him, rising on her haunches, ready to hear his praise. "Well?"
"Tastes like chicken," he said, and he didn't sound glad.
"Oh." Not what she'd wanted to hear because she remembered how he'd complained about chicken in one of her visions. She'd hoped for delicious, scrumptious, or savory. "It's good for you, so eat it whether you like it or not."
She filled a leaf for herself, sat back and nibbled on the burned flakes. Not wonderful, but not as bad as that energy bar either. "I wish we had pizza delivery here. I've always wondered what one of those gooey round things taste like."
His hand froze midair, hovering just in front of his mouth for a split second before he lowered it. "First you knew about the Hoover, among other surface items, then you knew about my sister Katie, and now you know about pizza, yet you don't know what it tastes like. I know you said you don't want to talk about this, but I have to know. How can you know of them, but not have experienced them? You said you never visited the surface."
She didn't want to answer. She could walk away from him again - she doubted he had the strength to follow - but he'd just bring it up the next time he saw her. Determination seeped from his every pore.
He'd been upset with the thought of her reading his mind, so how would he react to knowing she'd watched his life unfold all these many years?
No matter the answer to that, he deserved to know.
She closed her eyes and gathered her courage, then forced the words to emerge. "I've had visions of you
for years." There. She'd confessed, and the rest spilled from her. "I watched you grow from boy to man."
"What? How?" Those simple single-word questions whipped from him, lashing out. "I didn't see your entire Me," she assured him, "but merely glimpses."
A moment passed in heavy silence while he absorbed her revelation. "Glimpses of what, exactly?" Now his tone was devoid of emotion, and somehow that was all the more frightening.
"I saw your family, your home. Your," she coughed and glanced away, "women." "That seems like more than a glimpse to me." Still, no emotion.
"I had no control over it. I tried to stop them, to close my mind to them, but the harder I tried, the more visions I received."
His eyes narrowed. "I don't like being spied on."
"I didn't spy on you," she ground out. "I wish to the gods you'd had visions of me, so that this wouldn't seem so one-sided and wrong."
His eyes widened, and his mouth fell open. "That's it. That's where I've seen you." "What?" Her brow furrowed. "Where?"
"I've seen you before. I told you that. Remember, I asked you if we'd met before?" It all fell into place, and Gray's fish settled like lead in his stomach. Why hadn't he recognized who she was immediately? He'd known she was familiar to him the first moment he saw her.
Over the years, he'd dreamed of her. He'd thought nothing of the dreams at the time, thought they were merely products of his overactive imagination and the weird things he'd encountered, but now he replayed some of them through his mind.
Jewel chained to a wall, her body draped in a blue robe, her black hair streaming around her. Men and women were paraded in front of her, some killed afterward, others spared.
Jewel being held down while someone chopped off her hair. A punishment, the one-armed, knife-wielding bastard said, for omitting details.
Jewel, trying to escape a tower, falling to the ground and breaking her leg.
He shook his head, the images alone sparking fury. Dark, potent fury. This was so hard to take in. Almost impossible, really. He only prayed he was mistaken, that he hadn't dreamed of her actual life.
"Let me see your leg," he demanded softly.
Her face scrunched in confusion.
"Show me your lower right leg." He remembered how the bone had popped through the skin, how she'd cried in pain and hours passed before anyone found her. And then she'd been punished, forced to watch an innocent man slain. Her physical wound somehow and miraculously healed days later, but a scar had remained. "Please, sweetheart. Show me your leg."
Surprise flashed in her eyes, but she stood and lifted her robe.
His lungs constricted, and he scrubbed a hand down his face. There, on her shin, was the scar. His childhood dreams had been real. He'd actually seen glimpses of her life, and he