Destined (War of the Covens 2)

A sneaking feeling swept over Jaeden. His defense of Caia was quite vehement. Did he … did Ryder have a thing for Caia? For some reason, the thought irritated her more than his condescending lecture.

“Point well received,” she sniped. “And just so you know, I thanked Caia for saving me. I thanked Sebastian, too, before you bring that up.”

Another tense silence fell between them until finally Ryder replied, “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to—”

“Why don’t we just be quiet for a while, hmm?”

He nodded and relaxed into his seat.

And just as Jaeden felt herself drifting to sleep, Ryder chuckled. “I heard this really funny joke on the radio the other night. You want to hear it?”

She shrugged.

“I’ll assume that’s angry teenage girl gesture for yes.” He smirked. “Okay. So there’s this koala up in his tree, smoking a joint, and this little lizard walking past looks up and notices. ‘Hey,’ the little lizard calls, ‘what’s up?’

“‘Nothing. Just smoking a joint, getting stoned. Wanna join?’

“‘Sure,’ says the little lizard, and he slithers up the tree and starts getting stoned with the koala.

“A little while later, the little lizard says his mouth is dry and he needs a drink, but on the way down the tree, he leans over too far and falls into the river. A big crocodile sees it happen and swims over. ‘What’s up?’ he asks the little lizard. ‘You okay?’

“‘Sure.’ The little lizard nods. ‘I’m just too stoned from smoking some joints with the koala.’

“‘Joints?’ The big crocodile’s eyes light up. ‘I gotta check that out, man.’ So the big crocodile swims out of the river and takes a wander into the trees until he reaches the one the koala’s in. ‘Hey!’ he shouts up.

“The koala looks back down at him and shouts, ‘Fuuuck, duuude! How much water did you drink?’”

Ryder slapped the wheel of the truck, laughing as he finished the joke. “Ah, man, that’s funny.” He shook his head, wiping at a tear in the corner of his eye. “It kills me.”

Jaeden hadn’t said anything. She’d managed to hide her answering grin by looking out the passenger window.

“What?” Ryder huffed. “Come on, that was funny! That was comedy gold right there.”

She shrugged, enjoying teasing him. “It was okay. Kind of elementary.”

“Elementary? It’s an effing joke.”

“Whatever.”

“Aw, this is going to be a looong drive home.”

Jaeden hid her grin with her hand. Teasing and arguing with Ryder was the most normal she’d felt in a long time. She sneaked a glance at him again, and a rush of old feelings hit her like a battering ram. She remembered how just the thought of him had sent butterflies into chaos in the pit of her stomach, back when she’d been naively carefree; how daydreaming about him had gotten her through her boring history class; how she’d promised herself that when she turned eighteen, she would finally let Ryder know that his mate had been under his nose the whole time.

A golden peace briefly whispered through her with the memories.

Goddess, she had made a mistake leaving the pack. Instead of running from them, she should’ve let them fix her. And maybe she would’ve felt infrequent bursts of that golden peace until one day she didn’t feel so broken.

A hollow regret formed in her chest. Running from the pack was probably the biggest mistake of her life. She’d been so afraid of her family not understanding who she was now. But that wasn’t an excuse, was it? Why had she done it?

She held in the gasp of pain her confusion and regret created and kept her face turned from Ryder. A single tear escaped, trickling slowly down her smooth cheek, feeling like a heavy stone scoring her skin.

It was the first tear she’d shed since leaving the pack.

This time she did gasp. She was cracking, the steel armor she’d put up around herself rusting off, and all because she was with one of her pack. Coins on Ryder’s dash shuddered, and Jaeden flinched, willing her telekinesis into control.

“Are you all right?” Ryder asked, deep concern in his words.

“Yeah,” she managed. She turned to him, wide-eyed. “Yeah, I think I’m going to be.”

He smiled gently, seeming to understand.

4

Wants and Fears

The smell of coffee, eggs, and crackling bacon taunted her senses and made her stomach roil. She followed Lucien, who followed a waitress, to a booth at the back of the roadside diner.

“Here you go, hon,” the young woman purred, handing a grease-covered menu to Lucien, the look in her eyes indicating that if he wanted, he could order her off the menu. Caia slid into the booth, ripped edges of maroon leather catching on her jeans. Of course, the waitress didn’t even glance her way, let alone give her a menu. Good thing she wasn’t hungry.

“What are you having?” Lucien asked as he managed to fold his huge frame into the too-small booth.