Whispered Visions (Shifters & Seers Book 3)

by Tammy Blackwell

  “I’ve tried,” she continued, peeling the last of the glove off his hand. Once it was gone her bare hand covered his. “I’ve tried so hard, and I can’t do it anymore. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

  Chapter 21

  She shouldn’t be doing this. She knew she was sealing their fates, but she couldn’t bring herself to stop. The curse was too strong. The feel of Layne’s flesh against hers was like heaven, but even that couldn’t hold a candle to the raw emotions she could See with complete clarity now that she was touching him. Love was the most intoxicating and addicting drug in the world.

  “I’m sorry,” she said again, turning in his arms so she could press her face into the warmth of his neck. Her nose skimmed along the underside of his jaw causing him to make a choking noise that had nothing to do with distress. “I am so, so sorry.” She couldn’t tell him enough. The last thing in the world she wanted to do was hurt him, but even knowing it was inevitable, she pressed a kiss to his throat.

  “Jesus, Lizzie,” Layne groaned before pushing her away. There was a brief moment of relief, believing he’d finally been strong where she was weak, but then he was rolling her onto her back and rising above her. His lips were hesitant as they brushed hers, not quite believing she would welcome their sweet caress.

  That wasn’t right. Layne shouldn’t ever be uncertain where she was concerned. He should know the depth and breadth of her desire. The part of her that was always resentful for the space she’d put between them reached up, cupped the back of his head, and dragged his mouth to hers. Where his kiss had been all things sweet and tender, hers were fueled with passion and desperation. She expected him to follow her down into the abyss, but he pulled away. The cool air on her burning lips was the shock she needed to clear her mind. Shame was like a heavy wool blanket, suffocating her on this warm autumn night.

  “I’m sorry,” she said for maybe the hundredth time. “Layne, I—”

  “You’re crying,” he said, the words a growl.

  She brushed a hand against her temple, and sure enough it was wet.

  “I’m sor—”

  “I swear to God, if you say you’re sorry one more time, I’m going to lose it.”

  He was still poised above her. His hair was curling around the edges where sweat accumulated. Whether it was from their tiny burst of sexy-times or from the fact he was wearing a sweatshirt in an already warm room was anyone’s guess. His eyes were hard, and his mouth was pulled into a thin tight line. He looked angry, but he wasn’t. He was confused, wary, and frustrated, but not angry.

  “It’s the curse,” she said, making a split-second decision to tell him the truth. He deserved it. “I can’t fight it anymore.”

  His eyebrows did their mountain peak thing he was so proud of. “Curse?”

  “My family. We’re cursed.”

  “Like by a witch?”

  She shrugged, or did what might have been a shrug if she wasn’t lying on the bed, half pinned by the one person she shouldn’t have ever let touch her again. “I don’t know. Maybe.”

  “What kind of curse?”

  This was the hard part.

  “It’s a love curse. We fall in love, and whoever it is always falls with us. Hard. An all-consuming, to-hell-with-the-rest-of-the-world love. And then, one day, we just leave.” Her dad hadn’t even bothered to say goodbye. She and her mom came back home from a day of shopping to find his truck and most of his belongings gone. “One day I’m going to leave you, Layne, and it’s going to kill you on the inside. I’m sorry.” She was crying again. She could feel the tears as they dripped into her hairline. “I tried to stop it, to save you, but it is too hard. Maybe if we hadn’t ended up here, but this has been…” There weren’t any words to describe what the last few months had been like. She didn’t need to tell him anyway. He’d been here the whole time. He knew what it was like. “Every single moment is a battle, and this is the one thing I can’t fight anymore.”

  “So you’re cursed. With a love curse.”

  Lizzie nodded, not quite able to meet his eyes. He didn’t respond immediately, and she could See he was thinking. He did that. When the answer mattered, Layne took his time to think of a response. Since she couldn’t See individual thoughts, she had no idea what he was working through, but she knew he approached it like a puzzle, looking for the perfect response to fit into place.

  “How many came back?” he finally asked.

  “How many came back where?”

  “Your ancestors. I’m assuming you have a long list of forefathers who left the loves of their lives, the most recent entry being your dad. How many of them came back after they left?”

  “That’s not how it works. We leave and—”

  “And never come back,” he finished for her.

  “Yes.” It killed her to say it. Once what she was saying finally sank in, it would be Layne who was leaving her. She didn’t know if she would survive it.

  “No one came back, but you.”

  Her confusion must have been written all over her face because he continued. “You made me fall in love with you, and then you left. And you’re right. It was devastating. There were times when I thought I would rather hate you since loving you hurt so damn much. But you came back. You have come back, haven’t you? That’s what this is about? You and me finally being together?”

  Even if his soul wasn’t permanently linked to hers, she would have heard the doubt and fear of rejection in his voice.

  “Of course I want to be with you.” She let the truth of her words show in her eyes, and in case he couldn’t read eye-language, she trailed a hand down his cheek for good measure. “I’ve never wanted anything else. I think I might have fallen in love with you the first time I tasted your soul. You’re brave and loyal. When you love, it’s with your whole heart. At your core, you’re the most fierce and powerful Shifter in the world. The fact that you make me laugh and are my favorite person in the world to waste time with was just an added bonus.”

