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Rain Kimber
My cell on the desk started to vibrate, letting me know I had a phone call. I dragged my eyes away from the screens in front of me and picked up the cell. I turned it around and the name flashing on the screen sent a shiver of unease down my spine.
Ariel.
Shit.
That little shiver did not bode well for me. Usually I only felt elation and happiness when my daughter's name appeared on the screen. However, it seemed like these days my phone only rang when shit hit the fan or was about to go down.
I answered on the fourth ring. "Baby girl."
No matter how old she got, she'd always be my baby girl.
"Don't be mad."
Fuck, not a good way to start out any conversation with the girl. She was incredibly spirited and that usually landed her in a whole shit load of trouble more often than not. I didn't mind so long as she took me with her and I could protect her. It was when she went off on her own half cocked that I got pissed at her and wished she was still young enough I could ground her ass to her room for the rest of her life. Unfortunately, I'd missed out on those days, and disciplining her wasn't something I think I'd ever be able to do.
"Where are you?" I asked in a gruff voice. "I'll come to you and we can have this chat face to face."
"Uhh..."
Oh, Jesus, this was much worse than I had originally thought.
"Better question," I said. "Have you called Quinton with your problem yet?" Not that I wanted her to call that pervert before me, but if anyone could keep her out of too much trouble it was that man.
"Uhh..."
I sighed into the phone. "He's with you, isn't he? Please tell me that whatever the problem is, it's his fault and maybe I’ll get to smack him around a little bit. That would make me feel so much better."
I had wanted to strangle the life out of the shit since I started suspecting he was having sex with my daughter. Don't get me wrong, I liked him, really, I did. But that like only went so far, and once you defiled my daughter you took things too far, and an ass kicking should be expected. And Ireallywanted to kick his ass. One beatdown is all it would take for me to feel a whole lot better about the whole thing. I think there were a few more asses I needed to kick after I got my hands on Quinton, and that pissed me off all the more.
"Quinton is actually with me," Ariel said in a rush. "We uh... we sort of have Baxter and Isobel with us and we are taking them to a coven to see if we can stash them there for safe keeping. I was going to wait to tell you the news when we got home, but something came up that I felt like I had to tell you. It's something I think you have a right to know."
My throat seized and it felt like I'd been punched in the gut.
"We need them to be safe and it's not safe there anymore. If you think hard enough about it, you will see that I'm right. It wasn't an easy decision to make, but I made it. I need you to trust me that I know what I'm doing. I know how important they are to you, and I would never endanger either of them. Rain—"
I cut her off. As much as it hurt to push the words out past my constricting throat, I did it. "Smart move. One I would have eventually made on my own and have been thinking about. I was going to get into contact with some of my dad's old contacts. I've been procrastinating, though, because it hurt too much to think about them staying with someone else. It stings my pride to think I can't take care of them and keep them safe."
What I didn't say was that I'd been thinking about sending Ariel with them when I sent them away. She was always my number one priority, no matter how much I cared about the other two, Ariel would always come first. If I could get all three of them off somewhere safe where I knew how to get ahold of them when I wanted to, then I wouldn't have hesitated to send them there.
"I want you to think about staying with them. We got a storm headed our way here and I don't want you caught up in the middle of it."
Wishful thinking, I knew. She was already at the heart of it, and some would even argue that she was the cause behind it. I didn't see it that way. Sometimes you needed to make a stand, and Ariel had taken hers the moment she lied to the Council and stole a person from them. My daughter might have been a troublemaker, but she always made me proud, did my family proud.
"Where are you taking them?" I asked. Did I really want to know? How hard would it be not to get on a plane myself so I could fly there and check things out for myself? Baxter was my charge, my responsibility, and trusting that with someone else wasn't an easy pill to swallow. And, as much as I tried to avoid Isobel despite the fact we lived under the same roof, she'd grown on me and I'd be a fool to not admit she'd meant something to me since the very moment I'd seen her floating in that water.
"Not over the phone," Ariel said, cutting into my thoughts. "And that's not really why I'm calling. I just thought I'd tell you now over the phone so I could get it out of the way, and maybe you wouldn't be so mad about it by the time we get home. Quinton is concerned you're going to be pissed at him."
Quinton had every right to be concerned. He knew I knew he was having sex with my daughter, and that I wanted to put my fist in his face every time I thought about it.
"I... did you know that Isobel tried to feed you pot brownies?" she asked in a quiet, hesitant voice.
My eyebrows shot up in surprise. This is what she wanted to tell me?
"Course I knew. That woman is so far from subtle it isn't even funny. She couldn't pull a fast one over on me if she tried, and believe me, she's tried. Why are you bringing this up now to me?"
I heard her sharp intake of breath and frowned down at the desk. What was going on?
