Rebecca Zanetti: Shadowed

Jase growled low. “Stop fucking handling me. If I mate her, and if she still dies, I’ll deal with it.” He ducked his chin for a better view as Brenna scooped a toddler, his face a blistered mess, onto her lap for a cuddle.

Kane pivoted to face him. “Right. Because you’re so good at dealing.”

“I’m dealing,” Jase said. There was a time his brother would’ve slammed him against a tree to fight it out. Now none of his brothers came near him—it was almost comical how much they held themselves back from hitting him. They’d never see him as whole again. “I’m fine.”

“Fine?” Kane’s eyes swirled from a dangerous purple to black. “You disappeared until Talen tracked you down in the Andes.”

Everything in Jase wanted to turn away and watch Brenna bring joy to the damaged. So he kept his focus on his brother. “The king needed me, and I came home to help. I’m helping .”

“No. Dage wanted you home as a brother, and not as a soldier. As the king, he spends too much time worrying about you as it is. You volunteered for this duty. Volunteered to mate a witch you barely know.” Kane slid to the side and blocked Jase’s view of the room. On purpose, probably. “Why?”

“Why not?” Jase’s shoulder lifted as he smoothed out his expression. “I’m not looking for a mate or kids, so why not save Moira’s baby sister?”

“Why else?” Kane wasn’t the smartest guy on the planet for nothing.

“I want her skills.” Jase’s feet itched with the need to move. “She’s a witch, and if I can control molecules, maybe I can get my gifts back. But you already knew that.”

Kane nodded, tucking his hands in his pockets. “There’s more.”

Jase gave up the fight and pivoted to the north so he could see. Brenna colored in a book next to a little girl with bandages down the right side of her body. The toddler smiled, so much happiness in the little girl’s eyes that Jase’s gut hurt. The girl handed her drawing to Brenna, who gasped and said something. The toddler nodded, her eyes lighting up. Then she lay down, her head on Brenna’s knee, and Bren smoothed back the girl’s blond curls.

“Jase?” Kane asked. “Why else?”

He couldn’t look away. Didn’t want to. The world was cold and shitty. Brenna was warm and kind. “She saved me,” he said. “At my darkest point, Brenna Dunne saved my life.”

“How?”

If Jase couldn’t understand it, no way would he share it. “Doesn’t matter. The fact is that she saved me, and I owe her. Period.” Deep down, a dark voice he usually ignored rumbled up that maybe she could save him again. He shook his head. No.

There was no saving him this time.

A phone buzzed, and Kane read the face of his cell. “I have to go. We’re not finished with this discussion.” His footsteps echoed as he strode back toward his car and roared off.

Frozen molecules on the wind brushed Jase’s face. Dark clouds spread to cover the waning sun. Yet he stood in the cold, legs braced, his gaze on the woman inside the hospital.

Five years ago, he’d been tortured until every nerve in his body screamed in agony. Yet standing in the snow, watching kindness without expectation, true pain sliced through his heart. Pure and absolute, the cut illustrated more than ever that he’d never be whole. Never be able to have the simple life, the life he had planned on before being taken. They’d killed a part of him, and whatever remained existed only for revenge. He’d get that . . . with Brenna’s skills.

He turned away from the bright lights of the hospital to face the shadows.

Where he belonged.

Brenna tugged her gloves farther up her hands as she stepped into the billowing snow. As always, her visit with the kids served to lighten her mood, as well as remind her of her good fortune.

Late afternoon, the storm barreled full force. Tucking her head, she scurried toward her car. The second she reached the driver’s side door, a van jerked to a stop on the opposite side of the street. She whirled around. Three men jumped out, the one in front holding a bouquet of fresh, red roses.

She sighed. “Henry? You have got to be kidding me.”

Henry shoved his too-large hat off his forehead and extended the roses. “For you.”

Jase Kayrs instantly stood next to her like a deadly apparition out of the storm. “Who’s your friend, Brenna?”

Brenna’s heart leapt into full gear. She clutched her chest. “What are you doing here?”

He shrugged, his sharp gaze on Henry and his buddies. “I thought you’d like an escort home.”

Henry’s thin Adam’s apple bobbed. As a witch, he might be a century old, but he looked like a skinny thirty-year-old. “You’re spending time with a vampire ? No, Brenna. Please.”

She shook her head, her fingers tightening on the keys. “Listen, Henry. Enough is enough. Please leave me be.”

His muddy brown eyes widened. “Did you get my letters? My proposal?”

“Yes.” In fact, she’d received more than twenty marriage proposals from him in the last two months alone. “I’m not going to marry you.”

His thin shoulders hunched forward. “As our chosen one , you must mate, or you’ll die. I’ve seen your medical records.”

On all that was holy and pure. “Are my bloomin’ records suddenly on the Internet?” An ache pounded behind her left eye.

“No. We broke into the hospital records.” Henry slid forward and stopped when Jase growled. “You’ll die if you don’t mate. We only have five days until the solstice. Please meet your destiny.”

Jase chortled. “This guy’s your destiny?”

“Shut up.” Brenna waved off the roses. “I’m not chosen. I’m not your destiny, and you’re certainly not mine. I’ve told you before, the winter solstice has nothing to do with me.”

The two guys behind Henry eyed each other, their mouths turning down. Way down.

Jase angled himself slightly in front of her in a clearly defensive move. “Who are you people?”

Henry cleared his throat. “I’m Henry Balcott, the head of Brenna’s Warriors.”

Jase cut his eyes to Brenna. “Brenna’s Warriors?”

She sighed. No way did she want Jase to know how odd her life really was. “How about you head back to headquarters, and I’ll meet you for an early dinner?”

Henry nodded, his thin hair flying around. “Yes. Good idea. Go away, vampire.”

Jase stilled in that odd vampire way, and tension spiraled through the air. He stepped toward Henry.

Henry gasped and backed into his buddies. “No offense.”

“Offense taken,” Jase growled. “Explain yourself, peon.”

Now that sounded like a full-blooded, pissed-off Kayrs male. Brenna’s breath heated. She had opened her mouth to speak when a second van, this one white, jumped the curb. People waving signs of protest billowed out, apparently having been stacked end-to-end inside.

“Blast it,” she muttered.

A woman with flashing blue eyes shook a sign. A muted orange cascaded off her skin as proof she was a powerful and irritated witch. “Get off the council now, Brenna Dunne.”

Jase frowned and scratched his chin. “More friends of yours?”

Henry stomped over to the woman until they stood nose-to-nose. “You evil harbinger! Leave my intended alone.”

Jase leaned closer to Brenna’s ear. “Who are these people?”

Damn it. She licked snow off her lips. “The protesters are a group called Citizens Revolting Against Pagurus.”

“CRAP?” he barked out. “You have a group called CRAP protesting in Dublin?”

The woman smacked Henry over the head with her sign. He yelped and backed away.

“We prefer Citizens , if you don’t mind, Prince Kayrs,” the woman said.