Awakened

by Inger Iversen

  I didn’t fear him. I should have, but I couldn’t show fear with Kale and Jace. They were both fearless, as they’d shown me a few days ago when Laurent came looking for Ella. If I couldn’t stand up to Kale, how could I even hope to help when they stood against Laurent, to save and protect Ella? I met his stare head-on.

  “Look, man I know you care about her,” I said, strengthening my voice and raising my chin. I didn’t think it any of his business how I felt about Ella, but if that was what it took to get him to settle down… “We all do. Hell, I think I lov—”

  “Don’t!” Kale’s eyes were no longer dark. He stepped back and closed his eyes, taking what I assumed was a calming breath before he opened them again.

  “Man, if I didn’t know any better, I’d say that you think you are the only one here who wants to find Ella.” I shook my head in annoyance. “You aren’t the only one here who has sacrificed!” Rage flared in my chest. “You and Jace have a past—I get it, but that’s just what it should be.”

  “You know nothing of the past he and I share.”

  “Not for lack of trying,” Mia whispered.

  Kale snarled.

  “She’s right. You two tell us nothing, and then act like Ella—the girl I’ve known my entire life—is your sole responsibility, as if what is best for her is for the two of you to decide. But I’m willing to give my all for her. I’m ready to step up and sacrifice my safety—my life, if need be, so don’t sit here on some invisible high horse looking down on us.” I caught my breath, a knot in my stomach and my balled fists trembling.

  Rather than act like the reasonable, rational adult I expected, Kale laughed, looking angry, even furious. “You don’t get it, do you? I have sacrificed my safety and my life for her!”

  Everyone in the room was silent. Jace stood in the corner, smiling.

  “What’s so damned funny?” I asked. He shook his head, pissing me off even more. Mia and I were so in the dark, it wasn’t funny, and whatever secrets those two shared needed to come out.

  “I get it. We all want Ella back, and we have to work together.” Kale’s voice had finally dropped a few decibels. He snatched Jace’s list from the table. “What’s this?”

  Jace moved around the table and grabbed the paper from Kale. “This is the P.O. Box where we are to pick up our satellite phones, laptop, and weapons if needed, and a list of places and people I can call on, if need be.”

  At the mention of weapons, I looked at Mia. She had to be wondering about what she’d gotten into, as I was.

  “It also has the private number for my techie and Servitto, who will both be helping us.” Jace returned the paper to his pocket and looked from Kale to me and then to Mia. If the Council was able to supply us all that, then they had to have some heavy-duty resources to find Ella, and we needed them on our side.

  “I know that none of you trust me, but I am not with the Council, right now. I am looking for Ella.” Jace looked straight at Kale. “And I need your help to find her. Laurent is your master, after all.”

  Kale took the words like a punch in the gut before turning away from us. He grabbed his cell phone and headed for the sliding glass door that led to the backyard. Kale grabbed the handle, and he turned to Jace, eyes flickering black. “Je ne suis pas la seule personne qui réclame un maître.”

  Kale went out and slammed the door behind him so hard it shook the walls and windows. Mia’s arms were wrapped tightly around her body, as if that was the only thing holding her up. I pulled her close, patting her back.

  “What did he just say?” I asked Jace as Mia snuggled in closer. I looked down at her, regretting that I had been so adamant about involving her in this. I just didn’t want to leave her alone.

  She shook her head, anger and confusion whirling in her eyes. “What the heck is going on Alex?” Mia pulled away and power walked toward Jace.

  Before Jace answered me, Mia moved from my arms and pointed her sharp pastel-painted finger an inch from his nose. “You and Kale are starting to really piss me off.”

  She ran her hands through her hair and released an annoyed sigh. “We have been here for two hours, and Alex and I still have no clue what is going on.”

  “Or where Ella is,” I added, moving to stand next to Mia. She nodded in agreement.

  Jace sighed and motioned for us to wait in the living room. He went outside to get Kale. I hoped that Mia and I would finally get some truth from this. It seemed as if everywhere we turned there was a new threat or a new lie keeping us from finding Ella.

