I had just stated drifting off to sleep when I heard my phone ringing. It sounded like it was coming from the bathroom, so I decided it was faint enough for me to ignore. Finally, it stopped, so I settled back into his arms. A second later it started ringing again, and I groaned.
“Should I get that?” Jack asked tiredly.
“No, it’ll stop,” I said, hugging him even closer to me. If he got it, that meant he would have to be away from, and I definitely wasn’t ready for that. It did stop, only to immediately start ringing again.
“Sorry, I gotta get that.” Jack gently untangled himself from and I grumbled in protest, but I let him go. He slipped on his boxers, and I watched him as he walked to the bathroom, following the sound of the ringing. For one second, watching how gorgeous as he was, my heart swelled as I realized that I got to be that.
He belonged to me, and it delighted me endlessly. The phone stopped ringing again, and Jack sighed. “I’m still getting it, in case it starts to ring again. Where is it?”
“I don’t know.” I sat up, holding the blankets over my chest.
“Of course it stops when I look for it.” Jack started poking around the hamper, since I had tendency to leave my phone in my pants pocket, but it started ringing again. He went over to the medicine cabinet and opened it. “Alice, why is your phone in the medicine cabinet?”
“Maybe when I got the mouth wash?” I shrugged. I had no idea. “Just shut it off and come back to bed.”
“Uh oh.” He came out of the bathroom, holding my phone out to me. “It’s Jane.”
“I should probably answer that,” I sighed and held my hand out. I managed to answer it just before it went to voicemail, and Jack sat on the bed next to me. “Hello?”
“Alice? Oh thank god you answered!” Jane sobbed in relief, but her voice was shaking. “I’ve run into some trouble, and… Oh god. I am sorry. I don’t know-” She sounded absolutely terrified, and she knocked any of the warm fuzzy feelings I still had out of me.
“What are you talking about? What’s going on?” I asked.
“I don’t know! They just made me call you!” Jane said, then she shrieked and her voice got farther away.
“Jane? Jane!” I shouted.
“No, its not Jane,” a male voice returned to the phone, and the hairs on the back of my neck stood up. It was strong and deep with an accent I couldn’t place. Almost British, or maybe German, but softer.
“This is Alice, I presume?”
“Where’s Jane?” I demanded, refusing to answer his questions until he told me what was going on.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Jack hurriedly getting dressed. I’m not sure if he could overhear the conversation, or if he just saw the panic in me.
“If you want to see her again, I suggest you come and get her,” the voice said. There was something sinisterly playful in his voice, and I could hear Jane crying in the background. “Where are we again?” Jane yelped. “Where are we? You need to tell us if you want your friend to come rescue you.”
“You son of a bitch!” I growled. “Leave her alone! When we find you, we’ll kill you!”
“We?” He chuckled. “Even better.” Jane screamed behind him.
“Loring Park!” Jane sobbed in the background. “We’re at Loring Park! But Alice! Don’t come! They’re going to-” She screamed again, cutting off the rest of her sentence.
“As you can tell, we’re in a hurry, so act accordingly,” he said, then the phone went silent.
Chapter 25
If Jack hadn’t already been moving, I might have just sat there feeling dazed. Immediately after he hung up the phone, I tried calling back, but it went straight to voicemail. Jack had already pulled on shorts and a tee shirt, and he was struggling to pull on his Converse as quickly as possible. My stomach lurched, and panic and hunger were mixing together, making me feel volatile and frail.
“Alice?” Jack said, trying to snap me out of it. “Where is she?”
“Loring Park,” I told him numbly. “I don’t know who has her, but I think they’re going to kill her.
And they want me to come. She’s bait for me?” Jack pursed his lips and looked at me thoughtfully for a moment.
“You stay here. I’ll go get her,” Jack decided and made a step for the door.
“No!” I jumped up, holding the blanket around me. “If this is about me, there’s no way you’re going without me.”
“Alice, it isn’t safe,” Jack shook his head.
