Grounded (Grounded #1)

by Heather Young-Nichols

  He wrenched at his neck, then came over to help me up. I twisted my arm, gaining the advantage, and flipped him on to his back, landing an elbow to the chest.

  “You can’t fall for that,” I said once we were on our feet.

  He hunched over with his hands on his knees, gasping for air. “I think you broke a rib.”

  My face fell and I went to him to check it out. When I got within reach, he pulled me into his arms awkwardly and we stumbled back against the wall.

  “And you can’t fall for that.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  My earlier conversation with Aric came back to mind when we broke for lunch, but I didn’t have time to obsess about ways to get Jensen sexually frustrated because Dahlia found us—accidentally, of course. I made the introductions, as she’d demanded, making sure to be very clear that Jensen was off limits. The look she threw me said I’d be getting the third degree about that later. Dahlia being Dahlia, she started flirting with Aric immediately. He loved the attention. It was weird to see two parts of my life come together, intermingling in a way I never imagined.

  Dahlia came in to see if I wanted to go shopping with her at a mall several hours away. I hated shopping unless it was necessary, like in New York. Not to mention I wasn’t excited at the prospect of the long car ride. I’d had enough of those for a while. Luckily, I had a legitimate excuse to get out of shopping. I was sweaty and gross from training, something Dahlia commented on. She left pretty quickly after that.

  The morning was for fighting and the afternoon was for trying to coax Jensen’s power out. So, after eating, I took him back to my room. This was the first time I’d ever been so nervous around him; I wasn’t even this nervous when we were alone in his apartment and his hands started to wander, but that’s because our passionate make-out sessions were never planned. They happened naturally. I’d never intentionally gotten a guy worked up just to say no in the end.

  He dropped into one of the large chairs by the window, probably trying to avoid mucking up my beautiful, soft bedding with his sweaty body.

  After announcing that I needed to shower, I headed toward the bathroom, yanking my shirt over my head, and threw it at his feet. He only got to see my bare back as I walked away. I could feel his eyes on my skin.

  I wrapped the large, white bath towel I grabbed when getting out of the shower around me twice before I walked out to get some new clothes. The funny thing was, I didn’t even forget the clothes on purpose. I never took them into the bathroom with me. Never had reason to before then.

  Jensen’s breath caught as soon as I walked out in just the towel. “What are you doing?”

  I turned a little sheepish. “I forgot my clothes.”

  “Are you trying to kill me?” His voice sounded husky. He sighed a ragged sigh that made me giggle as he stalked over, brushed wet strands of hair off my shoulders, wrapped his hand around the back of my neck, and gave me a thorough kissing with his soft but demanding mouth.

  Moving to the bed, his hands ran down my body, gentle at times, urgent at others, sometimes squeezing so tightly his grip was a tad painful. Jensen loosened my towel just enough to get his hands inside. His skin burned across mine. I wasn’t even completely naked, but suddenly I wanted to be. I don’t know how long we laid there kissing, exploring each other without moving too fast. Too soon, Aric pounded at the door and called out, causing us both to jump. “Are we doing this or what?”

  At least he didn’t try to come in. That would be even more awkward than when we were in Jensen’s room when we first got back to Delaware.

  “Or what.” Jensen breathed into my now mostly dried hair, making me laugh.

  “Be down soon,” I yelled back, hoping he didn’t hear my voice waver.

  I hopped up, holding the Egyptian cotton towel tightly to my flushed skin while I pulled out shorts and a tank top. I made the twirl motion with my index finger to tell him to turn around. He hadn’t seen me naked yet and, while I was completely sure he would at some point, I had a job to do. Feeling a little devilish, I tossed my towel just in front of him once his back was to me so he’d know I was within an arm’s reach with nothing covering my body.

  “Yup, you’re trying to me kill me,” he said playfully, waving his arms behind him like he was trying to grab me.

  “Nah, you’d be no good to me dead.”

  Once dressed, I ran to the bathroom to snag myself an elastic to pull my hair back into a ponytail. Then I got my shoes, grabbed his arm and hit the door.

