Shifting Shadows (Sparks Collide Trilogy) (21 page)

God, Kira was smart and she really had
thought of everything. I pictured horrified people giving eyewitness reports of
seeing a car driving itself down the road and laughed out loud. “Trust me, the
tinting was necessary.”

Trent
gave me an odd look but I ignored it.

“Like I said guys, we’ll explain later.
It’s Kira’s story too and I think she deserves a night to chill before going
into specifics.” I turned around to the seat directly behind me to see what
Kira thought about all this but all I found was her with her eyes closed. She
was sleeping peacefully, leaning against the car door. She must’ve passed right
out.

I berated myself for being such a jerk
to her. Here she was living in hiding, scared out of her mind by some enemy in
the rest stop, running for her life. And there I was giving her a hard time,
making it worse. I’d done a lot of shitty things but this was one of the
shittiest. I decided then that even if she’d done something horrible in her
past, it didn’t matter. She’d been nothing but helpful to me and try to protect
my pack. I’d also wager that she protected Uncle Eric last night from the
attacker with some sort of spell. I thought I’d smelled residual magic and now
I knew why. She’d saved all of our lives.

From now on, I was going to have her
back.

Annabella looked at Kira and then to me
“Is she ok?” she asked softly.

“Yeah, let’s just say the girl can
handle herself in a crisis.”

Annabella smirked “Well we knew that,
she handles you after all.”

“True enough. In light of the fact that
Brandon’s not here to say this, I’ll do it for him. It sucks that the snacks
never made it out of the rest stop. Who’s hungry?”

Trent
snickered. “Took the words out of my
mouth, man. Next drive-thru I see, it’s on.”

I awoke to the smell of
french
fries. I lifted my head and something dropped from
underneath it and onto my lap. I wiped at my eyes and lifted the item. It was a
sweatshirt. “Hey sleepyhead” Annabella said from next to me.

Jay turned around to face me. “French
fry?” he said as he held out the fry holder.

I grabbed one. “Yeah, thanks.” I tried
to force away the images of my dream. I was being chased by a three headed
witch that snarled as I ran in circles, while another witch sat above me on her
broomstick and laughed. It wasn’t my most creative dream but it made sense
nonetheless. I held up the soft fabric. “How’d this sweatshirt get here?”

Trent
answered “Annabella put it under your
head. I had in my backseat.” That made sense. “Thanks.” They probably kept a
lot of clothes in their cars in case they had to transform back from wolves.
Wow, that was a crazy thought. I can’t believe my new friends are shifters. I
mean I’d learned about them plenty but I’d never met any before. I sure know
how to pick ‘
em
.

“What do you want to eat? We
have…everything.” Jay said.

“Salad?”
I asked just to mess with him.

“Um, no but we can stop and get you one
but we’re almost home and-”

“I’m kidding.” I said laughing. “I’ll
take chicken fingers and honey mustard if you got it.” A bunch of bags were
thrown at me and I laughed some more. I went through them and found what I
wanted. “You guys seriously know how to eat.”

“We already ate, this is the
leftovers.” Werewolves, now it all made sense.

“Where are we, anyway?” I asked.

“Like I said, we’re almost there, about
fifteen minutes.” Jay replied.

“What time is it?” “
4:30 p.m.
on the dot.”

Annabella went for her purse and said
“Oh. That reminds me, here’s your phone, Kira. Thanks for letting me borrow
it.”

“You’re welcome.” I checked it to make
sure my parents hadn’t called freaking out. By some miracle there were no
missed calls. I texted them just to check in, like I’d said I would. Only this
time, I could say I was safe from my mom’s vision. I wanted to tell them but
that would scare them even worse.

Unfortunately, every explanation
sounded like this in my head. “Hey guys, Omg Mom was right, I was attacked but
I’m totes fine, half of those dark creatures she saw was just my werewolf
friends. Also ran into random warlock on the road trip but it’s really
NBD
and must’ve been a coincidence. No
worries. XO Kira.” Yeah…I was going to hold off on that one.  What I sent
was “Hey guys, hope your day is going well. I’m doing great. Miss you both. XO
Kira.”

I dunked a chicken finger into the dip.
“So, we’re sure we’re not being followed right.”

“100 percent” Jay said “And before you
ask
,
my beach house is completely secure. No one even
gets through the gates without permission and no one gets near the house
without setting off every alarm.”

“Great, thank you.” I sat back and
enjoyed my meal.

As we pulled up to the gates, I rolled
down my window to see more of what was in front of me, and there was plenty to
see. What Jay had described as a simple beach house, turned out to be a
sprawling ocean side manor. Complete with four stories, open windows with
balconies, and a wraparound porch deck. I’d never been to the neighborhood they
all lived in but now I wondered what it must be like. I stuck my head back in
the car “This is your
second
house?”

Smirking, Jay answered “It’s the family
beach house. It belonged to my great-grandfather.”

“It’s…beautiful.”

“Thanks. We like it.” The winding road
leading to the house was a scenic adventure. The water beyond the house
glistened in the waning sunlight and the clouds above it shifted from pink to
purple.

When we finally pulled up to the house
I got out and stood staring at the ocean. Annabella tapped me and whispered,
“Wait till you see inside.” Her eyes dancing with the same excitement I felt.
We got inside and when we entered the immense living room where everyone else
seemed to be waiting, the reactions seemed mixed. No one knew exactly how to
act or what to say.

“Hey” I said sheepishly and that
elicited smiles from Demi and Mena. They were the only ones. Max, Brandon, and
Logan were not as easily swayed that everything was fine and dandy. Jay was the
last to arrive in the room because he had gone to throw out the fast food bags
from the car.

