Undone (The Guardians Book 1)

by Jessica Roe

  Cadby and Sacha had grown up together at Yarmac & Bogely's, before Terelle had been in charge. Sacha' mind was one of the very few that Cadby had been unable to read, which for Cadby, had made Sacha the ideal friend.

  She smiled with relief and peeled off the worn, brown leather jacket—Sacha's worn, brown leather jacket, his most prized possession—and held it out to Cadby. Although Sacha's scent had long worn off, everything about the jacket screamed Sacha to Gable. Almost every memory she had of him, he was wearing it, and he had loved the stupid thing so much. His energy had surrounded it so often that it had left imprints, and it was what Cadby used when trying to focus on Sacha's actual energy, to find out where he was.

  “Let's try something different this time,” Cadby suggested. “Let's you and me try blending our energies together. It's obvious I can't find him on my own, despite how awesome I am, but maybe if we tried together...”

  Hope bloomed. “You think we might get a result?”

  He shrugged. “Maybe. Sacha was closer to you than anyone. Your spirits were entwined.”

  “Entwined?”

  “Whenever I saw you together, your spirits were always wrapped around each other, constantly moving in tune, twisting, turning. Brighter.”

  “And when we're apart?”

  “They're dimmer.”

  “What does this mean?”

  He smiled reassuringly at her, sensing her fears, or seeing them in her mind, or whatever else it was that made him so...Cadby. “It's not uncommon, for people who love each other deeply. Some people might call you soulmates.”

  She squirmed uncomfortably and tightened her grip on Sacha's jacket. “It wasn't...I mean, we didn't...It wasn't like that with us. We were just—”

  “Friends,” he finished, his mouth twitching. “Yeah, I heard that from Sacha a million times. Trust me, I didn't need to be able to read his thoughts to know exactly how he felt about you. Just friends...pah!”

  It wasn't the first time somebody had commented on her relationship with Sacha. Truth was, she never knew how to answer, because their relationship was just far too complex to even put into words. They'd gotten by fine for years without defining things. “Stop referring to him in past tense,” she demanded sullenly, choosing to ignore the other thing.

  “Okay, try wearing the jacket,” Cadby said, back to business.

  She slipped her arms back inside and sat down opposite Cadby on the soft, grassy ground. Folding herself into the lotus position, she closed her eyes, waiting.

  She felt Cadby take her hands. “Clear your mind,” he said softly, “and now focus on your energy.”

  Because she wasn't an Outcast, she couldn't manifest her energy into physical form, but Cadby had taught her years before how to see it in her mind. She breathed deeply and concentrated, and she could almost feel the energy surrounding her body like a soft, comforting layer. It was a white light, except when she looked deeper within herself, it wasn't truly white at all. It was made up of many different colours, all coming together to form what appeared to be a beautiful, shining white.

  “Good work. Can you feel my energy?” Cadby asked. She nodded. It was different to hers. A powerful mass of colours that whipped around him like a vortex. “Merge your energy with mine, and concentrate on Sacha. I'll do the rest...”

  GABLE HAD BEEN living on and off—mainly on—the streets for almost a year before she met Sacha. Although, met was probably the wrong way to put it. Stalked by maybe more appropriate.

  It had been getting late and night had fallen. The sky was at its darkest, and though the city never slept, the dirty streets Gable paced were quiet, almost empty. She had just been wondering where she could find a place to crash for the night when she heard the steady pound of footsteps behind her. Living rough had made her cautious, paranoid, and after a while she was sure she was being followed. She took random turns, and the stalker followed, she sped up, they sped up, she slowed down, and so did they. Even before living on the streets, when Gable had been ditzy and over trusting, she'd have known that being followed when alone at night very rarely led to anything good. She was no longer ditzy and over trusting, and she knew that most of the time, her only options were fight or flight.

  She'd never been all that fast at running.

  She had, however, become pretty frikkin' nifty with her little fists, and had a tendency to act without thinking through the consequences first, which was the only explanation she had for turning around and slugging the stalkery ass right in the face.

