Noah
was a young, hungry, ruthless wolf-shifter who was a newbie enforcer in the pack with a lot to prove. And despite my initial resentment at being forced into training, I never missed our training sessions. In fact, I enjoyed the raw ruthlessness of them. It was cardio without all of the sappy music. It was all brute force with a little blood thrown in for good measure. Something I admit I enjoyed entirely too much. Just thinking about handing out a well-deserved ass kicking made my pulse race.
“Don't
let the pretty clothes and the smile fool you.” I let the blood thirst creep into my voice as I strolled around her. “It's really not my style, fighting like a couple of classless backstage groupies.” I stopped, strategizing how far I could lodge my foot up her skinny ass. “But I'm not opposed to finally having a reason to kick your ass. If you want to take it there, then let's go. If not, step out of my way. I have to get ready to cheer on my man.”
Her
strange, dark eyes filled with suspicion as she actually spit on the floor. My eyes widened with disgust. Who the hell does shit like that? You could take the girl off the streets, but not the street out of the girl, and Kaydee was a straight-up street urchin.
She
flashed her perfectly bleached teeth. “Not as soft as I thought you were.” She wrinkled her nose. “I wonder if Knox knows that his pretty little trophy girlfriend is a street fighter?”
I
shook my head with disbelief. She was truly a piece of work. I saw the way she bullied Knox’s groupies. It bordered on straight-up abuse. No, Kaydee was dangerous. A woman who grew up on the streets like Knox, she was used to doing anything and everything to get what she wanted. Unfortunately, I grew up around a lot of women like her. Most of them witches who were rotten to the core and had no qualms about using their body, beauty, and powers to manipulate people around them like pawns on a chessboard. And that's what Kaydee was, a master manipulator.
She
flicked the strands of my hair with a taunting glare. Swatting her hand away, I snapped, “Stop stomping those man-sized feet encased in cheap-ass shoes and get to the fucking point, Kaydee.”
She
smiled at me with eyes saturated with pure hatred. “It won't last.”
I
didn't try to act coy about what
it
was. “It? Believe me, my relationship with Knox will last as long as I want it to. And neither you nor Liam have the balls to chase me away. Trust me on this.” I stepped in her face, trying not to gag when I smelled a sweet, sickly scent wafting around her. A scent that was eerily haunting and clingy. “When will you finally get it through your bleached-blond head that Knox belongs to me and I won't go away just because you still want him? He—doesn’t—want—you. So stop being so pathetic because I'm not letting him go without a fight.”
Kaydee's
face flushed with anger. The air was so thick with rage and tension I could almost taste it like a bitter pill. “You are not one of us, Stormy. And we only stick to our kind.”
My
eyebrows rose. “Kind? Are you serious? What does that even mean?”
She
sneered. “You have no idea what and who you're messing with, rich girl.”
My
stare-down was unwavering. “Exactly what type of prescription drugs are you on? Because you sound totally deranged.”
She
just stared at me silently. Frankly, it was unnerving. “There’s something about you that doesn't make sense, but I can’t put my finger on what it is,” she spat.
Seriously?
Kaydee was mentally warped and I had enough of the cat-and-mouse game. “Okay, so are we done here?”
“For
now,” she responded before pushing past me wildly.
I
shook my head with disbelief. “Truly insane,” I mumbled under my breath, marching from backstage and immersing myself into the throng of drunk, gyrating bodies. One of them was Light, at the bar as usual, holding court to an entourage of men circling her like sharks as the boom of the music filled the club.
I
walked behind her, flicking her hair. “I'm here. Now the party can begin,” I said, giving her a wink. The sharks stopped mid-swim, focusing on me with interest. I gave them a cold smile. “Not going to happen.” I waved at them. “Bye now.” Leaning over, I smiled at the bartender, screaming over the noise. “Two beers.”
Light
smirked, grabbing her cup of beer as soon as he put it down. She sloshed her drink, pointing over at the two menacing-looking guys. One with blond hair, the other black. They eyed the crowd with disdain as they bulldozed through the people that were heading backstage.
“Storm,
check out the pretty auras on those two.”
Odd,
I'd seen them before. They were hanging outside of Knox's apartment, just watching. When I told him about them, he shrugged it off but got eerily silent.
“I
saw the skank known as Kaydee stomping away in a plume of anger. You two got into it again, huh?” Light stated flatly.
I
responded with a smirk. “Yep. This time I almost ripped her head off. That girl is
loca
in the
cabeza.
” I grabbed my cup of beer, pulling Light through the crowd toward the front of the stage. “I'm getting weird vibes from her. From all of them.”
Light
looked at me sharply. “Weird like what? Other?” she whispered.
“Maybe.
I don't know.” I responded with frustration. Not willing to concede yet that my uncertainty was a crippling result of my adamant decision to have limited interaction with Others. As usual, totally ignoring the seriousness of the situation, Light swayed to the music, completely in her own world. Not that she would be able to provide any earthshattering insight. She was a fumbling mess when it came to anything that didn't involve partying, alcohol, or shopping. No, if I wanted help with this Other question, I’d have to eat crow and call Mom for a quick tutorial on identifying Others, which was a lesson that she insisted was necessary years ago.
Shit! I hate when she's right.
A
spine-tingling warning ran down my spine, a sure sign of trouble on the horizon. “There's something going on. It could be plain paranoia, but I don't think so. Call it woman's intuition, but she's up to something.”
Light
leaned in close to avoid being overheard. “You know the solution to this, right?” She pointed her finger like a gun. I grabbed it quickly, looking around nervously.
“Don't
do that, Light,” I hissed. “We don't cast dark spells.” Well, that was technically true. We could. Well, I could. Light's spell-casting abilities were lacking at best. And mine, well, I've been told from birth that my potential abilities were up there with the very few gifted witches, which was something I chose to deny. There would be no using of witchcraft for me—ever.
