Page 55 of Her Irish Treasures
In fact, the golden light of truth only made me see more clearly.
“Everything was gray. The cubicles, the carpets, the walls. All very modern and expensive, I’m sure, but uniformly gray. Like a prison. I didn’t know Jonathan owned the place and I can’t remember exactly what I did. Only that I hated it. We weren’t allowed to hang any kind of artwork or personal items in our cubicles. I made the mistake of taking in a plant that Vivi had given to me when we got our first apartment in Kansas City. Just a common pothos, but it’d thrived in our dinky basement apartment. As soon as I took it to my cubicle, it started to shrivel up. The tips of its leaves browned and blackened. The roots rotted, even though I didn’t change the watering schedule.”
I laughed, but it sounded harsh to my ears. “I hated everything about the place, but the pay was great. Too great to leave, he said. I had to make my car payment and help with the rent on the new condo. I’d never cared about money before. I didn’t care about investments or retirement accounts or any of the other stuff he told me to do. I just wanted to paint.”
My voice broke.
The one thing I’d given up.
Resolute, I lifted my face from Keane’s throat. “I was that fucking plant. I rotted and withered every moment in that place and with him, yet I couldn’t leave. I didn’t even know anything was wrong. I just felt so bad all the time. I was trapped but couldn’t see the bars and chains. Not until it was too late.”
“Aye, you did know.” Doran knelt on the floor between the two hotel beds, yet he still managed to tower over us. “You fought every moment to stay alive, love. So you could find and free me. Do you think a normal human could have survived a changeling’s appetites for so many years? Only a survivor would have made it out alive, and you did, Riann. You broke free of something that should have been impossible to escape.”
Rage bubbled up inside me. “It shouldn’t have happened. Not to me, not to anyone. I’ll never be the same. I’m damaged and hurt and he’s still out there. Unharmed, untouched, probably laughing his ass off about how much he got from me. I’ll never know everything that he stole from me. How can I when I can’t remember? Did he take memories of my childhood? What if he’d destroyed my memories of Vivi? She’s all I’ve ever had.”
“Then let’s go get him.” Doran’s voice rumbled the floor. “Let us bring his head on a platter. Or is it other body parts you’d rather have?”
I wasn’t normally a vindictive person. That was Vivi’s area of expertise. She hadn’t been joking when she’d offered to find Jonathan and run him down with her car. She’d never done anything illegal—to my knowledge—but she’d deliberately chosen to work for the best defense attorney in town, and not just because the pay was great.
But staring into Doran’s dark eyes…
I wanted nothing more than to take him up on his offer.
He swept me against his chest. The hallway outside our room blurred with his speed. He pounded up a flight of stairs, following Ivarr’s golden light. Threw a door open and carried me out into the dark. His chest heaved, his back arching. His head thrown back, neck and shoulders straining. His body quivered as the gargoyle erupted.
Black leathery wings swept out from his back. His skin thickened and grayed, turning into the weathered granite. Clutching me against his chest, he ran toward the edge of the roof and leaped off into darkness. For a moment, we dipped, falling, my stomach tumbling in a queasy roll. Then his wings caught air and we soared into the sky.
Cold air stole my breath, but I was too exhilarated to care. Cars moved below us like little toys. Someone shouted and pointed up at the giant black thing streaking across the sky. Ivarr’s golden light soared ahead of us, probably drawing even more attention. But I couldn’t find it in myself to care.
:Not to worry,:Ivarr said cheerfully in my head.:I’m blurring our images with my light. They see us—but they can’t tell what we are.:
The roar of a motorcycle drew my attention back down to the road. Two bikes wove in and out of traffic, following us along the ground. Aidan and Keane raced ahead, turning back to the north. It took me a few minutes to realize where they were leading us.
The grocery store on the corner. The gas station where I’d filled up my car on the way to the job I hated. The two-story condominium buildings arranged in a horseshoe facing concrete pond. The fountain had been shut off for the winter, though the water wasn’t frozen.
I recognized the giant, ugly cement toad in the center. I hated that thing. It reminded me of Jabba the Hut. Why anyone had thought it deserved to be displayed in public was beyond me. I’d been forced to see it every day going to and from work. The frog was even visible from the kitchen window, so every time I did dishes, I had to stare at the ugly monstrosity.
This was our old neighborhood. When I’d been Mrs. Jonathan Blake.
I hadn’t been back here in a year, even to get the rest of my stuff. I didn’t want it. I didn’t want anything that reminded me of my old life. Not the year-old SUV I’d been paying for or the racks of business casual clothes I’d worn to work.
Doran rumbled in my head.:The fountain is a portal to the Otherworld, right outside your door. How did you escape him, love?:
I swallowed hard.:I don’t know. I remember getting out of an Uber at Vivi’s. I was barefoot and in my pajamas. I had my wallet, my phone, and a couple of changes of clothes in a bag. My old clothes from college—nothing I’d gotten in the last few years. I left it all behind.:
:Fuck.:Aidan’s voice clashed like swords.:The portal’s wide open. Stay clear until we can disable it.:
Wide open—like for creepy crawly creatures to start pouring into Kansas City? I suddenly had visions of giant green pookas and those nasty rat imps swarming the streets.:What does that mean?:
Doran spun away from the fountain in a slow, wide circle.:Even humans could accidentally stumble through an open portal.:
Ivarr swooped lower, casting his golden light over the bulbous creature’s face. My heart pounded with anxiety, terrified he might get sucked through.:Some of the dark fae use portals like this to lure in food. One way in, no way out. From the fat frog, I’d say there’s some kind of bog on the other end. Is it warded?:
Armed with both of his short, curved swords, Aidan circled the fountain, testing how closely he could get without triggering the trap.:Yeah. It’s so heavily warded that I can’t feel where it starts. It’s going to take all of us to shut it down.:
Sighing, Doran swept lower, looking for a safe place to deposit me.:I’m sorry,mo stór. I meant this to be a quick and satisfying resolution to your dismay, not yet another battle that may risk your safety. We dare not leave such a portal unguarded and open.:
:What can I do to help?:
