When Holly didn’t respond, Justin glanced over at her, but her face was turned toward the window. He couldn’t tell how she was reacting to what he’d said, but his guess would have been that she was reacting with resistance. She was so damned determined to stay married to her mortal . . .
“Anders and Decker said you probably couldn’t read me because of the head trauma I’d taken,” Holly blurted suddenly. “That there was damage that still needed repairing, and obviously there was. I couldn’t remember everything that led up to my fall at first.”
Justin was silent as he turned into the driveway to the house. But once he’d pulled into the garage and shifted into park, he turned to peer at her solemnly. “I couldn’t read or control you before you fell, Holly,” he said quietly. “Why do you think I had to chase after you? If I’d been able to control you I would have just made you stop before you ever left the crematorium.”
She blinked in surprise at that. “You couldn’t read or control me then?”
“No,” he assured her, having to fight himself to keep from reaching for her.
Holly stared at him briefly, a struggle taking place in her eyes, and then she turned and reached for her door handle, saying, “It doesn’t matter. I’m married.”
Justin watched her get out of the car and hurry into the house. Then leaned back in the driver’s seat with a sigh. She was going to fight this to the bitter end. Which meant his only option was to get them to that end as quickly as possible. His parents were right. His best bet was to teach her to read and control mortals and then reunite her with her husband . . . and hope like hell that Holly could read and control him. Because there was just no way she could live with the thousands and perhaps even millions of cuts that knowing every little thing another person thought or felt about you would bring. She just hadn’t experienced the pain of -people’s thoughts yet.
Slipping out of the car, he entered the house. Much to his surprise Dante and Tomasso were not eating at the kitchen table . . . nor were they eating in the living room. The dynamic duo were actually taking a moonlight dip in the pool.
“We need to teach Holly to read and control minds,” Justin announced grimly as he stepped outside.
Dante slicked his damp hair back from his face and turned to peer at him. “Sounds good,” he said, then slammed an open palm in the water bringing Tomasso’s swimming to an abrupt halt. When his twin swam to the edge of the pool and surfaced to peer around, Dante announced, “Justin wants to start teaching Holly to read and control minds.”
“About time,” the giant growled, running a hand down his face to brush away the water.
“Right. Now, how the hell do we do that?” Justin asked. He’d never actually been a part of training a new turn in reading minds, and didn’t really see how it would be done. It was hard to explain the concept of searching out a person’s thoughts to someone who had never done it. It wasn’t like hunting Easter eggs or anything as concrete as that.
Noting the glance the twins were exchanging, Justin frowned and raised his eyebrows. He then waited patiently as the two men pulled themselves out of the pool and retrieved their towels.
Running the towel over his large chest and then up his arms, Dante said, “We do what we did with Jackie.”
“Which was?” Justin asked curiously when the other man paused to concentrate on drying his hair, throwing the towel over his head and rubbing it roughly with both hands over every part of his head.
Justin had to bite back a smile when Dante pulled the towel off of his head. The man looked like one of the Bouviers after his mother had bathed and towel--dried them. His long hair now stood up every which way.
Running his fingers through the knotted mess, Dante pointed out, “Even young immortals can hear the thoughts of other immortals because they pro-ject their thoughts. Right?”
“Right,” Justin agreed.
Dante shrugged. “So, we start by projecting our thoughts to her as loud as we can. When she begins picking that up easily, we project them with a little less power, then less and less until we are merely leaving our minds open and she is searching out our thoughts. Then we take her to mortals to try.”
Justin stared at the man for a moment and then said slowly, “That’s brilliant.”
“Why do you think Lucian wanted us to help you?” Dante asked with amusement. “We might be pretty boys, but we’re not stupid.”
“No, you’re not,” Justin agreed on a chuckle.
“We’ll start first thing tomorrow,” Dante announced.
“Why not now?” Justin asked, fighting disappointment.
“Because you’ve had her out all evening,” Dante said patiently.
“She’ll be tired,” Tomasso added. “She needs to be fresh.”
“We also need no distractions and no interruptions,” Dante added. “So you aren’t invited.”
Justin stiffened at this news. “But I’m the one who is supposed to be training her. Lucian said I was responsible for—-”