What the Heart Takes (41 page)

His father cleared his throat, regaining Layne’s attention. He studied his dad’s eyes as they narrowed on him, their pale blue color sparkling with recognition. Another gaze went in Heaven’s direction and then back.

“She’s your source, isn’t she?”

The thump of Layne’s heart echoed in his ears. His face burned hotter, but not as hot as his lips when he pressed them together and swallowed hard. “What are you talking about, Dad?”

“Heaven is the source of your power, isn’t she?”

Yeah, she was, but he wasn’t sure he should be admitting to it. “Am I not entitled to privacy? My life has been an open book for years, even more so within the last year. I can’t take it much longer.”

Weary eyes gazed back at him as his father nodded. Layne couldn’t help but sense a twinge of sadness in his dad. His shoulders drooped, his eyes dulled and lowered to his folded hands. He held the position for a good twenty seconds before releasing a sigh.

“I failed you as a father, Layne. I’m sorry. I didn’t want this life for you, the life of a Keeper.”

As much as Layne hated it at times, being a Keeper gave him purpose, something he’d never had before Heaven came along. “It’s not that bad. I never thought I was cut out for the family life anyway.”

“I don’t know who you’re trying to convince, but it isn’t me. I’ve seen a Keeper’s struggle firsthand. I deal with your mom’s Keeper, Isaac.”

“Isaac? Are you talking about Isaac Snow, your neighbor?” Disbelief stung his face when his dad nodded. He couldn’t believe another of his neighbors was involved in this insane world. “What are his abilities?”

“He has nosokinesis. It’s any ability to control and create disease, bacteria, even viruses and plagues. I’ve never known him to create any, but he’s controlled many. He aids your mother in a lot of healings.”

Layne wondered how many other people he knew were involved in this secret society. He started to ask, but his dad cut him off.

“He cares a lot about your mother, but when he first came into the picture, it was a battle. His connection with your mother isn’t half of what your connection with Heaven is. Of course, they don’t share an affinity like you two either.”

“A what?” Layne had never heard that term before, and he’d heard a lot of crazy words since he’d found out about their unusual world.

“Affinities are the strongest bond a Keeper and Seeker can share, but they are very rare. They are confirmed through aura readings, which Anna does.” He tilted his head toward Anna, who was still seated on the couch beside her daughter. “She noticed the affinity in your aura, as well as Heaven’s. Affinities complicate things for a Seeker because the pull she feels for her Keeper is strong, damn strong, as in comparable to the one she shares with her soulmate.”

Layne didn’t believe it. There was no way Heaven could come close to feeling for him what she felt for Dylan. It just wasn’t possible. “That doesn’t make any sense, Dad. Soulmates are connected at the soul. How can anything be comparable to that?”

“You’re right, son, but all Keepers are connected to their Seeker’s soul. What makes things difficult for you is that you and Heaven are part of a Supreme Trinity. That, in itself, heightened your connection with her. The affinity shot it through space.”

No wonder he couldn’t stop thinking about Heaven, even while she was pregnant. He cared about
her
, not the fact that she was having a child with someone else. It didn’t give him the right to think about her the way he had, but it finally made sense.

Shifting his eyes back to his dad, he crossed his foot over his knee and began shaking it. Millions of questions ran through his mind, including two in particular. Did Heaven know about the affinity, and if not, should he tell her?

“I knew nothing about this, Dad. Is there anything else you can tell me?”

“Well, I will say this. The more you care about your Seeker—the closer you get to her—the easier it will be to protect her. You have to be in sync.”

So everyone kept saying. “How do we get in sync?”

“You have to spend time with her. Talk, about anything and everything. Get to know her. Be her friend. The rest will fall into place. If you keep denying your feelings for her, your abilities will remain blocked.”

It was yet another person confirming what Heaven had said. They
had
to deepen their friendship. Could he do it? The mere thought made his chest squeeze. How could he get closer to her? He already cared too much.

