Collin laughed. “This is a different kind of fantasy. There are wolves, but they’re direwolves, not werewolves. These wolves are awesome. I wouldn’t mind having one.”
I laughed. “You know that they’re probably not real.”
“Oh no, these ones are and are fucking crazy expensive.”
“Seriously?”
He nodded as he continued explaining the Game of Thrones world to me.
“You said there are books?”
“An entire series.”
“Maybe I should get them.”
“You can borrow mine. The author explains way too many things and my head hurt whenever I try to read it, but from what I managed to read, it’s much better than the TV show.”
I laughed, relishing his sense of humor.
“You’d actually be doing me a favor by taking off my hands,” he said with a grin.
“I never took you for a reader.”
“I have to do something in my free time.”
“Sorry, I assumed you were the brawny type of guy, not the brainy type.”
“Woah, an actual apology?”
“I have no problem giving them when I know I was wrong.”
“Which has been how many times in your life?”
“Shut up before I break your other leg.”
He chuckled and held up his hands in surrender.
We watched the rest of the episode and I had to admit, it was something I might grow to like. But I’d read the books first, to be sure.
I said goodnight around ten and went up to my room, leaving him in the lounge.
I wondered what my family was doing right now, and whether they were safe or not.
Would I be able to get a vision about the hunt when I wasn’t nearby? How would I know if they were in danger?
I shouldn’t have been here. I should have been with them.
I drifted off, hoping that whatever happened, my family would be okay.
Eleven
COLLIN
* * *
The next morning, I woke up bright and early and started making breakfast.
Ru wasn’t an early riser. She was more of a brunch girl.
I took advantage of the time by stretching my leg—the one in the cast—and to walking around like normal.
Last night, breaking the ice and being with her felt like old times. Old times that technically didn’t exist, as I’d never spent real time with her before last night. Not time that she was aware of.
I still needed to reel her in, and that part was fatiguing for my brain to grasp.
Thanks to the lockpass, I knew Ru well, and she wouldn’t respond well to being grabbed and kissed. I’d get a knee to the balls if I did that and she would feel guilty that my affection had shifted from her sister on to her.
She’d push me away out of respect for her sister.
I never should’ve led Liz on. It wasn’t right. But in all fairness, Liz had thrown herself at me.
I sighed as I picked up my phone and started to play Candy Crush.
Minutes before noon, the floor creaked overhead as Ru shuffled around. She skulked into the kitchen shortly after.
I pretended to be immersed in my game.
“He cooks, too. Poor, poor Liz,” Ru joked and I struggled to suppress my laughter.
“Good morning to you, too.” I had to bite my tongue not to call her peanut, the way Huck did.
“Let me guess, you’re an early riser.”
“Someone has to feed the chickens and milk the cows.”
“Haha, we don’t have animals on this farm. Except Liz’s lazy cat, but he seems to feed himself.”
I laughed. “Grab yourself a plate, please.”
“I’m not a breakfast person.” She poured herself a cup of coffee and sat down across from me.
I looked at my watch. “It’s technically not breakfast anymore.”
She looked over her shoulder at the food. “Fine.” She got up, grabbed a plate, and dished it out.
She sat down and took a bite of her eggs and bacon. “What did you do with the eggs?”
“You don’t like it?”
“No, it’s yummy.”
“Then it’s my secret.”
“Don’t do that. I suck with breakfasts. I want to make my dad a nice breakfast for once. It’s always Liz this and Liz that. Don’t get me wrong; I love her to bits. But growing up in her shadow…” She shrugged. “I want to be great at something. One thing.”
“Ru, you are. You can see the future. She can’t.”
“Not that. I was talking about eggs. These eggs. Please, what do you do?”
“It’s grated cheese. That is what I do.”
“Grated cheese?” She looked at her eggs. “Like what, you melt it into the eggs?”
“Yep. It gives it that gouda taste, doesn’t it?”
“It’s yummy.” She took another bite.
“You’re welcome.”
“It’s good to see you in a better mood.”
I wrinkled my nose and huffed.
She laughed. “C’mon, it can’t be that bad.”
I gave her a skeptical glare.
“How bad?”
“Eight more weeks.”
“Ouch. At least it’s only eight more weeks. You’re welcome to swap with me, seeing that you’ve got the cooking thing down.”
I laughed. “No, thank you. If you want, I can teach you, since Greg will probably drop me off here every time a hunt takes place.”
“You know he’s only looking out for you, right?”
“Yeah, but I’m not that type of guy. I can take care of myself,” I said to throw her off.
“Well, not according to them. Welcome to my world. We should actually run away and make them worry their asses off about us, that will teach them a lesson.”
Yes please, I thought. But alas, I didn’t have the courage to say it out loud.
“What? I was only joking. You look so serious.”
I shook my head and smiled.
