TAMARA WAS SMILING AS she walked out of Francesca's office, elated about her new job. She was just walking past the reception when she heard someone call out to her.

When she turned, she was surprised to find Fabiola walking in. Behind her, the whole group was present.

Tamara found herself looking for Pierce, but she shook her head and smiled, leaning into Fabiola's hug.

"Hey, Fab. How've you been?" she asked. Fabiola grinned back, her eyes crinkling. "Really good. I moved in with Grace like, a week ago and it has been so good."

Tamara nodded with a smile as Grace beamed at them both. Lucian came up behind, pushing his glasses up his nose with a finger.

"Hey, Tammy. Didn't think you'd be here first," he said, his golden hair all mussed up but adorable.

"Do you know where Pierce is?" Hans came up with his phone in his hand, Selena walking up with him. Tamara's smile slipped a bit as she shook her head. "Why does everyone just assume I know where he is?" she asked with genuine curiosity.

"Because you always seem to know where he is. And he always knows where you are," Davison said from behind and gave Tamara a side hug when he reached her.

"Yeah, well," she said, hugging him back. "I stopped keeping track five years ago."

Davison's brow furrowed as he looked at the others, keeping his arm around her shoulder. They all looked back, equally confused, but they didn't push for information.

"We gonna get some beer or what?" Another deep voice said, making Tamara's shoulders stiffen.

Jeremiah. Her elder brother. They were just siblings by blood. Didn't share a bond.

At least not like the Ferons did.

Tamara jolted a tiny bit at that thought. Where did it come from? The image of the Roberta, Dane and Hunter lying on their living room, noticing something she hadn't.

Their faces didn't look like they'd just killed each other.

There had been desperation in their eyes before they'd died. She can see it now. They were murdered by someone else. Not by each other.

This was gonna be more complicated than it had seemed to be some time ago.

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"So, what are y'all thinking of doing after Mortality?" Davison asked after taking a swig of his beer.

They'd walked on to the nearby bar and settled down after ordering beers for the table.

"I'm probably gonna go to a resort with Sel and fool around," Hans said, looking at his girlfriend with love.

Everyone laid out their plans and they all listened. Or at least Tamara pretended to listen. She zoned out after everyone started talking. She knew what they were gonna say.

"What about you, Jer?" Grace suddenly asked, getting Tamara out of her trance. She turned to the side. He'd chosen to sit beside her. Maybe they were making progress.

She looked on as Jeremiah shrugged and said, "I don't know. A vacation maybe, and then back to work."

Everyone nodded in understanding. Of all of the Guardians, Jeremiah was the one who stopped getting the dreams first. He just notified everyone one and a year later, he had a successful apple cider business, which has been booming on since.

That had been three years ago. One by one, the others had started noticing that they didn't have to expect bloody mass murders in their dreams.

Well, except one.

Everyone was now looking at Tamara expectantly, ready with an intervention speech. Of the lot, she was the only one who took the job very seriously and they knew that she wouldn't be able to let go of it. They'd come prepared with a list of things for her to do after turning back to human.

Tamara suddenly noticed them all looking at her and she took a long swig of her beer. She knew they were all worried. They always had been. The first job she hadn't able to finish, she'd harmed herself very badly. They all had needed to sedate her heavily to calm her down.

"I have another job to do, actually," she said. All of them opened their mouths at the same time to spew out various protests but closed them immediately. They hadn't expected that.

"Another job? Now?" Grace asked with surprise and concern.

"I thought the dreams had stopped for you too," Hans said.

"Yeah, they had," she said, fiddling with the steel ring in her right hand. It was a plain ring that she wore in her ring finger just like her mother. "But I got one again, so."

"How come we didn't get any?" Davison wondered aloud.

"Probably because it was meant for me," Tamara said, leaning onto her chair and rocking it back a bit.

"But we all got dreams together, didn't we?" Fabiola asked.

