Whatever it was, she'd given in to her need to be clean of the ugliness of what had been done to her by showering far too long in the shower inside the living quarters of his cab. She'd probably emptied his water tank, but he hadn't knocked on the door to tell her to get out. Instead, when she finally came out, it was to see he'd left a pair of sweatpants and a T-shirt for her to change into.
His clothes would've fallen off her, but these kind of fit after she tucked the T-shirt into the sweatpants in a very unglamorous move and tightened the drawstring, then rolled up the bottoms of the pants.
Clearly, the clothes belonged to a taller, healthier woman. The laughing blonde? The idea made Leila happy, though both Isaac and the woman were strangers to her. And she needed to think thoughts of happiness right now. It was all that was keeping her from shattering, her psyche held together by a single fragile thread.
When she came to peek out at Isaac, he glanced back at her with a cheek-creasing smile. "You know," he said before turning his attention back to the road, "you're not the first girl I've rescued."
The part of Leila that had kept her sane in the darkness scowled. "I'm a woman, not a girl."
"Jessie was mouthy, too." So much emotion in his voice as he touched his fingers to the photograph. "She drives big rigs now. Drives me crazy, too."
"I'm a scientist," Leila found herself telling him, and in so doing, reclaimed a part of her lost self. "I study the creatures that call the ocean home."
Isaac whistled. "Smart." His tone changed on the next words, became rough. "Those assholes hurt you pretty bad." He nodded up ahead. "You need medical help from your people?"
She could see the gleaming white all-terrain vehicle through the windscreen, the landscape beyond painted by cloudy late-afternoon light. "Are you sure those people are mine?"
"Some guy called Malachai confirmed it."
Her eyes threatened to fill with tears.
Malachai wouldn't let anyone hurt her. He was Miane's and Miane protected her people, no matter how distant they were or how small their relative importance to the rest of the world. Each and every member of BlackSea was important to Miane.
Crawling up to sit in the passenger seat, she forced herself to say, "I could ride with them. They're going really fast." Only she didn't know them and Isaac was safe. Isaac had a beard like her father and he loved a woman with blonde hair and freckles scattered over her nose and across the tops of her cheeks.
"I could do with seeing the ocean," Isaac replied with a grin that reassured her he didn't mind this detour. "Been a while."
"My name is Leila." It seemed right to tell this good man who was taking her home.
"Pretty." Picking up something from the cup holder, he held it out. "You should eat a little more if you can."
Taking what proved to be a protein bar, she peeled it open with fingers that were swollen from how the driver of the SUV had wrenched her fingers back when she tried to run at a stop. He'd also punched her in the face.
"You have someone who'll look after you?" Isaac asked in that rough tone that was oddly comforting, like Malachai when he got gruff. "Once you reach home?"
The thought of home made her chest ache.
"I swim alone," she told him after swallowing a bite of the protein bar. "But I'll go to the city for a while, rest in my family's arms."
"You ever get lonely?" He grabbed an unopened water bottle from his side and handed it to her. "Swimming alone I mean? Ocean's a big place."
Laughter spilled out of her, unexpected and rusty. "Don't truckers drive alone for days at times?"
"Point to you." He chuckled and the sound was a warm blanket wrapping around her. "But I don't run alone much anymore." A glance at the photograph that said more than words. "The rare times I do, I still see people--at the truck stops for one. At the sleep stops, if we end up parking side by side to catch some shut-eye. No truck stops in the ocean."
"I have friends who swim by." She smiled at the memories of how her best friends would haul themselves up onto her boat and raid her galley shelves for cookies. One time, after the fiends had eaten her out of cookies until not a crumb remained, she'd come up from a swim to discover two large sacks of cookies left on deck, the supplies carried to her in waterproof bags.
"The gaps are longer than in your line of work," she told Isaac as her mouth watered for a taste of those chocolate-chip-raisin cookies. "Weeks rather than days, but we're social in our own way." Her smile faded under a sudden nausea, her skin chilled. "I don't know if I'll be able to swim in my waters anymore. The kidnappers might take me again."
