Page 31 of Black Hand
Another shitstorm coming,my mind announced.
17
“Well?” Alice snapped after the shifter kept staring at me without saying anything. “Are you going to tell us or should we start guessing here?”
“It has something to do with you being different than the rest of your kind.” Dominic’s deep voice had the most inappropriate effect on me at the worst of times.
All that aside, hearing I was different over and over my whole life, well, it started to grate on my nerves after a while. It wasn’t his fault for phrasing it that way, but I couldn’t stop the grimace from lining my mouth when I heard it. “Of course it’s because I’m different.” I piped in sardonically.
Ignoring my comment, he focused on the pendant, talking to it instead of me. “After you got injured, I went back out to retrieve the dagger I knew must’ve fallen where you fought. I wasn’t aware the steel was mixed with silver until I picked it up and it almost melted the skin of my hand. That’s when I saw the spell around it, and then I got to thinking.”
“This is like watchingThe Originalslive,” Alice gushed, lifting her knees to her chest and hugging them with a firm push of her glasses up her nose.
We both ignored her.
“When the second attack came, I kept one of them alive so I could try to remove the pendant.” Dominic continued eyeing Alice through narrowed lids as if daring her to interrupt him. She grinned but stayed quiet, thankfully. “Call it curiosity if you will, or distrust, but I thought you were doing something to prevent me from taking it off you when I tried.”
“Of course you did,” I murmured acerbically, which earned me the same look as the one the human got.
“It came off without any resistance.”
I blinked at him. “I’m sorry?”
“I ripped it off his throat with little effort.”
“It can’t be. It doesn’t come off.” Tension started at the center of my forehead, though it was probably caused by my intense frown.
“Have you tried taking a pendant off of someone else?” the shifter asked slyly, and that had me scowling at him.
“No, I haven’t. Why would I?”
“Exactly my point. Back inside, I tried taking yours off again. It wouldn’t budge unless I cut your head off. Theirs come off, yours doesn’t. It has something to do with …” he struggled for a word, so I saved him from the misery.
“Me being different, yes we heard.” That had the opposite effect from the one I was expecting. The lines on Dominic’s face softened and he filled his chest to bursting before blowing out a sigh.
“Different is not necessarily a bad thing, Brooklyn. Not from where I’m standing.” That time when he said my name there was so much weight placed behind it that my heart skipped a beat before drumming against my chest.
“To me it has always been a hindrance, so I wouldn’t know.” Scrubbing a hand over my face, I looked at the open page next to me. “There is no way we can find a witch willing to undo whatever was done. The only witches I’ve seen belong to the Syndicate.”
Somewhere along the way the idea of having the pendant removed had become important to me. It could’ve been when I saw Veronica rip hers off, because to me it seemed like that set her free, and I wanted that freedom, though I knew I’d never have it. Or maybe it happened after seeing Dominic’s disgust when he looked at it. One way or another, it was just another thing that I could use to flip the Council off, so I was all for it.
“Hello.” Alice waved her hand in front of my face, her eyes as wide as saucers behind her thick glasses. “Witch right here, didn’t you hear what I said before we left my kennel?”
“Alice”—On a sigh, I watched her, my mind racing to come up with how to say something without offending her. “The witch we need might mean something different to humans. I don’t sense that power in you.”
“Oh, that’s fine.” Acting like I just told her she is the master witch of the universe, she grinned and jumped to her feet. Her glasses tilted sideways on her face, but she didn’t seem to notice. “That’s because I’m not ready. First, I have to open a circle. It’s how this works. Trust me, Brooklyn. I’ll be right back.”
Dominic and I watched her dart out of the living room and disappear into the kitchen, then a few seconds later pots and pans started banging, the loud noises followed by the crash of a glass breaking. Both of us flinched from the sound and turned to glance at each other.
“I don’t have the heart to tell her in any different way.” Confessing under my breath, I looked away from him.
“No harm in trying. What do we have to lose?”
“Time?”
“We have nothing but time until nightfall.” Turning away from me, Dominic walked up to the window, folding his hands at the small of his back. His wide shoulders obscured almost the entire thing, the lightening sky casting a bright glow like an aura around his body.
“We were also different.” His deep voice had a faraway quality as if he was talking to himself, not me. “My family and I.”
