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1055 Words
“You don’t need to be exposed to that, dear. That’s clan talk. Ladies don’t use certain words, nor do they hear them.”
She had no idea what words her mother meant. Apparently they were “men” words she couldn’t use. Being inside, she felt cramped and penned up. She opened the door and walked onto the front porch.
She saw three boys setting the storage houses on fire. Why would they do that? And who were they? They couldn’t be vampires since they were in the sun. They could be human, but smelled differently. She waited as they approached.
The big one in the middle made her stomach feel strange. Almost like a belly ache. His eyes were the bluest she’d ever seen.
She crossed her arms in defiance to these strangers. “You better get out of here before my father gets upstairs. He’ll be mad at you for burning the houses.”
The center guy shook his head. He asked, “Is your father the one in charge?”
She raised her chin. Even if those below didn’t think the clan belonged to her family, it did. “Yes, he is. The only leader.”
The same guy smiled at her. He was really cute, even though he smelled different. “What’s his last name?”
“Valderi. Don’t forget it,” she yelled. Hopefully those inside heard her. They should know not to go against her father.
The door to the cabin opened. Her mom said, “Darling, why are you yelling?”
She turned. “Because these men set the houses on fire.” She pointed a finger at them. When she looked back, they were halfway out of the area.
Her mother gasped. “Oh my goodness. Wolves. The sheds!”
Wolves? That’s how they smelled. And the center one scented especially good. Like her favorite warm chocolate chunk cookies.
Aria bolted upright in the bed. That boy in the middle was Trevan, her mate. This convinced her even more that making him go away was the best thing. He had to stay alive. Now she needed to focus on keeping herself alive.
A few minutes later, she knocked on the Central Wolfe pack’s alpha house back door. The pool looked very tempting, but she had other things to do first.
Emma came running and nearly flung the door open. “Why didn’t you tell me you were in trouble for helping me find my student’s sister? Good god, Aria. We have to prove your innocence.”
“How do you know? I only told Trevan a few hours ago.”
“Trevan blew through the house not too long ago, gathering his men, saying the vamp council was pinning murder charges on you for killing Filip. He was going to look for evidence or something.”
No, no, no. That’s not what she meant by him leaving. Dammit, Trevan. She sighed and rubbed her forehead. “Yeah, that’s why I’m here now. I was hoping you could help me.”
Emma grabbed her hand and dragged her inside to the kitchen. “Like there’s any other way. We are figuring this out now.” Emma pushed her toward the table while she headed toward the fridge. “This calls for the big guns.” She pulled out a tub of ice cream and Oreos.
Aria’s brows scrunched. “How is that different from last night’s guns?”
“Because,” Emma pointed to the word Neapolitan on the container. “It’s all three flavors for this.” Aria wondered if she’d have any weirdness when she was pregnant. Then she remembered, she sent her mate away.
“Okay,” Emma said on her way back to the fridge with a glass, “I already talked to Ellie about getting their official report regarding the whole alpha challenge between Rocco and Caleb. She’ll email it shortly.” Emma poured blood into the glass from the pitcher on the top shelf. “That has Filip’s arrangement with Rocco in it. But not all the details that didn’t pertain. You need to get those on paper.” She placed the cup in front of her.
“Thank you,” she said.
“Sure. Now, what else do we need?”
Aria gulped a swallow then set the cup down. “Penelope said we need to show a history of the wrongdoing. Show proof that it wasn’t more than a misunderstanding on a one-time thing.”
Emma scowled. “How do we do that? Embraced is burned down and most of the bad guys are dead.”
“Well,” she sat back in her chair, “if they were taking humans over all these years, then there might be a lot of missing persons’ reports.”
“Maybe strange death stats and obituaries,” Emma said. “We can find all the stats on the city at the library. Then we can go to the police to see if they can tell us anything. What else?”
“I didn’t even know about the stats at the library, so I have no idea where else to look.”
“Maybe someone at the library or police can give us an idea,” she said, stuffing a cookie in her mouth. She slammed the lid on the ice cream and tossed it back into the freezer. “Let’s get going.” Emma grabbed her purse and they were off.
After the drive into the big city, Aria and Emma sat in the main library’s backroom fiddling with technology older than they were. Well, not her, but Emma for certain. She sneezed as she dusted off another box of…
“What is this called again?” she asked as she took out the two reels containing the film.
“Microfiche,” Emma said. “I had to use this when researching stuff in college. Not everything had been transferred to digital yet.”
“Got it. But I’m still not sure what we’re looking for. There’s so much stuff here.”
“You said Penelope said we needed to find a history of continued abuse to show this wasn’t a miscommunication or whatever BS.”
She snorted. “BS is right. But what historical evidence is there in human files?”
- Writer
