Jaded

by Danielle James

  “We can’t just let this go on!” Brea shouted.

  “Brea,” Leigh said to her, “They won’t hurt each other. I’m pretty sure they can’t. It’s best to just let them have it out.”

  “I don’t think I can,” Brea admitted.

  “I know, but we have to. We would get ourselves killed, getting in the middle of that,” Leigh reminded her. Brea didn’t like it, but she backed off for a minute. She turned her attention back to the fight.

  Toni slammed Jade into the wall and Jade snapped at her with her teeth. Toni barely moved out of the way before she would have lost part of her face to Jade’s deadly jaw. Jade threw a punch into Toni’s stomach and her breath whooshed out of her body.

  Toni tried to get Jade into a head lock, but Jade was too fast. She had superior speed and used it to her advantage. She was out of Toni’s grip and behind her before Toni could take a breath. Jade kicked the back of Toni’s knees and drew back for another blow, but Toni disappeared. “No fair teleporting!” Jade shouted as she turned to see Toni approaching from her right. “No fair, no fair, you sound like such a baby,” she taunted as she tackled Jade.

  The battle waged on for a long time. Every time one would nearly best the other, someone pulled a new trick out of their hat. As the family watched, it was Brea who finally decided to do something about it.

  “Ladies,” she called out to them as she walked into the yard.

  “Brea no,” Angel said to his wife, but his words fell on deaf ears.

  Brea had seen enough. These girls were her family. Her own daughter and niece were fighting as if they were trying to kill each other. Brea couldn’t be sure they wouldn’t and that was something she couldn’t allow to happen. These two women were grown, but to Brea, they would always be their babies and she couldn’t bear the thought of either them getting hurt, let alone hurting each other. “Ladies!” she shouted.

  Both women stopped to look at the lone human who wandered into their midst. Brea possessed no special powers, no mind tricks, and no super human strength. All she had on her side was the respect of the two women fighting. “That is enough! You should both be ashamed of yourselves,” Brea chided them. “I can’t believe you are out here fighting like cats and dogs. This is not what I have taught you. Go to your corners and lay off for a bit.”

  “She’s just pissed because I showed her what her boyfriend was really like,” Toni huffed as she walked past Brea toward her own waiting parents, who by the way did not look happy either.

  “Boyfriend,” Jade said. “No, he wasn’t my boyfriend and he never will be. He was my mate,” she said in her father’s direction. She felt some measure of satisfaction as all the color drained from his face.

  Brea’s heart broke right there in her chest for her daughter. Her mate? This wasn’t a silly tiff over just any man; this was about the one soul on earth that would make her daughter happy for all of eternity. “Jade,” Brea said softly and so full of empathy that Jade nearly lost control of her tears.

  “No, Mother, it’s all right. I saw what happened and I know Dad put her up to it. I guess everyone can be happy now. He doesn’t have to hear what Michael thinks about me and I don’t have to find out later that my mate has wandering eyes. And don’t worry; I never fed from him so there is no chance of me dying without him.” She huffed the last part on a grumble and brushed off her family and stomped into the house.

  Brea could feel the anguish rushing off her daughter and her eyes narrowed. She turned her stare to her husband and said, “What does she mean you put her up to it?”

  Angel shrugged his shoulders. “I wanted to see if he would be faithful,” he said in his own defense. He left out the part about how he heard Michael thinking of Jade when the physical reaction that caused this mess took place, but Brea had been his mate long enough to know how to pick information out of his head when she needed to and she did.

  Her eyes narrowed more and her lips pressed into a thin line. She put her hands on her hips and just stared at her husband for a few seconds, as if she were choosing her words carefully. “How could you do this to your daughter?” she asked through clenched teeth.

  “I didn’t know he was her mate,” Angel argued.

  “You’re her father!” Brea snapped.

  “She locked me out!” he said, raising his voice.

