Authors: Felicia Jedlicka
“If I’m not mistaken, I knew before you did. I congratulated you too soon.” Nevia smiled when Cori didn’t stop staring. “That was the other reason I hung around. I assumed no one would know to check. The fetus is still alive.”
“You can tell all that, just by scent.”
“Pregnancy is fairly easy to detect. Miscarriages also come with signature pheromones. I can even tell you how far along you are.” Cori heard a bustle in the nurse’s station as Danato entered the infirmary and started yelling and pointing her direction. “Two months,” Nevia offered.
Cori gasped, and sat back down on the bed. She hadn’t assumed she was more than a month. Her calculations must have been very off. Cori heard, more than saw the parade of nurse’s rushing toward her room. “Don’t tell anyone, yet.”
“Of course,” Nevia said almost scolding before the door to Cori’s room slammed open, shattering the window in it.
Shards of glass fell beside Danato from the door he had just thrown open. Cori jumped and Nevia narrowed her eyes on him. “Clean this up!” He barked at the nurse’s that were trailing him to check on Cori. Two jumped back out of the room in search of a dustpan, while the third ran to Cori’s side to check her vitals as he
requested.
“I told you to inform me the minute she was awake.” He stared down Nevia, but she didn’t flinch. She had an unbreakable quality that made her immune to his anger. That quality he now knew was werewolf blood.
“You told me to keep you informed,” Nevia clarified. “Had I been given five more minutes to finish my conversation with Cori, then I would have contacted you.”
“My conversation will be taking precedence.”
“Is that before or after you give her a heart attack?” He glowered at her, but she didn’t lose stride in her monologue. “I imagine that you would now like to correct me on my conduct, so I will be more than happy to step out into the hall to discuss it with you.” Nevia stood and walked out of the room.
Danato looked to Cori who was nearly catatonic as the nurse made her way through the standard, blood pressure, heart, and lung checks. He stepped out into the corridor just as the nurse’s arrived to clean up the glass.
He watched Cori through the windows while he moved to meet with Nevia. She was waiting patiently a good distance from the room, presumably to mask his yelling, which for the moment was at normal volume. “What?” he asked when he reached her. “I assume that was your way of asking to speak with me alone.”
“I thought it necessary to pull you away so you could calm down.”
Danato scoffed and looked over Nevia. “You are the strangest cat, aren’t you?” He said. “I’ve never had anyone defy me the way you do, and yet somehow instead of wanting to rip your head off, I respect you more for it.”
“Do you remember the conversation we had about Cori?” Nevia said ignoring his offhanded compliment. “About you backing her up and supporting her decisions?”
Danato remembered the conversation very clearly. It was one of several conversations that Nevia had expressed herself to him without restraint. “Yes.”
“I would like to amend the advice that I offered you.”
“How’s that?”
“I’ve had a little more time to observe you, and I think that your instincts to protect her would be better received at this particular juncture.”
Danato smiled and tipped his head to examine her. “You just told me to go easy on her, didn’t you?”
“If we must sum it up so plainly, then yes, but more specifically I am suggesting you approach her with the endearment you hold for her on the inside, on the outside, and hide the disappointment and anger about this situation for the time being. I promise you the anger will eventually waver, and you will be glad you took my advice.”
Danato narrowed his eyes. “You don’t strike me as the type to change your opinion easily. Why are you suddenly more sympathetic to Cori?”
“I’m going to ask for your trust on this. As I’ve said before, I don’t like secrets, but in this particular case, I would like to remain objective rather than truthful.”
Danato glanced over to Cori. “Is she okay?” he asked concerned that Nevia’s secret was something health related.
“Yes,” Nevia said simply. “You’ve calmed enough I think. If you would like, you could yell at me to maintain face with your employees.”
Danato shook his head. “Not necessary, I’ve already trained them to scatter on approach, too many bitter years to undo that. You’re the only one that I can’t quite scare.”
“I don’t scare easily, Mr. Calabria. If I did they wouldn’t have partnered me with Daniel.”
Danato nodded. “We should talk about the council of the moon situation before you go. I know I can’t offer you much protection, but we should at least come up with a contingency plan if they do come after you.”
“Yes, sir.” She nodded and Danato headed back to see Cori.
Cori was relieved when Danato left the room. As much as she’d prepared herself to face him over the last two days, it was different in real life. Her potential bravery shattered right along with the window in the door.
When he came back in the room after his discussion with Nevia, he seemed calmer, but that didn’t stop her from cowering like a beaten child. The nurse, that had been intently examining her, scattered in the wake of his arrival.
“Danato, I…” Her voice croaked again, and she reached for her water glass. It was empty, but Danato came around and refilled it from the plastic pitcher on the bedside table. She looked up at him through her lashes and saw him examining her. His expression yet to be determined, she looked to her water and sipped it carefully plotting her explanation for her sudden appearance with a gunshot wound in her throat.
Danato sat gingerly on the bed beside her, tapping his cane on his toes before resting it against the bed beside him. He touched her temple to smooth back her hair and she flinched. When she looked back at him, he looked insulted and hurt, but she couldn’t take back the reaction.
She touched the lump of would be scar on her throat. “Where should I start?” She asked.
He shook his head. “We should wait for Belus for you to report. He’s probably not going to be pleased that you missed such an important detail as having a run in with a genie.”
“How did you know?” She said neglecting her real question.
“Efrat recalled the incident.
He
seemed to recognize it as something of importance.”
She detected a hint of surly sarcasm in that statement, so she didn’t bother to ask if
he
was displeased that she missed such an important detail. “I can explain,” she said.
“Yes, I’m sure you can,” Danato said softly and reached to smooth her hair again. “Are you okay? I mean aside from the obvious.”
