When you don’t sleep at night it’s easy to get up early. My one lone bag leaned against my legs like a lap dog as I waited for the alarm to go off. We were leaving the hotel just after four in the morning and I must have been on my bed for the past two hours. I felt tired but the peace of mind I needed in order to rest was nowhere around. Kain hadn’t stirred as far as I could tell so instead of asking him to accompany me in my misery, I left him alone.
Yet when I walked out of my room, I was surprised to see Kain waiting for me with a small thermos in his hand. He smiled and shifted from side to side.
“I made you a drink for your flight.”
“Thank you.” I was relieved we wouldn’t leave things on bad terms. “You didn’t have to do that.”
“I know.” He pushed the thermos into my hands and looked down into my eyes. “Please be careful, Eviana. Jeremiah can’t be trusted and Lucian will be looking for you.”
I swallowed hard, trying to stay strong. “I’ll be okay.”
The silence stretched between us. Just before I was ready to give in, Kain reached forward and gave me a quick kiss on the cheek.
“Be safe,” he said.
“I will.” I watched him shuffle back into his bedroom before turning to leave. It was a nice feeling to know we were still friends. I needed Kain’s support more than he’d ever know.
When I opened the door to the hallway, I was met with a pleasant yet very sleepy face. Apparently my cousin didn’t have any pressing thoughts on his mind. “Oh, you’re ready?” he stumbled.
“Yeah. Couldn’t sleep,” I said while closing the door behind me. “Are you coming too?” Maybe this wouldn’t be so bad if there was at least one friend going with me.
He shook his head and rubbed his eyes. “No, they want me to stay here. Or in California.” He smiled weakly at me. “Sorry. Can’t do this early morning thing. Master Forrester’s protectors are going with you. You can’t get much better than that.”
I placed my hand on my cousin’s broad shoulder. “Don’t underestimate yourself. I’d rather have you by my side any day. Plus, who’s going to train me?”
He snorted. “Good question. Although I don’t think you’ll have much free time for physical training.” I hadn’t told Palmer what was going on so I assumed his orders had revealed the real reason why I was being sent to a shunned merman’s house. Instead of discussing it further I sighed.
“Yeah, you’re probably right.” We walked to the elevator and I was surprised that Troy hadn’t appeared yet. I asked Palmer about him.
“Oh,” he said with a huge smile. “Troy’s kind of tied up right now.” I looked questioningly at Palmer, and he grinned even wider. Suddenly, I got it.
“Like with a girl?”
“Like with something female. I don’t know where he finds them, but he sure does have an interesting taste in women.” Troy tended to go for the older ladies - the “cougars”. I shivered with a bit of disgust. It was definitely an image I didn’t want in my mind.
The shiny elevator doors opened up to an eerily quiet and empty lobby. There were two employees behind the desk, apparently getting the graveyard shift. Graham wasn’t anywhere in sight but when I followed Palmer around the corner I spotted him sitting at the bar. His back faced me and I noticed he had on a different outfit. Obviously the cloak had disappeared and he wore a normal pair of dark jeans with a black sweater. His thick brown hair still stood in all different directions and when he turned to acknowledge me, I groaned.
The face alone was enough to draw me to him but I didn’t want to be interested. His eyes glimmered with mischief and I stared as he downed a shot of something and pulled out several bills for the bartender. Without saying a word, his two protectors seemed to appear out of thin air and the three of them sauntered over to Palmer and me. Graham made no attempt to hide his perusal of my body and I thought I saw a small smile twitch at the corner of his mouth. I wasn’t in my dress anymore, and had also opted for a pair of jeans and cute blue top. I hardly thought I deserved his attention, nor did I want it.
“Is that all?” he said jerking his head toward my small carry-on bag.
“It’s all I brought with me. Someone’s going to send me more.” I already called my sister to beg her to pack me another suitcase and send it promptly to Virginia. Three outfits were not going to get me through my time in Jeremiah’s lair.
Graham huffed and began to walk toward the street. I said a quick goodbye to Palmer, asking him to check in with me every day, and hurried off after my babysitter.
We climbed into the back seat of the town car. From the smell of him, I’d guessed that Graham hadn’t been to bed yet either. Stale cigarette smoke and an excess amount of alcohol drifted off of him causing me to turn my head to the side for the entire drive just so I could breathe. For all the responsibility he had as a Council member, Graham Forrester really didn’t seem to take life seriously.
