I can’t smell you.
Dawn needed a direction to point her canine nose.
The damned camper swayed, or Daisy’s body swayed, but in the shadowed recesses stuffed between the toilet and the bed waited a little propane-fueled, two-burner stove. And one of those long-nosed lighters. She’d seen it this morning, before she crawled into the passenger seat. In one of the cabinets. When she looked for dishes.
The camper hadn’t been swaying so much then.
Long-nosed and bright red, which was why she remembered it. Bright red like her fucking shirt and her fucking blood.
Daisy crawled over the seats and the damned mattress where the sex happened. Sex with that motherfucking monster Aiden. I’m going to kill him. Cut him the way he cut me.
A plastic plate fell out of the first cabinet she opened and hit her in the nose. She groaned and staggered backward into the bed.
She leaned against the mattress and rubbed the bridge of her throbbing nose, wondering why her brain couldn’t handle thinking through the sharp bleeding pain in her side, or the nausea, or the ache of her nose. She needed to open another cabinet. Other things would fall out. Because the camper broke.
Lighter. She needed the lighter.
A roll of paper towels smacked her in the face when she opened the next cabinet. The lighter, thankfully, had caught on a ridge and waited against the outer wall of the cubby.
Her fingers took longer to grasp the damned thing than they should have. And even longer to pull back the safety switch while pressing the trigger at the same time.
The mattress burned surprisingly well.
Daisy backed away. Her ass smacked against the driver’s seat. She breathed burning and ash. Chemicals and dust. But it didn’t mean anything.
She walked away as far and as fast as she could, but it wasn’t far enough. The waves and the distortions happened again. She dropped to the dirt, hearing the goddamned Texas buzzing, but not insects.
She’d at least gotten close enough to hear the road, even if the road couldn’t see her.
Chapter Seventeen
The sun melted Daisy’s eyelids together but she heard a dog barking and she smelled exhaust. Her fingers on her shirt felt sticky.
A shadow moved over her face, then another. Cinnamon and sandalwood and earthy goodness filled her nose. Daisy heard Dawn barking but she smelled beasts.
She forced open her eyes.
Two massive, shimmering, dinosaur-like heads swung above her face and body, with two sets of cat-like eyes. Both heads swiveled, both topped with ridges of bumps that twisted and curled along their long necks. Two spice-scented snouts sniffed at her face.
One massive six-taloned hand-claw touched her chest.
“Drag…” Daisy tried to point at the beasts circling her. “I see dragons.”
Both beasts vanished into the Texas glare.
Was the poison making her see things? Or the blood loss?
A tongue licked her cheek. A canine snout sniffed her ear. A paw touched her shoulder.
“Dawn?” Did her dog bring the dragons?
A small human appeared, backlit by the sun. Daisy remembered the halo of spiky blonde hair. The gruff attitude.
Small, familiar hands pressed on the cut across Daisy’s belly. A new pain erupted across Daisy’s skin and she groaned. Dawn licked her cheek again.
“What did he do?” Ivan asked.
Dawn brought that woman Ivan. The enthraller. The reason Daisy ran in the first place.
Fear pushed through the fog and made the pain sharper. Brighter. More all-encompassing. Fear and terror and dread because there’d be more invading. More poking and harassing. “Don’t…”
Dawn dropped to her belly next to Daisy’s head. She nuzzled Daisy’s chin and another cool lick flickered her skin.
“Dmitri’s coming. He’s a healer. You’ll be okay,” Ivan said. “We tracked you from the hotel lobby. We don’t have a good image of him from the security cams. He knew how to hide himself, didn’t he? Because he’s a Fate?”
Daisy would have pushed Ivan away, if her hand worked. “Don’t… enthrall me.”
The entirety of Ivan’s face rounded in shock. Her eyes, her cheeks, her mouth. Rounded so much Daisy saw it through the sun’s glare.
Ivan pressed on the cut again. “Is that why you ran? Because you thought I would enthrall you against your will?”
