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I didn’t love Gabe, though. And I was so freaking sick of people hurting me to manipulate me. If Asher had tried this on me again, I would have been furious. With Gabe, white-hot rage quickened inside me, and I fought to shutter my expression.

“You’ve made your point,” I said and I was proud of how calm I sounded.

Gabe relaxed, and I took advantage of that. I wavered and stretched out a hand, pretending weakness. He automatically reacted to help me. I dropped my walls in a rush. He sensed my
humming
instantly, but by then I held his hand and it was too late.

This time it was my energy filling his body and hurting him. The night Dean had shot Asher, we’d discovered that I could steal energy like any Protector could. Except my Healer side gave me an advantage Protectors didn’t have. Gabe’s kind could only steal from Healers, whereas I could take my pickings from either bloodline. It was why Asher and I had to be so careful with each other. Why we had to keep our guard up so often to ensure this didn’t happen.

That wouldn’t be a problem again. Asher was gone. And suddenly that knowledge didn’t hurt as fiercely with Gabe’s energy melding with mine, sparking coils of heat under my skin. The monster inside me roared with pleasure as it fed on Gabe.

“Remy, stop. Please . . .” Gabe begged.

Like coming out of a deep trance, I forced myself to focus on him. His face had lost all color, and lines of pain had appeared. His green eyes—Asher’s green eyes—stared at me helplessly.

Horrified, I released Gabe, and he collapsed to the ground. I choked on a sob and covered my mouth to stifle the sound.

The wind bristled the pine needles above us. I didn’t know what to say to him. I wasn’t even sure how I felt about it. Except that the monster inside me roared in fury at being denied Gabe’s energy.

“You don’t mess around when you’re pissed off, do you?” Gabe said, forcing humor into his strained voice.

“Are you okay?” I asked.

I didn’t dare to go near him, even though we both had our walls up now.

“Oh, I’m grand,” he said. “Never felt better.” He tried to stand and groaned. “Shit, Remington. It’s like you ran me over with a forklift.”

I laughed and it sounded more like a sob.

“Come here,” Gabe said.

“Are you going to hurt me?” I asked in a small voice.

“No,” he answered in a rueful tone. “I think we’ve done enough damage to each other for one night. But you look like you’re going to fall and I could use a hand getting up.” I hesitated a moment more and he added, “You can trust me. I swear it.”

I went to him and stooped to put my shoulder under his arm to help him stand. I muttered, “He said before he killed her.”

“Don’t even joke,” Gabe said.

“Who’s joking?”

We stumbled to a nearby rock, and I lowered him to sit. I made to step back, but Gabe pulled me down beside him. He let me loose when I tugged on my hand, but I didn’t move away.

“Franc thinks we’re dating,” I blurted out.

Gabe did a double take. “He what?”

“Don’t make me say it again. It was bad enough the first time.”

He swallowed. “Did you correct him?”

I shook my head. “I didn’t get a chance. He said all this stuff about how he could tell you cared about me and that you were welcome to go to Pacifica with us and then he left.”

“Well . . .” Gabe cleared his throat.

A nearby bush shuddered as a small animal explored. An unseen car’s brakes squealed on a road in the distance. And all I could think about was how awkward this was and how even sitting with Gabe now felt like a betrayal of Asher.

I shook myself.
Don’t go there, Remy. It’s not like you could ever feel anything like that for Gabe.

Gabe’s mouth compressed into a line. Then, he gave a small smile. “You and I both know your grandfather’s wrong.”

I nodded. “Right. It’s not like you would even be here if not for Asher.”

He looked up thoughtfully. “You know, we could use this.”

My mouth dropped open, and I recoiled from him. “Are you crazy? I’m not going to pretend we’re together. No way. Absolutely not.”

“Tell me how you really feel, why don’t you?”

I shoved his shoulder, realizing he was messing with me. He seemed to have recovered, and I rose. “Shut up, Gabe. Come on. I need to get back.”

We walked together in the direction of my grandfather’s.

“How long have you been feeling things, Gabe?” I asked, tossing a curious glance at him over my shoulder.

His smile looked sheepish. “Damn. I thought I’d snuck that one by you.”

“Uh-huh. You shrieking ‘that hurt, Remy’ totally fooled me.”

“I didn’t shriek. I yelled. Like a manly man,” he said.

That almost got a smile out of me. “Quit trying to avoid the question. How long?”

I thought he wouldn’t answer, but he finally spoke in a serious tone. “Always with the
humming
. More so since I helped you heal yourself.”

