And now, of course, she might die. Angel rolled her eyes. Why was she surprised?
Life wasn’t fair, at least not for her. She’d just found Parker and now thanks to whatever had happened to her she might be condemning them both to death.
She motioned to the pastoral lake scene with her chin. “What is that all about?”
Angel tried to figure out if she’d ever seen this place before and she drew a blank. So either she’d forgotten it like she’d forgotten why she couldn’t stay mated to Parker, or this was something brand new. In any case, if it helped her get out of here then that was fine by her.
“I’m not sure. This isn’t my creation. It’s yours. I’ve been living in my own version of this for thirty some-odd years waiting for your father.” Her mother put her arm around Angel’s shoulder, which should have been jarring but actually felt kind of nice. “Let’s walk down and check it out.”
They fell into an easy pace as they approached the lake. This time Angel’s legs worked just fine, the leaden feeling of earlier having disappeared as quickly as it arrived.
“Why are you still waiting for Dad if he should have killed himself when you died?”
Angel had so many questions flowing through her mind she could have built a raft and rode them all the way home.
“Your father made bad decisions. They have…delayed him a bit.”
As far as Angel was concerned almost every male wolf shifter she knew made bad decisions.
They were an aggressive, mean, murdering bunch of ego-driven Alpha-wannabes. The exception to that rule being her silent Parker with his shy ways and sensitive soul. She couldn’t imagine him ever going „bad’ even if he had made the tremendous error of ordering her around.
She bit down on her lip. In retrospect, if she’d listened to him, she wouldn’t have gotten hurt in the first place.
Together they finally arrived down at the lake. Angel blinked twice as she realized what she looked at. It was clearly Parker—as a child—seated by the water with his father.
“That’s Parker.” She kept her voice barely a whisper even though she doubted the memory she observed could hear her even if she shouted.
“I remember him from when he was a child.” Her mother stood silently for a moment. “That’s his father, Jack. They were so close. Jack always had a glow in his eye when he talked about his little pup.”
Angel exhaled loudly. “The question is, of course, why are we viewing this? Why is this significant here and now? Is it just happening because Parker is my mate or am I supposed to be getting something from it?”
“I have no idea.”
Angel stared at her mother. That wasn’t the answer she’d been hoping to get.
Shouldn’t a woman who had been dead for nearly forty years have gained some kind of universal understanding of all things?
Her mother smiled, like she knew just what Angel had thought and found it amusing.
A jolt traveled through Angel’s body and she shuddered. Glancing down, she realized her hands shook, which made her gasp. What the hell was going on?
“Mom?”
Her mother sucked in her breath. “You’re going back.”
“Back?”
“To your life, Angel, to your life.”
That was good news but Angel’s heart picked up speed just the same. “I still need to ask you about the book you gave me and removing Parker’s curse—”
Her mother interrupted. “No time. Just remember there is a reason he wants you dead beyond his desire to kill all of them. There was a reason you were hidden. Find the reason, reclaim the female line.”
With a start, Angel sat up. Her breath came in short bursts as she clutched her chest.
It felt tight and she wondered if she was having a heart attack. That would be awful. She just got back and now she would die? She looked left and right as she tried to figure out where she was. Her senses went haywire. Smells and sounds she’d never encountered before overwhelmed her and she had to close her eyes to stop the sensory overload that threatened to undo her.
“Ssh, calm down.” A woman’s voice spoke to her while a cold washcloth was pushed onto Angel’s head. “You’re safe.”
Angel didn’t know if that was true. Her wolf prowled inside of her, angry at the assault of the unknown. Angel shoved the washcloth away as she whirled to look at the person trying to calm her down.
The woman who stood next to her didn’t seem like she was much past twenty years old but that could be misleading. Although she wasn’t clear on the details of exactly why, Angel knew wolf-shifters stopped—physically aging at around thirty. Sometimes that could happen earlier. Angel herself appeared no more than thirty and some people swore it was less. She got carded frequently at bars. For all she knew, the woman who stood before her could be hundreds of years old.
“Who are you?” Her voice sounded rough to her own ears and she winced at the sound. This wasn’t proving to be a moment of personal power and there was nothing she disliked more than appearing weak. Where the hell was Parker? If they’d hurt him…
“You’re safe.”
She narrowed her eyes hoping the other woman could see the threatening wolf that wanted to come out and destroy. “Answer my damn question.”
“She’s a Kane, Ashlee. She’s bound to be surly when she’s uncomfortable.”
Angel jumped up onto her knees to see the other woman who spoke. There were too many scents in this place. She couldn’t tell one from another and she hadn’t even known there was more than one person in the room.
The woman who’d held the cloth on her had been young and redheaded. The new speaker also looked about thirty with dark brown hair.
“Faith, that’s not helpful.” The washcloth holder finally spoke and Angel turned to regard her again. “I am Ashlee Kane and this is Faith Kane.”
Kane.
Both of them were Kanes.
Her own last name had never sounded so appalling. There was only one reason Kanes surrounded her, which meant somehow she had ended up on Westervelt—the last place on earth she wanted to be.
The dark haired woman—Faith—spoke again. “You’re Angel.”
As Angel swung her legs over the bed where she laid, she considered lying. It wasn’t a good sign they knew who she was.
“How do you know that?”
The redhead grabbed her arm. “Don’t move so fast. You’ve been in a magical coma for days.”
“Days?” Angel’s mind whirled. She wanted to sit down. Of course her desire to do that warred with her need to shift and tear some heads apart. “Where is Parker?”
Faith stepped forward. “Is he the tall, dark haired wolf with all the tattoos?”
“Yes.” Now Angel heard herself snarl. “What have you done to him? Where is he?”
Ashlee raised her hands as she stepped between Angel and Faith. “He’s okay. He doesn’t say anything. We didn’t know if he did this to you so Cullen and Theo have locked him up. But he’s unharmed.”
Angel moved until she was within striking distance of both Faith and Ashlee. Neither of them seemed particularly tough. “Bring me to him. Now.”
Faith raised any eyebrow. “Yep, she’s their sister.”
Angel couldn’t care less what they wanted to say about her. She had no interest in seeing her brothers, who she had to assume were married to these women. All she wanted was to free Parker and get off Westervelt before the residents did something bad to her.
“A little gratitude might be nice. We did save your life, after all.”
Faith had a sharp tongue, something Angel might have respected under different circumstances.