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He frowned slightly. “How did the shooting incident end?”
“I didn’t stick around to watch. I honestly feared I’d be seeing my own death.”
She’d never seen him look so serious. “If you decide to continue, we’ll be in this together from this point forward. Tell me if I’m wrong, but I’ve always understood that the future was fluid, that what a fae witnessed wasn’t always what happened.”
He now stood directly in front of her once more. “That’s right. That’s how my therapist helped me to release the nightmares. I forced myself to believe what I saw would never happen. But one of the ways I did that was to visualize that if I avoided Savage, then I would never have an opportunity to get shot.”
He took her hand. “Maybe you should stick with that plan. Stay in Revel. Stay safe.”
His words disturbed her more deeply than anything else he could have said. Though he’d spoken kindly, she wondered if his true intention was to challenge her.
She’d never understood until this moment exactly how she’d been living for the past six years, like a turtle with her head and legs pulled in tight beneath its shell.
She could feel the frown between her eyes, the depth of the crevice. She wasn’t sure how it had happened, but she couldn’t go back to that life. She couldn’t ignore that her transformation to an alter fae had been intentional, that Renee had died by the hands of the same man, and that Talya had almost died as well just two nights ago.
She’d never believed that an individual only had one single destiny or fate. Life was about multiple choices all along the way.
Yet in this moment, she saw her destiny clearly, just as she had said before. She would breathe her last to take Kryder down, even it meant having to see her death from a gunshot wound, or if it meant renewed nightmares, or anything else the horrors of Five Bridges might soon rain down on her head.
She met Grant’s gaze straight on. He, in turn, scrutinized her face. “You’re determined.”
“More than I realized. The way I was living—” She didn’t need to finish the sentence. “But I will do as you’ve requested. I will engage with the future on our behalf, whenever and wherever that might be.”
“Good. I’m with you, Natalie. One hundred percent, nothing held back.”
“I know that, and I trust you. Just understand that this will be a physically painful process for me.”
“It will get easier.”
“Maybe.”
“So, how does it work, looking into the future, I mean?”
She moved away from him to stand at the nearest bank of windows. Her garden was in order, though not for the first time she wondered if she should bust apart some of the perfect rows and rectangles. Even her design had been about creating order in the chaos of the alter world. “Best if I show you, let you witness the process.”
“Where do you want me?” He asked.
The odd thought flitted through her mind, In my bed. But she kept it to herself. It wouldn’t serve at all if she started thinking about kissing Grant and not about her need to investigate the future. “Where you are is good. I need to focus.”
“Okay. Go for it.”
With her back to him, she forced herself to relax as much as she was able. She closed her eyes and felt the fae part of her begin to expand. The usual cramping took place along the small muscles beside her spine. She ignored the resulting pain that pulsed up her back and into her neck. No amount of therapy had been able to relieve her of these symptoms. She’d had to accept that her gift came with a certain level of pain and often a bout of nausea.
Her hands turned of their own volition, palms up. Her neck arched. In her studio, this would be the moment she would invoke her client’s name. Instead, she whispered, “Natalie. Now.”
But it was as though someone hit her on the side of the head. She listed and would have fallen. Grant was suddenly there, however, and caught her.
She opened her eyes and turned to face Grant. “Thank you for catching me.”
“What was that? What’s going on?”
“Not sure.” She reviewed what had just happened. It took her a moment to understand that she’d done this to herself. “I’m not allowing myself in. Oh, God, what if I can’t do this?”
“You can. I know you can. You just need to relax.”
“I am. I was just now.”
He chuckled. “You were standing on your tip-toes.”
