Chapter Eighteen
Kaden's POV
My blood ran hot like boiling water, and sweat would ooze from my skin at night as the nightmares invaded my thoughts. My head and heart fought ceaselessly, like two wrestlers together in the ring. It was a gruelling battle of rust, wrestled bones and old tension which froze in my veins.
They fought for Elle, as they always had. My head was fighting to protect her, while my heart was fighting to be near her. And while my head had always been the winner, its streak was coming to an end as my resolve started to crumble.
Like an addict clutching at their next high, I was crashing, my fingers twitching, and heart palpitations echoed in my chest cavity. It should be impossible to have withdrawals over a girl, but with Elle, I should have known.
Monday hadn't come quickly enough.
She was the first thing I saw through the window as we approached the hotel. Her cheeks were flushed, and the sleeves of her blazer were pushed into the crook of her elbow. She hadn't noticed us through the window, tapping feverously as she sorted through the hotel's computer bookings. Her hair was swept over her shoulder, kissing her skin as it fluttered under the heater's draft.
As she looked up, her eyes twinkling with a smile, my mind stuttered, and my heart overpowered my thoughts. She had a smile that darkened the stars, brighter than the moon. It smelled like summer when she smiled, of flowers, oceans, and dreams. My heart refused to lose this time, and words of breathlessness caught in my chest, but it was all gone too soon as she turned away, lifting a hand to adjust her earpiece.
Her smile was never for me.
I no longer wanted to go in but couldn't turn back. I slumped, burying my hands and shame into my pockets, and sulked across the lobby. Angry at myself for the excitement that her smile had summoned.
Jacobi's first meeting should have been nerve-racking, and it was partly. He wouldn't usually come to these things, but it had been the first week where normalcy had seeped back into our lives after Arlo's attack, and it was Jocobi's introduction to the council. As we moved across the hotel lobby, he bounced with unspent energy, his eyes turning over the lobby as though he had never seen the inside. We didn't make it far before he broke, charging towards Elle's desk with a goofy grin.
Elle's smile brightened, though she tried to remain focused on her conversation; glowing radiantly, she had never known how to smile sadly.
Jacobi was a distraction, and between the phone call and his excitement, she was too busy to look my way. It meant I had a moment of peace where I could explore the concaves of her face. Elle had always held my breath with the delicate skin of a soft pink rose petal and eyes that held the forest in their colour. I wasn't willing to break the spell to call Jacobi back, so I let him stay where he was.
She was wearing her vanilla perfume, like always, but she'd changed her soap, and now lemon undertones had melded with the scent. The scent of her skin made my blood jump in my veins, and I wanted to press my nose up against her and inhale until its delicacy could overcome me.
'Careful,' Rylan's mouth twisted into a grim line. His scowl flittered over Elle for a heartbeat, but he shifted his scowl away. 'Someone might notice.'
I soured, clenching my hands briefly before forcing them to relax. 'I said I was sorry.' I snarled. I was sorry, sorry that his feelings were hurt. However, I couldn't be sorry that I had kept quiet for so long. Her safety was more important than Rylan's feelings. 'What more do you want me to do?'
'How about you go back thirteen years and tell me then.'
I shouldn't have indulged him, the pettiness of his anger was childish, but I couldn't help myself, sarcasm oozing from my voice 'well, that's not exactly possible, now is it?'
Unable to glare at Elle, Rylan turned his eyes towards Jacobi, shrugging carelessly. 'I guess you'll just have to wait until I feel like talking to you, especially after you lied to me.'
'I didn't lie.' I hissed through clenched teeth.
'Well, you certainly hid the truth.'
I cut across his path, abruptly stopping him in his tracks. 'You don't get to decide what I do and don't tell you. And you don't get to be angry when I do tell you things.'
He remained silent, staring over my shoulder, his face puckered with the hostility of a thousand soldiers.
Just as I was going to strive for our loyalties, I smelled something rotten in the air. Tim sauntered close, jamming past us to the elevator, sneering, 'Trouble in paradise?'
