Caged Read online

  “Yes.” I slid my hands into my jeans pockets and rested against the front bumper of the pickup. A quick inhalation reminded me I hadn’t washed since the morning before. “She’s coming out to us.”

  As Dad joined me, arms folded across his chest, Jess pushed out the door, heels exchanged for flip-flops. The smile that played on her lips vanished. “Has something happened to Jem?”

  “Jem’s fine,” Dad said.

  “Then why isn’t she with you?”

  “She’s better protected at home,” Dad said.

  “Better protected?” Jess’s gaze flittered between Dad and me, like she could catch us out if she only moved fast enough. “Better protected from whom, Nathan?”

  “Anywhere decent to eat around here?” I asked.

  Her mouth opened for a second. “What?”

  “I missed breakfast. I’m starving. Is there anywhere—”

  “A bakery at the bottom of the hill.” She pointed off to the right behind her.

  “Excellent.” I pushed up from the truck, started walking that way. At lack of noise behind me, I glanced back to the irritation in Jess’s eyes. My lips curved as I spun to walk backward. “Walk and talk, Jess. Come on. You know you want to.”

  Her head shook as she smiled and took the first steps. “I guess I could murder one of their lamb and mint pastries.”

  “There you go.” Chuckling, I changed direction again, with Jess and Dad brushing my sides.

  • • •

  Dad explained the situation as I stuffed my face with one lamb pastry, followed by a second. I scrunched up the paper wrapper, opened a third, and shovelled in a mouthful.

  “So …” Jess brushed crumbs from the corners of her lips. “You came to see me about this, why? You need my help?”

  She may as well have added the ‘again’ on the end with the tone she used.

  “Actually, we just thought you deserved the warning,” Dad said. “And—”

  “Thought there might be more.” Jess’s skinny arms folded over her chest.

  “And,” Dad repeated, “we thought, as you’re the only witch we know, you’d do the honours of passing the caution onto any others in the area … or anywhere, for that matter, as we don’t, or won’t, know when these …”

  “People?” Jess offered.

  I shook my head. “No way humans could take so many werewolves down.”

  “So, what are they then?”

  I looked to Dad and went back to Jess at his nod. “We’ve no idea. Other werewolves, we presume.”

  “Not necessarily,” Jess said. “They could be anything. You do realise that, don’t you?”

  “Such as?” I asked on another bite of my meal.

  “Hmm, let me think.” A sardonic tone tinged her words. “I don’t know, maybe shifters. Or vamps. Half-demons.”

  My eyebrows shot up. “Half what?”

  She sent a glance toward Dad before giving me her attention again. “You lot are as much in denial as Jem. You’re not the only species out there, you know.”

  “Race,” Dad said. “And we’re well aware of that …”

  My gaze whipped to him. First I’d heard of it. Didn’t need to tell Jess that, though.

  “… I’m just unsure how broad a range the different races cover.”

  “Probably more than you imagine.” Jess faced Dad for seconds before her lips pursed. “Okay, you haven’t heard this from me, but”—she blew out a breath—“there’s a close knit group of vamps in the area.”

  Dad and I exchanged a quick glance.

  “You know these vampires?” I asked.

  She nodded once. “Word on the street is a couple of new ones have been spotted in town.”

  “New vampires?” Dad asked. “Strangers?”

  Jess gave us the same positive acknowledgement. “Look, I need to get back to work before my boss makes me do overtime.”

  “We’ll walk with you,” Dad fell into step on Jess’s left, and I took her other side.

  Between the two of us, Jess almost disappeared into shadow, and the narrow pavement meant I ended up in the road.

  “Do you have a description of these new ones?” Dad asked as we climbed the hill.

  “No. There’s only so much the locals share with us witches.” Although her lips curved, no humour entered her eyes. “Apparently, they consider us untrustworthy.”

  Witches—untrustworthy? Imagine that.

  “Could you ask them?” Dad asked.

