The Hunted (49 page)

‘Sponge Bob? Why didn’t you say so?’ I said, clapping my hands together and pretending to be thrilled by the prospect.

Not.

‘Couldn’t we start with something a bit smaller?’

‘Shit, Elena, will you stop procrastinating? I could have cured cancer by now.’

I frowned at him and then studied the weights in front of me again. It was almost four times my own body weight.

I wiped my hands and then circled them around the cool steel of the bar. It flexed gently as I tightened my grip and pulled upwards. At first nothing happened, mostly because I was too scared to pull any harder in case my spine snapped.

‘Come on, Elena, give it a bit more.’

‘Want me to toss you over the fence?’

‘No.’

‘Then shut up.’ I closed my eyes, counted to three, took a deep breath, opened my eyes again and then heaved. The barbell left the ground with surprising ease. Yeah, I could feel the weight of it, but I couldn’t exactly call it heavy.

I raised it to my knees and then lifted it up to my chest and then over my head.

‘That’s so freaking cool,’ Lucas murmured as he watched me spin it above my head.

I grinned. ‘I know, right?’

There was some rustling of tree leaves over near the fence and a couple of branches on the jacaranda tree bobbed up and down and brushed noisily against the fence post.

Ahh, crap. Why did Bob always take neighbourhood watch so seriously?

I lowered the barbell from over my head and placed it back down on the ground before Bob, our nosey next door neighbour made his daily appearance over the fence. His bald head, cracked through the shrubbery a moment later. ‘What’s going on over here?’

‘Hi, Bob,’ Lucas and I said in rehearsed unison. He must have propped a ladder up against the fence so that he could peer into our garden as the fence was well over six feet tall and there was plenty of dense foliage crowding his view of our backyard. You think he’d get the hint that we weren’t communal people when we erected the fence six years ago and let the shrubbery grow wild. He must have really wanted to know what all the fuss was about.

‘You kids causing trouble?’ he asked gruffly.

‘Not today,’ Lucas answered politely.

He smacked his lips together and rubbed at his grey bearded chin. ‘What are you doing with that exercise contraption there?’

I slapped Lucas lightly on the shoulder and smiled. He buckled forward and stumbled to the ground. ‘We’re trying to buff Lucas up, Bob,’ I said, smiling politely. ‘As you can see, he’s about as strong as a fart in the wind.’

Lucas scrambled back to his feet and shot me a look.

Bob huffed and scratched at his chin again. ‘I think you’re aiming too high, boy,’ he said, pointing to the barbell. ‘Maybe for someone of your stature you should start with some small hand weights instead.’

‘Thank you, Bob,’ Lucas muttered through gritted teeth as he flipped me off behind his back. ‘What an excellent idea.’

Bob frowned and looked at the weights again. ‘Just try and keep it down. Your hollering interrupted my TV time—Antiques Roadshow’s on.’

I sniggered quietly to myself and nodded.

He leaned away from the fence and swatted at something crawling over his arm. ‘You might want to take a look at the green ant’s nests that you’ve got building along this fence here while you’re at it. The little buggers really have a nasty bite on them.’

‘Sure thing, Bob,’ Lucas said, waving at him and then, turning his back on Bob, rolled his eyes for my benefit.

Bob waved to us both and then disappeared back behind the fence again. I could hear him folding his ladder up and putting it back inside his carport, muttering loudly about how many times he had just gotten bitten by ‘those bloody ants’
.

‘Can you believe that guy?’ Lucas said, jabbing his thumb over his shoulder and pointing in Bob’s direction. ‘Trust us to move in right next door to the chairman of the Neighbourhood Watch committee.’

I laughed and then looked back down at the barbell at my feet. ‘Do you want to take it back to the shed or should I?’

He paused. ‘You know, things are going to be different now. You’re going to have to be a lot more careful than you have been in the past.’ He said this as he concentrated on levitating the weights back up into the air in front of him.

‘Are you talking about keeping this secret from everyone at the IMI?’

He nodded. ‘But not just them. You’ll also have to be careful in the way you touch people or objects. It may just be a temporary side effect, but if it’s not, you’re going to have to relearn how to touch things and people with care. If you don’t, you’ll probably break someone. If that happens, then the secret will be out of the bag.’

I looked deeply into his powder blue eyes. ‘Can I trust you, Lucas?’

He sniffed. ‘As if you even had to ask. I don’t want you to be shipped off to the other side of the world anymore than you do. However sad this is to say, you’re not just my sister, Elena, but my friend. I know eventually that you’re going to turn and then leave us, but until then, I don’t want you to go.’ He turned away from me before I even had a chance to answer or gauge a reaction from his face. He headed off down through the weeds, into the backyard and disappeared behind the shed.

*          *          *

That night the family congregated together in the living room to watch a few sitcoms together. This meant being together in the same room and acting like we were enjoying one another’s company, even though the endless dialogue from the television negated the need for conversation.

My test results had not been brought up even once and it didn’t appear like they were going to be. I saw the quick glances that were aimed in my direction and then the silent conversation that seemed to pass between Susan and George. At least Lucas was keeping up the pretence that all was normal.

