Chapter 59

Colson could feel his wolf get angry when they heard their mate wanting to leave them behind and not stay with them. He knew she wasn’t aware that she was his mate, but the fact that she looked like she was scared of him practically killed him. Colson tried to shake that feeling out of his head. What was he thinking? She was a witch. He couldn’t be mated to a witch. It went against everything he was raised on, wanting her was going against the pack and he couldn’t do that.

“No, we need to find Amanda first. I’ll call Zachary and let him know what’s going on. Maybe he and Madeline can come up with something,” Vita told her.

Gretchen nodded but continued to stay behind Vita. She would not allow herself to get any closer to that wolf. He was Ophelia’s older brother. He was probably just like her, self-absorbed and malicious. She didn’t need any more people like that in her life. It was bad enough that she had to go about calling Tristan her cousin. The coven saw each other as family. Thankfully, she wasn’t blood-related to him. Her phone rang in her pocket. When she pulled it out, her heart felt as if it had stopped beating. Speak of the devil, Tristan was calling her.

Gretchen moved away from the group to take the call.

“Hello?”

“Cousin, where are you? You weren’t in your room this morning when I got up,” Tristan said to her.

“Sorry, Tristan, I went out to get some studying done while you were asleep. I didn’t want to disturb you.” It wasn’t necessarily a lie. She wanted to get out of the room and not be around him.

Vita’s head shot up when she heard the name Tristan and instantly paled. Why was Tristan calling Gretchen? Was he here too on the campus? Her heart raced as she began to panic. She wasn’t going back to him. She just wasn’t.

Deak could sense that Vita was uncomfortable about something, but he was afraid to come off as too possessive and overprotective of her. He gently placed his hand on her back and rubbed in slow circular motions as he leaned down and whispered, “Are you alright?”

Vita shook her head. She tried to get control of her breathing. She reminded herself that she was around people that cared about her and wouldn’t let him take her away, especially Deak. She knew that much.

“What’s wrong?” he asked her. He hadn’t been paying attention to the other little witch girl who was hanging on to Vita. He was watching the other Alpha boy and trying to figure out his end game.

“She’s talking with Tristan,” she mumbled.

Deak could feel his rage of anger and hatred for her ex fuel inside him. His claws lengthened. Deak closed his eyes and took a deep breath. He needed to calm down so that he didn’t scare Vita. He would not allow his Lycan side to dominate how he felt for the girl.

Gretchen looked over at Vita and noticed that Vita looked the way she felt. She wasn’t happy that Tristan was lingering around. She had a feeling that he was up to something, but she didn’t know if she was a well enough actress to play the part of getting him to talk. His mother could always sense when people were hiding things from her. She didn’t know if Tristan had the same kind of influence and she didn’t want to find out.

Deak sensed Gretchen and felt her fear was similar to Vita's. “Gretchen, we need to go to meet up with group to study,” he said aloud. It should have been loud enough for him to hear in the background.

“Tristan, I have to go,” she told him.

“Well let’s meet up later, I really want to catch up with you.

“Okay, I’ll call you later,” she told him and then hung up. Her heart was racing. She closed her eyes and focused on her breathing to get control of her emotions. When she opened them, she noticed everyone was staring at her.

“Why is Tristan calling you?” Vita asked. Her voice was trembling, but she was trying to stay strong.

“He, he’s here on campus,” Gretchen admitted.

Vita sucked in a breath. “Do you know why?”

Gretchen shook her head. “No, I don’t. I swear. I’ll tell you everything I know, I promise.”

“She’s telling the truth,” Deak commented.

Vita turned to look up at Deak. “I can’t go back there,” she told him as she wrapped her arms around him and buried her face in his side. She felt a sense of calm that she hadn’t felt before when touching him.

Deak placed his finger under her chin and raised her face to look up at him. “I won’t let that happen. I promise I will keep you safe.” He leaned down and kissed her forehead. Vita blushed but smiled.

“We’re wasting time here. We need to find Amanda before she gets hurt,” Hudson ordered.

Vita looked over at Hudson. “I don’t think you need to worry about her. I would worry more about the girl that she’s after.”

Hudson shook his head.

“Ophelia looks like a girly girl, but she’s fierce and she’s crazy,” he confided in them.

“He’s right, my sister has been off her rocker for a while now and my father lets her do whatever she wants as long as it makes her happy. No matter the cost,” Colson admitted.

“Alright, we should still split up. Colson, you come with me, Tab and Marco. While Deak, you, Vita, and this one keep your distance away from Tristan and figure out how to get this damn thing off of my wrist, without having to reject my mate,” Hudson demanded.

Everyone took their orders in stride and headed off, hoping to find the answers they needed to solve this.

****

Tristan closed his phone after his call with that pathetic witch. He hated that he had to play nice with her, but she could be the key to getting Vita back. As soon as his plan was complete, he would continue to keep his little “cousin” as close to him as possible. He looked around her room, trying to see if he could find anything to help him figure out what she had been up to while at school. He knew about the wolf that was harassing her to make spells for her to keep that Alpha away from the hybrid, which was good. It would only help his plan more in the end. After looking around for a bit, he found nothing of use to him. He headed down to the entrance of the hall where he spotted someone he didn’t think he was going to run into again so quickly.

He stepped out right in front of her, blocking her path. “Amanda, hey, what’s wrong?”

Amanda huffed as she tried to maneuver around him. “Get out of my way!” she yelled.

Tristan just smiled. This was going to be easier than he thought.