  “Doubt it will get me anywhere, but I’ll try.” It took only a few minutes to reach the car park outside Jess’s work. Her hands did a double point toward the glass-fronted business. “Do you need me for anything else?”

  Dad shook his head. “Just watch your back, okay?”

  “Sure. And you watch yours—and Jem’s.” She walked away a few strides before twisting toward us. “I take it there’s a chance you might be around then?”

  “Yes,” Dad and I said.

  “Well,”—she shrugged, smiling with her gaze on mine—“you need a place to stay, I still have half a bed that needs filling.”

  Dad’s head snapped round to me.

  “I’ll bear that in mind, Jess.”

  “’Course you will.” With a laugh, she spun and disappeared into the job centre.

  6

  Thanks to Dad’s call to Kyle and Connor with the order to meet us earlier, the supermarket restaurant bordered on empty. Only three patrons utilised the space, none of them near our spot, which allowed the four of us an element of privacy in our discussion. As I sipped on my latte, I leaned over the map of Shropshire on the table between us.

  With his head lowered, Kyle’s ginger hair and broad shoulders replicated his Dad beside him. Their resemblance came almost as close as that between us Holloway men. Our dark hair all matched. If not for my and Sean’s eyes following the darkness of Mum’s, instead of Dad’s blue, we’d have passed for a family of clones.

  Once Dad had relayed our conversation with Jess, and the information she’d learned from the local non-humans, Kyle’s head lifted to reveal his hazel eyes. “So, we pretty much wasted the morning pouring over this damn map then?”

  “Not necessarily,” Dad said. “We still need to make ourselves familiar with the areas surrounding Witchurch, in case we broaden the search.”

  “And these strangers Jess mentioned—they’re definitely here?” Connor asked. “They’ve been sighted?”

  I sipped at my drink. “Pretty much what Jess said—just not by her.”

  “By … vampires, right?” Connor’s eyebrow lifted. At my and Dad’s nods, he frowned. “So, vampires are responsible for the kidnappings?”

  “We don’t know for certain,” Dad said. “But this information can’t be ignored. How often has Jess uncannily got her facts straight before this?”

  “Every damn time,” Connor muttered, as Kyle’s head bobbed ‘yes’.

  “So, it’s worth checking out, if only for that reason,” Dad said.

  “And we’re splitting up again?” Kyle asked.

  Dad’s confirmation coincided with the buzz in my pocket. I stood to withdraw my mobile and peered down at the screen. With a quiet exhale, I hit connect and put it to my ear. “Shel?”

  “Hey.”

  I rubbed a hand across my hair, taking in the three pairs of eyes peering up as the others listened in. “You okay?”

  A pause preceded her, “Sure.”

  Silence returned.

  I waited for her to speak, thinking she wouldn’t when almost a minute passed.

  “This morning …” Her voice arrived as an emotional whisper. “Last night …”

  I spun and took a few steps to distance myself from my audience, almost sendin
g my chair flying in my haste. “Do we have to talk about this now, Shel?”

  “I …” A quietly blown breath stifled what might have been a sniffle.

  “I’m sorry, okay?” I studied the chequered floor, hoping for a hole to appear and swallow me up. “I behaved like an idiot …”

  “Ethan, that’s not—”

  “I’d no bloody right …”

  “But—”

  “Just … do me a favour, and pretend it didn’t happen, okay?” When she didn’t respond, I added, “Please, Shelley?”

  “Sure,” she whispered.

  “I’ll call you if we find anything. We got a lead to follow this morning, so we’re tightening the search.”

  “In Brickton Heath?” Hope tinged her voice.

  “No, Shel. We’re in Witchurch. I can’t talk about specifics, I’m in too public a place, but I’ll fill you in later. I promise.”

  “Okay.” Another whispered response. “Bye, then.”

  I’d barely reciprocated the farewell when she hung up. Lowering the phone, I rubbed at my hair as I stared down at it. Had I said something wrong?

