Gabe exhaled a tortured breath. In all the years he’d lived here, it had been his sanctuary, his island, but he’d never thought of it as his home.
Why had he said that to her?
There was no answer to that, so he followed her upstairs and into his bedroom. She was by the bathroom door and turned to give him an oddly shy smile.
“Do you mind if I borrow another one of your shirts? I’ll wash this one today.”
Curse the gods. The issue of her clothes hadn’t even crossed his mind. “Help yourself.” He folded his arms, so he wouldn’t be tempted to wrap them around her.
She nodded, gave him another smile, and entered the bathroom.
He swallowed a groan. He’d lose his mind if all she wore was a succession of his shirts. When he finished this mission, they’d go on a virtual shopping spree. She could order whatever she wanted, and he’d throw in a few exotic pieces.
Damn. That was the wrong thing to think when he needed to get to work. He didn’t have time to find anything for her right now, which left only one option.
He grabbed a rucksack and teleported to where he’d met Aurora the other day. It was early evening, but still light, and he threw up a glamour before striding toward the village to find her house.
We’ve got solar panels—the only ones in the village.
Should be easy enough to find.
It took longer than he anticipated, but finally he found the cottage tucked down a lane on the other side of the village. A car was parked outside, and a man and woman were just walking up the path.
Great timing. He stifled a sigh and followed them up the path. As her father unlocked the door, her mother glanced over her shoulder. Whoa. She was the image of Aurora, twenty years from now. Except for her eyes, which were dark brown, and narrowed directly at him.
There was no way she could see him, but he rolled his shoulders, oddly uncomfortable by her apparent scrutiny. Now he knew where Aurora lived, there was nothing stopping him from teleporting directly into the house, but he didn’t.
They went inside the cottage, and he marched toward the stairs.
“Where’s Aurora?” her mum said. Despite himself, he glanced at her, and a shudder inched along his spine when she met his gaze. What the fuck?
“She’s probably meeting up with friends,” her dad said. “I’ll send her a message and see if she’s coming back tonight.”
Gabe took the stairs two at a time as Aurora’s mum gave her dad a vague answer. It didn’t take long to find her room, seeing as there were only two bedrooms. How was it possible to cram so much stuff into such a tiny space?
He’d have to commission another piece of furniture, just so she had somewhere for all her possessions.
Although he’d done far worse things in the past, he felt like a thief as he filled the rucksack with her personal items. Did he really need to take it all? But if he didn’t, he might leave behind the one thing that meant the most to her.
The rucksack was full, and he hadn’t even found her clothes yet. He dumped it on her bed, which slotted beneath the eaves. It would be so much easier just to transport the wardrobe and chest of drawers in their entirety, but that would raise too many questions. And while he didn’t usually care about questions that he had no intention of answering, if her bedroom furniture vanished, it would freak out her parents. Which would upset Aurora.
He really was fucking losing it.
There was a case under her bed, so he hauled that out and transferred the contents of her drawers into it. Belatedly it occurred to him that she might not appreciate him going through her underwear.
Too late now. What the fuck had possessed him to start this? He should’ve just let her wear his damn shirts.
He yanked the clothes from her wardrobe and draped them over his arm, hangers included. The sooner he got out of here the better.
Warning prickled along the back of his neck and he swung around, senses alert. Aurora’s mother stood at the door, her gaze fixed on the bed.
Shit. He’d forgotten to fling a glamour over the rucksack and case. Not that it mattered. He’d enter her mind and wipe the last couple of seconds from her memory.
He didn’t get the chance. She looked at him again and her voice filled his head.
I remember you.
Staggered, he couldn’t even respond as she tilted her head, her eyes never leaving his.
No, she said in his mind. There was a questioning note in the word, but he still couldn’t answer her. It wasn’t you …
What the hell was happening? It shouldn’t be possible for any mortal to initiate telepathic contact with him. He recalled what Aurora had told him the day they met.
The only other person in her family who was telepathic was her mum.
Aurora had inherited her beautiful, unique, brain from her mother. And her mother could see through his glamour as easily as any immortal.
He shifted focus and scanned her aura. An eerie shiver scudded along his spine. Her aura glowed, but it was shredded, as though a giant claw had ripped through the fabric of her existence.
But she possessed not a drop of immortal blood.
“What are you?” Her voice was hushed, but she didn’t sound terrified by his presence.
An answer glimmered in his mind, and he responded without speaking. What are you?
Where have you taken my child?
It didn’t surprise him that she ignored his question. She was Aurora’s mother, after all.
“She’s safe,” he said.
