“How did you escape?”
A cold, ferocious look froze over her face. “The oldest trick in the book.”
“Being?”
“One of the warlocks had an... unhealthy interest in me.”
No, no, no, Jae pulled back, he didn’t... oh goddess.
“Don’t worry,” Laila assured her. “They had orders not to touch us that way. It could have a disturbing effect on the controls. But this one.” She shuddered. “He would sneak in some touching, petting.”
“Bastard,” Jaeden snarled.
The witch looked startled at her vehemence before throwing her a grateful smile. “I used it against him, though. I pretended an interest in him, which is probably the most difficult thing I have ever had to do, and he took me from the cage and snuck me out towards the back of the camp. He turned his back for a second and I knocked him out with a spell my mother had taught me years before. Stupid man.” She shook her head in disgust. “I stole his keys to his car, got a few miles away before I abandoned it and set off on foot, confusing my trail as I went. I thought Ethan would find me... but he never came.”
Jaeden snorted. “Yeah, cos’ he was dead.”
“He is dead then?” Laila queried quietly, her haunted eyes begging for an affirmative.
“Caia killed him.”
“She helped save me from prison... and now this news. It seems I will be forever in her debt.”
A sense of connection threaded its way between them and Jaeden smiled warmly at her for the first time. “The way that girl is going, we’re all going to be in her debt.”
The sound of the front door slamming pulled them from Laila’s tale, and Ryder strolled in, an obvious look of surprise on his face at the sight of them sitting together.
“Everything OK?” he queried, his eyes flicking between them.
“I was just going to ask that?” Vil hurried in now, his anxious gaze locked on Laila. She smiled at him, holding her hand out to draw him to her.
Visibly relaxing, he moved towards her like a magnet. Jaeden huffed in amusement at the suspicious look he leveled at her and jumped up towards Ryder, wrapping her arms around his waist, snuggling close to him. “Everything is good actually.” She searched his eyes, attempting to find the answer he had received this evening from her parent’s. “Everything is good?”
“What did I miss?”
“Ryder?” she whined.
“I’ll tell you if you tell me what happened here.”
She groaned and pulled away from him. “You’re a pain. Fine. Laila and I understand one another now, and I believe Caia when she says Laila is a good Midnight. Who would have thought? Now tell me what my father said.”
All of a sudden he laughed and grabbed her, whirling around the room. “Yes!”
“Yes?”
“Yes!”
“Oh my god-” he smothered her words with a passionate kiss. A discreet cough pulled them apart a few seconds later and they turned, smiling, to see Reuben lounging in the doorway. Immediately she felt Ryder tense.
“What are you doing here?”
“I came to see how your guests were faring, but obviously I’m interrupting a celebration.”
Vil grinned. “Jaeden’s parents are allowing them to mate.”
Reuben remained passive, not giving anything away. “How nice for them.”
“Reuben.” Jae made a move towards him, hating to hurt her friend. “I’m glad you’re here. I want you to be here for the ceremony. You’ve been through so much with me it would feel weird without you.”
“No it wouldn’t,” Ryder growled, brushing past her to stand bristling at the taller vampyre. “For a start my guests are none of your business.”
“I was merely curious. She is a Midnight after all.”
Ryder scoffed, his fists curling into knots. “We both know why you’re here, you son of a bitch.”
Jaeden fought an oncoming headache. “Ryder-”
“Son of a bitch?” Reuben thrust his shoulders back in an attempt to intimidate, all evidence of passivity gone and replaced with a stony anger. “I’m the son of a bitch? You’ve done nothing but hassle me since I got here.”
“Because you’re always here!”
“I’m her friend. I’m not going anywhere.”
“We’ll see-”
“Guys!” she shouted, looking desperately to Laila and Vilhelm for help. They were no good. They were already sidling quietly from the room to disappear into their bedroom.
“You have no right turning up all the time, that’s all I’m saying.”
“I came here to see if the boy and the girl were OK. That they weren’t causing any trouble, that’s all.”
“That’s what you can’t seem to wrap around your thick skull... this isn’t your business.”
“Whatever’s coming I’m more equipped to deal with it than you, lykan.”
“Enough with the prophet crap, it’s wearing on my nerves, vampyre.”
“You’re such a child.”
“I’m-”
Their argument drifted out of ear shot as she slammed out of the apartment and down the stairs out of the building. Half the time she didn’t think their inane arguing even had anything to do with her. Her headache throbbed harder.
A run.
A run would be good to work out everything that had happened this evening. Laila’s sorrowful tale, the bond that she had felt forging between them, the idea that Midnights might not all be bad (sheesh who saw that coming?), her official engagement to Ryder, and his inability to function normally in a room with Reuben.