We hardly said more than a few words to each other before we arrived at the airport and were sitting in our first class seats. Doing my best not to show how scared I was, I glued my eyes to one of those human celebrity gossip magazines and pretended to be enthralled.
“Are you still seeing that selkie?” Graham asked out of the blue.
“Excuse me?”
“Well you’re obviously not with Kain, so I’ve been wondering if you continued to see the selkie after everything that happened.”
I was so caught off guard the only thing I could do was develop an attitude. “I don’t really think that’s any of your business.” Plus, I didn’t really like knowing that the Council was privy to my love life, or lack thereof at the moment.
“You’ll end up with one of us,” he said with a surety that made my heart shudder. Was he speaking metaphorically or literally? “It will be the only way for you to live. He won’t stay with you forever. He can’t. Besides, a selkie is too far beneath you. It’s almost as bad as dating a human.” I couldn’t help but notice the hint of humor in his eyes.
“You’ve dated a human before?” It wasn’t unheard of but I hadn’t known anyone who’d actually tried.
“Several,” he said dismissively. “They’re so easy to control, it just isn’t fair sometimes.” I watched as he sighed and laid his head back against the seat while a memory consumed his thoughts. Imagining the worst, I decided to try and concentrate on my magazine for the rest of the flight.
Graham was only a few years older than me but it seemed as though he’d lived several more lifetimes. Not only was it disturbing but it also made me feel young and immature and I refused to let him ruin this trip any more than it already was. It was bad enough that he said he had to babysit me. Taking my hint, Graham pulled an eye cover over his face and was asleep before we were in the air.
We drove through the elaborate iron gates at the entrance in the early afternoon. The sun floated high in the sky and I welcomed the warmer temperatures and constant sea breeze. Especially since there was a deep chill in my bones at the reminder of where we were. Kain, Carissa, and I had visited Jeremiah as our first stop in trying to find the selkies that attacked Brendan and stole his skin. It was the incident that set the stage for everything else that followed. My parent’s death, discovering my powers, and Brendan leaving all occurred because I had run away from home. And now I was coming back to train with a man who embodied everything I vowed not to become. Someday I hoped I’d finally make the right decisions that led to a better path.
“I see he still has the fountain,” Graham said while bending forward to look through the front window.
“You’ve been here before?”
“A long time ago,” he said without looking at me. I wanted to ask more but the sight of the fountain sent a wave of dread through me. Would Jeremiah be angry about Abhainn?
“I stole his sprite,” I blurted out, thinking that maybe if I confessed, the fear of facing my punishment would go away. It didn’t work.
Graham chuckled. “You what?”
“I stole his water sprite. From the fountain. Jeremiah trapped him here and I felt bad so I stole him and then set him free.” The look on Graham’s face was priceless - a mixture of shock and pride.
“Nice going.” He sat back in the seat and looked at me with an intensity that sped up my heartbeat. “I never would have pegged you for the kleptomaniac type. I’m impressed.”
A small smile spread over my lips before I could stop it. Why was it so important that Graham liked me? I needed to stop acting like a stupid school girl right now. “Thanks, but I’m sure Jeremiah’s going to have something to say about it.”
“I’m sure he will,” Graham replied before opening the car door. I hesitated another moment then climbed outside. The three men were almost on the front porch before turning around to see where I was. Without saying anything, I hurried to their sides and waited to face my wrath.
To my pleasant surprise, one of the human staff members opened the doors and ushered us inside. She immediately directed us upstairs to our guest rooms and told us that we were to meet Mr. Williams for dinner promptly at six. He was apparently out and about, so that gave me a few hours of reprieve. It felt nice for a while, but after thirty minutes I was bored out of my mind.
Graham and the protectors had disappeared somewhere behind the numerous bedroom doors in the upstairs living quarters. The house was a mansion and I had already counted at least ten bedrooms on this floor alone. Jeremiah had once been a famous Hollywood actor and probably still lived comfortably off the royalties and endorsements he’d managed to negotiate before being shunned.
My shoes clicked on the wood stairs and the sound echoed through the open foyer area. I sensed the water coming from the indoor pool Jeremiah had built in the back of the house, but I certainly didn’t want to go there. Too many bad memories. There was no one around, so for lack of any other ideas, I went out the front door and walked over to the large fountain.
