Chapter 53
Viviane
“I look ridiculous.” I snort,
staring at my reflection in the mirror.
“You look unrecognizable.” Kiera
corrects me, “which is the point.”
I’m wearing a wig and color
contacts, as well as a heavy layer of bronzer over every inch of my skin and a
pair of comically oversized sunglasses. Kiera is in an equally thorough
disguise, and we’ve both donned the dullest clothes we can find in our closets.
Things are more than a little different from
the last time we visited the mermaid settlement. I’m now a veritable celebrity,
and Kiera isn’t far behind. The events at the sushi bar were front page news in
Asterion, with Kiera being lauded as the kind of friend everyone needs, as well
as the future Beta’s likely mate. So now we don’t only have to worry about
ditching Chase as well as Caspian and my guards, but also making it to the
outskirts of the city without being recognized.
“You’re sure this is going to
work?” I ask nervously.
“Look, you said yourself that
Caspian is going to be meeting with his father all afternoon, right?” My friend
replies.
“Yes.” I sigh.
“And he assured you that the
escape tunnel would lead outside the gates and security perimeter?” She
presses.
Those hadn’t exactly been his
words. When I moved into his rooms, Caspian had showed me the emergency
protocols in case we ever needed to get out of the house fast. Unlike the
tunnel James used to sneak us into the manor, the escape passage Caspian
revealed to me has an entrance in his own private chambers. He didn’t take me
inside, but promised it would let out somewhere downtown.
Guilt gnaws at my insides,
Caspian showed me the passage as a last resort in the event of danger. He would
be horrified to know I’m thinking about using it to sneak out of the house.
“More or less.” I tell Kiera.
“Then everything will be just
fine.” My friend promises. “Now let’s go. We don’t have any time to waste.”
The settlement looks exactly the
same way it did the last time we were here: half-empty, run down and haunted.
Together Kiera and I slip
through the abandoned streets, me searching the poorly constructed hovels for
signs of movement while she uses her heightened sense of smell to try and track
down any remaining inhabitants.
We’re on high alert for signs of
my ex-step father, and I’m merely glad Mom isn’t with us this time. After our
last, terrible conversation she’s only grown weaker, and I fear she’s slipping
away right before my very eyes.
After scouring the perimeter of
the small community, Kiera and I take up a position in a shack at the top of a
hill which offers us a panoramic view of the slum below. We wait patiently for
something, anything, to happen.
The hours pass slowly and we
fill the time with chatter, some topics more idle than others. Kiera fills me
in on everything going on with her and Chase, as well as her parents’ less than
thrilled reaction to learning a wolf is courting her. I, on the other hand,
relate my fears about Mom’s health, which brings me to the edge of tears and
forces us to change the subject rather quickly.
Eventually we see a group of
suspicious looking men entering the settlement through a back alley, and Kiera
and I both sit up to attention. Those are definitely not mermaids, and from the
mens’ appearance they also aren’t the kind of shifters I ever want to meet.
They’re covered in tattoos, and they have the light skin and eyes of many in
the BloodStone pack.
“Kiera!” I breathe anxiously, clamping
my hand on her arm.
“I know.” She murmurs in reply,
“They definitely look suspicious.
One by one the men peel off,
signaling to each other with unfamiliar hand signs and disappearing into
various huts. Kiera’s ears perk and her lips plunge into a deep frown.
Straining to hear whatever is putting that terrible look on her face, I ask,
“What is it?”
She raises a hand in caution,
cocking her head towards the noise. “It’s not good, Viv.” She reports after a
moment. “They… I think they’re taking people.”
“Are you sure?” I question
sharply.
Before she can answer, a number
of dark shapes burst from the rundown houses, and now those same men are
dragging young women behind them down the street. The girls writhe and thrash
in their arms, their screams muffled by gags and closed fists slamming into
their faces. “Oh my god.” I whisper,
“They’re kidnapping them.”
“We have to do something!” Kiera
replies, sounding horrified. “We need to call the guys.”
“No!” I insist, shocked that
she’s suggesting this. Kiera is always the one who dives fearlessly into
action. “We have to follow them.”
