Makeup that he’d left on my bed.
Along with a beautiful dress.
And shoes.
All of which were perfect for me, even the foundation that matched my skin tone perfectly.
I’d been so surprised the night before when I’d come out of the shower and found the bags from the mall sitting on my bed. I wasn’t sure what members of a bomb squad felt like, but it had to have been close to how my heart had pounded as I opened every bag and box. It kept pounding slowly while I’d looked for him and found him in his library.
I was holding everything in my arms when I stopped in the doorway. “What’s this?”
His attention had been focused on the computer on his lap. “Clothes.”
This mother… “For me?”
“They’re not for me, Cookie Monster.”
That didn’t help any. “For funsies or a reason?” I asked, my voice going just a little high.
His fingers flew across the keyboard as his lips moved along with it before he replied, “For tomorrow.”
What was…？ His mom’s. I’d purposely made myself stop thinking about it. The idea of meeting The Primordial’s mom… Alex’s mom… was intimidating as hell. I gulped. “I thought we were going to your mom’s.”
“We are.” He still hadn’t looked up. “You don’t go to her birthday celebration in jeans and a T-shirt,” he said, sounding irritated about it, but that did nothing for me.
I hadn’t been to a birthday party in years. Much less a birthday celebration. Was that a grown-up version of a birthday party? I was pretty sure the last time had been for this nice girl in high school. My grandparents had needed to go to their bank, which had been two towns over, and I’d snuck over there in the meantime. Her dad had made barbeque, and we’d drank root beer out of bottles and played pool. We had been living outside of Phoenix then.
I’d thought about looking her up once or twice, but I hadn’t seen the point.
Only then had Alex’s eyes strayed to me. “I don’t get to wear jeans either,” he’d said like that explained everything.
I had been speechless.
My mouth had moved, but nothing had come out, and then his phone rang, and I’d slowly backed out after he’d said Alana’s name.
I’d spent the rest of the night being stunned.
I’d pretended to be asleep when he’d come into the room hours later.
And now we were here.
I pulled at the silky black material of the dress that fit me surprisingly well and sighed.
For so long I’d dreamed about what I would do once I didn’t have to hide. How I’d go out and do things. But now I wanted to go back to my temporary home base and put on the jeans and the shirt that I’d been wearing earlier while I’d been in denial over this happening.
“Are you sure this is a good idea?” I asked him. “Shouldn’t I be hiding at your place?”
He glanced at me. “You don’t need to do that here. Not anymore. No one here knows or would think about betraying you. You’re safe.”
I hoped he was right. I really did. But somehow I knew he wouldn’t put me at unnecessary risk, not after everything.
“We don’t have to stay for long,” Alex reminded me, sounding so, so irritated it only slightly made me feel better.
I pulled at the material of the dress again and looked out the window. I didn’t want to get riled up. The last thing I wanted was to start sweating or smell scared. “Is there anything I need to know? You haven’t said a lot about your family, so I don’t want to screw up in case I have to talk to someone without you.” I thought about that. “Please don’t make me talk to people. My social skills are rusty. I would rather deal with you than have to stand there awkwardly all night or get nervous and tell someone about how I almost used poison ivy to wipe my butt when we were on the run and you barely stopped me in time.”
His fucking laugh startled the hell out of me.
I hadn’t even thought about the incident on purpose out of shame. At least the tiny amount of it I had left.
And he was still laughing as he said, “I won’t leave you alone.”
I almost asked him if he promised but kept the words in my mouth.
He made a noise in his throat as his laugh wound down while he approached what seemed like a gated community. We weren’t far from his house at all, but we had left the “neighborhood.” I hadn’t figured out this whole living situation and hadn’t found the right moment to ask either, but I would. Sometime soon.
He punched in a code at a gate, then went forward, and a few minutes later, nodded at a man working behind yet another booth. Only then did he start talking again. “Achilles, Kilis, was at the office. He’s my oldest brother. He has good intentions, but he’s bossy and a stuffy shit.”
A stuffy shit.
Here we were, driving to his mom’s “birthday celebration” dressed like something out of a spy movie, and he was… the way he was.
He really was something. “Is he special like you?” I asked him. “Or do the ‘superior genes’ skip around?”
“They do in some ways and don’t in others. We’re all like this, but he wasn’t chosen after all.”
“Because he’s a stuffy shit?”
The side of his mouth closest to me curved up. “Basically.”
I had so many questions about that.
“He was supposed to be one of the faces, but…” Alex shook his head. “When he was in high school, he lost control and hurt a classmate. Our grandmother had to get involved, and that’s why she chose me.”
The questions. The fucking questions I had. I almost choked on them.
He kept going. “Athena, Thena, my sister, is the second oldest. She’s also a stuffy shit. She only likes Achilles and Alana. The rest of us annoy the hell out of her. She’s mad she wasn’t chosen either, but she isn’t as strong for some reason. She’s the smartest though.”
He had to be kidding me.
“Then there’s Alana—”
“The Primordial?” I asked in a squeaky voice that got me another side-look.
“Yes. She’s everything she seems to be but better.”
Wow, those were big words from someone I didn’t think handed compliments out easily.
“Odysseus, Odi, is the fourth one of us. He’s a stuffy shit sometimes, but he’s a good guy.” He made a thoughtful sound in his throat. “After that is Robert, or who you all call The Centurion. He’s a kiss-ass, but he’s everything he seems to be. Then there’s Leon. He owns a farm an hour away. He’s good. He doesn’t like people much though.”
Said Old Grumpy Pants. I almost snorted.
“He might be here if our mom pressured him into it,” Alex kept going.
“Then you, since you’re the baby,” I told him with a little cackle. “It explains so much.”
“I was until Selene. She was the surprise no one saw coming.”
“She’s your sister?” I squawked.
He gave me a crazy look. “What did you think she was?”
“I don’t know. A cousin or something.”