Team Changes by Erin R Flynn

19

I woke but didn’t want to. I was cleaned up and on my bed… With my head on someone’s lap? Someone moved me. A woman was shaking me. She wouldn’t stop until I could finally focus on her.

Nora. Nora was shaking me and saying something over and over again.

“He’s alive.”

Who? Who was alive? What did that matter?

Why wouldn’t she stop shaking me?

Then she slapped me. Hard. It cleared the fog for just a moment, and I heard what she was trying to tell me right before the haze started to roll back.

“Kristof is alive and fine, Inez!”

That pushed everything back. I could focus better. Not a lot, but enough to move off her lap, which made her sigh, looking relieved. I had so many questions, but one kept pushing the others aside.

Why wasn’t he there then?

She seemed to understand and cupped my face. “We were worried you would think him a ghost. You wouldn’t me, so I sent the men away. Listen to me and focus, love. You can take your time on the rest but listen to me now. I’ve done what you have and injured the men I’ve loved. We all have. That power is one every princess gets. You are not a monster or alone.”

That was what I needed to hear. I didn’t even know it, but I did, and I collapsed back to her, hugging her around the waist with as much strength as I could.

“I will teach you control, little lass,” she promised, kissing my hair. “I didn’t know it happened with James. I’m sorry you are in so much pain and with no one to guide you. We will now as family should. We’d planned to, but you are so powerful so young. I was fifty when I first did it.”

I gave the barest nod I heard her as tears of relief leaked out my eyes onto her elegant dress. Nora was always elegant, and I didn’t give a fuck if I ruined her dress. I’d get her a new one if she wanted.

She waited until I settled a bit before helping me to sit back up, searching my eyes and moving as if to try and make me focus on her. So I did my best to. “Inez, I know it’s upsetting, but I need to know if Safie and Bahati are haunting you. Are you seeing them, love?”

I still couldn’t bring myself to make my mouth work. I swallowed loudly and tried, but it was a half-assed attempt if I was honest because I didn’t want to talk about it or deal with it.

I also didn’t know the answer.

She moved so she was sitting on her feet and our knees were touching as she pulled me up some. “Inez, I have been where you are. I know the pain you feel because I have too. Every princess has. We all break, and that is why I say take your time, but on this, I need an answer. I need it to help you, so even if you’re too tired—I know you’re so tired—I need you to fight and tell me, and I’ll figure it out.”

I could do that. That was okay to manage when she was doing so much to help me and the coven, promising to do more as I needed even. I swallowed again and forced myself to speak, ignoring how rough my voice sounded. “I don’t know, Nora. I thought I was cracking. I saw Safie once but not with the other ghosts.”

It took me a bit because of how exhausted I was, but I managed to tell her how I saw Safie before I took Kristof’s vow. It wasn’t nuts to think it was the blood loss or all the stress… Or maybe worry I was going a bit crazy from all the crazy around me.

But then it was Safie again. I had been expecting Bahati, but I’d never seen a ghost a second time.

And one had never injured me. I told her the truth and that I thought I’d finally lost my mind, and the ghosts had cracked me. That was maybe why I was so destroyed when I saw James with that leopard.

Because I didn’t blame him. I didn’t blame any of them for not wanting me or walking away. Honestly, the more I told her, really confessed what I’d been holding in, the easier it was to talk and get it out, even if I felt my tank completely drain.

“My poor darling,” she whispered as she held me when I was done. “I do not know the answers on the ghosts, but you are not cracked. You broke and will pull yourself up stronger as I have, and so have princesses before you. You have learned hard lessons too fast, and I’m so sorry you’ve had to. I wish none of us ever did, but that is not life.

“I understand exactly how you feel on the idiots. Everyone expects so much of us—demands it even—and then judges us so harshly. We are demanding. We are over the top. We are hysterical or too much. We are too burdened, and that explodes when we are not supported. It is why we are supposed to have so many husbands to help us if the dolts pay attention as they should. None of this was you.”

“I can’t be blameless in everything,” I argued weakly, exhausted to the max again but in a different way.

“No, you carry some responsibility, but you were naïve. You didn’t understand. You were scared. They were idiots. There’s a difference.”

If she said so. I found it best to agree with Nora.