It was like nails on a chalkboard, his voice grating in our ears. I considered the consequences of snapping off his finger as he pushed the elevator button repeatedly, a plague on our lives in his own right.
'Word of advice,' he snickered, as though he had already reached his punchline, and my body locked up, already agitated by his response, 'Save the domestics for home. At least then, we won't be able to use your weaknesses against you.'
A rumbling growl filled the lobby with an almost touchable power, and my knuckles cracked. I clenched my hands, trying to dispel the rage that was building under my skin, but I couldn't relax, my blood roaring with the demand to squelch him into the marble.
Rylan's worried look over my shoulder sent warnings through my head, and I forced my nails into the palm of my hand, reminding myself not to take a swinging punch at the slimy, smug smile Tim directed our way.
Elle was in the room.
I had to repeat, over and over, the instructions to stand down. My blood prickled and itched under my skin as Tim longed for a fight.
I couldn't do that to her, not again.
If I wanted to tear Tim down, I would do it in negotiations, a fair fight that would leave him wounded for years.
Elle's voice rang like a shotgun as she cleared her throat to get our attention. 'You boys are right to head up. The meeting is about to start.'
Boys.
Her words hurt.
The doors swept open just as Jacobi reached our side, and the silence simmered in the elevator as we made our way to the second floor.
***
'You have had numerous warnings.'
Tim could not settle on a face to stare at, his eyes thrashing in their sockets with the same flash of desperation as a newly caged animal.
When he brought his fist down onto the table, it splintered, and a ravening lightning bolt crack speared the centre of the mahogany. As the whites of his eyes glowed amber, a sign that he was more wolf than human, his skin turned mottled with rage. His muscles corded beneath it, and he turned towards his parents.
A choking roar caught on his lips, their facade of indifference fueling his feeling of betrayal. He was senseless, snarling at the leaders of the four packs. 'HE IS MY BROTHER.'
He was wrong, though. His anger was unfounded as his parents weren't uncaring. Well-hidden tears glistened in his mother's eyes, and she pressed her lips silently together. His father held her hand under the table, but couldn't look at his son, so he kept his eyes on the painting over Tim's shoulder instead. Lachlan was just as much their son as he was Tim's brother.
'He will face trial.'
I hadn't hesitated to bring Lachlan's transgressions to our discussions, determined to make an example of him.
I'd had the support of almost everyone. They all agreed that something needed to be done.
'He has a very high-ranked position in his pack,' Meniok, Alpha of Viridi, pinched his brow, studying the table as he tapped his finger, and I knew the following words out of his mouth would upset more than one person at the table. 'Perhaps it wouldn't be so wise to hold a public trial. He might benefit from a private trial of the councils.'
Inna, Luna of Viridi, was the first to raise her voice over the clutter that broke out. 'You want to protect him! Do you understand what he has done?'
'He is young.' Meniok justified. 'This could ruin his life, his position in the pack. Are we really willing to do that over someone who is probably overreacting?'
'Overreacting!' Nena, Luna of Caeruleum, cried. 'Lachlan Thomms doesn't even have a position in the pack. As per pack laws, Lachlan is only allowed a place amongst the elites if his brother is unfit to lead. Are we to lessen the consequences based on a 'what if'? Well, what if this human girl had done the same to him?'
'It's not possible.'
'But if it was, or even if it had been a werewolf with no political sway, what would you have done? You know the rules, Meniok.'
'But he is just a young b-'
Barely a whisper but heard around the room like a tornado, Sarah Thomms spoke up. 'He is not that young.' She couldn't look at her son, so she closed her eyes and touched her chin to her chest, her face creased with fear. 'We have talked to him, but he refuses to listen,' she cried.
Thomms tucked his soulmate into his side and addressed the room with sorrow in his eyes. 'Lachlan is eighteen next year. He is well past the juvenile age for criminal responsibility under federal and pack laws. Perhaps a public trial will make him see sense.'
