Gifted, A Donovan Circus Novel (15 page)

“And we’re back,” Nikolas
announced. He glanced at Gabriel. “Oh, hey man. What’s up?”

“Just talking to Lucy here,”
Gabriel replied. He turned back to me. “Say, weren’t you talking about your
training with the guys?”

I gaped at him. “What? No.”

“Well, I saw you guys a couple
days ago in the field. Who did the fireball that got the volunteer firefighters
to come check on us? I hear Sheffield had a time sending them away without
letting them further into the grounds in the middle of the day.”

Gabriel looked at Nikolas
expectantly, but Nikolas shrugged and waved his beer in my direction.

“Lucy’s fireball. I don’t manage
anything that big or it could get out of hand.”

“Oh, but Lucy can control it,”
Gabriel said. He gave me a sideways look as a sly little smile crossed his
face. I narrowed my eyes at him to stop.

“She’s good, that’s all there is
to it,” Keegan said.

“Word around the grounds is that
you’re the best one here since…well, since your dad,” Gabriel said.

“I don’t care what anyone says.
We’re all working our asses off,” I said. I drained the rest of my alcohol,
crushing the beer can in my hand while giving Gabriel a dirty look. He threw me
a cocky grin, which nearly set my hands on fire. I turned to Keegan.

“Enough work talk. Wanna team up
for the next round?” I asked, motioning to the beer pong table. He nodded,
finishing his own drink. “Nik, Fin, let’s play each other. Bring beers with
us?”

Finley saluted at me, grabbing a
case and taking it over to the table with Nikolas. Without another glance at
Gabriel, I looped my arm through Keegan’s, who looked surprised but very
pleased. I turned on my heel so hard my long hair swung around my shoulders as
we walked to the table. While we waited for our turn to play, I caught Delia
smirking at me as she talked with Bianca.

The first round, Nikolas and
Finley had no trouble beating us. Keegan performed admirably, but I’d never
played so it took me a while to warm up to the table. Luckily, no one lined up
after us, so the second and third rounds went much better. I saw Gabriel
mingling with everyone, but his eyes often met mine when I found him in the
crowd. I ignored him, instead yelling at the guys to miss the cups and cheering
when we sunk one.

As it turned out, I really liked
being competitive in beer pong. We did a lot of shit-talking and I was
definitely buzzed, so I felt braver. Keegan carried us most of the way, but
when I sunk the winning cup on the last game, I was so excited I could hardly
stand it.

“I can’t believe I got it! We
won two in a row!” I jumped up and down for a moment while the guys laughed at
me. Keegan gave me a huge smile and high-fived me, but in my very excited,
slightly drunken haze, I nearly tackled him in a hug.

“Oops, sorry,” I mumbled as I
realized my arms were around him. “I have no idea what came over me.”

“Trust me, it’s okay,” he said,
squeezing me. He let go and set me back on the ground. My face felt as though
it were on fire; hell, maybe it was and I was too drunk to realize it. My hands
flew to my warm face in embarrassment, but no fire appeared.

Nikolas and Finley high-fived me
and we took a much emptier beer case back to our group of friends. Brooklyn and
Renata now joined us and I waved at both of them in greeting. I noticed Gabriel
wandering through the small groups of people and I couldn’t help but think he
looked a little lonely. I caught his eye as he slid between two guys discussing
sports; he didn’t strike me as a people person, so the idea he might actually
only be here for company made me feel a little bad for him. Instead of rolling
my eyes or glaring at him, I made a silly face and stuck my tongue out. Caught
off guard by my sudden personality change, he actually laughed and made his way
over to us.

“Good games,” Delia said.
“Congratulations to Lucy, who won the last cup!”

“Beginner’s luck, I think,” I
said. “Keegan did most of the work.”

“We both played well,” he said.
He surprised me by draping an arm over my shoulders and I knew if I looked at
Delia, I’d either start giggling or burst into flames. As Gabriel walked up, I
saw his eyes briefly dart to Keegan’s arm over me. His grin faded as his eyes
met mine. I lifted an eyebrow at him in question but his face shifted back into
his normal, cocky smirk. I knew the next time he opened his mouth, it would be
some smarmy, asshole comment, probably specifically aimed at my own
embarrassment. I counted to three before he spoke.

