Succubus Happens

Chapter Seven

Monday morning I’m already awake before my alarm goes off. I’m nervous about going back to school today. I’m nervous because it’s possible that everyone will know that I know. And if they kept their distance from me last week, how will they treat me now that I know the truth.

I grab my phone from the bedside table and turn off the alarm before it goes off. It vibrates in my hand and I see a message from Carter. Of course he’s awake.

GOOD MORNING, SUNSHINE. TODAY IS GOING TO BE FINE. CHIN UP.

I roll my eyes as I get out of bed to begin getting ready for the day. I don’t message him back because I know that he knows that I’m already awake. Stupid connection. Within the hour I’m showered and dressed and heading downstairs for breakfast.

“Good morning, sweetie,” Mom says sitting at the table drinking her coffee. Dad’s more than likely already at the school “How’d you sleep?”

“Like a baby,” I smile at her before heading to the fridge for some juice.

“Good,” she says. “Did you have a good time this weekend with Natalie?”

I’m lucky my back is to her or else she’d know something is up. I nod. “Yeah,” I tell her. “Natalie’s…really cool.”

“Did you see Carter after the game?”

I feel myself turning red at the mention of his name. “Yes,” I say, finally turning around and grabbing a cup from the cabinet. “He’s really nice.”

“Nice? Cool?” mom asks, sounding dubious. “Why do I get the feeling you’re keeping something from me?”

“Oh my god, mom, I’m not,” I say, shaking my head. “Your coffee must not have kicked in yet.”

She smiles behind her cup. “Did something happen?”

I contemplate telling her, because knowing the school, word will get out to my father and then he’ll tell my mother. And god knows she’ll flip out if she doesn’t hear about it first. “He kissed me. We kissed.”

Mom lets out a squeal that is completely unnatural for her age. But I let it slide. It’s been a long time since I’ve let her get excited about a boy. “Really?” she asks, finally setting her cup down. Oh no. That means interrogation time. I don’t have time for this.

I finish of my juice and shake my head. “Really,” I tell her. “But I’ve got to go, mom, okay?”

“No please don’t. Can’t we talk about it? At least for a little bit?”

I rinse of my cup and set it in the sink before heading for the door. “No mom, I gotta go,” I say, pretty much running out to my car at this point.

Mom stops on the porch and grins at me as I pull out of the driveway. She’s so weird. I should never have told her. She’ll want to talk about it forever. Even so, her reaction makes me smile.

When I get to my locker, Carter is already waiting for me with that smile of his.

“Good morning sunshine,” I tell him, sarcasm heavy in my voice.

 “You didn’t think that was cute?” Carter asks, sounding surprised. “I thought it was adorable.”

“Yeah, moon boy, and how long has it been since you had a girlfriend?” I ask. And then I realize I don’t want to know, so I look at him. “Don’t answer that.”

“You sure about that?” he asks. “I’ll gladly tell you. I’ll tell you anything you want to know.”

I shake my head. “No,” I say. “That’s not something I want to know.”

“Okay,” Carter says. “You have nothing to worry about, Daph.”

“I’m not worried,” I say. “I like you. That’s all there is to know.”

Carter smiles and takes a step closer to me before placing his hands on my waist. “I already knew that,” he says, kissing me softly.

“Carter?”

He pulls away from me with a groan and I see Natalie coming toward us with that fake smile of hers. I don’t know who she’s trying to play now, I know the truth. Or maybe she doesn’t know that I know. I would have thought that word would have spread by now.

“Natalie,” Carter says. “Good morning.”

“Morning,” Natalie says. She doesn’t even look at me. It’s like I don’t exist. “Alex wants to see you.”

I narrow my eyes. “What are you, Alex’s lackey or something?”

That gets her attention. “I’m just helping out a friend, is all,” she tells me, her voice stiff. Then she looks back at Carter. “Are you coming, or what?”

“I’ll see him later,” Carter says, the muscle in his jaw pulsing. “Alex can wait.”

She glares at him. “Fine.”

And then she walks away, to wherever the hell she needs to be. I look at Carter. “Is she dangerous?”

He shakes his head. “Not in here, she’s not. She’s a Gemini,” he says.

I stop. “You mean like a real Gemini? From mythology?”

“Two-faced and everything,” he says. “Her other face is grotesque.”

I shut my locker. “Wow,” I say. “There’s really no end to how many creatures there are.”

“That’s for sure,” Carter says, lacing his fingers with mine.

“You do know that I sit next to Alex in this class,” I tell him.

Carter doesn’t look at me as we ascend the staircase. I wonder what’s going through his mind. “I know.”

“Should I be worried?”

He glances at me before shaking his head. “No. Alex should know better than to start something on school grounds. He’s not that stupid.”

“Are you sure about that?” I ask, as we get to the top of the stairs and Natalie and Alex are standing outside Mr. Bennett’s classroom. They’re joined with Tyler and I notice that Knox is standing closer to where we are. Is this what a house divided feels like? Have I broken up their pack? I feel like running away and almost do, but Carter squeezes my hand and reminds me that he’s there. It relaxes me, but only a little.