Isaac shot her a dark look that didn't terrify--she already knew him well enough to understand his anger was directed at the people who'd tortured and imprisoned her. "You could swim with a group for a while," he suggested. "Fight your need for solitude to stay in your home waters."
Leila thought of how she'd fought so much already, of how she'd survived unbroken and felt a flicker of pride, an emotion she'd long thought dead inside her. "It might be nice to swim with my friends," she admitted, knowing those friends would welcome her despite their own normally solitary travels.
Her skin ached, hungry for the cool slide of water. At home, the water was so clear she could see beams of sunlight spearing through to scatter sparkles of light like a silent fireworks display. But right now, so far from home, the memory hurt. So she turned to something that didn't. "Will you tell me about your Jessie?"
Isaac grinned, and then he told her all about the tough, smart girl he'd picked up on a lonely road late one night, who he'd then chewed out for hitchhiking. That girl had grown up, grown even tougher and smarter, and become one of Isaac's best drivers. She'd also turned into a "tall gorgeous woman" who seemed to find pleasure in driving Isaac to distraction . . . until one day, she stopped calling, stopped forwarding him funny e-mails, stopped being an integral and daily part of his life.
Leila's heart squeezed. "No," she whispered. "I don't want a sad ending." Couldn't deal with it. Not today. Maybe not for many days to come.
Isaac winked at her. "Jessie just got sick and tired of my thick head and decided to say to hell with me." His expression devolved into a dark scowl. "She started dating that pretty boy trooper Michel Benoit." Growling words that could've come from one of the big bull sea lion changelings. "I mean, really? A trooper?"
Leila's shoulders shook. "How did you win her back?" She knew he had, had just noticed the golden wedding band on his left ring finger. It was visible in the photograph, too, as was the glint of gold on Jessie's hand.
Shaking his head, the bearded trucker said, "That is one hell of a tale." He began to tell it, snarling every time he got to a part that involved his apparent mortal enemy Michel Benoit.
She was so caught up in his story that she didn't know when she fell asleep, but when she came awake, it was to a moonlit darkness and the salt-laced scent of the ocean. Eyes burning and heart thumping, she began to push at the heavy door. Isaac had already unlocked it, and by the time she pushed it open, he was there to catch her.
"Isaac"--tears rolled hot and wet down her face--"you brought me home."
He refused to release his grip on her. "I did, sweetheart, but you know what Malachai said. You won't survive a swim in your current condition."
Leila barely heard him, the music of the crashing waves a visceral pulse that pounded her name. Then a tall brunette with features that reminded Leila of another marine biologist she knew, a woman who hailed from the Lil'wat Nation, exited one of the escort vehicles and came over. She carried the scent of the ocean, too, deep in her skin.
Pack.
The realization was enough to pull Leila's attention from the sea, but not to separate her from Isaac. She didn't know this packmate, had never before seen her. Then the woman made a call, gave her the phone. Her entire body shook, because it was Miane on the other end, telling her she was safe, that this woman and her partner would bring her to her own waters.
"Canadian waters ar
e too cold for you in your current condition," Miane said with command inherent in her every word. "It'll stop your heart even if you shift. Stay in human form a little longer."
Leila's entire self hurt with need for the sea, but she couldn't gainsay the first among them. "I won't shift." It came out a trembling promise.
"Only a short while longer, little dancer."
Little dancer.
No one had called her by the childhood nickname for an eon. Of course, Miane would remember--and in so doing, remind Leila of who she was under the scars and the pain. "I'll hold on," she promised in a stronger voice. "Until I'm home."
Taking the phone after Leila handed it back, the brunette pointed out a yacht moored in the distance, its sails glowing white under the silver kiss of the moon, then gestured toward a small jetboat in the shallows. "If you're ready?"
Leila swallowed, looked up at Isaac. "Thank you. Your Jessie is a lucky woman."
