Suddenly all this resentment she hadn’t even known had been there bubbled up to the surface. Caia grabbed up a cushion off the sofa and threw it at him with all her might. It bounced off his chest and he stared at her incredulously. “Didn’t you even stop to think?! Didn’t you wonder why I was so adamant about killing the Septum? Me? Killing innocent people?!” She gestured wildly. “Did that make sense to you?!”

“No!” He yelled back like a child, crossing his arms over his chest and making a face. “I knew something was up, but what the hell was I supposed to do?! Run out after you and leave my pack to deal with six deaths all by themselves?!”

Oh well, he had to go and be all rational! She grimaced and shifted away from him. “No,” she mumbled and began picking at the thread on a throw over the sofa.

After a minute of silence Lucien dropped down onto a chair. “So you didn’t kill the Septum.” It wasn’t a question. Clearly, Vil had told Lucien the little she had explained and hopefully left out the rest.

“I couldn’t. There was a little girl… anyway we worked out something else.”

“Worked out what?”

“I can’t tell you.”

His jaw clenched. “Can’t or won’t?”

Ignoring his look of betrayal she sighed, “Can’t.”

He glared at her. “I can’t believe you’re being like this. Fine. Keep your secrets. But tell me one thing… are you going after Marita?”

That much she could be honest about. “Somebody has to do it.”

Lucien launched to his feet. “But why does it have to be my mate?”

Caia chuckled humorlessly. “Oh gods, Lucien, I don’t know. But if I don’t do this, things are going to get really bad. And it’s not like I’m going into this alone. I have Saffron and Reuben.”

He stiffened and his face suddenly turned a mottled red. “Is he here? Has he actually dared to come here?”

OK, so Reuben had acted ruthlessly, but Caia couldn’t handle a disagreement between him and Lucien right now. “It is his hotel.”

With a bellowing curse, Lucien blew past her and out the door. She heard him running along the corridor at an insane speed. Oh dear goddess! He was going to attack the vampyre that couldn’t die! Swearing under her breath Caia took off after him, scaling over the railings on the stairs in order to try and catch up with him. As it was, when she came barreling into the dining room, Reuben towered over Lucien, his large hand wrapped around Lucien’s thick neck. The flashing glints of red in his eyes told her he was mesmerizing Lucien, keeping him still as he choked the life from him, Lucien’s face turning a terrible purple as they all stood around struck dumb by the sight of their Alpha on his knees.

Caia felt a rush of sickness. “Reuben… STOP IT!” She screamed, but he merely tightened his hold. Suddenly Magnus leapt at the vampyre only to be backhanded as if he were a mere fly.

“REUBEN!” She screamed again as Ella followed Magnus’ footsteps. Lucien’s eyes were beginning to close and terror took hold of her energy; her energy took hold of her, sneering at her hopelessness and flowing out in a stream towards the vampyre. To her utter surprise it made impact and Reuben was blasted across the room with enough intensity to send him crashing through the windows and outside into the cold. For a moment she was struck dumb by the fact that her magik had actually worked on Reuben, and fleetingly she wondered if he had been lying all along about being impervious to it.

But somehow… she didn’t think so. A trickle of sweat slid down the side of his face.

Hacking coughs shook Caia from her thoughts and she rushed to Lucien who was being helped up by Draven. Her hands fluttered over him, checking to make sure he was alright, and she breathed a sigh of relief as his normal color returned. He appeared dazed and pushed her hands away as if she were irritating him.

“Well, that was a surprise.”

Caia looked up to see Reuben clambering back inside through the window he had just been thrown out of. He brushed pieces of glass off and then grinned unrepentantly. “Looks like I’m not impervious to you, Caia. Although, I have to say that a blast like that would have killed a lesser man. My feelings are hurt.”

Her jaw dropped at his audacity, and her lykan colored her words as she replied through a mouth longing to fill with her sharp wolf teeth, “You ever touch one of my pack again and I will send you back where you came from, you son-of-a-bitch.”

He quirked an eyebrow. “I’ll heed that warning. Since, apparently, you might actually be able to do that.”

Draven looked bewildered by the man. “You don’t seem that bothered.”

Reuben shrugged. “I’m not. I’m impressed. I’ve been waiting a long time for someone like Caia.”

Lucien growled and made a move towards the vampyre, but Caia pressed him back, scolding him. She was rewarded with one of his frostiest looks before he straightened his massive shoulders and thundered out of the room, Magnus and Ella following in his wake.

