Shifting Shadows (Sparks Collide Trilogy) (16 page)

“William is fine. He only needed one
bandage on his shoulder. I forced him home to shower and get some sleep.”

“Forced him?”

“Yes, that boy is as stubborn as you.
He wanted to stay but I assured him over and over that you were fine and that I
would take you home when I saw fit. Eventually, Demitria came by and picked him
up.”

“Good. I’m glad he’s ok.” I thought for
a moment then said “I’m not sure if I dreamed this or not but I think things
are better between us now.”

“I imagine you’re right if his actions
tonight are any indication. If this is true then I’m glad, for whatever the
reason that you decided to be friends again. You boys should’ve made up a long
time ago.”

I thought of Kira and being real. “I
can’t argue with you there.”

“I applaud you on your wise decision.”
He said, smiling broadly and added, “He explained to me that he used your
phone’s
GPS
to find you. It’s quite amazing how
technology works today. Now then, once you’re off of this table, you’re going
to explain to me why some hooligans ambushed you in the first place. William
didn’t have any of that information himself.”

I groaned, “It’s a terrible story, just
some punk werewolves from out of town trying to prove themselves. I’m not
innocent, I definitely started it last week with the Alpha and then I
embarrassed him but he made the fight unfair.”

“All right” he said “It’s all right.
I’m going to knock you out to facilitate the healing and I’ll finish your
stitches while you’re under.”

“That’s ok, you don’t have to knock me
out, what’s a little more pain compared to what I’m already feeling?” “As your
uncle and your doctor-”

“Which is totally unethical by the way”
I added.

“Right as the unethical man who helps
save your life on numerous occasions, I’m not going to allow you to go through
any more pain if I can help it. Putting you under is also the quickest way for
you to heal. I suggest you take my advice.”

Now that I’d just had my ass handed to
me, I nodded contritely. “I was just kidding. Do what you got to do…and thanks
for always saving me.”

“It’s not a problem. Now just close
your eyes and rest. I’m going to get some supplies out of the closet.”

I nodded again. It was slightly easier
this time.

As I pulled into the office’s plaza, I
thought I saw a light on at Bark n’ Bite. It was curious but I’d never been
here at night so maybe it was an emergency light that always stayed on. I
parked and saw Doc’s car in the parking lot. Maybe he was here. Was that
normal? I wasn’t sure. I got out of my car and walked to the office door.

As I got closer, I heard loud crashing
and banging. I froze, should I run in or run away and call the police. I
decided I had to see if Doc was ok. I couldn’t just leave him if he was in
trouble. I remembered the protective potion in my purse and got it out. I
pulled the stopper, held my nose, and chugged. The door was ajar when I came to
it and I snuck in quietly.

Doc was struggling against someone else
in the shadows. Doc went down and I panicked and screamed “Doc, no.” Before I
could think about it, I sent a lightning jolt onto the shadow and heard an
awful screech. I saw the shadow come towards me and in the dim light I made out
a male figure in black clothing. I felt the room shake as my potion repelled
him from coming any closer. The man turned away from me and in a flash, I heard
a loud piercing crash.

I saw that one of the glass windows in
the back of the room had just been broken. The shadow jumped through it and
fled. I ran to Doc and tried to conjure a tracking spell at the same time. I
sent out the spell but it was too late. The man was gone and out of range.

I pulled in the residual magic as best
I could and dropped to the floor to try to help my boss. “Doc” I cried. “Doc,
wake up.”

His head tilted towards the sound of my
voice and his eyes opened. “Kira, is that you?”

“Yes it’s me, are you all right?”

He sat up, coughing. I put my hand on
his shoulder to steady him “I’m fine. What are you doing here? Where’s James?”

I looked around frantically “Jay is
here?” I closed my eyes and wished for him to be ok.

Just as Doc yelled “James,” Jay hobbled
in unsteadily, holding his side. He looked like he’d just been hit by a truck.
Bandages covered more than half of his body.

“Uncle Eric, what happened? I…Kira,
what are you doing here?” His tone changed from concern to confusion.

Doc looked back at Jay, “I think my
boy, that she just saved our lives.”

They both stared at me then. “I. I no I
didn’t
ss
-save anything. I think I just, um just
scared him off.” I looked at the glass shards under my knees, tried to calm
myself and my magic down.

I knew Doc was explaining about the
attacker to Jay but I couldn’t focus on the words. Now that I saw both of them
were all right, I remembered that I had just sent an offensive spell on another
person. An. Offensive. Spell. I’d never done that before. I felt sick inside. I
closed my eyes, tried to gather up my magic and bury it deep into that vault in
my head. The one I imagined when I wanted to store my magic away.

I wasn’t supposed to do dark magic, I
was supposed to help and heal, defend if needed but never attack. I wanted to
cry and throw up at the same time but wouldn’t allow myself either. I had to
cover my tracks more thoroughly because residual magic still filled the air
from my spell. Focusing hard, I whispered the containment charm in my mind over
and over until all the magic remnants sparking behind my closed eyes flickered
out. When I reopened my eyes, I noticed Doc standing over me but completely
intent on Jay. I hadn’t even seen him stand up.

“Stop beating yourself up over this,
you cannot always blame yourself. We need to look at the outcome. We are fine,
focus on that.”

Jay shook his head, started to reply
“You” but his eyes flicked over me then down and he held back whatever he’d
been about to say.

Anxious now, I tried to think of
something a normal person would say in this situation “We should cc-” Get it
together, Kira. I breathed, stood. “We should call the police.”

Doc laid a hand on my shoulder, “I’ll
take care of it, go sit in my office and I’ll call some of the guys to come
pick you up, take you to your apartment.” He cut his eyes over to Jay who was
trying to pick up some broken glass “Jay sit down before you split your side
open all over again. I hadn’t gotten to finish with that wound before the
intruder came in.”