  The faces of the two Larsen’s whipped away when I turned back to them. With a frown, I righted my chair and sat.

  “Everything okay?” Dad asked.

  “Sure.” I pointed to the map. “We know where we’re all covering then?”

  “Connor and I will head east,” Dad said. “You two are going west.”

  Kyle and I saluted.

  “But not before we’ve eaten,” Dad added.

  • • •

  Fuelled up on a full English, Kyle and I separated from the two old guys. Heading west left us with the High Street and shops to canvass first. Despite the temperature being only autumnally warm, females milled about in strappy vests and minis, and men in loud-coloured shorts as though prepared for a day at the beach.

  Kyle ducked into the path of a young female with dark auburn hair, waving the picture beneath her nose. “Excuse me, do you have a moment?”

  I tapped the shoulder of a spindly guy to my right and intercepted his route before he could shoot past. “Spare a moment, please?”

  “Sorry, no.”

  I closed off my olfactory nerves to the tobacco on his breath as he sidestepped me hurrying on. His receding back weaved through the town’s patrons before disappearing.

  “Arsehole,” I murmured after him.

  A twist to the right showed Kyle’s easy smile aimed at the same young female.

  “No worries,” he said to her.

  She walked away, legs moving like a geisha on speed, hips doing a jig the rest of her body hadn’t been invited to join. With a backward glance, she tossed a smile his way, her hand lifting in a wave.

  Kyle’s own raised before he turned his grin on the next candidate—another young female in shorts that showed obscene amounts of flesh.

  I shook my head at his lack of awkwardness, half-wishing for some of his confidence, and switched back to our task.

  Rich meaty wafts interspersed with spicy tomato and melted cheese drifted out with each opening of the door to the baker’s we’d visited that morning. A small woman exited, her lowered head of wine-red hair streaked with blonde.

  “Shelley?” I took a step as she turned right but halted when her face lifted to reveal someone whose harsh features nowhere near represented the soft lines of Shelley’s face. “Damn female’s warping my mind.”

  I spun back, mouth open to let Kyle know I wanted to head up High Street, but didn’t make the full turn before something solid bashed into my left side.

  My lips drew back, a low snarl rippling past them.

  “Sorry.” As the offending guy’s hands came up, black eyes met my gaze from beneath mousey hair. He held my stare steady for seconds before his hand smacked the shoulder he’d barged with a resounding slap. “Really—I’m sorry, okay?” His tar-like gaze skimmed over me. “You hurt?”

  “No.” The word rumbled up from my chest as I tried to control the vibration of my lips.

  He rounded me without facing away as though afraid to show me his back. Only once he’d reached escaping distance did he whirl and walk in his original direction.

  I followed his passage, going a dozen or so strides with nostrils flared. No scent on the air disturbed me, yet I still stared at the path he cut through the pedestrians before retracing my steps back to where I’d last seen Kyle.

  A left to right scan didn’t show him. The female he’d been speaking to no longer stood where she had either. Kyle’s red hair should have been easy to spot with his six-three height. He’d vanished.

  “Oh, shit.” I raced forward, scanning as much area as possible. A bump with a middle-aged lady earned me a glare and profanity. I hadn’t time to utter more than a rapid apology before I dashed on.

  Green Lane came to a T-junction. Still no Kyle. A left turn preceded a run not far off a full-out sprint. “Shit, shit. Don’t do this to me.”

  Fifty yards and no sign of Kyle—I slammed on the brakes, about-turned, and charged back the other way. Straight past the road I’d recently left, I grabbed no more than a blurred glimpse of patrons moving from store to store—no red hair amongst them.

  Farther along the road, trees and greenery sprang up. The local park, maybe?

  My chest heaved as I ground to a halt. The wild scouring of my eyes bore no fruit. I rubbed a hand over my hair and dug into my pocket, fumbling in my haste to retrieve my mobile.