  I didn’t want to let anyone down. Mia needed my help, my family needed me, Jace and Kale needed a referee, and Ella needed to be found. It all rested on my shoulders, and I wasn’t sure how much more I could carry. When would it all be too much? When would I fail, as I’d failed Ella?

  Chapter 9

  Kale

  I paced around the living room, deep in thought. Mia’s insistent chattering and Alex’s deep voice radiated both squeaks and bass from the base of my spine to my temples. My head throbbed, while my vision and hearing heightened—my body was preparing itself for the hunt.

  La Luxure had gotten louder, begging for me to succumb, and it was difficult to ignore. La Luxure waited, searching for a weakness and planning its attack. I’d beaten the beast before, but it had never been this bad. Though Jace and I had discussed how important it was to keep my diseased status from this ill-formed group, I could think of little else but sinking my teeth into his neck. But Alex and Mia learning about my condition would only take time and energy we needed for finding Ella.

  With the evidence Jace had found of the Council’s corruption, time was of the essence. They had more skills, weapons, and knowledge than we did, and they could easily find her first. We were in Moose Nose village in my—no, in Daniel Barnes’s—cottage, the one I’d brought Ella to, the one where I’d lost all reason and kissed her, felt her warm soft skin against my own. I wasn’t a man of many needs, but since that night, I wondered how I had gone without her touch for so long without going mad. The heat of her fingers as they traced my skin, taste of her lips as she explored mine, the swell of her chest as she took each breath.

  “Kale!” Mia screeched, dislodging the memory of Ella and slamming me back into the present. “What is going on with you? We all called you like fifty times!”

  She exaggerated. They’d each called my name once before Mia’s screech. Ever since I’d come back inside, Mia and Alex had talked nonstop.

  “What?” I tried to hide the annoyance, but lately that had been growing close to impossible. The voice of la Luxure whispered to me, but I ignored it and Mia’s smooth long neck.

  “Alex wants to know why it’s safe for us to be here but not in Cedar.”

  I glanced at Alex. His chest swelled, and his heartbeat increased. His fear was for Ella, not in response to me, and that lessened the urge to drink from him. He crossed his well-defined arms over his chest a ridiculous show of dominance as he eyed me like I was his prey. The vein in his neck called to me in a language I had once spoken fluently and found impossible to resist. He had a lot to learn, and the only thing stopping me from schooling him was Ella’s feelings for him.

  “You’ll have to trust me.” I couldn’t explain without revealing what I really was; nor did I trust Jace with that information. I had another home in Daniel’s name, in addition to this one, and I didn’t want to risk Jace finding out about it and revealing it to the Council.

  “No, that’s not enough.”

  I quirked an eyebrow and smirked at Alex’s authoritarian tone. He gave me a hard glare.

  It was so easy to annoy that boy. He needed a lesson and fast. Too bad it wouldn’t be me that taught it to him.

  He continued, “We need real answers, and now. It’s been too long since her disappearance.” His voice broke slightly, and he shifted his stance. “And we want answers, Kale—real ones.”

  He felt more for Ella than she had initially told me, though he tried to hide it. Tho
ugh it angered me, I accepted it. Ella would be well suited with him. He had everything to offer her that I couldn’t: life and a future—but that didn’t mean that he would speak to me as a commander.

  I added silk to my voice to help calm the humans. “It is safer here; this cottage cannot be traced to me.”

  That much was true. I had obtained the house only because I was Chorý. Twenty-six years ago, I had saved Daniel’s mother—nine months pregnant with Daniel—from a hit arranged by her ex-husband. That particular night, I’d been in the mood for vengeance, and when I came upon the four men standing over a woman, I’d gotten my wish. I’d never told her that her ex-husband thought that the lives of her and his son were worth no more than a thousand dollars and a case of beer—nor what I had done to him two nights later. In saving her life, I relieved my true nature; instead of running away, she promised me a favor. All I’d needed was a new identity and a place to live, which she granted me. Saving her had been the first time I felt as though my disease was more than a burden, but that feeling hadn’t lasted long.

