Lord King (The King)

So what did this mean for me?

If Ten Club was never created, Victor Escorcia probably would have gone to jail long before he crossed paths with Mom. She might still be here today. Dad would be a completely different man with a different life. A happy one.

Who wouldn’t want that? Except… My eyes teared up again, realizing if the Seers went through with this plan, I would never meet King. He’d die, as he was meant to, thousands of years ago. He’d be nothing more to me than a footnote in one of the hundreds of history books I’d read.

I circled my hand over my stomach. No King meant no baby. Not this one, anyway.

I slowly walked to the living room and sank back down on the couch. I felt like I’d been hit in the heart with a three-thousand-year-old sledgehammer.

Everyone had been lying to me. King, the Seers, Ariadna. Everyone except Ansin. How ironic since he was a Ten Club member, and the Seers had warned me to steer clear of him.

They probably just didn’t want him getting in the way of their plans. Ten Club members were notorious collectors of people and objects with power. Ensuring King killed the three remaining members, Ansin being one of them, would help keep Ariadna safe until she was ready to carry out her task.

In fact, now that I thought about it, King would never have stayed for me. But for his daughter? Of course he’d stay. It would be what Mia would want because King was powerful and ruthless. He would be the protective father Ariadna needed until her destiny came calling.

That’s what this “penance” crap is all about. The Seers wanted King to do some cleanup and then protect Ariadna. The rest of their story, about him paying penance and “erasing his footsteps,” was bullshit. Sort of. They really did want that to happen, but King had no idea his role would be guarding the only person capable of making it happen. A new reality.

That new reality would include King taking his place as the Seer lord three thousand years ago, as he was meant to do.

I whooshed out a breath and threw my head back on the sofa. I can’t believe this. The pieces fit so neatly together that if it weren’t for my Seer abilities, I would be calling myself crazy. But I had no reason to doubt the visions I’d seen and what I felt.

The question was, now that I knew the truth, what would I do?

Once again, I was the girl with all the questions and none of the answers.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

After hitting a dead end, I decided it was time to go home to Tallahassee. Dad had no clue about any of the crap going on, but he was the only person I trusted now.

Would he believe me? Or would he nod reassuringly while secretly thinking his daughter had lost her shit? I prayed for the former, because I had to make a choice. An important one.

Letting things play out as the Seers intended meant having a baby and raising her and loving her and protecting her, while knowing she would eventually leave me. I would forget her the moment a new reality took hold. Or worse, maybe I would remember her, like a dream that never happened, and miss her all the same. Letting things play out meant King would have to stick around to protect Ariadna, but he’d remain madly in love with Mia. I would have to endure years and years of those looks—the ones he gave when he was wishing she were here instead of me. The Seers’ plan meant they had no intention of allowing Ansin to kill King—because why take away Ariadna’s protector, right? Which meant Ansin would be the one to die if the two went head-to-head, and I’d never know why I looked so happy in my vision with Ansin. And, finally, their plan also meant growing up with Mom alive—one more reason I wanted to talk to Dad. What would he say when I told him I had the power to erase the past and bring back the love of his life?

The other option was to stop the Seers’ plan from happening. The most obvious choice was to raise the baby to see that her future wasn’t fixed. My daughter could say no to the Seers and live her life. Not the Seers’. Not mine or King’s, but hers.

As for King, I could hide the truth and say nothing about Ariadna. He’d have no reason to stay. In fact, if I told him Ansin planned to kill him, King would probably respond with, “Yes, please! I’d love to die.” Provided that Ansin could actually end a man who kept coming back, King would get what he wanted, my heart would be broken, and the world would remain as is. The damage done by Ten Club would be a permanent fixture in a corrupt and angry world.