“Cheers to the happy couple,”
Gabriel said, lifting his beer can at me. Keegan’s arm tensed on my shoulder. I
inhaled sharply, and perhaps it was all the beer I’d had, but I made my mind up
to stay cool. I shrugged, doing my best to keep a passive expression.

“We’re a good team,” I said. I
took my empty can and aimed for the trash bin that stood six or seven feet
away; miraculously, I sunk it right into the bin.

The rest of the night was a bit
hazy, but I laughed a lot and didn’t make a fool of myself, so I considered it
a success. It was around three in the morning and a final count at eight beers
that I finally decided to call it quits. Delia wanted to stay and play more
beer pong and while I’d hoped Keegan would walk me home, he was nowhere to be
found. I started walking the long journey back to my camper, all three pathways
over.

I’d only crossed the first
intersecting path when a voice called out my name. I turned, smiling in my
excitement to see Keegan. When the figure came into focus, however, I found a
tall, hot blonde standing in front of me instead.

“Lucy, wait up,” Gabriel said.

“What do you want?” I blurted
out. My body swayed a little.

“I’ll walk you to bed.”

An amused snort escaped me.
“Right, I’m sure that’s exactly what I’d let happen, you sneak your way into my
bed.”

“Worth a shot.”

He grinned, keeping his cigarette
in his teeth as he searched his pockets for a lighter. I reached my hand up to
light it for him. He leaned forward to meet me, but in my drunken stupor I
managed to knock the cigarette from his lips. We both reached down to retrieve
it and wound up knocking heads.

“Son of a bitch!” I cried, my
hands slapping against my head. I nearly gave myself a black eye with my slow
reflexes.

“Sorry,” we both mumbled to each
other, massaging our foreheads.

He leaned forward again and this
time I lit his cigarette without any bodily trauma. We turned and walked for a
few steps before my stupid drunken brain made me stumble. He caught my elbow
and held on. I looked up into his blue eyes and forgot to keep my mouth shut.

“It’s too bad you’re so hot,” I
mumbled. I kept my eyes on the ground to prevent tripping up again. Or maybe it
was to keep from looking in his eyes and ripping his shirt off, I couldn’t be
sure.

“Why is that?” Drunk or not, his
smug expression was easy for me to read. The smile didn’t reach his eyes, but I
could hear it in his pleased tone.

“’Cause you’re a total jackass.”

“Well, I think that’s a little
rude.”

“Doesn’t make it untrue.”

I hiccupped. His hand still
gripped my elbow and I pulled away. Once again, I ignored the rush of heat on
my skin where he’d touched me.

“Did you have fun tonight?” he
asked.

I gave him a suspicious look,
but he maintained a straight face, so I answered him. “Yes, I had lots of fun.
I’m not really used to drinking, though.”

“I figured.”

I stopped dead in my tracks, my
hand slapping onto the arm not holding his cigarette. “You did? Oh, god, am I
obvious? I didn’t want to be that girl!”

He looked from his arm to my
face for a moment and my eyes grew bigger in panic. When he finally spoke, he
sounded surprised.

“I can’t tell if you’re fucking
with me or not. Are you genuinely worried that people know you’re drunk?”

“So I
am
that obvious! Oh, man.” My cheeks flushed in embarrassment. I
resumed the walk to my camper while Gabriel’s chuckle floated after me.

“If it matters, you’re doing a
pretty good job of not seeming that drunk. For someone who clearly doesn’t
drink,” he said.

I huffed and kept walking, all
the way up to my camper door. Gabriel caught my wrist right before I reached
for the doorknob. I turned to face him. Standing on the first step, we were
almost at eye level. I became a little distracted by his long eyelashes looking
down at me. His hand didn’t leave my wrist.

“You should drink lots of water
and pop some aspirin,” he said in a low tone that sent shivers down my back.

“Thanks for the tip.” My eyes
refused to leave his and I nearly drowned in the sea of blue.

Gabriel came in to stand as
close as possible to me, his body lightly pressing against mine. Heat flooded
through me and I resisted the urge to jump him. This was bad. In this state of
mind, I might not be able to refuse.

