Chapter One #2
“It’s what Roz told me to say.” He shrugged and turned his silver gaze back on Bréagha who had a hand to her forehead.
He watched as she shook her head, and her shoulders moved.
He glanced at Cathal with a questioning look but all he got back was a grin.
He looked over at Aiden who stood beside Bréagha with a confused look, then over at Liam. “Maybe I didn’t say it right?”
Just then Bréagha couldn’t hold back her laughter, and it burst out of her.
She wiped tears from her eyes and smacked Aiden’s arm before moving across the room to the hallway where their bedrooms lay.
“Oh man, you got me this time, Aiden. Magic and other realms…. how did you come up with that? And where did you find these guys? Giants-R-Us? Good one. Well, I’m going to shower, thanks for the laughs. ”
All four men stood and watched her disappear into her room, no one moving until the sound of the shower turned on. Then they turned and looked at each other.
“She thinks this is an elaborate prank?” Liam asked from his place by the window. “Is that something you two do?”
Aiden ran his hand through his hair and scrubbed his jaw.
“Yes? But nothing like this.” He remembered the time she had hired a motorcycle club to show up at the bar every night and convince him she was about to run off with one of them.
It was to prevent him from buying the motorcycle he had been eyeing.
“Well, okay maybe, but...” He didn’t know what to say after that, so he just sat down on the comfy secondhand couch they’d found at a thrift store for fifty bucks and ran a hand through his hair.
“You might as well sit down and wait. She’ll take her time and won’t come out a moment before she’s ready.
” Liam and Cathal didn’t move, just turned back to watch the darkness beyond the windows.
Killian moved to the entrance to the hallway and stood listening for any sounds that meant Bréagha needed help.
“Maybe we should call for Roz? We really can’t stay here much longer, Killian.
” He nodded so Liam knew he heard him. This was a new situation for all of them.
Their job as Sentinels often took them beyond the Garden and into the other realms to preserve the balance between light and dark.
But recovering lost Sentinels? As far as Killian knew, that had never happened before.
He rubbed the back of his neck and suppressed a sigh.
“Call Rozengwyn. She may be easier for Bréagha to deal with,” Killian instructed Cathal who nodded.
“Good idea, she can help us transport them, knock them out if needed.” Aiden’s head snapped up at that. He started to stand but just sighed and leaned back when he saw Cathal’s grin.
“Not funny dude.” Aiden instinctively trusted these guys for reasons that eluded him now, and he was too tired to try and figure it out. He and Bréagha had spent years pouring everything they had into Phoenix Rising, working long days and even longer nights to make it a success.
“She’ll be here shortly. If there’s anything you want to take with you, you better go ahead and grab it,” advised Cathal, even though Aiden didn’t see him call anyone.
He nodded, stood from the couch and headed towards his bedroom.
It took him about two minutes to grab his go-bag, the book on his nightstand, and the gun from under his pillow.
As the product of too many foster homes than he could count, he was ready to move in an instant.
It was a habit that hadn’t left him even when he bought this building with Bréagha. He knew, even then, it wasn’t forever.
“I’ll make sure Bréagha is ready as well. She should be getting out of the shower soon; we don’t have endless hot water.” He dropped his duffle bag near where Killian stood and walked back to Bréagha’s room without waiting for any acknowledgement from the three men in his living room.
Bréagha’s bedroom was a lot more lived in and decorated than his.
She had a wrought iron bed with an old worn-out quilt.
She had painted the walls a dusky rose color and hung black and white pictures of all the things she wanted to see in the world: Stonehenge, the Eiffel Tower, Edinburgh Castle, the pyramids, Venice, Rome.
She had plants and a window seat that he had built for her to curl up and read her books on.
The most important thing was the trunk at the end of her bed; hand carved with flowers.
When Bréagha and Aiden were found on the footsteps of the local firehouse as babies, this trunk was left with them and had somehow followed them from one foster home to the next.
When some kids had their belongings shoved into trash bags, Bréagha had her trunk.
Inside had been handmade baby clothes and the quilt that was now on her bed.
There had also been a picture of a young woman with a baby in her arms. Bréagha and Aiden had both tried to find out who the woman was over the years, but neither had been able to find anything.
That picture was now on Bréagha’s nightstand and Aiden placed it carefully in the trunk, along with the faded quilt and the go bag that Bréagha also kept.
He hesitated over the pictures on the wall, not sure if he should take those as well.
“Don’t waste the space. I can always replace them.
” Aiden turned to see Bréagha standing in the bathroom doorway, the steam from the shower billowing behind her.
Her long dark auburn hair was braided to the side.
She had put on old jeans and a worn flannel over a white t-shirt with a pit bull in sunglasses instead of her usual pjs.
She knew the inevitability as well as he did.
“Whether I understand what’s happening or not, there was something real in those shadows that meant me harm.
If there’s a chance they can help us, we have to trust it.
” Bréagha sighed and ran a nervous hand over her fresh braid.
Aiden nodded then bent to pick up the trunk, thankful it was on the small side instead of a full-sized one.
“Time to say goodbye to this part of our lives. It was fun while it lasted but if there’s something we’ve both learned…nothing is permanent, change is inevitable. Not sure why I ever thought differently.” Bréagha forced a smile for Aiden’s sake then walked out of the bedroom without looking back.