Gifted

Chapter Nineteen

After a short trip into the city, we were coming to a stop in a parking lot. The Council building was not what I expected at all. It looked like a huge warehouse; plain, industrial like. The gray paint was fresh and the brick was well maintained, but it didn't look like a meeting place at all. In fact, it looked as if it had once been a factory. There were no signs displayed, just big gold numbers indicating the street address.

I glanced over at Chase; he smiled reassuringly and nodded to the building. "You ready?" He asked. I smiled back, and we started across the street. The pull of power I felt yesterday was even more intense, and I knew that this was definitely the place.

The receptionist smiled up at us from the desk. She was an older woman with salt and pepper hair dressed in a grey business skirt and blazer. The pink dress shirt she had on under the blazer was the only hint of color.

"Hi Chase!" she exclaimed. "How's school going?"

"Hi Ms. Winchester," Chase said affectionately. "School's good."

She looked up and eyed me; her amethyst eyes caught mine "You must be Morgan."

"Yes ma'am," I answered and she smiled back at me. Her age did nothing to tone down her striking beauty.

She looked at Chase. "You know the drill."

Chase grabbed my hand and started to lead me down a long hallway to the right. "It was good seeing you," he called over his shoulder.

"You too sweetie," she answered going back to shuffling papers around her desk. The hallway was just as plain as the outside of the building. There were off-shooting hallways to the right. I could see some led to gray doors. A couple of doors were open in the main hallway revealing plain rooms with long meeting tables and wipe boards. The longer we walked the more nervous I felt. Chase must have sensed it and squeezed my hand. We finally reached a set of elevators, and he pushed the up button. The elevator made a dinging noise indicating it had reached our floor, and once the doors opened we stepped in. No elevator music, nothing, this whole building was so quiet. The doors closed, but the elevator didn't move. Chase let go of my hand and dug a card out of his wallet. He swiped it through a card reader above the number pad and pressed the number two. The elevator jerked and started lifting upward. There was a B for what I assumed was Basement, and three floors. The doors slid open as Chase was shoving the card back into his wallet.

He went to grab my hand again, but forgot it when he noticed the older man standing in front of the doors waiting for us. He reached his hand out toward Chase.

"Chase." He gripped his hand.

"Mr. Dawson," Chase answered respectfully. We stepped off the elevator, and Charles Dawson turned his attention to me. His amber eyes made my stomach do a flip flop. It was like a punch in the gut; they were the same exact shade as Rylan's.

"Ah, Morgan!" He reached his hand delicately over to me, not noticing my reaction, and held it for a moment. "Lovely to meet you," he smiled. "You look so much like your mother." It struck me that these people knew me. My parents had probably known them and attended Council meetings. It just blew my mind that there was this whole world I had never known. A world my parents had been involved in.