“No, otherwise I’m fine.” Cori glanced over to see if Nevia was still there, but she was gone. “Are you okay?”
“I’m very angry,” he said in his softest voice. “I’m extremely disappointed, but most of all I’m ashamed.” Cori bit back her lips and prepared to hear the speech that warranted her to make her second wish. “…of myself,” Danato added. Her brow dipped in confusion.
Danato rubbed his face before proceeding to explain his sudden change of character. “I was so mad last night. All I could see were your mistakes, your secrets, and your self-possessed rebellion.”
“Now?” Cori prompted when he didn’t continue.
“I realize that this is all my fault,” he said.
Had she been drinking, Cori would have spit the water out on him. “What?”
“This is why Belus wanted to be in charge of you. He saw this coming. The last two days is a culmination of my double sided authority. I can’t have it both ways.”
“But I thought we agreed that you are better as my family then my boss.” Cori’s eyes were alight with potential tears. Despite what Danato might have thought, the twisted melee of events over the last few days would not have been helped by a heavier hand from Danato. It was that heavy hand that prevented her from approaching him to begin with.
“No, I don’t mean that. I mean my refusal to share my life with you, and my demand that you tell me everything about yours. I’ve walled myself up emotionally, and I’ve walled you with my protectiveness. I shouldn’t have expected you to confide in me when all I do is push and pull you every which way. Your heart must be exhausted from loving and hating me.”
Cori’s tears shed at the sentiment and she buried her face in his shoulder. He wrapped his arm around her and rubbed her back soothingly. “Why are you saying all this? You should be yelling until you’re red-faced,” she mumbled into his shirt.
She could feel him take in a deep breath and let it out slowly. “When that helicopter went down yesterday, I thought you were dead. It almost broke me. It did break Ethan. You are too important to both of us to lose because I can’t be level headed enough to listen when something is wrong. The minute you knew about the elementals, you should have thrown the accusation at my doorstep and demanded an explanation, but I know why you didn’t. It pains me greatly that I’ve built our relationship on love and fear. That’s not what I want you to feel toward me.”
He scooped her up with no more effort than lifting a child and pulled her into a tighter embrace. She hung her head over his shoulder and cried for what seemed like forever, but it still wasn’t long enough.
“Cori!” Ethan had no qualms about stealing her from Danato’s grasp, and aside from a trailing grip on her hand, he let him. He embraced her gently like he might break her, and then he kissed her. The breathtaking kiss made her blush, since it was in the presence of both Danato and Belus.
Belus had trailed in behind Ethan and was leaning against the far wall, not so patiently waiting for the revelries to be over. He was taciturn as usual, but something told her that she needed to be careful with how she approached the next few minutes to keep it that way.
Ethan kissed her again, and she pulled away prematurely. “Ethan,” she whispered, “we aren’t alone.”
“I don’t care,” he whispered back.
She smiled at him warmly and went back to sit on the bed. Danato moved offering Ethan his position beside her which he readily took. The last two days—from his perspective—with her in a jail cell and almost getting killed in a helicopter crash—which she barely remembered—had been hard on him. He was only now getting the chance to express his suppressed sentiment.
“Would someone care to update me?” Belus asked disdainfully.
“We were just waiting for you, Belus,” Danato said resting his oversized frame carefully on the aluminum guest chair. “Care to take the lead?”
Belus eyed him suspiciously, but Danato motioned to him to proceed. Cori could see Danato was clenching his jaw, no doubt very literally biting his tongue. Belus paused a good long time just to be sure Danato was giving up the reigns before focusing on her.
She straightened up and shrugged off Ethan as nicely as she could. “As you know,” she began without further prompting, “during my time jumping I did have a run in with a genie. I was not concerned about it, because I was pre-occupied, so in essence, I forgot about it.”
“Are you aware of the power that a genie contains?” Belus asked. He was still pretending to be calm and aloof, but Cori could see the ire in his eyes. She wondered if Danato’s calm was going to throw imbalance into their good cop, bad cop routine.
“I am now,” she stated simply, but with enough force to indicate that further explanation was unnecessary. “Unfortunately, in order to get out of the wishes, I did need to negotiate an agreement with him.”
“You negotiated with a genie?” Danato said jolting forward in his chair.
“You and Belus, assisted in the negotiations,” she reassured him.
“What did you choose?” Belus asked concerned.
Cori stopped herself from rolling her eyes at him, which judging by his expression was wise. “I, of course, chose the three inconveniences. I could hardly risk anything else.” Belus didn’t necessarily relax at hearing that, but he did unclench his fists, which were balled and white in order to maintain his reticent behavior.
“I can go into the whole story, but I think we should address my rings first.” Everyone perked up. “Thanks to Ethan’s assistance we were able to deduce how the rings were activated.” Cori looked to Ethan who was baffled at her reference to him. She held out her hand. “Take them off.”
“I thought they couldn’t come off?” He asked, but proceeded to slip one off.
“My dear husband,” Cori turned back to address Danato and Belus in turn, “inadvertently spell bound them to protect me with his wedding vows. Since he bound them to me, he is the only one that can take them off.”
“Ethan,” Belus turned a sharp gaze to him, “take the rest of them off.”
Cori’s stomach clenched at hearing that statement. It was like the first time they banned her from her gun. Ethan glanced at Danato for consent and he gave a slight nod. When they were down to the last ring, her wedding ring, he looked up at her for consent. She also gave him a slight nod.
He gathered the rings in his hand and looked to Belus who was already holding out a small black bag for them. Ethan reluctantly went over and deposited the rings. To which, Belus closed the bag and it disappeared in one of his pockets.