Consequence

  She glared at Kyle—just a small flick of her eyes. “This big dork won’t stay out of my head.”

  Kyle ignored her and squinted at Caleb, shaking his head a little. “You don’t see her as the Visionary first? Really?”

  “She’s my significant first,” Caleb said harder.

  I was a little surprised by it. No, I hadn’t really thought much about it. I had always assumed the two things were neck and neck but Visionary was probably winning. He had just stolen me from a meeting though, hadn’t he?

  “But you weren’t that way in California,” Kyle reminded him. “When we found out who she was in the beginning, you were just as obsessed about it as I—”

  “And I paid for acting like an ass, if you remember,” Caleb told him. He sighed as his blue eyes found mine and he remembered how he watched me leave in the Jeep that night, feeling my heart beating so loud in his chest, and not knowing what was going to happen next. Knowing he’d screwed up, but not knowing what to do to fix it.

  I shook my head and opened my mouth to tell him no, that I was sorry, but Kyle beat me to it.

  “She’ll always be the Visionary, no matter what you want. Or what she wants.” He crossed his arms and scowled at us both. “Maybe that’s what’s going on right now. That you both are taking the Visionary thing too lightly and it’s pissed off, trying to send you a message—”

  Caleb moved before I could stop him. He got right in Kyle’s face, nose to nose, and growled, “You don’t live it and breathe it every day. You have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  Kyle scoffed, but had the good sense to back down enough to show he wasn’t about to go head to head with the Champion of his clan. “I’m not trying to fight with you. I’m just stating fact…” Caleb moved forward and Kyle changed his wording, “I’m just talking ideas. There’s a reason this is happening to Maggie.”

  I gripped Caleb’s arm—not to hold him back, but to just hold him. “Don’t ever say that Maggie hasn’t done enough or given enough or not taken being the Visionary seriously. She was yanked into this life by me and has done nothing but accept and love us, all of us. So shut your face with talk that she’s not absolutely amazing at what she’s been given and had to deal and work with. Even the ones of us that grew up in it wouldn’t do so well.”

  Kyle sighed and raised his hands. “I didn’t mean for it to come out like that.” He glanced at me and back at Caleb. “Both of you work hard. I just mean that maybe you’re spreading yourselves thin. Or…maybe focusing on the wrong things. Maybe you’re not on the right path and this is a little course correction from the universe. It’s obvious that Maggie’s not doing something right or this wouldn’t be happening, right?”

  Caleb’s hands snapped forward and gripped Kyle’s collar tightly.

  “Caleb!” Lynne screeched from Kyle’s back.

  “Champion or not,” Caleb growled, “I will bust you in your mouth if you don’t stop talking about my wife that way.”

  “See!” Kyle said and pointed above Caleb’s hands. “You said ‘my wife’, not ‘her’, not ‘Maggie’, not ‘the Visionary’. You’re looking at this all wrong, bro.” He shook his head and pushed Caleb’s hands off. “If it were me—”

  “If it were you, you’d be even worse than I am,” Caleb said, the fight completely gone out of him. He sagged, his head leaning down to rest his chin to his chest. I still had his arm in my grip, just watching the display.

  “Maybe,” Kyle conceded.

  You would. You know you would.

  I ignored Lynne’s internal scold to Kyle and put my hand on Caleb’s scruffy chin to pull his face over to me. I pushed everything away but him and me. I moved and pressed right up against him, his chest and thigh to mine, letting my nose and cheek rest against his—our own little secret place, he called it. With our eyes closed, I tried to think of a way to apologize to the man I loved more than life. He was right. He had thought of me as a woman first, as his wife, as Maggie, first. That’s what I’d always wanted and took it for granted, thinking it had always been the opposite.

  Our lives were busy, absolutely, between Champion and Visionary business, the family, the kids and the centers, but we made it work. And it worked perfectly, it seemed. It felt like our balance was pretty spot-on.