A flicker of fear—of understanding?—glittered in her eyes.
“Keep her safe.” There was an urgent note in her voice. “Promise me.”
A section of his brain couldn’t believe he was even having this conversation, but he didn’t hesitate. “I promise she’ll come to no harm under my protection.”
“And bring her home again.”
Regret burned his chest. “I can’t promise that.”
Her eyes glazed. “Tell him I didn’t mean to forget,” she whispered.
What was she talking about?
“Tell who?” he demanded, but she gazed at him as though she had no idea what he meant.
He didn’t have time for this, but her words haunted him. Was she speaking of Mephisto? Except something didn’t feel right. Meph had tracked Aurora for a specific reason, but that had nothing to do with her mother.
He’d figure it out later. Without another word, he swung the rucksack over his shoulder, picked up the case, and teleported.
Aurora was still in the bathroom when he returned. He placed everything on the bed, and then had the urge to disappear again before she emerged.
He had no idea how she’d react to what he’d done. Any other mortal would likely kiss his feet in gratitude at his benevolence. Aurora might just as easily hate that he’d collected her personal things without her permission and not hesitate to let him know.
Why didn’t he just admit it? It was her unpredictability he found so addictive.
She strolled into the bedroom, wearing one of his black shirts and towel-drying her hair. He’d definitely done the right thing. The sooner she had her own clothes to wear, the less distracting he’d find her.
Yeah, keep hoping that.
Her welcoming smile froze as she caught sight of his haul on the bed. He couldn’t tell whether that was a good or bad sign.
“What?” she managed at last, coming over to the bed and running her hand over her clothes. “These are mine.”
“It made sense.” He hunched his shoulders and glared at the pile of clothes. It was disconcerting that he had no defense if she took exception to his action.
He was a fucking archangel. It didn’t matter if she agreed or not with what he did.
“You went to my home and collected all of my things?”
“They were no good to you there.”
“I know, but …” Her voice trailed away. She appeared to be having a problem telling him what she thought, which had to be a first. “Well, I didn’t expect you to go to all this trouble.”
“It was no trouble.”
She bit her lip. “It’s just if my parents see my room’s been cleared out before they get my message, they’ll think the worst.”
“About your mother.” He waited until her reluctant gaze met his. There was little point telling her that her mother had seen straight through his glamour, as he doubted that would mean much to Aurora. “She’s one of the strongest telepaths I’ve ever encountered.” And he wasn’t just referring to telepathic mortals, either.
“You met my mother?” Horror etched her face. And was that a thread of fear in her voice?
Sure, he hadn’t intended to speak to her parents, but why was she so upset that he had?
“Yes. Briefly.” Clearly, his response didn’t reassure her as he had hoped, since she hitched in a ragged breath as though she was having trouble processing what he was saying. “She was fine,” he added, even though that in itself was odd, since humans were generally anything but fine when in the presence of an archangel. He decided to keep that to himself.
“Wait. How do you know she’s a strong telepath?”
“She spoke to me telepathically.” Well, fuck. Aurora had that ability. What was stopping them from communicating that way? It had never even occurred to him before, but the possibility intrigued him.
“She did what?”
Unease prickled. Aurora hugged her waist, her body tense, as though his answer was of paramount importance. He was missing something, and he didn’t have a clue what it was.
“It was unexpected.” To hell with it. He might as well tell her. “She shouldn’t have been able to even see me, much less initiate contact.”
She stared at him, desperate hope pulsing in the charged air between them. “Are you sure you didn’t just probe her mind by accident and read her thoughts that way?”
“No, I didn’t.” If he probed a mind it was never by accident, and the thoughts he harvested were read by design. While abilities varied between different species, the principles of not invading an unknowing mind remained the same throughout every telepathic race.
Then again, Aurora didn’t come from a primarily telepathic race. She had no idea of the etiquette involved.
And it was all academic. Mortal rules didn’t apply when it came to the gods and their descendants.
Or archangels and demons.
She let out a ragged breath, and his irritation at her accusation—especially since she had some justification for it—faded. She’d been thrust into a strange new world and throughout everything that had happened she’d been amazingly resilient, except for that one moment in Eblis’ club. But this glimpse of vulnerability was different. Deeper, somehow.
It shouldn’t matter. He had a missing child to find. And yet he couldn’t walk away.
“What’s the problem, Aurora? Why does it matter so much to you that she spoke to me?”
Her smile was strained and didn’t reach her eyes. “Because she stopped speaking to me that way years ago.”
“Why?”
