Beyond The Veil: A Paranormal & Magical Romance Boxed Set

by Multiple Authors

  “Silent.” Garrick gave a nod toward the window and she looked to find three cars pulling in. This would have to wait. For every answer she had, twenty more questions popped into her head.

  It looked like a group of clown cars the way people poured out of them. As they walked toward the front door, Garrick rubbed his head into Jolie's mother’s neck, and if she weren’t going crazy, licked her, too. It was a very odd gesture, and she was fairly confident she wanted to know absolutely positively nothing about her mother’s private time. Yuck.

  He was at the door before the first knock. In piled a group of men, each looking more agitated than the next. Leading the group was Sheriff Williams.

  “Garrick,” Sheriff began, “Mama told us you were here.” As if that answered the question as to why there were massive amounts of people flooding Jesse’s home.

  Jesse was up as the first person entered the living room. “Father, did you need my place for a meeting? I can take your mate and her daughter to your home if you do.”

  Garrick’s what?

  “Yes, son. That would be helpful.” Garrick didn’t even look her way. Her mom immediately got up and walked toward Jesse, and Jolie did the same. Whatever was going on, it seemed important to all of them that she leave now, and with people trying to kill her, that might be best.

  They started toward the opposite door, and just as they reached it, they were interrupted by one of the less friendly looking men. “Actually Garrick, it might be best if your mate stayed for this one.” Garrick gave him an evil eye, and he quickly added, “If that is okay with you and all. We may have found out some things about the incident.”

  “Liv, Richard is right.”

  The asshat’s name was Richard. Her mother walked toward Garrick as Jesse kept walking out the doorway toward what she instinctively knew to be a side entrance. This déjà vu was not getting any less intense.

  As they reached to the door, Jesse still hadn’t spoken. He seemed to be trying to eavesdrop as much as she was. She heard very little. Something about her car, a chip, and a beta. She hoped her mom met back up with them soon. She really wanted to know what was going on in there.

  Jesse opened the door and went to the car. She scrambled quickly to catch up. No one would look at them and think couple or freaking almost siblings. He was like an old fashioned faucet. Hot or cold with no mix between.

  He turned the car on before she shut the door and was driving down the way before her seatbelt was fastened. He looked calm on the outside, but she could see the façade. His eyes gave him away.

  “Jesse?” She didn’t know what to say, but needed to say something.

  “Not now.” He cranked the radio. The loud bass shook the dash. Chatting time was over.

  They drove for what felt like hours, but was probably more like fifteen minutes before he turned the radio off.

  “Sorry, I just needed us to be away from there before we talked.” He reached for her hand, and she felt more grounded than she had just moments earlier. “We should be there in about thirty minutes.”

  “What? Where? I thought we were going to my mom’s house and it was ten minutes from yours?”

  “I am taking you to his home. Not knowing what everyone found out, the last place he would have wanted me to bring you to was his house.”

  “I am lost.”

  “That is because you keep interrupting me,” he teased. Jesse seemed to get more and more relaxed as they drove further from his house. “His home is a cabin far away from all of his responsibilities. We used to come here a lot when I was a kid, when things overwhelmed him. I think the only other person who ever came here was your dad.”

  “You knew my dad?” Her father had this whole life she never cared about, and now she was somehow woven into it and in danger because of it.

  “Jolie, everyone you have met today knew your dad.” He pulled down a dirt road. “He was my dad’s only real friend. His job makes it hard to know how people really feel about him and your dad never gave a shit about power or prestige.” They turned again and this time the road was even bumpier. He removed his hand from hers and put it on the wheel. They spent the next couple of minutes swerving around rocks and holes on this barely-a-road road.

  Jesse knew her dad. Did she want to know more? She’d never thought she did, but then again she thought he never cared. Her mom had struggled so much, and now Jolie kept hearing how her had loved her and loved her mom. It was a ball of confusion that probably wouldn’t have been any less confusing even if no one was trying to kill her—which they were.