  The afternoon was fruitless. Jensen tried, he really did. Even though I gave a detailed tutorial on how I do what I do, nothing happened for him. It looked like he was going to have an aneurism or pull a muscle or something. We finally decided to call it a day.

  Before Aric left the room, he leaned in and whispered just loud enough for me to hear, “Do better.”

  That pissed me off on two fronts. The first being that Aric shouldn’t be thinking of me frustrating Jensen, and secondly, our moment together after my shower should have left Jensen with raging hormones like it did me. He should already be frustrated. I know I was.

  The moment Jensen and I parted ways, it was his turn to shower and change clothes, I burst into Aric’s room without knocking. Hearing the water in the bathroom, I headed that way. Again, I didn’t knock, which was probably not the smartest choice because the room was filled with steam and he was naked in the shower. Yeah, I needed to start thinking before I acted.

  “What the hell?” I pounded the glass door once, just hard enough to grab his attention. He jumped pretty high, but I was too consumed with anger to notice his assets. Really, I didn’t see a thing.

  “Christ, Alyssum.” Aric shut the water off, grabbed his towel and followed me out into the main room. “So, privacy is just a concept for you, huh?”

  I didn’t look at his bare chest or the muscles rippling down. I didn’t watch the bead of water tracing his body until it became inappropriate for me to see its destination…Or, at least, I tried very hard not to. Some things are hard to ignore. Yes, I was with Jensen now, but I wasn’t blind.

  “Privacy? You’re kidding me, right?” I folded my arms under my breasts. He looked dumbfounded and confused. “Don’t talk to me about…frustrating Jensen. Don’t talk to me about any of that stuff.”

  “Do you think I want to?” His eyes blazed. “It isn’t easy, but it’s what needs to be done.”

  “What are you talking about?” Because either I really wasn’t following or he was distracting me. It really could’ve been either.

  “Just because I can accept that you’re with him, just because I can stay friends with both of you, doesn’t mean I want to be involved with…” He groaned loudly. “But what I said is the truth. I don’t want my family to die.” His voice softened just a notch. “And you’re my family now, Alyssum.”

  Everything within me melted. I sometimes forgot that Aric had people he cared about on the other side, people he could very well lose.

  “Sorry for bursting in here. I got your message, but you have to stop bringing it up, ‘kay?”

  “You know, if you want to see me naked in the future, you could just ask,” he said as I turned the door knob. “Anytime you want.”

  I threw a mid-wattage bolt to his shoulder. It singed against his wet skin, making him grind his teeth together.

  “Mean,” he spat playfully just as I closed the door.

  ***

  That night, all hell had broken loose.

  I heard it long before I saw it. As the first echo found its way upstairs, I ran out of my room and bumped right into Jensen and Aric.

  “What the hell was that?” Jensen asked, holding me steady so I didn’t face plant into the floor.

  “Not sure. It’s coming from the front room.”

  When we got to close to the front room, I slowed down to peak around the corner and see what was happening. The hair on my arms stood up, like tiny wires poking out, and instead of the regular prickle up the
back of my neck, much bigger electrical pulses punished the base of my skull. There was a hell of a lot of Gobel inside the house.

  My father had someone by the throat while throwing instructions out at people I couldn’t see.

  “Gobel.” I drew back against the wall. The guys followed my lead and pulled back to stay hidden as well.

  “If you give us Aric, we’ll leave.” The heavy voice made my stomach drop.

  I looked to Aric and saw his eyes on the ceiling, like a kid who’d gotten in trouble. “My dad.”

  “You two stay here,” I said. Aric nodded. Only Jensen started to protest. “No, you need to stay here. They can’t know you’re here, they can’t know you’re you.”

  I caught Aric’s eyes and held them with mine. “Keep him here, no matter what.” He nodded.