  Except for the week of the reunification. We barely saw each other while everyone else was busy having fun with their games and family and friend time. I barely got to catch up with anyone, and my significant and I were on the border of withdrawals the entire time.

  I’d studied the photos that Rodney had taken of the previous Visionary, Ashlyn’s, scribed wall over the years. I did everything I was supposed to do, in my gut. I followed my gift, my ability, which was given to me to help change this race of people. I knew it wasn’t going to be instant, but had to be done. I saw that in my vision. I knew it was going to be hard sometimes. I didn’t know how else I could follow my path. I was doing everything I could.

  And Caleb. My sweet Caleb. He was always carrying the torch for me. Even now, ready to bust up Kyle for bad mouthing me when I didn’t even have faith enough to know what was in my own husband’s head.

  His hands came up, finally caving, as he cupped my face. He shook his head.

  Do you know how long it’s been since I’ve been in that beautiful head of yours?

  Too long.

  I mean it. Any idea how long since we’ve been able to really talk like this without a room full of council members taking your attention? Or exhaustion claiming us at the end of the night? Or kids asking us to put them in bed? Or since I’ve gotten to be in your mind at all for anything? Four days. Four days, Maggie. That’s an eternity for our kind. Do you know how long it’s been since we’ve mutualized?

  Six days. I’ve been counting.

  That’s not okay. It’s not your fault at all. I’m just saying, how can we be expected to be in sync and be the couple we’re supposed to be if the basic tools we were given aren’t even being allowed to us? If you’re taken from me the second you get here, then how are you supposed to know what’s going on with me? And I you? They’ve made us weak like this—all of the council couples.

  I should have made the effort. I should have paid attention. I rubbed his nose a little with mine so he’d know that this point was more important than the rest. I should have known better. I should have known what was in your head without even having to look. I just…the Visionary is always so front and center for everyone, especially here. I just let my assumptions lump you into that, too. I’m really sorry, baby.

  His hands moved, caressing down my arms and back, all the way down to wrap against my lower back. He sighed into my neck as he lifted me, pressing me against him. Gah, sweetheart. Do you have any idea how much I’ve missed you? My imprint has been going absolutely insane needing to be with you and to just…

  Say it.

  Consume every inch and piece of you.

  I gripped him tighter. Mine, too. I’m sorry.

  Before he could say anything, I slammed past his barriers, one after another. He groaned against my mouth, a small noise only for me, and held me tighter as I refused to let anything keep him from me a second longer. His protective barrier was there, ever ready, ever present and beautiful in his love for me.

  Our memories had changed over the years. We had kids and our lives were vastly different, but so much the same. Now in his loop of visions I saw, my aching and laboring over our daughter’s birth was there…the look on my face as I held her in my arms for the first time and then looked at him with such thanks for giving me such a gift…him watching me over the years as I did all I could for our people. The council may not like me very much, but even I had to admit that our people were a different story. As soon as the imprints started coming back, they realized that things were turning around and there was a shift in the balance. Even though I had fought it back then, I had been that balance. They were grateful and the more I embraced it, the closer I got to the people. I di
dn’t get to spend much time with them at reunifications, but I talked to them a lot from home during the year. The first year alone we had sixteen couples imprint of all ages.

  People like Haddock, who were older and thought they’d never imprint, were now doing so, finally getting the life they’d always been promised. But it wasn’t everyone. It wasn’t all the older people who hadn’t imprinted when they were younger, and people questioned why. I knew it had to do with our intentions, our actions, our progress as a race. I explained that. I explained that our life, our gifts and abilities, were just that—gifts. Those could be taken at any moment just like before, and we needed to remember that what we are is a privilege and honor, not a right.

  Past all that, past the linings of his mind was our life and the sweet things of inconsequence that piled up, but still made me ache with its sweetness. His kids from the centers he loved so much were in there, his family, his guitar—still his favorite instrument, and he played all the time—but at the core of him, right at the heated center, there was nothing there but me.