“Really?” Alex asks, gesturing to our conjoined hands. “Are you two thing now or something?”

“Matter of fact, we are,” Carter answers before I can get a word out.

Two werewolves arguing in the middle of a hallway. This shouldn’t be dangerous, right?

“Isn’t that sweet?” Alex’s voice curls around his words, making it obvious that he’s repulsed by the notion.

“Can’t handle a little competition, Al?” Carter asks, tilting his head to the side and raising a brow. “Apparently arrogant asshole only appeals to a certain type of person.”

I see Natalie stiffen at the obvious snub. “Apparently desperation appeals to you, Carter,” she says.

Now it’s my turn to be offended. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

Natalie smirks. “Exactly what I said.”

“Wait,” I say, taking a step forward and inadvertently taking Carter with me. “You’re saying because I didn’t feel like getting r***d outside of a diner, that makes me desperate?”

“Whoa,” Alex says, holding his hands up in defense. “No one said anything about that, Daph. I wasn’t going to r**e you.”

“You forced yourself on me, Alex!” I nearly scream at him.

“Enough!”

Mr. Bennett is standing in the hallway and we’re now surrounded by half of the school. I swallow and fall back against Carter. I hadn’t meant to go off on him. I hadn’t meant to cause a scene.

“I’m sorry,” I say quietly.

Mr. Bennett shakes his head. “Everyone get to class.”

I look up at Carter as the hallway begins to clear. “I don’t know what happened,” I say.

“You have nothing to apologize for.”

“I screamed in the hallway. Mr. Bennett had to come and break it up.”

Carter offers a slight smile. “Trust me when I say that is not the weirdest thing to have happened in this school.”

☽

First period passes without incident. Actually, that’s because Bennett made up a new seating chart and Alex and I are sitting on opposite sides of the classroom. I’m closest to the door and part of me wonders if that was intentional. An easier way to escape if I need to. I partially wonder if Carter got here early and told Mr. Bennett the short version of what had happened. Either way, I’m glad for the distance. Not that it makes it any less awkward, since I can feel people staring at me and can hear the whispers. They’re speculating. So much for wanting to keep quiet this year.

Carter is waiting for me outside when the bell rings and he takes my hand. “How’d you do?” he asks me.

“Fine,” I shrug. “People are talking.”

“They’ll do that,” he says. “They haven’t had much to talk about in quite some time.”      `

“How long ago was it that someone new came to North Grove?”

“Years,” he says.

“How many years?”

Carter raises a brow at me. “You want to know?”

“Yes, I’m curious.”

“Curiosity killed the cat,” he says.

“Cat’s been long dead, Carter,” I tell him.

He grins. “Fair enough. The last time someone new came to town…was about fifty years ago. That was when Alex showed up.”

The number shocks me. Yes, I had realized that Carter was older…much older than I had originally anticipated, but I wasn’t expecting that. “And how long were you here before that?”

His grin widens. “I’m not telling you that.”

I unconsciously stomp my foot. “Come on!”

Carter shakes his head, laughing as he pulls me into a kiss. “It doesn’t matter, Daph. Don’t worry about it.”

“You’re older than my grandfather and you don’t want me to worry?”

“Does it bother you?”

I think about it for a second, but then shake my head. “It doesn’t, actually. What bothers me is…”

“Don’t say his name,” he says. “You’ll only give him power.”

I roll my eyes, but I know that he’s serious. “I was actually going to say Natalie. I hate her. And I’ve never really hated anyone.”

I hear someone clear their throat and I turn, seeing Mr. Jenkins looking at Carter and me from the doorway. “May I begin class?” he asks, looking amused.

“Yes, sir,” I say, tugging on Carter’s arm and heading inside.

“You can sit with her,” Mr. Jenkins says as we pass him.  Does everyone know?

When we do sit, I look at my surroundings. Jake and Carter are on either side of me. Wonderful. I’m surrounded by wolves.

“What is this?” I whisper. “A protection detail? In the middle of class?”

Jake looks at me and grins. He’s definitely the more playful of the two. “Yes,” he says, his voice teasing. “You have enemies everywhere.”

I hear a low growl coming from my right, so I look at Carter. “Down, boy,” I tell him.

Jake snorts and then covers his face to silence his laughter. It doesn’t really work. Mr. Jenkins glances over at us, but he doesn’t seem angry. In fact, it looks like’s trying hard not to smile. Well, I’m glad that someone finds my predicament entertaining. Aside from Jake, I mean.

I look over at Carter, who doesn’t look like he thinks any of this is funny. He meets my gaze and I smile at him, reaching over to squeeze his hand. That relaxes his shoulders a bit, which in turn relaxes me.

“Like you said, Alex isn’t stupid enough to try something on school grounds,” I whisper, trying to reassure him.

“Who knows really how stupid he is,” Carter says, shaking his head. “I didn’t think he’d try anything this morning, but he did.”

