Resistance (36 page)

“Well maybe they don’t take enough time to get to
know you.” I wink at her. “If you ask my family, I’m a mentally
unstable deviant. Not everyone knows what they’re talking
about.”

Fi laughs and a blush comes over her cheekbones
suddenly. She bites her lower lip and says quietly, “My mother
always said that I put people off. I’ve never really had a friend
outside my family until…well, Flint.” Her light pink cheeks flush
deep red when she says his name. “He seems to break all the molds,
though.”

“Hey,” I snap and shove her shoulder. “I’m your
friend, thank you very much!” I should stop, I think, and not bring
up Flint. Last time I said something about them, Fi swallowed her
tongue and Flint about had a stroke. But one of my many flaws is
that I never know when to shut up until it’s too late. “I think
Flint’s a little bit in love with you. I don’t mean to keep
bringing that up but — damn. The way he looks at you…” I trail off;
feeling like I’m rambling and pushing, and already considering ways
to apologize for it.

Fi fans her face and clears her throat, but in spite
of her obvious embarrassment she has a huge smile on her face. “You
are my first female friend, and…” She coughs and her face turns a
deeper shade of crimson. “Um…well…oh, God. Flint.”

I suppress the urge to leap in her space and shake
her until she finishes her sentence. Flint was very touchy with her
at the dinner table before Sean came in and screamed at me, and I
haven’t had the chance to ask her again if they were just on the
‘DL’. “Well?” I ask. “Flint’s what? Don’t leave me hanging
here.”

Fi shakes her head and her eyes go wide. She looks
lost and frightened and utterly confused. “I don’t know the
protocol here for this stuff, but he’s, um…” She gulps in a breath
and swallows so loudly I can hear it. “He’s wonderful—I mean—he
just—we—well…” She coughs. “Well, I really…um…you’re right. It’s
mutual.”

“I KNEW IT!” I blurt without thinking; bouncing a
little in my seat and smacking my hands together.

Fi laughs. “I swear, we weren’t lying to you when you
mentioned us being a couple that first night. This all happened
after that.” She gulps again. “After Quincy broke in and attacked
us… It kind of came out after that…eventually.”

I shake my head. I’m smiling so hard my cheeks hurt.
“You two finally admitted you were ogling each other; that’s all
that matters.” I realize I sound like a maniac and shake myself.
“I’m sorry, I just…I like you guys together.”

Her face deepens in color to the point where she’s
almost purple. “Were we really that obvious?”

I pause. I don’t want to answer completely honestly
and say, “Oh, God yeah!” but I can’t exactly lie to her either. I
scratch my neck and look toward the floor; my voice a soft whisper.
“Um, well, yeah, kinda.” Fi groans and hides her face and I quickly
add, “I mean, you weren’t glaringly obvious. Someone really had to
be watching you guys.” That sounds believable, so long as she
doesn’t hear what I actually said: ‘If they weren’t looking in your
direction they wouldn’t notice.’

“I swear, I was oblivious,” Fi says from behind her
hands.

“Oh please,” I scoff. “He didn’t appear to have a
clue, either.” I remember his flushed and horrified face when I
asked if they were together and snicker to myself. “I thought he
was going to die when I said you were cute together.”

Fi blushes and laughs. “I didn’t notice.”

“I think I startled you too much. Honestly, he had no
idea what to do. I thought he swallowed his tongue.” I bite my lip
to try and stop my laughter and look her in the eye. “He was
following your lead the entire time.”

“Mine?” She laughs. “Seriously? That’s funny. I
didn’t think he could stand me most of the time.” She sighs and
shakes her head; looking at her clasped hands in her lap. “I’m an
idiot.”

I lurch forward and dig my finger into her side. “You
are not an idiot.”

She offers a shy smile. “Thanks. I guess I had
blinders on.” She stops suddenly and looks away again. She’s
drifting into a dark place — I’ve seen that look on my own face —
and I don’t want to watch her go down that path. “Look, Hellboy
wasn’t exactly in-the-know about your feelings either. Don’t beat
yourself up, okay?”

