“I’d say her memories were erased,” he said, like I was a moron.
“No shit. Do you know why?” My patience was running thin with this guy. His jaw clenched; he shook his head, indicating he couldn’t answer again. “Okay, what can you tell me?”
“I can tell you that I’m doing my best to break this fucking spell that bitch placed on me. The second I do, everything I know is yours.” He huffed in anger. “Until then, don’t trust anyone but your Ban Dia and fellow dianoch.”
“Fine,” I snapped, reaching for the door handle to exit the vehicle.
“Remember this, boy. The plague wasn’t as black and white as you’ve been led to think. A lot of supernaturals were hit with an in-between, gray area.” Victor flipped his hood up, hiding his scarred face from view. “Not everything is as it seems, and until a Ban Dia gets full control of her magic, it’ll be bleeding out into everyone around her, whether she intends it to or not.”
I glanced back inside the car at him. He quite clearly wasn’t saying anything further, so I slammed the door and headed back over to my jet. Glancing at the time, I remembered Kit was due to call tonight, and I couldn’t help the small surge of excitement when I thought about this new information I’d gathered for her.
13
Kit
“Wait, once more?” I was laying on the grass below the oak tree with my legs in the air against the trunk.
“He didn’t know the exact age, but somewhere around the three-hundred-year-old mark.” Vali’s velvet voice came down the phone. Wesley had presented me with a new phone at dinnertime, and I hadn’t forgotten my promise to call Vali. I was glad I hadn’t, too; he’d done some serious sleuthing.
“So I physically can’t get pregnant for another three centuries?” I clarified, and Vali murmured agreement. “Well that’s… handy to know. Suppose it does make sense as to why no one has ever really heard of them. Us. Whatever.”
“How are you adjusting to all of this?” Vali asked in a surprisingly soft tone. Not that him asking for my well-being was terribly surprising; in hindsight, he had been nothing but caring and protective since the moment we met. What was surprising was that he could tell, even from thousands of miles away, that my head was exploding right that second.
“You’re feeling my emotions, aren’t you?” I asked, chewing my lip nervously. Speaking with him on the phone like this made me forget he was this scary, intimidating crime boss with a penchant toward casual murder. He just seemed like a guy... that I was a little bit into. Okay, maybe more than a little bit. It was silly though, considering I was already sort of dating four other guys, and Vali had a girlfriend. I still hadn’t forgotten Elena, with her flawless complexion and perfectly styled dark hair.
“I am. You’re very...” He paused. “Conflicted. Guilty, even? For what?”
Um, how about for fantasizing about that kiss on New Year’s Eve when I knew you had a damn girlfriend?
“Nothing. You must be reading me wrong. Wait, can you feel my emotions, like... always?” A disturbing thought had just occurred to me.
“Only particularly strong ones, unless we are speaking like this. Seems like I can feel everything while we talk, and then just spikes all the other times.” His voice was warm and amused. Damn him. “Drag?, no need to feel embarrassed; I could feel how drained you were. But I can appreciate that this new development with your magic might take some getting used to.” There was another pause on the line. “Just tell me it wasn’t my dickhead brother getting lucky.”
“Umm,” I murmured, and he sighed.
“I hate him sometimes.” He said it softly, and I knew that wasn’t even a little bit true.
“You really missed him, didn’t you?” I asked, and he made a noise but didn’t reply. “Tell me about your mom,” I suggested, not really ready to hang up yet, even though he’d finished telling me everything he’d learned from Vic.
“My mom?” he repeated. “Ah, Andrei told you about her being Romani, then?”
“Um, yeah. Word of advice, though—if you are looking to mend bridges, you should probably call him Cole,” I advised. Cole made it pretty damn clear he wanted no reminders of his former life in the du Romane family.
“Cole. Right. Have to get used to that.” Vali made a noise under his breath, and I could picture him running a hand through that lush dark hair of his. Damn him. “There’s really not much to tell about my mom. She died when I was only a year old, and our father remarried almost immediately. God forbid he be without a wife as arm candy for fancy occasions. All I know is what my grandmother told me, that she had the sight.”
“Like, she could see the future?”
“No, not quite that magical. It was just a feeling that something bad was going to happen. I never understood what that meant until you showed up in my life.” He snorted a laugh, and I found myself smiling as well.
“Okay, I’m literally freezing my butt off out here, so I’d better head back to the apartment.” I groaned as I turned myself right-side up and pushed to my feet.
“Have a think on where you might look for that ring too,” he reminded me, like I could forget.
“Oh, I have an idea where to start,” I replied in a grim voice. “I just need to track her down first.”
“ All right.” Another pause. “Will you call again tomorrow night? Just so I don’t go out of my mind with worry when I feel you’ve been exhausting yourself?”
“Sure, I can do that,” I smiled and hoped I hadn’t just sounded too eager. Weirdly, I found myself totally comfortable talking with him on the phone in a way I didn’t think I could have managed in person. He was too damn intimidating.
“Well then, good night drag?,” he replied softly, then disconnected the line.
It was late; I’d been on the phone with Vali for way longer than I realized, so utilized some superspeed to get me back to the apartment in a fraction of the time it should have taken.
When I got there, only River was still up, although Caleb was apparently out again. Doing what, I had no idea, seeing as they were all suspended from field work, but River didn’t seem too concerned, so I didn’t pry.
“Get some sleep, love,” he murmured, standing to kiss me softly, then nudging me toward my room. “We’ll need to deal with the fallout of your healing in the morning.”
“Ugh, I almost forgot about that.” I pouted, knowing it was going to be another morning of lying to my adoptive-father, which just didn’t sit comfortably for me.
“Go,” River commanded. “Sleep.”
“I’m going,” I grumbled, smacking another quick kiss on his lips, then retreating to my room.