by Lola Gabriel
“Tell me everything. Who is she? Where did you meet her?”
“Relax, Cassie. There isn’t much to tell right now. I haven’t even spoken to her yet. But the minute I saw her, I knew she was meant to be mine.”
“I’m so pleased for you,” Cassie grinned. “And for the pack. I was starting to think we’d never get an heir.”
“Me too, to be honest. I mean, in all of the years I’ve been on earth, I’ve never felt anything like this before. I’ve been attracted to women before, obviously, but this was different. It felt like we connected on so many levels with just a look.”
“It’s the best feeling in the world, isn’t it?” Cassie grinned. Cedric nodded. “So why didn’t you talk to her?”
“I don’t know. For a second, it was like time stood still and we were frozen in time, and we just stood and looked at each other. I smiled at her and she smiled back and it was perfect, but then, I don’t know. For just a second, I saw a flicker of something like fear in her eyes. I think she felt the connection between us and it scared her a little bit. I mean, it’s pretty intense, isn’t it, and if you’re not an immortal, not expecting to feel that sort of thing, it must be quite overwhelming. I figured I didn’t want to scare her more by coming on too strong. And I’m bound to run into her again. Greer is small enough, so seeing her again is inevitable,” Cedric said.
“She’s from Greer? Who is she?” Cassie asked.
“I don’t know. I’ve never seen her before in my life. But it’s not like this town is exactly a tourist magnet, is it? So, I figure she’s here for a while.”
“Does she have long, blonde hair, curly?” Cassie asked.
Cedric nodded and Cassie beamed.
“Oh, what a small world. If I’m not mistaken, that’s Laila Kent. She’ll be working for me at the school starting tomorrow.”
Laila. The name suited her, Cedric thought to himself.
“Oh, this is perfect. I can introduce the two of you and there’s no way Laila is going to think you’re scary once she finds out you’re my brother,” Cassie said.
“Unless you’re the boss from hell,” Cedric joked.
“I’m a great boss,” Cassie said. “And soon enough, you’ll think I’m the best sister in the world. Okay, let me think for a second. She starts work tomorrow. I need to give her a few days to settle in, and then I’ll invite her over for dinner and you can come too. Oh, this is going to be so much fun!”
Cedric laughed and shook his head.
“You seem almost more excited about this than I am,” he said.
5
Laila was starting to feel like she was finding her feet with her new job. She had met Cassie as arranged and been given the grand tour, which in truth, wasn’t very grand. The school building consisted of two classrooms, hers and Cassie’s, a tiny kitchen where the cooks made lunch for the children and Cassie and now Laila, a toilet block, and two small supply closets.
Rather than the class of thirty children Laila had been expecting, her class consisted of a grand total of six children—two five-year-olds, two six-year-olds, and two seven-year-olds. Cassie’s class was slightly bigger with a total of nine children. When the children of the town turned five, they would join Laila’s class. When they turned eight, they would leave her and go to Cassie’s class, and when they turned eleven, they would have to go into the city to go to high school. Cassie told her about one time when Miss Leve, Laila’s predecessor, only had one child in her class for a full year.
It definitely wasn’t what Laila had pictured when she thought of being a teacher, but still, Laila was making the best of it and she was getting to know the children and learning where they were at academically. They were all excited to meet her and seemed enthusiastic, which was good.
Cassie had told her they had an after-school club from five until seven three nights a week on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays and she had asked Laila to take the Wednesday slot. Laila had instantly agreed. Tonight would be her first night running the club.
Laila checked her watch. There was just half an hour to go before three o’clock, the end of the school day. She clapped her hands to get the children’s attention. They all turned to her and she smiled warmly at them.
“Who wants a story before going home?” she asked.
“Me,” six little voices chorused happily.
“Come on and sit down on the carpet, then,” Laila said. She waited until her little class gathered on the carpet, their legs crossed, all looking up at her. “Who wants to choose a book?”
A hand shot up. It was Jack, the oldest member of her class at seven and three quarters.
“I know a story I could tell, Miss Kent,” he said. “One about Greer.”
“Well, then, why don’t you come on up here and tell it and I’ll sit and listen with the rest of you?” Laila said.
Jack took her place and she took his. Jack was a confident child and Laila had no doubt he would be able to tell his story and keep the other children engrossed in it.
“Once upon a time,” Jack began, “there was a little town called Greer and it was at the bottom of some mountains.”
The rest of the class clapped their hands in joy, laughing and cheering when they heard the start of the story. Laila figured the story had to be some sort of local legend that all of the children would have already heard at some point. She smiled at their enthusiasm. Jack beamed at them all and then he continued with his story.
“In the mountains was a castle, and in the castle lived a bad fae. The people in the town couldn’t see the castle—only the fairies could, because it was a magic castle,” Jack went on.
Laila smiled to herself as she looked around at the children. They were all focused completely on Jack, drinking in the story.