Even if it seemed self-serving.

“I don’t know what to do next.”

“Next, you see the man you love and let him tell you what happened,” she said gently. “He didn’t listen to me to give us space and has been listening in the stairwell, so he knows about the ghosts now and will understand. I don’t know the answers, but we will find them or find a way to help you. Maybe purify that feckin’ bathroom. The rest, I can’t tell you what to do.”

That wasn’t exactly a Nora-type answer. “What would you do?”

She smirked at me. “I would make them all grovel and squirm for the rest of their immortal lives and punish them severely. What I would do if I was you is sit down and listen to each of them once you’re up to it. Your situation is so volatile here, that everything blows up. That is what needs to stop.

“You are not—you’re not built for that, lass. You’re a quiet one who doesn’t want to start trouble nor live in drama. So it’s time to figure out how to sidestep some of that. Get a counselor in here to work through some of the issues, or Jaxon told me you liked reading to find your own answer. There have to be a billion relationship books you can find.

“That’s what I would do if I was you. I would figure out what I want. You give so much of yourself to them to make your relationships work that you never stop to ask for what you need. What do you need from them, Inez?” She sighed when my eyes welled up with tears. “It’s not an easy answer or thing to do, believe me. I struggle with the same still.”

“I know it’s not, and thank you for saying that, but… I don’t know who I am, Nora. I never know what to say because I don’t know what I need. I’m always winging everything.”

“Oh, little lass, you know more than you think,” she whispered. “You hate sleeping alone after all you’ve been through. And to have them switch out on you. Even I know that. If you would have stopped sooner and put yourself first, you would have seen that. You lived on the run with everything changing constantly. The thing you need most is consistency. You need anyone in your life to be a rock, not a flake.”

I nodded, leaning in and kissing her cheek while thanking her. “I’ll think about this. I really will.”

“But you need to see him.” She gave me a look that she understood. “Forgive yourself, because they did the moment it happened. They know the risks of being around someone powerful. You are worth it to them.” She waited until I nodded, kissing my hair before she moved off my bed.

And then he was there. He stood at the end of it, completely fine. I stared over every inch of him before ducking my head in shame and quietly sobbing.

“I’m fine, my love,” he whispered as he joined me on the bed and pulled me onto his lap. “I’m fine. We’re fine. Please, no more tears.”

“You were dead,” I choked out. “There was no life in your eyes. Your body was shredded, and your eyes were dead.”

“I’m so sorry you thought that and it looked that way,” he rasped. “I wasn’t. I wasn’t even close, Inez. You cut us, but you also shocked us. That was it. It was the electrical charge that made me like that. I swear it wasn’t a big deal.”

Now I knew he was lying because the others I’d done that to said it hurt like a bitch.

“Yes, it hurt,” he sighed when I cried more. “It hurt a good deal, but only for a moment, and we’ve all survived much worse. You didn’t get all of us, just those few closest to you before Vitor put up a barrier around you. We know how to help you with this now that you’ve developed the power. It’s simply early.”

“I thought I absorbed Safie and Bahati’s powers when I killed them, their evil with it, and that’s why I saw them in a way I don’t other ghosts. I thought that’s why they didn’t want to be with me.” I wasn’t sure if he kept up with that, but I kept crying and telling him more.

Until I was just empty. I finally got it all out in a way I’d needed to for a while.

I fell asleep with him, but it wasn’t for long because he woke me up smiling down at me. The confusion must have been on my face because he answered my unasked question.

“You were muttering about food in your sleep.” He brushed his lips over mine. “I have missed your voice, Inez. I love your voice and when you talk to me. I could listen to you talk to me forever.”

I felt my cheeks heat and snuggled against him. “And knowing you, you made poor Nick change whatever he had planned so I get the food I was muttering about.”

“Oddly enough, we were already having cheeseburgers and fries because he knows you well and loves you, so he wanted you to feel better,” he replied easily. “But he was more than happy to whip up a few cakes and was very happy to hear you like his pasta salad with the crab so much.”

I snorted. “Only idiots don’t. Everything Nick makes is amazing.”

It was Kristof’s turn to snort. “Asparagus?”

“It’s not Nick’s fault that shit is gross. He cannot be held accountable for that.”

