Wounded Soul

by Annabelle Jacobs

  Ian nodded, and Jesse wanted to reach over and hug her tight.

  Realistically, they could just take Ian’s phone—if Peter had managed to unlock it by now—and send the messages themselves, but Jesse loved her for asking him first. She also hadn’t mentioned that in the end, Ian was going to have to tell a huge lie to those people anyway because his old life was over. Jesse didn’t mention it either.

  “Right.” Lys pulled out her own phone. “Let’s summon the beast.”

  PETER WALKED INTO Jesse’s room, eyebrows rising at the sight of the discarded blood bags on the bedside table. “Someone’s still hungry, I see.” His gaze lingered on Ian in such a way that Jesse’s fangs ached in his jaw, the urge to let them come out and threaten Peter hard to ignore.

  “Did you bring them?” Jesse demanded, getting straight to the point.

  Peter rolled his eyes but reached into his pocket and drew out two phones. “Yes, of course.” He tossed them onto the bed, and Jesse didn’t miss the dark look that flashed across his face. “And obviously I haven’t touched them.”

  Jesse scoffed. “Of course not.”

  “Turns out fingerprint protection is a bitch to get past. In hindsight I should’ve got you to unlock your phone before leaving you to die.” He smiled, smug and irritating. “Luckily you’re both as predictable as fuck with your passwords.”

  Jesse glared at him, rage simmering just below the surface. His password was Callum’s date of birth, and the thought of Peter knowing that felt so wrong, like it somehow tarnished his memory. He snatched up both phones from the bed, passing Ian’s to him before unlocking his own.

  He knew before he even got to them that Peter would’ve deleted the photo and text that implicated him in Ian’s death. But seeing the evidence for himself still drew a curse out of him.

  “You knew I couldn’t leave it there,” Peter said softly. “I deleted it from your cloud too, in case you were wondering.”

  Jesse sorely wished he’d listened to Lys and backed up his stuff elsewhere like she’d suggested. He’d never bothered because he’d never had anything he desperately wanted to keep before.

  Turning to Ian, Peter said, “I left your messages intact because there’s nothing incriminating on there, and the police will be able to access your data phone records easily enough. The only connections in there are to Jesse, not me. And the fact that Cate was the last one to text you will keep the police busy for a while. Especially since they’ll find she deleted hers.”

  They knew all this already, but coming from Peter, it seemed to rub everyone the wrong way.

  “You’re going to get her arrested,” Ian spat. “I should text her now and tell her everything.” But Peter struck like a cobra, snatching the phone out of Ian’s hands in the blink of an eye.

  “Don’t,” he hissed. “The police won’t question her for long. She has a pretty tight alibi after all, but it’ll buy us more time and we need all the time we can get to try and sort this mess out.” He handed the phone back to Ian. “And if you need a little more incentive, how about I’ll kill her if you do?”

  “Peter!” Jesse whisper-yelled, arm reaching out to block Ian as he went to lurch off the bed.

  Peter laughed and raised his hands. “I’m kidding. Wow, can no one take a joke?”

  Lys sneered at him. “You’re such a sick fuck sometimes.”

  He grinned at her and shrugged.

  Not for the first time, Jesse looked at him and wondered just how Peter saw this playing out. How did he think he was going to come out of this whole fucking mess unscathed? In that moment he wanted to tug Ian to his side to keep him safe and throw Peter out, but he couldn’t. They needed to keep Peter on their side—as much as he ever was—for now, and keep him where they could see him.

  Even if the sight of him made Jesse’s skin crawl.

  Ian looked at his phone, screen open to the text exchange he’d had with Cate. After a few seconds of hesitation, he closed the app without sending anything.

  Peter’s smug smile was almost too much for him to bear.

  “They can trace my phone,” Ian repeated.

  “While they’re not looking for you, we should take advantage of it.” Lys smiled at him encouragingly, probably trying to take his mind off Peter. “Send the texts.”

  All three of them watched while Ian sent a text to his work. “I’ve told them I’m too ill to drive—throwing up, et cetera. That should give me a few days.” He set it down on his lap. “It’s too early to text Cate. I’ll do it later.”

  A kind of awkward silence settled between them.

  Ian yawned, breaking the building tension, and looked so startled by it that Jesse couldn’t help but smile.

  “Tired?” Jesse asked.

  “Knackered.” Ian frowned. “Which is really weird because I assumed vampires didn’t need sleep.” His gaze met Jesse’s. “Do they?”

  Jesse opened his mouth to speak, but Peter got there first.

  “We don’t need as much as humans.” He smiled, and Jesse recognised that tone of voice. Peter had used it on him once, and no fucking way was he using it on Ian. “But yes, we need to rest for at least a few hours a day.” He shrugged. “Most of us tend to do it around midday, when the sun is at its strongest, but there’s no set time.” He reached out as though to take Ian’s hand, but Jesse’s warning hiss stopped him in his tracks. His eyes flashed with something dangerous, but he merely folded his hands in his lap. “You’ll need more than that for the first few days, if not weeks, as your body adjusts.” He shot a dirty look at Jesse. “When Jesse first turned, he used to spend hours in bed.” He didn’t add with me, but Jesse heard it all the same.

  Doing his best to ignore the memories that stirred up, Jesse raised a thought that had been going around in his head for a while. They weren’t going to like it, but it wouldn’t go away. “I think we should tell Raph as soon as he gets back.” Which would hopefully be very fucking soon.

  Three sets of eyes glared at him.

  “Are you insane?” Peter asked, eyes wide.

  “Fuck, Jesse, you’ve made me agree with Peter. I may never forgive you.” Lys pulled a face. “Seriously though, why would you want to do that?”

  Someone had to say it. “Eventually Ian is going to need a coven. He can’t stay locked in my room forever, and whether he wants to stay with us”—which Jesse very much doubted after this was all over—“or join a different one elsewhere, Raph is going to need to know.” That was assuming he didn’t find out before then.

  Peter scoffed. “Well, I vote for telling him at the last possible moment. You know how he feels about the agreement. He’ll report us both to the VLCD in a heartbeat.”

  “You don’t know that,” Jesse protested, even though he wasn’t sure himself. “If we tell him, maybe he can help us find a way out of this mess, because at some point Ian will be declared as missing, and with his best fucking friend being VLCD, the boys in black are going to get involved. And then what?”

  He watched Peter mull over their various options and knew what he was thinking the moment his gaze drifted to Ian. “We could stage his death.”

  Okay, maybe not what Jesse had thought but still . . . “What?”

  Peter gestured to him. “Well for all intents and purposes, he is dead. No breath, no pulse. We just need to get someone to pronounce him dead and job’s a good’un.” His gaze drifted to Lys. “If only we knew someone who could do that. Oh wait . . .”

  She rolled her eyes. “Don’t be ridiculous. I can say that he’s dead, but you need a doctor or, in this case, probably a forensic medical examiner to record the cause of death. This is a sudden death we’re talking about. These things need to be investigated. And last time I checked, we don’t have any coven members who are Medical Examiners.”

  “There goes that idea then.” Peter frowned, clearly put out by Lys’s quick dismissal.

  “I don’t want Cate and Blake to think I’m dead.” Ian barely got the words out before anoth
er yawn gripped him. “They already know about vampires. Can’t I just tell them?”

  “Blake Jones might be your best friend, Ian, but he’s also a VLCD officer. He’d be duty bound to inform them.”

  “What about just Cate?” Ian drew his bottom lip into his mouth, the tip of his fang drawing blood and he quickly let it go with a gasp. “Fuck, keep forgetting about those.”

  Lys laughed. “You’ll be able to control them better soon, let them down at your will instead of at your body’s.”

  Jesse couldn’t look away from the drop of blood on Ian’s lip. Wanted to lean over him and lick it off, then kiss him until both of them were desperate for more—

  “Jesse?”

  He looked away from Ian to find Lys staring at him, one eyebrow raised. “Sorry, what?”

  She glanced from Jesse to Ian, then back, slight smirk in place. “I asked what you thought about telling Cate?”

