B0079G5GMK EBOK (8 page)

I glanced at him questioningly. Joshua would barely be pleased with Adam's leftovers, so I was sure he was up to something. I wiped his mind lightly, but I didn't catch anything alarming. Well, anything except a lust for murder, and that at this point was more than understandable. Joshua met my eyes without a blink, so I smiled at him, u
ncomfortably. I reminded myself
that Joshua was one to keep an eye on. I didn't want to experience any more unpleasant surprises. I turned my eyes from Joshua and felt Tiamhaidh
lightly in my mind
. I
stretched my hand and he grabbed it
hard. I knew I wasn't here alone. Although this was my fight, I didn't have to fight alone and even if I collapsed later in David's arms, Tiamhaidh was here and he would share his power with me for as long as I wanted. I didn't have to struggle, not with him. He was here for me and I could count on that. Whatever happened, he would stand beside me. I leaned against his warm body and sighed.

“It doesn't matter why you stay. The most important thing is that you stay. As there are nine strong shape shifters in our pack, I'm sure we'll find a way to keep Adam away from Clarissa.”

“I don't want to influence her choice,”
said Joshua
strictly.

“That was not a choice. Adam tied her to him by force and you know that. We
can't just overlook
that, but as Clarissa is still more human than shape shifter, I think we can separate her from Adam,” I said sternly. “Adam is my problem and from now on I will be watching his every step, closer than any of you can imagine.”

“Sofia,”
said
Tiamh
aidh
softly.

“No! Adam can never touch her again. Not without
Clarissa's permission,” I said
coldly.

“Why don't you just exile him? That would solve everything,”
asked Joshua
.

“I can't,” I sighed. “Adam is part of her soul and exiling him would break Clarissa. I just can't do that to her so I have to figure something else out.”

When I mentioned Adam being part of Clarissa's soul, Joshua hit the wall. S
hape shifters had only one soul-
mate and when they found it, it was for eternity. Even though I had said we would find a way to separate them, it w
ould be really hard, especially
if Clarissa and Adam didn't want to separate. Clarissa didn't know that when Adam bound them together, he could find her no matter where she was, influence her and seduce her wit
hout an effort.
I would have to teach her
to protect herself
better
. I would have to protect her better. “And what if she doesn't want your protection?” Tiamhaidh's voice asked in my mind. I glanced at him, but he looked so steady that I was sure no one else knew what he had asked.  I didn't know the answer, so I stayed quiet.

Daniel and Gavin glanced at each other. They could challenge Adam, but this was my fight and I had to make the decision. If Gunward were here I could've done it together with him, but he wasn't so I had to trust Tiamhaidh, who led the pack with me. He was Gunward's first man and I had to count on him and David to help me out of this. I felt hopeless. What decisions were to be made? I couldn't exile Adam without getting the eldest on my neck. Clarissa was stuck with him unless we could figure out some loopholes in their bond. So there was no choice but to let things stay as they were and try harder to keep Clarissa away from Adam. Darel
was staring
at me and it started to feel annoying.

“What?” I snapped.

“Drew
and I are going to Sarek,” he
said and glanced at Drew, who avoided my gaze.

I said nothing. Clearly they had made up their minds and I had nothing to say to that. I shrugged like I didn't care, though I did, and turned my eyes from Darel's dazzling blue eyes on purpose. He grabbed my shoulder blindingly fast and turned me around so that I had to face him. Tiamhaidh stood up and looked at him warningly, but I flagged him down.

“Sofia,” he
said, begging. “We're not going far. Things can change and then we'll be back.”

“And obviously you decided this a long time ago?” I asked icily.

“Before Gunward left,” Drew mumbled.

I gasped. They had made this back up plan with Gunward, a few weeks, maybe a month ago. I felt so betrayed. Had they
been spying on my pack and informing
Gunward on its every move? Had they spied on me?

“I see,” I expressed with an ice-cold voice. “I didn't even know you had contacted Gunward. I actually thought you didn't even know him.”

Drew blushed. “Gunward is the strongest alpha-male ever, so we contacted him before we even knew Clarissa existed.”

“And Gunward spends most of his time in Senja nowadays, so he needs someone to look after his pack while he's away. We promised to take care of it if Clarissa didn't choose either of us,”
said Darel
steadily.

“Or if she chose one of you, the other one would be free to join Gunward's pack,” I snapped.

“Not exactly. We'll stay, if you need us,”
sighed Darel
.

I sighed, too. I didn't want them to stay, but I didn't want them to leave to go to Sarek either. You want to go there instead of them, a small voice whispered in my mind, but I shook it away. I raked my hair absentmindedly and sighed again. I framed Darel's face with my hands and kissed his cheeks.

“Of course you'll go.”

“Sorry I even tried to stop you. You’ll be a bigger help in Sarek than here and you will love that place,” I said gently and turned to face the ones who were leaving.

I embraced them tightly. I didn't know if they
would stay
to say goodbye to Clarissa. I didn't wa
nt to let them go in a rush
without proper goodbyes or in anger so that the next time I saw them the
space between us would be huge
or we would be total strangers to each other.

I glanced at Tiam and went upstairs. Ciall
was sitting
behind Clarissa's door looking harsh.

“Go now. I'll watch her.”

Ciall looked at me uncertainly, but nodded and left me to face my daughters alone. I opened the door and saw Marie put her finger to
her lips. Clarissa was sleeping with
her head on Marie's l
ap,
sighing occasionally.

“How is she?” I asked.

“Having nightmares,”
whispered Marie
. “But don't worry Mom, she'll get over this, though she's deadly in love with Adam.”

