But the test results have thrown me for a loop, and I can’t figure any of this out. I’m more confused than ever, but there’s some innate part of me that says this is all bullshit and that I’m right to instantly disregard her claims.
Unless I get concrete, absolute proof that the same blood flows in her veins as mine, I’m not buying this crap.
“Alinthia is the Chosen One, and you can get the fuck out,” Maddox snarls, instantly jumping to my defense.
“Your obvious loyalty is commendable, but you’re not really sure about that, now are you?” She’s dropped the snooty, condescending look in favor of a more serious one as she scans the faces of my protectors, looking for unspoken answers to her question.
“If what you say is true,” Dane speaks in a calm, controlled voice, “where are your protectors?”
“The prophecy clearly highlights the Chosen One and her four hand-picked protectors and references the ceremony of light,” Beck supplies.
“There was a ceremony of light, and I had four chosen protectors,” Alandra explains. “But our connection was no match for the forces that have been hunting me for years. I only survived because they sacrificed themselves to save me.”
“They’re dead?” Coop asks, suspicion clearly evident in his tone.
“Yes.” Her serious face crumples for a second, and her eyes flood with emotion. I’m still freaked out looking at my face, yet it isn’t my face either—there are subtle ways in which we are vastly different. “The APGP had them killed.”
“Fucking bullshit,” Maddox exclaims, shaking his head. “If what you’re peddling is true, why the fuck would the Academy kill the Chosen One’s protectors?”
“Because the APGP is under the control of General Arantu, and they have been manipulating you for years. They want you to believe it’s Alinthia. They sent you on a wild goose chase around the galaxy all the while they have known exactly where she is. Instead, they had another team persecute me and my protectors, taking them out one at a time.” She buries her face in her hands, and her shoulders shake.
I’m highly dubious of her sincerity. Some inkling has been niggling at me for days, and the veil of dread I’ve felt recently hasn’t dissipated. While I’m sensing this is a setup, and I trust her about as much as I trust Jack, it could be argued that some of what she says appears to stack up. Zorc’s comments indicated that all is not as it seems with the APGP, and from what the boys have told me of their upbringing there, it’s not a wild stretch of the imagination to believe what she says is true. It would certainly explain a few things.
The boys are staring blankly at one another, and I know they’re discussing it in their heads. It infuriates me to no end that I can’t converse with them like that. Alandra’s dig at my failings hits hard. What if I am the least powerful sister? What if she really is the Chosen One? What does that mean for me?
I don’t know what to make of any of this, but one thing I am crystal clear on is the need to come clean with the boys. I have to tell them about the vision, and there is no time to delay.
“Can she leave now?” I speak up. “We need to discuss this, and I don’t want her here any longer than is necessary.”
She swipes her tears away, straightening up. “I can leave so you can discuss it,” she says, acting all agreeable and professional now. “But I refuse to leave town. I came here for a reason. I need your help.”
I snort. Can’t help it.
She narrows her eyes at me. “I understand your hesitancy, and I know it can’t be easy to hear you aren’t the Chosen One, but this is about the bigger picture. This is about our home and protecting millions of innocents in the galaxy. I’m being pursued, and I need protection.”
My nails dig into my palms. “They are my protectors, not yours. You can’t have them.” Even the thought has my blood boiling, and I don’t care how petulant I sound. They are mine. She is not taking them from me. Hot anger sluices through me, and my muscles lock tight. The tips of my fingers heat up, and a bolt of energy zips through my veins, supercharging my body from the inside. A layer of hazy red coats my retinas.
Alandra’s eyes pop wide, and she takes a few steps back, moving away from me.
“Hey, beautiful.” Coop slides his arm around me, pulling me back against his chest. “Take a few deep breaths for me. In and out. Nice and slow.” He rubs his hands up and down my arms until the anger tails off and the power lurking beneath the surface of my skin fades to a tingly sensation keeping my body on low alert.