I frowned. “I’m sorry, Gabe.”

Initially, pain had been the only sensation Asher experienced around me. Gabe had never really made it clear what he thought about becoming mortal. He’d been excited that I might be a cure for the Blackwells, but then, he’d known that Asher longed to be human again. Lottie liked being an immortal and hated me for making her feel anything. Gabe . . . Well, he’d kept his thoughts to himself.

“For what?” he asked.

He sounded taken aback, and I added, “For hurting you. For using my ability against you. For making you feel again.”

He’d gone out of his way to help me, and I kept fighting him.
Like Asher all over again,
I thought, and the comparison hurt.

Gabe waved a hand. “Are you looking to win the Oscar for Best Drama Queen, Remington? Get over yourself. I’m not that hurt, and I’ve met five-year-olds that were stronger than you.”

I made a sound of derision, and we started arguing about who could beat the other to a pulp first. It didn’t escape my notice that Gabe had distracted me on purpose. To my surprise, I didn’t dislike Gabe as extremely as I’d thought. In fact, I would almost call Asher’s brother a friend if I didn’t have a small doubt that he would throw me under a bus in his quest for revenge.

C
HAPTER
T
WENTY-THREE

G
abe settled in with the Healers faster than I had. He’d morphed into an affable guy who put everyone he met at ease. All arrogance had been suppressed. It was shocking how quickly they seemed to accept him coming around. It didn’t hurt that Gabe was hot, and the women happily glommed to him. I wanted to smack him more than once when I saw him using that fact to his advantage.

For his part, Gabe gave them no reason to be suspicious. He always had his walls up, unless we were alone. He never asked questions, and he stuck to my side unless my grandfather assigned him some chore around the house. In fact, he spent more time with me than at the Marina hostel he’d checked into. According to him, he was biding his time, waiting for the Healers to locate Xavier and Mark.

A month after I’d introduced Gabe to the group, my grandfather set him to patching a section of the roof that leaked when it rained. Erin, Delia, and I lounged in folding chairs in the backyard, sipping iced tea and enjoying the sun with the dull ring of a hammer in the background.

I’d been reading another book my grandfather had procured from his library. A library I’d yet to find, though I’d searched Delia’s, Erin’s and Franc’s houses. This particular tome went on and on about the Healers pre-War. The author, one Augustus Rue, practically worshiped Healers. After the third chapter extolling their near sainthood for seeing to the suffering so selflessly, my eyes had begun to close.

“Man, you are lucky, Remy,” Erin said.

I shielded my eyes from the sun to follow her gaze. Gabe stood on the roof with his shirt off and his chest glistening with sweat. Even I had to admit that he looked good, although I preferred Asher’s leaner body. Gabe noticed me watching and grinned. I flipped him a rude gesture without the others noticing. He just laughed and went back to work.

“What makes me so lucky?” I asked Erin.

“Duh. Gabe. The way he watches over you is so sweet.”

“Yes. Sickeningly so,” Delia added drily.

I decided to ignore that one. Every time someone made some teasing comment about Gabe, I thought of Asher and ached. To these people Asher had never existed. It killed me a little more each day to pretend I didn’t think of him all the time and wish that I had him back. If not for all the practice I’d had lying when I lived with my mother, I wasn’t sure I could have kept up the charade.

“Speaking of sick, where’s Alcais?” I asked. “I haven’t seen him around much lately.”

Come to think of it, I hadn’t seen him in over a week, and I’d been spending a lot of time with the Healers.

Franc had persuaded me to allow his people to test my skills, though I’d refused to let them draw blood. I didn’t offer a reason why, and to my surprise, Franc didn’t press me. I’d had visions of men in white coats conducting experiments on me, while they gleefully rubbed their hands at finding out what I could do.

In reality, Juliette and Micheline wore jeans and spent most of their time with me jotting notes onto clipboards that they were rarely without. Both Healers asked probing questions about how my powers worked. For the most part, I answered honestly. Some days, they would make tiny cuts on me or on one of them. Then, they’d observe what happened when I used my abilities. None of the tests really hurt all that much. The worst part was taking care that I didn’t lose control and take energy from them. Always, I had to beware of that monster.

Gabe didn’t like these experiments, but I didn’t see the harm in them so long as I hid my Protector side. Maybe I couldn’t help Asher, but someday I dreamed of going home to my family. If that day arrived, I wanted to know everything I could about who I was so that I could keep them safe.