I looked at Jay’s side wound which
looked like it spanned his entire torso. I watched Jay ignore him, and then I
turned back to Doc “I don’t understand did that man do that to Jay? How does he
already have bandages?”

“No, he was previously injured. We were
here this late so I could help him a bit. The intruder came in while I was in
the middle of it. I- Jay,” he yelled, shrilly as he turned towards him. “I said
sit down before you pass out.” He made a growling noise but leaned on the edge
of the reception desk.

I nodded “Well I have my car here, so
if it’s all the same, I’m just going to take myself home. I’m fine I swear.” I
steadily lifted a hand out in front of me “See, no shaking.”

Jay spoke “Oh hell no.” his eyes, so
deeply purple they were almost black in color, pierced me. There was no way I
could miss the intense anger in them.

Doc nodded patiently “You
misunderstand, Kira. That is not why I asked I-”

Jay cut him off “The point is whoever
just attacked us is still out there. We’re not letting you drive home alone.”

I wanted to tell him that the man was
long gone by now. Gone so quickly my tracking spell couldn’t even catch him but
that wouldn’t be something I could explain. Plus his eyes told me he wouldn’t
have listened to me anyway. “Ok, I’ll wait for the guys but I’m driving my car
and they can follow me until I get home if they want.”

Doc patted my shoulder, “Understood.
Now go sit in my office and try to relax, I’m going to help bandage James’
wounds, again.”

I wanted to offer to help but they
would both notice that he would heal all too easily. “Are you sure you
shouldn’t go to a hospital, just in case?” Jay ignored me so I looked to Doc.

“He’s fine, m’dear. He just got in a
fight today. I took him here to help him because he wanted to keep it quiet.
Being the mayor’s son tends to draw attention.”

I nodded in understanding. Fighting?
This looked like more than two guys in a ring. That cut looked large and deep.
It must’ve been a knife fight. I looked over at Jay, bent forward, holding his
side together, with his brown hair flopping over his face. Strangely his wound
didn’t look half as bad as I first thought. I distinctly remember it looking
twice as large and almost fatal but now it looked somewhat bearable.

Something about that felt odd to me so
I went into my mind and slipped into sight through my third eye. After years of
training, it was as easy as throwing on a different pair of glasses but with a
few drawbacks. It was decidedly painful and became more agonizing the longer I
used it.

Immediately my world shifted into
energies and colors. I fought through the disorientation and nausea to see that
both Jay and Doc’s auras were unlike any I had ever seen. Where most people had
a dominating color and a few traces of other colors surrounding them, the auras
in front of me were continually shifting. Both the colors and shapes moved
about restlessly, unable to settle.

Surrounding Jay, three colors stood out
among the rest, a deep red, a stark black and a light blue. This meant anger,
pain, and concern. For Doc, an amber brown fought for front and center. It
meant weariness. With so many eye catching energies to distract me, I had to
force myself to zero in on Jay. Through the sight I took in every detail of him
and noticed the faint blue sparks that caressed the skin around his injuries.
It too was unlike anything I’d seen before but my best guess would be a sort of
healing magic. Like mine but also completely different, more intrinsic to him.

It had only been a few seconds but the
pain that my third eye produced was becoming unbearable. Quickly I slipped out
of the third eye into normal sight. I guess I wasn’t the only one with secrets.
I decided to deal with this later. Right now there were too many variables to
contend with and sort out. At the very least, I knew Jay wasn’t a warlock of
any kind and he would be ok.

Finally, I gained the sense to look
away because he was shirtless and I was staring. “Ok, I’ll be in the back.”

“Good” Doc said “I‘ll call when the
guys get here.”

I mumbled an “
mmkay
”
and as I turned to go, added “And Doc, you really should call the police.”

He smiled reassuringly at me and said
“I don’t think any of us want that right now.” and walked with Jay, who had
limped by me into the operating room.

That’s when I knew. Doc had seen my
magic. That he knew what I was.

This confirmed that he, and probably
Jay weren’t fully human either. It meant that we all had a lot of explaining to
do.

Most important of all, it meant whoever
had attacked them, while I knew it wasn’t a witch or warlock, might not be
human either and they had my magic all over them. This was very, very bad.

I walked out to greet the guys in the
lobby. Not in the mood to talk, I nodded toward the back office and Logan,
Will, Max, and Brandon hurried off to Doc and Kira. Will and I exchanged nods,
both understanding we would talk later.

When they were gone, I smacked a fist
into the side of the wall and it left a gaping hole, concrete crumpling to the
ground. Luckily, my hole matched all the others throughout the war torn office.

Trent
walked in, keys in hand and examined
my dent in the wall “Let me guess
,
you’re jealous of
the
perp’s
damage and trying to get your hole in the
running? You’re too competitive for your own good, man.” He smiled but I
couldn’t.

“God, Trent I was knocked out, my uncle
was taken down trying to protect me, and Kira was here. She could’ve been
killed just for being at the wrong place at the wrong damn time. Damn it.”

He tried to place a hand on my shoulder
but I moved away “It’s ok man, you-”

I cut him off, yelling “And worse the
bastard saw her and now he can go after her.”

Trent
pushed my shoulders, got in my face
“Jay, it’s not your fault. If the guy ran away when he saw Kira then he
probably has no plans to find her later. If he wanted to silence her, he
would’ve killed her then and there. Think about it, anyone could’ve found out
about you’re injuries after the club today, which I’m so sorry about by the
way. News travels fast. Someone probably thought they’d get lucky and finish
you off when you were down. They just got more than they bargained for with Doc
and then Kira entering the building.”