Octavian's Undoing (Sons of Judgment) (36 page)

His eyes narrowed. “That is highly unlikely. I turn into a very large fish once a month and you accepted me. Rest assured that there is nothing you could have possibly ever done to make me feel any different than I do right now.”

“It’s different,” she whispered. “You can’t change what you are. I can, but I choose not to.”

He frowned. “All right.” Taking her hand, he guided her to the steps and pulled her down beside him. “Okay, now tell me why you can’t be with me.”

Riley knitted her chilled fingers together and stuffed them between her thighs. “My mother left when I was five,” she told him, picking her words carefully. “She decided one day that she wasn’t ready to be a parent to two children, so she packed up and never looked back. It’s been me and my father ever since.” She hesitated, staring hard at her sneakers as though they could save her from having to say the rest. They didn’t. “My father…” She blew out a breath. “He’s a… he’s not exactly like most fathers. He’s not a bad father,” she said quickly, afraid he might get the wrong impression. “He’s just… irresponsible. Most of my life, the duty of making sure we had a home and food always fell on me, because he couldn’t keep a job. Whether he doesn’t want to or he can’t I guess doesn’t matter. I never made friends or had a relationship because I was always afraid people would notice just how bad things were at home. I dated a few times, but I always broke it off as soon as it started getting serious and I… I couldn’t handle it. I dropped out of college shortly after to support my father. I’ve basically given up everything and I’ve accepted that I can never have anything because he will always need me.”

She hadn’t meant to spill her heart and soul out to him, but he sat there so quietly, so patiently, listening to everything she said, something no one had ever done, that she couldn’t stop.

When she finally finished, she glanced up at him, petrified to see his reaction, but desperate at the same time.

He sat perfectly still, eyes narrowed thoughtfully as he stared across the lush clearing towards the other side. He had his fingers laced between his knees as he leaned forward on his elbows. It was impossible to guess what he was thinking.

“Please say something,” she whispered.

At long last, he flopped back onto his hands. “I’m trying to understand why we can’t be together.”

Riley gaped. “Didn’t you hear me?”

He nodded slowly. “Yes, but none of explained why you want to leave me.”

“I don’t
want
to!” she exclaimed. “But I have to.”

He turned his head to her. “All right, but why?”

Riley moaned, scrubbing at her forehead with the tips of her fingers. “Because I can’t leave my father, Octavian. Ever. By the time he’s passed on and I’m finally free to have a life, I’ll be in my seventies while you… you’ll continue to look twenty. Are you really willing to wait that long for me?”

He remained pensive for a moment as he mulled over her words. His voice was gentle and unwarrantedly patient. “If what you want from me is to wait, I’ll wait. I’ll wait forever for you. There’s no question of that. I’m yours, Green-eyes, and I’ll be yours until the day I die.”

“Riley?” Kyaerin smiled when Riley blinked and brought the other woman and the quiet little bistro they sat in back into focus.

“Sorry?”

Kyaerin chuckled. “You’ve been so preoccupied this afternoon. Is everything all right?”

It was on the tip of her tongue to lie and brush away the clinging pieces of her decision sinking sharp little burs into her. In the security of her mind, pushing Octavian away had been the right thing to do. It was better for him, but in the end, it was all about her heart and how much pain it could afford to suffer when he walked away. She didn’t think she could stand it. Already she had fallen so far and so fast for him that being apart was the equivalent of bathing in hot oil.

“Yes.” She nearly choked on the single word.

Kyaerin’s neatly plucked eyebrows furrowed, knotting together in the center to form a small crease. “Is it because I asked you for lunch?” she asked, hesitant. “I know this must be a bit awkward for you, having lunch with the mother of your mate and all, but—”

“No!” Riley blurted. “It’s not you. I just…” She sucked in a gulp of air. “I kind of had an argument of sorts with Octavian and…”

“Ahh!” was all Kyaerin said, sitting back. “Can I ask what it was about?”

Why not? She’d said this much. Might as well flay the rest of the fish… Riley grimaced at the analogy, especially considering the woman across from her was part fish.

Riley took a deep breath and rehashed the entire story she’d told Octavian. There was genuine understanding in Kyaerin’s warm blue eyes when she finally finished, which was not what Riley had expected. Truthfully, she wasn’t sure what she thought the other woman would do or say. She expected a whole lot of yelling, maybe some scolding, but not sympathy.

“I know this is hard for you,” Kyaerin murmured, reaching across the small, glass table separating them to take Riley’s hand. “Honestly, it wasn’t all that easy for me either when it first happened to me. I was elated, of course, but I was also wary and terrified. I’d known Liam for most of my life growing up. He was, what you humans would call, the boy next door and we did not get along. Every female, human and Selkie, within a hundred miles wanted him and he loved it. He broke hearts like it was a free for all shoe sale. He was so arrogant and nauseatingly charming. I wanted to drown him, if it were a possibility.”

Riley grinned. “So how did you go from hating him to, well…?”

“Loving him?” Kyaerin smiled, her eyes glowing with adoration. “I really was trying to drown him.”

Riley laughed. “What? How do you drown a Selkie?”

Kyaerin’s grin was mischievous. “He wasn’t in his Selkie form. You see, we’re essentially human without our tails. We need air to breathe and food to eat and unsalted water to drink. So, when I saw him tangled with some human girl on the beach, I gave into my urges and… well, anyway. Long story short, the moment I touched him, it was like I was zapped by lightning. I felt every pulse of his body course through me as though we had melted away and were replaced with a single body between us. His every breath was mine and his heartbeat strummed through me. I felt like I had died and been reborn all over again. It was incredible.”