“And we got through it. It’s going to be okay, Carter.” I want to add an I promise to that, but I can’t. I just found out the truth about my life on Friday. There’s no way I can promise anything when it comes to anything supernatural. I don’t know anything about who I am.

He hears the missing words and raises a brow at me

“Don’t look at me that,” I tell him.

He grins and shakes his head before we both turn our attention back to Mr. Jenkins.

☽

The next day after school, Carter is waiting for me at my locker. I am more than relieved to see him after the day that I’ve had. Too many people were staring…far more than they were staring on my first day here. It’s gotten worse now that they know that I know about them. Now they know that I know the truth. So it’s a different kind of stare. It’s a “you know that we’re judging you because your parents are human” kind of stare. And it really pisses me off.

He sees the look on my face and he opens his arms to me. I happily walk into him and he hugs me tightly. “That bad, huh?” he asks me.

I groan into his shirt. “Can we run away and never come back?”

“Ooh, as tempting as that is…” Without looking at him, I know that he’s grinning. “We can’t. We kind of live here.”

“We could kind of live somewhere else,” I say, smiling up at him.

“Again, tempting,” Carter says, leaning down to kiss me. “But no.”

I pout and drop my arms from Carter so that I can open my locker.

“You don’t really want to run away,” he says. “North Grove is home.”

“I haven’t really been here that long, Carter. It’s not really home yet.”

He touches my elbow and I look at him, surprised that his face is so serious. “You don’t like it here?”

I fall back on my heels and shake my head. “No, it’s not that,” I say. “I was kidding. I thought we were doing that cute kidding thing.”

The corner of his mouth twitches up. “Oh yeah, that,” he says. “I’m old, you’ve gotta give me some kind of sign when you’re not serious.”

I kiss him quickly as I shut my locker. “Serious now,” I say. “I like it here. Mainly because you’re here.”

He slips his fingers in mine and we head to the parking lot. Carter drove today and I think he might be driving every day with the whole needing to protect me thing. I hear a second set of footsteps and I turn to see Jake coming toward us. I am flanked by two of the original members of the North Grove Pack. I feel suddenly guilty. I hadn’t even considered what all of this would do to everyone else.

“Hey,” I say, drawing my voice out unnaturally long.

Jake raises a brow and eyes me curiously. “What?”

I lift my shoulders in a shrug. “Nothing,” I say. “Can’t a girl just say hi?”

“A girl can, yes. But only if it’s one syllable like it should be,” Jake grins and nudges my arm playfully.

Carter squeezes my hand. “What’s going on?”

I shake my head. “Nothing,” I say.

“What do you mean nothing?” he asks. “You’re tense.”

“No, I’m not,” I say quickly.

“Yes, you are,” Jake says. “Plus your heart’s racing.”

I glare at him. “Who’s listening to who’s heartbeats now?” I ask. “Maybe you’re the vampire.”

And then I realize just how stupid that statement is. I stop walking, forcing Carter to stop with me. I close my eyes to take a deep breath, so I’m not sure if Jake stopped with us or if he went on his own way. I try to focus on my breathing; focus on getting the negative energy out of my body.

“Daph?” Carter’s voice is soft in my ear and he sounds worried. I don’t really blame him.

“Yeah?” I ask, not opening my eyes.

“Honey, can you look at me please?” he says, his thumb brushing the back of my hand. “What’s going on?”

How can I tell him what’s going on? How can I tell him what I’m feeling when we just barely had the conversation about me not feeling like this is home. How can I talk to him about how I feel guilty about the fact that I broke up his pack. A pack that had been in place for well over two hundred years just because I like a boy? Years of tradition thrown away just because of a romantic connection?

“We shouldn’t have moved here,” I blurt out.

“What?” He sounds stunned.

“I’ll let you handle this, bro. I’ll see you at home,” Jake says, rushing off. The coward.

I open an eye to glance at Carter. “I’m so sorry,” I say.

“For what exactly?”

“I broke up your family,” I say. “I feel like a Montague or Capulet or something.”

Carter looks like he’s trying really hard not to laugh, so I narrow my eyes at him. “What’s funny?”

“You are,” he tells me. “My family isn’t feuding with your family…or any family for that matter. No reason to feel like a tragedy.”

“Well, I do,” I say. “I broke up your pack. You guys were together for hundreds of years and I just swooped in and stole you.”

“We talked about that, remember? You got me. Not stole.”

“Same thing.”

“Hardly.”

“If it makes any difference to you, Daphne,” he says. “I willingly give myself to you.

“That’s so not the point,” I say, slightly pouting.

“Daphne, listen to me,” He says, cupping my cheeks so that I’m forced to stare into those stupidly distracting eyes of his. “I am yours…completely.”

“You sure?”

“What does ‘complete’ mean to you, Daphne?” he asks, raising a brow at me.

“It means complete,” I say, rolling my eyes. “I’m just being extra sure.”

“You don’t have to be extra sure. That’s what I’m here for.”

“Okay,” I tell him.

“You’re not going to lose me, Daphne,” he kisses the side of my head. “Ever.”