Page 60 of Wicked Thirst
“You as well.” She turned toward Zinnia. “Now what is this about? We have to keep digging. I know we’ll find something. I just know it.”
Just then another woman moved from behind the shelf and walked into the room. She held even more books, and when she dropped them on the table, they landed there with a loud thump. Her long dark braids streamed from the top of her head all the way down to her hips. She was exquisite with dark skin and eyes as equally dark. She wore a thick, light-gray turtleneck and dark-blue jeans.
She gave me a shy smile. “Hey.” She waved. “I’m Adrienne.”
“Piper.” Then I remembered Zinnia had said they had the daughter of a Greek working with them. “Oh, you’re the daughter of Athena?”
She gave a heavy sigh and looked away from me. “Yeaaa, Mom is . . . something else.”
Touchy subject. Noted. “It’s nice to meet you.”
“What brings you all here?” She glanced around at the rest of us.
They all swung their gazes toward me, and I hated to admit I was slowly starting to get used to people looking at me like this. “So, we know that Grayson is cursed, but every encounter with him gets weirder. I think there’s something or someone in his head, which might be part of the curse . . . I think. But I can’t be sure.”
“I’ve never heard of anything like that before.” Niche set her hands back on the table in front of her. “But it’s an interesting concept.”
“Is there any way we can get into his head and see what’s going on? Like, is there a spell for that? Something that would make me be able to see or hear his thoughts? Because if I can, we might be able to get an idea of who’s doing this and how to stop it.” I was a vampire, what did I know? I was just throwing out ideas. This was Evermore. Anything was possible. But if anyone knew how to do this, they would know.
Niche glanced toward Adrienne. They seemed to have a look pass between them, as if they were having a silent conversation no one else was a part of. After a moment, Niche stood up straight and pulled her glasses off. She pinched the bridge of her nose and gave a heavy sigh. “There are spells to get into someone’s head, of course.”
“Great, let’s do that.”
She shook her head. “It’s not that easy, Piper. These spells are complicated because the mind is a complicated place. The person could fight the intrusion or it could break their mind. In this case, it sounds like his mind is slowly breaking already. You could make it much worse—to the point where even if you managed to trap him and get into his head, there’d be nothing left when you’re done.”
I sighed and placed my elbows on the table, using the support to put my head in my hands and rub at my eyes. “So, let’s not do that.”
Niche gave me a pat on the shoulder. “The conscious mind is a tricky place to be.”
“But what if it wasn’t the conscious mind we were toying with?” Adrienne chimed in with a little smirk.
Niche’s eyes went wide. “You don’t mean . . .”
“I do mean.” Adrienne nodded.
“It’s possible.”
“I concur it could work. It’d be tricky but could work.”
“And how about full sentences for the rest of us at the table who have no idea what you’re talking about.” Astrid swung her arm around, motioning to the rest of us.
Niche straightened her stance and hurried away from us, calling over her shoulder, “I’ve got the book for that. Adrienne, you explain.”
“If we can’t mess with the conscious mind, then why not the unconscious mind?” She gave a broad smile like that one question would explain it all.
I glanced at the others, and they all had the same blank look I did. “You mean like knock him out and jump in his head then?”
She shook her head. “No, not knock him out. That won’t be enough. Dreams. The mind is at rest then and the unconscious mind takes over. If you slip into one of his dreams, it will not be as jarring to his brain. It’ll be more like walking through clouds rather than taking a wrecking ball to a mountain.”
“Okayyy, so how do we slip into his dreams? And will that tell me what we need to know?” Dreams were an odd thing. For me, they were sometimes so vivid that they appeared to be real. At other times, they were so abstract I hardly remembered them.
Niche ran around the corner and hurried back to the table. We all jumped back as she slammed a huge book down. She opened the pages, and the binding practically creaked as she thumbed through the pages.
“I know it’s in here somewhere.” She made a sound of frustration in the back of her throat. “Adrienne, would you please?”She slid the book across the table to her.
“Of course.”Adrienne held her hand over the book and the pages flew open and flipped themselves quickly.
Zinnia sucked in a surprised breath. “Adrienne, I had no idea you could do this.”