Woven into the story, Riley leaned forward, resting her elbows on the table and her chin in her hands. “What happened then?”

Kyaerin shrugged. “I told him to stay away from me.”

Riley blinked. “What? I thought you said—”

“And I meant it, but just because you imprint doesn’t mean your life magically stops and you suddenly belong to this other person. It’s just like any other relationship. You need to work at it and help it grow. It’s more of an enhancement of the feelings you already have, a booster if you will. It guides you to the person you were meant to be with. It’s a commitment between souls. A Selkie can go their whole life without finding their mates and they’ll go mad or die from heartbreak. A Selkie without a mate is like a world without sunlight. It’s cold and lonely and bleak.”

“Octavian told me that finding me was like finding summer after a long, hard winter,” Riley murmured. “I thought he was just being poetic.”

Kyaerin shook her head. “I wish I could somehow explain this all better for you. It’s more complicated with you because you’re not one of the Veil Creatures. You don’t feel the imprint the way we do, not until you’ve ascended. Right now, that block is keeping you from truly feeling the full power and beauty behind the imprint, while at the same time, Octavian is feeling everything. For him, you are the center of his universe, but he can’t be with you. He can’t touch you or hold you. He can’t wipe your tears or comfort you when you need it, and that, for a mated Selkie, is the worst sort of torture. It’s like being deep fried in hot oil but being denied the luxury of death. So if it feels like he’s pushing too hard, too fast, it’s not because he’s trying to be controlling. He honestly can’t bear the thought of being without you.”

Riley turned her gaze away, guilt burning her stomach lining like battery acid. “He hasn’t pushed me,” she whispered. “He’s been so patient. I’m the one who’s the problem.”

“That isn’t true,” Kyaerin said at once. “How can anyone expect you to just jump into all this with both feet when the rest of us were born with the knowledge of our path? I think once we get that block removed, things will be different.”

“I don’t think it will be.”

Kyaerin frowned. “Why not?”

Riley, not wanting to rehash the entire thing over again, said simply, “I just really need to find a way for this imprint thing to stop so Octavian can find someone else.”

Kyaerin pursed her lips together in a line of distress. “Sweet girl, it doesn’t work that way. You can’t un-imprint. You can ask Octavian to find someone else, but knowing my son, he would never do that and I really don’t think you want him to either. Can you honestly tell me you’ll be all right with seeing him with another woman?”

No.
There was no thinking necessary. The very idea made her want to punch someone, preferably the faceless woman.

“So what should I do?”

Kyaerin reached over and lightly touched Riley’s hand. “You do what you feel is best.” Kyaerin smiled, plucking up her menus. “Now, what do you think looks good, hmm?”

Riley followed suit, picking up the plastic encased booklet and flipped through it without really seeing the meals displayed. Everything looked unappealing when her stomach was in knots. She wished she’d had the guts to postpone her lunch with Kyaerin to a time when her life wasn’t so complicated. Granted, she had no idea when that would be when the whole imprinting thing wasn’t something she could switch off. What worried her most was the fact that she didn’t want to switch it off. She didn’t want to stop being so important to Octavian. She didn’t want to not be a part of his life. Whenever she tried to picture her life without him, it was like standing in a cold, dark room. She couldn’t bear it. She wanted Octavian. She wanted to be with him and be a part of him.

So what the hell’s stopping you?
The voice asked.

What wasn’t stopping her? He said he’d wait for her forever, okay great, except he had forever. She didn’t. By the time her father passed away and she was finally free, she’d be old while Octavian continued to look like he’d just crossed the threshold to his twenties. What was the point then? Then there was the fact that he couldn’t touch her without gloves on and if all that wasn’t bad enough, she was going to die if she didn’t finish ascending. It was all just too much.

“Riley?” Kyaerin was watching her. “Still with me?”

Riley mentally shook her head. “Yes, sorry. I was just looking at the…” She squinted at the open page on her menu. “Drinks…” she finished lamely.

Kyaerin chuckled. “You were staring so hard at them I was beginning to wonder what they’d done to offend you.”

Riley snapped the menu shut and set it down on the table. She used the tips of her eight fingers to scrub at her forehead. “Kyaerin, I am so sorry.”

“For what, Riley?”

Riley raised her head to focus on the woman across the table. “I’m not usually so scatterbrained.”

“Well, you have quite a bit on your mind. I can understand—”

Riley shook her head. “No, that’s not an excuse. I’m being rude. You must think I’m the worst person in the world.”

“On the contrary.” Kyaerin rose from her chair. “Why don’t I get us some tea and I’ll tell you why.”

With an affectionate smile to Riley, Kyaerin moved to the glass counter across the room, her sensible suit in caramel moving flawlessly around her perfect frame. The calming lights overhead shimmered in her curls, making the strands gleam like polished gold. She looked beautiful and every bit the business woman she was. Riley wondered if she could ever pull off looking that amazing in an outfit and nearly laughed. No one could pull of elegant and sophisticated like Kyaerin Maxwell.

A moment later, she returned with a moony-eyed boy of about nineteen trailing after her like a lost puppy. He carried a brown, plastic tray laden with cups, a steaming teapot, a platter of tiny sandwiches and a small bottle of honey. He practically tripped over himself setting everything in front of them, then took a step back with the tray clutched to his chest as he stared at Kyaerin.