When she finally found a seat at the table across from him he was still staring. She tried to ignore the heat that blossomed beneath her cheeks at his scrutiny.
“Yesterday must have been a little overwhelming for you.”
She looked up from her cereal. Goddess, he was huge. Struck dumb apparently, she merely nodded. Her reaction to him produced a quirk in the corner of his mouth which she suspected was a smile … or it could’ve been a smirk …
“You don’t talk much do you?” His brow was furrowed and he was looking at her as if she was an unusually complex puzzle.
“Only when I feel like I have something useful to say. I prefer to listen. You learn a lot more a lot faster.”
She was surprised when he actually chuckled, giving her a glimpse of his perfect wolf whites. “I suppose you’re right. Magnus would approve.” He smiled softly as he sipped at his coffee. “Big guy missed you.”
“I missed him too.”
“He all you really remember?”
Caia stopped eating and looked at him. His tone and the way he observed her told her that his question wasn’t merely out of curiosity. Pack Leader was beginning his ‘back to work’ interview. “I remember Magnus the most.” She looked over at the bulletin board he had pinned to the kitchen wall. Along with deadlines, memorandums and notes to one another, there were a number of photographs of the pack. “I do remember Ella though. I remember you, too.” Her eyes turned back to him. His gaze was still fixed on her.
“I thought maybe you were too young. I must have taken off just before you left with Irini.”
“Yeah, but I have this vague memory of you, too. Young, moody, avoided me like the plague.” She smirked.
His face remained expressionless as he replied, “You were a kid. I didn’t have time for you.”
If he thought she was going to be upset or insulted by this he could forget it. Instead she continued, “I remember Dimitri and some of the other, older pack members that I met last night. I didn’t think I would but... I don’t know… they unearthed some latent memories I guess.”
Lucien sighed. “Still, it’s been a long time.”
Caia finished her cereal and got up to rinse her bowl. “Are you asking if I’m ready to rejoin the pack?”
He made no sound but when she turned around he was standing right before her, so close she could feel the heat from his body stroking her skin. “You’re seventeen and you’ve never ran with a pack,” he murmured.
“No,” she whispered. “And no, I don’t think I’m ready.”
He seemed surprised by her admission and pulled back a little. “You have a lot of learning to do. From what Irini has told me we have nothing to worry about your integration into the local high school. But you’ll need to learn how the pack works.”
“Learn how?” She gulped nervously.
Lucien stepped forward again. “From experience. We’ve moved our monthly run up to next Sunday. You run with us.”
Her heart started racing a little faster at the thought. Unlike the pack she had begun to feel and enjoy the privacy of the change. She had to share her favorite thing? With these strangers? With him?
He seemed to understand, his large hand pressing onto her shoulder in what she guessed was supposed to be a reassuring gesture. Instead it felt a little threatening. “Loners don’t fit well into packs, Caia. I won’t have them in my pack. Especially not you.”
What did that mean?
She started to ask but was stopped as his ‘talk’ triggered a far more pressing question. “I have to start learning huh?” she led.
Lucien nodded, all stern and in alpha-mode.
“Fine. Here’s a question you can answer that Irini wouldn’t.” Caia watched curiously as his face hardened and he tensed as if ready to face something unpleasant. “Why … why did The Hunter pick me? My parents?”
The big lykan heaved a heavy sigh and leaned back against the counter crossing his arms over his chest. Caia almost gulped at the way his muscles rippled with the movement. “At first,” he began softly, his eyes not quite meeting hers, “We thought it was an attack on the pack, that we were one of the unfortunates the Dark Coven had targeted. It was confusing because we’re a small pack. Small packs don’t tend to draw the eye of The Midnights. But we later realized it was a member of the Midnight Coven acting independently from it. Your mother and father had taken a trip and apparently while on it they came across a Midnight: The Hunter. Recognizing what they were The Hunter tried to take them out. Your father killed one of The Hunter’s followers, and The Hunter tracked them back to us, and to you. He killed your parents and tried to get to you, but you were well protected. And as you know he didn’t give up. He came back for you four years later and again, he failed.”
Caia blinked, trying to take this new information in. “It doesn’t make sense.”
“Why?” Lucien frowned. “What?”
She shrugged. “Why, when he got to the pack did he just kill my parents? Surely he would have went back to the Coven and told them about the rest of the pack?”
Lucien shook his head, looking irritated by her questions. “No. He acted without orders from his coven when he killed your parents. He would have been reprimanded for his attack rather than rewarded. Besides, The Hunter is called exactly that because he was insane, obsessive. He wanted your parents dead and any trace of them – that would be you – gone, and that was that. There is no rhyme or reason to creatures like him.”