A knock on the door startled a few people, and we turned as the creaking door swept open, vanilla and lemon blooming in the room.
I had never been so focused that I had lost sense of where Elle was, and the disturbance frightened me as she made her way around the room with a jug of water.
Her voice was soft, non-intruding, but her words carried silence. I watched her in the window's reflection as she balanced the jug and a tray of glasses, glancing strategically around the room. Swiftly she placed a glass in front of each person, filling them up as she went, but when she got to me, I turned her away, unable to take the presence of her leaning in so close.
Setting my glass onto a set of drawers, she swiped her hands over her skirt. I had almost sighed with relief, but she came and stood at the head of the table. 'May I help you with anything else?'
Thomms hmmed, his chair scraping over the hardwood as he pushed back to study her.
I didn't want to breathe, wishing I could hold time still by catching the air in my lungs. I could see it all laid out before me, Elle breaking into submission as Thomms demanded she withdraws her charges against Lachlan.
But he didn't.
'I have a question for you, dear.'
Her brow dipped slightly, and she wiped her hands again. 'Sir?'
'We seem to be in a predicament.'
'What sort of predicament, Sir?'
'If we could prove the guilt of a werewolf involved with counts of harassment, sexual harassment, stalking, and emotional manipulation, what sort of punishment should ensue.'
'I don't think I'm qualified to answer that question.'
My father, who had turned his chair towards her, smiled easily. 'Just enlighten us.'
Wringing her hands together, Elle thought about her answer, looking over the faces which stared back with interest. 'Well,' she sighed, looking over at the only familiar face in the room. Jacobi nodded subtly. 'I guess it would depend. Those are chargeable offences, but they're mostly just summary crimes. Starting with the three harassment charges, it depends on the severity of the circumstances, but I would look at probation, community service, and possibly house arrest. If this were all done to one person, I would suggest a restraining order because I can assure you the victim would not feel safe in this situation. Um,' she hesitated, looking around the room, 'jail time?'
'And for the emotional manipulation?'
She was a flower in autumn, suddenly wilting as the environment around her changed. She looked down, bringing a hand to her lips, as she shrunk under their gaze, her confidence shrivelling. 'Emotional manipulation.' She rolled her lip between her teeth and fell back a step. 'I am only able to guess, but reportable emotional manipulation is when a werewolf has broken trust and lied to a human about their soul-line connection.'
'Yes.'
A quake shook over her skin, and I could hear her heart racing as she tried to collect her emotions. 'I don't expect you to understand,' her voice was fragile, like thin glass, bearly able to protect her against the wind, 'there are things you will never experience.
'When I first dreamt of finding my soulmate, I was filled with youthful dreams of what it would mean.' A shuddering sigh kissed her lips, and the emotion in her eyes drained as she forced herself to look upwards. 'But as a child, you don't realise just how important it is to feel needed by someone, to have someone want you so bad that it hurts. You can feel it burning within you as you get older, and it becomes more than just a wish. It becomes an untamable desire, unreachable unless someone tells you the truth.
'It happened to me once, and when a werewolf tells a human that they are soulmates, there is supposed to be a shadow of doubt because it's never certain, but I didn't feel that at first. At first, I was just relieved that someone needed me.
'That dream fell into a thousand shattered pieces, ruining me. It ruined me for months, and I feel bad for my real soulmate because I won't ever believe him. That's what it's done to me. When someone lies about their soulmate, it doesn't just hurt one person. And it hurts,' her voice cracked, 'it hurts so much.'
The colour seeped away from the world as Elle stood, vulnerable before the council. The stars in her eyes were made of tears, and she wrapped herself away from the world.
Suddenly my ribs were too tight for my chest, and breathing hurt. Elle was in pain, she'd been in pain for years, but she'd been holding onto it and letting it simmer under the surface as she smiled and acted as though it didn't hurt.
And I was to blame.