“Of course. Very fair.” He rolled us so he was on top of me, staring down with a smirk. “Peas?”

“Again, not his fault.”

“All beans?”

I opened my mouth but then closed it. “I’ve liked a few. Again, not his fault. I blame years of forcing gross, expired, canned ones in my mouth for survival. I kinda liked the grilled brussels sprouts, so I might come around on those, but some people had caustic toots after that, so I think we need to leave them off the menu.”

He narrowed his eyes at me dangerously even as his lips twitched. “That’s not nice to say about your husband, My Princess.”

“I wasn’t,” I giggled, knowing he did go in that category though. “I meant Sisay.”

“Yeah, that was unreal,” Moon said from the doorway and then chuckled. “He blamed the oil they were cooked with or whatever the drink was but dayumn.”

I glanced over at him and started laughing too. Kristof joined in, and then we were rolling. This was what we needed more of.

Not talking about anyone’s gas or issues to pick on, but to simply take a moment and laugh at how silly it was the ancient vampire could stink up any room if he had brussels sprouts. It was so ridiculous, and we needed more time-outs.

When we stopped laughing, I asked for a shower, being a brat and letting Kristof completely wash me. I soaked up all the attention and touches knowing full-well he enjoyed it.

“Does this mean I get to pick out what you wear?” he asked when we were done.

I nodded. “You have been.”

He winced, trying to hide it as he dried me off. “That was necessity, not fun with your permission.”

“I’m sorry.”

“I’m sorry I didn’t see you were suffering more.” He shook his head when I went to argue. “You pay attention and notice so much with everyone as much as you can. We’ve all been too distracted. This was a much needed wakeup call to remember what we have is precious and to not race for better. That was the mistake the world made last time. The apocalypse should have taught us this.”

I nodded but then shrugged. “People are desperate to latch on to anything they can of the way things were before. I can understand that.”

He gave me a sad look and kissed my nose. “You don’t though, and that’s why you’re amazing. You don’t remember before, and yet you accept how people need things. Please know we feel the same, and that’s why we accept how you are and what you need.” He let out a shaky breath. “If you tell us. Please tell us, my love. I’m a stupid, stupid man who can’t figure out much. Tell me what to do.”

“Okay, I’m the smart one,” I teased, tears burning my eyes too. I was trying to lighten the mood, but I heard him… For real, maybe, this time. He wouldn’t get upset or annoyed. He wouldn’t leave me or disappear. He wasn’t uninterested in me or didn’t care.

He simply didn’t know what to do or the right thing.

Didn’t I feel that all the fucking time?

I thought about what he and Nora had really said while we finished getting ready. “I would like to eat, try etching glass again so I don’t let my anxiety build how it went the first time and talk myself out of doing it, and then I want to see something pretty before I spend the night protected and loved in your arms. That’s what I want. Maybe pie.”

“We always have to add dessert. I would have guessed brownies.”

“A good choice I make often, but I should have more fruit too,” I teased, knowing full well that so much sugar with the fruit pretty much killed anything healthy about it.

We ate in the small dining room, and he told me what had happened, who I’d hurt, and made sure I knew how quickly they’d recovered. It was dinnertime, so I’d passed out through lunch. He also informed me they’d fed from people just to be ultra-safe… Making sure to tell me who he fed from so I knew they weren’t women.

Smart man.

I didn’t say much, feeling a bit pressured to now that I was talking again. Honestly, it was exhausting, and I just didn’t want to. There wasn’t really anything to say, and I was glad Nora joined us. She kept giving me supportive looks like I was doing fine and to remember what she’d said. Easy enough.

“Another week of you recovering, and we’re going to start working on that power,” she said gently. “I warn you, the training is not fun, but it’s tried and tested to be the easiest way if you simply push through it. It keeps us from hurting anyone.”

I bobbed my head, swallowing my next bite loudly. “Why that power? Why the ability to cut people from a distance. It seems odd we all have that as something we can do.”

She gave an elegant one-shoulder shrug. “Some think it’s another form of punishment and visible to help us keep order. My family has a legend of the first princess almost losing her tree in an attack, and to spare it and her daughter, who was a princess, she unleashed all of her power at once and cut down the invaders in half. It killed her, but that self-destruct was given to all of us to save our trees.”

