Page 17

When I wake up, I’m warm, comfortable, bathed in a scent that’s so familiar it could be my own. I shift my body, letting out a low noise, and feel something tighten around my waist.

That’s when it hits me—I am sleeping with someone. Not someone—a man.

Emin lets out a low, rumbling sigh and hauls me up so I’m more fully sprawled over him, and I feel a deep, full heat spread out over my face. My sweatshirt has ridden halfway up my torso, so our stomachs are pressed together, and though I’m draped over him, my leg is wedged between his.

Then, to make things even worse, he lifts his hand in his sleep and slowly, gently runs it over my hair, before dropping it back down into his lap. My breathing gets shallow, and I will myself to get up, to get off of him. To put distance between us.

But all I can keep thinking about is Emin as a teenager, showing up at my mother’s house, asking after me. Why would he do that? Especially if he knew how his father would have felt about him being seen there?

Out of everything—him protecting us, offering up his house to us—it’s this knowledge that’s making it most difficult to hold on to my anger toward him. He came, he asked after me.

And now, in his sleep, he’s reaching for me, pulling me to him, making sure our bodies are pressed together.

My eyes skip over to Sarina on the couch, and once again, I feel that familiar tug in my gut. The knowledge that she’s growing up without a father, but now tinged with the feeling that, instead of solely sitting in Emin’s lap, that fact is starting to belong to me, too.

Because I could tell him the truth right now. I could tell him the truth about Sarina, and he’d do the right thing. I can tell that it’s true—but my stomach tightens at the thought of it. If I tell Emin that Sarina is biologically his, that will force us to stay here.

Even if Emin Argent still wants nothing to do with me.

My mind skips back to the Llewelyns, that omegas-only college where Sarina could go and be free to pursue her studies without worrying over alphas. Without worrying about her heat.

When she was growing inside me, I’d hoped more than anything for her to be a beta. Even an alpha would have been manageable. But the moment she came out, I knew the truth—she would struggle through the world exactly the same way that I did.

Maybe as a teenager, she would meet her mate, fall in love with an alpha, and the trajectory of her life would change forever. I don’t regret having her, I don’t regret doing everything I could to give her a different life.

But that doesn’t mean I want her to go through what I did. Having her options taken from her. Carrying the baby of a man who’d so callously push her away, turn her out. Living on the outskirts of society because of bullshit pack standings.

Even if Emin came back for me, even if he went to my mother’s place and asked after me, that doesn’t mean he didn’t turn me away in the first place. And it doesn’t change a single minute of the things that happened to me after that.

Slowly, carefully, I untangle myself from him and tiptoe up the stairs to the shower, where I scald myself with hot water and scrub with soap, desperately trying to rid myself of his scent.

***

“Good morning!”

When the door swings open, it reveals a tall, wire-thin woman draped in colorful fabric and bangles, her gray hair swinging around her shoulders, her round glasses magnifying her eyes as she peers at me. A smile breaks out over her lips.

“I’m Beth, you must be Veva—and Sarina!”

She surprises us by hugging us both, then we’re ushered inside.

Emin is waiting outside in his truck, and I’m glad to be out from under his gaze. When I came back downstairs this morning, Sarina was already up and reading, and Emin offered to take us to breakfast.

I sat quietly, chanting to myself mentally, a constant reminder not to fall into Emin’s charms.

Now, Beth shuffles us through a hallway piled with books on either side, plants stacked on top of them perilously. When we break out of the hallway, it’s into a large, light-soaked room, a table right in the center of it.

There’s a wall of windows on the far side, and crystals dangle from the window panes, catching and reflecting the light, sending shards of rainbow spinning through the space.

A dozen heads turn to us, a collective shifting when we walk in.

“Veva?” Kira stands, her eyes darting from me, to another woman, then to Beth.

“Our newest member,” Beth says, clapping and bumping her shoulder into mine. “Veva, Sarina, would you like to introduce yourselves and your powers?”

I look to my daughter—I’d rather not tell this group of mostly strangers about her, but I don’t seem to have much of a choice.

“I’m Veva,” I say, putting my hand on her shoulder and drawing her to me. “This is Sarina, my daughter. I inherited clairsentience from my grandmother, and Sarina…”

She looks up at me, and I stare down at her, and I finish, “Well, we’re not quite sure.”

“Oh, that’s fine,” Beth says, gesturing for us to come in and take a seat. “Part of our job here is to test the boundaries of our abilities, press up against those thresholds. In fact, Ash here is without a gift, but enjoys joining us all the same.”

