“You were shouting in your sleep.”
I was? “I was?”
He nodded and sympathy melted into the sadness. “You were shouting for Jaeden.”
Her dream came back to her immediately and she scrambled excitedly for Lucien’s arm without thinking. “I dreamt of her.”
“What?”
“Jaeden.”
“What was the dream about?”
“I think I was where she was.”
“What was it like?”
Caia couldn’t help but smile softly in gratitude. He wasn’t even questioning the madness. He believed her. With that she sighed and went on to tell him of her visions.
22 - Revelations
“So, are you still pissed at Lucien? Cos’ it didn’t look that way this morning,” Sebastian asked quietly, almost tentatively, as they walked towards the main entrance of the school.
Caia sighed. Before her powers had suddenly shifted into gear she would have unobservantly answered Seb’s question. Unfortunately, now she could feel the jealousy rolling off of him and she winced. Their relationship had been so much easier when she hadn’t known he had feelings for her. She blanched at all the times she had playfully shrugged off his embraces. Could she be any more of a bitch?
“We’re OK,” she answered carefully, ignoring the smirks she was receiving from her human school mates. They were whispering about her alleged attack on Alexa. Well not so much ‘alleged’ as actual. She huffed. “I’m trying to forgive him for deceiving me. I know he only did it to protect you all.”
Sebastian nodded but wouldn’t meet her gaze.
Dammit. It was going to be difficult if he kept this up, and frankly he was the only friend she had right now. Mal and the others were suspiciously off to class when Sebastian, who had decided to drive Caia to school today despite her protesting that she had shiny new Ford, had pulled into the parking lot. They weren’t standing in their usual spot around Mal’s SUV waiting on them.
Caia had laughed. “What, are they scared of me or something?” She had indicated the abandoned SUV.
“Actually, yeah.” Sebastian had chuckled and taken her book bag from her like a true gentleman. She had let him. It was easier that way...and kind of nice.
As they approached Caia’s locker, Sebastian sighed. “So, no word yet from Dimitri and the others?”
More comfortable to be on safer ground she nodded. “Actually, yeah, but no good news. They’ve searched the eastern and southern boundaries but nothing. They’re going to cross state lines next. But Lucien seems happy with the speed of their progress in the search.”
“Yeah, they’ve accomplished quite a lot in a few days. They would have accomplished even more if they had let me in on the search.”
Caia touched his arm, drawing him to a stop. “Lucien wants you here, protecting the pack.”
That garnered a snort. “Yeah right. He thinks I’m a useless young male.” His golden eyes flashed. “I’m not useless. And...” he growled, not meeting her eyes. “She was my best friend, Cy.”
“Is. Not was,” she warned him.
He nodded, although his jaw clenched in anger. “Sure.”
The bell for first period rang and Caia impulsively pulled him into a hug. “I’ll see you at lunch,” she mumbled in his ear, and then immediately regretted the hug when his arms tightened around her. She felt his anger dissipate into comfort mixed with lust. Teenage boys, she huffed inwardly, even immediate danger and war doesn’t cool their libido. Pulling away from him gently she sent him her most platonic smile and wandered off to class.
“Oh sorry,” a voice full of laughter said as a large body bumped into her. Caia turned to see a boy from her biology class stumble back and then smirk when he realized whom he’d walked into. He nudged a guy Caia didn’t recognize because she didn’t have a class with him. “Dude, it’s psycho Ribeiro.”
‘Dude’ chuckled, his dull eyes drinking her in from head to foot. “Man, how is it even possible that she launched some other chick across a room? She doesn’t look like she could lift a pencil.” He laughed raucously at his own lame joke.
The boy from biology curled his lips. “Dunno man, but she did it.” He stepped closer to her and Caia flinched back. A human had never attempted to intimidate her before. Was there something off with her pheromones? “You like it rough, Caia? How about you play it rough with me after school, huh?”
She felt a growl begin at the base of her throat and had to remind herself to exert some self-control. “Why don’t you go play rough with your ‘Dude’, jackass.”
His eyes narrowed as he closed the space between them. She refused to back up even though he had a good six inches on her. Seriously… why wasn’t he afraid of her?
“Maybe someone needs to teach you some manners, little girl.”“Maybe you need to back the hell off.”
“Or what?”
“Or-”
“Or you’ll be eating out of a straw for the rest of your life,” a rough voice rumbled from behind them.
