I was pretty sure Kaci’d be fine, physically, after a forced Shift. But not psychologically. She needed to want to Shift, or we’d be in the same position a few weeks later. Only she’d no longer trust me to talk her through it.

“It’s your decision,” my father continued, and my heart beat so hard my chest actually ached.

My head fell against the wall at my back. Less than a year earlier, I’d whined about never being allowed to make my own choices. What the hell was I thinking? I couldn’t choose between Marc and Kaci!

My dad cleared his throat to recapture my attention. “Faythe? What are you going to do?”

It was strange to hear that question coming from the man who, in the past, had simply told me what I would be doing.

“I don’t know,” I said, and immediately hated the sound of what had to be the weakest sentence I’d ever uttered. “Kaci clearly needs me. But I need to be here when we find Marc.” The weight room swam as tears formed in my eyes, and I rubbed them away roughly, silently scolding myself. Tears wouldn’t help Marc. Or Kaci.

“What would Marc say, if you could ask him?” my father asked gently.

I closed my eyes, wiping away more moisture. “He’d say that he’ll be fine without me, but she needs me, and I damn well know it.”

“And would he be right?”

“Yes.” My next exhalation seemed to deflate me completely. “But I’m coming back as soon as she Shifts.”

“Of course.”

“I’ll be there as soon as I can.” I flipped the phone closed and glanced up to find Dan watching me from the hall, barefoot and naked from the waist up, a clean shirt in one hand. “How much of that did you hear?”

“Enough.” He smiled sympathetically.

“And?”

His smile grew, even as the sad wrinkles around his eyes deepened. “You’re doin’ the right thing. Parker and I will be here for Marc. And he really would want you to go.”

He was right. “Thanks.”

Dan nodded, and turned to pull his shirt over his head, but as he lifted his arms, light from the dusty bulb overhead shined on something I’d never noticed. A small, smooth white scar right between his shoulder blades.

“Dan, wait!” My pulse raced, and I flipped my phone open, autodialing my father again.

“Faythe, what’s wrong?” he asked in lieu of a greeting, as Dan raised one brow at me in question.

“Dad, can you have Dr. Carver leave for the ranch now? I think I just found the proof we needed.”

Sixteen

We made it home by four-thirty in the morning with no trouble, and I actually managed nearly three hours of sleep while Dan and Ethan took shifts behind the wheel. They’d insisted I wasn’t alert enough to drive, and I wasn’t going to argue.

In spite of the early hour, my parents were both up when we walked through the front door, my mother wrist-deep in a colossal pile of shredded potatoes, while grease warmed in two massive cast-iron skillets on the stove. She was making hash browns to go with the huge platter of bacon already fried and ready to eat. Next would come eggs, and I knew by the scent of the entire house that homemade biscuits were already baking in the oven.

“Mom, you didn’t have to do all this.” I sank onto the closest bar stool and crossed my arms on the countertop, trying to hold my head upright though it felt about ten pounds too heavy from exhaustion.

“Kaci needs the energy, and from the look of the rest of you—” her gaze flicked over my shoulder to where Ethan and Dan had followed me into the kitchen “—so do you.” My mother set down her shredder and rinsed her hands at the sink, then dried them on a clean towel hanging from a drawer handle. “You must be Mr. Painter,” she said brightly, rounding the end of the peninsula with her arm extended.

Dan nodded and shook her hand. “Nice to meet you.” I’d never seen him look so…bashful, and I was just plain amused by the amazement with which he watched my mother. And for a moment, I saw her through his eyes: pretty, petite, nurturing, and efficient, with a surprising strength in her handshake and a bright gleam of intelligence in the Caribbean depths of her eyes.

I smiled and waved the guys toward the remaining bar stools, then swiped a slice of bacon from the platter.

“You made fantastic time,” my father said from the doorway, and I turned to see him frowning. “Which means someone drove entirely too fast.”

I pointed at Ethan, and he smacked the back of my head, but his grin never faltered.

“Mr. Painter.” My father stepped forward and extended his hand toward our guest, as Dan slid off his stool. Apprehension flitted across his face for a moment before his blank look settled into place—another lesson well learned from Marc. He shook my father’s thick hand, and I couldn’t help but contrast this greeting with the less enthusiastic welcome he’d gotten the last time he’d been on the ranch, when he was interrogated about the time he’d spent with Manx during her crime spree.

It felt like my entire world had been spun off its axis in the four months since then. Everything had changed, and not for the better.

“May I see this scar?” my father asked, and Dan turned and pulled his shirt off to present his back for examination under the bright fluorescent lights.

I smiled at the strange sight, while Dan flushed. I could sympathize. My partial Shift had been perfunctorily examined many times, and I hated being presented like a show horse. But Dan was a good sport about it, due in part to his agreeable nature. Though I assume he was also equally eager to have the foreign implant removed from his body.