  But the stalkery ass was quick—very quick—and dodged her second fist. She was surprised, and the momentum of her punch carried her forwards, knocking them both to the ground. Shock stunned her for a couple of seconds, and then she recognized that the body she lay on top of was very large and decidedly male, and the freaked out girl in her began to attack every inch of him she could reach with her fists and her nails. He rolled them over so that he was on top of her and pinned her fists above her head. Pure, unadulterated fear washed over her in hot and cold waves. Her heart pounded ridiculously fast, her eyes watered, and every self defence technique she'd taught herself vanished into some dark part of her mind.

  “I won't hurt you,” Stalkery Ass promised quickly. His voice was low and super deep and he sounded desperate, like he needed her to believe that he was being honest. “I just wanted you to stop hitting me. I think you made me bleed,” he said, as if he expected her to feel sorry for him or something. He touched his bottom lip with the tip of his tongue. “Yep, see? Blood.”

  Gable stopped squirming underneath him and looked up into his eyes—clear, beautiful blue, like the sky at noon—and he seemed so genuine that for a moment, she almost believed him. She hated herself for that, and she hated herself for wanting to believe him. It was that kind of naïve bullshit that got a girl butchered and baked into homeless hussy pie.

  It had been such a long time since she'd trusted anyone, and she was exhausted. Truly exhausted.

  But not enough to be an idiot. “Well I'm not hitting you now. Get the hell off me!”

  He rolled off her immediately and scrambled to his feet, holding out a hand to help her up. She studied it for a moment; it was so big that it probably could have encompassed both of hers. Ignoring it, she stood on her own.

  “What are you even doing out here so late at night?” he questioned accusingly. “Why aren't you at home? It's not safe out here.”

  Ironic that she was being lectured on safety by the stalkery ass who'd stalked her ass.

  Despite how the guy was a freakin' giant—at least a foot taller than Gable—Stalkery Ass wasn't as old as she'd originally assumed. In fact, he couldn't have been more than a couple of years older than her; eighteen or nineteen at the most. He was crazy beautiful, though he looked run down and kind of scrappy—in the same way that she looked run down and kind of scrappy. His dark brown hair was in need of a trim and was messy and sticking up all over the place, but his nose was straight and his pink lips were thick and turned up at the corners. His brown leather jacket looked old and worn, and his jeans were just a little bit too tight—but in a really nice, though probably not intentional, way.

  But the thing was, beautiful guys were just as dangerous as the ugly ones. Maybe even more so.

  “I don't have a home,” she answered flippantly, kicking her tattered tennis shoe against the ground like her admission didn't bother her. She tucked her hair behind her ear. It had grown since she'd first cut it all off and it almost reached her collar bone, but she still kept it dark.

  “Neither do I,” he said quietly. “I'm alone too.”

  She whipped her head up and glared furiously into his bright eyes. “Who said I'm alone?”

  “Aren't you?”

  Some stupid part of her wanted to ask him why he didn't have a home, why he was on the streets, where his parents were...why he was alone. But she didn't, because then he would think that she cared, and if there was one thing that Gable couldn't afford to do, it was
care about somebody. Caring led to trouble. “Leave me alone.”

  “I'm Sacha,” he announced, before she could turn to leave. “Sacha Vaughan.”

  “What kind of a dumb ass just goes around telling total strangers their full name?” She batted away his outstretched hand.

  He smiled at her reaction, and damn it if he didn't have a frikkin' dimple. Gable had always been partial to dimples. “This kind of dumb ass, I guess. What's your name?”

  “Okay, the way you're looking at me right now all hopeful and waiting because you actually think I'm gonna tell you my name proves that you're insane.” He didn't seem offended by her rudeness. In fact, the corners of his eyes wrinkled with amusement, which only served to piss Gable off. “Later, weirdo.”

