by Sarra Cannon
“Thanks a lot,” Sera muttered. She grabbed the doorknob, breathing slowly in and out. It stood an inch open. She pulled it shut. Her heart beat too fast. Panic welled in her throat. She couldn’t do this.
A hand touched her back. She flinched away. Talon’s eyes widened. “Sera?”
She glared at him. Anger, frustration, pain didn’t even begin to describe this whirlwind of emotions. If she went in there with Talon, she’d explode on one of the men—her father or Talon. It no longer mattered. “I’m going in there alone.”
He took a step back. His face slipped into that damnable mask again. “We need this information, Sera.”
“I know.” Her nostrils practically snorted fire. “You can listen at the door and come when I call. But I’m facing my father by myself.”
Without another word, she pushed the door wide and stepped into the room. Flicking it behind her, she allowed it to close in Talon’s face. Her anger seethed, a living beast without restraint. The aggressive surge of emotion, the rage, startled her. She fought it down, settling for bitter sarcasm as her weapon. “So, miss me?”
“Serafina?” Senator Marsh rose from his chair, placing his glasses on the desk. His hand spanned across his striped red and black tie. A well of feeling fanned from his question. Too many to name. He hadn’t called her by her given name since she was a little girl. “Is it really you?”
Sera’s breath hitched. He looked old, far older than the way she pictured him from memory. His once jet-black hair had faded to a charcoal gray, offset by silver streaks. The dark suit he wore masked his gaunt frame, but the evidence of his weakened strength showed in his sunken cheeks and wrinkled brow. Bags drooped under his eyes as wide as the Okanagan Valley they’d love to hike and camp together when Sera was still a child.
“Yeah Dad.” She heard herself saying. Her rage replaced by some strangling emotion—one she didn’t want to face. “It’s me.”
“Oh thank gods.” He took three steps toward her and had his arms around her before she could think to push him away. “I’m so glad you’re alright. I was so afraid they wouldn’t understand. Wouldn’t protect you. After you didn’t return my calls, I feared the worst.”
As a wave of uncertainty threatened to choke her, she took a pointed step back from his embrace. “Thanks,” she whispered, unable to keep the bite from her voice. “But I’m fine.”
He moved away, giving her air, but his soft hazel eyes never left her face.
Sera’s breathing grew ragged under the scrutiny. Her hands drifted to her neck. Reaching for courage, she heard an echo flitter across her psyche. Buck up, pet. No time to wuss out. She crossed her arms in front of her stomach to ease the queasiness. Coldness steeled her nerves. She didn’t come for a reunion. She came for answers. “I think you know why I’m here.”
“Yes honey, I know.” His features softened. For a moment, he became the man she remembered, the father who had loved her.
Her breath stopped. A split second. That was all it took. Suddenly, the case, the murders, the phage, none of it mattered. The question she’d kept bottled up all these years rose to the surface, skimming the edges of her emotions. The wall around her heart crumbled. In a whisper that cut worse than a blunt knife she asked, “Why?”
“I didn’t want you to be hurt by my political obligations.” He straightened, his face revealing nothing.
“No,” she said. Her teeth clamped together so she nearly spat. “Not that. Not now. Eight years ago...” Her insides bled, raw. Nerves exposed. Her voice simmered low, not her own. “Why did you abandon me?”
He stumbled and fell into his desk as if she’d given him a physical blow. Tears gathered in her eyes. She blinked them away. Before he could speak, she sputtered on, “If you really cared about me, you wouldn’t have shipped me off to some boarding school in the middle of no where.” The memory from all those years ago played over and over in her mind—the look of disappointment in her father’s eyes, the way he’d silenced her from speaking about the accident, how he forbid her from ever using her powers, and the next day when he told her he was sending her away. Her soul felt afire, but her words cut colder than ice. “You left me. Your own daughter. You abandoned me.” She tasted nothing, her mouth dry. “How could you?”