  Us.

  I could feel Caleb’s arms binding around me tighter still as he picked me up before cold bricks met my back. In his mind, I saw he’d moved us out of the middle of the street and into a small alley between the bakery and the deli. Kyle and Lynne were long gone somewhere.

  Don’t think about them, or where we are, or what’s going to happen. Just me. Only me.

  I obeyed him as if his voice was pushing the buttons that controlled my very being. He caged me in, one arm around my neck and one around my lower back. When his mind eased back inside mine, he was walking the ledge of control. And so was I. It had been a very long time since I’d lost control and not been able to rein in my ability, but when I saw a blue ribbon crackle behind my eyelid, I gasped into his mouth.

  Hold on, baby. Just hold on. You need this just as much as I do.

  More. I gripped his brown curls and pulled his mouth down to mine. I’m so close to losing it.

  It’s their fault, he growled even as he devoured my tongue with his. He dove deep and used his hips to pin me to the bricks. They’ve got to stop treating you like an object and remember that you’re just like them.

  No more, I begged. No more talk of them. Just kiss me until I can’t think of anything at all.

  He caved and not another word was spoken. His love and respect for my wishes was given in his answer to my request. He always did anything and everything to give me what I wanted. If there was a problem that he couldn’t solve, it wasn’t just his own upset, it was a physical need to see it through that hurt him. That’s why all this stuff with the council didn’t make anything easy. And it didn’t make much sense either.

  Why were they so hell bent on making things so hard?

  But as Caleb picked me up in his arms, my knees on the side of his hips, and carried me a little bit farther into the alley, I was done worrying about it.

  As the building touched my back this time, I saw he’d moved us behind a little outdoor café that wasn’t open yet. Must have been only open at night…and it was getting darker.

  The fire that sparked between us hadn’t dwindled over the years. If anything, it had gotten more intense—more focused, I should say. Centered. Our imprints knew what they wanted and they went for it. No more bumbling around in our insecurity and immaturity. Those days were long gone.

  I held my muscles tight, keeping them coiled and sprung for the ready. This was how I kept myself in check, keeping the energy ribbons from popping out everywhere in the air and scaring everyone within a quarter-mile radius.

  He pulled my tightly wound leg up, hooking his palm under my thigh, and used his free hand to smooth down my neck to my chest and back up, rubbing his skin into mine. As he tormented me with his big hands, he plundered in my mind, and I gripped my arms around his neck as I felt the first spark zing into my veins. I gasped and opened my mouth to moan or groan or…something, but he swallowed it down and pushed his mind harder, making me his again.

  Always mine, his insistent growl reminded me.

  As it built, I clung harder and tried to keep myself in check. I hated it. I wanted to cut loose and be myself. At home, we had no worries, but right now, this was about more than just a good time; this was about necessity, a need ingrained in our veins and blood that ached, but still keeping people from seeing my ability at the same time.

  I leaned my chin down and squeezed my eyes shut, but he took my chin between his fingers and pulled it back up. He covered my mouth with his, and though he didn’t say anything, he didn’t have to—he pressed against me, head to toe, and commanded my body to surrender. It was amazing how it worked like that. I shook against his hold, but kept kissing him as our sighs collided between our breaths. The bursts I saw behind my eyelids weren’t energy ribbons this time but the mutualizing coming to an end. I gripped his hair tightly in my fingers and found him doing the same thing to the ends of my hair right under my ear—a handful in his fist absentmindedly. The hot and cold zings consumed me, littering my veins until it was all too much. I didn’t know how many times we’d mutualized over the years, a million it could’ve been, but it didn’t matter—the first time, the last time, they all were the same and different in their own way, but equally amazing.

  He wasn’t able to keep the reins as tight on himself like I was and the groan that moved from his lips to my sensitized skin caused goose bumps to run over me. I covered his lips with my fingers and silently begged him to stop before I blew the place up as he moved his hand in his mind to caress my leg, ankle to hip bone.