If only she knew how serious I was. Pretending to not want to be here was so difficult, but not touching her, when she could finally feel it, was twenty times harder. I didn’t think about the hunt or Greg or how silly it was to be here and not there. I was happy where I was. I needed to plant the seed into her mind that we could be together. How on earth could I do that with her sister looming over us?
All I knew was this was not the weekend to tell her about the complication.
I let her finish eating as I carried on with my game.
She did the dishes afterward and spent the afternoon asking me all sorts of questions about my time with my pack.
I hated lying to her about that, but I told her the truth as much as possible.
I told her everything I knew about the wolves.
“Your cast is hurting my eyes.”
I looked down at my cast. “What do want me to do about that?”
“I have an idea,” she said as she got up from the chair and ran to her room. She came back down with a pencil case filled with markers.
“Really?”
“Please? That white is so glaring, I can feel a headache coming along. You know how I feel about them.”
“Fine, doodle away,” I said quickly.
We moved to the living room.
I took a seat on the couch, and she settled on the floor in front of my cast, grabbing markers and decorating my cast with a myriad of colors. “Don’t make it too girly.”
“I’m the artist, so shut your mouth,” she said as she continued drawing.
“So, tell me what else are your visions showing you.”
She grumbled under her breath. “I told you I don’t want to talk about it.”
“Why not? Is it too scary?” I asked with a laugh.
She looked up at me, biting down on her lip. “Something like that,” she mumbled.
“Ru, what do you see? Tell me.”
I knew the look she was giving me. She was frightened of som
ething. If only she’d tell me what she was seeing.
“I don’t think we’ll succeed in finding the Alpha.”
I frowned, feeling my heart rate pick up. “Why do you think that?”
“Because I see a war, Collin.”
My eyes widened. Was she seeing the Great War?
“What kind of war?”
“One between monsters. On one side there are rows and rows of wolves, on the other, I don’t know what they are, or what any of it means.”
“This war… have you seen the outcome?”
She shot me a puzzled expression. Shit, I shouldn’t have asked her that.
“It changes constantly.”
“I don’t understand. What do you mean it changes constantly?”
“I don’t know what it means! I’m losing my mind.”
I sighed. “Ru, you are not losing your mind. If you tell me what you’ve been seeing, I can help you decipher it.”
She sighed and grabbed another marker, pulling the cap off with her teeth. “Sometimes I see the war happening, and it’s never-ending.” She took a deep breath as she continued scribbling on my cast. “Sometimes there’s this girl. She’s young, but the things she does, Collin…”
“What does she do?”
She shrugged. “It gonna sound insane.”
“You can tell me.”
“She can manipulate the elements of nature. I saw her. The wind howled at her command, fire sprang from her hands. Even lightning struck where she wanted it to. It’s terrible when she’s there.”
“What side does she fight on?”
“Collin, it doesn’t—”
“What side, Ru?” I asked sharply.
“The human side. Or the side that resemble humans.”
“Not the wolves?” I asked.
She shook her head.
“The wolves never have a chance, except during the times they don’t fight, but I’ve never seen that outcome.”
I narrowed my eyes. “Who are you talking about?”
She smiled. “Sometimes it’s a guy.”
“I don’t follow.”
“When it’s not the girl, it’s a guy. He looked human, but I don’t know what he is. He wanted peace, but the wolves refused. The negotiator got attacked, but he got saved by another wolf who jumped in the middle. Then a vampire and a werewolf showed up.”
“What?”
“I told you it’s insane. It doesn’t make sense.”
“I’m sorry. I’m trying here. What do you mean a vampire and a wolf? How do they show up?”
“Together. Like they belong with one another, like a couple in love.”
I stared at her. “Ru, vampires and werewolves are enemies.” Could this be the breed that Greg had told me about? I knew the myths about hybrids, but I hadn’t thought they existed.
It was hard to imagine that somewhere a vampire and a werewolf had fallen in love.
“That vision is usually the strangest one. There were so many things happening at once. It was as if the werewolf and the vampire tried to stop it. But the wolf that saved the negotiators life died and I didn’t see her turning back into a human.”
“Her?”
“Someone protected that side with something unexplainable. It was a huge, white dome that covered all of them. It was blinding with the light or magic coming from it.” She looked up at me as she continued drawing.
“This is why I didn’t want to tell anyone about this. It’s nuts.”
“Go on, Ru.”
“Then the dome vanished and I saw the guy that wanted the peace losing it. He had a woman in his arms, and she was dying. A werewolf near her shifted into a wolf again, and…” She sighed. “It doesn’t make any sense. It was as if her death made this guy change his mind. And then the flames came from him, the thunder, the lightning. He wielded it.”
“The guy?”
“Yes, sometimes it’s her, other times it’s him, and then there’s the war. I don’t know which one is real. But whenever these two are in the vision, the wolves don’t stand a chance.”
I nodded.
“Are there really monsters that have that type of ability?”
“I don’t know,” I lied. It worried me. She said it was a woman. Morgan, my sister. My mother bound her abilities with her life, with my mother gone, my sister would be getting her abilities.
