In The Alpha's Bedroom

Gran

Other than the Dakarai intervention and inquisition from all three adults, the rest of the afternoon seemed to swiftly pass by, without a return from Nebula.

At least someone was having fun, Page thought to herself while rolling her eyes in boredom. Being stuck with three serious and moody adults all  sitting around the dining room table, scheming, plotting and planning without an ounce of tequila or popcorn was becoming problematic for her sanity's constitution.

Page's attention periodically refocuses itself on the discussion around the table in front of her.

"If he's after a phoenix eye, then he's serious about wanting to keep tabs on someone. Do you think he wants to use it on Pumpkin?" Brent mulls over the thoughts growing and connecting in his now overly active mind.

Page vanishes into her own thoughts about the last few weeks at college. The eerie way Dakarai would be standing outside their dorm house, or how he would constantly pop up around Nebula. The visions of Nebula always running away from him made her inwardly chuckle to herself. The creep! The frigging ancient, old man creep. Ew! How did I ever.... She breaks her thought right there and then. Gross. She finishes off her internal monolog.

Pipper, sits quietly for a few seconds, deep in thought before one flashes it's way across the vast plains of those deep thoughts, she opens her eyes wide with shock making her jump to her feet.

Everyone at the table jolts.

"What is it Pip?" Bridgette asks, looking up at her with etched concern. Everyone else's eyes follows hers too.

Pipper, starts pacing around the table like a horse on a merry-go-round with her hands fixed on her hips, thinking of how to word her thoughts to her friends.

Page tries to keep up with her aunt but gives up when she feels like she's getting dizzy and sets her eyes on the table's surface just to stop the liquid inside her head from sloshing around in too many directions at once.

"I think he might just be after Nebula." She answers Brent and Bridgette's question at the same time. "What do you remember about the day you found Nebula?" She asks them in return.

Both Brent and Bridgette look at each other and slink back into their memories trying to remember that day.

"Wait, what?" Page suddenly sits up as the liquid in her head freezed into something solid and she instantly starts paying attention to the conversation taking place. She looks at Nebula's parent one at a time not understanding what her aunt has just asked them. "What do you mean by found Nebula? I thought you were her parents."

Bridgette, slightly flustered, takes Page's attention onto herself and explains to her how for all intense and purposes they are her parents, just not her biological parents. Brent and Bridgette were unable to conceive children of their own, so when they had been out collecting their monthly stock of fresh herbs, they had come across an abandoned and swaddled baby in the middle of the forest and instantly took the baby as their own and then officially adopted her with the assistance of the witch council.

Verbalizing that day's events, Brent sits up straight and clears his throat. "Love, do you remember the birth mark she had when we found her? We even thought it was odd because within days of bringing her home it had cleared up?"

Bridgette narrows her eyes and looks up recalling the memory. "The dark line she had on her nose?"

"Dark line on her nose?" Pipper repeats back to her.

Page starts to feel like she is watching a tennis match the way her head jerks from one side of the table to the other as each of the adults throws questions and answers at each other.

Where is the tequila!!!

"Yes. There was a rather dark purple line that ran down the length of her nose, from her bridge almost to the tip." Her eyes dart to Pipper, "Does that mean something?"

Pipper grabs her phone and dials a number without saying a word before bringing it up to het ear.

A loud resounding, "Why, hello my angel!" Sounds out for all to hear, even though the phone is pressed up against Pipper's ear.

Page chuckles, knowing exactly who could be so loud. She leans her head towards Bridgette and mutters under her breath, "Gran."

"Is that Page with you? I can hear her from here." Taunts Page's gran into Pipper's ear, making her smile for the first time in hours.

Page shakes her head trying to stifle her laughter. Nothing gets passed that old hag and there was definitely nothing wrong with her hearing. She had an uncanny ability to hear the things you didn't want her to and didn't hear the things you did want her to.

"Yes, mom it is." Pipper starts. "Mom, we have a situation and I need to pick your brain about something." She adds before the old woman could go off on a talking binge that would take all the legs off a donkey.

"What is it Angel?" The old woman inquires.

Pipper then goes through every pain staking detail of her story, from Dakarai and his need for a phoenix eye all the way through to Nebula, her abilities and the strange disappearing, purple birth mark, with her mom listening intently on the other side of the phone, not saying a word.

Dakarai, abandoned baby, purple marks, stalking weirdos, mates, phoenix eyes, oh yes and don't forget a best friend who can go poof and turn into a giant ass cat... What the hell! Talk about living in the middle of some fantasy novel! Page's internal monolog strikes up once more.

Even weed would do. Like come on...

The only sound Pipper can hear coming from the other side of the phone as she talks is that of papers being shuffled around and books being flipped open and closed.

After a few silent moments after her story has been told in full, Pipper voices, "Mom?"

"Yes, yes." Gran says highly distracted. More shuffling is heard. "Purple birth mark you say? Does this girl have flaming red hair, one green eye and one blue by any chance?"

This question stumps Pipper as well as everyone else paying attention to the old woman. "Yes, she does." Pipper finally answers her mother slowly, still trying to process how she knew that.

With that knowledge, the old woman begins a story of her own. This time Pipper puts her mother on speaker and places her phone in the middle of the table so that everyone could hear her telling a tale about an ancient blood line of witches with red hair and colorful eyes and a prophecy about an all powerful hybrid set to rule over all of the supernaturals, but the most disturbing part of this old woman's tale was that of a curse placed on the last offspring by none other than Dakarai himself. Leaving his mark on the child that he would one day come back and claim.

"Oh my." Whispers Pipper into the center of the group, her eyes transfixed on Brent and Bridgette. This was disconcerting, very much so.

Page swallows hard.

All three adults now very much aware of how badly they needed to keep Nebula both safe and as far away from Dakarai as possible.

Page does an eye roll at the thoughts of how she was practically throwing Nebula at Dakarai. Thank Nebula's drunken instincts or else she too would have gotten laid by a grandpa.

Pipper, thanking her mother and hanging up, she then rejoins her friends seated around the table. Now that they knew what the possibilities were, they could actually formulate a better plan of action.

For now though, Nebula would be safe where she was so there was no sense of urgency for her to return. Mateo would naturally make sure that nothing happened to his precious mate and so would his pack.

Lucky cat! Page screams in her head. Neb gets stuck with a hottie and I get stuck with three parentals and no tequila. I so need to text her to tell her next time she needs to take me with her.

"We need to glue Neb's phone to her in the future." Voices Page, breaking the thick tension around the table.