  “Wait!” he called as she walked away. When she didn't stop, he hurried after her until he was walking by her side. With his long legs, it wasn't at all hard for him to keep up with her. “Come on, I'm sorry. Friendliness obviously offends you. I'll be mean, I promise.” He was grinning at her so charmingly that if she'd still been Gabrielle, she would have fallen for it. Instead, she blew out a noisy breath and continued to walk. “Look,” he said, suddenly serious. “We're both alone so...maybe we could hang out or somethin'?”

  Gable stopped. “Why were you following me?”

  “I dunno.” He faced her and shrugged. “I saw you walking and you looked lonely, and I guess I wanted to know why. So what do you think?”

  “About what?”

  “About being lonely together. Maybe if we spent time together, we wouldn't be so lonely any more. Maybe...maybe I could take care of you?”

  Sacha's vulnerability made her warm, and she made sure to scoff extra hard because of it. “Seriously, you should go away now before I accidentally punch you in the nuts.”

  But he didn't go away, and he managed to avoid her fists when she went through with her threat. He followed her around for the rest of the night until she gave up finding a roof to sleep under and curled up on a park bench, shivering as a light rain began to fall. Too tired to tell him no, she let him lay down next to her and wrap her body up in his warm leather jacket. Pressed up against him from head to toe, she skipped right past awkward and instead found herself grateful to be cocooned within his strong arms. All she had to do was try to forget how broad his shoulders were, how hard his chest was underneath her cheek, how good his large, calloused hands felt on her waist. Sacha smelt like rain and man and of the bar of soap she found inside his pocket. It was nice, comforting, and oddly sexy.

  “What's your name?” he asked sleepily, obviously as used to ignoring the rain as she was.

  She hesitated only a moment. “Gable...Xanders.” Her full name; she must have been more tired than she realized. Yeah, that was the reason.

  After that night, there wasn't anything Gable could do to shake Sacha, and God did she try. He was faster than she was, so running was out of the question. She tried to sneak away while he slept, but he always found her, a triumphant grin on his face. She cursed at him, yelled at him to go away, threw things at him, but her fiery temper only seemed to amuse him. He'd smile his stupid-sexy-annoying smirk at her whenever she called him a dick, or stroke her hair away from her face when she flipped him the bird, or kiss the sensitive spot on her neck underneath her ear whenever she got all pissy and grumpy—which was often.

  He wouldn't leave her, and she despised him for that.

  And then...she kind of didn't. In fact, she realized that maybe she liked having him around. Maybe she even liked his crooked smile, and the way that when he sat next to her he'd press his knee against hers when he thought she wasn't paying attention, and even how he wanted to protect her. And maybe she even loved the way he was so friendly and open, but only with her. When they were around other people, Sacha became quiet, withdrawn, sullen, brooding. With his large frame and rugged appearance, he was intimidating when he scowled, and other people avoided him. Not that he cared. He'd be tense and alert, his cautious eyes always searching for trouble until they landed on Gable and they'd soften. The only time he ever seemed to let himself fully relax was when it was just the two of them.

  Gable was no longer alone. Sacha had stormed into her life and wrapped himself around every part of her, and it was okay. Having someone to care about didn't make her weak, or stupid, or afraid.

  But only a couple of weeks after they'd met, Sacha grabbed up his ratty rucksack and announced that he was leaving. For good. He'd been glowering and morose all day, getting steadily worse as the hours passed.

  “Why?” she demanded, her harsh tone at odds to how she was really feeling—small and scared and idiotic for thinking he was different than every other jack ass she'd ever met.

  “Because I'm dangerous to be around,” he said stiffly, refusing to look her in the eye. He was acting like the Sacha she saw in public, not the Sacha he was when they were alone. “I never should've involved myself in your life in the first place. It was dumb and selfish, and now I'm leaving.” And then he hoisted his bag onto his shoulder and left her standing alone on the street.

  It took Gable thirty devastated seconds to remember that she wasn't the same dumb little cheerleader who ran away in tears when a boy rejected her. Clenching her fists, she chased after Sacha, refusing to be tossed aside like dirty laundry.

