by Lena North
“Yes,” I said with a wide smile.
“I’m going to ask you a few questions, Mary, and you’ll think I’m rude. Please… just answer me.”
“Okay,” I said as I sat up slowly, although my gut clenched because she looked serious.
“Did you sleep with Kit?” she asked.
“What? No!” I said, angrily, but she put a hand on my arm, and I leaned back again.
“I feel like an idiot for asking, Mary, but… Olly?” she said.
She thought I’d slept with… Olly?
“No, of course not,” I said. “Why –”
“Okay,” she exhaled. “You know I still do research on the crystal that Wilder found in the mountains, right?”
“Yes,” I replied, completely confused.
“I lied to Hawker,” she whispered, and I felt my brows go up. “I told him there was no energy in the crystal, but there is. Lots of it. There’s only one problem…”
“What?” I snapped, getting impatient with her.
“It’s linked to the connections they have with their birds, Mary. It only shows on my instruments when one of the guys who have a link to the birds is close.”
“Okay,” I said.
“Today the energy levels spiked beyond anything I’ve seen before. When you walked into my lab,” she said.
I blinked.
“I don’t have any link to a bird.”
“I know,” she said and smiled gently. “But you’re pregnant, Mary, and your baby does.”
I heard a strangled sound behind me and turned. Dante and his friend Daniele stood there and stared at us.
“I can’t be pregnant,” I told them, turned to Jinx and repeated myself, “I can’t be pregnant. We only had twenty-four hours, how –” I cut myself off because it was such a stupid question, and I knew the answer.
“It only takes once,” Dante snorted.
“Seven,” I murmured.
“What?” both men asked at the same time.
“We were going on number eight when Kit walked in,” I said and turned to Jinx. “This can’t be normal?”
“Hell, no it isn’t normal,” Dante snapped.
I blinked.
“What?” I asked weakly.
“That’s once every three hours around the clock, and the man isn’t exactly fifteen,” Daniele said with something that I thought sounded like awe in his voice.
“Wh –”
“He’s not that old, you know. He’s only thirty-four,” Jinx murmured.
“I’m thirty-four too and I couldn’t…” Daniele hesitated, and then he glanced at Dante. “Maybe I should –”
“It can’t be normal,” I repeated.
My mind was spinning, and they were busy talking about Miller’s sexual prowess, which as awe-inspiring as it apparently was, really was beside the issue.
“What are you talking about, Mary?” Jinx asked. “Did he do something –”
“God!” I shouted. “The sex was normal,” I added, “But it was four days ago. How can I be this much pregnant?”
There was a stunned silence, and then they started laughing.
“There’s no such thing as a little pregnant,” Dante said. “Either you are, or you’re not.”
I stared at him, and slowly it sank in. If Jinx was right, I was going to have a baby. Then my eyes flew to Jinx.
“You must be wrong, Jinx. There’s only one connection to a bird in each generation, and Kit has that bird. Mill is his uncle, so he can’t –”
“Miller is exactly in-between his brother and nephew, Mary. Either their abilities are evolving, or else the birds decided Mill was the same generation as Kit.”
I swallowed.
“Well, shit,” I whispered hoarsely. “I took away Kit’s possibility of having a son with a link to one of the birds too.”
“Don’t be stupid,” Jinx snapped. “Maybe it was always meant for Miller to have that child? Who knows how this whole magical mumbo is decided anyway?”
“Yeah. Maybe,” I whispered.
I hoped she was right, but knew Kit wouldn’t be happy about this regardless.
“What are you going to do, Mary?” Jinx asked.
I raised my head, and when they saw the look on my face, I heard Dante swear softly.
“Oh, honey,” Jinx said. “We’ll help. You don’t have to worry, we’ll –”
“You don’t get it,” I said, and their brows went up when they saw how I started to smile. “I will love this child so much.”
“Miller isn’t going to stay away from you when he finds out,” Dante predicted.
“Let’s go back,” Jinx interrupted suddenly. “It’s getting dark.”
It wasn’t, not yet, but dusk was starting to settle, and it was colder. I also heard thunder rolling at a distance, so I nodded, got to my feet, and then Jinx started walking so fast through the village that I had a hard time keeping up.
I realized that it hadn’t been thunder I’d heard and stopped walking when I saw the line of bikes outside the Mayor’s house. They were all there, getting off their bikes and tucking away their gear. My eyes flew to Miller, and when he saw me, he threw his helmet on the ground and started walking.
“Miller,” Jinx said and kept walking toward him, putting her hands on his chest and pushing gently. “There are things I need to tell you all.”
“Mary,” he said, although it wasn’t clear if he addressed me or talked about me.
“Mill,” she snapped, and he turned his gaze to her. “You know me. You know I wouldn’t ask this of you if I didn’t have a reason,” she said.
He swore softly, turned around and walked back to his bike.
I tried to walk around the house, thinking that I’d slip upstairs and let them have their meeting without me. The important part they needed to talk about was the crystal, and my impregnated state wasn’t necessary to bring into that.
