Rage simmers underneath my skin, and the sky outside reacts, lightning reflecting across the darkness. I take a few breaths to steady my rage then step out of my room.
The house is silent as I make my way down the hallway and toward the stairs, not even Kash the faerie is shrieking. I begin to question if anyone is home, but when I walk into the kitchen, Foster’s standing near the kitchen island, cupping the side of his face with his hand.
His gaze collides with mine as I enter the room, his eyes back to the striking shade of lightning-blue.
“Hey,” he greets me with a hesitant smile. “How are you feeling?” He shakes his head. “Sorry, that’s a dumb fucking question, isn’t it?”
“No, it really isn’t.” I pad over to him and lean against the counter. “I’m fine for the most part, but I’m really confused how I got here. The last thing I can remember is being in the car with Porter, Hunter, and Max. Then we had to pull over because Porter and Hunter were acting weird. Max started to explain that they were acting like weirdoes because my power did something wonky to the link, but when I asked him exactly what it did, he got super twitchy and knocked me out with his hypnotizing powers.”
Foster blinks at me. “Wow, I’m pretty sure that’s the most I’ve ever heard you say at once.”
“Sorry,” I mutter. “I’m just really confused and starting to get annoyed.”
“I didn’t mean that as a bad thing. It just means you’re getting comfortable around us.” He shifts his weight and scratches at the back of his neck. “And I’m sorry for what Max did. Sometimes when he panics, he turns to his power. It’s a bad habit of his. He’s been working on breaking it, but fucks up sometimes.”
“I get it.” Sort of. “But I still don’t get why he made me pass out or why he was panicking to begin with when all I did was ask a question.”
Foster restlessly drums his fingers against the countertop. “I don’t want to scare you.”
“You guys lying to me and knocking me out is scaring me,” I point out, crossing my arms.
“I guess you’re probably right.” He moves his hand away from the counter and turns toward me. “When you were in the room of darkness and your power was trapped inside you, some of it leaked through the link and kind of… spilled into my brothers and me.”
“Wait… So my powers are actually in you guys right now?” Holy crap, when Max said my powers leaked down the link, I didn’t think he meant my powers actually went into them.
Panic flares through me and a bolt of lightning zaps across the ceiling.
Foster places a hand on my shoulder. “Easy, Sky. It’s not as bad as it sounds.” His fingers splay around my shoulder and he holds onto me, his touch singing to sleep the adrenaline soaring through me. “And Hunter is working on repairing the link. Once he does, your power won’t be able to leak into us anymore.”
“So it’s still going into you guys?” I ask with wide eyes.
He nods. “But it’s fine. It’s not hurting anyone.”
“Then why were Porter and Hunter acting so weird? And why was Max so evasive about telling me?”
“Porter and Hunter always act weird, but even more so right now because your power is energizing their power and making their abilities a bit magnified. And Max was reluctant to tell you this because we knew you’d feel guilty.” His fingers trace a path down my arm. “We can tell from when you talk about your powers that you’ve spent a lot of time worrying that you were going to hurt someone.” When his hand reaches mine, he gives it a squeeze. “But you didn’t hurt any of us. I swear.”
I search his face for a sign that he’s lying, but all I can see is lightning blue eyes piercing into me.
“How are you feeling about the other stuff that happened?” He changes the subject and I have an inkling he did it on purpose. “About Brody and being in that room?”
I smash my lips together, unsure if I want to, or even can, answer him.
If I let myself think about what happened in that room, I can almost feel Brody’s lips against mine an
d feel the pain of seeing the images that darkness showed me. Particularly the ones of my parents leaving me. Could that be true? Could they have left me? Did they ever care about me?
Does anyone care about me?
“I’m not sure how I feel…” I admit. “Did you …?” I struggle to get the words out. “Did you find Brody in that room?”
Foster’s eyes briefly flash blue, but then he carefully nods. “I did.”
“Was he …? Was he okay?”
Foster works his jaw from side to side. “He was okay until I got ahold of him.”
My stomach clenches. “What did you do?”