River Cast: Part Two in the Tale of Lunarmorte (8 page)

“
Caia.”
Lucien sounded like he was choking on laughter, as he got up and
sat down beside her, patting her on the back more roughly than was
necessary.

“
I’m OK.” She
held a hand up to ward him off, eyes watering more from his help
than the coughing.

“
Can I get
you water?”

“
No,” she
croaked. Then she looked up at him, and realised how close he was,
the heat from his body stroking her skin; his silver eyes curious
and concerned, inches away from her. “I came to
apologise.”

A wrinkle appeared between
his eyes. “Apologise?”

She took in a shuddering
breath, her gaze falling to her hands again. “I never apologised
for what... for what my mother did to you... to your father... to
your family…”

“
Cy-”

“
No, let me
say this. She did all those horrible things, and when I found out
the truth the first thing you said was that you were sorry. You
didn’t have to do that. She deserved what she got. But
I
never apologised
properly. More than that, I never thanked you for supporting me
without question. I
am
part Midnight and you refused to judge me for that. Thank
you.”

“
Caia!”
Lucien grabbed her chin, jerking her eyes up to meet his own. He
looked angry and sad... and frustrated. “You have nothing to
apologise for. You. Are. Not. Your mother.”

A tear she didn’t even
know had appeared slid down her cheek, and he caught it with his
thumb, rubbing the salty liquid into her skin.

“
Do you
really believe that?”

His eyes widened in
disbelief. “Of course. Caia...”

“
I’m scared,
Lucien,” she whispered.

He pulled her gruffly into
his arms and she sighed, inhaling him, clinging to him like a life
boat.

“
You’re not
her. They will see that. You have to know that.”

Thoughts of
those Midnight traces she had been feeling trickled down towards
her tongue. She needed to tell someone. Maybe Lucien
would
understand. Maybe
it was a mistake. Maybe...“There’s something I-”

Tap tap
tap

Lucien groaned, “Sorry,
that’ll be room service.”

Caia pulled back, grinning
tremulously. “You ordered food already?”

He grinned wolfishly back.
“Of Course. We haven’t eaten in-”

“
Three
hours.”

He laughed and got up to
open the door. “Bring it on in, thank you.” He stood aside as a guy
in a waiter’s uniform pushed a trolley of food into the room. The
guy nodded briskly and left quickly.

“
You’re
unbelievable.” Caia chuckled, watching him lift dish after dish up
to inhale the aromas. Her own stomach started to ache in
protest.

“
Hey.” He
grinned again, almost licking his lips. “Thought I’d cash in on
your powerful pull with these people and get me a proper meal
before prep work tomorrow. I will need all the sustenance I can get
if we’re gonna kick some evil Midnight ass.”

Caia’s face fell. Well,
there went that window.

“
You wanna
join?”

“
Uh no.” She
shook her head and made for the door. “I’m tired.”

“
OK. Hey.” He
frowned. “Didn’t you have something to tell me?”

She locked on to his
concerned gaze and wished she did. But her previous instinct had
been right. Hating Midnights was too ingrained in a Daylight to
make what she had to say understandable.

And Marita was right. She
needed all the allies she could get.

“
No, not
really. Night.”

“
Night.”

***

“
You’re late,”
he reproached darkly, watching beneath his lidded eyes as the large
man walked sedately into the room.

“
I had a few
issues to deal with before coming here,” the distinguished magik
said in his heavy accent, before brushing off a chair and easing
into it. He straightened the lapels on his long wool coat before
crossing his leg over the other in a gesture that was at once
elegant and masculine.

“
I have
people to get back to. I don’t have the luxury of your abilities,
remember.”

“
Well, be
quick with your news, by all means.”

“
My contact
tells me you have a problem, Nikolai.”

Nikolai chuckled, lifting
his hands up in a gesture of disbelief. “I would really like to
know how you... have contacts within my Coven.”

“
I’m very
old, Nikolai. I have had many years to garner enough knowledge in
which to blackmail people.”

“
Of
course.”

“
My contact
told me your problem goes by the name Pierre Du Bois.”

Nikolai stiffened. “What
is Du Bois up to now?”

“
You know
him?”

“
Da. He is a
thorn to say the least. What is he up to?”

He shrugged. “My contact
doesn’t know.”

“
You believe
your contact?”

“
Yes. Let’s
just say he has no pain threshold.”

“
You must
watch your methods. If we want our plan to work we must present the
right image.”

He nodded. “Believe me, I
know. Don’t worry about me. You better find out what Du Bois is up
to, Nikolai.”

“
I have every
intention of doing so. If it’s what I think he is up to, it will
provide me the perfect opportunity to have him…
misplaced.”

A silence settled upon the
room. Then...

“
And the
document; is it finished?”

Nikolai nodded gravely and
stood up. His large hand delved inside the wool coat and reappeared
with an envelope. He pushed it across the desk separating them, the
small diamond on the onyx ring on his pinky finger winking in the
dim light.

He opened the envelope his
hands almost shaking in anticipation. The paper inside was the
beginning of the end. He was sure of it. He pulled it out and
unfolded it slowly, his eyes widening at the information printed in
Nikolai’s scrawling penmanship.

“
The Septum,”
he breathed.

“
Da.”

“
And we’re
sure this is correct?”

“
Positive.
We’ve been searching a long time. I would not have brought you it
merely based on assumption.”

He nodded impatiently. “I
know, I know. I just can’t believe we’re getting this
close.”