After the shows had ended and the non-existent conversation appeared to stretch on into the silence, I excused myself and said goodnight to everyone. I headed to the bathroom for a hot shower, and from the murmured dialogue that was going on in the living room as I left, it appeared that everyone else had the same plan. Apparently dealing with Sarah’s mutterings of satanic possession and Kim’s threats of leaving the IMI if I stayed was starting to wear Susan and George down. Both of them had bags building under their eyes, and not the stylish Louis Vuitton kind that I’d love to get my hands on.

When I got out of the shower, I ran a comb through my wet hair and loosely folded it up with a clip.

I searched the room for my clothes and then slapped my forehead when I realised I had forgotten to bring my night clothes in with me, for the umpteenth time. As a compromise, I wrapped a thick towel around myself and darted for my bedroom as quickly as my feet would carry me. My family had already dispersed to their own areas of the house, and all the lights had been turned off downstairs. Lucas’s bedroom door was closed as I sprinted on past.

I got to my room, gliding along with the stealth of an assassin and the speed of a cheetah. There was only my own shadow that was stalking me along the wall beside me for company.

I shut the door silently behind me and then turned around, and switched the light on.

‘What took you so long?’ William asked, sitting perched on the edge of my window sill.

Bloody hell!

I had to cup a hand over my mouth to prevent a scream from escaping.

I steadied myself against the edge of the desk, took a calming breath and then looked back up at him. He couldn’t have looked any more relaxed if he tried. I searched his face for marks, scratches or imperfections. There were none, and it was clear now, more than ever, that he was alive and well. Why had he not tried to contact me, to tell me he was alright? And why had he not returned any of the messages that I had left on his phone?

Geez, Elena, calm down. One thought at a time.

I tucked the towel more securely around myself, trying to be demure. Luckily, even after the scare and
almost
forward tumble down to my knees, everything appeared to be in its place.

So what the hell is he looking at?

I grew more self-conscious by the second, as his gaze appraised me, taking in the creamy, white expanse of my bare arms and shoulders, and the length of my naked legs, right to where the towel cut off the view neatly at the top of my thighs.

I reached over and switched the light off again. He began to chuckle at my growing embarrassment. ‘Do you think turning the light off makes a difference to me?’ he said, still laughing.

‘Would you mind turning around please?’ I said stiffly. He continued to chuckle to himself, but effortlessly spun himself around on the window frame to avert his eyes.

I ran over to the dresser and quickly pulled out a pair of underwear and a bra, and studied them in the darkness by holding them out in front of me. I wasn’t sure if the colours even matched.

Why are you worrying about your bra and panties, you dipshit? Just throw something on!

I shook my head at my girly behaviour, dropped the towel to the floor and slipped them on as quickly as possible. I grabbed my denim shorts from the top drawer along with a red turtleneck sweater that I hadn’t worn in years. The excess fabric rolled warmly around my neck and ears, and the sleeves were long enough that the cuffs covered half of my palms. It may have been an overreaction on my part, but I thought the more of my neck and open vein sources that were covered the better.

I kicked the towel into the corner of the room and then walked over to switch the light back on again. William had already beaten me to it and my fingers gently brushed over his, in search of the switch as his hand was pulling away. His skin was as chilled as always, but it transferred to the flesh of my fingers as a welcoming heat that I both enjoyed and detested.

‘What are you doing here?’ I asked, breaking the silence between us, our hands slowly lowering. ‘I thought something had happened to you. I left you messages on your phone but you never called me back.’

His eyes glistened with amusement. ‘Have you been worried about me?’

‘Don’t flatter yourself. I was just wondering.’

He chuckled and touched a finger to my nose. ‘I think you have been worried about me. How lovely.’

I groaned audibly. ‘What happened to you? Do you even realise that the Alpha came after me?’

He took in my appearance with a quick glance of his eyes and then started to chuckle again, ignoring my question completely. He reached up and fingered the red fabric that was wrapped so comfortingly around my neck. ‘Nice outfit,’ he answered simply, lowering his hand and crossing his arms in front of his chest, a smug sort of smile forming on his face.

‘It’s not exactly the Vogue designer wardrobe in here, you know,’ I answered sharply. ‘What I really wanted to wear was the latest Versace number with Jimmy Choo pumps, but I guess you caught me on a laundry day—sorry about that.’

He looked at me for a second, expression neutral, before he tugged at my turtleneck again. ‘What I meant was,’ he said slowly, ‘why the turtleneck? It’s not winter anymore.’

I shrugged. ‘Just trying to make things a little easier.’

‘How so?’

I chewed at my fingernail for a moment, pondering the best choice of words. ‘Well, when the alpha found me the other night, things didn’t exactly go very well and the last time you and I talked you mentioned that my blood
is
mouth-watering and difficult to ignore. I just thought this,’ I said, tugging on my sweater, ‘would make things a little easier for you to be around me. You know, out of sight, out of mind?’