Yes. “Don’t enthrall me, please.” I’m dying. “Don’t…”
“I won’t.” Ivan’s lip twitched and an unreadable expression replaced the roundness. She pulled away, her hands coming off Daisy’s body. She stood, waving her arms in the air. “Dmitri! She’s over here!”
Ivan leaned over Daisy again. “What happened, Daisy?”
“Poison… cut… he’ll kill… if I confide…”
“We expected that. I can help decrease the pain.” Ivan breathed into Daisy’s mouth. “He’s a future-seer?”
The ache eased, but not the fog. “… yes…”
“What you feel you can tell us will be enough. We’ll find him without putting you in any more danger. We found you.” Ivan thrust her chin at Dawn. “She doesn’t have a fracture so Ladon and Brother-Dragon put her in their van. He says she went crazy when she saw the smoke from your camper.”
Dawn licked Daisy’s face again.
Dawn found her. But Aiden touched her. “… We…” Daisy’s fears bubbled out of her mouth. “I don’t… want to be… pregnant….”
Ivan’s unreadable expression turned hard and cold. The hot air around Daisy charged with a new, hotter anger.
Ivan sniffed. “You’re not. If you were, I’d smell it.” She glanced over her shoulder again. “He won’t touch you again. He won’t touch anyone again.”
But the little voice she should have listened to in the first place, the one that had told her to run, whispered again: Yes, he will. They weren’t going to find Aiden or Ethne or the other one, Fina. Not yet.
The Children of something she didn’t remember. Something very, very bad.
“Your father flew back to the States the moment you vanished.” Ivan pulled her hands away again.
A tall man dropped to his knees next to her side. Dark-haired with a classical jaw, his eyes gleamed so bright she saw their blue through the glare. “Is your mother’s name Cecilia Reynolds?” he asked.
He pulled a glove off one hand and pressed his palm onto the cut. Hot-like-a-toaster heat of a healing coursed into her belly.
“… Yes…” Daisy panted. Her mom was out there, somewhere. At the mercy of Fates.
Ivan whispered in the new man’s ear.
The concern on his face turned as hard and angry as Ivan’s had earlier. He nodded and his hand moved lower, to her pelvis. The heat happened again. Then higher and to the side, just under her ribcage.
“I am healing your liver so that it detoxifies the drug faster.”
“Thank you,” Daisy whispered.
More people appeared behind the man with the bright blue eyes. She recognized Ladon, but not the small woman with the black ponytail, or the handsome guy wearing a cowboy hat.
Dawn laid her head on Daisy’s chest and the man healing her patted the dog’s head.
“Who are you?” Daisy’s brain knew it should be able to connect a name to this man. But it couldn’t.
“My name is Dmitri Pavlovich.” The man kissed her forehead. “You are welcome in my home, daughter. Now and always.”
Chapter Eighteen
Branson, Missouri, six years and six months ago….
Daisy swirled her straw through the ice of her soda. The ice clinked against the glass tumbler and the brown liquid fizzed, but it smelled right. It smelled like The Land of Milk and Honey—slightly oceany. The air swirled with the usual heavy booze and fried foods. Outside, the winter air smelled more waterlogged than cold.
Ladon sat on the opposite side of the table from Daisy, dressed as usual in head-to-toe black. They were off in the corner near the b
ar, behind one of her father’s giant tanks of exotic fish, in the part of the bar reserved for the dragons and other “important people.”
The bar and the restaurant brimmed with loud locals tonight, but the staff kept the patrons out of this area. The ‘ignore the dragon’ floating in the air helped, too.
The beast stretched out along the floor in front of the tank. His hide mimicked the décor but not at a level so intricate he needed to vent his resulting heat as flame, and her shimmered softly in the light. Both dragons seemed quite captivated by Coco, her father’s mimic octopus.
Brother-Dragon flashed the little creature a new pattern. Ladon said he was trying to train her to mimic back. When she responded, the dragon raised his head and pointed before dropping tasty octopus chow into the tank.
Ladon shook his head and rubbed the top of his scalp. “No, you can’t have one.” He nodded to Brother-Dragon. “Every time we’re here, I explain that we can’t keep an octopus, but he keeps asking.”