Even more than the experiments, Gabe hated Alcais and had made it his goal to keep the boy away from me at all times. I could tell this incensed Alcais, but I didn’t care. I hoped the toad found a mud hole to crawl into.

While Alcais didn’t come around as often, Delia had taken to joining Erin and me when we hung out. I’d told Gabe that I thought this had more to do with him than me, but he’d shrugged it off.

Even now, I could see Delia practically salivating as she watched Gabe work. I considered telling her to put her tongue back in her mouth, but we’d been getting along okay and I didn’t want to provoke her. Ever since Alcais had hurt Erin, Delia had been spending less time with him.

“Are you sure you two aren’t dating?” Delia asked, gesturing to Gabe.

“Yep. I think I’d know it if we were.”

“Your grandfather thinks you are,” she said.

I shrugged. “I can’t control what Franc thinks.”

Delia stood suddenly. “You know, Gabe looks thirsty. I think I’ll take him some iced tea.”

She wandered off, and Erin made a face after her.

I hid a smile behind my book. “She doesn’t stand a chance with him.”

Erin shot me a wry look. “I know. He’s smitten with you, even if you won’t admit it.”

I dropped my book to my chest and scowled. “No. He’s really, really not.”

She smiled and settled back in her seat to watch the Delia show. “Whatever you say.”

 

The longer I stayed at my grandfather’s, the more I felt like I lost myself. And the more time I spent with Gabe, the more I felt Asher slipping away from me. I would never confuse Gabe with Asher again, but they looked so much alike. The same hair and eyes. Similar facial structure. Then there was the way they carried themselves, always moving with a combination of confidence and arrogance that came from their Protector abilities.

Gabe and I had tolerated each other because of Asher and our love for him. I could hardly describe what we’d become now. Delia and Erin believed he watched me because he cared about me. They imagined we had feelings for each other.

They were wrong. I would never feel that kind of love for Gabe.

I’d begun to wonder what the point of all this was. Revenge for Asher. Would he even want that? I hardly knew anymore. What if I left the Healers and my grandfather? I couldn’t go back to my family. I had no money or friends. Really, I had no place to go.

You could always charge for your abilities.
As soon as that thought crept in, I rejected it. I refused to be like those greedy Healers who’d healed the highest bidders. Besides, healing people in the open would just make it easier for the Protectors to find me.

I tired of tossing and turning in my bed. The dark room suffocated me, and I rose and made my way to the kitchen to brew a pot of coffee. The hot liquid warmed my hands as I stood over the sink with a mug, sipping and watching the sun rise over the forest. For once I didn’t long to be out running away from this place. No, I wanted to be in Blackwell Falls, and I would never reach my home on foot.

The ache for my family had become a physical thing. Some days my insides felt hollowed out by all that had happened these last months. It was the kind of hollow that hurt, like when your stomach cramped with hunger.

“Remy? You okay?”

Franc’s voice startled me, and I sniffed. He still wore the sweats and T-shirt he’d worn to bed. He yawned and ran a hand through his hair, making it look wilder than usual.

I gave a weak smile. “Just a little homesick.”

He took my mug and set it on the counter, before pulling me into a hug. Taller and broader, he engulfed me. I settled against him and wished that I had the power to forget. That would be a useful ability.

Franc gave me a pat on the back and stepped away. “Hey, what do you say we get the heck out of here today? Maybe head over to Muir Woods? It might do us some good to change things up.”

I nodded. “I would love that.”

“Come on, then. Let’s get dressed and get a move on.”

An hour later we drove across the Golden Gate Bridge. The fog hadn’t crept in yet. On one side of the bridge, the city rose out of the hilly landscape, surrounded by the blue waters of the bay. On the other side of the bridge, the Pacific Ocean stretched endlessly into the horizon. I couldn’t decide which view was more beautiful.

I flicked a finger over the phone I’d hidden in my pocket. Earlier I’d texted Gabe to let him know I would be out for the day, but he hadn’t answered. That had never happened before, and it worried me. I tried to tell myself that I needed some time away from him.

Eventually we left the ocean and the bridge behind. My grandfather drove into the hills, winding past homes situated in the woods just off the road. I’d heard about Muir Woods, with its massive redwoods, some large enough for groups of people to stand inside of the hollowed trunks. We reached a crossroads with a sign directing us toward the national park. I frowned when Franc turned the opposite way.

He noticed my confusion. “I have a quick stop to make,” he said. “And then we’ll be on our way.”

