“Ya’ risk everythin’ by pushin’ him away.”
She had to trust him. Had toshowhim she trusted him or she’d lose him. But how the hell was she supposed to do that when every time she left him alone, he put himself in harm’s way?
From the dining room, Liam’s whisper carried. “Those two need to get on with the matin’ already.”
“God help us all if they don’t,” Cade replied.
Farren took a slow, deep breath and swallowed her angry reply, turning back to Eli instead. “Ye’re truly all right?”
“I am. Better now that you’re here.” He settled her in his arms, and she tucked her legs under her so she could steal a few minutes of closeness with this man she was damn close to falling in love with. “Stay with me like this a while, and I’ll be right as rain before you know it.”
* * *
Eli
He couldn’t tell Farren the truth. Not the whole of it. He hadn’t moved from his spot on the sofa for almost an hour, and at one point, he’d felt his heart stutter and feared it would stop entirely.
What was worse? He still had no idea how tousethese damnable markings. He’d been too out of it to pay attention to whatever conversation had taken place around the dining room table, and hoped Farren would ask about this idea Mara had so he wouldn’t have to.
At least he’d been honest about one thing. Having Farren in his arms soothed his pounding head and his battered body. “A while” wouldn’t be near long enough, though. A day, two? That would get him back to full strength.
The others joined them, couples sharing the other couches, with Ewan and Tierney bringing in chairs from the dining room. “Well, out with it,” Farren said. “How is Eli supposed to use all these sigils and shite?”
Mara, a cup of tea balanced on her belly as she relaxed in Cade’s arms, looked as shattered as Eli felt. She’d hovered at the edge of the study most of the morning, occasionally remarking on a particular symbol she recognized from some book her sister had given her.
“Katerina was a practitioner. And an elemental,” Mara said. “The spells and charms in the fire agate pendant allowed Caitlin to hide from Fergus for years. When I was in high school, she came to see me. We weren’t raised together, you know. Katerina was older when our mother was killed, and she aged out of the foster care system, while I was adopted as a baby.”
As Mara explained about her sister’s notebook, how some of the symbols had stayed with her, Eli watched the group gathered around him and Farren.
They were so obviously a family. Or two families, closely related. Cade hung on Mara’s every word, as Liam did with Caitlin, and the mated pairs were so in sync, it bordered on the absurd.
Absurdly brilliant.
He wanted that sort of bond. To share a connection so powerful, he could feel his partner’s emotions. It took until Mara had finished and Caitlin was explaining that Eli needed to find a way to activate the right symbols at the right timewhileusing his elemental power that he realized the truth of it.
He already had what he wanted. Farren’s uneasiness was like a cold chill along his side, yet every time he met her gaze or played with a lock of her hair or squeezed her thigh, that chill warmed until all he felt was...love? Perhaps not quite love. But close.
It only lasted for a few moments each time, and he ached to carry her upstairs and strip her naked. To tell her he needed her as much as she needed him, and that once they were free of this threat, hedidwant to be with her.
In his arms, Farren tensed, and an overwhelming sense of guilt and shame flooded him. Hers. Not his. Blast it. He had to understand why she couldn’t forgive herself for what had happened to the rest of her pack. Had to see if he could find a way to prove to her she hadn’t failed them.
* * *
Tierney broughtthem both cups of strong black tea, and Farren pulled a dozen folded sheets of paper from her jacket pocket. “I found a fair bit of information about yer parents, Eli. And I think I have an idea why they took yer memories along with yer powers.”
He sat up a little straighter, stifling his wince when the new marks across his back pulled taut.
Farren handed him the first sheet, and he ran his fingers over the national ID photos of his mother and father. He’d forgotten so much about them. How his mother’s eyes crinkled when she smiled, his father’s laugh...
“Paulo Ruiz and Una Colón?”
Farren nodded. “Yes. You grew up outside of Sheffield, in a cute little cottage in the country.” The second page showed a black and white picture of the home’s exterior.
“Mum painted it this pale blue not long after we moved in,” he said. “With trim the color of the night sky.” Fuck. He missed them so much. But their last names...they didn’t make any sense, and when he said so, Farren rested her hand on his thigh.
“I don’t have any legitimate educational records for ya’ before ya’ became Eli Escobar. Only a note in Eli Colón’s file about ya’ being home schooled. And even that? Colón? I don’t think that was truly yer mum’s name. She married yer father back in Scotland, three years before ya’ were born. The records from County Inverness-shire show that she took yer father’s name when they wed.”
“Then why did she change it when they moved? Why didn’t I get his name? Or even hers?” Eli passed the papers to Caitlin and Liam, unsure how to process all of this new information. If he could just talk to them one more time, he’d know what to do.