Jinx thought otherwise, and put a surprisingly strong arm around my shoulders and shuffled me along until we were seated around their big dining room table. Dante stood next to Jinx, and Snow leaned on the wall with a guarded look on her face.
“I asked you all to come because I have a few things to share,” she started.
I looked around the table and Byrd, and Olly looked mostly curious. Wilder and Mac looked friendly, and Kit looked like a thundercloud. Hawker and Miller didn’t show any emotions at all.
“Everyone here has a connection to a bird,” Jinx continued.
“Not you, and not Dante,” Kit said, but added angrily, “And not Mary,” he spat out, making my name sound like it tasted bad in his mouth, and maybe it did. “She needs to leave,” he added.
“She’s paid a high enough price for the crystal, don’t you agree?” Byrd said calmly.
“No, I do damned well not agree,” Kit snarled. “She hasn’t paid nearly enough for her actions.”
“You need to be quiet, Kit,” Wilder said, looking at Jinx and clearly waiting for her to start talking, which she did quickly, to prevent Kit from throwing more ugly words at me.
“She does have a link to a bird. She’s also the only reason I’m telling you what I’m about to share because right now I don’t give a holy hell about any of you,” Jinx said, and her voice was loud and incredibly angry. She looked like a queen, sitting at the end of the table with Dante standing at her side. “Except for Wilder, every one of you can go suck an egg for all care,” she said with so much disdain in her voice that they all straightened.
“You’re sitting there, either spewing shit about one of the kindest persons I know or staying quiet and not defending the kindest girl I know. Either way…” she trailed off and then she got to her feet, leaned forward over the table and said quietly, “Fuck. You.”
There was a stunned silence, and then Hawker said calmly, “Fair point, Jinx. Now tell us what it is you need to share so we can get to the point where we talk about Mary.”
“Someone could want to use you. It’s also a fool-proof identification for anyone who wants to find out who you are.”
There was a long silence while they digested what she had told, and then Hawker exploded.
“You lied to us. Jinx, what the hell,” he roared.
Jinx reared back, but Dante leaned forward and roared right back, “Jiminella did it for you. You’re such an idiot, Johns. She did it to protect your children. Until she figured it out, she thought it was best if nobody knew, and she still has work to do, but now she has a friend to look out for as well, so now she’s telling you.”
Hawker clenched his jaws, and his mouth was a thin, angry line.
“You’re pregnant?” Miller asked hoarsely.
When Jinx told them I had a link to a bird, his eyes had flown to me, and our gazes had held throughout the shouting. His face was still a blank mask, and I tried my best to keep mine the same.
“Jinx says I am,” I said just as quietly.
“What?” Kit yelled and got to his feet. “I should have known you would be looking for a sugar-daddy,” he snarled as he walked toward me. Everyone seemed frozen, and my eyes were locked with Miller’s. “I had you investigated, you know,” Kit went on, “I know all about your years as a thief on the streets of Prosper. I know you were a whore,” he spat out, leaning closer to me.
In the corner of my eyes I could see Hawker move a little, and then I heard him murmur, “Miller, you idiot.”
“Are you sure it’s even yours, Uncle,” Kit drawled.
Olly, who was sitting next to me, calmly leaned to the side and punched Kit in the head. Kit dropped to the floor immediately.
“He needed to shut the hell up,” Olly said and looked at Miller when he said it.
After a moment of stunned silence, Miller slowly got to his feet. Then he walked out of the room, and through the silence, we heard his bike roar.
I sighed and turned to Jinx.
“I told you good things don’t last,” I said.
Then I turned to the room in general.
“I’m really sorry. I never meant to –” Suddenly tears pooled in my eyes, and I looked down at the stupid, dishonest, idiot on the floor. “I’ll leave you now. Please let Miller know that I won’t ask anything from him.”
Hawker made a sound, so I turned to him.
“Tell him to stay away, Hawker. He’ll get word when my child is born, and he will be able to see it if he wants to.”
“Mary,” Hawker murmured but tears had started rolling down my cheeks, and my lips were quivering, so I turned and walked out of there without looking at any of them.
Cha
pter Thirteen
Roses are red
I stopped crying as soon as they left. The windowsill in my room on the third floor was wide, and I sat in it, watching their taillights disappear. Then I wiped the last tears from my cheeks. I’d had such high hopes about seeing Miller again, and even though the way things had turned out had been awful, I couldn’t allow myself to be crushed. If Jinx were right, I would be responsible for more than myself in a not too distant future, so I had to figure out what to do.
I wasn’t tired, but I knew they would come up to check on me, so I got into bed, and as expected, someone opened my door slowly. I pretended to sleep, and after a while, I heard Dante.
“She’s faking it, Nellie. Let her do that, you can talk tomorrow.”
I thought, “Thanks,” as loudly as possible and heard him chuckle.
“No need to shout at me, Mary,” he murmured, and then the door closed.
I slept restlessly but felt better the next morning, so I showered, which I needed, and got dressed. I’d have to find a washer, or borrow some clothes from Jinx because the tee I put on was the last clean one I had and my jeans were iffy.
