The best the boys got out of him so far was to let it play its course; the rush will get old…in a hundred years or so. Awesome. It was going to be a blast avoiding his overprotective mother from this point on. She has called or texted him every hour since he left the hospital and was downright PO’d at him for moving into the Falcon manor. It’s not like he wasn’t already living there anyway. He had more clothes between there and Gavin’s than he did at home in the first place. He couldn’t even remember the last night he’d crashed at his moms.
“Why are you so worked up?” Gavin asked him.
Mason smirked because that was usually his line. Neither one of them were anxious souls, but Mason was the mellower of the two. Gavin found exhilaration in his work, in his research. Or obsession, one of the two, basically he found it awesome to worry about crap that hasn’t happened. Mason normally rolled with the flow.
Gavin was taking the transformation more smoothly than Mason. Mason was sure Gavin was enjoying the mental side of it. The whole ordeal had opened up their minds. Allowed them to understand why both of them fell for the same girl, why both of them felt at home at the manor. At the same time, it posed more questions than Mason was sure they had time to ponder. Like past lives. That was no doubt some messed up shit as far as Mason was concerned. The lives weren’t even like normal ones, nope, they were otherworldly ones.
Instinct was telling Mason to protect Indie, to watch her and make sure she came through this unscathed, but at the same time he knew he was missing something. Mason wanted to be focused on the now, but his mind kept traveling back to the life he could only vaguely remember on the other side. And somehow, after his mind did that little time warp, it jolted forward to this life, to his life before he lost his twin brother. It was a twisted circle that brought far too many emotions that Mason had reverently buried, back to the surface.
He was trying to break down what he was remembering to put those thoughts in order, and find meaning behind them. Doing so was even harder than it sounded. Nevertheless, those flashbacks led Mason to the mysterious library.
He still didn’t know how he knew to look there. Books are not his gig, they’re Gavin’s. Yet, he was drawn to that library as if he was the creator of it. Inside those four walls a rush of emotions slammed into him, as soon as he figured out he didn’t rightfully own those emotions in this life—he felt empty. Broken and lost. So far, he hid the pain well.
Gavin took fast action to get the texts decoded. Mason didn’t even bother to question his methods. He wanted answers. He wanted to find out why emotions from his two, all too distant, pasts were linking up.
Then again, maybe it’s best to let sleeping dogs lie. Fuck I sound just like my grandmother, Mason mused to himself. “Maybe we moved too fast on this.”
“You? Move too fast, never,” Gavin mocked with a raised brow.
Everything felt like it was moving too fast. It could have been because they were dead days ago, and everything felt like a fog. It could be because they had fire raging through them now. Mason didn’t know. He just knew his body was not the only thing that was hard to grasp—time and emotions were out of whack, too.
A minute could feel like an hour then an hour would feel like a minute, it just depended on what he was doing. At the end of the day, though, they always accomplished more than reasonable results. They may be new to this war, but they were not in the dark, or sitting ducks. They were bringing their A-game next time Wilder showed his mug; they nailed him last time even though they were blind and weak as hell.
Yep. Mason knew from the gate that dude was bad news. Dead my ass. Mason played his game, and in the end Wilder was the one ducking out the back door with fewer minions.
“Skylynn insinuated those texts were about more than us,” Gavin offered.
“She did, but it’s our job to protect Indie, not Skylynn’s. I don’t like how she knows things and doesn’t share.”
“Yeah, but Indie made it clear she wanted to help Skylynn to repay her for watching over her. We all agreed on that. The answer has to be down there, and she found someone to read them—simple as that. Take a chill pill man, you’re making me dizzy.”
“What about Wilder? What are we going to do about him?” Neither of them were all that concerned with Cadence. Something odd happened the night they went face to face with her. Someone hit the pause button, and when all of them came back into play the real Cadence was not there, it was just a hologram, that theory of Mason’s was proven when they struck her, and she vanished. First glance might have led them to believe that Cadence pulled some kind of switch on them to save her own skin, but the thing is both Gavin and Mason sensed her death. Felt it, and knew it as well as their own name. Wilder was the issue. That much Mason knew.
“When he comes back around we’ll deal with him. We just need to sort this out right now. Let Indie adjust. Let’s figure out what we knew on the other side and get ourselves together.”
Mason cringed when Gavin said ‘the other side’. Which did not go unnoticed.
“You want to talk about that,” Gavin asked with a nod to him.
Nope. That’s what Mason’s glare clearly stated.
“Mason, I can sense you. Your emotions. You’re struggling.”
“We need to figure out how to turn that shit off. We only need to connect like that when it comes to Indie.”
“It’s not like I’m in your head. I just know you’re cranked up. Call me crazy, but we cannot turn that on or off when it comes to the job we have. You weaken us when you feel the way you do.”
“I weaken you?” Mason’s glare was lethal.
“Stop picking my words apart.”
Mason grunted. “Nothin’ is wrong man. A lot to take in.”
“What are you trying to swallow?”
Mason shook his head and grumbled a curse before he spoke. “I feel guilty for something, but then again I don’t.”
“Indie?”