His smile was sunrise over an ocean. "Send me a postcard with palm trees on it someday. I've never made it to the tropics."
Throwing her arms around his big, sturdy form, she whispered, "Come visit me. Bring Jessie."
And then she couldn't fight the pull anymore, was heading down the beach so fast that her knees threatened to crumple out from under her. The brunette woman and a slender black man helped her onto the jetboat. She trailed her hand in the water and tried not to sob with need as they began to pull away.
Home, she was going home.
Letters to Nina
From the private diaries of Father Xavier Perez
July 14, 2081
Nina,
War has broken out. The streets of San Francisco crawl with soldiers. I'm writing this in the cellar of the church, in a stolen moment. Around me are refugees I and other able-bodied people have brought in.
There is no more time to write. I must go, must see if there are others I can help.
Xavier
Chapter 48
MIANE DIDN'T TAKE a real breath until Leila stepped onto Cifica, the city rocking gently under them in a rhythm that was the sea's pulse. The young woman had been ferried by yacht to the nearest large BlackSea city, then put on a high-speed plane home. That plane had landed two minutes ago on the water beside BlackSea's main city in the tropics.
"Leila." She took her packmate into her arms, held her while Leila cried.
"They made me ugly," Leila whispered against her chest. "I was never pretty but now I'm a monster."
"Never say that again." Miane fought her fury, squeezed Leila tight. "You are strong and beautiful and one of mine."
Leila's voice was thick when she answered, her fingers rising to her face. "The scars, Miane . . . I want them gone."
"We have an excellent surgeon." He was human but an angel with scars. "I'll get him to come out to the city." That Leila had spoken first of her scars didn't surprise Miane. All victims of trauma reacted differently, and she knew from Olivia Coletti that sometimes, a superficial statement or request wasn't superficial at all.
Each time I look in the mirror, Olivia had whispered to her, I see them. This isn't my face. It's what they made me.
"Will it work?" Leila asked shakily.
"Yes." Olivia's scars were already so fine that it was difficult to spot them under normal light. "He's very good."
A jerky nod. "I'm not vain. It's just . . ."
"I know." She kissed the shorter, slighter woman's temple, kept her warm and safe within her embrace. "We've missed you, Leila."
Sobs broke out of Leila's body anew, heartrending and painful and raw. But when it was over and Leila lifted tear-drenched eyes to Miane's, those eyes held a luminous light. "The world doesn't understand. They think because some of us swim alone and because the ocean is so vast, that we don't care."
Miane wiped away Leila's tears. "We know the truth and that's what matters." Miane would turn predator for her people, would fight any enemy to keep them safe. "We are BlackSea."
"We are one," Leila whispered, completing the motto that was written nowhere and yet that defined water-based changelings.
No matter how far they traveled or how deep, they were part of a bigger whole. Never forgotten. Never discarded. One.
PART 7
Chapter 49
TEN MINUTES AFTER receiving word that Leila Savea was home safe with her people, Riley walked with Mercy in the woods near their cabin, her arm hooked into his. He refused to let go of her--his tall, lithely muscled mate looked as if she'd topple over.
"Why didn't you put on weight anywhere else?" he growled at her. "At least you'd be more stable."
She bared her teeth at him. "Shut up. I can keep myself upright. And for your information, I ate like a bear before hibernation, but our children are voracious hooligans."
Riley waited when she stopped, caught her breath.
Wait, at no point in her pregnancy had Mercy ever had to catch her breath during a simple walk. "You're having a contraction," he accused.
"First one." A scowl directed at him. "Only tiny anyway. Probably be a few hours yet at least."
"Of course it will." Knowing that any children with Mercy's blood in their veins would be in no way predictable, he pulled out his phone and put in the call to Tamsyn.
"I'll be there in fifteen," the healer said, clearly already in the vicinity.
That was likely on purpose, with Mercy overdue. Not just in terms of a multiple changeling pregnancy but generally.
"Oh, crap!" Mercy almost bent over.
