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Chapter One

RAIN

I sat in the hard chair, looking over the one-page menu. I couldn't decide what I wanted. Mostly because my mind kept jumping back to Christmas. In truth, it hadn't been my first Christmas or anything, but it had kinda felt like it.

Bracken and Liam had gone overboard. Everything from frosting cookies and a massive meal to all the gifts they'd gotten for me - so many gift cards - had been a little excessive, but in the best way. The mind-blowing part was how it had all been for me. Me !

Not even my birth family had cared about me as much as these men I'd basically just met.

Ok, so it had been a few months and all, but still!

I felt like they understood me. Like they accepted me for who I was.

Like they gave a damn. Then again, that was basically the whole reason we were here.

We were going to tell my foster parents I was getting adopted .

A family.

For me.

We were really doing this!

Beside me, Liam had already made his choice, unaware of my spinning thoughts.

Sadly, the other half of our lunch meeting wasn't here yet.

They were why I couldn't focus enough to make a decision.

It was hard to be hungry when I felt this nervous.

If anyone could make me tense, John and Nancy Sparks, my latest foster parents, were at the top of the list.

"What are you having?" I asked Liam .

"Burger, fries, and a chocolate shake," he said, flashing me that supportive smile he had. "The shake will make Nancy roll her eyes at least once."

This was why he was so amazing. He knew how to put me at ease, and picking on Nancy helped. I wanted to say it meant more than he knew, but I had a feeling Liam knew exactly how intimidating those two were to their foster kids. So, with a plan in mind, I read the menu again.

I'd just settled on something when the Sparks sat down across from us.

Liam greeted his brother, then his sister-in-law, and started in with small talk about the other kids they were fostering.

Nancy was more than happy to give a rundown on how noisy the house was now that school was out for the holidays.

I tuned it all out. My eyes drifted to the floor and lost focus. My thoughts kept going back to the moment Liam had asked me if I wanted to be adopted. Every time I replayed the memory, a rush of emotion came back. The only name I could give this feeling was euphoria.

I was seventeen, and so close to aging out. I'd come to terms with the reality of never having my own family, but that wasn't the same as not wanting one. And Liam? Bracken? These two men were the first in so long to make me feel wanted. Not tolerated or merely accepted, but actually wanted.

A little smile was trying to take over my face, but I fought it. The Sparks would take it wrong, and that wasn't a fight I wanted to have. Instead, my eyes hung on the line between darkness and light, right where my shadow reached into the walkway beside our table.

Odd. The thing was shimmering again. I quickly glanced at Nancy's shadow, but hers was calm and boring. Even more confusing, the light in here was natural, mundane, and completely human-made. The only time my shadow had been like this was when a fae light caused it.

I was trying to figure out how to subtly make Liam look when the waitress came to take our order.

I picked a chili cheeseburger, cheese fries, and a strawberry shake.

Across the table, Nancy visibly twitched.

Well, she deserved it after locking me in my room for trying to help.

Both of them did! Sadly, my choice of lunch was about the closest I could get to revenge.

The moment the waitress left; John leaned over the table. "Don't tell me she's already been suspended from that school."

"Rain actually made good grades last semester," Liam assured him. "Mostly As and Bs, although I've arranged for her to have some additional tutoring in math. "

"Liam!" I groaned.

He shot me a look. "You studied that hard and made a C? That means you're lacking part of the foundation. This will make it easier, Rain. It's not punishment. It's help."

"Yeah, I know," I grumbled.

Yet John acted like my interruption hadn't happened. "So why are we meeting?" he demanded. "You could've just called."

"I actually wanted to do this face-to-face," Liam said.

"John, you and Nancy have inspired me." He paused to look at me, the expression on his face both nervous and excited.

"Rain is being taken out of the foster system.

She's found a family, which means you can request another foster child at the start of next month. "

"What?" Nancy gasped. "Who would want to adopt her?"

"I do," Liam said.

His hand clenched in his lap. I could see it, but I couldn't rub his arm without giving him away.

I knew this was harder on him than he wanted to admit, but he was doing it for me.

He was facing down his big brother and all the idiotic, homophobic ideas his family had because my new dad was protecting me.

It was a strange thought. All my life, I'd had to protect myself.

I'd always known I'd be on my own, responsible for my own future, and that if I wanted a good one, I'd have to bust my ass to get it.

When I'd gone into the foster system at the age of five, my safety net had vanished and I'd simply accepted it as the way things were.

For me, life lessons had been things like learning not to rock the boat, mastering the art of packing everything up quickly, and never - ever - showing how freaked out I might feel. Calm, polite, and boring were the tricks to being a good foster kid. Sadly, I wasn't really any of those things.

But now, I had a dad. Two of them, although I couldn't mention Bracken to the Sparks.

Liam had never told his brother he was gay, and I refused to out him.

So, for today, I had a single dad, and I was still trying to wrap my mind around how happy I was.

The crazy shadow on the ground strangely felt like proof of this, in a weird and magical way.

Then Nancy had to ruin my moment. "Are you in a relationship with her?!"

Liam gave her a disgusted look. "No, Nancy."

"Then why are you adopting her?"

"Because I want to be a dad," Liam snapped.

"I want my own family. I want Christmas dinners and summer vacations.

I also don't want to give up my career, so a baby's out.

I don't have time to date, and adopting from the foster system makes this easy for a single man.

I have devoted my life to children, Nancy.

You know that. You and John have done the same.

It's just that Lorraine and I..." He looked over at me and smiled. "It's nice to be needed."

"What do you think about this?" John asked me.

I almost sputtered. The man had given me the impression he preferred kids to be seen and not heard. Not that I agreed, but I was on my best behavior today. The last thing I wanted to do was mess this up, so I tried to come up with an answer that didn't sound stupid.