Mason let the question hang in the air simply because he didn’t want to explain the answer.
“Sophia?” Gavin pushed.
“I did what I could for that girl.”
“Then what is it? Or who is it?”
“I don’t know. I can’t focus, and it’s pissing me off. I see everything we did in that other reality, or at least the gist, but then again there’s this block.”
“You’re feeling guilty about the block, or that it’s blocked?”
“It’s messed up, man. When I try to think about that place, my mind jumps back to before I met you guys in this life. It brings up too much… you know what I mean.”
One nod in response.
Grief was their deal, what Mason and Gavin understood without a word. After Mason lost his twin he felt wretched, and he stayed that way until he met Indie, then Gavin. For a while, he tried to pretend that was when his life began because life before that was too hard to recall, for a host of reasons. Now, his mind was making him face it all.
“Showtime,” Mason said under his breath as he watched the limo pull up in front of the manor.
“I have a trick. Just think walk,” Gavin said to him with a wink.
Mason had to hold in an audacious smirk. Worth a shot.
“I’ll try it,” Mason said as he made a point to think ‘walk’ as he moved closer to the door. Through the glass, he saw a girl with mostly blond hair hit the pavement, and that notion swiftly went null and void.
His mind told him it wasn’t Indie that he saw falling to the ground—struck by an unseen force but instinct took over. Before he knew it, he was soaring toward the limo. He managed to stop himself and walk around the hood of the car so Ben and this chick would not flip out.
Turns out, Mason was the one that was about to have a meltdown, one that started the second he saw her face. He dove across the snow-covered drive as if he were grabbing the air itself, as if his life was lying there…
“What happened?” Mason bellowed as he stared at the angelic body of the girl tha
t was, is, should be, his air.
“She just collapsed,” Ben answered as he pulled his phone out.
In an instant, Mason had one hand cradling her face and the other sliding over her body looking for damage, rushing his energy into her, trying to protect her, trying to take away any pain. “River,” he said in an awestruck tone, trying to convince his heart to stop thundering.
“You know her?” Ben was noticeably shocked.
Gavin was at Mason’s side looking down at him like he wanted nothing more than to find a rewind button so he could figure out why Mason was holding her like she was a lover, pushing every ounce of his soul into her.
Mason didn’t have time to tell him, that in the most innocent sense, at one time, she was.
To Mason, River was always breathtaking, the kind of beauty that would suck you in—like a moth to a flame. He used to just stare and wonder how it was possible for her to be real. To him, River’s beauty was way beyond skin deep, it spilled from her eyes, from her soul. She was always on the level with him, not afraid to tell him how she felt. River saw every strife as a bump in the road. She was never a fake optimist, but the real deal. She knew life could get twisted but trusted a steady beat to pop up at any second—there could be no good without the bad, that was a River line.
Did I know her, Mason thought as Ben asked him that yet again. He couldn’t bring himself to say—‘yeah, you never forget your first kiss, and you never forget the first girl you dared to tell you loved her’, even if you were just a stupid kid at the time.
“Is this a bad move, Mason?” Ben all but yelled in his direction. Mason was tense, nearly shaking with adrenaline. Over five years had passed, and it felt like five seconds. All the emotions were there. Every. Single. One.
“She’s legit,” Mason heard himself say as he tried to figure out why she was here. They were waiting on a decoder. Then it hit him, her mother. Her mother was a mythologist. Mason knew something else, too. Prickles. River was a fighter, no doubt. Her warning sign was prickles. And when she fought hard, this happened.
Mason felt a malicious stare clawing down his back.
“Get her inside, Gavin. Now!” he shouted as he put River in his arms.
Mason jerked Ben up with him telling himself to walk. Ben couldn’t do crap for this situation, but Mason needed him distracted so Gavin could do a disappearing act with River. Get her away from what Mason could not see but could sense as if he were staring it down.
The air was pungent with smoke, with death, but there was nothing there.
“What are you two seeing at that gate?” Ben asked Mason, Mason barely noticed Ben was trying to get his arm loose from his grip.
“River faced off with someone at the gate?”
“Someone? No. She just jumped out of the car while it was still moving and started to walk toward it, hell she tried to jump out at the gate. She was a bit cagey.”
Mason turned his glare from the gate to him. “I told you that girl is legit. Born and raised in the Quarter. If she was running, I would be following, not asking questions.”
“You’re saying she’s psychic? Is that it?”
“Among other things,” Mason said under his breath.
“What’s going on, Mason? Do I need to double security? Is it Wilder? She senses him or something?”
Well, would you look at that? Ben was opening up the idea of souls having extra senses, Mason thought to himself.
Mason clenched his jaw before he spoke, “You’ll have to ask her.”
“Me? You’re friends with her. She already shut me down, not really an open book if you know what I mean.”
Mason needed to track Skylynn down, and figure out what was at the gate. Why River was here instead of her mother, or even those aunts and uncles that had the same skills.
“Trust me. River is not going to want to have anything to do with me.” And with that Mason vanished, not caring that Ben saw him do it. In his mind, if Ben was going to hang with them, then he was going to have to get used to the unexplainable. Because there was no way in hell Mason was going to be able to keep his edge on the down low with River Sabien around. Not happening.