  “Oh.”

  She might have already known about vampires, but it was still a big risk. One Raph would never approve of, but then again, he wouldn’t approve of anything they were doing right then. “Would she be able to keep a secret like that from Blake?”

  Ian thought about it for a moment. “Not forever, but for a while she could.”

  “What’s our plan then?” Peter sat at the opposite end of the bed to Lys and looked at the other three. “Because I’m not getting locked in a VLCD cell for this.” He pointed a long, thin finger at Jesse. “You’re as much to blame for this as I am, so if you try and report me, I’m taking you down with me. And remember, all evidence points to you, not me.”

  Apart from Ian, Jesse didn’t add, but he didn’t need to.

  Peter’s gaze shifted to Ian. “And if you think you can sway them because Blake’s your BFF, think again. He’s their newest recruit. He has no say in what goes on yet. And they won’t trust you anymore, you’re not one of them, not some poor human who needs their protection. You’re a vampire. The enemy as far as they’re concerned. So you need to start thinking in terms of them and us.”

  Jesse hated it when Peter made sense. Hated having to agree with him.

  He reached for Ian’s hand, cheering inside when he let him take it. Jesse gave his fingers a squeeze that he hoped conveyed that Ian wasn’t on his own in this.

  And never would be again if it was up to Jesse.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Them and us.

  Peter’s words went round and round in his head, but Ian didn’t want to accept what he was saying.

  Would Cate and Blake see him differently now?

  Of course they will; you’re a fucking vampire!

  But he was still their best friend, right?

  Ian sat there as the others debated ways to get out of the mess they were in without one of them landing in vampire prison. He was all for Peter taking the blame for everything, but apart from Ian’s word, there was no evidence to support it, and if Jesse was right, then the VLCD might not listen to him anyway. Blake would though. Vampire or not, they’d been best friends for over fifteen years. They wouldn’t let a little thing like death come between them. Would they?

  Ian pictured Cate the last time he’d walked her to her car, eyes darting all over the place as though expecting to see a vampire any moment. Would she look at him with that same fear?

  The thought left a heavy feeling in his chest.

  But he had to try. He couldn’t bear the thought of them worrying about him, not knowing what had happened to him, even for a few days.

  He yawned again and this time he couldn’t even be bothered to cover his mouth. The others stopped talking and turned to look at him.

  “You can sleep if you want,” Jesse said softly, hand tightening around Ian’s.

  Ian looked down at their twined fingers and couldn’t remember when that had happened. He liked it though; Jesse’s touch was comforting. Whether that was messed up or not, Ian couldn’t be bothered to work out. He was knackered, his whole body aching like he’d run a marathon, and Jesse’s hand in his felt right, safe. “What if I tell Blake that I asked for it?” Ian struggled to get the words out, eyes already drifting closed.

  “To be a vampire?” Jesse asked, quickly followed by Peter’s scoff.

  “Obviously. What else would he be talking about?”

  Ian imagined Peter rolling his eyes. “Yes, that,” he mumbled. “Would that help?”

  “You’d do that?” Jesse sounded wholly unconvinced, but Ian was fading fast, couldn’t find the words to explain that however it had happened, he was stuck like this for . . . forever.

  He didn’t fancy his chances out there on his own, and these were the only vampires he knew. Seemed common sense to try and keep them from being taken away. Not Peter though. He didn’t give a fuck if he got arrested. “Yeah,” he said eventually, drifting off.

  Jesse’s voice lulled him to sleep and Ian gave in to the pull. The rest of them could sort it out between themselves. He was so done.

  IAN WOKE WITH a start.

  Though the room was dark, he could see just fine, and it took him a good few seconds to remember why that was.

  Fucking hell.

  Vampire.

  He lay there, trying not to freak out at the weird sensation of feeling panicked, but his heart remained still instead of hammering against his ribs.

  “You’re awake.” Jesse’s voice was soft in the quiet of the room, and Ian glanced over, following the sound. He sat in an armchair by the heavily curtained windows.

