Chapter 30
Troy
I DRAGGED DYLAN INTO the kitchen with me. The poor guy didn’t know how to act, and I couldn’t blame him.
As we stepped into the kitchen, Dylan let out an exaggerated breath and gave me the bug eyes. “She’s actually here.”
“She is.” I poured water into an electric tea kettle and started preparing the French press. “You noticed how antsy she is, though?”
Dylan nodded. “You think she’ll try to run again?”
“I don’t know. This has to be overwhelming for her, and as much of a monster as Billy was, she viewed him as her father. Even if she won’t grieve for him, she’ll grieve her childhood that she just learned was a lie or grieve the childhood she might’ve had if she’d grown up with you.”
Dylan got the coffee mugs out and put them on the tray. “I know. What do I do to help, though?”
I’ve been thinking about it this whole time and still had no idea what would be the best course of action. The only thing I did know was that I wanted to be there for her and not just by standing guard under the bathroom window just in case she decided to climb out.
“She needs to act.” At least I knew that much. Her fight or flight response has been firing nonstop this entire time, and it wouldn’t just go away on its own. She had to act on it.
“Alright.” Dylan nodded to himself. “We need a plan. How to deal with the mob, I mean, because I don’t think they’ll give up, and if she stays here, they’ll keep coming for her.”
I looked at the door that separated me from my girl. Was she mine? Just because everything had been going well yesterday didn’t mean she’d still want to be with me, especially now that she knew I had been keeping some major secrets from her.
First things first—I had to keep her safe, and to do that, we had to eliminate the threat.
I grabbed the French press and the porcelain creamer with the mermaid’s fluke forming the handle. Dylan took the tray with the cups and the sugar, and we went back to the living room together.
Eirlys was still a giddy mess. Finding her daughter would do that. Kiora, on the other hand, was a little calmer. Were Dylan and I putting her on edge? Or was it just me?
I grabbed a chair and moved it closer to the couch instead of taking the spot next to Kiora. Dylan returned to the armchair he had been using before, probably for the same reason—we didn’t want to crowd her.
“We need to discuss what we’re going to do next,” Dylan started, and at Kiora’s nervous expression, clarified. “About the mob. You can’t keep running from them for the rest of your life, so we need to find a way to neutralize the threat.”
“Kicking ass and taking names. Let’s do it,” Eirlys agreed enthusiastically.
“How?” Kiora asked like a reasonable person—more reasonable than her mother. “They’re an international crime syndicate. Plenty of people have already tried taking them down, and they didn’t succeed.”
“We don’t have to take the whole organization down,” I pointed out. “We need to find out why they want you so badly, and then go from there.”
Her leg started bouncing again. “I don’t know why they want me.”
I switched seats, taking the spot on the couch next to Kiora. With a comforting hand on her thigh, I said, “Hey, it’s okay. We’ll figure it out. Don’t forget, you’re in a magical town. Plenty of folks here might know how to help.”
Dylan cleared his throat and gave my hand a pointed look. Oh, crap. I didn’t want to go there right now, especially since I didn’t know where Kiora stood.
I pulled away from Kiora but didn’t return to my chair.
“Again, plenty of people tried to take them down,” she repeated.
“And plenty of people succeeded in taking down parts of the organization,” Eirlys pointed out.
“So, we need to find out who exactly is after you and why. Then we can take them on personally,” Dylan concluded. “We did take down the traffickers who were transporting the supes and the ones who came here for you. They aren’t all immune.”
Kiora’s shoulders relaxed, and her knee stopped bouncing. Hopefully, she was starting to see our point. We could do this. She didn’t have to keep running. It was time to stand tall and fight.
“All I know is that phone call I overheard, but I don’t remember much from it. I was too busy panicking.”
“So, we need to find someone who can help you remember. That shouldn’t be too hard,” Eirlys said, her giddiness melting away now. This version of her was a little scary. The woman had a habit of taking down her enemies with an extra serving of brutality.
“And if there isn’t anything important in those memories? What if they just think I overheard something, but I actually didn’t?”
“Then we’ll go from there and find another way to tackle it.” I wanted to get closer again, to hold her hand at the very least. Well, what I wanted more than anything else was to know if she still wanted me to hold her hand.
“Isn’t there a mnemone potion available at the Magic Bean?” Eirlys asked.
“I’m not sure how well their potions work,” Kiora objected.
“Oh, they work,” Dylan said.
Eirlys burst into laughter, the pure joy kind. Kiora frowned at her, inspecting her clothes, her face, then the living room.
“Son of an urchin,” Kiora mumbled, then louder added, “Okay, fine, we’ll try the mnemone potion, but it better not bring back that time I got a giant zit the day I had a day with the boy I had been crushing on. That was the first time someone told me I was too gross to be kissed. It was also the day I stopped crushing on him.”
I’d seen her pictures when she was in her teens, and if I’d met a girl who looked like that when I was a teenager, a pimple wouldn’t have stopped me.
I checked the porthole clock over the mantle. The coffee shop just closed five minutes ago. It was starting to get late.
“It’ll have to wait until morning,” I said, gesturing at the clock.
Kiora looked at it, surprise registering on her face. “It’s not a mermaid clock.”
Dylan snorted a laugh.
“It’s a porthole, though. Pretty sure there were a few portholes in the cartoon.” I smiled.
Kiora talking about the little mermaid was a good sign. She wasn’t spiraling anymore. Working on a plan really was working.