  “She locks us all out,” Brea reminded him. “But you are one of the few who could have figured it out if only you weren’t so blind. You saw how she protected him when he first arrived. You saw the way she looked at him! You were dead set on seeing him fail because you didn’t want anyone to touch your little girl. Well, news flash, mister. Jade has grown up and she is a woman now. Men are going to touch her. You should have listened and then acted. Who else knew?” she demanded.

  Her glare traveled over her family. The guards had the good sense to go back to work, but the rest of them were still outside. She walked down the line they had formed, looking into each of their eyes. Rebel couldn’t meet hers. “You knew,” Brea accused him.

  “I was sworn to secrecy,” he replied. “We both were.”

  “Who is we? Leigh?” Brea demanded.

  Leigh shook her head. “I had my suspicions but never a confirmation.”

  “Then who?” Brea gritted out.

  “Azerial knows,” Rebel told her. “But she hasn’t exactly been around.”

  Brea walked back to her husband. The fury inside her was growing to epic proportions. Never in her life had she been so pissed off. Not even when he mated himself to her without her knowledge or consent. This was so much worse. This entire debacle could have been avoided. Her family followed Angel without question and for the first time, it backfired. She stopped in front of him and brushed her bright red hair out of her face. She stretched to her full five foot four inches and looked up into his face. He looked guilty as sin, as well he should, she thought. Finally she said, “I hope you’re proud of yourself.” She jabbed a finger into his chest. “You have sentenced our daughter to a lifetime alone.” And then, she turned her back on him. “I suggest you find somewhere else to sleep tonight,” she said as she followed her daughter back into the house, slamming the door as she went.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  Michael finally made it home and dragged himself into the house. He knew that people were home, but no one showed their faces. Had they talked to Angel? Had he called to tell them he had been fired? Probably. That man hadn’t wanted Michael anywhere near Jade in the first place. He now understood that he had been set up to fail.

  That didn’t make the failure any easier to take.

  His mother finally came out to greet him. When she saw his face, he knew that she was reading his thoughts, as messed up as they were. “Oh no,” she breathed before running to him and wrapping her arms around him.

  “Mom,” Michael protested.

  “Shh,” she told him as she squeezed him tighter. “Whatever happened we can make it all right.”

  Michael endured the comforting session with his mother because although he didn’t want to admit it, he needed it. He needed to feel loved right then. He had thought he and Jade had something special. She was all he could think about and still was. He missed her. He wanted to hold her like he had in his dreams. He wanted to be with her, and only her, for the rest of his life, and now that was a broken dream as well. He had wanted to prove that he could be someone special. But the truth was glaring him right in the face as his mother did her best to comfort him. He was never going to prove himself to Angel Knight and he was never going to have Jade as his mate. All because of a misunderstanding.

  Kelly abruptly raised her head from his chest and held him at arm’s length. “What did you say?” she asked. She had been hearing his thoughts again. Having a vampire mother was inconvenient at times.

  “Nothing,” Michael answered her. “It’s nothing. I failed the test.”

  “No, not that. Did I hear the word mate?” she demanded.

  Michael shrugge
d. “I guess I probably thought it. It doesn’t matter now.”

  Kelly let go of him and propped her hands on her hips. “The hell it doesn’t.” She turned her head slightly in the way that let him know that she was having one of those mind conversations with his father. Phoenix came bounding into the room and looked at his son. The man was centuries old but looked more like Michael’s brother than his father. “I think our son found his mate,” she beamed at Phoenix.

  Phoenix took another look at his son. “Um, Darling, I don’t think he is happy enough to have found his mate.”

  “I heard it in his head. Jade is his mate.”

  “Is that true son?” Phoenix asked.

  Michael shrugged. “Like I said, it doesn’t matter. I fucked up and there is no going back.”

  “What happened?” Kelly asked him.

  Michael put up every barrier in his mind he could. Surrounded it with a brick wall and a padlock.

  “Michael Joseph Martin. You will tell me right now or I will pick it out of your head. Your choice,” Kelly demanded.