Alandra composes herself quickly. “We are all working toward the same goal, Alinthia. I’m not asking to take them from you”—for a second that condescending sneer is back, until she reins it in—“just that we work together to defeat our enemies.” She shoots one last, lingering look in Dane’s direction. “Think about it. I’ll be in touch.”
And then she’s gone, vanished in the blink of an eye.
I release the breath I’d been holding.
“You getting ready to fireball her ass over us was super-hot, beautiful,” Coop says, and I know it’s his way of attempting to defuse the tension.
“Not now, Coop.” Dane rubs a tense spot between his brow. “This is a fucking nightmare.”
“She can’t hear us, can she?” I ask, wondering about the level of her skillset.
“Not while we’re in here,” Beck confirms. “I have a blocking shield protecting the house, the outbuildings we use, and the grounds in close proximity to the house. She couldn’t hear this conversation unless she was inside with us.”
“How do we know she didn’t just teleport to another room?”
Beck taps on his tablet, holding up an image. “See this map of the house?” I nod, squinting at the screen and the five red dots in the living room. “This is us, obviously, and there are no heat signatures anywhere else, so she’s not here. You can relax. She’s definitely gone.”
I massage my temples. “I won’t relax until her skanky ass is over the other side of the galaxy.”
“I’m with you,” Maddox says. “I’m not believing any of that garbage. It was all too much of an act, and did you notice how quickly she changed from sleazy to serious? Nah. I’m not buying that pile of horseshit she just fed us.”
“I’m not buying it either,” Dane says, “but how can she look like Alinthia if she isn’t shape shifting? It can’t be a coincidence.”
I clear my throat, needing to get this off my chest before I chicken out again. “I have something I need to tell you all. Something I should’ve told you weeks ago, right after the attack at the barn, just when it happened.”
Dane’s eyes dart to mine, flashing dangerously. He clenches his jaw so tight I fear he’ll give himself lockjaw. I stand straight with my shoulders back, holding a confident poise as I spill my guts, telling them about the awful vision that accosted me during the attack at the barn. I also tell them what Arantu said the second time he pulled me to the dream realm and the insinuation that I’m his daughter. They say nothing as I speak, but I watch a myriad of different emotions flickering across their face, and I feel all manner of feelings flooding our connection.
I’ve disappointed them and raised doubts. That’s a natural reaction given the circumstances, and I’m hoping once they come to terms with it, they’ll come around. Cooper is more accepting than the others, and I wonder why that is. He squeezes my hand in a show of support, and I’m grateful, if a little confused. Perhaps his guilt over what happened with Alandra is allowing him to be more forgiving of my failings.
“I fucking knew it!” Dane yells when I finally finish speaking. “How many times did I ask you to tell me what you were hiding, and you deflected?!”
I’ve seen Dane mad before, but this is nothing like that. He is a walking ball of rage as he paces the floor, clenching and unclenching his fists.
“I’m sorry. I was scared to tell you. Scared you would doubt me and become fearful of me.”
“Well, you were fucking right!” he roars, putting h
is face in mine. “How the fuck can we trust you when you keep something like this from us!?”
“I’m telling you now,” I say meekly.
“Yes,” he sneers. “How convenient. Alandra shows up claiming to be the real Chosen One and you produce this story as evidence of what exactly?”
“I’m not sure,” I say, my voice faltering along with my confidence.
Dane throws his hands in the air. “Well, that’s real helpful.”
None of the others are saying anything, and that makes me nervous. “I was planning on telling you tonight anyway.”
He scoffs. “Sure you were.”
“Read my emotions. What do you detect?” I’m hoping my remorse and my regret comes across and that it translates as honesty.
“You shouldn’t have kept this from us,” Maddox says, and I detect the noticeable strain on his face. “And I’m disappointed you didn’t confide in me, but I can understand it too, to an extent; however, we’re supposed to be a team, and—”
“A team can’t function without honesty and trust,” Dane finishes for him. “And you’ve just shaken this team’s foundations to its core.”