I was staying away to protect Morgan, but if Ru sees her in this life as one of them, fighting against the werewolves, how was that possible?
“I don’t think we’ll find the Alpha.”
“Don’t say that. Please. We need to find him.”
“I don’t want to find him!”
“Why not?”
She grabbed another marker and scribbled furiously on my cast. “Because we are going to die, Collin. We’re all going to die. That war was between werewolves and vampires with other creatures in between. Creatures I’ve never even seen before. If we succeeded in killing the Alpha, werewolves would have been wiped out, and I would not have seen this war. So, it could only mean one thing. We are all going to die.”
* * *
RU
* * *
Telling Collin about my war vision lightened the load on my shoulders, but seeing the look on his face when I told him what I believed… It tore into my heart.
He was more worried about this than I was.
I couldn’t tell him I was having visions of the Alpha. That I saw where he was sleeping, hiding.
I spent too much time wondering about the Alpha after I got that vision.
How did he get there? Did the humans entomb him?
Bury him alive?
With these visions, it was becoming harder to see some of these creatures as monsters. Especially the man that wanted peace and had to say goodbye to the woman he loved—the wolf.
I still had no idea what he was. I just knew he wasn’t human.
The next morning, my family and Greg returned.
Collin and I were waiting in the kitchen, enjoying some coffee.
“This was fun,” Collin said, smiling at me.
“Yeah, sure. Whatever,” I sulked and he got up with his crutches and grabbed his backpack before he hobbled to the door.
“You look better,” Greg said with a smirk.
“Yeah, I figure Ru has it way worse than me. So…”
“Shut up.” I pretended to kick him on the butt as he clambered his way off the porch.
Greg laughed. “Thank you,” he mouthed behind Collin’s back and I shrugged, smiling.
I had to admit that it had been nice to not to be alone for two days.
My father kissed my temple. “You have fun?”
“It was okay. I made his cast more appealing.”
He laughed.
My sister pushed past me without looking at or greeting me.
“How was the hunt?” I asked when we all—except Liz—settled in the kitchen.
“Touch and go. We trapped three wolves, and Greg will be interrogating them soon. I wonder how he disposes of them.”
“Do you really think he’s killing them?” I asked my father.
“He must be. I can’t see why he would set them free, sweetheart.”
“Dad, I don’t think they’ll ever give up their Alpha.”
“Maybe not. But they won’t stop trying.”
“Give me all the gory details. I need to know how it went.”
“Well, your sister almost got herself killed.”
“What?” I yelled in outrage.
He shook his head. “I already gave her the lecture, peanut. These past two days haven’t been easy on her.”
I looked at my father, annoyed. “Collin was right. She was only going to get herself in trouble. She needs to get over this.”
“She needs more time.”
“And I assume Collin staying here with me while you’re out hunting had absolutely nothing to do with her fantastic mood?” Sarcasm dripped off my every word.
“Give
her time.”
“Dad, she’s being pathetic. Liz has never been like this. She needs to get over this and move on with her life.”
“Give her time. She knows nothing happened here.”
“Really?” I couldn’t believe that was what was bothering my sister.
“Ru, please.”
“No, Dad. She’s my sister. I would never do that to her. She needs to know that.”
I marched upstairs and knocked twice on her door before wrenching it open.
She was sprawled on her bed, looking up at the ceiling.
“Get out!”
“Stop this, Liz. What the fuck is wrong with you? We are sisters. This is why you are doing this?”
“Doing what?”
“You want to stay here, cooped up while everyone else is hunting? Well, be my guest. But Collin isn’t stupid, Liz. He wouldn’t toss you away just to take you back later.”
“And you know everything he’s thinking after two days together?”
“No, I don’t. He told me he doesn’t want you back. He even said that he never should’ve gone for you in the first place.”
“That’s a lie!” Liz shrieked, bolting upright
“You don’t believe me? Then fucking call him and get him to tell you. I tried, Liz. You’re my sister! I would do anything for you. You think I like seeing you like this? You hardly know the guy. This is not like you!”
“Shut. The. Fuck. Up,” Liz bit out, her nostrils flaring with every word.
“I won’t. You are better than this. Better than Collin. Snap out of this and grow a pair of balls. Not everyone is going to go apeshit over you. Move on. Being pathetic doesn’t suit you.”
I ducked as she threw her lamp at me and heard it smash against the wall, shattering into tiny pieces.
“Get out of my fucking room! You’re the pathetic one with your little visions, and ‘oh, I saved everyone. Yay me.’”
“That is what I’m talking about. I get that you are hurt, but you don’t have the right to speak to me like that. You have no idea…” I took a breath. “I hate you.” I stormed out.
“Good,” she yelled.
I passed my father as I reached to my room.
“Ru, what did she say?”
“Nothing,” I spit out and shut the door behind me.
If she didn’t want to act like my sister anymore, then fine. What was happening with her? She had never been like this. I mulled it over in my mind.
Forbidded Page 10