  When Michael wasn’t talking fast enough, Kelly did just that. She forced her way into his mind, giving him one hell of an instant headache, and sorted through all of his thoughts. She saw the test he was given, the way Angel set him up, and she saw the incident with Toni. She saw the way Jade looked at him and she saw the pain her son felt. When she retreated, Michael dropped to the sofa in exhaustion, but Kelly was shaking with anger.

  “Oh, no he did not! He did not do that. I’m going to fucking kill him!” Kelly raged. Phoenix grabbed her by the arm and forced her into his.

  “Kelly, Love, we can’t do that. They are our friends.”

  “Friends do not sabotage a mate!” she screamed at him. “You know how it is for us; think of how Jade must be feeling. That poor girl.”

  “Kelly,” Phoenix pleaded with her, “you know he has to do this on his own. Give them time to work it out. If they are truly mates, they will find a way to get over this hump. Every relationship has rough spots. They just found theirs a little faster than most.”

  “I am giving it one week. Seven days,” she said. “Not eight, not nine. Seven. If this hasn’t resolved itself, then by God I am going to make it right any way I see fit and there isn’t a damned thing you can do to stop me,” she informed her husband. She stormed off in a huff.

  Phoenix ran his hand through his hair and looked at Michael who was desperately trying to hide a smile. “What?” Phoenix demanded.

  “Nothing,” Michael answered. “Just feels nice to have someone on my side.” And it did. Because no matter how much losing Jade hurt, he knew without a doubt that his mother would fight for his happiness, even if it was against the all -powerful Knight family.

  ***

  Jade slammed her bedroom door and used her mind to lock it. Not just the lock, but the door itself. She didn’t want anyone near her. How could he? Her father? Wasn’t he supposed to be there for her and to make her happy?

  Maybe she had been wrong about Michael. Her mate would never look at another woman. But she knew better. She knew he was her mate and if she had any doubts, they were squashed the night she tasted his blood. Her body recognized his flavor and claimed it. She gagged at the thought of going back to bottled blood. She didn’t want to drink it anymore. She didn’t want to drink from anyone but her mate. She needed food to live, but she also needed blood to survive. She was vampire and blood was a necessity. She knew without a shadow of a doubt that she was going to be one of those vampires who could only drink from their mate. The truth was, that one taste, that one stolen kiss, was going to be her undoing.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  Frankie paced her altar room. She knew she was wearing the carpet thin but she didn’t care. Things had gone from bad to worse in the four days since Michael left. Jade had locked herself in her room and refused to even acknowledge anyone who knocked on her door. Frankie knew she was alive in there, but only because she could hear the steady beat of her heart and the soft sound of Jade’s breathing. Both of which were getting slower and fainter.

  Jade had said that she didn’t feed from Michael, but still her heart was broken and she was in mourning. Frankie could only imagine what it must feel like to be without her mate. She had run from Jacque in the beginning, and yes, it took her a while to come to terms with who she was to him and who he was to her, but in the end it worked out and she couldn’t imagine her life any other way. She had been nearly killed before Jacque took the risk to change her and saved her life. Now, he was her life.

  But things were going bad on other fronts as well. Angel had been banished to the couch for four days as well. Brea wouldn’t talk to him. The only thing she said after that night outside was that he made his bed and now he could lie in it. He wasn’t doing very well without his mate at his side either.

  And then there was Azerial. She had left more than a week ago to find out what was going on with the shift in power she had felt. Frankie had always loved Azerial. First as her goddess, then as her sister after she mated with Samuel. No one had heard from her and that was another reason to worry. “Azerial, where are you?” Frankie whispered. “We need you here,” she said to the empty room.

  ***

  Brea had had enough. It was all too much. She hated being away from Angel and she really hated that her daughter was locked away in her room. It reminded her of when Antonio lost Macy. He lay in his bed waiting to die. She couldn’t let the same thing happen to her daughter. Brea took in a deep breath and marched to Jade’s door and knocked.