  “You think meeting me was dumb?” She was forced to take two steps for each one of his—damn his long legs.

  “Don't twist my words, Gable.” He didn't slow down.

  “You can't do this! You can't just stalk me for two weeks until I get used to you and then screw me over and leave! What's with that?”

  He stopped suddenly and turned to her, his eyes practically glowing with anger. Gable wasn't sure if it was directed at her or himself. “Did you just miss the part where I told you I'm dangerous? Do you have a death wish or something? No sense of self preservation?”

  “Oh right, so now you're not only dangerous, you're deadly, too?” she asked sarcastically. “Let me guess, you're in the Mafia? No wait, you're a serial killer? Or are you carrying a flesh eating zombie virus?”

  “Don't be dense, Gable.” He started walking again.

  “Don't call me dense, you ass! And stop walking away from me and tell me what your deal is!”

  He growled in frustration, nervously eyeing other pedestrians. “Drop it, please.”

  “No.”

  “You are so damned stubborn!”

  He grabbed her wrist and pulled her down an empty alleyway, stopping in the middle so they could have some privacy. It was dark down there, but Gable could still see the grey sky at the opening.

  He pushed her against the brick wall and gripped her shoulders. “You want to know why I'm bad for you, Gable? You really want to know? Because once I tell you, there's no going back.”

  She swallowed hard. He was entirely serious. “Tell me.”

  “God, I didn't want to do this with you.” He closed his eyes and stepped back, releasing her shoulders. “I'm a Werewolf.”

  SHE WAITED A beat. And then punched him in the face. “Son of a bitch! Why can't you just be serious with me?”

  He used the back of his wrist to wipe away the small trickle of blood from underneath his nose and then snatched up her hand, placing it against his heart. She could feel it pounding under the fabric of his grey t-shirt. “Feel how fast it beats, faster than average? It's like that all the time. And haven't you ever wondered why I feel so warm, even when we're sleeping outside? Or why I'm so fast, or strong? Or why I could find you whenever you ran off—I followed your scent. I'm a Werewolf, Gable.” He shook his head when she tried to interrupt. “When I first saw you on the street that night, all I wanted to do was take care of you and keep you safe. Don't you see how ironic that is? I was crazy to think I could ever look after you when the thing you need protecting from the most is me. I'm the deadliest thing out there, Gable, and trust me when I say that there are a lot of things out there that you have no idea about.”


  He sounded so sincere, and Gable couldn't figure out whether he was just bat shit crazy or the greatest liar she'd ever met. “That's really the story you're going with?” she asked quietly, her heart breaking just a little bit. She pulled her hand away from his chest.

  “Yes,” he answered without hesitation. “Because it's the truth. And in...” He glanced down at the watch on his wrist. “one hour and forty eight minutes, the sun will set and the moon will rise and I will turn, whether you believe me or not. I can't control myself as a wolf so I need to get away from you now because I want you to be safe and I...have things to do.”

  And then he really did leave.

  Leaning against the wall, Gable digested everything he'd said. It was insane, of course. He was insane. So why couldn't she let him go?

  He had to be lying, acting crazy to get rid of her. Maybe he had a girlfriend. Not that they'd done anything cheat worthy, but perhaps he was feeling guilty for spending so much time with her? Or maybe he wasn't really homeless? Was it possible he was just a runaway, angry with his parents for not buying him a new car or for grounding him, but he'd gotten fed up with life on the streets and was going home to his warm, comfy bed?

  Could she really believe that everything he'd ever told her was a lie?

  She knew one thing—she sure as shit wasn't going to believe that in an hour and a half, the guy she'd spent two whole weeks with, twenty four hours a day, was going to sprout fur and a tail and fangs.

  “Aw, man,” she moaned, already knowing what she was going to do.

  She edged out of the alleyway. It wasn't hard to find Sacha, he was at least a couple of inches taller than most people, so his dark head was easy to spot through the crowds.

  In a twisted role reversal, she followed him as he paced through the city with his stupid long legs for over an hour, seeming to have no destination in mind.