“The fae was a bad fairy and he sneaked down into the town and stole all of the women. He kept them locked away in his castle as his prisoners and made them have lots of babies. The end,” Jack said.
Laila thought the story had taken a rather dark turn. Abduction and imprisonment and implied rape weren’t exactly things she would want in a children’s story, and it made her a little uncomfortable, but the children were all clapping and cheering and she figured they all already knew this story, and if it was a local legend, who was she to tell the local parents not to tell it to their children? Clearly they didn’t understand the implications of the story. To them it was no different from hearing about the big, bad wolf who blew down the houses of the three little pigs, or the wicked queen with her poisoned apple.
Laila told the class another story, one from a book that she felt was more appropriate, and then she dismissed them for the day, walking them to the door and seeing them run off to join their parents. She debated talking to Jack’s parents, but again, she decided against it. It wasn’t her place to start judging the locals on their customs and none of the children seemed in the least bit disturbed by the story.
By the time she had returned to her classroom, gathered up her things, and popped her head into Cassie’s classroom to say goodbye to her, she had pretty much forgotten about the story.
Instead of dwelling on it, she started trying to think up some activities for the children to do at the after-school club. It was hard to come up with something that could amuse children from the ages of five right through to eleven, and she made a mental note to have a chat with Cassie about it before her next session and try to get some inspiration from her. For that evening’s session, she thought she would likely have to resort to some sort of craft activity or painting.
She was halfway home when a car pulled up beside her. She glanced at the car and kept walking, assuming the driver lived in one of the houses on the street she was walking down. She was so shocked when arms wrapped around her, a hand clasped over her mouth, and she was dragged to the car. After being thrown into the back seat, she couldn’t even fight back.
The man who threw her into the car held her face down on the back seat while he bound her wrists, a
nd then he rolled her over and sat her up. What the hell? she thought to herself, panic swirling inside of her.
“Who the hell are you? Where are you taking me?” Laila demanded, trying and failing to loosen the cord tied around her wrists.
The man had gotten back into the driver’s seat of the car and turned it around, and was now driving toward the edge of the town. When she spoke up, he ignored her. Laila kicked the back of his seat.
“Hey! I’m talking to you,” she said.
The man lifted his hand and Laila saw that he held a gun.
“Kick the seat again and I won’t hesitate to shoot you,” the man growled.
Laila swallowed down her rising panic, trying to work out what the hell was going on. She took a deep breath.
“Where are you taking me?” she asked again, trying not to sound so demanding now that she had seen the gun.
“You’ll see,” the man replied.
Laila watched out of the window as the car headed toward the mountains. It began to climb up a narrow, winding road. Laila looked all around her, searching for some indication of who this man was and what he might want with her. She didn’t dare ask again. It was clear he wasn’t going to tell her, and the gun worried her greatly.
She looked out of the front window and looming up in the distance, she saw a castle. She felt herself relax. It all made sense now. The townspeople were hazing the newcomer. It must be a thing they did to all of the new residents. First the spooky story about the bad fae in the mountains, and then this. A part of her knew this idea was absurd. As if a whole town would be in on something like this, and even if it was just Cassie doing this, no one would take a joke this far. Laila ignored the rational voice that tried to tell her this. It was much easier to believe she was the victim of a practical joke than it was to believe she had been snatched off the streets by a strange man.
“I know what you’re doing,” Laila said, needing to say something to fill the ominous silence that had settled over the car. “I know this is some elaborate joke and I want you to know that I don’t find it funny. So why don’t you just pull over and let me out?”
The man threw his head back and laughed but he made no comment and he certainly made no effort to pull over. He just kept driving, and after a few minutes, he drove through the gate in the castle’s wall and then he pulled up in the castle’s grounds outside of the front door.
As they pulled up, two other men came down the steps that led to the castle’s door. They opened the car door and dragged Laila from the car. She kicked and swung her body around, but the men were far too strong for her to throw off and they marched her toward the castle, one on either side of her.
They pulled her up the steps, half carrying her. They led her down a hallway and brought her into a room that looked like a large lounge. They pushed her onto the couch and then one of them reached out and grabbed her nose. She made an mmm sound, shaking her head until tears came to her eyes, but he didn’t let go. She opened her mouth to breathe and a bitter-tasting liquid was poured in. The man forced her mouth closed and held it tightly until she had no choice but to swallow so she could breathe again.
As soon as she swallowed, the man released her. Laila tried to get to her feet as the men walked away, but her limbs were too heavy and she couldn’t move. Her eyes slipped closed.
She heard a door opening and then a voice started to whisper in her ear. The voice told her that she had been approached by a man on the street who told her he had something he needed to discuss with her, and that if she came with him with no fuss, she wouldn’t be harmed. As soon as the voice whispered to her, Laila remembered it happening.