She pauses and gives me a weird look, and some of the
light comes back to her eyes. She giggles. “Hellboy?”

I smile. I’m very proud of that nickname. “Yes.
That’s his chosen pet name.”

She tilts her head back and laughs a little louder;
covering her mouth as she nods. “It fits him,” she says, and takes
a sip of her coffee.

“Nah.” I shrug. “I think Twinkly Bottom fits him
better, myself, but he didn’t appreciate the art in it.”

She chokes on the hot liquid in her mouth and clamps
her hand over her lips. Her eyes snap shut and her shoulders shake
as she tries to breathe through her nose and not spit coffee all
over the floor. I start laughing, unable to contain it, and she
gulps unevenly. “Oh my,” she says, and bursts into giggles. “That
is…I’m going to have to use that one.”

“I have decided that’s his nickname when he’s being a
twit,” I say, still cracking up.

Fi doubles over and wheezes, hardly able to breathe
already. “I love it.”

“I’m sure he won’t be thrilled I told you about
that,” I say, catching my breath.

Fi smiles and shakes her head. “I’m sure he won’t…I
really don’t care, though.”

“Just be warned he may shun us both,” I tell her.
Then I think about it and pause. “Well, just me at least. I don’t
think he could ignore you for very long.”

Fi, who had gone back to a normal shade of pink,
returns to her deep red color and clears her throat a few times. “I
haven’t tested that yet, but I don’t think he’d stay upset with you
very long either, honestly.”

“Trust me,” I urge, smirking. “You wouldn’t be
ignored for it. He’s sweet, but I do believe he would glare at me
quite a bit.”

“Oh yes, there will be glaring.” Fi sniggers.
“Whatever will we do?”

“Oh, I’m sure you could bat those pretty eyes at him
and he’d be a happy little fox again.” I try to keep a straight
face and fail miserably; a rather unladylike snort breaking free of
my throat. “I’m sorry. You two are just so cute I can’t stand
it.”

Fi laughs. “I don’t know about all that.”

“You’ll see soon enough, I’m sure,” I say. Insecurity
rolls off her in waves as she shrugs and I pat her knee. “It’s not
hard to notice how in love with you he is.”

“You’re sweet,” Fi says; the blush traveling down her
neck and disappearing under the collar of her shirt. “I am not the
most, uh, shall we say practiced when it comes to romantic
things.”

“Don’t worry, I don’t know a thing about it either,”
I inform her, like that is somehow supposed to make her feel
better. “I’ve never even had a boyfriend—” I cut off abruptly and
about punch myself. I don’t even remember where I was going with
that statement. Surely she’ll think something’s wrong with me now.
Centuries old and I can’t even withhold a relationship? Why am I
giving her any sort of advice?

“Don’t be embarrassed,” she says; snapping me out of
my mini anxiety attack. “I haven’t really, either. Well, I thought
I had a boyfriend, but he was, uh…well, he was using me to try and
hurt my brother. So I kind of consider Flint my first
boyfriend.”

Relief floods in when she opens up and lets me see a
bit of her she probably doesn’t show everyone. Then her words
register and my mouth moves without permission from my mind. “What
a dick!” I cry, and then blanch. “I’m sorry, that was crude. But,
ugh!” I shake my head. “Jerk.”

Fi roars with laughter and claps her hands together,
amused by my outburst. “No, you’re right. There really isn’t
another word for him.” Her jaw tightens and she gets a faraway look
in her eyes.

“You have Flint now,” I state, “and he’s not like
that. I don’t think, anyway.”

“No,” Fi says; her jaw loosening and forming a small
smile now. “Flint is nothing like him at all. He’s protective and
affectionate and sweet and — and I’m rambling!” she says; throwing
her hands up. “I’m sorry, let’s talk about something else.”

I smirk at her. “You can ramble all you like. That’s
what girlfriends are for, right?” I look into my coffee and take a
gulp; savoring the smooth richness on my tongue for a moment before
looking back at her. “What would you like to talk about?”

“Anything at all…other than men, that is,” Fi
says.