Three small concrete ponds interconnected to a larger, higher one in the center. The water constantly trickled out over the fourth pond and sprinkled down against an array of lily pads and faux boulders like a magical landscape. I sat on the edge of the closest pond and ran my hand through the water, letting the microscopic droplets seep through my fingers like sand.
I suddenly missed Abhainn, which made me miss my friends, which made me not want to be here at all. Not knowing what was in store for me was not a feeling I was accustomed to anymore. I liked having a plan and I liked being the one in control of that plan.
Deciding that my thoughts were too depressing, I changed my focus. I remembered our practice session with Abhainn and decided to try again since I didn’t have anything else to do right now. Looking out over the property in front of the house, I made sure that no one was around. This was something I really didn’t want anyone else to see.
Shifting so I sat completely facing the water, I closed my eyes and tried to conjure up a few water balls. Abhainn had done that part for me last time but I hoped I was strong enough to do it on my own now.
In my head I envisioned three glistening globes of water rise from the pond and hover over my hands. Although when I opened my eyes I was only partially satisfied. There was one ball of water and it had barely breached the surface. At least it was a start.
For the next twenty minutes or so I tried to move that water with my own commands. I managed to get it to circle around my hand a few times before plummeting back into the pond, and forcing me to start all over again. By the fifth or sixth try, I had two balls of water and they hovered at eye level.
I wanted to do so much more. Having control over water could mean so many different things. For me, it meant that I could probably hold my own in a water fight, but for someone like Kain who seemed to be a natural, he might be able to control an entire fountain or even the rain. Then I realized what kind of damage someone could do if they really could control and dictate water flow. It was such an important element to so many. Directing water away from nature could be devastating.
The water splashed in my face as the ball fell back into the pond. I certainly wouldn’t be disrupting the natural balance of water and earth anytime soon. Controlling this element was definitely not my forte.
But since I was alone with nothing better to do, I kept on practicing. I don’t know how much time passed before I thought I was finally getting the hang of it. A small column of water had risen up before me and I squealed in delight as the formation moved from side to side in time with my hand. I drew circles and waves and squiggly lines through the air and watched in fascination as the water mimicked my every move. When it shot straight up out of the pond and began to form a tiny tornado, I hesitated to believe that this was of my doing.
The water spout danced around the lily pads and jumped from pond to pond, growing larger with every passing minute. The water level in the ponds noticeably dropped and I could no longer hear the trickling fountain. I stared in awe as the spiraling water stopped moving and spread out across the width of the fountain to form a translucent wall. The particles continued to flow toward the ground and seemed to be recycled as they rose to the top and fell to the earth over and over again. It reminded me of an infinity pool where the water supply seems to be never-ending. It was breathtaking.
If I hadn’t been so enamored, maybe I would have heard him walk up to me. The sharp crunch of gravel nearly gave me a heart attack and when I turned around to see Graham staring up at the wall of water with a smirk on his face, I really wanted to punch him. Not just for scaring me but also for letting me think I had actually achieved something.
“You’re doing this?” I asked incredulously.
He shrugged and winked at me. “Maybe.” His hands were in his pockets and he had looked away from the water for a few seconds. I needed to have all of my attention on the water balls in order to get them to even rise. Graham seemed to be controlling this monstrous display without trying at all.
“How?” I breathed in awe.
“It was natural for me.” As if I needed another demonstration, Graham flicked his head slightly to the right and the wall exploded into millions of tiny droplets. But instead of falling, they moved in slow motion like someone had literally stalled time. They spread out wide across every pond in the fountain and then as leisurely as snowflakes, fluttered to the surface and disappeared. He must have noticed me smiling.
“Pretty cool, right?”
I turned to look up at him. Those dark brown eyes glimmered again and the shadows from his stubble only enhanced the strong line of his cheekbones. I swallowed hard. “It is.”
He stared at me in that intense way again before finally turning his back to the fountain. Leaning against the edge, he twisted his head so that he could still talk to me. “Why are you out here all alone?”
“Am I not allowed to be?” I said with an attitude.
