Page 34

Billie

THE COLD WIND basically backhands me as soon as we step out onto the stone patio, and continues to twist around my body like it’s trying to trip me up, take me down, and make me run back inside. Thoughts of breaking in the fireplace for the season, cuddling up with my mates under piles of blankets, and drinking hot toddies have my body feeling heavy, and my weighted steps slow to a shuffle.

A strong, supportive hand clasps the nape of my neck, and plush lips brush my ear. “Playdate soon, mate,” he seductively whispers, his voice smooth like melted chocolate.

My eyelids flutter, and I lean into his solid presence, repeating, “Playdate... do it for the playdate.”

“That’s right, do it for the playdate. You can do this. We need you to do this,” Xander continues as his fingers massage away the tension, his hand working his belief into me, strengthening my spine. I refuse to be the weak link, and all of these superpowers are feckin’ nugatory, good buddy , if I can’t use them, if I can’t control them.

By the time we’ve woven through the five circles of cheap plastic chairs, each held down with a fifty-pound bag of either gravel or rock salt, my shoulders are rolled back, my spine is straight, and my mind is focused on what needs to be done. “There she is,” he says, suckling my lobe with his hot mouth. “There’s my duchessa ... my mate.” Then he lays one last kiss on my temple and releases his hold.

It’s only then I realize another person has been connected with me, his fox hanging out with mine while I’ve been squeezing his hand throughout the entire interaction. I loosen my grip and slide my eyes to a smirking Alessandro. Wincing, I mutter, “Sorry.”

His smirk turns into a sly smile, and his fingers flutter around mine. “ Nessun problema, la mia stella. As you can see, they still work. And it’s good to know you have such a strong grip.” He winks while swaying our clasped hands. I exhale a breathy laugh and nod my head, then we get to work.

Everyone except Alessandro, me, and my mates stay just outside of the largest circle. I have to ask Ethan or Heydar about the actual dimensions, but I think the largest is about a hundred feet in diameter. The chairs and bags are set up in such a way that each circle has six equally spaced targets, and there’s about ten feet between each circle. Squinting my eyes and turning my head, I notice that no target is in a direct line with the targets in front of or behind them. So: five circles, ranging from a ten-foot radius to a fifty-foot radius, with me in the center.

Alessandro comes to stand in front of me and takes both of my hands, letting them sway, silently waiting until I’m ready. I lift my gaze to his and hold it. Without breaking eye contact, he gently lifts our hands up between us. Pressing my palms together, he wraps his tightly around mine.

Our foxes, who have been snuggling, sniffing, and gently playing with each other inside Little Fox’s salon, pause their antics to turn their attention to us. Together they slide the ottoman out of the way, and Little Fox releases the trapdoor. Soft paws scamper down the metal steps into the Royal Grotto, and they hop up onto the captain’s chair, which is more than big enough for both of them to fit. With a few more head rubs, they relax back on their hind legs, fluffing out their tails and wrapping them around their front paws, patiently waiting for us with glowing eyes—eyes that match our own.

Alessandro shares his warmth, rubbing my fingers and blowing a summer breeze of a breath over our joined hands. He explains, “Last time you made one spool of energy. This time you will make two spools. Just enough, la mia stella . This is a test.

We just need to understand the process and become comfortable with it.”

“Got it,” I say with a firm nod, more than okay not going all out.

“Then you will bring forth an emotional cloud like last time, but this one... it...” He audibly swallows, and his handsome features contort in pain.

I furrow my brows. “What, Alessandro? What’s different about this one?”

His hands continue to rub mine, and he lays a few soft kisses on my fingers. Biscotti licks Little Fox—or as he likes to call her, Fragolina —behind the ears, and Alessandro says in a strained voice, “Like last time, you’ll feed the energies through the emotional cloud, but unlike last time, you’ll need to do it twice. The first time the energy should still be able to hold a ropelike form and be respooled. The second time, it should liquefy, and your fox must immediately guide that energy down your arms and into your hands. Because this is the first time, you and she will need to work the energies separately, holding on to the intensified forms for a longer period of time. And—” He exhales a rough breath. “And the emotional cloud has to be strong enough to inoculate two different spools of energy... twice.”