  “Have I slept all day?” Ian sat up, feeling disoriented. “And where are Lys and Peter?” Not that he expected them to sit around while he slept, but their absence made him wary. What had happened while he’d been out of it?

  Jesse stood and came to sit on the side of the bed. “No, you’ve not slept all day. It’s just after eleven in the morning. The windows are treated, I don’t need the curtains closed, but I didn’t want to scare you by having the sun blasting in here when you woke up.”

  “Thanks.” Ian stretched, his back making a satisfying crack. “Have I missed much?”

  “Not really.” Jesse focused on his fingers for a moment. “Did you mean what you said? About telling the VLCD that you asked to be changed?”

  “Yes.” Ian had been more than a little fuzzy when he’d said that, but that didn’t alter the fact that he’d meant it. “I don’t really give a fuck what happens to Peter because he’s a murdering bastard, but you . . .” He didn’t know how to articulate his feelings because they were a jumbled mess that made his head hurt when he tried to sort through them. “Fuck, I don’t know.” He gripped his hair, holding tight in an effort to ground himself. “I know it was you who changed me, but if you hadn’t, I’d be dead, lying in a hospital morgue right about now, and although this isn’t something I chose, it’s a hell of a lot better than being a corpse.”

  A hint of a smile teased Jesse’s mouth. “You called me a walking corpse not so long ago. Or words to that effect.”

  “I know. Sorry.” How had so much changed in so little time? “I’m not saying I’ve accepted this. I’m pretty sure I’m going to be all over the place for a while, but for now, I know you didn’t go into that alley to end my life.”

  “I didn’t, I swear.”

  “And I’m not sure if this is weird or wrong, but I liked you before all this, Jesse. I was gutted when you ended things.” As Ian said the words, memories flooded his mind, a little hazy, but there was no mistaking Jesse naked, crawling on top of him and making Ian beg for more. “But your reasons for doing it don’t exist anymore, do they?”

  “No, but—”

  “So there’s no reason we can’t pick up where we left off. Especially now that we have time to kill.” He leant over and reached for Jesse’s hand, sliding their palms together. As soon as their skin touched, something settled in Ian and he felt calmer, at ease in a way he hadn’t been since he’d woken up a vampire. “We fit.”

  “We do,” Jesse conceded. “B
ecause I was the one who changed you.”

  That sounded like a good thing, but Jesse’s expression didn’t match his words. Ian sensed a huge cock-blocking but coming his way. “But?” he prompted, not wanting to wait for it.

  “It’s not real. You’d have felt like this towards whoever had turned you.”

  Ian didn’t believe it. There’d been something building between them before all this had happened. Before Jesse had stopped it all with his good intentions. “I think you’re talking bollocks.”

  That startled a laugh out of Jesse, but he quickly went back to being serious. “When Peter changed me, I felt much the same.”

  Ian scoffed. “I doubt it.” Jesse had said they’d been involved, but Peter was a tosser, and with the way Jesse acted towards him, Ian couldn’t imagine them ever being close.

  “As much as I hate to admit it, Peter was there for me when I needed him.” Jesse grimaced as though the memories weren’t pleasant. “I wasn’t in a good place, and he helped me, made me feel . . . safe, accepted. He taught me how to be a vampire and live in this world.”

  Ian sensed there was a lot more to this story, and he doubted Peter was the shiny saviour Jesse was making him out to be. “What happened?” Ian asked, tugging on Jesse’s hand and urging him to sit next to him at the top of the bed.

  Jesse acquiesced and rested his back against the headboard. “It’s a long story.”

  “You said that.” Ian gestured around the room, smiling wryly. “It’s not like I have anywhere I need to be. And you’re my appointed babysitter, so . . .”

  “Fine.” Jesse still didn’t look too thrilled about the whole thing, but Ian could live with that. He needed the distraction. The last twenty-four hours felt surreal, and Ian wasn’t convinced it had all properly sunk in yet. Scratch that, he knew it hadn’t. Sometimes he felt on the edge of a total melt down, and if left to his own thoughts, it might hit him full force.

  So as uncomfortable as Jesse seemed, Ian needed him to talk, to keep his mind occupied.