Her answer seemed to cheer Styx up, now grinning from cheek to cheek, her little fangs visible. “Well, that’s okay. We’ll just move. Reuben will be totally cool with that. Ooh, yay!” She bounced from one foot to the other, clapping her hands like a perky cheerleader. “Maybe we can convince Reuben to buy an actual loft apartment … you know, one with windows!”
Jae laughed and shook her head. “I don’t know. I sometimes think Reuben forgets you guys can actually stand the sunlight. Too many episodes of The Vampire Diaries, I think.”
“He does think that Elena girl is hot.”
Jae smirked. “So does Lily.”
Styx sighed longingly. “Ian Somerhalder all the way.”
“Uh-uh.” Jae scrunched up her face. “Too pretty. I prefer my men a little rough around the edges.”
“Like Reuben?” The vamp giggled.
Jaeden laughed and punched her arm playfully. Despite Styx’s matchmaking attempts, Jae enjoyed the young vamp’s prattle as they wandered back to the apartment. Her chatter about anything and nothing was soothing, allowing her thoughts to settle nowhere and be at peace for the moment.
“Ah, home sweet home.” Styx chuckled as she pulled the building’s main door open. “But not for long.” Her blue-yellow eyes twinkled happily at the exciting thought of moving up and on.
Jaeden snorted. “One can only hope.”
“You know, I’m thinking we should go abroad. Like Rome or Egypt or something. I’m betting there are a lot of bad teeth over there,” she said as they headed down the hallway to the loft. Her small hand clasped the door handle. “I mean, all that culture and beauty. The bad teeth would want to rip that sh—”
Styx stopped as the door slid open, her doll eyes wide, rosebud mouth parted in shock. Jaeden’s heart thumped loudly as she dared to step around the vamp and look inside the basement. The blood rushing in her ears drowned out any sound.
How had he found her?
Ryder felt like smirking at the shocked look on Jaeden’s face. All along, he hadn’t wanted to believe the information on the little paper Marion had handed to Lucien and then Lucien to him. He knew the girl had been through a lot. But she knew the rules.
You did not hunt other supernatural races.
If he hadn’t witnessed the horrific situation Jae had been in with Ethan, he would’ve been yelling at her by now. But he had seen only a fragment of the damage inflicted upon a girl who’d once been the spunkiest, most vivacious kid in the pack. He wasn’t going to condemn her for this recent stupidity. He was going to put her in the truck and leave this mess in the past where it belonged. That was if she ever made a move into the apartment toward him.
He frowned as her blue eyes flickered toward the vamp kids who sat terrified on a dilapidated old sofa.
“They’re fine. No harm done.” He smiled, holding up his hands in surrender. And he wasn’t lying. After they had come home to find him there, they had attacked, but quickly saw reason after he blocked and outmaneuvered all three of them. And that tall chick had game; he inwardly winced, recalling her near blow to his groin.
He waited patiently. Jaeden didn’t respond.
Finally, she took a tentative step inside, her slender hands gripping the tiny female vampyre behind her, pulling her in before she slid the door closed. Ryder waited as she turned toward him, her face expressionless.
She was different, he realized.
It wasn’t just that her manner had changed. She used to be a bundle of energy, always in motion, her sentences forever flowing into one another. Now she was cool and aloof, a reserve in her gorgeous blue eyes that had never been there before.
Ryder shrugged off an uncomfortable, unwelcome feeling as his eyes drank her in. Jaeden had grown up … and the effect was, well …
She was hot.
Crap.
“What are you doing here?” she asked warily.
Ryder decided now wasn’t the time to mess around. “I’ve been sent to return you to the pack.”
Her eyes narrowed; her body shifted into defense mode. “I don’t want to go back.”
For the hundredth time, Ryder wondered why Jaeden couldn’t stand to be around her pack. When anything got to him that badly, all he wanted was to be with the pack. The bubble of irritation under his skin threatened to vocalize itself, but he checked it at the last minute.
“I’m afraid you don’t have a choice,” he replied evenly. “It’s either the pack or imprisonment.”
Her mouth fell open.
Finally. A response.
“What?” She growled, her lykan distorting her voice.
Ryder chuckled, crossing his arms over his chest. “What, you thought you could break a major coven law and not have to deal with it?”
Panic shot through her eyes, but only briefly. Ryder watched in amazement as she hid the emotion with ease as she walked toward him, her shoulders drawn back defiantly. The girl really had become something; he enjoyed the panther-like way she moved.