Oh, My Dragon (I Like Big Dragons 3)

“And your mom?” she prodded gently.

“Died about five months after my dad. Mom was still going through her treatments and by the time his end came, they were so far in the hole financially, that she just stopped them altogether,” I answered. “We were really poor. My sister and I got our clothes at Goodwill on the good days, and on the bad we just wore the same outfit over and over again, despite the fact that they didn’t fit.” I cleared my throat and looked at her. “It was bad. When my mom died, my sister and I were split up into different homes.”

Her eyes showed sorrow.

“That’s terrible,” she said. “Have you ever found her?”

I nodded.

“Found her. Then let her go without seeing me,” I said. “Haven’t actually seen her with my own two eyes since college.”

Wink’s eyes filled with tears at that explanation, but before she could finish the question I could see in her eyes, I pulled out the bag of peas from the fridge and placed them on her face.

Her gasp had me smiling, and the one eye I could see of hers had me wanting to laugh.

“Why did you get hit?” she asked, changing the subject.

“I told Keifer his son wasn’t really his son,” I said honestly.

Her eyes widened.

“How do you figure?” she asked. “How can one baby be his, and the other baby not be?”

“I didn’t mean it like that,” I said. “I was talking about another kid.”

Her brows furrowed. “What does that mean?”

I sighed and picked her hand up to hold onto her peas, and then started pacing.

“I don’t know,” I said. “I touched something a few months ago when I was investigating a cabin where Brooklyn had been held, and I saw something that I haven’t been able to make sense of. And each time I focus on it, all I get is confusion, and the repeated words ‘your son isn’t your son.’”

She waited for more, but when I didn’t give it to her, she opened her mouth to reply.

“And did you tell that to Keifer?” she asked.

I shook my head.

“No,” I said. “I was trying to tell him more when he took offense to me implying that his son wasn’t really his son, and punched me.”

She shook her head.

“Why would he know to ask you about that anyway?” she asked.

“The wink I gave the girl,” I said.

“Do they have names?” she asked. “And why did you wink at her? Isn’t she like a week old?”

I nodded.

“Grace and Reed,” I said. “And they’re two weeks old. As for why I winked at her, the babies are intelligent creatures. They’re very aware of what’s going on around them, and the girl—Grace—and me bonded.”

“How?” she asked.

I studied her for a long moment, before shrugging and explaining.

“She’s a dream walker,” I said. “She can leave her body like Nikolai and his woman can, but only during sleep. She does this almost nightly, and for some reason keeps finding me in my sleep. She keeps repeating the same thing to me that I saw when I was in that cabin. ‘Your son isn’t your son.’”

“That’s the weirdest thing I’ve ever heard,” she said. “What do you think it means?”

I was shaking my head before she’d finished.

“I’m not sure. I have no clue who it’s about, or why I would be the one to keep hearing and seeing it,” I said. “My ability to see people’s pasts through objects is normally very definitive. I can usually pick up anything I want. But what I got from picking up that lamp was nothing in comparison to what I usually see. It’s as if the person that touched it, who it belonged to, was gifted as well, and was able to shield most of his memories.”

She pursed her lips.

“Did you try going back, seeing if you could pick something else up?” she asked.

My brows went up in surprise.

“No; actually, I never really thought about it,” I answered. “But now that you mention it, I can go back. The cabin is now owned by Vassago properties. It hasn’t been touched since it happened.”

“Well, let’s go!” she insisted, jumping up and causing the peas to drop to the ground.

I bent and picked them up, and then walked to the freezer and tossed them back inside.

“You’re not going with me,” I said. “But I will go.”

She looked at me with a small pout tipping the corners of her lips down, and I sighed.

“Fine,” I said. “But if I tell you to do something, you listen to me or we’re out of there.”

She curled her lip up at me.

“Fine,” she said.

“Fine.”Chapter 8How do I like my eggs? In cake.

-Every woman’s secret thoughts

Wink

“Oh, my God! We’re going to die!” Wink screamed, covering her face with her hands.

I refrained from asking her what she thought she was going to accomplish by doing that, but only just barely.