Yeah, a run would be great.
Trying to throw off her irritation at Ryder and Reuben, Jae mused over Laila, feeling an impatience growing for Caia and Lucien to return so they could work this all out. With relief, she pulled into Lucien’s driveway and walked across the gravel and up on to the porch. She didn’t bother going through the house, knowing they would hear her strolling around to the back porch and would work out for themselves who was there. That impatience she felt bubbling in her skin changed into an impatience for the run. Jae jerked out of her clothes and she suddenly wished she could be like Caia. Ryder had described how she could change into a wolf instantly now, how she could run into the woods in human legs and soar into the change. It sounded wonderful. But as her muscles strained in the burn of the change, and as her bones cracked with eye-watering satisfaction, she knew she wouldn’t give up this feeling for anything. Distantly she wondered if Caia missed it. The cool night air rushing through her pelt was exactly what the doctor ordered. She crunched through pinecones, ran at full speed towards a tree and launched herself at it, only to bound off it and race in the opposite direction.
With the run, her mind cleared, replete and calm.
After a while she grew exhausted, and so made her way back to Lucien’s backyard, leisurely and purposely slowing the change back into human form. Jaeden smiled, stretching her muscles from top to bottom and yawning. With a final roll of her neck she began to shuffle back into her clothes.
On the last button of her shirt, her ears pricked up at a loud crack that came from the woods close by. She sniffed the air and an unfamiliar sweet scent she couldn’t quite identify swam up her nostrils. She hadn’t quite turned around to investigate when pain shot through her head and dark spots clouded her vision, swallowing her whole as they multiplied into a thick black tar.
“I can’t believe this. It’s all your fault!” Ryder railed at the vampyre as they followed Jaeden’s scent.
Reuben snorted. “You started it.”
“She’s probably furious at me. At you. I can’t believe she left without me evening knowing it. It’s your fault. You piss me off past rationality.”
“It’s always nice to be appreciated.”
“Don’t make me come over there, vampyre.”
“I’m shaking in my boots.”
Ryder bared his teeth and swung the truck viciously into Lucien’s driveway so that the vampyre slapped against the passenger door with an ‘oof’.
“Childish, immature-”
Ryder ignored him as his eyes narrowed on two figures he saw at the side of the house. Two figures that appeared to be struggling-
“Jaeden!” he bellowed, cutting the vampyre off. Slamming on the breaks and cutting the engine, he threw himself out of the truck running towards the dark figure that had Jaeden bundled over their shoulder. The figure stopped at the entrance of the woods, jerking towards them, their face hidden by a black hood. Unceremoniously, it dumped Jaeden’s unconscious body to the ground and like a shadow disappeared into the darkness of the trees.
Reuben was running past him. “You check Jaeden, I’ll go after them!” he ordered, his face set with determination. Ryder barely had a moment to register that he had never seen anyone look quite as dangerous as Reuben did in that moment as he blurred past him.
“Jaeden.” He fell beside her, turning her limp body over. He pressed two fingers to her pulse, relief rushing through him at the steady beat.
“Ryder, what happened?”
He looked up to see Ella and Magnus rushing out of the house, their faces etched with concern. “She’s been knocked out, her head’s bleeding.”
“Get her into the house,” Magnus ordered gruffly, his gaze searching the woods. “There’s someone out there.”
Ryder nodded, lifting Jaeden into his arms with ease. “I couldn’t see who it was. Reuben’s gone after them.”
Magnus frowned. “The vampyre. Sure he can handle it?”
The venomous look on Reuben’s face flashed before his eyes. “I’m sure. Let’s worry about Jae.”
Magnus reluctantly agreed and followed them into the house. Ella cleaned the blood from the wound and Magnus checked her over.
“When she comes around it’ll heal,” he assured Ryder, “No concussion.”
Ella wrung her hands. “Must have been some hit to take one of us down.”
Ryder growled in response.
At that, Jaeden stirred, her eyelids fluttering open. “Ow.”
Relief overwhelmed him as he took her hand in his. “Jae. You’re alright baby, you’re alright.”
After a few moments, her eyes seemed to focus and she groaned in irritation. “What the hell happened now?”
“I lost them!” Reuben suddenly strode into the sitting room, his hair wild from having run against the wind, his shirt torn from obstructing branches.
“Lost who?” Jae whispered, her look of confusion trying to mask the one of fear he knew was waiting in the wings. “What happened?”
Magnus shook his head in deep concern. “Someone tried to take you.”
Horror flit across her eyes before she could stop it. “Kidnap me?”
Ryder squeezed her hand tighter, rage unlike anything he had ever known desperate to explode and take everything with it. “We’ll find out why?” he promised tightly.
“I want to know who,” Ella snarled.