No Spoilers
Must read The Reflex Part 1 first. Reflex Part 2 is not a stand-alone book.
The Reflex Series is a secrets and lies expose of the end of a fairy tale life.
The story continues with more details about the big reveal. How will this assist the team in finding out who is targeting Cara? How will they exploit this revelation to gain insight and the upper hand? Will they solve the mystery, and at what cost? How will all of this affect their family and relationships?
Read Part 2 to uncover all the answers and experience the exciting conclusion. Enjoy the final half of The Reflex.
No Spoilers
Must read The Reflex Part 1 first. Reflex Part 2 is not a stand-alone book.
The Reflex Series is a secrets and lies expose of the end of a fairy tale life.
The story continues with more details about the big reveal. How will this assist the team in finding out who is targeting Cara? How will they exploit this revelation to gain insight and the upper hand? Will they solve the mystery, and at what cost? How will all of this affect their family and relationships?
Read Part 2 to uncover all the answers and experience the exciting conclusion. Enjoy the final half of The Reflex.
Cara’s throbbing head has become more of a dull ache. Her body is still trembling as she not only hears her husband’s thoughts for the first time ever, but also feels his rage. All of it directed at Reed and Sasha. With one arm wrapped around her and his other arm out, finger pointed at both, Nic screams, “This what you two talked about last night, isn’t it!?”
Sasha doesn’t look apologetic when he answers. “It was all there, Nic. Reed is correct. I am to blame as well. You...you are different. I grew to love you like a brother, so I didn’t want to see it. But it was there. You are like Cara, somehow. You are you, but more. It explains so much I’ve taken for granted over the years.”
While Sasha is talking, Reed approaches and leans into her, placing his lips to her ear. She flinches, but he holds her head, firmly. “Tell Jinx it’s time to start drinking, and to get some alcohol out here...with your mind.” He backs away, but his eyes are fixed on her in silent command.
She places her hand on Nic’s face and gazes into his eyes before Jinx jumps up and announces, “Shit, I don’t know about you guys, but I need to start drinking. Do I have any takers?”
Cara inhales so hard, her heart literally skips a beat. She’s not even sure how she did that. Reed answers Jinx, calmly requesting she open a bottle of red, but his eyes remain on Cara.
Sasha adds, “Jinx, do you mind going down to the wine cellar and getting the Russian River Pinot, please? You know I love that one.” He smiles at his joke.
Oblivious, Jinx heads out to descend the stairs. When she is out of earshot, Reed commands, “C, tell her to grab the Frascati for something lighter, as well.” Jake moves towards Reed when he realizes the game they’re playing with Jinx. Reed puts up his hand to stop him from overreacting. “I’m sorry, it must be done. Please let this play out.”
Three minutes go by while no one speaks or appears to breathe. All eyes are darting around the room, looking from one to the other. Jinx starts talking as soon as she’s at the top of the stairs. “You know, I grabbed a bottle of Frascati, too. It’s nice and light for anyone not looking for the heavy Pinot this early.” There’s a collective gasp heard around the room.
Jake reaches for his wife and gently pulls her into the living room, taking the two bottles from her. “What happened?” Jinx inquires seeing the shocked look on all their faces.
“When the mission script had to change, how did you know where C needed you to be in the field, Jinx?” Reed demands.
Jinx is confused by his inquisition. “Most times I guessed based on what she would do.”
“But you always guessed correctly, didn’t you?”
“Well, sure?” Jake takes Jinx’s hand and tells her discreetly what just occurred. “WHAT?” Turning and glaring at Cara, she yells, “You’ve been manipulating me?!”
Reed, again, takes control, “Jinx, calm down. I don’t believe C does it consciously. When she NEEDS you, it projects to you.”
Cara and Nic are still on the ground speechless, both feeling anxious and perplexed. Cara’s head is starting to clear, though. Nic, it’s all true, isn’t it?
It would appear that way, cara mia.
Do I manipulate you?
No.
How can you be so sure? I mean, I manipulate people all the time. It’s common knowledge, but I didn’t realize I had mad skills at it.
I’m not sure how, but I do know, and you don’t have that effect on me. I think Reed has a direction he’s going with this. Can you read anyone else’s thoughts like you’re reading mine right now?
She scans the room. I’m getting a sense of some thoughts from Sasha,
Reed, and Jinx. None are clear like yours and mine, though. Jake is closed off completely. So are all three kids.
Interesting. He muses.