“I never abandoned you. I cared about what happened. Why else do you think I’d send you away?” The light in his eyes died, replacing the hazel with a deeper brown. His shoulders sagged. “I had to bury the incident, the files. I used my influence at the police station to destroy the leads back to you. To ensure it looked like an accident. If anyone found out the truth, then they’d learn about you. I couldn’t risk it.”
“What about me? You don’t even know the truth. You wouldn’t let me say anything. I nearly killed Matt after he...” Her fury fell, stealing her strength. A pit of sorrow replaced it. She touched her stomach and shook her head to banish it. “It doesn’t matter what he did. All that matters is I set that fire. I burned him. I put him in a coma. And you sent me away.” Her heart leapt to her throat. “Maybe I deserved it.”
He moved toward her again. “Sera, of course not. You didn’t know what you were doing. I know you didn’t mean to hurt that boy.”
“You don’t know anything!” She shoved him hard. He staggered into the desk. Agony tightened her chest. “I meant to hurt him.” She struggled for breath and wiped the sweat from her forehead. Her voice rose high, but steady. “Do you even know what he did to me?” She pushed at the vision, refusing to give it power. It claimed her anyway. The night of the dance. Matt draping an arm over her shoulder. Rushing her to his car. Saving her from the crowd. Then after... “He was so nice to me. I wanted to make him happy. But it wasn’t right.”
Her father’s cheeks drew in as if he’d sucked them between his teeth. “Sera, honey, what are you saying?”
The nightmare continued on, a movie stuck in a loop. “I had to get him off me, so I let go. I used my powers. I burned him.”
“Did Matt,” a ragged exhalation escaped between his lips, “did he hurt you?”
Finally, she trapped the memory into its vault and shoved it to the back of her mind. “I don’t know.” She shrugged, refusing to make it harder. “It did hurt. I said no, but he didn’t stop.”
Her ears picked up Talon’s enraged footsteps from beyond the door. She knew he paced the hall just outside the office. He’d have heard every word with his shifter hearing and waited for her to call him inside. If he’d given even a small sign of his feelings after their night together, maybe she’d take comfort in him. But not now. Not how things were between them. No, she’d have to rely on herself.
Her father took another step closer, reaching out a hand to her. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“You told me not to talk about it, my powers, ever. You told me never to use them.” She wanted to take his outstretched hand, to feel comforted, loved. She crossed her arms instead. “I didn’t know how to tell you about Matt.”
Viciousness unlike she’d ever heard before seeped from her father’s mouth. “That son of a bitch should be dead, not in a coma.”
She blinked, shocked by his show of emotion. In all of their brief interactions over the years, he’d been stoic, calm. He hadn’t shown anger in...well, not since the day she left for that boarding school. “It doesn’t matter now. He’s suffered enough because of me.” She paused, unsure if she wanted an answer to her next question. “Why did you send me away?”
The lines on his forehead scrunched together. His words faltered. A deep sigh ripped from his abdomen. “After you used your power, I knew I had to hide you. Your mother warned me. I promised her—”
She gasped. “Mom? What did you promise her?”
“It was a long time ago.”
Not once had he initiated a conversation about her mother. All of the times she’d asked, all of the questions, she’d had to beg and plead for answers. He’d given her scraps. “Tell me.” She wouldn’t let him get away with half-truths
now. “Please.”
Another painful sigh shook him from head to toe. His eyes grew glassy. “When you were born, it was a difficult birth. Your mother labored for hours. The doctors told us you wouldn’t survive, but your mother knew she could save you.” He fell to a half seated position atop his desk. The strength drained from his body like a deflated balloon. “She passed on her powers to you. Then, her health started to fail, her organs giving out one by one. The doctors couldn’t understand it. She told me her essence and the link to her family would live in you.” Small beads of moisture coated his brow. Two teardrops fell from his eyes. “I didn’t know what that meant, but I tried to stop her. I pleaded with her to take it back, to let you die instead.”
Sera’s eyes widened at the admission, but she remained quiet. Her heart squeezed so tight. She couldn’t breathe.