Daisy grinned. “I guess you’ll just need to come by and say hello.”
Brother-Dragon raised his giant claw-hands. Yes, he signed in his dragon version of American Sign Language.
“Come visit me too, okay? I’m going to miss you and your sister, my dragon friend.” She pushed around the ice cubes in her soda again.
Brother-Dragon swung his big head around and nuzzled Daisy’s shoulder. We will visit, he signed before returning his attention to his little octopus buddy.
Ladon rubbed the top of his head again, messing up his already messy hair, and sniffed as if the thought of college smelled bad. “Why Minnesota?”
Daisy snorted. “It’s not the desert.”
“True.” He sat forward. “You’re going to be a full day’s drive away.”
He said it with the same concern she’d heard from her father when she told him she wanted to apply to the University of Minnesota. From Ivan, too. And also from AnnaBelinda and Derek.
There’d been the fretting and the “why not Missouri?” She’d explained that the U of M had one of the best veterinary schools in the country. And her father’s horses deserved only the best. There hadn’t been a lot of arguing after that.
“You did an excellent job training me, Ladon,” Daisy said. He had, too. Spent a full six months at The Land running her through hand-to-hand and weapons boot camp.
“I can take care of myself. Plus, Ivan’s helped me cope.” That fucker Aiden might still be out there but Daisy had found her strength again. “I want to do this. I think I need to be on my own.”
Ladon tapped the tabletop and he held his face tight the way she’d expect a big brother’s face to look the first time his little sister told him she was moving out. “If you need a ride north, just ask.”
Daisy sipped her soda. Spending a full day in a giant delivery-looking van with Mr. I-Wear-Only-Black and Mr. Brother-Dragon while listening to two millennia’s worth of advice about how to live on her own might get a little tedious. “I’m driving myself. Don’t have a lot to transport. Mostly Dawn and me.”
She wasn’t going north without her dog. Dawn’s presence calmed Daisy’s Fate-caused anxiety flashes just as well as Ivan’s targeted calling scents. “Plus, Dad’s activating me tonight. As my present for getting accepted into the U of M program.”
Ladon laughed and slapped the table. “I was wondering when you’d ask.” His eyebrow arched and he flipped a spoon between his fingers the way a magician would roll a coin. “You have plans?”
Activation increased all appetites, and feeling like crap around men during the time she was supposed to enjoy sex the most didn’t seem… smart. So she’d asked her dad to wait. The hedonistic splendor of becoming a Shifter should be experienced with fun and wonder, not apprehension and depression.
Her current boyfriend understood. They weren’t going to stay together when she left for Minnesota—neither of them felt their relationship would survive long distance. But she trusted him, and he’d agreed to help make the evening special.
“Yep.” She didn’t say more, though repressing a smile took effort.
Behind them, Brother-Dragon released a small flame.
“He says congratulations.”
“Thanks.” She’d miss The Land and the barns and the animals when she left. Dawn would miss the other dogs. But a new life called. “No matter what my abilities turn out to be, I’m going to study veterinary science. Dad wants me to run the operations someday.”
“Is that what you want to do?” Watching her closely, Ladon took a sip of his vodka tonic.
“Yes.” Daisy swirled her straw. “There’s more to life than killing Burners.”
Ladon laughed, but it came out slow and drawn. “Yes, there is.” His scent shifted slightly toward the flat, sour notes of sadness.
Ladon and Brother-Dragon still frightened her a little bit. Their presence always took more of her attention than it should. She was sure they were both acutely aware of her tiny fraction of agitation. It must show in her posture. Maybe in the pitch of her voice.
Everyone reacted to them like that. Except perhaps her father, and Ivan, and AnnaBelinda’s husband, Derek.
Sometimes she wondered about the lives of the long immortal. About the things Ladon and Dragon had seen. The hell her father and especially his cousin Derek had lived through. About Ivan’s many centuries. How they survived it.
Ladon nodded toward the beast. “We both wish you the best, Daisy.”
Maybe she’d grow out of her apprehension. All the long immortal she knew had. So Daisy reached across the table and squeezed Ladon’s hand.