Graham held his hands up in surrender and chuckled. “Of course you are, luv. Just trying to make polite conversation.” I arched an eyebrow. “What?” he asked. “Can’t I talk to you?”
“You can. It’s just that you’ve made it all but clear that you want nothing to do with me. I’m a burden and you’ve been sent to babysit. You’ve barely said five words to me in the past twelve hours.”
“Hmm,” he sighed and crossed his arms. Tilting his head up to the sky, he closed and eyes and continued. “Sorry about that. I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable.”
“Really?”
“Yes, really.” He smiled down at me and I’m sure that my breath caught yet again. “It’s not you exactly. It’s this bloody place…and Jeremiah…and I just really didn’t want to come back here ever again.” He picked up a small piece of gravel and threw it toward the house. I didn’t say anything hoping he wouldn’t make me ask the silent question. “Adele sent me here when I was fifteen. It was just after Jeremiah had been shunned so nobody else even knew about it. In fact,” he said while giving me another wink, “you’re the only other person that knows. Well, except for Jeremiah of course.”
“And now you’ll have to kill me,” I stated with sarcasm. That earned me another laugh.
“Maybe. We’ll see how this week goes.”
“Why did you come here?”
He paused for such a long time that I didn’t think he would answer. “My parents sent me to Adele because they didn’t know what to do with me. I was out of control but that was mostly because I didn’t understand what was happening to me.”
“Your powers?”
“Yes, my powers. It seems as if nature played a cruel joke when she created me. An adolescent teenage male should not be allowed to control the minds of all those around, manipulate water without a second thought, and be a natural lie detector. It was too much at once. I acted out, partied all the time to dull the effects, and my parents simply couldn’t take it anymore.” He shuffled his feet and I worried he might leave. “So they shipped me overseas and I’ve been here ever since.”
I thought about that for a minute. In a sense, it was kind of like Brendan’s situation. Being forced to leave home and live on his own at such a young age had to be heartbreaking. They never really had a chance to be normal kids. Well, I guess none of us were really normal, but at least I didn’t need to face that truth until recently.
“How did you get a seat on the Council?”
“Adele. She knew how powerful I really was and once I gave them a demonstration it didn’t take much convincing.” I wondered what that demonstration could have been, but decided it was a conversation for another time.
“They don’t seem to like you much.” I don’t know why I said it but thankfully he didn’t mind.
“They’re just afraid of me. Fear is a big motivator of hate. They know what I’m capable of and I don’t go out of my way to make their lives easy.” He pushed away from the wall and held out his hand toward me. “We should get ready for dinner.”
“Do we really have to stay here?” I groaned.
“Yes, luv we do. But I promise that we’ll try and make the best of it all right?” I smiled and grabbed his hand, allowing him to wrap his warm fingers around mine. An electrical current shot through my arm as I remembered Kain’s warning about Graham’s reputation. Sure, he was attractive, but I didn’t need another complication in my life right now. Perhaps we could just be friends. Graham laughed.
“You’re too much, Eviana Dumahl.”
“What are you talking about?”
“You’re attracted to me,” he said with certainty.
“No I’m not!”
He stopped walking and stepped in front of me, face serious with concentration and focus. “Natural lie detector here, remember?”
I gulped and he smiled again. “So, you’re an attractive guy. That doesn’t mean I want to marry you or anything.”
He cocked his head to the side as though listening to my inner thoughts. “Partial truth,” he stated. “You don’t know me well enough yet to declare that you want to spend the rest of your life with me.”
“I don’t!” I protested but he covered my mouth with his hand. I resisted the urge to bite down.
“Plus, your heart is elsewhere right now.”
“How do you know that?”
“Told you, luv. I’m talented.” With that, he ushered me into the house, holding my hand all the way to my bedroom door. He placed a gentle kiss against my fingers before winking and telling me he’d see me downstairs at six.
I needed that time to calm my nerves and my racing heart. Perhaps it was because I really missed Brendan or maybe it was because I’d been watching Kain and Carissa’s relationship bloom into something that I no longer had. Whatever it was, I need to clamp down on these feelings because Graham Forrester was not someone I should be with. Ever. And I needed to stop imagining his soft lips against mine when he scoops me up into his arms and we ride off into the sunset together. What a cliché that was anyway. Not to mention that Graham was off limits and as soon as I got through this trip, Brendan and I could be together again.
