Rafe slurped loudly on the cup of tea Shafer had handed him while mine was slowly going cold on the coffee table. We weren’t here fortea. And Vince had always been a bit of a dick, so I wouldn’t put it past him to try poisoning us.
Rafe, not suspicious in the slightest, took anotherloudslurp beforeloudlyclanking his teacup onto the saucer, thenloudlyclanking the two down onto the coffee table. He sat back in his chair and crossed one of his legs over his knee, then settled into a princely pose while staring Shafer down.
All these years of knowing him, and I still couldn’t tell when Rafe was riling someone up for his own amusement, or if he really was just as insufferable as he acted.
I’d long suspected he was insufferable.
“Vince, I see you’re as charming as always.” Rafe said with a grin. “We’ve got a lot to discuss with you today.”
“Yeah? I might have something to ask you as well.” Shafer said, raising a bushy white brow.
Rafe threw out his hands. “By all means.”
Shafer turned to me, then looked me over critically. “Since when do you shake the ground?” I shrugged. His jaw clenched but he looked to Rafe. “You know he has an affinity for sensing. Why do you need me?”
Rafe and I both went still.
“Ah, so y’all didn’t know about that.” Shafer sat back in his chair. “Interesting.”
“It was a hunch,” I ground out. This old man was giving Rafe a run for his money in the irritating department. “I’ve always had a feeling but it was never addressed. Byyou, no less.”
Shafer shrugged, then took a sip of tea before saying three words that shook me worse than when I’d seen Skye teleport.
“Affinities can evolve.”
Rafe and I were like statues, barely breathing as we stared Shafer down.
Affinities can evolve.
“What does that mean?” Rafe asked sharply.
Shafer gave him a droll look. “It means exactly what it means. Affinities evolve, kid. Especially the strong kind. Like yours,” hiscornflower blue eyes flashed toward me. “Your Sensing has gotten better since you were younger, am I right?”
My nod was stilted, even as my mind raced, trying to find reasons he was wrong.
“And you,” he turned back to Rafe while he rubbed his jaw. “I bet those shadows are taking on a mind of their own.”
Rafe, in a stunningly smart move, didn’t reply. I narrowed my eyes at him slightly. He’d always told me he didn’t completely control the shadows, I just never believed him. If what Shafer was saying was true…
“Yeah. I tried telling your grandfather, but he wouldn’t hear it. I suspect that’s why the cancer killed him.”
Rafe snorted, surprising Shafer. “My grandfather was an idiot. He still believed that old wives’ tale that fully connected affinates won’t get sick.”
“That’s not an old wives’ tale,” Shafer said gravely. “I didn’t have a simple cold for thirty years before my wife died. Woke up the next morning with a sore throat.”
Rafe flashed me a look, and we didn’t need to speak through the mind link for me to know he didn’t buy that at all.
But there was something about how he said it…
“Would a Healer confirm this?” I asked.
Shafer snorted. “Sure. Ask Holmes, she’ll tell you the same.”
Rafe made a sound of indignation. “If any of that were true, my grandfather would still be with us, Vince.”
“Not if he weren’t connected,” Shafer snapped suddenly, then froze. His eyes darted back and forth between us like he hadn’t meant to say as much.
I could tell the ground had opened up beneath Rafe.