  “After my mom died,” Jesse began as the road seemed to become more grass than rock. She wasn't sure it could be classified as a road any longer. “My dad was in a real bad place. You only get one true mate and all. Your dad understood, having lost your mom, and they bonded over that. Their childhood friendship became much more. Enough more that he trusted him with this place. I’m not even sure your mom knows about it yet.”

  He turned one more time and a beautiful cabin sat in front of her. It didn’t seem possible to have a cabin this far off of the beaten path, but here it stood.

  “It’s beautiful.” It looked like something out of a story book.

  “My dad built it with his own two hands.” Pride filled his voice. “He even read up on all the prepper stuff, and it has electricity and water even though we are nowhere near the public lines. This is part of the reason I wanted to be a builder. I figured if he could do this, one man alone, imagine what I could accomplish with a crew.”

  “Your house.”

  “True, but so much more. When this is all over with and you are truly safe, I will have to show you what I have truly accomplished.” He opened his door and started to get out.

  She reached for her purse so she could do the same, and it wasn’t there. Suck an egg. She’d left it at Jesse’s. She did made a mental list of all that was in there and really hoped it was safe. Her phone, her wallet and pretty much all the money she had. Brilliant.

  Her door opening startled her. “What’s wrong?” Jesse squatted down so he could look at her eye to eye.

  “Nothing, I just forgot my purse at your house and was wondering … never mind.” She unbuckled her belt and turned to get out of the car to see he hadn’t moved. They were only inches apart. That was too far for her and she closed the distance.

  It felt like home as her lips met his. The position was awkward, but she had no intention of letting him know that. She had been wanting to get her lips on his since they last parted. He was like an addiction. The more she had, the more she needed, and be damned that it was wrong in so many ways. He pulled back too soon for her liking and a whimper escaped her lips.

  “Let’s go inside, sweetling.” The humor in his voice left no doubt that he heard her whimper. Awesome.

  “Do you think my purse is safe?” she asked as they climbed the stoop to the front door.

  “Absolutely. No one would steal or touch anything in that house.” He opened the unlocked door.

  He walked inside and she followed suit. One step in and she was overcome by a weird sensation. She couldn’t quite place it, and at first it freaked her out, but that feeling quickly went from creepy to comforting.

  “Wait.” Jesse was now in front of her, blocking the view of the house. “Tell me what just happened.”

  “We came inside?” She was pretty sure he meant with her reaction to walking inside, but she didn’t want to open that can of worms if she didn’t have to.

  “Nice try.” His smirk was endearing, but unwanted. She didn’t need to let him in on her brand of crazy just yet. “So …”

  He was not going to give up.

  She sighed in exasperation. “I sometimes get feeling about things, and I did when I came in. It’s all good, though.”

  “By feelings you mean you felt the security ... umm … system?”

  Crap. Details it was.

  “Can we sit down? I promise to tell you, just not standing here in the d
oorway.” She needed a few moments to pull her answer together.

  “Fine.” He grabbed her hand and led her to a love seat only a few feet in front of her. Not much time, but enough. She hoped, anyway. “Sit. Speak.”

  “Not a puppy dog.” She saw his tension leave his eyes. He liked her playful side as much as she liked his. “Okay, so sometimes I get feelings. Usually that something bad is going to happen or something is wrong. Not that I ever know what, so it kind of blows.” She tried to look down at her lap, but he quickly pulled her chin up to look at him. No hiding today. “Sometimes, like this afternoon at your house, I get déjà vu. Only at your house it was super beyond intense, which is why I needed to go outside. Just now, I had a weird feeling when I went in the door, but then it felt comforting so I let it go. Can we drop it now?”

  “Ahhh, that makes sense then. You have some power in you, don’t you, sweetling?” He leaned in and gave her a peck on the cheek. “Okay, let’s have a tour so we can have some alone time before the parents arrive.” He gave her a wink and rose.