  Of course, there was no answer. Brea wasn’t going to give up this time. “Jade, it’s me. Open this door.” Still there was no response. Brea sighed. She was going to have to do it the hard way. “Jade, if you don’t open this door right now, I swear on all that’s holy I will get every man in this house to come and take this damned door down. Open it.”

  Brea waited and just about the time she was ready to turn and leave, she heard the lock click. Jade had opened it. Brea grabbed the handle and turned it before Jade would have time to change her mind. She opened the door and her breath caught in her throat. Jade, her baby girl, was lying on her bed in a fetal position. Soft sobs were coming from her chest and she sniffled as she tried to gain control of her emotions.

  “Baby,” Brea said softly. She walked to the edge of the bed and sat down. She reached over her daughter’s back and rubbed her arm. “I’m so sorry.”

  “It’s not your fault, Mom,” Jade grumbled.

  “I know it isn’t,” Brea said, “but it doesn’t mean that I don’t hurt for you. Why didn’t you tell us?”

  Jade turned to look at her mother. When their eyes met, Jade heard her mother’s panicked reaction to her color. She sucked in her breath and her eyes went wide for a second before she covered it up. Jade knew she was pale and her eyes were sunken in. She saw it through her mother’s eyes. She was dying. “I didn’t want anyone to know because I was afraid they would tell Michael. I wanted him to love me for me, not because he felt like he had to because he was my mate.”

  Brea nodded. “I can certainly understand that.”

  “I hate this,” Jade whispered as a tear streaked down her cheek.

  “I know, Baby,” Brea told her and brought her into her arms. Jade didn’t fight her. Instead, she curled into her mother’s embrace and let the tears come.

  “When you said you hadn’t fed from him, that wasn’t true was it?” Brea asked.

  Jade shook her head. “He thought he was dreaming,” she told her mother. “It was one kiss. He cut himself on my teeth. It was only a little but…”

  “Oh no,” Brea breathed.

  “It just hurts so bad,” Jade cried into her mother’s chest.

  “Let me help you,” Brea urged her. Jade opened the gates and her grief came pouring out of her. It hit Brea like a Mac truck and she stopped breathing under its weight for a moment. It was crippling. As she held her only child, she took all the pain that
Jade had to give. She took it into herself so that her daughter wouldn’t have to bear it all alone. She stroked Jade’s hair and let her cry it out. The emotions were too much. Not only was Brea feeling Jade’s pain, but her own for her daughter. She had no choice but to let her own tears flow as well.

  ***

  When Jade had cried herself to sleep, Brea laid her gently on her bed and pulled the covers up over her shoulders. She leaned down and kissed her lightly on her temple before leaving the room and closing the door silently behind her.

  And then she marched herself to Angel’s office. Brea wasn’t sure when it happened, but her family had been replaced with idiots. They had to know what was going on with Jade, but no one seemed to have a clue how to help. Well, by God, she did and she was going to do it right now.

  She burst into his office where he was counseling someone on something. It didn’t matter to Brea what it was. “Get out,” she told the man sitting across from her husband. “Now.”

  The man looked at Angel, who didn’t look so well either, and then back to Brea. Finally he said, “This can wait. I’ll call you tomorrow.” Angel nodded and the man quickly left.

  “What are you doing?” Angel asked her. “You can’t just throw people out of my office.”

  “The hell I can’t,” Brea snapped at him. She shoved her wrist in front of his face. “Drink. Now. You’re going to need it.”

  Angel looked at the arm in front of his face. He hadn’t feed in a few days and was definitely feeling the loss to his system, but Brea had always fed him from her neck. Offering her arm while she was angry brought back memories of a time he would rather not remember. “Do it now,” Brea demanded.

  Angel kissed her wrist and let his fangs sink into her vein. As her blood filled his mouth, so did her emotions. He could tell she was in more pain than she had ever been in before. He could also tell that she was blaming him. He licked the wound closed and looked up into her eyes. He would rather not feed at all than to feel like this.