“Dane,” Coop interjects, stepping around me to face his brother. “She made a mistake, but she was telling the truth, and we can’t allow it to distract us from the real issue here which is Alandra and what her agenda is.”
Dane scrutinizes his brother’s face. “Why are you not more shocked at this?” He cocks his head to the side. “Is it because it helps offset your mistake, your guilt, for fucking around with Alandra in the woods? Or because you already knew?”
My heart starts pounding in my chest. Coop was asleep when I spoke with Kylie about this, wasn’t he?
A muscle ticks in Coop’s jaw.
“Cooper?” Beck moves over to Dane’s side. “Is Dane correct? Did you know about this already?”
Air whooshes out of Coop’s mouth, and he drags a hand through his perfectly styled blond hair, messing it up. He casts a helpless glance over his shoulder at me, and a flurry of butterflies descend on my chest.
Holy shit.
“That was you at Kylie’s house? I thought someone was watching—it was you?” His eyes plead for forgiveness, but, in all honesty, there isn’t anything to forgive. I feel like the biggest piece of shit for putting him in that position. He lied to his brothers to protect my secret, and he didn’t even let on that he knew or try to persuade me to fess up. I’d like to know why, but it’ll have to wait—Dane is about to go nuclear on his ass.
Coop faces his brother with a steely look. “Yes, I knew. I woke up and Alinthia was gone so I followed her to Kylie’s, and I overheard the tail end of her conversation where she talked about the vision.”
Dane is puce in the face, and I’m legitimately worried he’s going to have a coronary. If we’re even capable of having one. “You concealed this from us? You should’ve come to me the minute you found out!” Dane roars.
“I know, but I knew Alinthia would confess, and I didn’t want to force her hand until she was ready to explain it. I heard her say she was scared, but I knew she’d do the right thing.” He turns to me. “And I didn’t believe it either. Not for one second.”
Wow. He clearly has more faith in me than I do, because I’ve sat on this for weeks wondering if I’d ever summon the courage to tell them.
“And, maybe now we know why,” he adds.
Dane pinches the bridge of his nose, pacing back and forth across the floor. You could cut the tension in the room with a knife.
“I’m really sorry I didn’t open up about this straightaway.” I could offer up some excuses that are plausible, like I didn’t exactly trust them at the time because they’d concealed important stuff from me too, and my dad just died, and I was in shock over what went down at the barn, but that will only serve to infuriate Dane more, and I need him to calm down so we can dissect this and try to figure it out. “And I know your trust in me is shaken, but I was scared it might be true, and I didn’t want to look into your faces and see doubt there.”
Dane harrumphs. “It’s a bit late for that, sweetheart.”
I gulp over the ginormous ball of emotion clogging the back of my throat. “I don’t blame you for doubting me now, and I know the timing seems suspicious, but you know me.” I skim a look at all their faces. “You all know me well enough by now to know when I’m telling the truth. My emotions tell you how I’m feeling. I … I love you all, and the thought that that might actually be a vision of the future, it sickened me. Because I can never imagine doing anything to hurt you, let alone kill you.”
“You have hurt us, and now you even have our brother lying to us.” Dane is practically spitting blood. “How is it you are supposed to unite us when it feels like you are ripping us apart?”
“That was never my intention, and that’s not how I see it. You’re the one who has deliberately kept me at arm’s length.”
“For good fucking reason! This only proves it.”
“Dane, you need to calm down.”
“Shut. Up. Coop. You’ve done enough damage.”
Ignoring the splintering in my heart, I forge on. “What if Alandra is my twin? And what if it’s her in the vision? What if that’s the real reason she is here. She said it herself—she’s alone and she needs protecting. What if that’s her intention? She wants to take you away and leave me exposed, and all this other stuff she’s saying is a smokescreen to hide her true agenda?”
“That’s what I was alluding to, and you’ve got to admit it’s plausible,” Coop says, eyeballing Dane.
“Or convenient,” Dane retorts.