  “Wait? That’s it? I tell you the crazy and you are all ‘let’s have a tour’?”

  He grabbed her hand and puller her to stand. “Well, I figure the knowing stuff you got from your mom, and as for the rest of it, I was mostly curious if you felt the security system more than anything else. So why sit there and gossip about it all like old ladies when we could be getting in some kissing time?”

  She stared at him, unsure what to say next. Her mom? How was this connected to her mom and how did he feel the same thing she did?

  “Come on, Jolie.” He pulled her toward the hallway. “We were just in the living room/kitchen combo. My dad’s room is down the other hallway …” He kept them moving, “This is the bathroom. Just let the water run a couple of minutes before you drink it the first time. I was here a couple of days ago, so it should taste fine, but sometimes it gets stale if it sits in the pipes too long.”

  “Okay.”

  He opened the next door, and to her surprise it was an office. It felt out of place in this homey little cabin.

  “This is my dad’s other office. Even when he wants to be left alone, he works.” He led her inside and she felt like she was invading on Garrick’s personal space, but Jesse acted as if it were no big deal. “I want to show you something here.” He dropped her hand and went to the desk, grabbed a frame, and handed it to her.

  Jolie looked at the frame and in it was a picture, yellowed by age. She recognized Garrick immediately. He looked so much like Jesse in his youth. His arm was around a beautiful woman who, even in the aged picture, Jolie could tell had eyes the same aquamarine as Jesse. In her arms was a baby.

  “Is that you?”

  “It is. And look to their right.”

  She did and was met with her mother staring back at her, looking so joyful with her father’s arm wrapped around her. “That is your parents. They were visiting to meet me.”

  “She looks so happy.” Jolie said more to herself than to Jesse. “She really loved him.”

  He took the picture from her hand and pulled her into a hug. “She really did. They loved each other just as much as if fate had put them there for each other, but they loved you more.” His hand rubbed a small circle on her back, giving her comfort. “They knew you would be in danger and did everything they could to protect you, hoping the danger would one day be gone and they could be together, but that never happened.”

  Jolie went to speak and a sob came out instead.

  “Shush, beautiful. I didn’t bring you in here to make you cry. I just wanted to fill in a piece I knew you were missing and wanting to know about.”

  “Thanks,” she sobbed into his shirt. She still had no idea what was or wasn’t going on with them, but at this point, she couldn't care less. She needed him. He might go from hottie to asshat to sweetheart back to asshat, but she would take it because right now everything around her was tumbling and fast.

  When the sobbing turned to crying turned to sporadic tears, she pulled away and wiped them from her face. She felt remarkably better. She was still confused and scared, but a huge void that influenced her life more than she realized was filled.

  “Better?”

  “Better.” She took the picture that he was still holding and placed it back on the desk. “So is that the full tour?”

  “No, love, there is another room.” He winked at her, and the room brightened again. “Come, I’ll show you where the magic happens.”

  Life is but a Dream …

  That stopped her in her tracks. He said no one else had been here, but it still hurt. What was wrong with her?

  “Bad choice of words and not at all true, Jolie, so drop the face and come with me.”

  She was usually so good at hiding what she thought, but around him she failed miserably. She had yet to decide if that was a detriment or a relief. She followed him to what she was sure was going to be his room. Her hormones had been on overdrive since she first met him, and here they were, completely alone in the middle of nowhere. Of course now they were related, so … bahhh, she wasn’t going to even go there.

  He opened the door and stepped aside for her to walk in. Jolie took two steps and froze. She had been here before. This was no déjà vu. She had been here, on that bed, tied up and blind folded. She was here in her dreams. She started to back away and hit a wall. Not a wall, Jesse. His arms quickly enveloped her.

  “You recognize my room.” It was not a question. It was a statement. Maybe this really was where the magic happened, just the wrong kind of magic. “You probably want to talk about that. In here or in the other room?”