Are you processing with that brilliant brain of yours?
Yes.
Why can’t I hear or see that, the processing? Just your words. I imagine you’re speaking in your head like I am.
I am speaking them, but I don’t know why you can’t see more.
Cara deflates. She takes in a big breath to reorient her body. Nic, did my cliché B grade movie life just become science fiction? She can hear him sigh in her mind.
Which answer do you want, cara mia? The one that makes you feel better, or the one my brain is processing right now?
Before she can mentally respond to Nic, Jake comes to their side on the floor. “You’re talking to each right now, telepathically?” Jake inquires, kindly, considerate of their feelings.
“Yes,” Nic states.
“So, you can hear her thoughts like Jinx can, but you can also project your thoughts to her?” Jake questions, directing his inquiry only to Nic.
“Yes.”
“You have never done this consciously before?”
“No, we have not.”
“But you have had a connection to one another that’s deeper and more
intimate than most couples.” This genteel Jake is foreign to Cara. Nic nods his answer and Jake continues, “It never occurred to you to explore that, or think it ‘odd’?”
“No.” Nic hesitates for a moment. “Maybe?”
Jake very calmly sits back on the floor with his legs spread to each side of Cara and Nic. He leans into the couch behind him, getting comfortable, before turning hard and casting a menacing glare towards Sasha and Reed.
Pointing his finger between the two of them, he accuses, “You two little co-conspirators have no idea what you’ve just done.” He points to her and Nic, who are obviously in distress, before addressing Sasha and Reed again. “Subtlety is neither one of your talents, is it?”
Reed suddenly looks very guilty as his eyes move to Cara’s tear-stained face. He immediately babbles on about how he did some quick research on the plane and read how their gift could be pushed into the conscious level with an emotional breakthrough. He admits he spoke to Sasha about the situation last night, and they couldn’t think of a better way to make that happen than to trick Cara.
Sasha jumps in and apologizes but adds they were both tired and knew they didn’t have much time to come up with a plan.
“You are both dumbasses,” Jake reprimands. “Did it not occur to you that this emotional scene could have been avoided by just discussing it with them?” Jake continues to chastise Reed and Sasha. “Breakthroughs can occur many different ways. Sending someone over the edge is only one means. You came at this ill-equipped and unprepared. Although you achieved the required result, you could have accomplished it with a kinder, gentler hand.”
****
Placing one hand on Nic’s leg and one on Cara’s, Jake decides he needs to elaborate for all of them to contain the hysteria he feels building in the room. “What just happened isn’t magic or fiction, it’s only science. What I’m about to tell you may be hard to take, and may blow your minds a little bit, but hear me out.
“Many great physicists, including Einstein, have envisaged the existence of the particular anomaly you’ve just seen displayed, and Nic and Cara are, by far, not the first to have this gift. It’s all about the ability to convert thoughts into energy. Our thoughts have a molecular structure like everything else in the world. Those molecular particles have energy. Some people can manipulate that energy with their minds the way your brain tells you to lift an arm when you want to reach for something. It’s the same concept.”
Research and experiments in this field of science have been going on for decades. The physics portion aside, it begins with the notion of intuition. Why do some people have more acute intuition than others? Some minds process information on an intuitive level first, while other minds can only process information given the facts. Many personality tests, like the Myers Briggs, for instance, have been around for decades and are used to determine which type of mind one possesses. These tests are often utilized to gauge someone’s career choice, learning challenges, even which type of mate is most suitable.
Other researchers began to look more closely at the concept of intuition. What occurs organically in the brain to cause it to view the world from an intuitive level? That research has led to a more biological understanding of neuropathways in the mind, and how information is moved on the synapses firing on those pathways. It’s sometimes referred to as neuroplasticity, the ability to alter and change the neurons and synapses in the brain. Much of this research has led to breakthroughs on ways to approach and treat traumatic brain injuries, how to help Parkinson’s victims, and aided in mental illness solutions and drug therapies. But what is ultimately known of the human brain is still a very fractional understanding.
Still other doctors and researchers have moved toward the concept that our brains are only functioning at ten percent of their capacity. Those scientists have been more inclined to believe intuition is the result of a special talent. A gift. They believe the mind can acquire the ability to utilize and manipulate those neuropathways to produce an evolved outcome. “Tons of research has been funded in this direction, although some of it may be questionable in its ethics. Regardless, there have been some documented results of psychic gifts.” Jakes looks around the room to find all eyes directly on him.