“Do you know someone who cuts hair?” I asked as I walked into the kitchen, and both Jinx and Dante turned slowly.
“Does either of us seriously look like we know a hairdresser?” Jinx mumbled and took a deep swig of coffee.
She had a point. They both had long hair, but even long hair needed tending, didn’t it? At least, my hair did.
“Uh,” Dante murmured. “I actually have a cousin who –”
“God,” Jinx snapped sourly. “You have so many cousins it’s impossible to keep track of them.”
“Sweetie,” he smiled, “You know she’s not my cousin, she’s my aunt’s sister in-law's third –”
“God,” Jinx murmured again and got up. “I’ll be in the lab,” she said sourly and left.
“Wow,” I said as the door slammed.
“I know,” Dante grinned.
He knew? Knew what?
“It’s just too easy in the mornings,” he chuckled, and I realized he’d deliberately baited her temper.
“Uh,” I said, but decided to not get involved in whatever twisted morning routines they had, and he didn’t let me anyway.
“I’ll give our hairdresser a call,” he said, and five minutes later I was told to go straight over after breakfast.
“I have no money,” I murmured, embarrassed but since it wasn’t something I could hide, there was no use trying to keep it a secret.
“I told her you’d paint a sign for her. Something nice that she can hang outside her house,” Dante said calmly, and added, “Most people don’t have loads of cash here, so we trade shit all the time.”
“Okay,” I said with relief.
“You’re going to cut off much?” he asked as he scooped up porridge in a bowl, added milk, and some apple sauce. “Eat,” he added and slammed it down on the table, sat down and continued his own breakfast.
I looked at the bowl, caught the look on his face, sat down, and ate.
“I wasn’t a whore,” I told him quietly.
His face darkened, and he muttered, “Jeez, Mary. I know that.”
“I lived on the streets, though. And there were women there who tried to help me. They saw this scrawny kid with no future and no one having her back, and they tried,” I said, and added, “Some of them were hookers.”
“Honey,” he murmured softly but let me continue.
“When I lost my family, I lost everything, so I took a knife and hacked off my hair. Right at the scalp, Dante, and I wasn’t very good at it, so I looked a little bit like a funky chicken.”
“I doubt it,” he said.
“I did, and I kept it short until Joelle and Reuben took me to Thend. I let it grow then, and haven’t cut it much since I lived with them. Joelle lost all her hair, so we used to joke that I’d have enough for both of us.”
“You lived in Thend?” he chuckled. “That’s less than an hour from Norton.”
“Forty-five minutes and a world apart,” I answered. “I’m going to cut my hair off again now, though it’s not from grief. It’s because it’s time to be strong again. Besides, Jinx gave me such a gift yesterday, so I think it’s time to celebrate.”
He stared at me but didn’t say anything.
“Are you reading my thoughts, Dante?” I asked.
“No,” he replied, and continued softly, “You should remember that Jinx wasn’t the one giving you that gift, Mary.”
I winced because what he said was true, but I couldn’t think about Miller. Not just yet.
Suddenly Dante grinned, leaned forward and whispered, “Seven times, Mary? Really?”
I laughed because he looked like an impish boy, slapped him on the shoulder and left to get my hair cut.
The middle-aged woman looked at my hair and told me that I didn’t have to paint her a sign if I let her sell the lengths she cut off.
“It’ll be enough payment for you to come back at least four times after this.”
“Really?” I asked with considerable astonishment.
“They’re always looking for good quality natural hair at the hospital in Twin City, Mary. They make wigs out of it, and yours should be enough for two.”
I remembered a bald head and no money to buy a wig, so a scarf had to do instead.
“I’d rather donate the hair to the hospital, and paint a sign for you,” I said quietly.
“Oh, honey,” she murmured, understanding immediately. “I’ll get it to Corriente Medical for you.”
Then she braided it and cut the thick braids off at the nape of my neck.
“No way back now,” she grinned.
It felt like a weight had been lifted off my shoulders, and I laughed, suddenly feeling happier than I had in a long time.
She cut it short in the neck and sides but let the bangs be a little bit longer, and showed me how I could fluff them up, or push them to the side with a clip.
“It’s always a worry to cut off hair that long, Mary, but I have to say – this suits you much better. You look cute,” she said.
I moved my head around a little and looked in the mirror. My neck looked almost fragile, and I looked more vulnerable, I thought.
“It looks better than I thought,” I murmured, and asked, “What do you want on the sign?”
“Flowers,” she said promptly.
“What kind?” I asked. “Red roses?”
Something nagged at the back of my mind, but I couldn’t catch what it was, and she interrupted my thoughts.
“Wildflowers, as many as you feel like drawing.”
“And the name?”
“Name?” she echoed.
“But… Don’t you want to have a name on the sign? People might think you sell flowers if you don’t.”
She started laughing, and when a pretty blonde woman came through the door, she called out, “Mary thought people would think I sell flowers.”
I blinked because surely it was a logical thing to assume?
“Hello, Mary,” the woman said. “I’m Danny’s wife, Anetta. And everyone knows Carlie cuts hair.”