An icy ache shoots down my left arm like my bones are freezing, making my fingers throb with numbing pain—the same pain I felt when I deployed the Wonder Whip. My face pinches with the memory, and I lowly groan, “This is gonna hurt.”

“What do you mean?” Xander asks, taking a step closer, his arms crossed over his chest, head canted to the side, his glowing eyes scrutinizing me.

I shake my head and puff out a breath, muttering, “Nothing. It is what it is.”

Ethan and Jax follow his lead, closing me in on either side, gazing at me with furrowed brows and pursed lips. “What do you mean it’s going to hurt, love? How do you know?” Ethan inquires.

I slide my gaze to Alessandro, the corners of his mouth pulled down in a frown. Not liking the look of sorrowful empathy on his face, I gaze around at my mates, finding even more unwanted worry and concern. I decide the sky may be a better option, the soft blue with the long brushstrokes of wispy white clouds and the hazy pink creeping up from beyond the horizon. Yeah, much better. “Nothing, it’s just...” I lick my dry lips. “The emotional pain, I felt it physically when I did the Wonder Whip.” Inhaling a shuddering breath, I roll a shoulder as if to say, no big deal . “So, with this drawing on, what—” I bring my gaze down to Alessandro and hitch a brow “Four times the emotional energy I used for the whip?” He jerks a tight nod, and I continue. “I’m imagining four times the amount of pain.”

Xander closes the distance between us and cups my cold face in his hands, hands that are warm despite the cold and him not wearing any gloves. His thumbs caress my cheeks, spreading that warmth, and it seems like lately I’m either sucking up everyone’s heat or stripping off layers. Am I going into menopause? Do shifters hit menopause earlier than humans? “You never mentioned being in pain, and I couldn’t sense any from you when we practiced last time,” he comments.

My lips tick up on one side, and I kiss his palm. “I’m pretty good at numbing out physical pain. It’s one of the first lessons you learn in the ring. Take a hit and keep fighting.” Xander dips his chin in understanding, but I don’t fail to notice the tic of his jaw. I sigh. “This is not putting myself in danger. This is something I’m—” I snort a snicker and raise my brows. “Born to do.” I crane my head around to Ethan. “Logically speaking, if I couldn’t handle it, I wouldn’t be capable of it.”

Nibbling on the inside of his lower lip, his dark eyes harden just a bit, and he cautiously replies, “Logically? Yes. But—”

“See, a-okay,” I interrupt, totally cutting him off. His nostrils flare, and with a clicking of his teeth, he snaps his mouth shut while flames spark behind his dark eyes. Yup, pretty sure I’m gonna get a mouthful for that one later.

Seeming to understand my need to keep this moving, to not get caught up in the what-ifs, Xander fills my vision by bringing his forehead to mine. I lean into the intimate touch. His eyes shutter closed, and he pleads, “I understand. Just don’t hide the pain. Not from me.”

I rub my nose against his and hum my understanding, not agreeing or disagreeing. Then I pull away and out of his hold so I can focus on the task, because that’s what I need to do. Gazing around at my mates and then our... shifter teammates or whatever, the need for space fills me. “I think this will go best if everyone but Alessandro and I wait on the patio, away from me. After last time, I don’t want to risk hurting anyone, and worrying about it will just make this harder.”

There may be some growls of disapproval, but in the end, Xander ushers everyone to wait where I hope they’ll be out of harm’s way. Ya know, because last time I did set the forest on fire.

“I will be here with you while you spool and pool, la mia stella ,” Alessandro murmurs. “Then I’ll leave and join the others. I can’t be connected to you when you release it.”

I nod and swallow. “Right, because who knows if you will be protected from it or not.” Focusing on my breath, I close my eyes and connect with Little Fox. She jumps down to the metal floor just to the side of the chair where two spools of green glowing energy have already been portioned off into metal trays.

