Page 107 of Crimson Flames

“Damien would totally use it as a way to edge me all day long,” Evie adds.

Now that I think about it, that’s exactly what he’s been doing. But does he realize that?Shite, that fecker totally knows exactly what he’s doing!

“He is, isn’t he?” Laney guesses from my silence.

Shaking my head with a grin, I nod over to where Ani looks three seconds away from fighting the kid that accidently knocked down her castle.

“Ani,” Laney calls, rising to stand. Ani is about to pounce with her reddened face and balled fists when the boy surrenders, holding his hands up.

“I’m sorry. It was an accident. I tripped.” He points to a shovel on the ground. Ani glances at it then back at him before looking over to Laney. She looks sad and torn, but Ami comes to her side.

“Deep breath?”

Ani nods and inhales as Ami helps her exhale.

“Build together.” Ami points to the boy and he agrees quickly.

“Yeah, I’d love to help. I have a few extra buckets by my mom’s chair. One sec.”

He takes off in a run and comes darting back with a rainbow of buckets in all shapes and sizes. Ani squeals as they begin to work together, and Laney looks relieved as she walks back to us.

Normally we rent out the place, but since it was a Saturday and snowing outside, we didn’t want to ruin the business and the obvious joy for the kids in town.

“It might not seem like it,” Laney says, taking a seat, “but that was a huge improvement for her.”

“They seem so much better than when we first found them. What does their speech therapist think about them talking?”

Laney sighs, looking saddened. “She thinks that because of the trauma and delays in development, it’s likely only Ami will really learn to speak well. We have started taking some sign language classes now that we can see Ani isn’t progressing very fast. She has learned to say more words, but she doesn’t like to use them. Sometimes she will fight with the therapist and spend the rest of the session in silence.”

Laney looks over at the girls who are happily working with the other kids around them now.

“You would think that Ami is the stubborn one, but Ani holds grudges. She’s so smart and adapts quickly, but that girl never forgets a thing. I wish she could speak more because it would help us work through her frustrations better, but we all agree that forcing it will only make her reluctant to use her speech at all.”

“How do the girls feel about that?” Evie asks as we watch them giggle with the boy when he starts pretending to be a knight at the castle.

“They seem fine with it. It’s all they’ve ever really known. The two of them have some secret signs they must have taught each other, but now we are going to need to help teach them more so that we can better understand what they need.”

“We can all learn that,” I say. I used to study some signs to use when on a mission. While I know this is different, I’m willing to put in the time if it means Ani will be able to talk to all of us.

“I’ll get Lev to find us some of the best classes,” Evie offers.

Laney holds a hand over her heart. “Akio and Adrian will be so relieved. They were worried you would find it to be too much.”

I scoff and lean in so no one else can hear.

“What the feck? Do they really think so little of us?”

Laney shakes her head. “No, they just have their own trauma. Parents that were always telling the both of them that they were never good enough, so now they worry about dumb shit with the girls. Dr. K is helping them all though.”

“I’m impressed,” Evie says. “They have grown so much. All of us have. Especially you, Ness.”

I sit back in my chair, getting comfortable and drawing my feet up.

“What do you mean by that?”

She shrugs. “You used to believe that you would never get anything in this world unless you stole it. Your father practically beat it into you. Yet, look at you now.”

Laney nods her head. “You’ve worked hard to not only change your mindset, but to be someone greater. You don’t let the world beat you down anymore. You keep fighting until the universe has no choice but to accept your strength or its defeat.”

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