Free Savor by Alyssa Rose Ivy

uses dreams.”
    “Yeah, still doesn’t sound great.”
    “I’m not going to actually try any of it on you.”
    “So all those Pteron questions were out of curiosity and not experiment prep?”
    “Pteron questions?” Vera asked.
    “He thought I was hitting on him, but I was just learning.”
    Vera grinned. I’d been right she had been jealous. “Of course he thought that. He’s so full of himself. He’d think anyone was hitting on him.”
    I let her have her fun, at least she was smiling. After talking to Gareth about finding my mom and the potential job, I knew we might be staying a few days—if I could keep Vera from running that was. “I think we should probably turn in. Your parents wanted to see you before bed.”
    “I can escort you back,” Jaythan quickly offered.
    “We’ll be fine, but I appreciate the offer.” I held up a hand.
    “Are you sure?”
    “Absolutely, and don’t worry, Gareth doesn’t mind me walking her home alone either.”
    Jaythan scowled.
    “Nice meeting you, Gemma.” Vera ignored the two guys and started walking away.
    “Bye.” I waved and hurried after her. “Leave it to you to start a fight at a party.” I still couldn’t shake a feeling that things weren’t as they seemed. Everyone seemed friendly on the surface, but there was something else going on, and my gut was that Gemma and all that healing arts stuff was at the center of it.
    “I didn’t start a fight.”
    “Ok, not a fight, you just kicked a guy so hard he was on the ground.”
    “He deserved it.”
    “I don’t doubt it.” I bit back a smile. Vera was impressive.
    “You know you think it’s cool.”
    “If you say so.”
    “I do say so.”
    We walked back to the house in the darkness, but it didn’t bother either of us. Her night vision probably wasn’t quite as crisp as mine, but it worked, and in some ways it was nice. Sometimes it’s good to have a break from worrying about people.
    “What did Gareth talk to you about?” Her voice was level, but I knew she was asking for more than conversational purposes.
    “My mom. The dangers in looking for her.” I decided to focus on that. There was no reason to mention the job offer yet.
    “What kind of dangers? What would you be afraid of?”
    “It’s not dangers for me.”
    “It better not be about me.” She crossed her arms.
    “No, about her. My mom. It’s why Gareth didn’t look harder for you. If you think someone’s in danger, you don’t want to attract the wrong kind of attention to them. It’s not worth finding her if it means getting her killed in the process.”
    “I hadn’t thought of that.”
    “I hadn’t really thought any of this through. I knew I had to leave, and I did.” Leaving New Orleans was my biggest and most impulsive decision in my life.
    “Are you usually a planner?”
    “Yes and no. Yes when it comes to my job, no when it comes to my personal life.”
    “Yet you up and left your job without warning. You can’t say that was planned out.”
    “It wasn’t, but it was necessary.” I was going to snap otherwise.
    “I’m not a planner.”
    “I can tell.”
    “Yeah.” She looked at me, slowing down her pace in the process. “I’m not exactly what I appear on the surface though.”
    “Are any of us?”
    “Some are. Some people are exactly the way they appear.”
    “Or at least you think they are. Even the shallowest person has a story.” That was a lesson my father taught me at an early age. It went along with never underestimating an opponent. You never knew what their hidden strength could be.
    “What about all those girls you’ve used, huh? They were more than they appeared?”
    “Of course they were. And I didn’t use them. They wanted exactly what I did.”
    “At least you think they did.”
    “And you just proved my point. We can make assumptions about people’s true motivations and feelings, but it’s impossible to really know. Sometimes it’s hard to know what you really