  It vibrated against my fingers.

  I stared at the screen: Kyle. My thumb depressed the connect button, and I whipped it to my ear.

  “Where the hell d’you go?”

  “What the hell happened to you?” Kyle sounded as frantic as my breaths.

  “Jesus, Kyle.” I gave a rough rub to my face, releasing a heavy sigh. “Where the hell are you?”

  “Right here, dammit. Where we were supposed to be. Where the hell are you?”

  “All over the damn place, looking for you.” I growled. “Don’t move, and stay on the phone. I’m coming back.”

  I jogged along the way I’d come and shimmied past a gaggle of schoolgirls taking up the entire pavement, who, no doubt, should have been in school.

  “Which way are you coming from?” Kyle asked at my ear.

  “To the right from the lower end of where you are.”

  “I’m heading down to meet you.” His uneven breaths stilted his speech.

  “I said stay where you are, dammit.”

  “You think I can’t hear your tone? Quit stressing, I’m already moving that way.”

  “Shit.” I lowered the phone to save relaying my panic. As Kyle hadn’t avoided kidnap nine months before, I didn’t consider my concern to be unwarranted. He would never understand the void a pack separation like that could create—not when he’d been unconscious the entire time he’d been gone.

  Less than twenty yards to cover, and Kyle came into view. He checked left before turning my way, lowering his phone when his gaze landed on me.

  As I brought my pace to a more reasonable level, I slid my mobile back into my pocket, yet my strides remained long until I reached him.

  “You okay?” He grasped my shoulder, giving a gentle shake. “You’re sweating.”

  I shook him off. “Where did you run to?”

  “Nowhere.” His frown cut deep. “I was just in the bloody doorway, right by you, showing some female Gabe’s pic.”

  “Doorway where? Which doorway? I looked, and you were not there.”

  He flung his arm out to the right. “That doorway. Right there.” His arm swung round as he pointed to me. “You’re the one who ran off.”

  “You suggesting this is my fault?” My entire body tensed, yet I bit back the growl bre
wing in my chest. “I wouldn’t have gone anywhere if you hadn’t disappeared.”

  “Like I said, I never went anywhere.” Another finger pointed my way. “You did.”

  The growl escaped as I spun to walk off. “Next time, stay where I can see you.”

  His footsteps followed after me. “It’s not just your body odour that stinks, Ethan.”

  Fists clenched, I turned back until I stood chest to chest with him. He matched my stance as well as my glare. For seconds, neither of us moved—until I realised I’d taken it out on the wrong person. My anger had arisen because of my own inability to keep him in my sights not because he hadn’t remained there.

  Blowing out a breath, I pinched the bridge of my nose and closed my eyes a moment.

  “Sorry.” Kyle’s hand patted my shoulder before he herded me round to walk. “You really do smell ripe, though.”

  My lips twitched as I fell into step beside him.

  “Even worse than you did over lunch.” He sent me a sideways glance. “When was the last time you washed?”

  “Don’t push it,” I muttered.

  7

  Kyle and I left High Street, hit the main B-road, and walked its length until we met the A41. From there, we headed east again, rounding back on ourselves until at the south entrance to Witchurch.

  On our tour of the locality, the clouds dispersed for an hour or two, remerging to conceal the blue of the sky. Small breaks allowed brief peeks of the warming rays, which only added more sweat to my unsavoury odour.

  “You get any vibes off anybody today?” Kyle asked as we ducked into the town.

  I thought back, trying to recall all those I’d spoken to or studied. “Nope.”

  “I think we’re looking at the wrong time of day.”

  I dug my hands into my pockets. “Meaning … ?”

  “Jess thinks we should be looking at vampires.” Kyle mirrored my pocket-delving. “So, why the hell are we looking before dark?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Vampires don’t come out in the day.”

  I couldn’t help but chuckle. “Just like we only change with our lunar cycle, and have no control over ourselves.”