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“Ben loves you,” Liliana told him, remembering the softness in the teacher’s voice when he talked about Pete. And the sadness at how little he knew about Pete’s current life.
The spider seer would never admit, but she sometimes watched the two of them together. It was a little like watching a romance movie starring people she knew. It made her feel warm, happy for them, and more than a little envious.
The contrast between Pete with Ben, and William Eliot with Sergeant Giovanni made her slightly nauseous. Eliot’s cold manipulation of the passionate sergeant’s nature made Liliana angry on her behalf. Sergeant Giovanni had a tendency to give her heart foolishly, but she always gave it generously.
She was one that loved not wisely, but too well.
Hopefully, things would work out better for her than they had for Othello and Desdemona.
Pete smiled, but his normally radiant smile showed more sadness than joy. “I guess you know why I came.” Pete had finally asked Ben to marry him, but as the spider seer knew he would, Ben said, “No.”
She could have warned Pete, but telling the wolf-kin ahead of time would not have helped.
“You don’t know how to tell Ben that you’re wolf-kin without him thinking you’re insane, or he is. And Ben won’t marry you because he knows that you’re hiding much of yourself, and fears that he doesn’t fully know you.”
“Yeah. That’s pretty much it in a nutshell.” He transformed just his hand and popped the beer top off the bottle with a claw. He took a swallow and set the bottle down on a crocheted coaster on Liliana’s little handmade folding end table.
The spider-kin nodded. She knew why he came. Her best friend wanted advice on his love life.
She also knew that when it came to love, her advice was nearly useless. She had seen love. She recognized it in others. But Liliana had never been in love.
There had been lovers, of course. But that was a thing of the body, usually initiated by men. Women had approached her a few times as well, but she did not find them as physically fascinating. With men, she found sex enjoyable as long as they had good reasons for wanting her. With some lovers, she had felt friendship or affection. With most, though, she had simply felt attraction, and it had worn off quickly when she realized they wanted something from her, such as her venom, her sight, or her body.
Spider seer venom in particular was a powerful temptation. If they knew about her nature, lovers sought her out for the near immortality her venom could offer. They didn’t want her, just her venom. A few didn’t know about spider seers and sought her for her own qualities, but when they found out, they often became obsessed with the lure of immortality.
Liliana did not want anyone to stay with her only for the benefits of her venom. With her first blood fire time coming in less than four years, she needed to find a relationship with more depth. She needed to find something real like Ben and Pete had.
“So?” Pete asked. “What can you tell me?”
Liliana did not have to look again. She had already looked and looked for an answer. No outcome had appeared where Pete explained to Ben what a wolf-kin was, and that he was one, that had not ended badly. The only way Ben would accept Pete’s Other nature would be if he found out on his own.
“I am very sorry, Pete.” She reached across to the chair arm and touched the back of his hand. “There is nothing you can do. You must give him time.” Eventually, all the odd things that happened in Fayetteville would coalesce in Ben’s mind. It might happen suddenly, like if an Other exposed their inhuman form to him, or it might happen gradually, as lots of little indications of Other activity, and Pete’s Other nature added up. “Some aspects of the world are not as he was taught them. One day, he may figure that out for himself.” The middle school science teacher had already noticed a few unusual things about some of his students, like Janice’s children. “Perhaps then, if you are careful, you can gently ease him into our hidden world. But you must be patient.”
None of the good outcomes were close in time. There were a hundred outcomes that Liliana had seen that were varying levels of awful. In some possible paths, either Pete or Ben died. In others, they ended up hating each other. The spider seer had seen a lot of future paths that involved restraining orders.
One particular path caught Liliana’s attention. In that one possible future, Ben shattered Pete’s heart. The wolf-kin came to his pretty friend, Liliana, for comfort and eventually, Pete became hers.
At first, Liliana had been intrigued and excited by the existence of that future. She adored the handsome wolf-kin but knew his loyal heart would never betray his beloved Ben. For a time, she considered advising Pete toward the path that would lead him first to heartbreak and then to her arms. Pete would be the one to be with her when the blood fire time came.
Liliana opened her fourth eyes and looked at that flicker of possible future one last time where Pete held her in his arms and kissed her as a lover does. She knew what to do to send him down that path. She considered it one last time. It was still a possibility.
But even considering it was an act of incredible selfishness. She ran the trailing ends of the brightly colored silk scarves that made up her skirt between her fingers. A wash of shame filled her. She wanted what Pete and Ben had, but she was not willing to see her favorite wolf badly hurt to get it.
And in the end, she knew that Pete was fundamentally a different kind of person from her. They were not an ideal match long term. He would lose his chance for a life of joy, and she would gain only a few years of happiness before they parted ways.
“I will speak to Janice Willoughby. Perhaps we can find a way to help Ben accept Others. But you must be patient. It will take time.” As Liliana watched, that flickering possibility that Pete might one day be hers vanished forever. She let it go with only a trace of regret.
She wanted Pete happy far more than she wanted him for herself.
“Time and patience, huh?” Pete sighed. “That’s all you’ve got for me?”
“For you, yes.”
Pete raised his pale brows at her. “What do you mean, for me?”
“Sergeant Giovanni did not take my advice. She has fallen in love with the man with the silver rose.”
“Eliot,” Pete said. “Something about that guy just doesn’t smell right. It’s not just you, Lilly. She didn’t listen when I warned her away from him either. Zoe’s never had the best sense when it comes to men.”
