Page 76 of Hunted in the Shadows
His smile didn’t entirely mask the worry in his eyes as he glanced at the gathering clouds overhead. “Looks like rain soon. Will you be okay?”
“Those don’t look like thunder clouds. Trust me, when you grow up paranoid about storms, you learn to tell the difference.”
His brow furrowed, gaze searching. “What happened with you and storms, anyway?”
“Jon hasn’t told you already?”
When he shook his head, my insides stirred with a feeling I couldn’t place. When we had first met, Jon shared everything I told him with Cliff. At some point in the last two months, something must have shifted.
“When I was a child, my father and I were training far from the home willow—as far as we were allowed, anyway. He’d chosen the storm by design. He was showing me how to morph heavy rain into icicles without slashing myself to ribbons. And… he’d been experimenting all day, so he used gem magic to keep from tiring out.”
I chewed my lip at the memory. His paling face, his fluttering eyelids as I cried for him to get back up. The unpolished ruby glinting dully in the mud.
“The gem magic overtook him,” I said. “For hours, I was alone with the thunder bellowing at me.”
Cliff sucked in a breath, shaking his head. “What a way to go.”
“No—he recovered,” I said. “He was lucky. The healers yelled at him when he was back in their ward, though—I’d never heard them do that before. It wasn’t until a few years later that his obsession with gemstones finally ended him.”
“I’m sorry.” Cliff’s eyes flickered away from me, resting on a random tree ahead of us. After a measured pause, he asked, “Aren’t you worried that’ll happen to you?”
“I don’t have his ambition,” I said.
“Well, that’s just bullshit.”
“Really,” I insisted, chuckling ruefully. “Besides, I’m not having much luck getting my hands on a full gemstone, so what’s there to worry about?”
He lifted his eyebrows. “You used that little gem to turn Rhett into an ice sculpture, didn’t you? Any power left in that thing?”
I’d glimpsed it on the nightstand before fleeing the motel room. Each day I hadn’t used it felt like a victory. And now… “Empty,” I said bitterly. “It’s nothing more than a worthless stone now.” My throat tightened at the knowledge that I’d likely tuck it back amongst my things anyway. “Mother said that Father would have wanted me to have it. I suppose we have them to thank for escaping with our lives.”
Cliff tipped the flask to his lips instead, pulling a long swallow. “Gotta say, I envy you.”
“Why wouldn’t you?” I quipped, rolling my eyes.
He nudged my shoulder for this, giving me a half-smirk that didn’t reach his eyes. “I’m serious. I mean—having a father who actually gave a shit. Seems like he was a solid guy before thegemstone stuff.” He looked away, jaw tightening. “Can’t fathom seeing eye-to-eye with my old man like that. Hell, he made it his personal mission to make sure I knew what a fuck-up I was to him. Every damn day, like I might forget it.”
“Your father—” I nearly swallowed down the words, a vice around my heart. “He hit you?”
His eyes dropped, smile so tight it was almost a grimace. “On special occasions.”
Horror rippled through me like a silent, seeping wound. The Elders of Elysia left discipline to each family, only involving themselves in extreme cases that surfaced—but it was rare.So rare.I’d only once heard that Damian’s uncle grew volatile after a particularly festive Solstice feast. It was difficult to imagine Cliff as a soft-faced teenager. He won every fight he entered. I’d seen vampires cower from his advance.
I stirred from my drifting thoughts as Cliff set down his flask, pulling out a set of three tactical throwing knives from his jeans pocket. I hadn’t noticed the slight shape jutting against the denim earlier, but I had long since learned to temper my surprise when he pulled weapons from his person. His demeanor was contemplative, almost sullen as he unwound the leather case on his lap and grabbed the first knife in his hand, pinching it by the blade.
“My old man was a hunter—just deer and rabbits. No demonic bastards,” Cliff said, more to the blade than to me. “By the time I was eight, he had a Savage Rascal in my hands and dragged me out with him every weekend on his trips. I hated it. Not the noise so much as the killing part, watching the light leave the animal’s eyes. First time I landed a shot—lodged right in the buck’s neck—” Cliff paused to give a dry chuckle, shaking his head. “I cried, and he smacked me for it. Wouldn’t let me look away as it died.”
Cliff’s wrist twitched in a quick flick. Air rushed as the blade soared across the clearing and embedded itself in the trunk of the tree across from us with a clean thunk. He glanced at me ashe reached for the next knife, revealing the guarded glint buried there. My heart ached, but I didn’t dare breathe a word. When was the last time someone had offered him comfort, had hugged him?
“See, it was a decent shot but notgood. I missed the heart because I’d been shaking so bad. I remember begging—begginghimto kill it for me. Bastard let it suffer until the light went out for good.” Cliff sucked through his teeth and threw another knife. It landed directly beneath the first, separated by six inches or so.
“As I got older, he kept bringing me along on those hunting trips, and I kept getting better. Turns out I had a natural aptitude for precision once I stopped shaking like a leaf. He even shelled out five grand to hire some douchey tutor from out of state. The day I outdidthatguy… Only time I ever caught my father looking proud of me. And for a second, I thought things would be different.”
“I’m sorry,” I finally croaked. Months of wondering—and now, I didn’t know what the hell to say. He was offering me something more valuable than any amount of money or gold—a piece of himself.
Cliff shrugged, offering a humorless smile. “It wasn’t all a waste. When things hit the fan with Jon’s dad, we were scared shitless and I was the only one who could land a shot on the son of a bitch—besides Tammy of course, when she finally found us.”
He threw the last knife, completing the perfect constellation in the tree.
