Ch. 119: Burn the World

CHAPTER 119

Rachel~

So it came to the point that I needed to go home. The thought was surreal. How could I go anywhere else after all of this? How could I go back to my ‘normal’ life after all I had learned? After everything I’d witnessed?

It was getting late and while I’d gotten a text from Ally saying she and Kyle had made it home safe, I didn’t know how I was going to get back.

Jake had been gone for over half an hour now. I’d been left in one of his rooms, some sort of mini living room deal. Maybe this was once some inner office or receiving room from back in the day. Now it was a room with sparse offerings. Desk, laptop, TV, a couch, one bookcase with some pretty serious sounding historical anthologies, and a big huge window. Outside from here I could see the moon now fully high up, and when movement caught my eyes after so much tranquility, I couldn’t help but pull my knees in and watch intently like it was the finals in some big game.

It was Nick and Evan. That I could make out from this distance. They started fighting in their human forms and after some time they shifted into wolves. I hadn’t had the opportunity to closely see a werewolf in wolf form (a hellhound is really something else entirely in my opinion), and while this was still far off, it was actually very interesting watching them move. Well, spar. That’s the right word, right? I don’t think they’re actually fighting, it’s like Nick’s heart isn’t behind his movements.

What is that? I spend a moment thinking about my thoughts, and then shake my head. That’s too meta, even for me.

The fighting - er, sparring - continued on and after some time they seemed to slow down. A few more movements, and they were out of my sight and into the trees. I waited for a few minutes to see if they would come back out, but if they had exited the wooded area it was somewhere out of the angle of this window.

I thought about the battle earlier, and remembered how Maxine got away. How Sophie escaped. I still didn’t know exactly why their little troop wanted to kill or take over this place or these people, but I knew they weren’t going to back down after one fight like that.

The thought made my stomach flip. I was able to do a few things today, but outside mostly helping Jake funnel his abilities, what did I really do? I can’t just cower in fear when they come back for my mate, for my friends. I thought back briefly to Archangel Aurora telling me what I needed to do after defeating Sean…

I need to get stronger. I pulled my phone out. The battery was crazy low but I sent a quick text to my mom that I was heading home. And then I sent one more message.

<<To Ally from Rachel>>: Do you think you can teach me? To fight?

<<To Rachel from Ally>>: I’m not sure. But I can try. I’ll call you tomorrow?

<<To Ally from Rachel>>: Please do.

The door creaks open and I turn to face it. It’s Jake. He looks awful. Sweat beading down his face, tiny flits of flame over his head and arms, a red streak of something across his cheek. Part of me knows what that is. The other part ignores it to focus on him.

I leap up from my position and rush over to him. He opens his arms to envelope me in a hug but I stop him.

“Sit,” I say, no nonsense in my tone.

“Rach, you may not know this,” he sighs. “But as Alpha, I generally do the ordering around here.”

I look at him unimpressed. He’s smirking back.

“Sit,” I insist again, pointing to the couch.

He drops his act for a moment and walks over as I head into the adjoining bathroom. It’s a bare half bath, with just the essentials. Sink, toilet, soap, hand towel. So I take the hand towel and soak it in some cool water before going back out.

He’s watching me with some curious fascination. I sit by him and he again tries to envelope me in his arms, but I push his arms back down and take the towel to his forehead. I dab the cool towel across his face. He smartly doesn’t resist. I scrub a little at his cheek, and then refold the towel to make it lengthwise, draping it across the back of his neck.

“Better?” I ask him.

He looks like he might laugh.

“Am I amusing to you?” I tease.

“Why, yes, actually, you are. Now can I please hug you?” he asks genuinely.

I nod and he pulls me forward. We stay like that for a few moments. I’d tease him about breathing me in, but I’m breathing him in…

He gives me a quick kiss on top of my head before pulling back all the way.

“Thanks for taking care of me, Killer,” he says, smiling proudly, as he holds my cheek with one hand. His thumb caressing my cheek.

I close my eyes from how soothing the feeling is. When I open them his face has gotten significantly closer to mine. My heart rate shoots up. Blood pounds in my ears. I’m acutely aware of everything. My face in his hand, the strand of hair that’s fallen forward in my vision, the few inches between our lips, the very-Jake serious look in his eyes. But he doesn’t move.

His last words echo in my mind and I decide to respond. “Always.”