Her father’s voice rose in a passionate outburst. His fist clenched in the air. “It was wrong, but I loved her so much. I didn’t want to lose her.” He dropped his fist into his lap. “She chose you as she should. As I should have. Then, she made me promise if you ever used your powers to hide you. To make sure no one discovered you, because if the wrong people found out, you wouldn’t be safe.”
She took a step closer. “Safe from what?”
“Your mother didn’t say. She only made me promise.” More tears sprang forth and dried on his cheeks. He looked at her with so much pain in his face. It sent chills across her skin as she struggled for air. His words whispered between them. “Oh, Sera, I’m so sorry. I blamed you for her death. I couldn’t even hold you in the beginning, but then you needed me. You were only a baby and I knew I’d been a fool.” He dropped his head and stared at the floor. “After you used your powers with that idiot boy, I was terrified of losing you too. I knew I had to get you away. I had to bury the report. It’s why I sent you to boarding school, had you change your last name to your mother’s, and encouraged you to go away to college.” He sunk lower. His back bowed. “It’s why I kept my distance. I thought if no one could connect your old life to your new one, then you’d be safe.”
“Why couldn’t you tell me?” She reached a tentative hand toward him. Her fingertips grazed his arm. “Why did you make me believe you hated me?”
With infinite slowness he raised his head, stared at her face, and wrapped his hand around her palm. “I never hated you, sweetheart. I was afraid for you. I love you more than anything.”
She jerked her hand back and held it against her chest. “You’ve treated me like a stranger all of these years. Every time I reached out to you. Every time I wanted to come home. You always pushed me away.”
“I had to honey.” His voice whispered lower, rougher. “I thought I was keeping you safe. It killed me not to tell you why.”
“Not even at my college graduation?” Tremors ran through her chest. A hollow ache in her heart.
“I was there.” He kept his gaze locked with hers. “I had to make sure I changed planes and lost possible trails. The same way I had your calls routed to disposable cell phones over the years.” A hint of the man she remembered, the former police chief emerged. She even detected a hint of his old cologne—earthy, sandalwood mixed with fresh cut grass. The scent reminded her of happier days, childhood. His spine straightened. “I couldn’t take chances, but I had to see you walk across that stage. I stood in the back row. I was so proud.”
She didn’t know how to respond. He’d been there. Her chest constricted, a spring about to burst.
Easy, pet. Don’t want to pop a blood vessel. Guy’s taunts sobered her.
“I’ve lived with a voice in my head for years. Never knowing if I should just check myself into a psych ward or what.” She bit her lip. “Now, you’re telling me you knew I had some link to my family, to mom, and you wouldn’t tell me?”
Her father’s body sagged once more. His hand waved helplessly. “I wanted you to have a normal life, not be worried about all this supernatural nonsense.”
Her temper flared. “It’s not nonsense! It’s who I am. It’s who mom was. She might have wanted me safe, but she would have wanted me to know the truth too.”
“Maybe.” His hand dropped. “It hardly matters anymore. I made a mistake running for office. I wanted to do things right.” He inclined his head at the nameplate on the desk—Senator Reginald Marsh. “But the political arena is a nightmare. Cutthroats everywhere, every facet of my life unveiled. Once I discovered your file had been unsealed, I knew I had to tell you the truth. I tried. I sent a recommendation to the PCD, so they’d discover the truth and protect you. I called you. I left messages.”
She coughed. “And you wonder why I wouldn’t talk to you?”
Bitterness coated his answer. “We’ve spoken a handful of times. I thought you’d take my call when I told you it was important.”
“Yeah, well, a lot of things have been important to me over the years, but you never seemed to bother.” She took a breath. “I wish you would have told me about coming to graduation.”
Silence reigned for two heartbeats, before he said, “I know.”
“Look, this is pointless. I get it, okay, I do. But we’re not going to magically come back together.” She pulled at loose strands of her hair. “Hell, it’s not even about us now. People are losing their lives, and whoever unsealed my file is a part of it.” She eyed the door. “I’m going to let Talon in now. He’s a PCD agent. I need you to tell him everything you know.”
