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Mr. Bell looked angry for a moment, then he chuckled and his face softened. “I should have expected no different from you. You two,” he pointed a finger at his sons, “always tried to protect her. I believed it was because your inherent need to be protective, but it’s more than that. Isn’t it?”
Jax seemed very interested in a carrot all the sudden. Mr. Jace gave his brother a pointed look and then sighed. “I think Jax and I are connected to her.”
His father looked at us dumbfounded, and I was even more confused. “What does a connection mean? I mean,” I looked at Jax, “I had a feeling we could…” I searched for the right words suddenly embarrassed. “…have a connection because we’ve been communicating for a while, but what does that all entail?”
Mr. Bell seemed even more astonished for a moment, although I think that didn’t happen very often. He looked at his younger son. “This has been going on for years, hasn’t it? When you were younger, you seemed entirely too interested in the silent communications with a connected pair. It was because of her, wasn’t it?” At Jax’s reluctant nod Mr. Bell continued, looking pointedly at me. “It means if you were to bond to the ones you have a connection with your gifts and theirs can increase to epic proportions. We have a few in our community with multiple connections, but it infrequently happens.”
I felt blindsided for a moment hoping he didn’t mean what I thought he meant.
Finally, Noah spoke, seeming highly amused. “In other words, if you were intimate with your connections you could increase all of your gifts.”
Chapter 6
I began to laugh thinking they were pulling my leg, but when no one else laughed my eyes narrowed. “You’re kidding me, right?! I’ve never even had one boyfriend before, let alone two at the same time. Isn’t that highly immoral? How would that even work? Not that I’m interested.” I was highly embarrassed suddenly and I knew I must be beet red. “He’s my teacher,” I pointed at Mr. Jace. “And other than that annoying voice in my head,” I pointed at Jax, “I barely even know him.”
Noah laughed at Jax and said, “Annoying voice sounds about right.”
I looked around the room. Mr. Bell seemed to have a calculating look, and Remy went back to his laptop as if he felt like he was intruding on our conversation. Drake was just as red as I was as he continued cooking dinner, while Mr. Jace was looking at me with his normal concerned look, and Jax was giving me a perturbed look.
“I was more than an annoying voice. I know quite a bit about you, as you do me.” I wanted to crawl into a hole at that moment. He did know a lot about me. A lot more than everyone did. I turned to him so many times over the years. He knew intimate details about my life that I would have never shared with anyone if I thought he truly existed.
He looked like he wanted to take the words back the moment they left his mouth, probably knowing what I was thinking.
Mr. Jace finally spoke quietly as if he didn’t want to spook me, like I was a frightened doe that may run. And I wanted to. If Ella wasn’t here I would have. “Not all connected pairs bond. We don’t have to. Some of us, like Jax and I, have grown accustomed to the idea since we were kids, but most people don’t get their gifts until they hit puberty, and even then, they still have years to understand our lifestyle. You were taken away from us before you could comprehend any of this.”
I turned on Mr. Bell, suddenly furious. I never wanted any of this. “Now I know why my father took me away from you animals. I don’t even want this gift, let alone entertain the idea of dating not one guy, but two. Please take me home now,” I turned to Mr. Jace.
Mr. Bell held a beseeching hand towards me. “I am a man. I have made several mistakes. As a young man, I was best friends with two other men that were gifted as we are. We created the institute in hopes of protecting the gifted. Unfortunately, Horatio took it too far and tried to turn the gifted into weapons. It took the death of Greg before I realized he was going about it the wrong way.” He looked at his sons and me, and from the looks on their faces, they seemed as surprised by his revelations as I was. “If you don’t learn how to control your gifts, or tap into them incorrectly, you can…self-destruct and hurt a lot of innocent people as well. Our emotions are connected to our gifts. To a normal person, a simple emotion like losing their patience is nothing; it’s inconsequential compared to the gifted losing control over a simple emotion. And,” he looked at his sons, “denying a connection can not only destroy you, it can destroy the people you are connected to. Imagine not putting a plant in the sun or watering it. It can’t thrive, and eventually, it can die.”
I sunk down onto a bar stool. As if my life wasn’t complicated enough as it was, now I found out I wasn’t just a freak. I was the biggest freak in the world.
“Let’s eat,” Drake said quietly from the kitchen. It was the first time I had heard him speak and it was odd
ly soothing to my frayed nerves.
I reluctantly ate because Ella was watching me like a hawk. I hadn’t eaten since my breakfast bar this morning. I had skipped lunch to meet with Mr. Jace. The fresh pasta with chicken alfredo and a salad was probably some of the best food I had ever eaten, but I couldn’t give it any justice.
Everyone seemed to want to pretend normalcy. The men talked, some laughing and joking, making sure to include Ella. After I decided I couldn’t eat a bite more, I got up, disposed of my uneaten food in the trash compactor, and headed to the bathroom to get ready. I needed this right now. I needed some sense of normalcy. I applied my make-up, transforming my baby face. Then I slid into my black halter top, red short shorts, black tights, and my black thigh-high boots. I threw on my long coat so Ella couldn’t see me dressed this way.
I trusted Mr. Jace, but after this morning’s run-in with Tom, I wasn’t sure if my sister should go home without me. I was suddenly worried about her.
I went back out to the living room and saw Mr. Jace’s raised brow. “You’re still going to work?”
I nodded, looking at him defiantly. “Yes, I am. I need the money. What is Ella going to do?”
Ella perked up and looked at me and then at the guys hopefully. I could tell she didn’t want to leave.
Jax cleared his throat. “After Jace and I drop you off at work we are going to swing by your place and talk to your stepmom. I’m sure she will let her stay with us temporarily.”
The way he said it, I somehow think they were going to use their gifts to persuade her.
I looked at Ella, “Would you like that?”
A huge smile lit up her face. “Yes please!”
The guys laughed. Clearly, she had already grown on them. Even silent Drake and gruff Remy seemed to have taken a shine to her.
I could tell Mr. Jace was upset with me, but I didn’t have it in me to care. Did he expect me to quit just because I just found out I might possess a powerful gift, and that I was not only connected to him but to his brother as well?