  He chuckled, loving his torture of me as the oblivious passerby’s moved in the light just feet away from us. He pulled my wrist up, his panting breaths beating against my skin as he kissed my tattoo with his name lovingly written there. He started to ease away from me, but I gripped his shirt front in my fist. “Not yet. Stay.”

  “Not going anywhere,” he assured as he lifted me and took us to sit in one of the outside deli chairs.

  He sat and held me on his lap, but I didn’t snuggle in and cuddle. I stared at him. His face, holding a few years more on it, was still hard and gorgeous, his chin strong and his dimples even more defined with his stubble in full force. He was even more handsome with his young, boyish looks on the way out, making room for a very grown-up, powerful looking Champion of our clan. Handsome and loving husband to me, and still being the playful father to my children.

  It felt like an eternity had passed sometimes since our wedding, but it had only been ten years in actuality. Still, ten years was a lot to wrap your head around. All those years of letting him love me and trying my best to love him back even more, in return.

  I palmed his cheek and rubbed my thumb over his dimple when they made an appearance with his grin. His hands on my sides flexed and caressed up and down my torso as he watched me watch him.

  “It’s amazing to me that you’re still surprised by it,” he mused, one of his hands drifting to my neck—to my Visionary mark. He brushed his thumb across it several times before leaning in and kissing it, staying close to me to speak, answering my silent question. “That I love you and this is really our life.”

  I leaned to the side, gripping his head and sighing into his hair. “It’s a good life. It’s not uncommon to be grateful to the point of disbelief.”

  A flash of the visions I had played in the back of my mind and I couldn’t help but let it seep into our perfect moment. He wrapped an arm around my lower back and pulled me to him, pressing his face against mine. “I will fix this for you, baby. I will make all the bad things go away. I promise you.” I nodded slightly, but he shook his head. “Believe me when I say that whoever is behind this will regret the day they made you suffer.”

  I leaned back just enough to see his eyes—his honest blue eyes that never lied to me. “You think someone did this on purpose? Not something supernatural?”

  He sighed. “This isn’t your ability, sweetheart. If it was, then I would
see the visions, too. I’d have them with you like I always do. This is something else. It just doesn’t feel right. It feels…” he rubbed my upper arms to soothe me as he said the words, “evil.”

  “The Watsons,” my mouth spouted immediately, almost as if the words weren’t my own. The Watsons were always the first people who came to mind when I thought of anything that came against us that had evil intentions.

  “I can’t prove it, obviously, and I have no real reason to think that. They’d be stupid to show up now after all this time, with no powers and no way to defend themselves. But I feel like they have something to do with it for some reason, like they’ve been waiting in the shadows for the right time to strike.”

  He was right. His words rang true in my ears and my veins, but I still felt like I needed to rebel. “Please, no,” I begged in a whisper. “Anything but that.”

  “Right now,” he said, taking my face in his hands, “I’m taking you for a quiet lunch and we’re not going to think about that.” He kissed the corner of my mouth and helped me stand.

  I stalled and rubbed my palms over the tattoos on his forearms. They were new, one on each arm for each of our kiddos. Rodney’s name was on a cog wheel on Caleb’s left arm, and Ava’s was across a piece of filigree fence with a vine crawling over it. The man carried his whole life on his skin.

  Taking my hand, he towed me into the street and ducked into the deli. I knew he could hear Kyle’s thoughts as he borrowed my ability. He and Lynne were in the deli already and were waiting for us. They knew we’d come when we were…finished. They knew we’d hear their thoughts and know where they were. Kyle was sorry for being an ass, but still believed that Caleb was wrong for looking at me as the Visionary second. He was a true Ace in his thinking. They all thought that way. He would never understand.

  “Maggie is my business,” Caleb told him as he pulled my chair out for me, “so let’s stop talking about it since we’re not going to agree. We don’t have to agree; that’s the beauty of it. She doesn’t belong to you.”