Heart thudding, Riley nonetheless kept his cool and began to stroke her back with the firm touch she liked. When she was ready, he helped her back up. They walked some more but stayed near the cabin.
Riley's instinct was to hustle her into a comfortable bed, but Mercy was a leopard sentinel and she knew her body. At one point, she pressed her hands palms-down against a tree and pushed out while he massaged her back, digging in his thumbs the way she demanded.
Even when she snarled at him, her eyes dark as a result of the increasing pain, he kissed her temple and petted her, and after the contraction passed, his wild, beautiful mate turned into him. "I'm sorry."
Riley kissed her cheeks, her lips in a caress that was all about comfort. "You can yell at me all you want. It makes me feel like I'm useful for something." Brushing back her damp hair, he held her as long as she wanted before they began to walk again.
Mercy's water broke a minute later.
The contractions were coming so close together by the time Tamsyn reached them that the gaps were measured in seconds rather than minutes. They didn't make it inside. The pupcubs were born in a rush on the soft grass outside the cabin, Mercy's hand gripping Riley's and her back braced against his as Tamsyn caught their impatient children.
Who all decided to come out pretty much on top of one another.
Wiping off their faces, the healer placed the children in Mercy's trembling arms. Riley slid his own under hers to help her hold them safe. "Hello," Mercy whispered, a softness to her that, until this instant, only Riley had ever seen.
She kissed each squalling face in turn before looking up at him. "You're a daddy now, wolf."
His smile felt as if it would crack his face. "Hell, yeah."
"Come around," she murmured as the pupcubs quieted under their mother's touch, at the skin-to-skin contact that was so important to newborn changelings. "They need to feel their daddy's touch, too."
Easing away his bracing hold, he came around to the side so he could support Mercy with one leg behind her back and still be able to hold their babies. He undid his shirt almost without thought and then Mercy was putting all three pupcubs in his arms. The "voracious hooligans" were strong and healthy but tiny. He nuzzled each soft face, drew in their scents, felt his heart expand again to make even more room for these three precious souls.
Tamsyn, who'd been taking care of Mercy, finally nudged them up and into the house. Only when all three pupcubs were snuggled up against Riley in the bed, ski
n-to-skin, did Mercy step into the shower for a minute.
Dressed in one of his T-shirts afterward, panties on underneath, she made a beeline for their babies. "Look at them. They're so perfect." She took a tiny foot, kissed each toe. Then did the same for the other two pupcubs as Tamsyn smiled and left them in privacy.
When Mercy took a pupcub and the baby whimpered at the touch of cotton, she tugged off the tee and snuggled their child to her heartbeat. The baby quieted at once. "Riley, we made three gorgeous babies," she whispered in open awe, her eyes shining.
With her hair cascading in red waves over skin of cream and gold, and her face luminous as she looked first at one babe, then leaned over to kiss the loosely fisted hand of another, the head of the third, Mercy made his heart stop. "We did," he managed to say, juggling the two pupcubs he held over onto one arm so he could close his free hand over Mercy's nape. "You're amazing."
A sparkling smile. "Never forget it, wolf." Leaning in, she nipped at his lower lip. "I want to hold them all again." She situated herself in a slightly leaning position against the headboard, pillows piled up behind her, then Riley placed the other two pupcubs against her.
Their tiny faces seemed to smile, their soft hands spreading on her skin.
Riley watched over them, feeling a joy so deep that neither part of him could articulate it. His mate was safe, as were their pupcubs.
Riley Aedan Kincaid could ask for nothing more.
Letters to Nina
From the private diaries of Father Xavier Perez
September 27, 2081
Nina,
Our city has been at peace for months.
The changelings won the battle that shattered that peace earlier this year, but both my friends believe this is only a temporary lull--change is building with ever-increasing momentum in the PsyNet, the network that connects every Psy in the world but for the rare few who have defected.
"An earthquake is coming, Xavier," one of my friends said to me just hours earlier. "Only the strong will be left standing when it's over."