His heart thudded loudly
in his chest. All they needed now was the girl. He needed to get
back. His plans so far were not going as smoothly as he had hoped,
but it was time to take matters in hand. He needed the girl, and at
present he only had one avenue to her.

“
Will we get
her, you think?”

“
Have no
fear, Nikolai. Caia Ribeiro will be in our hands before the year is
out.”

6 - Why?

“
Well, ain’t
you a picture,” Ryder boomed as Jaeden threw open her motel door,
face pale, and eyes squinting against the sun.

She sighed heavily,
slipping a pair of dark sunglasses over her eyes. “You know I’ve
never noticed how annoyingly chirpy you are. Have you always been
so, or is this a recent development?”

He laughed as she pushed
past him, heading across the lot to the motel grill & bar. “Not
a morning person, huh?”

“
Please be
quiet.”

He grinned behind her
back, enjoying her obvious irritation, and by the looks of the
stiffness in her body, the morning effects of sleeping in the worst
bed in the state.

Doing as requested, Ryder
didn’t direct any conversation at her until they were seated and
had ordered. He waited until she finally took the sunglasses off
before deciding to hit her with the question that had been bugging
him for a while.

“
So tell
me... why did you leave the pack in the first place?”

Her dark blue eyes
narrowed, and her full lips thinned in discomfort at his
directness. She glared.

He shrugged. “Hey, I’m
just asking the question that everyone will be asking when we get
home.”

More glaring. Wait, was
she snarling?

Ryder snorted and sat up,
leaning across the table towards her. “Look, Jae, you are going to
have to talk about this at some point. Dimitri was going nuts
whilst you were gone. He probably would have had a search party out
scouring the country if Lucien hadn’t given him a direct order to
leave you alone.”

He watched the surprise
flit across her face, her mouth dropping open in astonishment. It
was fascinating, watching the way she wiped the expression clean,
putting her cool facade back in place. And just when he thought he
wasn’t going to get a reaction...

“
Why would
Lucien do that?”

Ryder smirked, smug (and a
little relieved) that he still knew her enough to know she couldn’t
resist that little bit of information. “Caia asked him
to.”

Jae frowned. “Wait...
why?”

Suddenly the memory of her
broken, of her young skin lashed and burned, her bright eyes blank
and numb with torture, flooded his thoughts, sobering him
immediately. “Because after what happened to you she thought you
deserved the time you needed to yourself.”

She looked down, shielding
her eyes and thoughts from him. “That was... kind.”

“
The girl you
met for those, what two weeks, you liked her, right?”

Still not looking at him,
Jae nodded. “She was cool.”

“
Caia cares
about you a great deal.”

She was frowning again,
and suddenly he was caught in her curious gaze. “You respect her a
lot, don’t you?”

Ryder chuckled. “Yeah.
She’s my friend... actually she’s more like a sister.”

“
So you
don’t...”

What was she trying to
ask?

Laughter bubbled up inside
of him as realisation dawned, but he managed to contain it as he
replied in a strangled voice, “Nah, I’ll leave that particular
privilege to her mate.”

Sitting back in her seat,
seeming more relaxed, she smiled wryly at him, and he tried to
ignore the sudden speed in his pulse.

“
Yeah, what’s
up with that? Lucien doing what Caia tells him to do?”

The whole Lucien and Caia
thing was mind boggling to him. It was obvious they were crazy
about each other, but neither one could see it, and neither one
wanted to talk about it. He had had his head bitten off enough
times for him to shut up on the matter. Hopefully, they’d work it
out before it really was too late, and someone did something they
would regret.

“
Cy’s got
Lucien wrapped around her little pinky and vice versa.”

“
Before I
left I got the impression they were going to ignore their
mating.”

“
You got
right. Nothing’s changed. They’re still idiots.”

Jaeden chuckled and sipped
at her coke. “I’ve missed the pack and all the drama.”

“
I would have
thought breaking Coven laws, and hunting vampyres, would have been
enough drama.”

“
That was bad
drama. The pack is good drama.”

“
So why did
you leave?”

She groaned and went back
to glaring at him. He merely enjoyed annoying her further by
grinning cheekily at her.

She glared. “You never
give up, do you?”

“
I’m
tenacious. Persistent. Determined. Dogged-”

“
You’re like
a rash that won’t go away.”

His smile widened, but he
didn’t have a chance to retort because their food arrived. The
first few minutes of silence descended on their table whilst they
dug in. Ryder decided to choose his moment carefully, waiting until
a sigh of pleasure escaped from Jaeden. Now that she had fed, she
might be more amenable to answering the damn question.

“
So why did
you leave?”

This time she just watched
him as she chewed carefully, swallowed, and took a sip of her
drink. She was deliberately tormenting him, fully aware of his lack
of patience.

“
You really
want to know?”

Finally.

He nodded, afraid he would
say the wrong thing and lose the moment.

At first as she spoke, Jae
held his gaze, strong, steady. “After what happened, I was in too
much pain to be comforted, and I knew my coldness would only hurt
my family.” She stopped and her gaze dropped. “I didn’t know how to
tell them all that had happened to me. I didn’t want to hurt them
any more with that knowledge. And I was just... a mess... I didn’t
want them to see me like that.”

She refused to meet his
eyes.

You’re
lying.

Oh, he was sure what she’d
just revealed was partly the truth, but there was more. He could
feel it. What was she hiding from him, from them all?