Charcoal Tears (24 page)

“Cut it out.”

Tariq and Tabby stopped talking, but the others didn’t seem surprised.

“He’s still pissed,” Cabe informed me. “And you’re a girl, so he doesn’t know what to do about it. He can’t beat you up. That’s how he usually deals with these situations.”

Silas growled, cutting his glare to Cabe for a moment, before returning it to me.

“Hulk. Smash.” Noah chuckled.       

I suspected Silas’s anger to bloat into something ominous and explosive, but it seemed to diminish as the other boys laughed. He turned away from me and started eating.

“This isn’t much of a birthday celebration,” Tabby remarked, reaching out to catch Quillan’s hand across the table, needing to reach over Tariq. “I brought a present, but I was waiting for a… calmer time. I hope my sons remembered this time?”

My brain seemed to stutter in shock, but Quillan only smiled easily at her, squeezing her hand. I wondered where his parents were, because he was giving Tabby a look that I recognised. It was the kind of look you gave a mother figure.

“They bought me another watch,” he said, fondly, “and thank you, Tab.”

She nodded, approving. “We’ll have a proper party once we’re settled in the mountain house. And,” she turned to Cabe and smacked him lightly across the side of his head, “stop buying him watches.”

Cabe smirked. “It’s fun, trying to coax that fossil away from him.” Cabe waved at Quillan’s wrist, and I noted that the watch he wore wasn’t new. In fact, it seemed quite old.

Tariq glanced sideways at me but I only shrugged my shoulders.
I’m just as surprised as you are
. “Happy birthday, Mr. Quillan.” He sounded too hesitant, like he didn’t truly believe it was Quillan’s birthday

I couldn’t help it. I laughed. Over the time that I had grown to know Quillan, it slowly became more and more absurd every time someone called him
Mr. Quillan
. Everyone turned to me, and I waved a hand, my face turning red.

As they all returned to their food, I got up. “Be right back,” I said, and then paused. I grabbed Silas’s arm and pulled him with me, because I knew that if I did what I was about to do without one of them, Quillan would be holding up another finger.

I pulled him back into the living room and then dug my hand into his pocket. Nothing. I tried the other one, as he stood unmoving. Finally—and with absolutely no help from him— I snagged his keys, and made for the door. He shadowed me.

“I’m your getaway driver again, aren’t I?” he asked as we stepped into the lift. There was no trace of anger left in his voice. It seemed that I had made the right choice.

“Yes, of course.” I gave him a floppy smile and he moved rapidly, shocking me back several steps until my spine brushed the wall of the lift. I expected his arms to alight either side of me, blocking my escape routes, but instead his hands captured my waist, gently spanning the circumference.

He crowded me, his eyes veiled with dark neutrality as his regard dripped over my face, causing my heart to stutter in a jittery pattern against my ribcage. “Good,” his accent had thickened; his voice carrying an unspoken warning that skittered across my suddenly warm skin, seemingly spreading out from where his hands had tightened around my waist, his fingers biting softly through my shirt. “Although Miro would have been the wisest choice.”

“Not Noah or Cabe?” I was surprised that my voice came out sounding unaffected.

He leaned closer, until our faces were inches apart, a low sound humming in the back of his throat. It rolled over me, a muted thrum of tangible menace. I had grown adept at translating Silas’s non-verbal communication over the last year, and the sound seemed to carry a significant amount of anger, though his eyes were darkening with something like amusement, leaving me confused.

The doors whooshed open, and the attendant that usually stood in the lobby stepped forward, alarm momentarily clouding his expression.

“Sir—”

“Hold the door,” Silas growled.

I finally began to move, but Silas’s grip tightened, pushing me tighter against the wall of the elevator and blocking my view of the attendant. He dipped forward, his hands sliding away from me, though he was now so close that I would have had to push him to escape the elevator. “No,” he whispered, his lips brushing my earlobe.

My mind reeled as he backed away and strode past the attendant, who was holding the doors open.
Had I asked him a question
? I couldn’t remember.