“Thank you, my friend,” she said.
Maybe she’d grow out of all the feelings she no longer wanted.
She could hope.
Chapter Nineteen
The St. Paul campus of the University of Minnesota, now….
When Daisy said “The Fate took advantage of me,” she turned away from Gavin to unlock the front door of her house. He leaned forward and turned his head. He no longer saw her lips.
And he needed to know, for sure, what he heard. If the slightly higher pitch to her voice had been from her, or an artifact of his hearing aids. If she did, in fact, make a small hiccup, one he saw more than heard.
She stood perfectly still for an uncomfortably long moment, her hand on the doorknob and her other wrapped around Radar and Ragnar’s leashes.
She’d said three sentences as they strolled up the sidewalk: “I ran away from The Land because I was a stupid kid. Ended up getting used by a Fate.” And “He took advantage of me.”
Nothing more. Nothing else. No details. Then she looked over her shoulder and smiled.
Gavin’s heart sank. She obviously didn’t want to talk about how the Fate hurt her. Or she couldn’t. But it ate at her. It happened nine years ago and it still gnawed at her innards like bugs chewing through cardboard because her family never found the evil son of a bitch. He was still out there, somewhere.
It ate her from the inside out and she probably didn’t even realize it. She’d probably pounded it down so deep her mind considered it “healed.” But it wasn’t.
This, Gavin understood. This, he’d dealt with since his accident, nine years ago. That moment when a hit-and-run driver left his eleven-year-old self bleeding on the curb. When his younger brother lost his leg and Gavin lost a good portion of his hearing.
Daisy opened the door and let the dogs off their leashes. They both padded into the entryway, two mountains of puppy protection. Daisy watched them go.
Nine years, for both of them. Nine years of therapy and operations and guilt for him. For her, he didn’t know.
Gavin followed Daisy into her Craftsman bungalow at the edge of campus. Meticulously maintained, the house was probably worth ten times more than his family’s suburban home. But Dmitri Pavlovich wanted his daughter safe and comfortable.
Gavin followed her into the kitchen. When she dropped her keys on the showroom-quality granite countertop,
he picked up Radar and Ragnar’s water dish to rinse it out. She watched him rinse the dogs’ dish in the sink, but her eyes looked sadder than he liked. Sad and lonely and that emotion beyond anger. Not the coldness of a mind planning revenge. The emotion that happens after a body has exhausted all its capacity for rage.
The wonderful woman he called friend, the woman who had protected him from Burners and Shifters and Fates, looked burned out.
“Do you want me to stay for dinner?” He refilled the water dish and set it down. “I’ll order us pizza. We can watch television.”
“Sure.” Daisy pulled a container of the dogs’ food out of a lower cabinet.
Tails wagged and doggy butts bounced against the island. Gavin patted first Radar, then Ragnar, watching Daisy fill their bowls.
That son of a bitch Fate did worse than “take advantage of her.” His actions still made her crunch in on herself, even to this day. Gavin saw it in how she moved.
He couldn’t help her with the fighting. Or with the war. Couldn’t help any of the long immortal he knew.
But the damage that fucker did to Daisy? Someday, he’d help.
I promise, he thought. I can help you with this.
Chapter Twenty
Abilene, Texas, eight years ago….
The normals on the construction crews knew him as Vick. The Shifters knew his real name, his station, and why they needed to behave: Vivicus, the First Morpher, and the leader of the best and the brightest of the Shifters, the burning ones, the Seraphim. He would kill them where they stood if they messed with his opportunities.
On the sticky restaurant table, to the side of Vivicus’s plate of tasteless, dust-scented ribs, sat the latest report from the Abilene construction site. If he worked hard, rehabilitated the property, God would grant him an opportunity. One worthy of his efforts.
Because God always did.
The lights in this place made reading difficult for normals, which was one of the reasons he lunched here. No one pried. The report detailed his efforts to reinforce the buildings destroyed by Fates and Burners twelve years ago. Vivicus tapped a particularly annoying sentence suggesting his inability to make his property Fate-proof.
Bonds Broken & Silent Page 20
