Chapter 168 She's a ticking bomb
Apparently, the Skinwalker pandemic that had practically died down, reemerged just the night before our flight landed.
The Ashbound councilor slipped into the back of Mordiane’s limousine at Mulholland Drive. He inclined his head to Finn and I, then turned to his lord and announced the murder-suicide of the Salvatore twins.
An explosion went off in my ear, and I stiffened.
“Are you OK?” Finn jerked his head towards me, clutching my hand.
“I know them,” there was a tornado in my chest now. How did they expect me to be calm, to avoid negative emotions when things like this kept happening? “Are you sure?” I stared at the dragon-made creature.
The Salvatore twins were omegas from my own pack. Popular, charming and socialites. But they were so pleasant they were practically friends with everyone.
But they were closest to the Grunders. They were Arthur’s close friends. Some of my most vivid childhood memories feature them swimming in our pool on airless July afternoons, bickering over Christmas cookies, or chasing Gianna and me around the house with blue-bellied lizards.
The dragon’s face was a dark wrath now, and the poor Ashbound was squirming in his seat. Something cold pressed against my leg, and I looked down to see Mordaine pushing an ice-cold bottle of water against me.
“We will continue this…”
“No,” I cut him off, accepting the bottle with a trembling hand. “I want to hear it.”
I could not handle any more secrets. His silver eyes flashed when they met mine, but then he sighed and nodded to the Ashbound to continue.
“A skin walker stormed their penthouse last night. The housekeeper says Bristol,” He glanced at me, “the younger twin.”
I nodded in confirmation. Sitting this close to one of these creatures, I noticed they had half-dead eyes. That was the only sign that they were not humans.
“He was the first to catch sight of the skin walker, and chased it around the house. He finally caught up with it upstairs and pulled out a plasma on him.” His voice dropped. “It was a trick. The skin walker jumped off the building and the man found it was his brother that he had burned alive.”
The bottle slipped out of my hand and rolled on to the car seat.
“He shot himself in the head with a silver bullet.”
“That’s enough.” The dragon said as I stared down at the floor, forcing myself to remain still, pushing the negative emotions away and thinking of the positive side to this.
Afterlife. They were right now in the starry halls of the moon goddess. She would keep them safe, and they may become patron gods to pups unborn.
But my tears broke, and the world darkened around us.
By the time we drove into the garage, the world was a blur outside. It was a storm accompanied by downpour, howling through trees and shaking doors and windows violently. Finn held me, his arms like a cage around me, but he and Mordaine seemed speechless.
“I cannot live like this,” My voice came out broken as the Ashbound slipped out of the car. “Why is it that I cannot even fucking cry!”
Mordaine moved beside me then, sinking his fingers in my hair and caressing my hair back. “It’s just rain, doll.” He said quietly as I struggled to breathe through my tears. “People will get wet, run late for their appointment, so what? Of course, you can cry.”
I snickered, and then I thought of how Hale would have called him immoral for saying something like that, and my tears intensified.
It was as if my body was intent on purging out all the tears I had not shed since the hotel.
The dragon pressed warm lips to my temple now. “It’s the anger that is dangerous. I would say cry all you want if it helps your process hurt and let go.”
And that was our last conversation for days.
My questions remained unanswered because he was locked at The High Den, the central authority building for all seven districts and their wolf packs, covens and vampire courts in his Hearthrown city.
I doubted he had been there since I moved in with them. But things were different now. He and Hale had moved onto the scene to scrub the city clean of every last skin walker themselves, instead of leaving it to the Ashbounds and the other night advocates as usual.
It was on one of those days that I received a formal invitation to Atrium, Fentone’s company. There was a single knock on our bedroom door as my eyes reached the end of the card.
Finn walked into the bedroom, “Uh… looks like it’s just us today again. Dinner’s ready…”
He paused and stared at the card I was holding up now. Then he crossed the room quickly towards me as I rose from the bed.
“Grandma said he was planning a proposal for when I returned from Korea.”
He slowly hugged me to his side, gently plucking the card out of my hand. His lips curved in a sneer at all the elegant flourishes embossed on the card he was turning over.
I smiled for the first time in days.
Hugging his arm, I leaned my head on his shoulder as he read through the message.
“I’m coming with you,” he said in a voice that encouraged no argument.
He turned his head to look at me and our faces were so close I could feel his breath on my face. “OK,” I said quietly, pulling away from him as heat spread through my body.
I could still feel his eyes on me, but I kept my gaze on the wood floor till he turned and started to walk out of the bedroom. I followed him down the stairs at a safe distance.
My mouth watered at the aroma of the food as I approached the table, but in the dining hall my eyes fell on a gift box as he pulled my seat back.
“Another gift?” I beamed up at him. I caught his shy smile just before he turned to go sit at the other side of the table.
I picked up the medium-sized box, and tugged the ribbon loose as he watched me.
My brows jumped at the sight of the gold box sitting inside, the size of two ring boxes stacked.
“Another music box?” my chest tightened at the thought of his gift I had shelved. I will pull it out the moment I return to the bedroom.
“Do you plan on opening it this year?”
My head jerked up, and I smiled shyly. I lifted the lid and a burst of electronic cheer filled the room as a miniature Santa popped up on a spring. He was bent over, twerking like a whack-a-mole on steroids.
I doubled over with laughter, shut the lid and opened it again. Same absurdity. A twerking Santa who popped up with his butt in the air.
“Did you make this?” The words came out twisted in my fit of laughter.
He grinned, but shook his head. “I’m not, uh… so talented. I had a craft shop design it.”
“His butt is in my face,” I wheezed, and he started to chuckle.
“That’s the idea.”
When we finally started to eat, him basically snacking, I caught him watching me. “I don’t think I have ever seen you laugh. Not a smile or giggle, a real laugh.”
I smiled sadly, dragging the piece of crab around my plate. I laughed with Hale all the time, deep belly laughs. That was the part of me he said he wanted to keep to himself.
I raised my head now to look in those aqua-colored eyes. “You make me happy, Finn.” I swallowed hard as my voice trembled. “I hope twerking Santa is not a substitute for your presence. You are not planning to leave too right?”
His eyes darkened, and he reached for my hand. “I’ll never do that to you.”
The next morning, he drove me to the company in Silicon Valley in his sleek Jaguar.
My heart was racing as I inhaled and exhaled through my mouth, staring out the window at the glass buildings flashing past us.
“I should have told him. It was wrong not to tell him earlier that there was no chance of us getting married anymore.”
Finn glanced at me, then faced forward again. Silence stretched for a few seconds before he said, “I can help you. When we get there I’ll help you break the news to him.”
“No,” I bit my lip. “Fentone… he deserves better from me.”
…
“Hello, miss Grunder.” Fentone’s own P.A. met us in the executive lobby at that top floor, waving the receptionist away.
This woman who delivered all those elaborate gifts and bouquets of flowers every other day to my house for three years now, oversaw my vacations with her boss, had no smiles for me today.
With a sinking feeling, I realized that I may have more problems on my hand than the possibility of a marriage proposal I did not want.
“Mr Miller is waiting in his office, he expects to see you…” she finally glanced at Finn, and she stiffened, staring at him slack-jawed the way everyone reacted when they saw him for the first time.
Then she seemed to remember she was still at work.
“...alone.” She turned back to me, blinking. “The CEO would prefer to see you alone.”
“Not happening,” Finn said without hesitation.