Gifted Connections: Book 2
SM Olivier
Chapter 1
Last night when I went to sleep, I had a different life. Last night when I closed my eyes, I laid my head on a man I had come to care for more than words could say. Remington (Remy) Murphy was my quiet, gruff, yet protective guardian. We went running every Saturday morning. Sometimes our routes took us up in the mountains where he found solitude. I felt privileged that he had shared that beauty and awestriking view with me. Sometimes we ran the quiet country roads, watching as the wild life continued their daily routines, barely noticing us. Our last run had been in the city, a city that was forgotten but now, because of him and other likeminded people, was coming back to life again. He had just opened a restaurant on that side of town and renovated a charming warehouse, making it his home.
This morning I woke up in the bed of a man I barely knew. He had been one of my first crushes in high school, but after his crazy ex-girlfriend started harassing me and making my life miserable, I knew I couldn’t pursue my interest in him. The last time I had seen him, he was hooking up with a girl that was supposed to be in love with one of the kindest, gentlest, most thoughtful men I have ever met.
The second man in my life, Drake Bell (the last name he took after he was adopted), was going to school to become a child psychologist—although, I still believed he pursued that career path because his ex-girlfriend was majoring in the same field of study. I think he missed a calling to become a chef. He was one of the best cooks I have ever met, and he cooked for our family of eleven with ease in addition to any others who came by, since our house had become the gathering place of my band and our friends.
I was getting ready for my first day of school at Knightstown Academy…again. Last time, I had just found out that I had a gift, and with that came a lot of adjustments. Like the fact that I was supposed to make connections with six guys. Two of them were brothers, and the other four had been fostered and adopted by the same man. Even though they shared similarities, their differences made them unique.
It was because my gift was powerful, not to mention my questionable parentage, that was the cause for my new predicament.
I was scrambling to figure out the reasons why the people who put me in this situation chose to erase the last few weeks by turning back time, and why they put me so close to the guys they had worked so hard to separate me from.
My sister, Ella—well technically my cousin—had predicted this would happen, but she also told me no one would remember the relationships we had created. Not Will, the man I had started to call Pops. Not Jace, the man who was once my teacher, my connection, the man who made me love music once more, and who helped me get me out of my previous life of squalor and pain. Not Remy, my connected, my protector. Not Troy, my Casanova, the man who could make a girl feel special, like the time he took me on a ride in his helicopter for my first real date. Not Noah, the man who used to flirt relentlessly with me and made me feel beautiful, but who recently had distanced himself from me. Not Drake, my sweet, thoughtful, sometimes shy guy. Not, Jaxson the one I had technically known the longest. He had come to me in my darkest hours. Because of our gifts, we had been having conversations in our heads since we were 10 years old. Recently, he was the one who chased my nightmares away. Not, Jemmy, my outgoing, fashion savvy, sensitive, dramatic best friend. And not Rachel, another new-found friend, but at least with her I had hope.
“Hey, Collin,” I asked as I came out of the bedroom. “I must have drank a lot last night, because I don’t know where I’m supposed to be going or where my uniform is.”
He was sitting at the counter eating a bowl of cereal. Outwardly he was handsome, with his blond hair and blue eyes. His physique, like most gifted, was well taken care of.
He turned and smiled, but I noticed his eyes were calculating, satisfied even. “Darling, you’re in college, you don’t need to wear uniforms. Remember? You had enough credits to graduate high school, and Zach told you your placement test had you on college level. Lucky you.” He drew me in his arms, and I had to will myself not to stiffen. “Now get dressed, you silly goose. We’re going to be late.”
I turned to go back into the room. I had already snooped and noticed we were in a two-bedroom studio apartment. It was a nice but paled in comparison to how I lived with my guys.
He must still be under the impression that whatever Horatio and his minions did to me had worked. But it hadn’t completely worked. My memories were still intact, I remembered everything; it was my gifts that were in question. My gifts of compulsion, fire, force field, empathy, and illusion were gone. In vain I had tried to use them, but they evaded me.
I had to fight the feelings of anxiety, despair, and panic. It was like I was on an island with an alligator, surrounded by sharks circling in the water. I was afraid of the alligator on the island eating me, yet I had to be careful leaping in the water to escape because that couldn’t end well either. I had to make things right. I had to get back to my guys. I had to find Ella, Alex, Micah, and my other brother. They were in more danger than I was. I had to get my old life back.
I knew my first plan of attack was to find the Judge and Rachel. Will had made me remember Judge Myers’ contact information and repeat it back to him several times. Thanks to Ella, we knew this day would come, and we knew we couldn’t prevent it, so we made plans to repair it. We had made plans A, B, C, and D. We tried to think of all possibilities and how I should approach each situation, even the possibility of my gifts being temporarily blocked.