When I try to bring forth the emotions needed, at first all I find is exhaustion. Exhaustion on so many levels. My body feels chilly, achy, and spent from my possibly unhealthy emotional need to work out no matter what, and maybe my severe lack of sleep. My mind is fried from classes, the pack mentoring with Gertie, and the royal sessions with Sandro. My well of mental coping strategies to handle all these emotions is near empty. Almost dying... twice? God, Castle Island feels like it was so long ago. Anyway, it really fucks with you. Oh yeah, can’t forget about Jax being drugged and assaulted and how much is being asked of Xander, how much of himself he’s giving, and how I feel like I don’t have enough to support him. Enough to support all of my mates. Hell, I just want to curl up in a ball and cry myself to sleep and not wakeup until—

“La mia stella ,” Alessandro cautions, his thumbs tapping my knuckles.

“I know,” I grumble, shaking the weariness from my shoulders. Inhaling, I suck back the tears—the tired fucking tears pooling behind my eyes. “I know, just give me a second.” Even though I want to focus on something different, pick an event or a person that I’m scared of or mad at—feck knows there’s plenty—the exhaustion keeps pulling on me. Like a tangle of vines hidden under quicksand, I feel myself getting tugged under the sinking feelings. Because I am tired and have been since I lost them. Since they were taken from me. Taken from me as if they were nothing more than collateral damage. Their lives, their souls were considered so trivial that their deaths were just a necessary causality. I glower, and red sparks flicker to life in my chest. How dare anyone think of my parents as insignificant.

“That’s,” Alessandro says, “that’s good, la mia stella . Now level it up.” He groans, and his fox whimpers as the pressure cooker of boiling anger that’s been kept on a simmer for a decade and a half begins to rattle. My jaw clenches. My muscles twitch and tremble with my rising temperature, my rising anger.

I’ve never truly allowed myself to imagine what they must have gone through, the pain and suffering they may have felt. I was a kid, focused on my own pain, my own suffering.

I think of them in their old sleigh bed, snuggled together, my father spooning my mother because he always loved having her in his arms. What if they did wake up? What if the effects of the gas wore off? What would it have been like? What if the coughing and choking as they tried to expel the smoke roused them from their drug-induced sleep? What if they awoke with bleary, dry eyes to a room full of smoke, their bodies burning up, covered in sweat and soot as flames surrounded them with no way to escape? Their minds were probably barely able to comprehend what was happening, while their legs and arms stayed motionless, numb under the drugs. My lungs constrict with theirs. My heart clenches with worry and confusion. My mind fights against the uncomprehensible helplessness they must have felt.

When I started therapy and had a hard time explaining my feelings, my therapist used to ask me what shape and color would my emotions be. That’s what this process reminds me of, taking my emotions and giving them form. With the Wonder Whip, my emotions were an amorphous dark-gray globule with red flashes of blinding light. Ice-cold fear and uncertainty mixed with startling blasts of anxiety. This time, it’s a blazing sun, a spinning sphere of orange and red flames. An inferno of anger that’s been left unattended, and ignored. But it kept getting hotter, building upon itself.

Little Fox begins to feed the short spools of our green energy into the fiery ball. Solar flares lash out, and sparks pop and crackle, floating around the space. It’s then I notice her goggles and welder’s gloves, my fury so hot, so volatile that even my fox needs to protect herself from it. The green energy glows radioactive as it pours out the other side, and she spools it onto a block of ice. A glowing green mist rises on contact, and the energy holds a form.

Little Fox lifts her head up, the flames dancing in the reflection of her goggles. Our anger , she hisses through gritted teeth, the tips of her white-furred chest darkening.

Grinding my molars, I nod, feeling the call of our anger, hearing it’s whispered promises. And I listen. My blood rampages through my veins, burning away that bone-weary exhaustion. Hot spikes slice through my addled brain, making everything sharper, no more confusion over what decisions to make. My insecurities and doubts about my ability to be the mate, the shifter, the duchessa that I need to be, become laughable, ridiculous thoughts so insubstantial they float like ashes in the updraft. The fire burns hotter, grows larger, and my ribs crack, with my chest opening up, trying to set it free. To release this rage. To scream about the unfairness of it all. To break something. To destroy as I was destroyed. Little Fox growls in response.

The hands that were once a warm comfort are now cold cuffs—frozen manacles that are holding me back from transforming, from giving myself over.