Once again, the aroma of coffee floods into my
bedroom early in the morning the following day and pulls me from a
dreamless sleep. The sun hangs low in the sky and the clock on the
wall tells me it’s about seven-thirty a.m. I’ve never slept so
soundly for so many hours in a row and I’m kind of stunned by it,
so when there is a soft knock on my door I jump in surprise. “Yes?”
I call.

Fi pokes her head in the bedroom and smiles at me.
She looks tired, her green eyes are shadowed with exhaustion and
she has a mug of coffee clutched in her hand. There’s a dark spot
on her arm that looks almost like a hand-shaped bruise surrounding
her forearm. “Morning, Lulu,” she says before I can verbally fret
over it. “I was wondering if you’d be willing to come talk to me
and Eir again? About our dad?”

“Sure,” I say; rolling out of the bed and following
her out the door. We don’t go far, just down the hall and into the
large family room on the same floor. Flint and Eirnin are both
already there. Flint looks tired, but Eirnin looks downright
fatigued. He’s holding a pint-sized coffee mug to his chest like
one would a lover, and I force myself not to snicker about it. He
is not an early riser by choice.

Fi collapses at Flint’s side and pokes him in the
ribs when he yawns. He chuckles at her but says nothing, and I step
over to the table and pour myself some of the delicious brown
liquid before taking a seat by Eirnin.

I know the Dolans are waiting for me to start up
about their dad, but I can’t seem to tear my eyes off the bruise.
This has to be how Fi felt before she knew about my brand when I
first arrived. It’s like I can’t look at her without seeing the
giant, blackened, angry mark around her arm. “Okay, you’re killing
me with that thing,” I blurt in my usual non-ladylike manner of
speech.

Eir doesn’t seem to hear me, but Fi looks over at me
in total confusion. Even Flint quirks a brow at me and I clear my
throat; waving my hand in the general direction of her arm. “We all
know Flint didn’t do that, and Eir’s hands are way too big — not
that he would ever do that — I just…I mean…” God, no wonder my
family always wanted to gag me. “What happened to your arm,
Fi?”

Fi shakes her head and looks down to see what I’m
babbling about. When she sees the bruise and remembers, she flushes
and looks back up to meet my eyes. “Oh, uh…Sean grabbed me,” she
says; her eyes trained on Flint, who offers her a small smile even
though his jaw is clenched so hard I can see the muscles working
from where I sit.

“What?!” Eir snaps in shock. “When did this happen?
Why was I not told so I could punch him in his stupid face?”

“Eir,” Fi starts tiredly and leans into Flint, who
looks at the huge boy over Fi’s dark hair. There is a slightly
wicked gleam in his eyes when he says, “I took care of it.”

Eir still looks furious but a little relieved by
Flint’s words. Part of me wants to ask what the hell he means by
‘took care of it’, but there’s another part, a larger part, that
doesn’t want to know the lengths he would go to when someone
threatens Fi.

“Lu?” Fi says, cutting the conversation short before
someone can ask what Sean went through for putting a hand on her.
“What about our mom? Was there ever a woman with Dad?”

I frown at her and shake my head. “No, he was always
alone when I saw him. He never mentioned a wife, either.”

“Never?” Eir asks from the inside of his coffee mug,
almost hiding behind it as he looks at me questioningly. “That
doesn’t sound like Dad.”

“But Eir,” Fi says before I can respond, her voice a
little shaky. She swallows before continuing. “If she were gone, he
probably wouldn’t want to talk about her.”

Eir looks skeptical and I pull my lower lip between
my teeth. “I asked him once,” I say, and all three sets of eyes
shoot back to me. “He was so worried about you two and wanted to
get out and get back to you, and I asked if at least his wife was
with you.”

“And?” Flint asks when I pause.

“He, um…he said that wasn’t a good topic and changed
the subject.”

Fi pulls in a sharp breath and looks away from me.
Flint reaches forward and rests his hand just above her knee,
giving it a small squeeze, and she reaches forward and holds it
between both of her trembling ones. “I think that means she’s
really gone.”