"Uh, I uh..." I looked over at Liam for help.

When he nodded encouragement, I finally found my voice.

"I never had a good dad. Not even when I still had my father.

Liam's amazing, Mr. Sparks. He doesn't care if I don't know things, and he's helped me with school.

I... He..." What the hell was I supposed to say to that question?

"Stop stammering, girl," Nancy barked at me.

Her tone erased all of my self-consciousness and my attitude came out full force.

"It's nice to have someone who cares about me, ok?

Not someone who wants me to clean their house, or someone who expects me to shut up.

It's nice to have one person in my life I can talk to about stupid stuff.

Someone who can help me. Someone who actually tries to understand me, not make me be whatever is most convenient for them.

I've been calling Liam my uncle since I went to Silver Oaks Institute, and it's the closest to a family I've ever had.

So, if he's willing to be my dad, then you're damned right I'm going to say yes! "

"This means she'll be a permanent part of the family," Liam warned.

"It does," John agreed. "It also means the brat's going to bleed you dry for whatever trinket she wants. She sees you as a bank account, William. That's all teenagers care about. Next, she'll be asking you to buy her a car."

"I don't need a car," I said quickly.

"You'll learn to drive mine first," Liam said. "We'll talk about a car for your graduation present."

"See!" John snapped. "Buying children doesn't make them care about you. It won't teach her anything."

"I happen to disagree," Liam said. "Parents are supposed to smooth out the potholes of life.

They're supposed to encourage their children to dream and help them handle the mistakes which happen along the way.

Maybe our father didn't do that, but look at what he did to us, John.

Do we really want to be like him? What about your parents, Nancy? Where do we stop the cycle?"

"We're good to those kids," Nancy insisted.

Liam tipped his head in a partial concession.

"You feed them. You clothe them. You don't beat them.

In my opinion, that's not the same as loving them.

Children need love to thrive, and they give it back.

Rain might be seventeen, but she's not too old to need a father figure in her life.

Even in our thirties, we often still need parents to guide us - and I want to be that.

I intend to, and I don't need either of your approval.

I came here to let you know our family is growing, nothing else. "

My head was bobbing back and forth as I tried to watch the argument play out. Just as John pulled in a breath to say something, movement caught my eye. Down on the floor, my shadow was reaching out to Nancy's with both hands.

I wasn't, and this thing was no longer matching my shape! No, it was trying to strangle Nancy in the only way it could. My heart slammed against my ribs and I looked up, terrified someone would notice the movement. My eyes landed on Nancy just as she cleared her throat.

That didn't work, so she coughed. On the floor, the shadows were now struggling, and Nancy acted like she couldn't quite swallow something. Her spit, maybe? I didn't know, but as the woman's face began to turn red, her husband thumped her back in an attempt to help. Nancy only coughed harder.

Fuck! My shadow was doing this? It had to be, so I reached out with my foot to stomp on the thing. Subtly, though. Well, as subtly as was possible. But when my shoe crushed the butt of my own shadow, Nancy was able to suck in a breath. Ok, so this had to be working, right?

Dragging my foot back across the restaurant's wood-looking floor, I forcefully hauled my shadow back.

Its hands left Nancy's. A gap of normal light appeared between the two darker forms, but mine was still reaching, still struggling.

I wanted to hiss at it to quit, but that would definitely make me look crazy, so instead I just thought angry things at it.

And damned if that shape didn't turn to look up at me.

The fingers relaxed. The form shifted away.

With another tug of my foot, the shadow moved back to where it belonged: under me.

Then, while I tried to watch without being obvious at all, the rippling of its edges stopped and the shape returned to merely a dark silhouette of my own posture.

"Stop staring at the floor!" John snapped, making me flinch.

"Sorry," I mumbled. "I didn't want to gawk. "

"I'm fine," Nancy grumbled, "but thanks for asking."

"You sure?" John asked her.

She nodded, reaching up to touch her throat. "Just swallowed wrong, I think."

I looked over at Liam, but he didn't seem to think anything was weird at all. Then again, from his angle, he couldn't see my shadow. Hopefully Nancy hadn't either. I twisted to see if anyone else in the restaurant may have been looking, but that was the wrong thing to do.

"Sit still!" Nancy snapped at me. "Liam, is this how you intend to raise her?"

"She's just looking," Liam countered. "So yes, it really is."

Thankfully, the waitress finally showed up with our food. From the look on the girl's face, she could tell this little meeting was far from civil, so she was hurrying. I hadn't thought we'd been that obnoxious, but maybe the tension was just a little too tense?

Because people were watching. In the quick glance I'd gotten, I'd been able to see the restaurant wasn't full, but too many eyes kept turning our way.

Ours, luckily – they weren't looking at the floor.

They seemed more interested in the emphatic whispers that were just a little too loud or the way Liam and John were leaning at each other.

Yeah, it looked like a disagreement. Then again, it was.

The Sparks would be mortified to think anyone in town would talk about this later, since they were the sort of people who cared about the opinions of others.

Liam - whose last name was also Sparks, even if he was never a "Sparks" to me - would probably find it funny. At least I hoped he would.

I kinda did.

My shadow had just tried to choke out Mrs. Sparks? Yeah, there was some humor there, if I overlooked the shock and panic parts. My heart was still pounding a little too much, but whatever. Maybe my shadow was now like some representation of my inner darkness or something?

I had no clue, and I couldn't really ask now. I wanted to. I also knew better, and the one thing being a foster kid had taught me was that staying in my lane was always safest. So long as I acted like everything was fine, I wouldn't be the one getting in trouble or messing this up.

And today, I really wanted to make sure I got this right.