Ten minutes later we pulled into a private driveway. The modern two-story home had more windows than walls, giving the owners little privacy. I doubted Healers lived there considering the way they kept to themselves.

Franc hopped out and gestured for me to follow him when I hesitated. A woman in her thirties opened the front door before he could knock, and I stepped back in surprise. Average height with average brown hair of an average length, nothing about the stranger stood out. If you had asked me to pick her out of a crowd tomorrow, I doubted I would have been able to. Something was off about her, though, but I couldn’t figure out what.

“Hey! You made good time.”

“Melinda, how are you?”

They made small talk about the drive and the weather. All the while, the woman’s gaze devoured me. She gestured for us to enter, and Franc walked past her into the living room. I pretended to study the interior of the house beyond her shoulder when my grandfather introduced us and she held out her hand for me to shake. Every instinct I had screamed for me to avoid touching this woman.

Her brow furrowed in confusion when I gave her a wide berth as I followed my grandfather into living room. Franc sat on the couch, and the woman took a seat next to him. They continued talking about friends they had in common, and I tuned out of the conversation. I paced restlessly to the floor-to-ceiling windows that overlooked the driveway.

Why is this lady freaking me out?
She wasn’t a Protector. I would have sensed that right away. I’d never met her before. I was sure of it, although she reminded me of someone. Someone from my past in New York.

I snuck a glance at her over my shoulder. That was when it hit me. Mrs. Rosenbaum. She reminded me of Mrs. Rosenbaum, the teacher from my old school. The one I’d told Delia, Alcais, and Erin about. She’d had stomach cancer, an illness that had almost killed me when I’d accidentally knocked into her. Back then I hadn’t known how to shield myself. I’d been fourteen and had spent weeks in pain while I healed a little at a time. Since then, I’d avoided healing anything related to the big C or coming into contact with anyone I knew who had it.

Melinda had the same look Mrs. Rosenbaum had. She was sick, and if I had to guess, I’d say it was serious. In the window, my grandfather’s reflection studied me with a speculative look on his face that I didn’t like. I knew what was coming, and I held my breath waiting.

“Remy,” he began hesitantly, and I turned to face them with my head tilted in defiance. He’d tricked me into coming here.

Please don’t ask me.
My stomach twisted into a double knot.

I hardly listened when Franc began a long-winded explanation of how Melinda had a rare blood disease. It was killing her and none of the other Healers had been able to cure her, but their tests had shown that I could heal things they couldn’t. He hated to ask me, but could I . . . would I . . .

He couldn’t even get the question out. His chin dropped to his chest as if he felt ashamed of himself for bringing me here. I opened my mouth to refuse. Obviously I couldn’t do this. I couldn’t risk my life to heal this stranger. Hadn’t Asher and Lucy told me to weigh the consequences? Was my life worth less than this woman’s?

Melinda reached for my grandfather’s hand and gripped it. I bit my lip as I noticed how closely they sat together. They shared a glance, and there was such intimacy in it that I felt like an interloper for witnessing it. Geez, my grandfather loved this woman.

Questions began to form in my mind. Why had he kept her from me? Were they together? Why hadn’t he even mentioned her before now? I should have felt angry, but that would have made me a hypocrite. I had a thousand secrets.

Still, bile rose in my throat. My grandfather had to know there was a possibility that curing this woman could kill me. Did he even care?

I shook my head. “I’m sorry,” I said to Melinda. “I can’t help you. I wish I could, but . . .”

Her smile was sad. “I told him it was too much to ask. It’s okay. Really,” she added when I bit my lip.

The room grew quiet. They shared another one of those knowing looks that I wasn’t part of.

Franc pressed Melinda’s hand and spoke to her softly. “We have to tell her.”

I frowned.
Tell me what?

Melinda tried to pull her hands away, protesting, but Franc hushed her. “You listen to me, Mel. I know my granddaughter. She would want to know.”

“What are you talking about?” I asked.

My grandfather stood and pulled Melinda up with him. He tugged her forward with a supportive arm around her shoulders. His solemn gaze made the hair on the back of my neck rise. I wasn’t going to like what he had to say.

“Don’t!” Melinda said, but he ignored her because even I could tell it was a token protest.

“Remy, she’s your cousin.”

I squeezed my eyes shut, as he explained that he’d first stayed with the Healers in hopes of finding a cure for Melinda’s illness. But with the Protectors always on the hunt for Healers, Franc had thought it better to keep my cousin away from the Healers in order to keep her safe. She was the reason he’d chosen to stay in San Francisco.