“Exactly!” I ran to the closet to put on clothes before he left. I don’t think I’d ever gotten dressed so quickly in my life. Jack stood in the doorway to the closet and sighed. “I’m a vampire now. I can take care of myself.” This I said while I struggling to put on a pair of jeans and nearly falling over. “I beat up Jane’s boyfriend or whatever before. If you can handle it, I can handle.”
“No. I’m much more skilled than you are, and you just lost blood.” He crossed his arms over his chest and tried to look as resolute as possible.
“I don’t care.” I slipped on my shoes and walked up to him. “We’re together now, forever.
That means if you’re in danger, I’m in danger. Jane needs help, and we’re going together.”
“I don’t like it,” Jack relented.
“I don’t care.” I pushed past him, knowing that we had to hurry to save her, and I had to hurry before he changed his mind. He couldn’t stop me from going, but he could slow us down with unnecessary arguing.
“Alice?” Milo opened my bedroom door before I could even get to it. He had a bewildered, frantic look on his face, and my heart raced, fearing that he might be in trouble too. “Is everything okay?” He pushed the door open a little bit wider and stepped inside. “What’s going on?”
“Nothing. Why? What’s going on with you?” I narrowed my eyes at him.
“Nothing! I just… I thought something was wrong,” Milo floundered. Then I realized what had happened. Just like I was tuned into his heart, he was tuned into mine. It had been beating in a panic for the last few minutes, so Milo was concerned. He probably would’ve come in right away, but he misread it at first as being part of the festivities that me and Jack were partaking in.
“Jane’s in trouble.” I chewed my lip, looking at him, and Jack gave me a weird look. Milo was my little brother and I’d do almost anything to protect him. But he was a vampire, more powerful than me, and from the sounds of it, Jane had more than one attacker and she was terrified. We needed all the help we could get.
“She’s in the park. I don’t know who has her, but I think they want to kill her, and they want us to hurry.”
“What are you talking about?” Milo tensed up, and I could see his muscles flexing under his shirt.
Someday, he’d probably even be more powerful than Jack, especially since he had so much control.
“I don’t know! And I don’t have time to explain! If you want to come with, we have to go now!” I looked insistently at him, and I knew my invitation surprised Jack. He’d expected to me demand Milo stay here and try to protect him, and maybe I should’ve. But we were three vampires, and Jane might die. I didn’t think I had much of a choice.
“I’m in,” Milo nodded once. “Let’s go.”
We’d barely made it out the bedroom door when we ran into another snag. Bobby was in the process of pulling a sweater on over his head when he came of his room. He saw us in a hurry, so he caught up with us.
“What’s going on?” Bobby asked nervously.
“Nothing. Go back to your room.” Milo tried to make it down the steps, but Bobby wouldn’t stop following him. Jack and I paused at the bottom of the steps, but I wouldn’t be able to wait for long for either of them. The clock was ticking.
“Where are you going on? Why do you all look so freaked?” Bobby’s hair had been mussed when he pulled on the sweater, and he tried to smooth it out while keeping his eyes fixed on Milo.
“What happened?”
“
Look, just go back upstairs!” Milo said sternly. “You can’t come with!”
“Why?” Bobby was only getting more and more freaked out. “What you are doing?”
“It’s too dangerous for a human. Just go!” Milo pointed up to the top of the stairs like Bobby was a disobedient dog.
“Dangerous?” Bobby blanched. “No! If you can get hurt, I’m going with you!”
“We don’t have time for this! We’re going now!” I waved my hands of it and walked to the garage.
Jack was a step of ahead of me, but Milo trailed behind me with Bobby at his heels.
“Bobby!” Milo snapped at him when we reached the garage. “You can’t come with!”
“No!” Bobby grabbed into Milo’s arm and looked as if he might cry. I wondered if this is what I had looked like when I was mortal. “I’m not gonna stay here why you go off to …”
“Get in the car,” Jack said, looking over the Lexus at Bobby.
“What? No!” Milo protested, and I gave him a questioning look. Jack refused to meet my gaze, and I knew he was thinking something, but I couldn’t tell what it was.