The woman Beth gestures to taps her finger against her temple, smiling. “Keeps me sharp.”

“Don’t lie,” Beth jokes, “it’s all about getting to have some of my famous tea.”

Ash shrugs, her hands wrapped around a mug, and takes a sip as the tendrils of steam curl around her face. She’s pretty, with dark brown hair, and I realize who she is—Dorian’s little sister.

We take a seat. Kira smiles at me, and I smile back at her. The others around the table are young—teenagers and adults accompanying them. Beth sits at the head of the table, leading us through several exercises.

It’s a lot of breathing, clearing our minds, letting thoughts come and go.

“They’ll drift through like clouds,” Beth says, her eyes shut as she sways at the head of the table. “Acknowledge them, but don’t trap them inside. Let them move on.”

Later, when everyone is working through their own exercises, Beth drifts over to me.

“Okay,” she says, dropping into a seat beside me. “You inherited this from your grandmother—clairsentience? What do you know of your power?”

A blush rises up my cheeks. “Well—nothing. We weren’t that close, and my grandmother was a very private woman. She said she was giving it to me. I didn’t—I mean, I’m still not even sure that’s really a thing. Is it?”

“Yes, it very much is,” Beth says, folding her hands in her lap. “Does your mother have abilities?”

“I don’t know. I don’t think so. Maybe my grandmother just said she was giving it to me, but didn’t?”

“Would you say that you have good gut-feelings, Veva?”

“Well, I trust my instincts.”

“That could very well be a symptom of your gift,” Beth explains, gesturing into the rest of the room.

“Many of the gifts in this room are more…targeted. For example, Kira here is clairaudient. Her premonitions are centered around hearing— whether that comes from the past or future, or from the spirits around us.”

Sarina shifts, looking around us uncomfortably.

Beth laughs, “ Benevolent spirits, dear.”

“So,” I say, crossing my arms. “Clairsentience is useless, then?”

“No,” Beth’s brows draw down so dramatically I have to bite my lip to keep from laughing.

She scoots forward, laying a hand on my arm.

“ No , dear, not at all. Just because something is subtle, doesn’t mean it’s not powerful.

You have a sense for what’s going to happen, what’s already happened.

You’re sensitive to energy, have an acute ability to understand what others are feeling.

You may even,” she whirls her hand through the air, then says, “have a certain sense of…auras. Not to say a visual sense, but clairsentients can often see right into the heart of a person, know whether they’re good or evil. Understand their intentions.”

“But I won’t have premonitions?”

“Clairsentients don’t often have explicit premonitions. If anything, truth comes to you in your dreams.”

“What about me?” Sarina asks, bouncing on her seat, moving toward Beth.

It’s startling to me, seeing Sarina at this stage in her life. Moving between maturity and childlike behavior like this, excitement over learning about her gift.

“Well, your mother said you’d had one premonition. Can you describe that to me?”

Sarina nods, closes her eyes. “When it happened, I was someone else. I was an announcer man, at a race, watching horses.”

“Interesting,” Beth drops her head into her hand. “Do you have any idea why that happened?”

“I was thinking about horses,” Sarina admits, looking to me, like this is actually something she did wrong. “We saw one pulling a cart when we got to the market, and it just…melted from that into me being someone else.”

“Do you remember what they were saying?”

As though reading from a script in front of her, Sarina says, “Adelphus pulls ahead, despite all the odds, taking the race by fifteen full seconds! Second place goes to Glanmore, third to Rylan! What an upset!”

I realize the entire room has gone quiet, and is looking at my daughter.

“That is excellent , Sarina,” Beth says. “Many of us don’t recall our first premonition, so it’s really something special that you’ve held on to the whole thing.”

Sarina beams, but something takes root in my stomach. The sense that this “gift” might be a lot more trouble than it’s worth.

We go on with the exercises, and Beth guides me through identifying the clairsentience, and how it guides my gut feelings. Just before it’s time to go, she catches me by the arm and pulls me back.

“Veva,” she says, voice low, head tipped down, eyes flicking to Sarina as she pulls on her shoes.

“Keep an eye on your girl. With the way her gift is presenting…I feel she may develop more. And with the capacity for casting from your blood? Those abilities may be much stronger than a ten-year-old is capable of managing.”

“Oh,” I say, laughing and pulling back from her, running my hands down my shirt to smooth down the wrinkles. “I will. Also—she’s turning eight soon, actually.”

Beth’s eyes sparkle. “Oh, sure she is.”