“Here’s where some of the confusion and perhaps skepticism presents itself.” Jake continues with his lecture. “Despite your brain’s capacity to possibly produce a ‘gifted’ moment, between the biology, the psychology, and the physics associated with the event, everyone’s mind has some conflict with it.”
First off, the concept of the ‘breakthrough’ is highly debated. Psychologically, every mind is broken into levels of consciousness and sub consciousness. Consciousness is the editor of the mind. It inherently filters inconsistencies for the mind. Any input it’s getting from the subconscious, or any input it receives from the reality around it, will be discarded if it makes no cerebral sense. Normal, sane brains function this way.
Jake points to Cara and uses her as an example. “Cara may have been hearing people’s thoughts at an early age. Her subconscious released that chatter to her conscious, but it rejected it. It may have rejected it because it was incongruent. It made no sense. Or it may have rejected it because all the chatter was too overwhelming to process. Either way, her subconscious has been protecting her, keeping the chatter to a minimum. So, the information is there, but she is accessing it only on an instinctive level.”
Pointing to Nic to make his next example, Jake expands, “Nic’s brain may have been receiving the input but, biologically, the neuropathways didn’t exist yet, to allow the chatter to make the clear jump from subconscious to conscious. So, again, the information is there, but it has no means to move because the synapses to reach its destination don’t exist. Neuropathways can be created and repaired in the brain. Doctors have discovered this by monitoring the progress of healing from brain injuries. A breakthrough can be that path suddenly developing.”
Jake adds, “The physics portion of this, well, that’s complicated and confusing.”
Physics theories would argue both Cara and Nic were born with these abilities; their brains were engineered with the ability to manipulate energy on an evolved level. The details on how they are doing it is the complicated and confusing part. And none of those details are factual at this point. It’s all theories and equational math. “String theory, quantum mechanics and the God particle are all still only theories to suggest we are one with our universe,” Jake says, glancing at the three teenagers on the couch. “Are you still with me?” he asks with a wink.
Nic has been listening to Jake intently. He’s looking much more composed as he pulls Cara tighter to him and runs his fingers through her hair. Nic lets his gaze travel around the great room before resting on Jake. “Thank you, Jake, for your assistance. Apparently, our handlers are a bit inept when it comes to ‘handling’ a situation. A simple game of guess what number I’m thinking in my head may have sufficed, don’t you think?” He glares at Sasha and Reed before turning his attention back to Jake. “But, how is it you know so much about this?”
A shot of panic runs up Jake’s spine. He has offered too much. He shakes his head sadly at Nic and resignedly asks, “Ever hear of the Stargate Project?”
Someone is targeting Cara’s children because of their psychic abilities, and she refuses to let that happen. She vows to do anything necessary to protect them and to take out whoever is threatening them together with her husband Nic, their best friends Sasha and Reed, her ex-analyst Jinx, and Jinx’s mysterious husband Jake. All of them have discovered latent psychic abilities, and they combine their abilities to identify their enemies. Cara naively believes that this new connection has brought all of her loved ones much closer together. But their abilities also lead to uncovered secrets and unforgivable betrayals. Will Cara and her friends be able to protect their children?
I would rate The Reflex Part 2 by Maria Denison 5 out of 5 stars. I was worried that the supernatural aspect of the book would be too unbelievable, but Denison somehow manages to pull together different scientific and cultural explanations for the group’s abilities that somehow make psychic abilities seem natural. The love story between Cara and Nic is once again beyond perfect, with their desire and love for one another conquering all of the dirty secrets that the group uncovers. Cara and Reed also have a cute moment, and it is once again so fun to read how Uncles Sasha and Reed interact with Mia and Max, Cara’s apparently super powerful teenage children. After reading The Reflex Part 1, I was anxious to get my hands on the second book in the series– and it definitely did not disappoint! Based on the combination of love triangles, deep friendships, vulnerability, and intense action scenes, I really think that The Reflect Series by Maria Denison should be the next big paranormal romance/action series.
I would recommend this book to absolutely all mature audiences! Though the romances in the novel are more catered to women, the action scenes and the interesting backstories of each character would appeal to all. I would add trigger warnings for institutionalization and rape. If you are looking for the perfect beach read, The Reflex Part 1 and The Reflex Part 2 are the books for you! But be warned that when you finish those, you’ll be on the edge of your seat waiting for the release of The Reaction Part 1.