  “Here.”

  She walked toward the bed and sat down. Jessie looked at her, then at the chair in the corner, as if deciding where to sit. She patted the bed in response. For whatever reason, having him near but not right beside her made Jolie very uncomfortable. He sat on the bed, but not right next to her, as if still unsure if this was the best place for him.

  “So …” Jolie wasn’t sure how much to give away. There was a slight chance he didn’t know about the dream and confessing wet dreams to new boyfriends/brothers was not really the way she wanted to go. “I was here before, but not. You seem to know that already, though.” He nodded. “I figure you might want to explain that.”

  Jesse turned his body so he was completely facing her. “One of the dreams you came to me in was while I was here, so you were kind of here in a way, I guess.”

  “I what?” She was fairly sure if she could travel in dreams she would have done that long before now. Her mother used to tell her a story of a little girl who could and she had … her mother knew. “My mother,” she sighed.

  “I’m lost.” Jesse looked at her as if she were about to bolt any second, the anxiety showing in the wrinkle of his brow.

  “My mother used to tell me stories about a girl who could visit people in her dreams. She knew.” Today went from bad to crazy to who knows what. Maybe this was the dream?

  “You didn’t know. When you came to me, you had no idea?” He looked mortified, as if he was the one she should be upset with.

  “I didn’t know. I just thought that we had fun on the bench, well before you stormed off yelling at me, and that I still wanted you and … you know … dreamed about us together.” Her cheeks were now burning.

  “I thought you knew.” Jesse ran his fingers through his hair. “I’m so sorry. I thought you felt it, and that is why you came to visit me. If I had realized—”

  “If you had realized what? You would have sent me away?” Okay, embarrassment was gone.

  “No, I would have let you know what was going on. I thought you just dropped by for … you know.” His knee was bouncing so hard she could feel the bed moving beneath them. “If I had realized you didn’t know about it all, I would have explained it to you, and we could have used the time differently … or the same … but you would know and … I feel like a creeper … I wasn’t trying to be a creeper …
”

  Jolie watched as he fumbled his words, choosing them ever so carefully. Would things have been different if she had known at the time? She thought back to all they had done in her dreams. Some of them were oh so terribly kinky. He never seemed to mind, but what twenty-something guy turned down free one hundred percent safe sex? None.

  “Jesse, stop. I’m the one who should have known.” He didn’t look convinced. “Would things have gone differently? Probably. We probably would have talked a bit more. Okay, we probably would have talked a lot more, and I would have come to you more often. I can do that, right?” She met Jesse’s eyes and they seemed less concerned than they had earlier.

  “I don’t really know. Your mom is very powerful, and I know she and your dad used to be together even when they were apart.” They what? Jolie never realized how much her mother hid from her. She knew her mom kept things close to the vest, but thought that was to avoid Jolie worrying about things like rent and food, not because she had a secret dreaming relationship with her father. “It is not the same as being in each other’s lives, but she always kept him up to date on what was going on with you.”

  “You mean, I could’ve known him, if I wanted to, because I can do this?” Would that have made a difference? Most definitely. She'd gone from not caring at all that her sperm donor died to feeling sorrow over never knowing him in only one day. Now guilt hung heavy. She could have done more.

  “You might not have been able to, Jolie. You held no memory of him.” He opened up his arms, and she scooched over to him, allowing his comfort. “I think the only reason you were able to do it with me is because we have our connection.”

  “Our connection? You mean hormones?” Did they have a real connection? Probably not. She had lust at first sight, which is hardly the stuff a strong connection is made from.

  “Oh, Jolie, I know you feel it. The need to be near me even when we are in the same room. Missing me before you knew me more than a few kisses.” He was right on both accounts. “Like we are more than just a hook up.”

  “Yeah, but …” Which but should she begin with? But you are my stepbrother? But people are trying to kill me? But I molested you in my dreams? But I don’t really even know who I am right now? Which?