“Just do it,” Jack commanded and hopped in the driver’s seat.
Milo and Bobby did as they were told, although that didn’t stop Milo from arguing about how idiotic it was for Bobby to be coming along. I agreed with him, but I kept my mouth shut. Jack started the car, and we sped out of the garage, on the way to the park. It wasn’t until I was trapped in the enclosed space of the car with Bobby that I realized how hungry I was. He was afraid, so his heart was beating even faster, and my mouth started to water. I had to grip onto the door handle to keep my hand from shaking.
Jack noticed, and he frowned at me and rolled down the window. The cold night air helped some, but there was nothing more that either of us could do.
Thanks to the ridiculous weather, the roads were slick, and Jack wasn’t keen on slowing down. When we came to a stop in front of the park, the car skidded sideways, and Jack jerked the wheel.
The Lexus lurched over the curb, and slid across the slush covered grass before finally coming to a stop like two inches away from hitting a tree.
“Is everyone okay?” Jack asked, looking around to make sure no one was injured or killed.
Bobby had hit his head on the back of my seat, but otherwise everyone was okay.
“You’re a really terrible driver,” I muttered, but I didn’t really have time to complain. I opened the door and stepped out of the car, instantly slipping in the grass. I grabbed onto the door just before I fell to the ground, but I wasn’t boding well for how I would do in battle.
“Careful,” Bobby said and started getting out of the car.
“No!” Jack shouted. He’d already gotten out and he pointed at Bobby. “You. Get back in the car.”
“What? No!” Bobby whined.
“No, if you come with, you’ll only hinder us,” Jack said. “Stay here so you don’t get us killed.” Bobby wanted to argue, but he had to realize that Jack had a valid point. Humans always slowed down vampires. It was just a fact.
“I’ll be back as soon as I can,” Milo promised. Grudgingly, Bobby climbed back in the car, and Milo leaned in to give him a quick kiss.
“I love you!” Bobby said, but Milo was already hurrying after Jack and me. We had started down a winding pathway through the center of the park. It had been salted and sanded so it was much less treacherous than walking on the grass.
“Where is she?” Milo asked when he had jogged up to us.
“We don’t know,” Jack glanced over at me, hoping I’d have more information.
Milo was about to ask something logical, like how did we plan on finding her, but I shushed him. I was trying to get a read on her, but it was hard. Even late at night in bad weather, downtown Minneapolis still had tons of activity. It was hard to separate sounds. On top of that, there were so many people, and I was getting really hungry. I kept getting focused in on the wrong smells and sounds because they were far more appetizing than what I was looking for.
“Ugh.” I wrinkled my nose, catching onto something. It smelled dirty and not quite right.
“What?” Jack froze in his tracks and looked at me.
“I don’t know. I just smell something.” A cold wind came up, blowing it away, and I shook my head.
“It was probably the dog park. But it definitely wasn’t Jane.”
We walked a little further down the trail, but then I started noticing the smell again. It wasn’t even really a dirty smell so much as it smelled like dirt, like the ground and trees. A hint of pine, and something else, something familiar. It reminded me of when the fair came to town, and I always spent too much time feeding the goats in the petting zoo. It was almost how they smelled but different. I kept walking, and I had started following the scent, but nobody questioned me about it. Even when we started veering off the trail. If Jack and Milo noticed, they didn’t say anything to me.
Finally, too late, I placed it. I stopped dead in my tracks and my heart stopped in my chest.
“What?” Jack asked in a nervous whisper.
“Reindeer.” I could barely even say it aloud.
“What?” Milo asked incredulously, and even Jack gave me a confused look.
Neither of them understood what that meant, but I was scanning the trees frantically. I knew how fast they could move. They were probably here. We might even being surrounded already. I turned in a circle, slipping in the slush, and Jack caught me before I fell to the ground. The wind picked again, taking the scent away from me, and that was the only hint I had to where they might be. Thirst mixed with my panic, and the edge of my vision blurred red. My hands trembled, but I couldn’t say for sure if that was from hunger or fear.