“Sera, I’ll do whatever I can to make amends.”
“Good.” Walking to the door, she didn’t look at her father. She circled the knob. “It’s a start.”
Chapter 18
SENATOR REGINALD MARSH’S OFFICE, CALGARY, ALBERTA
“Talon, you can come in now.” Sera opened the door for him. Heaviness coated her like a second skin, dragging her down. A thick knot formed in his throat. Hearing her pour out her pain, recounting that nightmare memory to her father, ate at him. He craved to hold her, comfort her. He’d been an ass for pushing her away, no matter the reasons, especially when she needed someone in her corner.
Make it up to her, then. Could he? Talon rested a firm hand on her shoulder and squeezed lightly. She gave him a grateful half smile he didn’t deserve. It nearly undid him. He had to look away or he’d pull her into his arms and never let go. You can’t afford that. The old demons whispered in his mind. He shook his head. No time for it.
He shot Sera a weak grin in return, then spun and lanced her father with a lethal stare. Yellow bled into his irises. He could feel the color change as the wolf called to him. He kept his voice even. “Senator Marsh, we received an official recommendation for Sera to be added to our recruitment list from this office, from you.” He dropped his hand from her shoulder and stepped forward. The room shrank as his energy flared outward. “You wanted us to find her, but it wasn’t to recruit her. Was it?”
To his credit, the old man didn’t flinch. In fact, his knuckles turned white as he fisted them at his sides. “I assumed the PCD could handle protection of one young woman.”
The smirk that played along his lips shifted close to a predatory snarl. “Senator, I’m in no mood for games. My people have been trying to hunt down killers, the same criminals who may very well be after your daughter.” This time a growl escaped him. “We know the person in charge of these bastards is blackmailing you. Tell us who he is so we can end this.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” A fine sheen of sweat broke across the senator’s forehead.
Sera stirred at his side. “You said you sent them information on me to protect me, right? Well, who were you protecting me from?”
“I’m a political figure, Sera.” The senator wiped his forehead with the back of his hand. “I receive threats all the time, but,” he grunted like a wild hog, “a few days ago, I opened an envelope to see your old police record sitting inside. The only thing besides the file was a small slip of paper with a phone number on it.”
“A
nd when you called that number?” Talon’s patience rested on a fine edge. The shifter energy swam in his blood.
“The voice on the line was camouflaged.” The old man chewed on the words like acid in his mouth. “I’ve had my people on it since. They’ve hit nothing but dead-ends.”
Talon crossed his arms over his chest. “What did the caller want?”
“Simple really. I consent to put some of his people into positions of power, and he—”
“Or she,” Sera interrupted. Talon turned to her at the same time as the senator. Both men looked at her as if she’d grown horns. “What? You said the voice was garbled, so we don’t know. Could be he or she.”
Talon grinned. She’d make a hell of an agent. Pride in his— whoa, whoa not his. Cool it with that. He gave her a brisk nod. “Good point.”
“Yes, well...” Senator Marsh rested on the edge of the desk, looking older than his mere fiftyish years. “He, or she, agreed if I helped him place twelve of his people into various positions in the government, your file would remain sealed.”
“I take it you agreed then,” Talon said.
The fire that radiated from the old man’s countenance had Talon wondering if Sera truly inherited her flammable abilities from her mother’s side. The senator sure looked ready to combust. “Agent, I am not accustomed to caving to threats.” His eyes softened, however, as they shifted to Sera. “Especially not when they concern my family.”
“How about the names of the twelve potentials, got them?” The temperature in the room spiked another ten degrees. Talon pinched the bridge of his nose.
“I refused to play his games.” The old man flicked his wrist and stalked to the window. Unlocking it from the base, he cracked it an inch. Sighing, he turned back to them. “The N.U.A. government does not negotiate with criminals.”
“So, you have nothing.” He shook his head and snorted. “The blackmailer fails in his agenda and decides to up the stakes.” He dragged a roughened hand through his hair. “Perfect.”