  A smile, one of the first true non-Caroline-induced smiles she’d seen from him in years, stretched across his face.

  “Fierce and powerful? I thought you said I was the most stubborn and vain Shifter you’d ever Seen?”

  “Well, you’re that too…”

  She felt his laughter as much as she heard it, and it caused shockwaves of awareness to ripple through her body.

  “I love you,” she said, the words she’d been afraid of for so long tasting more right than any phrase she’d ever uttered before.

  “You are my world,” Layne said in return. “Now that I’ve got you back, I’m never letting you go. I might not be able to See into another person’s mind and heart, but I don’t have to be a Seer to know you’re never leaving me again. Your curse is broken. This? Us? It’s going to be forever this time.”

  God, she wanted him to be right. She wanted it so bad she was trembling. It felt like her soul might actually crawl out of her body and fasten itself onto his.

  “You’re mine,” Layne said, and because she could See him, she knew these words were from the heart of the coyote who was at the crux of who he was. “Lizzie Anders, I claim you as my mate, now and forever.”

  The list of reasons she should reject his claim was both long and compelling. Mating was a for-life commitment and they were still only teenagers despite everything they had been through. Yet the words that fell out of her mouth weren’t a denial.

  “Layne Hagan, I claim you as my mate, now and forever.”

  Incandescent joy surged through the newly formed bond they created with their declarations. Lizzie was still afraid, and there was a chance a part of her would always worry that it would all fall apart in the end, but her fear was overshadowed by so much love and hope she didn’t know how it could all fit inside her body.

  This time, when his lips met hers there was no hesitation. Her hands slid beneath the hem of his shirt, exploring and discovering not only the heated silk of his skin, but the man inside. Layne’s
mind wasn’t noise, but a soothing melody made up of hundreds of harmonies.

  Chapter 22

  “The show will begin in five minutes,” Caroline announced from her stage in front of the television.

  “Do you think we should explain the difference between minutes and seconds?” Layne asked when she immediately launched into yet another dramatic rendition of “Let it Go.”

  Lizzie tucked a strand of hair behind her ear with the hand not currently entwined with his. “She’s three. I’m pretty sure we’re supposed to be happy she knows minutes are units of time.”

  Layne spent the early morning hours watching Lizzie sleep. The moments he’d spent with her in his arms were everything he’d ever dared dream and more, but he knew there was a chance the late night intimacies wouldn’t survive the harsh light of day. But if anything, Lizzie seemed more sure of things. The hesitation and fear he’d sensed in her last night was gone. Her smiles and touches had grown bolder, while his own had lost some of their certainty. Years of self-doubt couldn’t be erased in one night. He knew he didn’t deserve her, and part of him was just waiting for her to pull away and say it was all a mistake.

  “Did you know,” Lizzie said softly so as not to interrupt the fourteenth verse of Caroline’s unique extended version of the Disney song, “if this was England in the days of yore, I could be considered ruined for sitting so close and holding your hand?”

  “Just for holding hands?” His Gramma Hagan would consider them both ruined for the things they had done last night, but even she found hand holding fairly innocent.

  “Well, it wouldn’t be quite as scandalous as it would be if they caught us alone and kissing on a secluded balcony during a ball, but still, skin-to-skin contact was very taboo. One of my male relatives would feel obliged to force you into marrying me.”

  He lifted their joined hands to his mouth and gave her knuckles the most sensual kiss he could manage given the circumstances. “And what makes you think they would have to force me?”

  “I don’t know,” she said, her voice far too innocent to be trusted. “I am cursed, after all.”

  Cursed. Ha. Lizzie’s only curse was being born to a family who didn’t know how to love and protect her.

  “I’m willing to risk it,” he said, realizing he was going to have to deal with this particular neurosis for a long time. Possibly forever. It was okay though. As long as he had forever with her, he was willing to put up with whatever brand of crazy she could throw his way.

  “And I’m willing to put up with your fear of abandonment as well,” she said. “Even though I know I will have to put up with it for the rest of ever.”

  If they were any other couple on earth, he might have believed her words had echoed his thoughts simply because they were so perfect for each other they were one hundred percent in-sync. But they weren’t other couples. Lizzie was a Seer, and she’d been way too precise about things for a while now.

  “I thought you couldn’t See individual thoughts.”

  Lizzie’s gaze drifted to the side and her teeth worked her bottom lip. “Not normally…”

  “Not normally, but…?”

  Her eyes lifted to his. “It’s different with you.”

  It didn’t make sense for her words to cause him joy - who wanted their every thought read? - but they did. He liked being the only anything with her.

  “Different how?”

  “I get more from you. More emotions. More thoughts. And it’s not noise. It all makes sense without me having to unravel it.”

  Okay, so maybe they were one hundred percent in-sync.

  Well, she was in-sync. He still had zero idea what she was thinking.

  “How long has it been this way? Since last night?”

  Her eyes slid away yet again. “Ummm… Awhile?”

  “Awhile as in since we’ve started spending so much time together, or awhile as in—?”