“You’re not the first person to tell me this, but I don’t trust myself, Dad. Whenever I’m around her, hell, even when I’m not, the pull I feel is overwhelming. I have a hard time keeping my hands off her.”

A part of him regretted saying the last part, but his dad surprised him with a chuckle. “I understand, Layne. The more you fight this, the worse it will get.”

Silence reclaimed the space between them as he focused on Heaven again. Right or wrong, the feelings he had for her weren’t going away. If anything, they were gaining strength, especially since the dream.

Part of him wanted to tell his father about it, but decided against it when he noticed his dad’s mouth turn downward. His eyes glistened with the moisture increasing within them.

“I really am sorry, Layne. I should have told you about this years ago, but Delia explained how she had to keep the information a secret. And the thought of telling you about your fate was more than your mother or I could bear. So we took the silent pact with Delia and hid the truth. If I’d just told you, I could have spared you the pain ahead of you.”

“What are you talking about?”

“The Keeper’s curse. Regardless of whether or not a Keeper is mated to his Seeker, he is destined to fall in love with her.”

Why did everyone keep insisting that he was in love with Heaven? He cared about her. Yeah, it was more than anyone else, but it didn’t mean it was love. “I’m
not
in love with Heaven.”

Blue eyes pinned him once more. Their pale color seemed to darken as much as the expression on his father’s face. His jaw tightened, eyes slanted, lips pressed in a thin line. Layne started to turn away, half expecting his father to accuse him of lying. Instead, his dad shook his head and said words Layne never imagined he’d say.

“If you aren’t in love with Heaven, you will be. You have to be, if you want to save her.”

CHAPTER 26

A ray of sun broke through the window blind and made its way straight to Dylan’s eyes. It, along with the heaviness in his lids, had him struggling to open them. He managed to do so after blinking a few times. The reward of his efforts came in the form of the beautiful angel lying beside him.

He trailed his eyes over her face. The sight of her beside him in their bed had his heart hammering in his chest. As he moved his eyes down her body, his lips tugged upward when he saw that she wore nothing but the blanket covering them.

Flashes of the night before played through his mind. How the minute he closed the bedroom door, she hadn’t left his arms. He didn’t remember much between pulling her close to the time they made it to the bed, but he remembered every detail of what happened after. The way he laid just behind her, holding her close. The way she worked her hips back to his, taking each of his thrusts deeper than the one before.

Her body had come alive for him, had made his do the same. It had him driving harder and faster, rocking her in a frantic rhythm. The pinch of her brows, the gape of her mouth, the sound of her voice, it sparked a current through their connection. That same current jolted through him and then her, burning them both before it finally exploded. Every sound, except her voice, disappeared. Her cries grew louder then softer as her body shuddered. Each pulse clenched around him, unnerving him until he couldn’t resist his release.

As the last of him spilled into her, he’d buried his head against her neck, losing himself in the love beating within their connection. She’d wanted him, needed him, just as much as he wanted and needed her. He would never get tired of that feeling because it meant one thing for sure. She would always be his, regardless of her connection with Layne.

The thought of his friend took his thoughts back to the earlier events of the evening. How Nicholas and Spencer informed him about the fire Layne started with his mind. He couldn’t deny that the news relieved him, nor could he deny the questions it stirred, like how long had Layne had been able to start fires. It would explain the reason his blanket and drumsticks caught on fire when he’d awakened from the dream in Jamaica.

Layne had avoided him as well as everyone else for the rest of the evening. He’d remained outside until the sun went down, had spoken little at dinner, even less when they went into the den after. He kept to himself, sitting by the bay window while everyone else talked and laughed.

His distant behavior puzzled Dylan, as did the fact that he hadn’t bothered to tell Heaven what he’d accomplished with the torch. Had it not been for Nicholas bringing it up at dinner, she wouldn’t have found out until later.

What he found even stranger was the way Heaven had little to say about Layne’s accomplishment. She didn’t have much to say to him at all. When they left the main house, she didn’t bother looking his way as they passed by. She’d been speaking with Hope, who ended up walking them to the door. Yet something in Dylan’s gut said it wasn’t the only reason. She didn’t
want
to talk to Layne.