She had been heading home from work when a car pulled up beside her. The window had wound down and a man told her he needed to speak to her. He opened his jacket enough for her to see he had a gun and she got into the car. He brought her up into the mountains and asked her to wait in the lounge for a moment. She was afraid, but not terrified. She hadn’t been manhandled or forced to come here, but she knew there was an implication that she might be hurt if she didn’t agree.
Laila’s eyes opened and she looked around the room. She was alone, sitting on a yellow couch. She had thought for a moment that her hands were bound, but of course, they weren’t. She shook her head. It felt a little fuzzy and she wanted to be alert when she found out what the hell this man wanted with her. She thought maybe he had the wrong person.
Laila turned her head when the door opened and a man walked in. It wasn’t the man who had brought her here. He smiled warmly when he saw her.
“Laila, thank you for coming to see me,” he said.
“Who the hell are you?” she demanded, wondering how this complete stranger knew her name.
His smile widened but there was a certain sadness to it.
“Don’t you recognize your own father when you see him?” the man smiled.
6
Cassie picked her cell phone up when it rang. She frowned when she saw the name on her screen. Joan Michaels. She was the mother of one of Cassie’s students. Cassie hoped nothing bad had happened to Luke, her son. He was a sickly child and she decided he had likely picked up a bug or something and the call was just Joan letting her know he wouldn’t be in school tomorrow.
“Hello,” she said, taking the call.
“Hi. This is Joan Michaels, Luke’s mom,” Joan said. “I’m just letting you know the new teacher, what’s her name? Miss Kent? She didn’t turn up for the after-school club. It’s fine, only four children turned up for it, so I’ve taken them back to my place and informed their parents where to collect them from, but I just thought you should know.”
“Oh,” Cassie said, completely thrown by the news. “Well, thank you for stepping in, Joan, and thank you for letting me know. Don’t worry, I’ll find out what happened and I promise you that it won’t happen again.”
“No problem. The teacher is new, isn’t she? She likely just forgot. It must be overwhelming moving to a new place and starting a new job all within a day or two,” Joan said.
“Yes, that’s mostly likely it. I’ll come over to your place and take the kids off your hands,” Cassie said.
“Oh, don’t worry about it. Like I said, there’s only four of them and one of them is Luke. It’s really no problem and it saves calling the other parents again,” Joan insisted.
“If you’re sure, that would be great. Thanks again, Joan,” Cassie said before she ended the call.
It was certainly possible that Laila had gotten a little overwhelmed and forgotten about the after-school club. Wasn’t it? Cassie had meant to come by her classroom and remind her earlier in the day, but it had completely slipped her mind. Cassie decided to walk down to Laila’s place and see if everything was okay, because her forgetting about the club just felt wrong. Laila didn’t seem like she was overwhelmed and she had been really enthusiastic about the club when Cassie had mentioned it to her.
Cassie called out to Stuart, telling him she was going out and she didn’t know how long she would be, and then she slipped out before he could question her further. He already complained that she brought her work home with her, and she could do without a lecture about her going out to speak to the staff after hours. He just didn’t get it. Cassie brought her work home with her because she cared about the children in her school, not because she felt like she had to do it. If she had a staff of forty teachers, she would still do it. It was just the way she was.
She walked to Laila’s place, enjoying the cool breeze that stirred the leaves on the trees. She always liked early spring evenings when it was neither too hot nor too cold. She reached Laila’s place and tapped on the door. No answer. She knocked louder and still got no answer.
She was starting to get a really bad feeling about this, so she moved to the living room window and peered inside. There was no sign of Laila. She went back to the door and opened the letter box, crouching down and peering in.
“Laila?” she called through it.
She thought for a moment and started heading toward Cedric’s place. She didn’t want to worry him unnecessarily, but if her theory was right and she didn’t tell him, there would be hell to pay. For her and for Laila.
She arrived at Cedric’s place and went in.
“Cedric?” she called.
“In here,” he replied.
She followed the sound of his voice and found him sitting in his home office at his desk.
“What’s up?” he asked, frowning when he saw her expression.
“I don’t know. Maybe nothing. Probably nothing,” she said, sitting down in the chair opposite Cedric’s with a sigh. Now that she was here, she was sure she was overreacting, but she still wasn’t sure enough to not tell Cedric her thoughts. “Laila was supposed to be manning the after-school club tonight, but one of the students’ moms just called me. She didn’t turn up. I’ve been to her place and there’s no sign of her. And I don’t know. I just have a bad feeling about this, Cedric. Do you think it’s possible Fabian took her?”
“Wow, Cassie, that’s some leap. Someone misses a shift at work and you assume she’s been taken by Fabian? What would he want with her?” Cedric frowned.
“What does he want with anyone?” Cassie countered. “Maybe he’s heard that you’re interested in her and he’s using her as bait to lure you in and take you out.”
“Cass, listen to yourself,” Cedric said. “The only people who even know I have taken an interest in Laila are you and Josh. And neither of you has run and told Fabian, have you?”
“Well, I haven’t…” Cassie said, tailing off.