  “As in since that day in the music room three years ago.”

  “Three years?”

  “And that’s not all,” she said with a nervous smile. “I don’t have to touch you to See you.”

  Three years. Three years of being able to See him, all of him, without so much as a touch to help matters along.

  Awesome.

  There wasn’t really any need to vocalize how freaked out and close to pissed off he was, was there?

  “You have every right to be mad, but I promise, I’m trying. I can block most of it. Distance helps—”

  “No. Distance isn’t an option. Not anymore.” It was the coyote’s instinctive response. She wasn’t pushing them away. Not again.

  “Distance helps,” she repeated, “but not necessary. Not anymore.” She pulled her knees up on the couch, turning her body into his. “It’s gotten easier over the last few weeks. I didn’t even realize it was happening, but it doesn’t break through my barriers anymore. Not unless we’re touching.”

  “We’re not going to stop touching.” He would touch her every minute of every day if he could. Obsessed? Hell yes. He always had been where she was concerned. “You can take whatever you want,” he decided. “I don’t have anything to hide from you now. If you still want me - want us - knowing how screwed up I am at this moment, then I’m not worried about what you might See tomorrow.”

  Lizzie reached up and brushed her fingers across his cheek. “You’re amazing,” she said just before her lips met his.

  His heart did a fist-bump against his rib cage and he completely lost himself in the moment… for all of three seconds.

  “Hey!”

  Layne pulled back to see a pair of dark brown eyes staring at him intently from three inches away. “I’m dancing here.”

  “I’m sorry, Caroline,” Lizzie said, running a hand over her lips. “It was my fault. I didn’t mean to interrupt your performance. Will you forgive me for being so rude?”

  Caroline narrowed her eyes. “You’re supposed to watch me and then clap and say, ‘Good job.’”

  “What if you don’t do a good job? Do I still have to say, ‘Good job?’”

  Caroline’s scornful glare swung to him. “Yes.”

  “Good to know,” he said, smothering a grin.

  Leaning back, finally giving them some breathing room, Caroline asked, “What are you guys doing? Were you kissing? Are you in love now?”

  “Yep,” Lizzie said. Layne felt certain three letters had never caused another person so much joy before. “He’s my Prince Charming.”

  Caroline’s nose wrinkled as if she got a whiff of a catfish that had been sitting in the sun for two days. “Layne?” she asked with utter disbelief.

  “Yes, Layne,” he said. “I’m at least as charming as that Flynn Rider douche.”

  “His name is Eugene. And he’s not a koosh.”

  “Layne, language.” Pari’s voice rang out from the kitchen area where she was reorganizing the cabinets. “And Caroline, I thought you were going to dance for me.”

  Pari had noted the change in Layne and Lizzie’s relationship that morning over breakfast, muttering something about foolish idiots and chasing trouble. Layne may have been more inclined to care if she hadn’t been fighting a smile the entire time she was saying it.

  Caroline gave Layne a final you’re-on-my-list look before resuming her place in front of the television. The song she belted out sounded a bit like an R&B version of “Row, Row, Row Your Boat.”

  “She’s going to be on Broadway,” Lizzie said.

  The dance he was watching, which included a lot of shimmies and butt wiggles, didn’t exactly look like something out of Les Mis.

  “She’s going to be on a pole,” he said with no small amount of actual worry.

  Lizzie smacked his chest, and he pulled her tighter against his side. They watched the show for a few minutes before Lizzie said, “I’m going to work on blocking it while we’re touching. I think I’ll be able to do it. Using and controlling my Sight always seems easier when it comes to you.”

&nb
sp; “You really don’t have to. I trust you.”

  She tilted her face up to his. “Everyone deserves privacy. Even mates.”

  A smile stretched wide across his face. “Say it again.”

  “Everyone deserves privacy?”

  His mate was so saucy.

  He loved it.

  “No. The m-word.”

  A bit of her old fears still shone in her eyes, but her goofy grin was genuine. “My mate,” she said.

  “Damn straight I am. And at the next Hustings, I’m going to make it official.” It was a two-fold promise. The obvious one was that he was serious about this being a forever arrangement. He wasn’t stupid. He knew they were going to have to work to get past all the damage they’d done to themselves and one another over the past three years, but although he’d never had much faith in himself, he had all the faith in the world in the two of them together.

  The other part of his promise was they were going to escape. He didn’t know how or when, but it had to be soon. His coyote was getting restless, and Layne wasn’t sure what would happen if he finally lost control over that part of his personality. True coyotes will chew off a leg to escape a trap. He had no idea what a coyote Shifter might do when it reached its limit.

  The clink of the doors locking snapped Layne from his thoughts. Caroline quit singing and ran over to the couch where Lizzie promptly scooted over so she could pull the child up between them.

  Layne wasn’t the least bit surprised when Alistair walked into the room looking as if he was prepared to slaughter an entire village of women and children. Despite the early hour, he reeked of sweat and expensive booze.

  There was a strong chance someone had been watching the security cameras they had wrongly assumed no one was paying close attention to these days.

  “Lizzie, we’re going to the library. Now,” Alistair said, his accent even more clipped than normal.