“What’s going on?” Milo asked. He was looking around, trying to figure out what exactly had me so freaked. Jack still had his hand on my arm, steadying me, and the scent became stronger behind me, so I turned around.
On a bench only thirty yards from us, a vampire stood on a bench. I had just been looking at a few seconds ago, and nobody had been around, but here he was. His dark blue work jacket hung open, revealing his bare chest covered in dark hair. His jeans were filthy and ragged, and hadn’t been washed in months.
Despite the cold slush on the ground, he was barefoot. The wind blew his black hair across his face, but I could still see his black eyes staring right at me, giving me the same chill they had when I first saw him in Finland. It was Stellan, the lycan that wouldn’t speak English, and he’d already spotted us.
“I never should’ve brought you here,” I said, both to Jack and Milo. Letting them come along had been a death sentence, but I didn’t realize it until too late.
“What is going on?” Milo repeated, growing frustrated.
“Who is that?” Jack followed my line of vision, where I was staring at Stellan, and Milo turned to look at him too. He was by himself, and he didn’t look that threatening, but I knew more of them were nearby.
“Lycan.” I couldn’t look away from Stellan because I knew he would move as soon as I did, so I couldn’t see Jack’s reaction, but he instantly tensed.
“Go back to the car,” Jack commanded through gritted teeth. I thought of Bobby, sitting unguarded in the car, and I choked by vomit. He was a sitting duck, and they probably had already found him.
“No.” I glanced back at Milo. The car was a deathtrap, and I couldn’t have him going back there.
“Run, Milo.” I looked back at Stellan, but he was already gone, and my heart sank. We didn’t stand a chance.
Milo would never be able to outrun them.
“Get out of here!” Jack shouted. He had just seen Stellan’s disappearing act, and he was just starting to realize what we were up against. “Alice, Milo, get out of here!”
“No!” I grabbed his arm and looked up at him. “I’m not leaving you!” His eyes were conflicted and terrified. He wanted to protect me above all else, but we had probably already been ambus
hed. How could he protect us? “They want me anyway!”
“No, they don’t want you!” Jack shook his head and gritted his teeth. “They want Peter!
You’re just the thing that’s most important to him! They’re trying to flush him out.”
“How astute.” The voice on the phone interrupted us. He was only standing fifteen feet in front of us.
Shirtless, his upper body was pure muscle. His dark hair was pushed back from his face, revealing brown eyes, but they were so cold and empty. It was like looking at an evil doll. Just by looking at him, I knew he was Gunnar, the leader of the lycan. “What an adorable little pack you have.” He took a step towards us, his bare feet crunching in the grass, and Jack moved in front of me. Milo tried to step up next to him, but he held up his arm in front of him, blocking him. Gunnar laughed at his feeble attempts to protect us.
He was alone, so his comrades must be hidden amongst the trees around us.
“Where’s Jane?” I asked, barely keeping my voice even.
“Around here somewhere.” He glanced darkly around us, smirking arrogantly. “It’s so easy to misplace things in the city. That’s why I’ve always preferred the intimacy of the country.”
“We don’t know where Peter’s at,” Jack told him. “He doesn’t know we’re here.”
“I’m aware. I know he would never let a pathetic attempt like you out to greet us.” His expression changed, growing dark and angry, and rather terrifying. “There’s no sport in going after you, and Peter would never bore his guests.”
“Don’t go after us, then,” I suggested. “Just give us Jane, and we’ll be out of your hair.”
“You know what I think would be fun?” The devilish grin returned to his face. “Is if we made you find her, and bring her to us.”
“Don’t you already have her?” I asked, growing confused.
“Yes, I do, because I know that a good guest always brings something to share with his host,” Gunnar said, his dark eyes started to sparkle. My stomach twisted, knowing that whatever made him happy would horrify me. “You’re looking quite famished, Alice, and I know for a fact that your friend is a very tasty treat.”
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