Light
rolled her eyes. “Well, you need to do something about her. There are rumors circulating. Very nasty rumors that those two are not exactly over.”
“So
you're saying they’re still sleeping with each other?” I asked furiously.
Light
popped her hands on her curvy hips, giving me the stare-down. “You want to hear the truth, or get all pissed off like someone stole your fucking bike?”
I
sighed heavily. “The truth.”
She
touched me on the shoulder. “I think he's still fucking her.” She pulled my hair away from my face. I tried to pull away, but she held me still. “You asked for the truth. But there's one thing for sure; he really needs to cut her loose. She's dead weight.”
I
blew out with frustration. “I agree, but he has this ridiculous loyalty to her, something about her saving his ass.” I snorted. “I can’t imagine her saving anyone’s ass but hers.” I shrugged. “Anyway, she knows way too many of the music players. I hate her, but she's a fucking beast when it comes to the music business. If anyone can get him a deal, she can. The problem is that she wants him on a personal level too.”
Light
looked at me with concerned eyes. “And it doesn’t help that they’re fuck buddies. Damn, I hate when girls refuse to move on.” She took a sip of beer and winked at me saucily. “Her desperation can only mean one thing… that his sex game must be simply unforgettable.”
I
rolled my eyes. “Put it this way, he's really talented.” Well, as far as oral sex went. We hadn't gotten to the real down and dirty sex stage—yet.
Light
clapped her hands, sloshing beer all over her jeans. “Hot damn, I knew it.” She kissed me soundly on my cheek. “When you didn't come home last night, I was hoping that you finally uncrossed those sexy legs and gave it up. Jeezus, he's been sniffing around you like a wolf in heat. It's cute in a pathetic kind of way.”
I
shook my head. One of the drawbacks of having a best friend who is also my cousin is that she is a shameless, prying witch. “Are we really having this conversation now?”
She
shimmied against me. “Don't get all uptight.”
“I'm
not getting uptight. I just don't want to talk about it in the middle of a party,” I responded. Light raised an eyebrow. “Okay, should I dance to celebrate the luck of finding a guy with a mean tongue game?”
“Oh
, hell yeah! It’s a miracle, like striking gold—eureka! Now get past oral and move to the real thing, baby. Call it a parting gift.” She winked, dancing around me.
I
gave up and danced with her. “You're truly crazy. You know that, right?”
“The
craziest witch you know, baby!”
We
danced with wild abandonment, forgetting for a minute all of the troubles of our world. College was our reprieve from reality and our overbearing mothers who were reason enough to make us do a happy dance. It was like a four-year hall pass. As soon as we graduated from high school, we were plotting to get away from our mothers. We were thinking states and miles away but had to settle for going to an Ivy League university in Manhattan. There were safety risks, according to our mothers, that the long-distance logistics wouldn't allow. Again, the last of the Credence bloodline paranoia reared its head.
So
the second we moved out, we literally never looked back, acting like we were miles away instead of minutes. No going home for the holidays and no guilt about it. Our mothers didn’t celebrate holidays anyway. They spent it in Europe with their latest boy toys while Light and I traveled in the opposite direction to ensure no awkward mother-daughter moments.
I
actually blossomed while being away from the pressure of trying to live up to the Credence name. It was like a breath of fresh air. I dated and flirted without a care in the world because I had no intention of falling in love. The guys were fun. And when they started wanting to become serious, I cut them off and moved on to the next one in line. I was so sure that the Credence Curse wouldn't get me here—that was before I met Knox.
Light’s
voice brought me out of my thoughts. “That reminds me, the cackling hens called last night from Vegas.”
I
almost choked; they rarely called, respecting our need for independence. “What did our mothers from hell want?”
Light
pointed at me accusingly. “Your mother had a premonition, something about a bird—no, an eagle. Then she babbled about how you need to watch your back and that the Credence Curse is about to rear its ugly head again.”
I
stopped dancing, my heart pounding nervously. “What?”
Light
’s eyes were a little dazed. “Huh?”
“Light,
did it even occur to you to mention this earlier?”
She
blew a strand of hair from her forehead. “Why? You're not stupid enough to fall in love…” She sloshed her beer. “Oh, hell no! Tell me you didn't fall for him!”
My
eyes widened as a feeling of near hurl status gripped me. “No! I know the Credence rule…” I took a sip of beer, staring into space. Shit, I was truly fucked. I wanted to go running out of the club in sheer terror.
Her
eyes narrowed. “Do what you do, Storm. Keep it simple.”
I
swallowed nervously before the lights flickered. The music lowered. Yeah, right. The time for simple was over the minute I met him. Happy for the distraction, I pointed to the stage. “It's about to start.”
“Wait
a minute. Isn't that Stalker Luke talking to Kaydee?” She pointed to the other side of the club.
I
looked over with shock at Luke, a.k.a. Stalker Luke. There he was, standing against the wall with his friends, the Ivy League squad, and Kaydee practically climbing him like a tree. It was strange because he wasn’t her type. He was what I called a chameleon. He was anything he thought you wanted him to be in order to snare you. A point I found out the hard way when we first met in psychology class.
I
was intrigued; he was funny and smart. We became fast friends until he made a point of letting me know that he wanted more than friendship. Three months later, it was glaringly obvious that we really had nothing in common. Then I had to have the awkward talk with him, letting him know. My idea of fun was clubbing late into the night with all walks of life. His idea of fun was downing a couple of kegs at his fraternity house party. He was vanilla, boring like a dry slice of bread. And when I met Knox and made it clear—again—he had to leave me alone, he still pursued me with an eerie stalker-like focus. I just didn’t understand why.