Caia felt tears of frustration prickle in her eyes. “You were going to kill him.”

“No.” The vampyre shook his head. “I know killing Lucien would mean losing you, and I need you too much. I was merely teaching him a lesson. He attacked unfairly.”

“You blackmailed his mate.”

“But it all turned out OK in the end.”

“He doesn’t know that! He thinks I’m punishing him for kicking me out of the pack.”

Reuben threw her a condescending look before taking out a flask from his inner coat pocket. It was full of blood. He went to take a swig and noticed her watching. “You depleted my energy.”

Caia threw her hands up in the air, wondering why she even bothered trying to get answers from the guy. “I’m going to find Jaeden. You… stay away from my pack.”

“I don’t know if they’re your pack again just yet, sweetheart,” he taunted, and laughed when her only answer was a rude gesture.

24 – The Green-eyed Monster

Rose’s heart pounded in her chest as she stood in the middle of the woods, some fifteen minutes from the hotel. She had just rushed out of a pack meeting where Caia had told them all about the Septum and the little girl, Eliza Emerett, she couldn’t kill. Caia had seemed to go off into a world of her own as she described the little eleven year old Midnight and where she lived. Rose smirked. She doubted Caia had meant to be so detailed in her maudlin retelling of why she couldn’t possibly go through with such a wicked plan. But that was all Caia was telling them and Rose was more than a little suspicious. Clutching the cell phone in her hand she prayed the number she had for Marita was still in use. Surely if it was, and she saw who it was calling, Marita could look into the trace and see Rose was sincere in her intentions. All she had to do was fight through the fog Reuben had put over her trace to hide her from Marita, but she would be careful to keep where they were staying still masked. It would be better if she held all the cards.

Rose was reeling from Lucien’s betrayal, and yet she couldn’t blame him. It wasn’t his fault. He was under that she-witches spell. They all were! And Caia was going to bring the pack to disaster. Lucien and his pack were good people, nothing like the ambitious, deceitful pack she had grown up in where your best friend would stab you in the back if it meant climbing up the next rung on the hierarchical ladder. She had to save them from Caia, from themselves, and then she and Lucien could finally be happy together. Marita wasn’t a bad person! It dumbfounded her how all these people could believe that a woman who had successfully led the Daylight Coven against the Midnights could suddenly just become a monster. This was a witch hunt started by a being that needed to be stopped. And if Rose helped Marita stop Caia, she was sure she could negotiate a pardon for the pack. Trembling with excitement Rose dialed the number. It rung out for a while, but finally the tone clicked.

“Rose,” Marita’s familiar stern voice.

Relief washed through her. “Oh thank goddess, Marita. Do you know why I’m calling?”

“Hmm, yes, I’m reading the trace. Very interesting. What is interesting is I don’t know where you are.”

Rose paused. “I can’t tell you that just yet.”

“I see.” She was silent for a moment. “Fine. I appreciate you calling, however. And this information I’m reading in the trace about this Septum and this little girl. It’s all true?”

“Yes,” Rose gushed. “Caia’s planning on destroying the trace.”

Marita hissed, “That little bitch.”

Rose waited, her ears lifting under her hair every time she heard a noise. No one could know she was doing this. They just wouldn’t understand right now.

“I want you to keep pretending you’re on their side, Rose. Contact me if you discover anything else of importance.”

“Of course.”

“And Rose.”

“Yes.”

“I won’t forget your loyalty.”

25 – Last Mistake

Caia was dancing with Lucien, her cheek pressed against his shoulder as they swayed gently to the music. A soft breeze played with the hem of her dress and tickled through her hair as she sighed contentedly. It was a perfect night. The dark sky sewn bright with stars as colorful as fireflies, the air temperate and free, the sound of the surf crashing on shore as rhythmic as a lullaby.

“I love you,” she whispered and felt him squeeze her close.

“I love you, too.”

Caia pulled back to gaze up at him, smiling at the relief of it all being over, that they could finally be together in peace.

“Caia,” he breathed… and the sound was followed by a sickening wet whisper of metal through flesh. Lucien’s eyes widened in surprise, his mouth falling open in shock – blood began pouring out in its wake. He collapsed to his knees and Caia reached for him with a soundless scream, helpless to do anything as the sword that had torn through his heart twisted full circle. Lucien’s eyes emptied, his expression going slack as he disappeared, leaving only a body that tumbled down into the sand, a gory photograph of what had once been the real man.