Rachel Vincent - Shift

She looked at me like I’d just gone over to the dark side, but nodded reluctantly.

Marc took my hand, then let his fingers trail through mine as I stepped past him toward the door. Then I stopped and deliberately brushed a kiss on his rough cheek on the way, inhaling deeply to take in as much of his scent as possible, lingering for Blackwell’s benefit, as well as my own. To reiterate for the old coot that I would choose my own relationships.

But on my way into the hall, my gaze caught on Jace’s, and the tense line of his jaw betrayed his carefully blank expression. As did the flicker of heat in his eyes. We’d agreed not to talk about what happened between us the day Ethan died. There was really no other way to keep peace in the household, and keep everyone’s energy and attention focused on avenging my brother. And I’d sworn to myself that Marc would be the first to know. That I would tell him myself. He deserved that much, as badly as I dreaded it.

And there had been no good time for that yet. Not even an acceptable time. Every time was a rotten time, in fact, and each time Jace looked at me like that—each time I felt myself respond to the connection I wanted to deny—my internal pressure dialed up another notch.

If I didn’t break the tension soon, I was going to explode. Or do something we’d all regret.

I forced myself to walk past Jace with nothing more than a polite, sad nod—exactly what I would have given any of my other fellow enforcers—and closed the door as I stepped into the hall.

My mother was already standing there with my leather jacket and Kaci’s down ski coat. Sometimes I forgot she could move just as fast as the rest of us, if she chose.

Sometimes I forgot she had a mouth on her, too. Guess that’s where I got mine…

“Thanks.” I took the jacket and shrugged into it. “Mom, that was…awesome.” There was just no other way to describe it.

Her lips formed a straight, grim line. “It was the truth.” She pulled Kaci’s long chestnut waves from beneath her collar and forced a smile. “Come in and warm up in half an hour, and I’ll have hot chocolate.”

On the way down the hall, Kaci shoved her bare hands into her jeans pockets and glanced up at me, her frown almost as stern as the one my father typically wore. And in that instant, I wanted nothing more than to see her smile. To see her look—just for a moment—like any other thirteen-year-old. Like a teenager who knew nothing of violent death, and soul-shredding guilt, and spirit-crushing fear.

“What was awesome?” she asked, shoving the front door open.

I grinned, my mood momentarily brightened by the memory of my mother’s bad-ass monologue. “My mom just handed Blackwell his shriveled old balls in front of everyone.”

Kaci’s eyebrows shot halfway up her forehead. “Seriously?” I nodded, and for a second, I caught a glimpse of what a happy Kaci could look like. “Cool.”

We stepped onto the porch and I had actually gone two steps before I realized we weren’t alone. Mercedes Carreño—Manx—sat in the wrought-iron love seat with my brother Owen. They both looked up as we approached, but their easy smiles said we hadn’t interrupted anything. No conversation, anyway. They were simply sitting together, enjoying the winter silence. And somehow their easy comfort seemed more intimate than many kisses I’d seen.

“Hey,” Kaci said, oblivious as I raised a curious brow at my brother. “Where’s Des?”

Manx shrugged deeper into her wool coat. “He is sleeping.”

My eyebrow went even higher, and Owen flushed, sliding his cowboy hat back and forth on his head. Manx never left Des. Never. The baby slept in her bed, and she sat with him when he napped. And she wouldn’t even go to the bathroom until she’d found someone she trusted to watch him while she was gone.

Yet here she sat next to my cowboy-gentleman brother, doing nothing, her hands resting easily in her lap, butchered fingernails concealed by stretchy, crocheted gloves.

“Can I play with him when he wakes up?” Kaci asked.

Manx smiled. She’d already realized that playing with the baby—though that amounted to little more than letting the one-month-old grip her finger—set Kaci at ease as little else could. “Of course.”

Kaci’s shoulders relaxed, and I couldn’t help wondering if two babies might mean twice the therapy, for Kaci and for us all. We hadn’t had time to verify it yet, but Ethan’s human girlfriend, Angela, was pregnant, and I had no reason not to believe that the baby was his.

My mother was cautiously optimistic over the news, with occasional, unpredictable bouts of unbridled delight in the moments when she let herself believe it was actually true. Nothing could fill the hole that Ethan’s death had left in all of our hearts. But his son—my mother’s first grandchild—could go a long way toward healing the wound. She couldn’t wait to meet Angela, but we’d all agreed that for the new mother’s safety, introductions would best be done after our troubles with the Territorial Council were over.

Kaci’s gaze roamed the yard in the direction of the barn. Then her eyes narrowed and a frown tugged at the corners of her mouth. I knew what she was looking at without turning.

Ethan’s grave.

We’d buried him beneath the apple tree, halfway between the front yard and the eastern field, and his headstone forever changed the familiar landscape. But that was the plan. We wanted to see him every day. To remember him without fail. To mourn for as long as we saw fit.

“I’m goin’ on ahead,” Kaci mumbled, then jogged down the steps without waiting for a response.

I hadn’t intended to linger with Owen and Manx, hesitant to interrupt…whatever they had going on. But Kaci clearly wanted a moment alone with Ethan, and I had to respect that.

“How are the digits?” I asked, sinking into a wicker chair at the end of the porch.

“Pardon?” Manx frowned until I nodded at her hands, then she held her fingers up, as if to check on them. “Oh. Much better. They only hurt when—” she paused, searching for the right word in English “—bump things.” She pushed her hands forward against nothing to demonstrate.

Nearly two weeks after being declawed, her hands had almost completely healed, but the scar tissue where her fingernails had been was still bright red and puffy. She hated the sight of them, and wore thin gloves whenever possible, only taking them off to care for the baby or herself.

I turned to glance at Kaci—halfway to the apple tree, and loping at her own pace—and idly noticed a pair of hawks circling overhead.

“How is your arm?” Manx asked, recapturing my attention.

I held up my cast, smiling at the doodles Kaci had drawn between the enforcers’ perfunctory signatures. A flower with purple petals and X-shaped eyes in the center. A pink skull and crossbones. I’d sat still for several of her masterpieces. Anything to make her smile. Though, I’d threatened to paint over them with black nail polish if she plastered any more pink on my arm.

Still, I had to admit that thinking of Kaci when I looked at my cast was much better than thinking about how I’d broken it. About the bastards who’d stolen Marc and beaten him to get information out of me—when beating me hadn’t worked.

“It’s fine. Dr. Carver says I can try Shifting in a couple of weeks.” Because broken bones take longer to heal than simple cuts and gashes. I was already itching for the transformation—and from the cast, which somehow made my arm sweat, even in the middle of February.

“She really misses him.” Owen nodded at something over my shoulder, and I twisted to see Kaci on the ground beside Ethan’s headstone, one knee brushing the freshly overturned earth.