“Are you crazy?” Kiera demands,
“Of course we’ll follow, but what then? How are we supposed to help them? We’re
way outnumbered.”
“If we can figure out where
they’re taking them, we might be able to help a lot more people than just those
girls.” I explain. “How many other mermaids are they smuggling over the border?
How many other victims are they selling to the Bloodstones?”
“That
didn’t answer my question,” Kiera hisses, jumping to her feet when I start to
slink out of our hiding spot. “What happens after we follow them? We need
help!”
“No.” I repeat stubbornly,
hurrying down the hill and sticking close to the shabbily covered doorways.
“I’m sick of having everyone else clean up my messes. I’m going to take care of
things on my own for once.”
“You’re not being rational, Viviane!”
Kiera snaps, following in my footsteps. Still, she doesn’t pull me to a stop,
she doesn’t refuse to come along, she simply stays at my back like the good
friend she is.
We pause at the end of the
street, peering around the corner where the kidnappers disappeared. “They won’t
stay on foot for long,” I think aloud, adrenaline pumping through my veins.
Kiera grumbled something
unintelligible below her breath, and I have a feeling she’s advocating to call
our mates again. After a moment, however, she grimaces, “If they’re taking them
into the main part of the city we might be able to find a taxi to follow them.”
When they’re far enough away,
the mermaids’ muted cries sounding very distant now, we round the corner and
jog after them. I’m breathing heavily and feel like a bull in a china shop next
to Kiera, who moves so silently you’d never know she was there at all.
We keep this up for a few more streets, and
I’m thankful the narrow roads of the settlement are too narrow for any vehicles
to pass through. Kiera’s right, the moment they get to their cars we’re going
to be in trouble.
Just as we reach the edge of the
slums, one of the men glances over his shoulder, forcing my friend and I to
come to an abrupt halt and try to appear nonchalant. I’m facing Kiera, so I
can’t see what’s happening, but when she starts shaking her head, I know our
ploy has failed. One moment her lovely eyes are narrowed with worry, the next
they’re wide with fear. “Run!”
I only have time to glance over
my shoulder, immediately met with the sight of two very angry looking shifters
coming towards us, before Kiera takes off and drags me with her. Bolting in the
other direction, even my very human ears can hear the running footsteps
pounding the pavement behind us.
We
veer around the corner as thunder cracks overhead and lightning flashes through
the sky. The noise startles me, and my foot catches on the edge of the curb,
sending me flying to the ground. Kiera turns back and yanks me up, but the
damage has been done. They’re so close behind us now we don’t stand a chance.
Regret
and fear race through me. What the hell was I thinking? Why did we do this? Was
my own stubborn pride really worth endangering myself and Kiera? The gravity of
our situation hits me over the head like a falling anvil. It doesn’t matter
that the traffickers won’t be able to identify us as mermaids, we were
following them, we know what they were doing.
If they catch us, they’ll kill
us.
The sky opens above us and rain
pours from the heavens, soaking me within seconds. In that frantic moment I
realize that the water will not only wash away my overdone makeup, but my
pheromone spray as well.
Terrible inspiration strikes,
and I feel a sob rising in my chest. These men might kill a pair of cat
shifters who were spying on them, but if they trap another mermaid… well, it
would be a waste to destroy something so valuable.
They’ll kill Kiera. They won’t
kill me… but they will take me.
Love for my friend swells inside
me. She’s stood by my side and defended me as long as we’ve known each other.
She saved me just last week and she tried to stop me from coming here today.
She’s only here because of me, because she wouldn’t let me come alone.
“Kiera,” I call over the wind,
“you have to leave me behind.”
She looks at me in horror.
“Never!”
“Kiera, you can outrun them, I
can’t. If you stay with me you’ll die!” I remind her.
“Then I’ll die!” She exclaims.
“No!” I insist, “They won’t hurt
me, they’ll sell me. You can get away, you can tell Caspian what happened and
if anyone can get me back, it’s him.”
“Viviane-”
“We don’t have a choice!” I
shout. “Now go!”
Throwing one last grief-stricken
look over her shoulder, Kiera takes off at a sprint, and I turn to meet my
fate.