  Jace moved from his hiding place in the corner to stand directly in front of the fireplace. “If it can’t be traced to you, then maybe it can be traced to the person who allows you to squat here, and there is the link to you that you believe does not exist.” His ice blue eyes spoke the words that he would not say in front of Alex and Mia. He had been eyeing us all suspiciously, as if we were the ones with blood ties to a corrupt ancient Council.

  Jace, no matter how helpful he had been recently, would never gain the knowledge of how I came about this home. Alex stood taller, as if Jace’s words shielded him from my annoyance. I snorted at his ignorance and wondered if Jace’s true goal was to have me feed from him and expose myself. He had never been my ally, and even now with our common goal, I wouldn’t put it past him to have some backstabbing scheme up his sleeve.

  I needed them to leave, but Alex and Mia needed answers. If we didn’t tell them something, they would become liabilities. “If anyone here believes that they are not safe,”—I pointed to the door, hoping that Jace would leave—“there is the exit. Take it, and please don’t look back.”

  Mia paled. I couldn’t help but feel sorry for her. Her small pale frame shrunk and her round blue eyes seemed desolate and fearful—a quick attitude change from earlier. She was not safe; the bald Chorý had taken a liking to her after smelling her blood. Ella would want me to protect her, and I would stay close to her until I figured out what he was after. No need to alarm Mia if I could handle the situation.

  “This is getting us nowhere.” Mia’s voice sounded as if it belonged to a child lost in a storm. “Before Ella left, she told us that she heard voices and saw seriously funked-up stuff.”

  Mia paused and looked at Jace. He inclined his head, as if giving her permission to continue—a friendly gesture that didn’t go unnoticed. “Are you gonna tell us what is really going on with her? ‘Cause I have to admit, at first I thought she and Alex were nuts, but now—” Mia sank back onto the sofa, her gaze glazing over as her fear took her.

  Jace sat beside Mia. “You are all entitled to the truth, and now that I know of the Council’s true intent, I think it is time I explain myself,” Jace said gently, surprising me.

  She absently stroked her bandage and offered Jace a broken smile. I wondered how he expected to explain the truth without revealing his immortality and other sensitive information that we’d already agreed to keep quiet. How would he filter it? I crossed my arms, leaned back against the wall, and waited.

  Alex’s phone blasted some bass music produced solely for those without ears. “Crap, it’s my dad. I got to take this.” He cast a worried glance at me.

  “Remember what I told you,” I reminded him. Alex’s parents didn’t believe that she had runaway even though most of her belongings were gone—well, they were here in this home, but that was beside the point. The only thing that saved him from the sheriff’s suspicion was the fact that one of Laurent’s men had infiltrated the police department in Elmwood City. Apparently impersonating an officer of the law was difficult in a small town. The girls that had gone missing weeks before in Elmwood City were found in Cedar bringing Elmwood City police to almost every doorstep in Cedar. It was hard to hide in a small town which was why I opted to live in the mausoleum when I found Ella in Cedar. There were no questioning glances or whispered rumors about who I was or where I’d come from.

  “I know.” Alex growled as he answered the phone. His alpha male persona was starting to really bother me. He did play an important role in the group, as the only liaison we had with his parents and the sheriff.

  “Kale.” As the first time Jace spoke my name without utter disgust, it got my attention. He jerked his chin toward the kitchen. “A moment, please.”

  Knowing what he wanted to ask, I went ahead into the kitchen. The subject could no longer be skirted. Mia and Alex needed to know what we were fighting. My eye captured the cooler that normally held my dinner. Its emptiness weighed heavily on my mind. After a century of drinking bagged blood without the use of my fangs, I could easily hide them, but they ached to be free. La Luxure and its need for blood from warm flesh increased the hunger I had so easily controlled before.

  After coddling Mia a moment longer, Jace waltzed in. “My immortality is nothing that I am ashamed of.”

  I fought the urge to roll my eyes, a silly habit I’d picked up from Ella.

  “So when I tell Mia and Alex of my true nature, what should I say you are? Chorý, Nosophoros, Nosferat, or parasite? ‘Parasite’ being my personal favorite.” A harsh smile edged his lips.