“Use your insight,” I tell him. “What’s it saying?”
The look he gives me sends shivers down my spine.
He puts his face into mine again. “That you can’t be trusted,” he responds in a low, menacing tone. “That we were fools to trust you in the first place.”
CHAPTER 31
I leave the room without uttering another word. I’ve said what I needed to, and now I need to give them space. Self-revulsion and fear accompany me as I return to my bedroom to change. The sharp ache in my chest is like someone speared my heart straight through the middle. I don’t blame Dane for his reaction; genuinely, I don’t. I was an idiot to keep this hidden for so long. Kylie warned me not to do it, and I didn’t listen to her. I have no one to blame for this fuckup but myself. And I’m terrified now that Alandra will use this to her advantage. I’m shocked Coop kept it a secret, but his belief in me is the only thing stopping me from breaking down right now. I’ve got to hope that the others will come around once they’ve had time to get over the shock. It can’t be easy hearing I’ve had a vision of the future where it looks like they might die.
If only I had looked at it from their perspective earlier. I should have told them if there is even a chance that it might be true. To at least give them an opportunity to prepare, to be on guard for any signs or symptoms that might lead them to believe I’m the girl in the vision.
I remove my dress and kick off my shoes, watching numbly as they fly across the room. Coop didn’t even get his dance, his one normal high school dating experience. I even failed at that. Unclipping my hair, I stand in front of the mirror, detesting the sight of myself. Maybe Alandra is right. Perhaps she is the Chosen One, and I’m the fraud.
And now I have to visit my ex and try to explain everything to him. In an effort to keep Jensen protected, I’ve only made him a target. Dane was right—we should have left Eaton Lake the instant the guys showed up and explained who I was. But my selfishness ruled supreme, and now I’ve placed everyone I love at risk.
I pull on jeans and a comfy sweater, and I’m lacing my sneakers when Coop knocks on my door. I know it’s him, because he always raps three times in quick succession.
And because he seems to be the only one really speaking to me right now.
“You can come in,” I call out, and he opens the door.
“Hey.”
>
I lift my head up. “Hey.”
He sits down beside me, unraveling his tie and tossing it on the bed. “It’s going to be okay. They just need time to process it.”
“I don’t think Dane will ever forgive me for this or ever trust me. He’s always had his doubts, and I don’t think he’ll get over this. Maybe he’s right not to. I shouldn’t have kept it a secret.”
“You made a mistake, but the most important thing is you told us now.” He runs his fingers through my hair, helping untangle the strands.
“I can’t believe you kept it from them too.”
“I told you before that my gift is a curse sometimes. Now you know what I mean. I overheard something I shouldn’t, and I was conflicted over what to do. I’m loyal to my brothers, but I’m loyal to you too. I was pissed at you at first,” he says, and I remember the cryptic conversation we had that morning while we were making coffee, “and shocked, but, for once, I didn’t overreact. I let it stew, and when I’d processed all my emotions, it boiled down to one thing.” He kisses my forehead, and I look up at him expectantly. “I trust you, Alinthia, maybe more than you trust yourself.”
“That wouldn’t be very difficult right now. I pretty much hate myself in this moment.”
“Don’t, beautiful.” He puts his hand on top of my sweater, right in the place where my heart is. “You’re good in here, Alinthia. You have a good heart, and you care about others. Your actions attest to that. Plus, we all feel your emotions and we’ve learned to read your expressions. We’ve watched over you, and lived with you, and you’re not a bad person. Not at all. My brothers know this, too, and I trust and believe in them as well. Give them a little time to think it all through, and they’ll tell you the same things I am.”
I snake my arms around Cooper, inhaling his scent and his warmth. “I love you, Coop.” I hug him fiercely. “Thank you for believing in me when I didn’t even believe in myself.”
“That’s what you do for someone you love.” He rubs his hand up and down my back and it’s amazingly soothing. “You remind them of who they are when they most need to hear it.”
The Secret Heir (Alinthia Series Book 2) Page 22
