Page 28 of Siren in the Rain

“Everything changed when I was ten. Looking back, I can see where problems had been brewing for a long time. Things happened that I didn’t understand as a child, but they make so much more sense to me now. My parents argued a lot. My father spent a lot of time away and my mother found out he was seeing someone else.” He takes a deep breath and lets it out. “Finally, my mom had enough. She told my father she was going to take me and move back with the Silverstorm sept to raise me without him.” He looks down at his mug. “If only it had gone smoothly.”

“Are you sure you want to tell this part?” Emma asks, her brow creasing.

Shae nods. “Thanks, Em. I’m okay.” He clutches his mug tightly. “I was young so I don’t remember all of the details, but we were getting ready to leave when my parents got into a fight. My father got really angry and grabbed a heavy vase off a table. He started beating my mother with it until… she stopped moving.” Shae’s voice cracks and a tear slides down his cheek. “I tried to stop him. I kicked and punched and screamed, but he was so much bigger and stronger. I couldn’t do anything.”

Throughout his horrific account, Shae’s mental trauma hits me like a tidal wave I’m not ready for. It leaves me reeling and scrambling to resurrect some of my emotional defenses. I left myself too open to my mate and wasn’t prepared for how much anguish he feels inside.

Tears stream down my cheeks and I don’t try to stop them. I focus all of my SCSS mojo on sending love and protective energy his way.

I stop breathing when, with a crooked smile, Shae extends a hand toward me and wipes away my tears. “Anyone ever tell you that you’re weird, Wolf Boy?”

“Everyone,” Cal snarks affectionately.

I sniffle and stick my tongue out at him.

“What happened next?” Dallas asks, trying to keep things going.

Shae swallows convulsively. “He carried my mother’s body to his car in the garage and put her in the trunk. Then he locked me in a closet and drove off. When he came back, my mom wasn’t with him.”

“Oh, Shae. I’m so sorry. You never should have witnessed that,” Ruby says, sniffling.

By now, I have Shae wrapped in my arms and I’m stroking his hair. The fact that he’s letting me, and seems to be enjoying it, fills me with relief and pride.

“That was only the beginning though,” Shae continues. “I don’t think my father knew what to do with me. After all, I was a witness to his crime. But it seems he drew the line at murdering a child. Or perhaps he feared it would draw too much attention to suddenly no longer have me or my mother around. I don’t know. He took me out of school and claimed I was being home-schooled. However, no schooling was involved. I was just confined to my bedroom and he boarded up the one window to prevent me from escaping.” He lets out a bitter chuckle. “He kept threatening to do to me what he’d done to my mother if I ever told anyone. And me being young, dumb, and scared as shit, I believed him.”

“You were only a child,” I protest in outrage.

Get your act together, Griffin McIntyre!

Losing my cool won’t help my mate.

I focus instead on covering him in my scent and enveloping him in all the soothing vibes I can muster.

“After a few weeks, my dad moved a new woman into the house. Six months later, they got married. But Margaret wasn’t solo when she joined our household. She brought her eight-year-old daughter with her.”

“Ugh. Bitchface Bella,” Emma says from her seat next to Ruby.

Shae smirks at Emma’s groan of disgust. “Margaret was apparently a major Twilight fan around the time her daughter was born, hence the name. Anyway, the apple didn’t fall far from the tree with Bella. I honestly don’t know who was worse to me sometimes, her or her mother.”

“Were they always awful to you?” I can’t help but ask.

Shae nods. “They hated me from the start. I don’t know all the reasons why, but Margaret made it evident that my half-siren nature disgusted her. Soon, she convinced my father I needed to be hidden from view. My life became even more confined, but I at least had Haku with me, so I wasn’t alone. They brought me meals three times a day, but I was a prisoner for all intents and purposes.”

“How did you end up with a drake?” Cal asks, curiosity gleaming in his gray eyes.

Shae reaches up and pets Haku, who nuzzles into his neck and then gives me a smug look.

I growl.

He hisses.

Am I seriously going to have to duke it out with a drake for access to my mate?

Shae continues, ignoring us both. “Haku was a gift from my mother for my tenth birthday. Most sirens are gifted a protective guardian at that age. Our sept apparently has a longstanding magical agreement with a tribe of drakes.”

Haku rears up on his hind legs and flaps his mini-dragon wings. “We protect the Silverstorm sept and they protect us.”

“You’re so freaking cute!” I coo at him.

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