Before she could reply a bright voice called from the doorway, “Oh how good it is to be home to a kitchen that’s bigger than a cereal box.”
Both she and Lucien turned to Irini who was practically crooning as she danced into the kitchen.
“Our kitchen wasn’t that bad, Irini,” Caia mumbled, not only reeling from Lucien’s story, but also from having overheard Irini’s conversation with Ella the night before. Irini didn’t know she had heard and she didn’t want her to. Instead she let a placid mask slide onto her face.
“Ha. Speak for yourself.” Irini shook her head as she poured herself some coffee. “It was tiny for a girl who was used to … well … this.” She gestured with both hands as she smiled at the room.
“Glad you’re back.” Lucien chuckled as he held out his own mug to be refilled.
Caia’s mind wandered from the kitchen as brother and sister bantered easily with one another as if the last ten years of separation hadn’t existed. She was lost in a mass of whys and hows - furious and relieved all at the same time. She was furious to realize that if her parents hadn’t taken some stupid trip away from the pack they would still be alive; furious that Irini hadn’t already told her and saved her years of worrying about the pack... which led her to relieved. She was relieved that her parents were the targets of some weird, persistent hunter, and not a soldier of war sent by the Dark Coven to wreak havoc and destruction upon their small pack. Boy, if she’d known that for the last ten years imagine the hours of sleep she wouldn’t have missed. She looked at Irini and wanted to be angry at her, she really did. But it wasn’t in her nature to growl and hiss and spit, and neither was it in her nature to hold a grudge. And how could she when Irini’s face was flushed with a happiness she had never witnessed there before; her eyes light with what she could only imagine was a new lease of life. She looked so young. As if the ten years had melted away and she was eighteen again. No, Caia couldn’t be angry with her. Irini was ecstatic to be home. If it hadn’t been before, it definitely was obvious now, that she had genuinely been too upset to discuss anything of the past with her young charge.
Her thoughts and musings were interrupted by the sound of the doorbell, and both Caia and Irini’s heads snapped towards the sound in alert. Lucien’s eyes narrowed as if he understood; for years now both of them had been living quiet, isolated lives where the doorbell ringing signaled a potential threat.
“It’s OK,” he reassured them. “It’s just Jaeden for Caia.”
She frowned at this, her mouth forming an ‘o’ shape in question. But he was up and out of his seat before she could speak, returning to the room a few seconds later with a tall brunette who looked about Caia’s age. The first thing Caia noticed about her was the warm friendliness in her eyes, but as her gaze travelled over her she realized that the girl, with her piercing blue eyes and luscious curves and curls, was as outrageously attractive as the rest of these creatures. She had a feeling her self-esteem was going to take a serious hit among this crowd.
“This is Jaeden.” Lucien nodded to Irini and Caia. “Irini, you remember Jaeden, Dimitri’s daughter?”
Irini smiled brightly at the mention of the Elder and got up to hug the girl who was at least three inches taller than her. “Of course,”
Jaeden laughed at that and Caia was warmed by the pleasant sound of her chuckle. The girl’s blue eyes found her. “Do you remember me, Caia?”
Gazing at her in concentration she had the vague impression of a gangly young girl who used to have to coax her into playing with her. She nodded and smiled tentatively back at her. “Yeah. I do.”
Lucien looked pleased. “Good. Jaeden’s taking you to school.”
“School?”
“School.” He nodded, enunciating the word as if she were an idiot. “It’s Monday. I’ve got it all sorted out. They’re expecting you. I told them that your guardian died and as a minor you had to come here, so there shouldn’t be too many questions about your transfer one semester from graduation.”
“Oh. O-K.” She was thrown by this news. She thought she might have at least been given time to settle in.
Obviously that was wishful thinking.
Goddess, she couldn’t wait until she graduated at the end of the school year. “I’ll grab my backpack.”
It was awkward at first, climbing into Jaeden’s …
“Can I ask… what is this?” Caia indicated the rust-colored rust-bucket she had just climbed into.
Jaeden laughed. “I think they call it a 1982 Buick Skyhawk.”
“Wow, I’ve never even heard of a Skyhawk before.”
“She runs like a dream,” Jaeden reassured her, lovingly stroking the wheel of her car.
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to be rude.”
Again the girl laughed. “Don’t worry. I’d fear for my life as well if I was taking my first look at this baby. But she’s fine. I swear.”
Caia didn’t have a chance to answer because Jaeden launched straight into the questions. “So, what’s it like living with Lucien?” She giggled, her eyes sparkling in excitement. She ran her tongue along the tips of her top row of teeth. “He’s really rather delicious.”
It was Caia’s turn to laugh. “I suppose. To be honest, I really don’t know what it’s going to be like living with him. So far... pretty intimidating. The man is huge.”