Alone. We need to be alone with this, for some emotions are best felt when you don’t have to worry about others seeing you, seeing the depravity that lives in the dark corners deep within... within us all.

“I know, la mia stella , I know,” Alessandro assures me, and my upper lip jerks up in insolence. How would he know? He still has both his parents. “ Si, si, lei ha ragione.

Per favore ascoltami. I beg, listen to me. Feed the energy through a second time and let it pool in your palms. Then, when you and Fragolina are ready, you will spread your arms wide, and she will lift her tail in preparation. To send it outward, you must bring all that force held in your hands together by clapping them at the same time she releases hers by slamming down her tail. This is—”

“Got it,” I hiss, feeling that anger, that rage, flare out, lassoing everything it comes in contact with and incinerating it—taking any thought, any feeling, any interaction, and making it my enemy. I’m about to get spun up in the whirling vortex of wrath that is becoming a pulsing, living entity inside me, ready to take out anyone or anything, including myself. I spit out, “LEAVE. NOW.” The words are hot on my tongue.

“Si , la mia stella ,” Alessandro whispers and croaks a gasp. “Let it out.” Then he releases my hands, taking his calming energy and his fox with him. A brief feeling of heavy loss plummets into my stomach. But, like an ice cube dropped into hot tea, it’s quickly eaten up, evaporated by the roaring flames of anger.

A mad cackle scratches up my throat. So easy . It’s so easy to feel nothing but anger when anger is what you feel. It storms through you. It decimates everything, and it makes you feel powerful. Strong. Because we lost them. They died in flames, and those responsible are still out there, still breathing air, still smiling, and laughing, just as their children are, and have been. They are going on with their lives like they didn’t end two lives and destroyed a third. More rage gets added to the already-blistering sphere, feeding the fire. Long lengths of fire lash out like whips, snapping and scalding where they hit, wrapping around my limbs, my neck pulling me in. Sweat pours from my whole body, my entire existence being engulfed by the heat, consumed by the fires of fury.

Little Fox moves closer to the block of ice, brushing her tail along the sides, cooling herself down and reining herself back in from her rage. Because I’m not reachable—I’m being devoured. She passes the energy through the volatile flames a second time. Mini-explosions burst from the sphere, as the green exterior cracks and peels away, leaving a liquid of blazing white. My right arm heats as the roiling, bubbling energy streams down it. She quickly does the same with the other spool, and the searing agony of my right arm is temporarily forgotten with the fresh pain scorching the nerve endings of my left arm. Hey, you can only register pain from one area at a time, right? My fingers are sizzling as if the white heat is smelting the bone from the flesh like metal from ore. And I can smell my own flesh melting. My tears are so hot that my cold cheeks feel like icebergs cracking apart.

“Ready,” Little Fox states, and my attention returns to my chest, to what she’s been working with. The fiery ball of spinning, unstable energy has shrunken, and the rotation has slowed. I can breathe, and with a few deep inhales, I’m able to think past the anger. I can feel the agony of holding on to all that rage because I am holding it in my hands. Afraid of losing focus, I keep my eyes closed and spread my arms out wide. The cool air brushes my hot, blistering hands, sending slices of fresh pain through my raw, exposed flesh. Little Fox raises her tail, which is fanned out and seems to be electrified, with flashes of white light zapping through it.

“Ready to do this?” I snarl.

More than ever. Little Fox growls.

Inhaling, I arch my spine and throw my head back. On the exhale, I scream, “Hadoken!” like Ryu from Street Fighter . Little Fox roars out her own call of power, slamming her tail down just as I smack my hands together. A piercing crack followed by a sharp boom interrupts the steady hum of blood whooshing in my ears, and I’m thrown to the ground. Upon impact, the cool grass sizzles, sending ribbons of steam up around my heated form. Little Fox falls into a similar position, greenish vapor rising from her body, her mouth open with her panted breathing. I quickly fold over myself, cradling my throbbing hands close to my chest, and try to breathe through the scorching waves of pain.

“Get up. Get up,” I hiss at myself, knowing I need to box this pain up and get to my feet. I can’t lie here.