jase had found out their mate loved the game, he went straight to the hospital gift store and purchased the game. They had enjoyed getting to know her over the past week over the game.
The afternoon Melaina had introduced them, Parris had been guarded, but both Jase and Rhys sensed the moment the mating bond fell into place for their mate. Her breath rate had increased, and her beautiful deep-green eyes had darkened. Rhys had bit his lip to hold back a sound of need when she pressed her bottom lip between her teeth. When Melaina mentioned that she had to leave Grey River for a task, which was the exact word that she used, one that Rhys still found a strange choice, Parris had started to get up from the bed to go with her.
It had taken all three of them to convince her that she needed to stay where she was. Melaina had to promise Parris that she could trust him and Jase, and she had to swear that she was coming back. Now, over a week late, Melaina had yet to return and Parris was starting to get worried. He could tell because she would get this little frown on her face, she would start nibbling on her bottom lip and her eyes would turn troubled, just as they were now.
“Hey”—Rhys slid a finger beneath her jaw and gently pulled her gaze up to his—“Melaina will be back soon. She told you she would, right?” Parris looked into Rhys’s eyes, and he felt as though she might be able to see right through to his very soul. “And has she ever broken a promise to you?”
Parris shook her head and sighed gently.
“And she’s not about to start now. It’s obvious this task is taking a little longer than she wanted, but she’ll be back, little one.”
The door to the room swooshed open, and Jase strode in carrying a tray laden down with the spicy fruit smoothies from the Country Blue restaurant down the street they had discovered their mate adored. Jase’s face filled with joy when he looked at Parris, and Rhys knew he had it bad.
“You have it just as bad, asshole,” Jase snarled to him down their link without his expression changing. Rhys couldn’t argue with that.
“Hey, sweetness,” Jase moved toward the bed, leaned down and pressed a kiss to Parris’s forehead. Rhys heard her slight intake of breath and the way her hands tightened on the bed sheets. “You look beautiful today. How are you feeling?”
* * * *
Parris felt a gentle heat sweep across her cheeks at Jase’s compliment, and she fought the urge to look away. She was not used to compliments, but these two heaped them on her so consistently that she was starting to get used to them. She didn’t blush as hard as she had a week ago, but there was definitely still a sweep of heat.
Parris reached for the blended pineapple-and-coconut smoothie she had come to love. “Thanks, Jase. These things are almost criminally good.” She took a few long draws from the straw in the top of the takeaway cup, closing her eyes to savor the explosion of flavor from the drink, and moaned at the delicious taste of it. When she was in danger of an ice headache from consuming the icy-cold beverage to fast, she let the straw slip from between her lips and opened her eyes with a sigh of pleasure.
Then she froze.
Both Rhys and Jase were staring at her, and their eyes had started flashing between their usual dark brown and a bright blue. Parris gasped and sat back. Were they enhanced like she, Pepper, and Melaina were? Whenever they used their abilities, it affected their pupils, making them appear dilated to the point of completely covering the iris. She had never actually seen an eye flicker between two colors before, though. No, these men weren’t enhanced. They were something…different.
“What are you?” she whispered, her apprehension clear in her tone.
The brothers both seemed to wince and the blue flashing their eyes had been doing stopped. They shared an intense look, and Paris acted on a hunch and pushed into their minds. Agony ripped through her at the move, and she locked her jaw against the scream that threatened to let loose.
“So we are in agreement, we tell her the truth.”
Jase’s voice sounded clear in her head, each word like the slice of a knife within her skull.
“Yeah, Ty has already declared it legal to tell mates, so yeah, we should tell her,” Rhys answered.
Parris could hold the link no more. She disconnected and fell back against her pillows gasping for air, closing her eyes against the light in the room, and fighting a wave of nausea.
She could hear movement and voices around her, but she ignored them and focused her attention on breathing through the pain. After a few moments that may have actually been hours, she cracked her eyes opened and took another deep, shaky breath. The coppery tang of blood that tinged the air had her frowning.
“Parris, can you hear me?” Dr. Carson’s tone was calm and unhurried. “I need you to open your eyes and talk to me.”
Parris pushed aside nausea and pain and opened her eyes farther. She blinked rapidly to clear her gaze and slowly brought the doctor’s face into focus.
“That’s it, come on back to us, sweetness.”
Parris turned her head slightly and caught sight of Jase and Rhys standing close to her bed on the opposite side to the doctor. They stood with mirrored expressions of concern mixed with relief, no doubt from seeing her awake.
“Parris?”
She turned back toward the doctor, thankful that the room was no longer spinning as fast as it had been moments before.
“Tell me how you feel?”
Parris sighed. “Other than a headache that could quite potentially put a hippopotamus on its ass, I’m just peachy.”
Chris grinned as he shone a small penlight into her eyes. She winced at the twinge of pain the light caused but froze at the sound of growling that echoed against the walls of her hospital room. Chris winked at her before he lifted his gaze to the two men growling—fucking growling—from the opposite side of the bed. “Ignore these two, they just don’t like the fact that you’re in pain.”
“No fucking kidding,” Rhys snarled, and there was a distinct distortion to his voice.
Again Parris found herself wondering what in the hell they were. And if Rhys and Jase were both telepathic and had powers that had their eyes changing colors, then perhaps Chris Carson did, too. Melaina had told her she could trust everyone here and that they had nothing but her safety and best interests in mind, but did she know they were kinda possessed?
“You’ve had another seizure,” Chris informed her, and Parris knew it was a result of her using her powers. “You had a pretty
severe nose bleed, that I figure was triggered by the blood vessel that was damaged during the seizure itself. Now, you need to make a decision, Parris. We’ve talked about this in private since I admitted you a week ago, and without any further incidents, I haven’t pushed you to let Rhys and Jase in on what is going on with you. However, this last seizure was a doozy, and without Melaina here, you are going to need the support I know these two growling knuckleheads can give you but only if you are open and truthful with each other.”
Chris looked up at stared pointedly at Rhys and Jase. “And only if all of you are open and honest with each other. That means you two bastards are going to have to man up and tell this woman what she needs to know. Now, I’m going to head out and grab some of the test results I’ve been waiting on. I will be back here in about fifteen minutes.” With that cryptic message to the room, he swept out the door.
Jase reached over and clasped her hand in his. When she met his gaze, she felt a connection within her start to pulse.
“Sweetheart, are you okay? You scared the shit out of us.”
Parris looked between him and Rhys and could read the fear they had for her clearly in their expressions. Before leaving, Melaina had told her to trust these men, and Chris had basically just said the same damn thing. Taking a breath, she opened her mouth and took a chance. “I’m dying.”
* * * *
Jase felt his heart crack open and start to bleed at hearing those two words. Down the familial link he shared with his brother, he could sense the same deep, guttural pain coming from Rhys. She was dying?
“What do you mean ‘you’re dying’?” Jase asked his voice flat, devoid of all emotion as he fought to stay in his human form and keep his wolf from forcing the change.
Parris shuffled back in her bed, got comfortable, and gestured for him and Rhys to do the same. Rhys moved swiftly to the other side of her hospital bed, and they both sat down on the edge. Jase knew she was using these moments to gather her thoughts.