“When we were on that other planet, you asked me if I’d deliberately breached dimensions.”
“I don’t see the connection.”
She swallowed. “When I was a child, Mum used to tell me stories about her home all the time. We were linked telepathically from when I was born. Poor Dad, he must have felt left out at times. But about ten years ago she just cut off our link. No warning. And she wouldn’t explain it. But it was as though she’d cut off, I don’t know, half of my brain and one of my limbs. She just wasn’t there anymore.”
The raw pain in her voice clawed through him. He understood more than she would ever realize.
He and Eleni had been telepathically linked, and the void she’d left behind had been … immense. And although he was oddly touched that she had confided something so personal, he still wasn’t sure how this was linked to her breaching dimensions. “Why are you telling me this now?”
“It was awful.” There was a tremor in her voice. “It was as though she needed to close the door on her past life, just so she could survive in this one. But shutting me out didn’t help, Gabe. She’s still fading away from us. I thought if I could bring back some proof that her world really did exist, she’d remember everything again.”
That her world really did exist?
“Theoretically, I should have arrived at the exact place where the flowers grew. If anything could help her remember it would be the flowers. I wanted to bring some back for her, that’s all.”
Where the flowers grew.
Ice skated along his arms as he recalled the silver frame with its strange, ethereal bloom that she’d dropped in his kitchen. The eerie certainty he’d experienced of something being not quite right with it.
No. He couldn’t imagine what she was trying to tell him, but it wasn’t that her mother came from another dimension.
“And yes, I admit I wanted to find out more about that side of my heritage. Who wouldn’t? But I had no idea it would be so dangerous or that I was breaking cosmic laws.”
“Are you trying to tell me …” The words lodged in his throat. There was no way this could be true. “What are you trying to tell me?”
Wariness flashed in her eyes. He had the oddest conviction that his reaction wasn’t what she’d been expecting. So what the hell had she expected?
“My parents are from different dimensions.” The words were reluctant, as though she’d never spoken them before. Of course she hasn’t. It wasn’t the kind of thing anyone would share. “They met in their dreams when they were still children and kind of grew up together. Later, they communicated on the astral planes. And then … they fell in love.”
He guessed that theoretically it was possible to dream of those who existed in another dimension. Why not? And she had just revealed the astral planes weren’t confined to one dimension or another. Which meant they were potentially accessible to all sentient beings.
Except for the Guardians.
Somehow, Aurora’s parents had succeeded in a trans-dimensional physical union.
And then the truth slammed through him.
Aurora is the result of a trans-dimensional union.
Awe shivered through his soul. It had been so long since anything had so fundamentally shaken the core of his existence that he had no idea what to even say to her.
There was nothing that marked her as such an extraordinary being. Her damp hair curled around her face, the freckles that dusted her nose and cheeks were still ridiculously appealing, and her eyes were the prettiest blue he had ever seen.
“What happened?” His voice was hushed. Her parents had flouted the most elemental laws of the universe—and had lived, undetected by the Guardians.
But the Guardians were of this dimension. Aurora’s mother came from another. Was that how she had avoided detection?
“When they were teenagers, they found they could communicate without needing the dreamworld or the astral planes. They were telepathically linked. But the thing is, that’s the sum total of my dad’s psychic ability. He can’t even link to me.”
Another eerie shiver scuttled over his flesh. It took this to another level entirely when her parents had been still able to connect outside of the spiritual realms.
At least he now knew the reason for Aurora’s extraordinary mental barriers. She had inherited them from a species of human he’d had no idea even existed.
“One day when they were sharing thoughts she simply walked from her world into my dad’s arms. The same place we met the other day.”
“How did she evade the Guardians?”
“She never mentioned them. She just took one step. That’s all. And then the gateway or whatever it was that had opened for her closed. Permanently. But because of my heritage I was sure I could access my mum’s dimension. And … I was right.”
“There has to be more to it than that. Something must have triggered a split between this world and your mother’s.”
She hesitated, and he took her hand. Just as Mephisto had asserted, Aurora had been fully aware of what she was doing. And now he knew her reasons, he couldn’t even blame her.
The damage had been done, and even if he understood why she had done it, it didn’t change the outcome. Nothing could change that, but in his eyes, at least, she didn’t deserve to be condemned to a lifetime of confinement for simply trying to discover her maternal origins.
Her smile was infinitely sad, and something deep in his chest ached in response.
“Somehow when they were psychically connected to each other, they also simultaneously opened a physical breach between their worlds. If I could do that, using the flower as my anchor, then theoretically there was nothing to stop me from walking into her world.”