“Lovely,” I sighed.

We finished dinner, and then Kristof took me to an actual glass warehouse he’d found in raiding a while ago. They had saved it for later since not much was damaged inside, and the glass was meant for buildings like the one yesterday… The ones we planned to build.

Instead, now I had hundreds and hundreds of canvases to play with in a way. Vitor had gotten in on the idea as there were a lot of energy beads there that I could tell were also glass. Probably colored glass so I didn’t feel limited.

I thanked him and went over to the first huge piece of glass set off to the side, clearly set up for me as a gentle push. One from Kristof. It was obvious as I glanced back at him and he looked relieved I was ready to try.

And it made me realize he was who I also wanted to try. My first attempt—while traumatizing me—captured a moment in time. I wanted to do that again but a better one.

It took me several moments to think, but then I smiled, locking on the one I wanted most. I focused on the details of the night months and months ago when I’d seen him walking out of the lake and thought he was the most beautiful and dangerous man I’d ever seen. I’d still wanted to touch him even if he’d bite me, and I was struck stupid with how attractive he was.

But also, the scene. That lake had been gorgeous. The moon had been huge and shining down on the water in way that all made it seem like the best dream. I remembered how the water ran over his body when he pushed his hair back and the way his muscles moved.

I remembered all of it as I pushed my power into the glass.

“Is that how you see me?” Kristof rasped when I was done.

I opened my eyes and slowly smiled. It was exactly how I remembered it, some blue glass infusing in the picture somehow. I nodded. “You were so beautiful; I couldn’t believe it. I wanted to touch you, even if you would bite me, and you looked so perfect that night. It was as if the lake and moon were there to back you up. You were the night, and they simply were a part of that.”

“You were perfect,” he argued as he hugged me. “You are perfect. I cannot believe you saw me that way when I bullied you and leered at you like a dog. I was a dog who made sure to be naked around you so—”

“Don’t pick on our courtship,” I whispered as I turned and kissed his cheek. “It meant everything to me, even the bumps.”

“You mean everything to me, My Princess.”

“Good. Then I believe you promised me pie and snuggles.”

He flinched. “Are you tired?”

The “already” was hanging there even if he didn’t say it. “This wasn’t tiring, but I was already exhausted. Nora made it clear baby vampires need all the sleep, so I’m going to start having it.”

He nodded, and after sneaking a kiss and taking another look at what I’d made, carried me back home.

I got my pie and snuggles… And a few days later, James got that conversation I guess he’d been talking about when I was out of it.

We somewhere far, a place of his request. I wasn’t sure where, but Petre wasn’t shocked at the location, so I had a feeling he’d been there before and maybe with James. I was even more curious when he set out a blanket under a tree after setting down several cooler totes of food Tian had brought with.

While Kristof had carried me, and Moon flanked him. I now had four guards all the time. I didn’t blame them nor argue the change. Something was definitely up, and being smarter meant we all survived. I couldn’t preach that and not follow it.

I sat down when James gestured for me to go ahead, and then he joined me. I accepted the drink and container he handed me, watching him carefully. Then I couldn’t take it anymore. “I’m sorry I almost killed you.”

He froze in what he was doing and slowly looked at me, his golden eyes shining with emotion. His caramel hair had grown out since we’d met and now was long enough to fall in his face. He let it, clearing his throat and sitting next to me. “You don’t have a thing to apologize for. I’m sorry you went through what you did. I’m sorry I pushed you there.”

I didn’t know what to say to that, glad he didn’t hate me at least. Maybe?

“I love you, Inez,” he whispered.

It was my turn to freeze and slowly look at him. I couldn’t hide my shock. I imagined he had a lot to say to me but not that. I never thought that. “Liar.” I flinched, not having meant to say that.

“I’m not, and I think you know me well enough to know I wouldn’t lie about that,” he argued gently. “I do love you. I am in love with you.” He let out a slow breath and turned to stare out at the scenery. “I used to love this place. It was one of the best places to see the city from a distance, but you could still see the New York City skyline.”

I blinked out at the nothing, and my heart ached for him. There was nothing but… Nothing. I could see some fields that clearly must have been outside of the city, but after that was not a damn thing in the distance. Wow. “I’m so sorry.”