I followed Silas to the car and told him where to drive, embracing my mission with a single-minded silence that lasted the twenty minutes it took to find a cake and speed back to the apartment building. I paused in the hallway outside the apartment, my hand on the doorknob, wondering if I should bring up the question that had been scratching the back of my mind since we had left. Technically, it should have been Silas’s birthday as well, since him and Quillan were twins, but something had been stopping me from questioning him. Silas leaned against the wall beside the door, notching his foot so that his leg was bent at the knee, his forearm casually slung over his thigh. He seemed unconcerned with my hesitation.

I chewed on my bottom lip, my hand falling away from the doorknob. I opened my mouth to ask why Silas wasn’t celebrating his birthday, but the words got caught. Somehow, I knew that I wouldn’t like the answer. I wasn’t ready for it. Standing before me was a twisted man; a man with demons dancing behind his eyes and fury shrouding his heart. It seemed to me that he was precariously held together, the pieces of him sewn into a haphazard outline, but all it would take to unravel him would be a nosy girl, picking at the strings and asking questions.

Strings can be severed
. About that, at least, the messenger was right.

I pushed open the door.

Silas walked into the dining room without a word while I hid out in the living room, sticking candles into an odd shape. I didn’t actually know how old Quillan was. With a shrug, I lit the candles, and crept with the cake toward the dining room.

“—took forever,” Noah was grumbling. “What is she up to this time?”

Quillan saw me first, and started laughing, though he looked pleasantly surprised. I set the cake down in front of him, and they started singing happy birthday.

“Happy birthday, Bossman,” I said once everyone had finished singing.

He grinned at me, his dark eyes crinkling.

14

This is not the Protocol

The next morning I woke up with a new name. Tariq and I had each slept on one of the couches in Silas and Quillan’s television room, and Silas was already awake when I walked out into the tech-centre-living-room. He crooked a finger at me without uttering a word, and I cautiously approached where he sat behind one of the desks. He was still wearing the same clothes as the day before, yet there was no exhaustion in his face, only the usual cool detachment of his unassuming glare. I sat on the desk beside him, pulling my legs up and folding them. He dropped a driver’s licence into my lap.

Stephanie Adair
.

“Stephanie Adair?” I questioned, examining my own face in the picture.

“Hmm.” I could feel his eyes on me, trying to gauge my reaction. “Miro thought it would be a good idea. You, Cabe, and Noah, posing as family.”

Something clicked in my brain, and caution skittered down my spine. There was more to this. The bond I shared with the four of them manifested in different ways, but it seemed to instil in Noah and Cabe the need to be close to me, to touch me. I wasn’t so clueless that I assumed the need to be entirely platonic. I looked up, returning Silas’s regard.
Is it the same for you
? I wanted to ask.

Quillan walked out of his bedroom, breaking our stare-off. “Coffee?” he asked, moving to stand beside the desk.

I nodded, and he lifted a brow at Silas before moving off. It seemed that Silas’s silent ways were catching. We still hadn’t spoken by the time Quillan returned. He pushed a mug into my hands and pulled up a chair on my other side.

“Is there an issue?” his eyes moved to the driver’s licence still in my lap, and then turned to Silas.

Silas didn’t even blink an eye.

“No,” I assured him. “But Noah and Cabe aren’t going to like this, and I think you know why.”

Quillan nodded, not even bothering with pretence. “Those boys are ruled by their instincts. They don’t pause to think things through. That’s what the bond is, Seraph. Instinct.”

I couldn’t voice my understanding, because it didn’t exist. I barely grappled with the idea that he presented.

“What about mine?” I asked instead.

“Yours?” His brows drew together and his eyes clouded over with confusion.

“Is that what the bond is supposed to be for me as well? Instinct?”

The very apparition of my confusion only seemed to fuel his own. Beside us, Silas smirked. Of the three of us, he was the only one who boasted any apparent understanding of what was going on, so I turned to him. “Well?”

“Are you saying that you don’t understand what the bond is making you feel, angel?” Silas sounded downright amused, and Quillan drew in an unsteady breath, averting his eyes.