Chapter Four
River jolted out of the bed she was in when she heard her phone ring. She’d told that blond haired boy, and all those other people that came in here that she was fine, just jet lagged. Their solution was to send a tray full of food—enough to feed an army—to her room, or rather her suite. It was two rooms; one was a massive bedroom, and bath, the other room was a sitting area.
River’s phone had died, so she had it plugged in at the corner of the bedroom. It took her forever to choose whom to call. Her mom? No. She may be cool with text, but walking spirits put her on edge. Her sister? Nope. Wasn’t ready for the lecture Ash would give her for agreeing to any of this. Saige? Maybe, but all in all, she wanted to talk to Jamison.
River had an odd relationship with him to say the least. He’d always been her father, even before he finally admitted it, but it was still strange for her to call him ‘dad.’ It was odd for her to comprehend that the power and magic coursing through him was rushing through her veins, too. It was easier to call him Jamison, to think of him as ‘Raven’s’ dad. River constantly thought of him as a teacher, one she loved deeply and wanted nothing more than to make proud.
A year or so after Rydell died, and their fate was told to them, Jamison came to River and said look chick, I’m your dad, stop that. Embarrassingly enough, he spoke up, and bluntly so, because of a boy. Because River was hooking up with her best friend’s, dead boyfriend’s, first in command, Dagen. Yeah. River still didn’t know how Jamison picked up on that vibe because the others hadn’t.
Jamison said that the essence of an Escort was within him and that someone from that same breed of souls would see River’s energy differently. He said it would be intense—raw passion between two—and it would not be real. Torrid was a word used in his description, but he made it seem like a bad kind of torrid. Blindly physical.
Dagen was right by River’s side when Jamison explained this. He helped River through it, explained that her father was more than likely right if she did indeed have the essence of an Escort within her. Neither of them were trying to make what they were complicated. Then, as well as now, they both just needed each other, someone to understand the hell they were in, a safe haven.
Dagen knew all about River’s odd traits, all about her family, which meant that River could be herself around him. In the beginning, they fought the pull of lust; they did so because they were sure it would hurt Raven. Dagen looks and carries himself a lot like Rydell had; having him around would only make her think of him more.
Then one night they said to hell with it, life is something that is meant to be tasted, expressed. It’s not meant to fit perfect circumstances. They met in secret. It was hot and heavy for a while. Long enough for River to give him something she could never take back—her v-card - and for her father to bust them.
After the conversation with Jamison, River and Dagen backed off a bit and tried to figure out what was real and what was them. That was four years ago. Now they’re just friends, good friends, that tend to meet up when they need to feel a physical connection with someone which could be daily, or weekly, even monthly. Lately, it had been on the monthly cycle. Dagen focused heavily on building the faction that Rydell ruled when he was alive. He was preparing for his return, River was sure of it.
Because of her relationship with Dagen, and because she was sure Jamison could all but read minds, River had been distant with Jamison. Sending him a text and telling him she was already in over her head was a hard thing to do, because of Dagen, and because she didn’t want to let him down.
At that moment, her phone began to ring. When River reached for her phone it wasn’t Jamison’s number on the ID, it was one of the numbers that belonged to the girls. Even though Raven, Ash, and River all have a phone, they never knew whose was whose and often forget them wherever they w
ere. River knew that meant it was either Ash or Raven, and she knew her luck.
She swiped the screen to answer and held the phone out a little knowing Ash was going to start as soon as the phone was call was answered.
“Hellllllooooooooo,” Raven said.
Deep sigh.
“I thought you were Ash. I was just going to let her get it out of her system.”
Raven laughed because she knew River was right.
“I’m glad you called. I need to talk to Jamison. Have you seen him?”
“Asleep I think, he didn’t get in until dawn, you want me to wake him? What’s up?”
Jamison wasn’t a partier, but he did own more than a few establishments in the Quarter and kept a close eye on them. Towards the end of each week when business was busiest, he would work through the night and sleep during the day.
River walked a little closer to the window, wanting to put distance between the bedroom door and her. “They tell you why I’m here?”
“Nope, but me and Ash were here when the UPS guy came to pick up the care box Emery made to send up to you.”
Emery promised River she’d send up some nicer clothes and put some cash in her account.
“What’d Ash say?”
“Oh, you know, something about this was not the time to be chasing down old hook ups, yada, yada. Me? I think it’s romantic.”
Damn, I didn’t even think about calling Dagen. River thought to herself. It’s not like the boy had a cell or anything, but because of the passion they’d shared and because they were as close as they were, all she had to do was think about him, and he would sense it like a silent call.
At times that little trick wasn’t so awesome, sometimes a girl just wants to think things through without the sin in question popping in the room.
Wait—wait one second. River thought. Those two didn’t know about Dagen. Why would he be here?
“What are you talking about?” River asked carefully as her cheeks flushed, and her heart started to beat in some awkward, hollow manner. River didn’t want to confess this deal with her and Dagen over the phone, not after keeping it a secret for the better part of five years.