He couldn’t say the same for his friend. The moment Heaven stood from the couch, Layne’s eyes locked onto her, following her every move. Though his gaze appeared empty, Dylan doubted the same of his mind. There were plenty of thoughts running through it.

Once Layne noticed him staring, he walked toward the kitchen where his mother went just a few minutes prior. Dylan hadn’t seen him the rest of the night, nor had he heard him return to the cottage.

The more he thought about it, the more he questioned what had happened. He could only think of one reason why Heaven and Layne would ignore each other. They’d had another argument like the one they had on the drive up from Florida. Or maybe it was something more. Maybe it was—

Buzzing filled the air. His eyes shot toward the nightstand where his phone lay. He uncurled himself from Heaven’s body and grabbed the phone, hitting the silence button. As he stared at the screen, no name showed where it normally would. The caller’s number did, but he didn’t recognize it.

He tapped his finger against the phone, half tempted to ignore the call and go back to holding his wife. Yet the nagging sensation in his gut wouldn’t let him.

His feet hit the floor a second later. He grabbed his pants off the bedpost where he’d tossed them the night before and made quick strides toward the bathroom. The door closed behind him as he placed the phone to his ear.

“Hello?” The phone balanced on his shoulder while he slipped into his pants, waiting for the caller to answer.

Silence responded. It lasted so long that he double-checked the screen to see if he’d lost the connection. The call timer continued to tick away the seconds, proving he hadn’t. When he replaced the phone to his ear, words began to echo within it. “It’s such a comfort to hear your voice again, son.”

All the blood pulsing in Dylan’s ears felt like it drained to his feet. He pressed his back against the door to keep the room from spinning. It didn’t help, nor did the coolness of the wall relieve the erratic jolts of his energy.

“How the hell did you get my number,
Dad
?”

“You know I can’t reveal my sources,” his dad taunted. “You can’t hide from me, Dylan. When will you realize that? I’ll always find you.”

“What the hell do you want?”

Cynical laughter resonated through the phone. Dylan pulled it from his ear, tempted to smash it against the wall. For all he knew, his father was tracking his GPS signal at this very moment.

Yet the nagging sensation in his stomach changed his mind. It was his intuition warning him of something. He didn’t know what and wouldn’t know if he destroyed the phone.

Plastic pressed to his ear once he brought the phone back to it. His dad’s voice chimed in a moment later. “You and I need to chat, son.”

“So talk. You have my attention.”

“Do I, Dylan?” Something rattled in the background, like paper crumpling. “This picture I’m staring at says I don’t have your attention at all. I guess I should say congratulations on your marriage.”

Knowing his dad had seen the newspaper article didn’t surprise Dylan. That it took him this long to call is what shocked him. Either he was getting better at hiding or his father was up to something.

“What do you want, Dad? I know you didn’t call to talk about Heaven.”

“That is the precise reason I called. I need to speak to you about your
wife
, and I want to do it in person.”

“Like hell,” Dylan growled. The phone creaked as he tightened his hand around it, squeezing harder.

“You should know by now that I always get what I want. You would be smart to do as I say and not cause problems.”

His threats didn’t scare Dylan. He’d heard similar ones all of his life, though his father never followed through. Thanks to his mother, and apparently Spencer, his dad couldn’t touch him. They protected him every step of the way.

Now that he was older, there was no way he’d cower down to the man who never did anything for him, short of starting his career. Even that had been for a reason. It served his father right that music did the exact opposite of what he’d intended—to make Dylan forget Heaven.

When would his dad realize that nothing would keep them apart?

Cracking the bathroom door, he gazed across the room to the bed where she lay. She remained in the same position, fast asleep and clueless to the conversation he was having. Once he knew that she wasn’t listening, he closed the door and moved toward the sink.

“If you can’t say what you want while I’m on the phone, you won’t be telling me at all. I don’t have time for your bullshit.”

The line went silent—eerily silent. He started to check the connection again, but a throaty laugh stopped him.