I decided that it would be best not to answer. I palmed my coffee and stood from the desk, shoving the driver’s licence into my pocket. Quillan rolled his chair back for me to pass, but Silas didn’t budge. His dark eyes were fixed on my face, and he was beginning to laugh.

“Don’t be cruel,” Quillan muttered beneath his breath.

“Oh but this
is
cruel, isn’t it?” Silas’s laugh quickly turned to a scowl, his words almost spat out. He stood up, causing his chair to skitter away. “And little
Seraph
here doesn’t seem to understand why. But
oh
…” he shook his head and pointed a finger into the centre of my chest, “she’s beginning to get the picture. Little bit by little bit… I can see it sinking in.”

We both watched as Silas left the apartment, and Quillan loosened the breath he had been holding. “I’m sorry, Seph.” He wasn’t looking at me. “That wasn’t nice.”

There was a tight notch of pain in my chest, but some inexplicable part of me understood Silas’s volatile emotions. Maybe it was the bond? Maybe it was something else… something inside of me.

“It’s okay,” I eventually said, turning to go and wake my brother. Unfortunately, he was already standing in the doorway, his expression cloudy. “Tariq,” my voice wavered, “I didn’t realise you were awake.”

Quillan straightened now and then stood, shifting around like he didn’t know what to do with himself. “I’ll…” he jerked his finger at the door Silas had just left through, and then trailed off, simply turning and leaving.

“Mr. Quillan. At a loss for words. How about that,” Tariq didn’t sound entertained, and his face was chillingly black—which spoke volumes for my expressive little brother.

After watching him for a few moments, I found the source of my coffee in the kitchen and poured Tariq a cup, needing to forcefully push it into his hands.

“Go ahead,” I said. “Ask.”

“What
bond
?” he spluttered immediately.

I swallowed several large gulps of my coffee and then set the cup aside, needing to twine my nervous fingers together. “There’s something I didn’t tell you.”

“No shit, Seph.”

“The electricity,” I continued, ignoring his snideness, “it isn’t the only power. I have another, as well.”

His eyebrows arched high, disappearing into his hairline. His mouth had slung open, part disbelief, part shock. He opened and closed it a few times, but no sound came out.

“The other is my painting. I have some kind of psychic ability… I’m painting real things, real things that I don’t know about, or shouldn’t know about.” I cut my eyes sideways. “Things in the future.” He finally managed a strangled sound, but I pushed on. “That’s not all. The Zevghéri—that’s what the guys call themselves, and other people like them—have certain connections or bonds between people. If you’re born with a power, you’re also born with a bond. Your bond is with two others, a
pair
, and they help you to stay strong because the human body isn’t built to withstand so much power.”

“And you have two powers.” Tariq seemed to be catching on.

I nodded. “So I have two bonds.”

“Two pairs. That’s basically an entourage.” Tariq’s lips quirked, and I felt the tension leak out of me.

Of course he was making jokes, it wasn’t such a big thing
. A connection. Two pairs. That’s all. I furrowed my brow, wondering how I had forgotten the simplicity of it. I was bonded to four people, and maybe Noah and Cabe were getting their feelings mixed up, but it wasn’t that serious. It wasn’t a big deal.
Was it
?

Shaking my head, I joined in Tariq’s awkward laughter, glad that he had taken the news so lightly, though I could see him compartmentalising the information, calculatingly storing it away for later. He didn’t trust the guys, and that made me uneasy.

We shuffled down to Cabe and Noah’s apartment and I fetched a change of clothes from my suitcase to have a quick shower before I got dressed. Getting to the train station took a long time, and I wondered again why we didn’t simply drive, but Noah only waved off the question. Tabby, Tariq, Silas and Quillan all went separately, while Noah and Cabe took me to the mall. We walked from shop to shop, pretending to browse, and then Noah disappeared. Ten minutes later, Cabe was pulling me through a fire exit and we were in the basement, piling into a taxi that Noah was already waiting in. They spent the entire drive staring out the back window, making sure that nobody had followed us. They knew that the messenger would figure it out eventually, but they weren’t going to make it easy for him.