Trial by fire(63)

He had more scars than anyone I’d ever seen.

“I’m never quite myself before my morning walk,” he told me. “I’m sensing maybe you’re not much of a morning person, either. Care to join me?”

It was on the tip of my tongue to say no, but annoyance flashed across Valerie’s face the moment the man extended the invitation, and that made me reconsider.

“Maybe that’s a good idea,” I said.

“Maybe it’s not.” Caroline stepped out from the shadows and made her presence known. I wasn’t the only one who turned to track her progression into the room. In fact, the only two people who didn’t react that way were Valerie, whose eyes were locked on mine, and the old man, whose weathered face softened the moment Caroline appeared.

“Rule nineteen, Caro,” he said, his voice gruff. “And for that matter, twelve.”

I got the feeling that unlike the facetious “Bryn Rules” my friends like to reference, Caroline and the old man really did have a numbered list.

“Rule seven,” the girl in question countered.

The man rolled his eyes. “Fifty-three.”

That, apparently, was something Caroline couldn’t argue with, and my companion turned his attention back to Caroline’s mother. “Don’t worry, Val,” he said, brown eyes shining against white-scarred skin. “I’ll bring our little visitor back. Scout’s honor.”

With those words, he put his hand on my shoulder again and guided me to the door. This time, I didn’t resist—not because of the way he’d handled Valerie and Caroline, but because the moment he touched me, I felt a familiar sensation, like I knew him.

Like we were the same.

He’s Resilient, Chase whispered from his place in my mind. Like you. Like me.

Like us.

I tried to remember what Valerie had told me the day before, but all I could remember was the man’s name—Jed.

The two of us walked in silence, each taking the other’s measure. Once we were out of earshot of the house, Jed spoke. “Came close to flashing out in there, didn’t you?”

“Flashing out?”

He strung his thumbs through his belt loops and kept walking. “It’s what happens when people like us get backed into a corner. Smart girl like you must realize that woman was backing you into one on purpose.”

I knew other Resilients. The majority of our pack was Resilient. But this was the first time I’d met another human whose gift was being scrappy and stubborn and coming out unscathed when other people would be dead.

“I wasn’t going to lose it,” I told him.

The man grunted.

“I’m better at keeping my head than people give me credit for.”

He grunted again. “I shouldn’t have grabbed you, but she was pushing the others, and if you’d flashed out, they would have attacked.”

“She doesn’t want me dead—not if there’s a chance she could turn me into one of her little sock puppets instead.”

My use of the phrase sock puppet seemed to throw Jed for a loop, but only for a moment. “If Val can’t get inside your head, she won’t have any other use for you. Lucky for you, woman’s not the type to accept defeat. She’s been trying to get in my head going on eleven years now. Most of the time, I shake her off. Doesn’t put her in the best mood, but as long as I keep my mouth shut about it, ’bout what she’s doing to everyone else, she lets me be.”

As I processed Jed’s words, I realized that I was talking to the one person in the entire coven who was able to insulate his emotions from Valerie’s influence. From that, I concluded two things: first, that even without the others in my head, I might be able to do the same; and second, if I wanted to figure out what was really going on in this coven, my current companion would be a good place to start.

“Eleven years—is that how long you’ve been with the coven?”

Jed shook his head. “That’s how long she’s been with the coven. She showed up on our doorstep, same way you did, with a little blonde moppet in tow. Cutest kid you’d ever seen—real solemn, except when Valerie wanted her otherwise. Two months after the two of them showed up, Valerie married Wes.”

“Wes?”

“He was a good kid,” Jed said. “Great leader. I’d been with him since he was seventeen. He was the one who talked me into finding others like us. He found them, saved them, made them family.”

Your coven has lost someone. You must have loved whoever it was very much. The words Ali had used to spur the psychics into showing their hand echoed in my mind.

“He’s the one who got killed by a werewolf?” I said. Doing the math, I hit a snag. “He wasn’t Caroline’s father?”