"Yeah, well. It's gonna be my last one."

"How do you know?" Selena asked. Tamara shrugged and said, "I don't. It's just a gut feeling."

She lost her balance with the chair and was going to let out a very shrill squeal when Jeremiah caught the chair and set it right.

He didn't even have to look. Tamara was having one of those moments again where she was very jealous of her brother.

"Don't do that," he said and gave her a pointed look. "You'll get hurt."

It was easy to see why they didn't look like siblings. He had chocolate brown wavy hair and baby blue eyes, whereas she had dark brown wavy-curly hair and midnight black eyes. The only things that matched were their upturned noses and their narrow chins. Their face shapes matched a bit too, though Tamara thought hers was a bit rounder than his.

Was it embarrassing that she had tried to notice how they looked similar? Yes. Did she care? She couldn't really get herself to.

She was an artist. It was her nature to notice that stuff.

"Are you sure you should take up the job? I mean, isn't it weird that just before everyone gets the letters, someone gets a dream?" Davison asked with concern.

Tamara shrugged again and said, "It's just gonna be any other job."

But her gut told her something else. Her gut said that there was something else going on behind all this. Something which was interfering with the flow of things.

JEREMIAH STARED AT HER, his baby blue eyes unreadable. He could see the gears turning in her head. She didn't think it, even if she did say it with so much confidence. The soft, vulnerable part of him roared with brotherly protectiveness. He hadn't even known that he'd had a sister till they'd all died. But the emotional part he'd tried to bury deep inside him had come back to life every time he'd looked at her.

She was his little sister. Although only two years younger and perfectly capable of doing everything on her own, he couldn't help but be worried. He'd seen her when she'd lost it in London when she hadn't been able to save the person she had supposed to.

She was hopeful. More hopeful than she ever allowed herself to be. It was scary.

"I'll be fine, guys," Tamara said. "Don't worry."

What if you're not? What if they die anyway?

Her shoulders stiffened a bit, as if she thought the same thing, before she tucked a strand of her hair behind her ear.

She was nervous. Something was wrong. They had worked together once, but he still hadn't been able to help himself and had observed all her little mannerisms, all the little things that made her unique.

"I'll come with you," Jeremiah said without thinking. Tamara paused for a second and blinked at him.

"That's not necessary," Tamara said politely. "I know," he replied.

"I have to do this alone."

"No, you don't."

"Yes, I do. It's my last mission, I don't want anyone to help me."

Jeremiah was shut up by that. She looked a bit fierce about it, like there was something about this particular job that she needed to do it alone.

"Look, please, just... trust me on this, alright guys?" she requested them all. "I'll call if I need help, I promise."

Jeremiah nodded but didn't believe her. He knew that she wouldn't. She was the proudest and the most selfless out of the lot. She wouldn't call for help even if she was in danger.

Especially when almost all of them were going to become human.

But he extinguished the fire of protectiveness and decided to let it go. She wasn't going to relent. She was ten times more stubborn than him. So he didn't argue and instead, took another swig of his beer.

Please let her be safe.

He swatted that thought away. He wasn't a caring big brother. He had been an uncaring immortal asshole first, human second.

I'm not made for all that shit.

What his brain let go, his heart could not. He couldn't just let her go like that. Where's the job? Who does she have to save? Is there anything that's fishy about it? What if it's a trap? What if-

"Jeremiah," Tamara said, looking at him intently. He turned and saw those inky black eyes, ones that he remembered his father for. He hated that they were always clouded with empathy. She trusted too much. She believed people could just change.

They won't.

They never do.

"I'll be careful," Tamara said suddenly as if feeling his panic. "I'll call if I need any help."

He could tell that she hoped that she wouldn't have to. There was something fishy going on and she didn't want to involve anyone else in it.

He was gonna have to talk to Francesca about this job. Get the details.

She was a tough nut to crack, but he was nothing if not half as stubborn as his father made out to be.

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