  I took off in a run directly into the middle of the mayhem. I dove over a few guys fighting on the floor, taking out a woman at the shoulders. She hit the floor with a crack. Since the running allowed me to pick up some static, I threw a bolt at the guy sneaking up behind my dad. Taking inventory, I took a deep breath, picked up all the energy I could, and sent a band of static across the room. People on both sides fell to the ground. The ring snapped against the wall. No one had ever seen me do that. Sometimes there are abilities a girl needs to keep to herself until she really needs to use it.

  “Now that I have everyone’s attention…do you think there’s a better way to handle this?” In the house, I couldn’t pick up enough power to do any real damage to that large of a group, but that was fine. I just wanted to startle them out of fighting.

  “I want my son,” the man with the big voice declared.

  “Not gonna happen.” I shook my head. He charged until I threw the biggest spark I could muster. I wasn’t trying to hurt him, but no way in hell was he gonna hurt me.

  “Kidnapping a Gobel is grounds for war in and of itself,” he said, stalking toward me much slower, one small step after another.

  “We didn’t kidnap him.”

  I found Kale’s pale face in the crowd. He refused to look me in the eye.

  Aric’s father was about to disagree when Aric showed himself from the hallway. “They didn’t, Dad.”

  “Aric,” the woman I was his mother came forward, “you must come home, please.”

  “I can’t, Mom. Not this time.”

  Aric’s dad suggested that some of their posse wait outside so he and his wife could speak to their sons. Leaving them to deal with family issues, I ran back to where I’d left Jensen. He was gone. I searched the nearest rooms fairly quickly, finally finding him in the garage, alone. Moon rays crept in, giving me just enough light to see him.

  “There you are.” I was slightly breathless from the search and the fear I might not find him, that somehow one of them got to him. My stomach turned. I felt sick at that last thought.

  He jumped. “Yeah, I, uh…need to make…” He threw his hands up helplessly.

  “Why the sudden rush?” I thought I knew and leaned with folded arms on the wall by the door. Some things I had to let him say, let him come to terms with on his own.

  “You ran off into that,” he raised his hands in the general direction of the foyer, “and I had to stay back because I’m useless. You guys seem to think there’s something inside me, so I need to get it out. What’s the secret?”

  I smirked before beginning to walk toward him. “Well, Aric says the reason our powers kick in just after puberty is from the…frustration that comes with it.” I saw what was going on his head all over his face. He knew exactly what I was saying. “He didn’t seem to think you’ve been frustrated enough for it to kick in.”

  He winced, like he’d made a painful realization or was afraid that I had.

  “So, that’s what you’ve been doing?”

  “Yes.” Three more steps brought me within reach of him.

  “Did any of it mean anything?”

  I couldn’t believe he could ask me that, even though I really shouldn’t have been surprised. Yeah, I had to work him up for his own good, to get his power out, but I enjoyed every damn minute of everything we did.

  “All of it. I just had to make sure it didn’t go any further, no matter how much we may have wanted it to. And trust me, I wanted it to.”

  “Ah. Well, you do a fine job.” He tipped his head in my direction, like it was a compliment.

  “It really wasn’t that hard,” I said playfully.

  “Speak for yourself,” he threw back.

  I smirked. I hated the idea that had just formed in my head. A deep breath helped me work my courage into place so I could say what needed to be said. I hoped he wouldn’t get angry and leave. “Maybe we’ve been going about this all wrong.”

  “How so?” Jensen got close enough that he could trail his fingers down my arms.

  “Well, back in Putnam Valley, whenever Aric and I were together…” I jumped. A spark zapped my arm, like the static shock from a blanket. Not too painful. The important thing was that I didn’t do it. “Oh.” A smile slowly formed. “So, when we were alone in his apartment,” a little bigger jolt caused me to take in a quick breath, “aside from all the—”

  The next shock was painful enough to interrupt me, like a hard, sharp pinch on each arm, or being snapped with the thinnest rubber band ever. The thin ones hurt more than the thick. I yelped.

  “I’m sorry. Did that hurt?” Guilt dilated his pupils.

  “Jensen, you did it!”

  “I did? I did.”

  “Try again. Just this time not on me.” I took a step back. If the voltage of his zaps continued to grow, I didn’t want to be on the receiving end.

