Page 38 of Power Shift
The magic felt somewhat familiar, but I’d never sensed it before. Anger rose within me. My greenhouse was the one place I felt safe in, the place I knew I could come and relax. I dropped the thread of power and reached for the door, careful not to make myself a target.
When I opened it and nothing happened, I went up the steps and peered around the door’s edge, tightly leashing my power to my body, a ploy to make who or what was inside underestimate me.
A red-haired woman stood by the Dutchman’s pipe vines, one finger lifted to stroke the edge of its strange flowers. She didn’t acknowledge me when I walked in, and I could only see her face in profile. A sharp, straight nose, high cheekbones, and crimson lips made her look like she walked off a movie set, but when she turned, I realized she was much more than that.
The woman was drop dead gorgeous. Her hair was in perfect coiled curls, her makeup flawless. Her eyes were dark, almost obsidian. She wore a rust-colored shirt, green corduroy pants and a pair of leather loafers. No rings adorned her well-manicured hands, but she wore a gold chain around her throat.
A lion charm dangled from the end.
She smiled the smile of a toothpaste model, friendly and open. “Evie Quinn. I was beginning to think you were a figment of Finn’s imagination.”
I stilled, struck by the knowledge of why her magic seemed familiar.
“You must be the other Chimera.”
The woman clapped politely. “He said you were beautiful but failed to tell me you were intelligent, too. No wonder he’s so fixated on you.”
“I take it he’s not dead?” My plants came alive at my presence, their pots creaking and groaning as they strained to find me.
The woman’s eyes flickered as she noticed, a hint of unease on her face there and gone so fast I thought I imagined it.
“You should know killing a Chimera is extraordinarily difficult.” She ran her fingers over the other flowers, and I felt the greenhouse’s unease like a living thing inside my body. “We are quite resilient, and with our ability to turn into anything, we can become a tiny atom and burrow deep until we heal.”
“If that’s true, why did your kind go extinct?”
“You may call me Rhona.”
I didn’t plan on calling her anything.
“Extinct is the wrong word as you well know. Though my kind was decimated, all it takes is one scratch and one bite and our numbers are replenished.”
“Finn lied to me then.”
“You care what Finn thinks?” Rhona asked, disappointment brimming in her dark eyes.
“No, but it would have been nice to know if there were others like me.”
“Others who were not him?” Her deep chuckle resonated around us. “Finn does have some sadistic tendencies which are not ideal for keeping our species a secret.”
I couldn’t stop my disgusted snort. “He’s vile.”
“And yet, he is my child.” Rhona clicked her tongue. “Not of my womb,” she said when she saw my expression. “Of my bite. Unfortunately, his personality was formed long before he became what he is.”
“He thought you were dead?”
“Finn thought everyone was dead, which is why he made his ill-advised decision to come here.” A flicker of distaste on her face. “This is a small place, a nothing town.”
Hope flared within me. “Then you plan to leave?”
Rhona laughed. “At first, until I saw the delicious Lord who claims this territory.” She ran blood red nails across the wood planting shelves. “If I were to align myself with him, I’d never need to scrounge for power again.”
Realization struck me. “You were the one posing as Gianna.”
Rhona lifted a shoulder in a careless shrug. “Not at first. Not until I saw her goal. She was easy enough to manipulate. People like her usually are.”
“And placing her body on my property?”
Rhona smiled. “Insurance, but you are a clever girl, aren’t you? Not a single trace of DNA on your land. How’d you do it?”
