“She wanted you to stand with her, Zach.” Kay leaned forward, resting her arms on the kitchen table. “But instead, you sent her away by herself believing that she’s not one of us. You sent her away frightened and alone.”
Ethan wrapped his arm around Kay’s shoulders and pulled her closer as he shook his head at Zach. “I never want to have another car ride like that again. Listening to her cry in the backseat the whole way to Cardiff. Fuck.”
The whisky Zach had drunk climbed up his throat like acid.
Ethan twisted, using his free hand to smooth Kay’s hair back and then cup the back of her head as he looked down at her. “I’m sorry, you know. For when I hurt you.”
Kay smiled up at Ethan, her hand coming up to touch him gently on the cheek as if she didn’t even notice everyone else in the room. “I know. I love you, Ethan.”
Zach turned away. Watching them together only made everything a million times worse. God. Emma cried the whole way to the station.Hemade her cry. The burning in his throat reached his eyes and he scraped at them with the back of his hands.
What should he do? Did he take back the things he’d said, knowing she’d want to go after Gordon? Or did he go after Gordon first and then find her? Did he apologize first, or protect her first?
He turned back to the room. Ethan and Kay were cuddled together. Riley was watching him with big, red-rimmed eyes while Elizabeth simply looked exhausted.
“We need to get to Gordon,” Zach insisted. “We need to end this. Then I can fix things with Emma. We should go and get James and—”
“That won’t work, Zach,” Kay interrupted. “I’m sorry.”
“It will. I know we’ve been keeping James off Gordon’s radar, but now—”
Kay cut him off by pushing out of her chair and walking over to him. Then, without warning, she leaned down and wrapped her arms around him, and held him tight.
Zach had never had the easy physical relationship Kay and James had. He’d always been slightly on the outside of their triad—more like an older brother to their twins—and it had never really bothered him. But now Kay was holding him like she thought he might shatter, and it was truly terrifying.
“Kay?” he asked, voice gruff. “What’s going on?”
It was Ethan who answered. “Emma didn’t go back to her home, Zach.”
He shook his head, even as Kay held him tighter. That didn’t make any sense at all. “Of course she did. She’s expected back at her bakery. She had a train ticket back to Dorset. She—”
Kay gripped him tighter. “No, Zach. She changed her ticket.”
“What? Why?”
“She went to London to look for Gordon.”
ChapterTwenty-Four
So,this was how the Circles lived. Emma tilted her head back to take in the huge Highgate mansion and its lush, landscaped front garden. It was impossible not to compare it to some of the grim little spaces she’d called home over the years.
She lowered her shoulders, lifted her chin, and strode up to the door, wheeling her suitcase behind her. Only a few lights were on and the mansion—more of a hotel really—had that strangely quiet feeling of an empty house even though she knew David was there.
Kay and Ethan had promised to drive up to join her in the morning. As soon as they’d made arrangements to keep James and Elizabeth safe, they would be on their way. For now, they’d organized for her to stay with the head of the London Circle.
Zach always spoke of David with genuine love and respect, and if she hadn’t been so exhausted, so heartbroken, and overwhelmed, she would probably have been looking forward to meeting him.
The door opened before she could ring the bell. An athletic, silver-haired man in a suit and a white button-up shirt stepped out. He’d taken off his jacket and his shirt sleeves were rolled up to reveal powerful forearms, his hair seemed to have grown out of a previously short cut, and his tie had been tugged to hang loose. He looked tired but formidable, with an air of power around him.
“David?” she asked.
“You must be Emma. Welcome to London.”
Emma paused for a moment to check her mental shields and make sure the door in her mind was firmly closed, then she put out her hand to shake. All she felt was David’s big, calloused hand and the firmness of his grip.
He led her into a luxurious reception room with pale-gray sofas, vibrant modern art in reds and oranges, and a massive television along the wall. The curtains were open, revealing glass doors thrown wide to the early summer air coming in from the garden. Artistically arrayed spotlights highlighted a row of towering oak trees as well as a gorgeous fountain shaped from polished steel to form a trinity knot. Water gleamed as it poured down the arching lines celebrating the Guardians, Seers, and Healers of the Order. It was beautiful, but it seemed very empty.
What would her life have been like if she’d been welcomed into the Order all those years before? Would she have lived here, enjoying the benefits of thousands of years of accumulated wealth? Would she have ever learned to bake? Would she have started her own business and put in hours of sweat and tears to finally see it flourish? Or would she have stayed hidden from the world within these high walls, never truly spreading her wings?