I move forward and our lips meet for an electrifying kiss that could burn the world.




Evan~

I’m pretty sure the black eye I gave Nick would still be there in the morning. Werewolf healing, sure, but Goddess had I packed a punch in that one.

We didn’t say a word to each other as we shifted back to our human forms and walked back to the packhouse. We rounded the side and I headed right back to the cellar. My dad’s order hadn’t included staying away from here, so I would be here if they needed me. I would stand by the interrogation room. That was all.

‘Oh, because we aren’t coming back here at all for our mate,’ Xavier snickered.

I clenched my fist. Goddess, I wish I could punch him.

‘Oh but you can’t’ he said back.

“Ugh!!” I exclaimed before punching the wall. 

Some drywall cracked and Nick raised a brow at me but I waved him off.

I would stand here and wait. I would ignore the comforting scent of daisies I had smelt a whiff of when coming down the steps. I couldn’t let anyone know. Wouldn’t.

The image of my nameless mate came to my mind and the thought ran through me, that for some reason, she didn’t seem to have told anyone either. I wondered why.

After nearly ten minutes my nerves couldn’t take being so still any longer.

“You got this?” I ask Nick, like he wouldn’t have had this.

“ ‘Course,” he says briefly.

And I’m thankful for his short response. Freaky Gamma intuition likely knew I didn’t have patience for anything more right now.

Nick stayed behind as I walked closer and closer to where she was being kept. I could have closed my eyes and just followed the aroma. But I approached with eyes open, scanning for the first glimpse of her.

And there she was. Sitting on the floor in the back corner. Her head tilted to the side, resting against the bars.

My eyes went to everything else. Her closed eyes, the lack of comfort in the cell, her change in breathing.

Her bright eyes fluttered open. At first she looked confused. She blinked a few times and her gaze focused on me.

“Back with more questions?” she asked, her voice raw like she hadn’t spoken in years.

I looked around. “Did no one come by with water?”

“Ah, yes. A question,” she said, pushing herself from the wall a bit, rolling her neck. She stopped stretching after a moment and looked at me seriously. “No, not yet.”

I twist my mouth and walk away.

I hear her settle back down as I walk off into the darkness without a word.

I return with a paper cup filled with water. When I came back to the cell her eyes were closed again, so she blinks again a few times when she hears me return.

There’s a question of her own there in the look she gives me but she quietly gets up and walks closer to me.

That’s when I see a chain between her ankles. They connect to each other and then to the wall. Her hand reaches out and I have to put my hand with the cup inside the cell up to my elbow in order for her to reach it.

“Short arms,” I say before I can stop the words.

“Well we’re not all built like trees,” she says softly, before putting the cup up to her mouth and taking a greedy gulp. She drinks the rest down and then squishes the cup in her hand before returning to her seated position.

“Any more questions for me?” she asks me, in a wry tone.

“Why?” I ask.

She seems thrown. “Why what?”

I don’t answer. We just stare at each other for a while. She breaks eye contact first, choosing to focus on the paper cup in her hands. She’s flattened it and is now rubbing it against the stone floor. She pushes down in a few places, tears it carefully, and then begins to fold it.

“What are you doing?” I can’t help asking.

“Always with the questions,” she hums.

She doesn’t look up but I hear the smile in her tone.

How could she smile in here, of all places? After what she’s done? Is she smiling because she’s getting under my skin and she knows it? Smiling because she’s plotting something?

I continue to watch her until she lifts something up.

“What is it?” I ask.

She chokes out a short laugh. A chortle. Then she stands again, making her way to where she stood a few minutes ago when she took the cup from me.

“Here, this is for you,” she says, holding something in her palm.

I don’t know why but my arm moves forward, into the cell. My palm up, ready to receive whatever it is that she’s made.

She brings it to my hand and her fingers graze the side of my palm. Everything is still in that instant. There’s buzzing all around and throughout my body, my mind. I’ve been zapped. It is just like being hit by lightning but instead of making me want to cry out in pain, it makes me want more.

I pull my hand back quickly, just as the image of her out there with her kind, attacking my pack comes from my memory. I stormed off, leaving her there standing with her jaw hanging.

“I’m Amber, by the way,” I hear her say.

I rush back towards the direction of the interrogation cells. But not before glancing at my palm to see what she made. It was a star.