He stepped in and said succinctly “Hey
guys, thanks for helping with our impromptu joy ride. Max, you the man. I ran
into Rosie in the kitchen and she says dinner will be ready at
6:30
. I’m going to go shower. Peace.” With
that he left.

He could do that? Well I didn’t want to
stick around either. “So who wants to give me a tour…Annabella?”

She jumped up “Sure. Let’s go.”

Relieved, we walked around the corner
and headed for the stairs. The house was truly spectacular. I’m not sure how
else to describe it. Every room was held the feel of the beach but it was
elegant and sophisticated at the same time.

When we found a room with my bags in
it, I sighed and fell onto the bed. “I guess this is your room.” Annabella
said. I smiled and felt the plush comforter beneath my fingers. “You have a
connected bathroom too.” She added.

“That’d be perfect because I need a
shower. Unfortunately I don’t think I’m ever leaving this bed.” I said lazily.

Her eyes filled with mirth “You won’t
say that once you see this bathroom.”

“Good maybe it’ll give me the incentive
I need to move at some point. Gosh, I can’t believe I get to sleep here. This
place is amazing.”

“I know what you mean.” She replied. “I
have a feeling my room is next door, hold on.” She peeked into next room in the
hallway briefly then came back “Yep, I’m next door. I just threw my bags in
there earlier and waited downstairs with everyone else so it’s still
unfamiliar.”

“Oh” I said in a dreamlike state. After
this entire day, lying here felt like heaven.

“You know…” Annabella started

“What?”

“Well, some of us think you and Jay
disappeared today because you wanted to be alone for a while.”

I burst out laughing “So we stole a car
to have a romantic tryst? Ha. I can assure we did more fighting than anything
else and it was not pleasant.”

“What’s the anything else part?” “You
know, walking in blistering heat, building a cart, walking some more. Usual
stuff”

“Dang, I was kind of hoping for juicier
stuff.”

I sat up straight. She was acting like
juicier stuff was a possibility. Had I really been so blind? It was something
to think about. “Sorry, I’m just lucky that Jay and I are still friends.”

“You’re going to have to elaborate on
that later but I’ll take your word for it.”

“Don’t worry. All will be revealed. I
promise.”

“Ok, I’m going to let you settle in.
See you at dinner.” She said, walking off.

“See you” I called out. “Wait,
Annabella.”

She turned around “Yeah.”

“I know this is kind of unfair of me to
ask but whatever I tell you tonight, will you give me a chance to explain it. I
don’t want to lose you as a friend…”

Her eyes turned serious “Sure, Kira.
I’m all ears, when you’re ready.”

“Thanks.”

“Anytime” she said as she left and
closed the door behind her.

I lay there and thought about the day.
The Warlock in the rest stop seemed like he genuinely wanted to talk but I had
an intense distrust of my kind instilled in me since birth and it wasn’t going
to break now.

I wondered, just as I’d wondered a
million times before, what I would do if confronted with the choice. Declare
myself as a light witch or a dark one, neither seemed like a viable option when
my parents had taught me to be open minded. Sure, I practiced light magic, it
was life and healing but it wasn’t everything inside of me. I accepted magic
for its whole entity because I wanted to be accepted for my whole self at least
in theory. In truth dark magic did kind of scare me a little.

I’d never wanted to use the dark arts
before but what if that changed in 20 years? How could I devote myself to only
one part knowing it wasn’t everything out there? Wouldn’t I crave for more
simply because it was no longer available to me? I knew I was naïve when it
came to the truth of magic. I’d only understood and learned what my parents and
our ancient texts taught me.

I feared a day that would force me to
choose because I knew that I wasn’t informed enough to make it, at least not
enough for my own satisfaction. On top of that if I was found, it would expose
my parents. Then, both light and dark witches would be vying for them or vying
to kill them. It would ruin everything they worked so hard to stay away from,
everything they worked so hard to keep me away from. Also, it would force us to
participate in a war and wouldn’t that just bite?

Top five best things about my beach
house

5. Open floor plan, light and air AKA
no stress.

4. Outdoor showers. What? They’re cool.

3. Far away from dad also AKA no stress

2. Water sports: Surfing, boating, jet
skiing etc.

1. Rosie’s cooking.

In that order.

I looked down at my plate of oysters
and crab legs and could have cried tears of joy. Well not really but you get
the idea. Everyone was seated around the large dining room table. As nice as it
would’ve been to eat outdoors, what Kira needed to say should be said in a
private a place as possible. Not that anyone else would be around outside but
that I wanted her to feel comfortable and safe.

We dug into our food but the usual
chatter was missing. Everyone seemed to be holding their breath. Even
Brandon
was quiet and it didn’t have to do
with the fact that he was stuffing his face because he talked with his mouthful
all of the time.

I was loading an oyster onto a cracker
when Kira finally spoke. “So I guess I should get this over with.” She paused
and you could’ve heard a pin drop. “I’m a witch… and the reason I know you guys
will believe me is because I know that you’re werewolves.”

“Wait, that’s it?” Annabella blurted
out.

Kira blinked “It’s not the whole story
but I thought I would get the main secrets out of the way.”

“So you’re not like a mass murderer?”
Brandon
asked.

“What? No-”

“You’re not a fugitive with
kleptomania?”
Brandon
continued.

“No. I had to take the car because-”

“Pay up little brother”
Logan
said proudly.

“No wait until she explains there might
be some dirt here yet.”