Page 28 of Paris and the Reaper

Kai shifted Paris’s grip, flipping it so he was the one squeezing Paris’s hand. The apology in his eyes nearly startled a gasp out of Paris. “You gotta promise not to be mad at me. This wasn’t about you.”

Not about him? Mad at Kai? For what? Showing up here? Not possible. “I missed you too much to be mad.”

Kai released his hand, then held his own out to Mac. “Because I’m one of you. Kai Finley.”

Paris did gasp at that. One of you, as in a raven? A shifter?

Eyes wide, Mac seemed as surprised as him for once. “What’s your real name?”

“Kaimus. Finley was my father’s surname. My mother’s was Kasta.”

“Haida?” Mac asked, and Kai nodded. When Mac spoke again, his tone did a complete one-eighty from suspicious to almost... reverent. “I thought your kind were gone.”

His kind? So he wasn’t a raven? And what was Haida? Kai rarely spoke about his parents or where he’d come from before landing in YB, but he had mentioned his mother was from an Indigenous tribe up north. Was Haida that tribe? Of shifters?

“Not gone,” Kai said. “Just hiding.”

“Cormac Kelley. It’s an honor. And please, call me Mac.”

Head spinning, Paris slid between the two men, glancing back and forth between them. “I’m lost. Can someone please explain?”

“You didn’t know he was a raven?” Mac said.

“Clearly.” He pointed at Kai’s face. “And his eyes are brown.” Only humans had brown eyes.

“Not really,” Kai said, apology in his gaze once more. Standing beside the table, he removed a case from his pocket and removed contacts Paris had never suspected, had never seen him put in or take out before. When Kai lifted his gaze back to them, his blue-green irises were again not what Paris expected.

“They’re not purple like yours,” he said to Mac.

“No, because he’s a different kind of raven. He’s special, Paris.”

“Well, thespecialpart I knew.” Kai was the best of them, the one who’d gone straight and earned an honest living tending bar. He was calm, he was caring, he kept him and Jason in line as much as he could. Paris trusted him completely, but not the other way around, it seemed? He couldn’t keep the hurt from his voice. “But the other...”

Kai captured his flailing hand. “I’m sorry. With your dad, I couldn’t risk him finding out what I was.”

“Does anyone in YB know?” Mac asked.

“Our other best friend, Jason. He’s the only person here I’ve told.”

That stung, not because Kai hadn’t told him, but because Paris’s father had stolen something else from him, had put a wall between Paris and his best friends. One of whom was conspicuously absent, and with everything Paris had learned about ravens lately, Paris’s worry ratcheted higher. “Where is he?”

“That’s why I’m here. I think he’s in trouble.” He shifted his gaze to Mac. “The raven knows he is.”

“Jason’s always in trouble,” Paris said, though he sensed something was different this time. It had to be for Kai to risk coming here, to expose his identity. Paris squeezed his hand in solidarity, letting him know he didn’t hold anything against him, that he still had his back.

Kai nodded, then turned his attention back to Mac and lifted his other hand, splaying it over his chest. “It burns.”

The resemblance to the motion Paris had just shared with Mac was unmistakable. He wasn’t surprised his best friends were connected in a similar way. But what did he mean byit burns? “What’s happened?” he asked as he led them to the seating area, Mac buttoning his shirt along the way.

Kai lowered himself on one end of the couch. “Moira.”

Becauseof courseit would be her. Paris flopped next to Kai and hung his head back on a groan. “Fucking hell.”

“Who’s Moira?” Mac asked from the chair.

“Asshole vampire of the highest order.” He righted his gaze and flicked a hand in the air. “She and Jason were a thing for a hot minute.”

“She told him there was a stash.” Kai cleared his throat and glanced guiltily at Paris. “One of your father’s in the Canyon Lands. She needed a lock pick.”

---