  I pointed at the far wall. He closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and nothing happened. Aric came in, shirtless after the heat in the foyer, and when he stood beside me, I put a hand on his chest, then let it fall lightly toward his waistband.

  A shock of energy, big enough that it blew the hair off my shoulders, hit the chair, completely destroying it. Smoke smoldered and flames rose. The sprinklers rained water down to put the fire out, a little precaution my dad put in throughout the house when I was a kid. Jensen wasn’t the only one to mistakenly set something on fire. Not that all Gremalians could set fire to things without something extremely powerful like direct lightning but, somehow, Jensen did it with just the natural static in the room.

  “Okay, you’ve got it,” I said, getting pelted with water. “Now you know what you have to think about until it becomes second nature.”

  “Great. I get to torture myself.”

  His face fell. I have to admit, I kind of liked him being jealous. Before I officially became Jensen’s girlfriend, we were all calm and grown-up about our situation. Maybe, back then, that was an act and he’d always hated every minute I spent with Aric. Now I was certain he’d been jealous and was still jealous.

  “Sorry.” I giggled. “Whatever it takes.”

  Aric put two and two together and figured out why I’d touched him in such an intimate way, though he didn’t look mad.

  “How did he do that?” he asked.

  “What?” I looked up at him once the downpour ended. I tried to squeeze as much water out of my hair as I could.

  “Set that thing on fire using just the energy in the room?” Aric pointed to the chair.

  “Are you sure there wasn’t lightning in the area? It doesn’t have to be that close.” Playing dumb rarely works for me and yet I still tried.

  “Yeah, Alyssum,” he said.

  “Great.” I sighed. “Hey, you’ve never told us specifically what you Gobel can do. I can’t believe I’ve let it slide this long.”

  He scratched the back of his head in a way that told me he didn’t really want to say. “We, uh, have some control over plants. Along with a few other parlor tricks. Nothing impressive.”

  “Plants?” Jensen asked.

  “Yeah, plants,” Aric confirmed.

  I ran to the back yard, yanked down a hanging
basket, and brought it back inside of the garage with me.

  “Here.” I sat it down in front of Aric.

  He sighed, rolled his eyes, and waved his hand at the basket. I wouldn’t have believed it if I didn’t see it with my own eyes. The flowers, wilted and on their deathbed from the oppressive heat we’d been having, bloomed and sprung to life in beautiful tints of purple and white. They kept sprouting until a small jungle of greens surrounded us. He dropped his hand.

  “Impressive.” I couldn’t look away; I don’t think I could even blink. “So, why do your people want the copper?”

  “That’s the thing. I didn’t know until I talked to Kale. Mostly because I didn’t pay attention to Gobel/Gremalian relations until recently, when tensions started to build again. It seems the copper allows us to heal too. Kale wasn’t sure if it does anything else, like boost our power. I know copper can do that for Gremalians if they have enough of it.”

  “I get that you’re saying copper helps Gobel and Gremalians heal, but why does copper do that? I mean, you’d think supernatural creatures would heal on their own,” Jensen said.

  ”That’d be nice.” Aric chuckled. “But no, apparently it’s the copper that makes us heal quickly and The Gobel Council feels you guys have hogged it for too long.”

  ***

  All Dad would tell me about the situation in the front room was that it was handled and Aric would stay while the rest of his family left. Aric assured me that the family members who offered to support us still would. After thinking it over, I didn’t see the big deal about allowing the Gobel access to the mines or about just giving them some of the copper. If using one of those options would stop a war and keep Jensen out of the thick of it, then maybe coming to an agreement should become my mission. I didn’t know how I’d do that, but I still thought a compromise was an excellent idea.

  In the beginning, when I first went to see if Jensen was still alive, I had no qualms about thrusting him into danger if it meant putting an end to the many years of turmoil between the two sides. I thought ending the turmoil meant exerting our power and showing dominance by winning the war, but now I cared about him and didn’t want to use him in that way, especially since he was only in Delaware because I’d asked him to come.