As soon as the thought crossed
my mind, the corners of his mouth turned upward and he took a small step away.

“Good night, Lucy.”

Gabriel took another step back
and I had a full view of him in his dark jeans and black tee. The camp lights
gleamed off his blonde hair. Despite him being covered in shadows, I could
still feel his eyes on me.

I managed to get in the camper
and when I turned around, he was gone. I shut the door, changed, and got into
bed. Then I got up again and poured myself a large glass of water and took some
aspirin.

I didn’t fall asleep
immediately. Instead, Gabriel’s deep eyes and soft touch flooded my thoughts.
He was too smooth, too skilled, too used to sweet-talking any woman he wanted.
With his ego and sarcasm, he couldn’t be taken seriously. Why couldn’t I get
him out of my head?

Perhaps I shouldn’t have
admitted his good looks. It seemed to only encourage him. Alcohol, it seemed,
was not great for my normal filters.

Chapter
10

We had finished up the final
show of the night and the last group of people filtered out before we shut and
locked the gates. I was with the usual suspects; Finley was securing the
grounds while we waited for him to meet up with us. We congratulated each other
on another night well done and discussed our plans for the evening when
everything fell apart.

Fin ran like he was trying for a
gold medal, when he literally skidded to a halt in front of us, his eyes wide
with disbelief. Red in the face, he looked incredibly freaked out. “You’re
never going to believe it. I can’t believe it. I don’t understand how this
happened.”

Delia and I shared a puzzled
look.

“You are not making any sense,
Fin,” Delia said.

“What in the world is going on?”
Bianca asked at the same time.

He took a deep breath. “They
found Marty.”

“Okay…and?” Brooklyn asked.

Finley’s voice cracked. “He’s
dead. No one seems to know how it happened. But…it doesn’t look like it was by
accident. I didn’t get a chance to see the body, but people who did are wigging
out.”

A small noise escaped from
Bianca, but otherwise shocked silence amongst the group; it couldn’t be real. I
didn’t understand what happened. Marty was an Unbreakable. How could he
possibly be dead?

“What are we standing here for?
Let’s go—where is he?” Keegan demanded.

“Over by our parking lot. Word’s
traveling quick,” Finley replied.

The group immediately took off
towards the car lot. As we all hustled over, I glanced at Delia, who was as
white as ghost.

“Are you okay?” I asked.

She shook her head and I could
see tears gathered in her eyes. “I have known Marty since the day I got here. I
do not understand how this could happen. It is not only that he was an
Unbreakable. That is mind-boggling, true. But he was also the nicest guy; he
never said no to helping anyone and protected the girls when sketchy townies
were around. I cannot fathom why anyone would want to hurt him.”

I thought of Marty’s warm voice,
the friendly smile that made lines around his eyes. I hadn’t known him well,
but he’d been welcoming to me. I could imagine trusting him as my father once
did. With almost a sweet composure, I couldn’t imagine why anyone would want to
hurt him. Or how they could even do so.

We made our way over. There was
already a crowd gathered near the parking lot entryway. I could make out bowed
heads and hear hushed whispers. I only heard bits of conversation.

“I don’t get it—Marty was
fine earlier today. What happened between then and now?”

“How did he end up here in the
parking lot of all places? No one comes out here.”

“Yeah, well maybe that’s why his
body’s out here.”

“How did an Unbreakable get
killed? It doesn’t make any sense.”

“I can’t see anything. What does
Marty’s body look like? Maybe that would give us a better idea.”

Nearly all the females in the
crowd were crying. Men exchanged angry whispers of revenge. Marty was family;
no way this would be overlooked. Whoever did this would be hunted down and
broken.

A booming voice broke through
the chatter. Sheffield.

“BACK UP! Let me
through—sorry Josephine, didn’t mean to knock you over—guys,
seriously, get the hell out of the way and let me get up there,” I heard him
say.

I was too short to see what was
going on up front, but I could hear everything now that the crowd was silent. I
could barely see Sheffield’s top hat peek through the front of the crowd as he
broke through to front of the mass. There was a sharp intake of air and a grim
pause before:

“Go to your campers. Everyone.
Now.” Sheffield ordered, each short punctuation a bark. His seriousness could
not be mistaken.