The boy pulled back enough for Caia to see Malek standing beside ‘Dude’, towering over them all, his muscles rippling as he crossed his arms over his chest.
She was surprised to say the least. Mal had flirted with her and had also been downright rude (she had shrugged that off because he was rude to everyone) but he had never, however, shown her much interest other than wondering what she looked like naked. And from his absence this morning, she had a feeling he was now wary of her, afraid of the Midnight blood that ran in her veins. But there he stood, un-amused and defensive because someone had been threatening her.
A warm rush ran through her. She was still his pack.
The boy’s face turned a yucky sick color. He mumbled something about making a mistake before he brushed past her into the biology lab. ‘Dude’ made a quick getaway.
Caia smiled and flicked a look up at Malek. He nodded sharply at her. “See you at lunch.”
“Sure.” She grinned despite his abruptness. “And thanks.”
He shrugged as if it was no big deal, and then grinned back at her. Well, leered back at her. “Can’t have ‘them’ sniffing around our females now, can I?”
She rolled her eyes and started after biology boy. The truth was ... it was nice knowing Mal still felt that she deserved his dominant male protection – annoying but reassuring.
And later, halfway through biology, with a little concentration on the boy who had been trying to intimidate her, Caia managed to tip his opened bottle of water into his lap (he was wearing crème khakis) from all the way across the classroom. Immature ‘he peed himself’ jokes floated around for a good ten minutes, his angry blushes only making the class laugh harder.
Yup... being a magik had its perks.
Her mood abruptly changed at lunch with the dark pall that hung over the table. The news of Jaeden’s kidnapping had reached all of the packs’ ears by the weekend and had affected everyone deeply. Dana and Alexa didn’t bitch at her, and Daniel made no attempt to make her laugh with his stupid jokes. Only Malek seemed to be himself, cracking out lewd comments and then teasing Caia quietly about being a witch. His first mention of it caused everyone to tense except for Caia. She was glad he had brought it up.
“I didn’t see your car outside, Cy,” he snickered. “What, you fly in on your broom instead?”
“Your wit astounds me,” Sebastian grumbled.
Caia actually laughed though. She was the only one, other than Mal, who wasn’t acting like she should be grieving because she knew Jae was still alive and was comforted (despite Jae’s conditions) by her nightly visitations to see her. The night before she had actually seen how the scars on Jaeden’s back had completely healed. And on the plus there were no fresh ones. Jae had even stopped whimpering and was sitting upright, although she was still unaware of Caia’s presence.
“I really hope you’re joking, Mal, and that you know a little bit more about witches than you’re letting on.”
Alexa snorted. “I think all we really want to know is if you’re going to kill us in our sleep?”
Sebastian growled and Caia had to kick him under the table. It had been fairly loud and she had seen some humans glance around in confusion at the animalistic sound.
“No,” she warned him, pressing a reassuring hand on his arm, “It’s fine. I even understand the hostility now.” She smiled sweetly at Alexa, being deliberately irritating. “You’re worried that because of my heritage I’m a bad guy. I’m not.”
“No one is saying that.” Mal glared at his sister and Caia drew a puzzled look at his out of character behavior. “Are they?”
Alexa hissed, glaring back at him. “Just because Dad said... ugh you are so whipped.”
“And you are so dead if you don’t get your attitude in check.”
“What, you’re going to tell Dad on me?”
“You bet your ass I am.”
“Well, I’ll tell him all about your little sexcapades with ‘them’.”
Mal shrugged, ripping into his sandwich carelessly and answering with his mouth full, “He already knows.”
“Uh-huh, yeah sure.”
“Yeah-huh. Lucien had a word.” He winced and then snarled, biting harder into the sandwich. “And believe me, it sucked. So if you want to keep that little ass intact I’d shut. The hell. Up.”
Alexa snapped her teeth and stood up from the table to repeat her dramatic performance of leaving the pack in a huff. It was a ritual she had perfected to once a week ever since Caia’s arrival. Today it presented an opportunity for Caia. She stood up too and to everyone’s surprise rushed after Alexa.
As Sebastian had noted that morning, Caia and Lucien were talking, but things were still strained between them and the cause of it was swinging her ass out of the cafeteria. With her new found ‘emotion radar’ Caia was going to put to rest some serious doubts.