  I returned the smile, but for an entirely different reason. I eyed the thumping vein on his neck and closed my eyes. The voice spoke to me, clear as day, and asked the question I wondered myself: How sweet and strong would the blood of an immortal taste?

  I slowly opened my eyes and smiled. “Jace, I have no blood here at the moment.” I flicked a glance at the cooler and then back to Jace, who looked unaffected by my comment. “Do you think that Mia tastes as sweet as she looks?” I asked, playing at his newfound weakness with the sapphire-eyed blonde and ignoring the beast’s request for Jace’s immortal blood. The beast growled low in my belly as Jace’s lips peeled back from his teeth and an equally threatening growl emanated from deep within him. I smiled, allowing him to see each inch of the sharpened canine that I’d threatened to sink into the unmarred flesh of his new crush.

  “If you so much as—”

  “Shut. Up. You pompous cod.” I gritted my teeth as my anger arose. My accent thickened, and my fangs descended. Jace spoke my native tongue, and I his—Belarusian was easy enough to learn. “I have not given in to la Luxure de Sang in more than a century. Continue to test me, and you shall see my true beast,” I promised in his native tongue.

  Jace clenched his fists. “How shall I explain your situation to them?”

  I didn’t want to be associated with the corruption of the Council; nor did I want the disease of the Chorý tainting my name, no matter how merited it might have been. If Jace aimed to tell the truth about our immortality and I didn’t claim to have been created by the Council, then my immortality would become an issue, and I didn’t think that my being Chorý and having a thirst for blood would go over well with either Alex or Mia.

  Jace doubtless hoped that Alex and Mia would ally with him, upon learning of my disease. There was nothing I could do to stop it.

  “Tell them whatever you please. It’s no concern of mine what they think of me.” It was a lie, but what else could I do?

  Jace only chuckled and walked back into the living room. I didn’t follow him; I stared at the cooler, willing blood to be inside as if I were some sort of magician.

  Mia’s heart raced as Jace returned to her, and I’d had to force myself to ignore the pace of Alex’s pulse since he’d answered his phone. This situation sucked, for lack of a better word. Back in the living room, Jace and Mia whispered quietly to each
other as Alex ended his call.

  “Crap!” Alex’s voice carried from the living room.

  I went out to find out what happened, Jace coming with me. “What?”

  Alex expelled a heavy sigh. “The sheriff is thinking of calling in the FBI. My dad said that since Ella’s body hasn’t been found, the sheriff believes that the FBI can help bring her back, alive.”

  Everyone was quiet for a moment. I closed my eyes and remembered to think before I spoke, because a few choice words had taken residence on my tongue.

  “I think we need to tell the truth,” Mia said, her voice barely a whisper. Alex asked her to repeat herself.

  I answered her first, and not harshly. “No.” This had gone far enough; there were some truths that needed to be told, and soon. The sooner Mia realized what we were up against, the sooner she would take to heart the gravity of her new “stalker”.

  “Kale is right. There is more to Laurent than just an evil man with a convoitise pour la puissance,” Jace drawled, earning confused glares from Mia and Alex. He wasn’t doing very well explaining something as simple as—

  “A lust for power,” I translated. “It is often called ‘Le Besoin’—or, in English, ‘the Need.’ It’s the powerful need to have power and dominance over all.”

  Mia and Alex stared at me, wide-eyed. This wasn’t going to be easy.

  “What kind of power?” Mia’s eyes glowed with curiosity.

  “He means like the power he and Jace have,” Alex accused. I met his stare head-on; he had some clue as to what Jace and I really were. I wondered how far off-base his little brain was from the truth. “Mia and I have been discussing some stuff, too.”

  I raised a brow at Mia, and she blanched. So much for defending her partner, Alex.

  “We know that something isn’t right with you and Jace. You’re both too strong, too fast, and Kale—dude, you keep sniffing the wind like a lost puppy that can turn into a Rottweiler at the first sign of trouble.” Alex’s words were true—childish, but true.