He nodded. “We lost everything when we learned NYC was gone. Trisha and I had to keep going since we were high-ranking, but we collapsed after we found out. We still lost so much, but you gave us back Vance. And Callum, Asher, Wolfe, and Wilson. We will forever be indebted to you for that. I know you have a special place in both of our hearts because of it.”

I focused on my food, not wanting to be special to him because of that but glad he appreciated it.

“I was raised to lead my clan. It was never going to be this early and like this, but I was groomed to take over.” He let out another slow breath, and then I saw him turn towards me out of the corner of my eye. “Yes, my hesitancy towards you in the beginning, was because you’re a princess. Then I saw you’re not like the ones I’d heard about and even more, I saw the system from the other side.

“But there are still a lot of vamps that see shifters as second-class.” He waited until I gave a slight nod. I hated it, but he wasn’t wrong. Our coven wasn’t like that, but clearly, the world still sucked at times. “It seemed stupid to think to get real with someone that I would have to put up with that shit to be next to them. You couldn’t kick the ass of every court that treated me like your pet because we dated.”

I snorted. He didn’t have enough faith in me if he said that.

“You would, but it would put others at risk.”

I shook my head. “So was standing up for Trisha and the others who those assholes were treating like food and whores. Anything we do can get us into shit, James. I’m not letting any of us be treated like shit. That’s not how we roll, and we stand together on that. None of you guys let me take slights either. The fight is worth it.”

“You’re right,” he agreed after a minute. “I didn’t see it then or think that logical, but we do. I also didn’t know you as well then.” He waited for me to nod again. “I’m still the head of a clan, Inez. So it wasn’t about you being a princess, but a vamp. I should have… We should have had a conversation, especially after you crashed with me.”

“I tried to,” I whispered. “You ghosted me.”

“Maybe. I was worried I’d reach for you more or get in the way.” He blew out a harsh breath. “I’m not a noble, sexy bite. I’m an Alpha, head of a clan now, and we don’t share well. I don’t want to share my mate. Not ever.”

I bobbed my head, knowing that. “If I was a shifter, you wouldn’t have to, and I could have your kids.”

“Yes, but I meant what I said to you, that if you were a shifter, you wouldn’t be the Inez I know. That is the woman I fell for. I needed you to know that. You deserved to know this wasn’t play for me, and my feelings are real.”

“But?” I wondered when it seemed there was definitely more.

“But I thought it was just me, and I was a bastard how I handled all of this. I thought I fell, and you were maybe interested in something if I gave you a green light. You didn’t seem… I’m sorry. I swallowed down what I felt because I couldn’t give you what you would want. I didn’t know you were there with me.”

I was still reeling that he loved me. One of the guards would have busted him if he was lying to me, and James was right that he wasn’t a liar. No way he lied about that.

However…

“And that woman?” I asked, my tone going frosty.

He cleared his throat. “When we were attacked and I watched you pass out from saving us, I almost lost my shit. I was worried I was going to do something I couldn’t—that would ruin everything. I thought Trish was right, and maybe it was time to move on and—”

“Trisha thinks you shouldn’t be with me?” I rasped, tears immediately filling my eyes. “I thought she liked me.”

“She does. Inez, right now, she loves you a whole lot more than me,” he promised, reaching over and trying to take my hand. He stopped when I pulled away. “She said I didn’t deserve you if I was going to be selfish and to get my head on straight. She didn’t want me to hurt you, so she said have some flings and leave you alone. She’s on… She loves us both.”

That sounded like Trisha. I could accept that. “So she was going to be a fling to forget me?”

“That was the idea in my drunk head. Yes. I thought a non-vampire would be better than a vamp that wasn’t a princess.”

I bit back a sigh for several reasons but mostly because another idiot thought getting drunk would help anything. “So where does that leave us?”

“I don’t have a fucking clue, and I need to do a lot of soul-searching before I have any idea. I don’t know if I can be what you need, and I won’t hurt you like some of them have. I won’t let myself promise everything because I love you like we live in a bubble. We don’t. We both deserve better than that.”

Well, at least I respected him for that even if it hurt. I accepted that as an answer.

For now.