He rubbed my shoulder, pushing me toward the couch.“Why don’t you try to take a nap before your meeting.Shared visions always take it out of you.”
I turned, glaring.“Carrying a child doesn’t mean I’ve become one.”
He looked as though I’d slapped him.“I don’t…”
Ignoring the couch, I stomped up the stairs to my loft bedroom and bathroom.“I’m taking a shower.Can you lock up on your way out?”
Once in the bathroom, I fought my way out of my work clothes and stepped into the shower.Water poured over me, and my anger sluiced off along with the sweat.Why was I being such an asshole?Declan was trying to look after me.Why did that piss me off?
Theories swam around my head while I cleaned, shampooed, and intensely conditioned.I needed a personal assistant just for my hair.My chest got tight when I remembered that Declan would have gladly stayed to wash and condition my hair for me.
I wrapped a towel around myself and started working the leave-in conditioner through my hair.Wet like this, it hung past my butt.Once it dried, it curled up into multicolored corkscrew curls in browns and reds, blacks and golds.When it touched seawater, the highlights changed to blues and purples.
All my life, people have assumed I dyed my hair, which is a crazy thing to accuse a five-year-old of.I tried cutting it when I was younger, but it grew back immediately.Apparently, my water fae blood was offended that I’d tried to cut off my siren hair.
Combing through the curls, I stared at myself in the mirror.Was that it?I’d been dealing with hostility and fear my whole life.Even family members kept a surreptitious eye on me at all times.I was not to be trusted, yet too powerful to attack head-on.
Eventually, that became comfortable for me.I knew where I stood and fuck ’em all anyway.I worked in isolation.I had my sea creature friends and my abandoned cannery.I knew where I stood, and I was fine.
In the span of a few months, I’d met Declan.Mom and I had finally had a breakthrough and were communicating in a way that didn’t presuppose the other’s ill intent.So many things had come out about Gran, things I was still having a hard time with.She had been my one constant, the one who I’d thought loved me completely.Maybe she had.I wanted to believe she had.Perhaps, though, she put up with me because she knew a powerful half-fae Cassandra wicche was a boon to the Corey family.She had to keep her weapon grateful and loyal.
I wrapped my hair up in a drying towel and went back into the bedroom to get dressed.There was movement to my side and I jumped, my fingers flicking, only to realize Declan was sitting on the bed.Luckily, I’d caught the spell before it left my hand.
“I thought you were going back to work,” I said.
Nodding, he patted the bed beside him.“I’ll admit, I started stomping out the door, but then I stopped.I went over everything I’d done and said and couldn’t come up with what had set you off, so I decided I needed to calm the fuck down and ask.”He scratched his beard.“So, what did I do?”
I crawled up on the bed and leaned into him, resting my head on his chest.I felt the tension leave his body as his arm wrapped around me.
“I was trying to figure that out too,” I told him.
“Any ideas?”He pulled my hand into his and held it.
I blew out a breath.“Maybe, but I’m not sure.”
He kissed my temple.“Walk me through it.”
I hadn’t worked this all out in my own head yet.“My life has changed a lot in a very short time.”
After a pause, he said, “Okay.”
“I’m not sure how to explain this.”I looked up at him and felt like I was tumbling into kind brown eyes.“I’m the badass.The rest of my family might not like me, but they fear me.Or they fear my mother.Regardless, the isolation and contempt from them is familiar.I have my home here, and Cecil and Wilbur, Charlie and Herbert.I have my art.Who cares if Gran is the only one who actually seemed to like me?I have my art and I’m fine.”
“Ah,” he rumbled.
“What?”
He squeezed me tighter.“You’re right.Everything’s been flipped.You’re rarely ever alone anymore.If it’s not me, your great-uncle Bracken is here.Not to mention the detectives always coming by for your help.Even your grief is screwing with you.”He kissed my forehead again.“Do you mourn the woman who felt like the only one you ever had on your side?Or do you tightrope walk between grief and betrayal, now that you know some of that was manipulation so she could keep her sharpest sword at the ready?
“Your feelings for your mom are new and very confusing.On one hand, she’s been as manipulated as you.On the other, she kept you from ever knowing your father.And now you have your father in your life, so one more person crowding you, wanting something from you.”
He let go of my hand and palmed my stomach.“And this little one is the neediest and most constant of all of us.You can’t tell her to go and lock up on her way out.Twenty-four-seven, she’s here weighing on you.Especially with the threat of black wicches now.”
I wiped the tears from my face.“Yeah.That.”
He nodded.“And instead of being the one whose immense power at least caused others to be distantly respectful, you have a partner reminding you to eat and telling you to take a nap.If you were a wolf, you would have gone for my throat.”
Closing my eyes, I wrapped my arm around him.Was this what it felt like to be known?“You didn’t mean to verbally pat me on the head, but I felt it and it pissed me off.I’m Arwyn fucking Corey.You’ve been to crime scenes with me.Those cops might sneer when they see me coming, but there’s fear in their eyes.I see it and they know it.”