“No, she's not. At least not yet, though she thinks she loves him.
Give him o
ne second and Adam will make her love him for real,” I said.

“What are we going to do?”

“There is no we. This is my fault and I will deal with this.”

“Mom, don't be
foolish. She's my sister,” she
snapped and scowled at me.

“I know that, love, but I don't want you to mix with Adam. Not in any way. If you get involved in this, Tiamhaidh couldn't just stand by, and you don't want them to fight. I'm pretty sure Tiamhaidh would win, but not a hundred percent sure, so stay away from this one.”

“But I
can't
just
sit and do nothing!”

“You don't have to. You're doing what you're good at. Be her sister and let me handle Adam, okay?”

“What if you don't win?”

“Of course I'll win. How could I not?” I said and tapped her nose softly.

“Hmm. Promise?” she
asked with a tiny voice.

“I promise,” I said and fondled her hair gently.

Clarissa’s
phone rang
,
cut
ting
our conversat
ion. I rifled through her
school bag, but couldn't find her cellphone. Finally the ringing stopped just to start again in a while. This time Marie thought to look for the cell in Clarissa's clothes, but when we managed to shut it down, Clarissa woke up.

“Who called,” s
he mumbled sleepily.

“I don't know, but you don't have to answer now. Try to sleep some more,” I said and kissed her hair.

“It could be Stella. Let me look.”

Marie handed the phone to Clarissa and glanced at me hastily. She formed the name Brianna with her lips, and I looked concernedly at Clarissa.

“Brianna,”
gasped Clarissa
. “Well, I don't think I'll answer that.”

The phone, however, kept ringing doggedly and soon I hoped she would answer it. Clarissa looked at us
with her face as
pale as snow, and pressed the button.

“I'll put it on speaker,” she whispered.

“You bitch!”
raged Brianna
. “Adam is taken, can't you get it! We are a couple, so please, please stop playing your games and go elsewhere to play!”

“I won't buy that,”
said Clarissa
quietly. “I, I care for him and he cares for me.”

“You better believe
it
, though I swear it's true. Where do you think Adam has been living for these past weeks? Under the bridge? I don't think so. He's been with me, at my house, not yours, get it? We practically live together and he spends all his nights with me, in my bed. So do you want me to describe this better? Leave it, bitch! There's no way you can take him from me,”
bragged Brianna
proudly.

Clarissa couldn't say a word for a moment, but then she collected herself and asked quietly. “Can you swear that's the truth?”

“Of course I can. And if you don't believe me, ask Adam.”

“Then you better tell A
dam to leave me alone,” she
said tiredly. A lonely tear rolled from her eye, but she silently wiped it away.

“And you stop hunting him!”
shouted Brianna
.

“Yes, if you can call it that,” Clarissa's voice was almost inaudible.

“Promise?” Brianna's voice was doubtful.

“I promise, with a friends honor,”
said Clarissa
with a shaking voice.

“Good. I'll talk to Adam,
”
said Brianna,
and hung up.

We stared at the mute cell. Clarissa spoke with a voice that was not a young girl's but
of
a
very tired woman
.

“That's it then.”

I tried to catc
h her eye
, but she looked at the floor, devastated.

“I want to
talk to Adam as well,” I said and looked at my fragile child.

Clarissa was so broken. Sleep had helped her for a while, but now she remembered all the horrible things that had happened today and I saw how hard it was for her to hold
back
her tears. Her lips quivered as she rolled again onto Marie's lap and finally, with Marie grabbing her tightly, she let her tears fall silently. Marie touched her soft honey blond hair and looked at me helplessly.

“There’s a lot to solve before this is over and I don't think Brianna is telling the whole truth,” I said and thought about how I was going to handle Adam. He would cry before I was done with him. “Try to rest some more, sweetie. I can see how exhausted you are. I'll ask Ciall
to bring some warm sandwiches for
you and Marie.”

I glanced at Marie, who nodded at me in secret. Then I left the room, but just outside the room I allowed myself to lean heavily against the door for a moment.

I felt the room spin around me and my legs seemed to crash. Just when I was sinking to the floor, I felt strong arms grabbing me an
d I sensed Gavin's familiar odo
r. He held me in his arms, but said nothing. I sucked in his strength and knew I had to deal with this mess soon. I didn't want anyone to know that Adam already knew Brianna had called Clarissa, and that he was furious.

After his attack, I had decided to connect my mind with Adam continuously and he had
humbly allowed it
. I had sensed that Brianna
w
ould do something like this. She wanted Adam so badly that she would've done anything. Lie, cheat, steal, anything to keep him, and I wanted Adam to know that as well. He knew what she had told Clarissa and how she had hurt her, and if Brianna had known what a deep, murderous rage Adam
was feeling towards
her, she would've escaped as far from him as she could. But she didn't, and somehow I felt sorry for her.

Clarissa

Clarissa dreamed about Brianna, who
was running
on an almost dark road, in the middle of the woods. Only a few run-down street lamps lit the small part of the road with their sallow lights. The road was slippery from
the
frosty leaves that were glued tightly to its su
rface and her shoes slid
occasionally, almost chopping her down. Brianna glanced behind her, horrified, but the road behind her was empty. Her muscles
were aching
and sweat
was running
down her face, but she was too afraid to slow down. An invisible beast
was hunting
her and she knew she had no chance to get away from it. Even though she knew she couldn't escape from the beast, her survival instinct wouldn't let
her stop and surrender, instead making her do everything she could
to get away from the predator. Nothing moved in the woods. It wa
s so quiet. Too quiet, actually. T
he only sound she
could hear
was her own shoes when they fell on the frosty road. The world around her
was just
holding its breath,
waiting
to see what would happen.