by Mikayla Lane
“Mmmmm… good morning my love.” Jess smiled as she snuggled her back closer to Amun’s chest and tried not to think about what she needed to do today. She just wanted a few moments with him where she didn’t have to think about the day of the mating ceremony. It was starting to seem like the weight of all the secrets and lies were going to crush her… or Amun’s love for her.
Amun knew immediately when her mind turned from their embrace to her own troubled thoughts. She stiffened imperceptibly in his arms, and her beautiful eyes clouded as if she was in pain.
“Jess, will you please trust me enough to tell me what is bothering you? Do you wish to wait before we are joined together?” Amun sat up and gently rolled her, over so he could look into her eyes when she answered him.
Jess couldn’t bring herself to look into his eyes and stared at a spot on his forehead instead, as she gave him a weak smile. “Everything is fine. I’m just nervous like any other bride would be days before their wedding.”
Unable to bear staying in bed with him while lying to him like this, Jess got up and covered herself with her robe, feeling suddenly self-conscious.
Amun felt her lies like a knife through his heart. How could he go through with the ceremony when he knew something about it was bothering her so much? Had she changed her mind and was afraid to tell him? Before he could ask, she interrupted his thoughts.
“I’m going to get a shower; do you mind getting Lily ready this morning for me and take her to class? I’m supposed to meet some of the girls. There’s still so much to do before the big day!” Jess tried to sound excited, but she was afraid she sounded more like a strangling mouse.
She peeked nervously at him when he still didn’t respond to her question and saw him looking at her with sad eyes that broke her heart. Pulling herself together as much as she could, she summoned up a brighter smile and walked over to him, put her arms around his waist and hugged him.
“I love you so much, Amun.” She whispered as she fought back the tears that threatened to spill as he gently stroked her back.
“I love you too, Amalaya. Of course, I’ll take care of Lily this morning.” Amun could hear the catch in her voice as she spoke and knew that whatever she was keeping from him was hurting her as much as it was him.
“Jess, if you’d rather wait for us to be joined…” He couldn’t stop himself from starting to ask her before she cut him off.
“No Amun, don’t you ever think that! I want nothing more than to be yours forever. I’m just a little sad, but it has nothing to do with you. Please believe that.” Jess had leant back to stare into his sad, dark eyes and wished more than anything that she could pour her heart out to him. However, she couldn’t.
“Jess, please just tell me what bothers you. Whatever it is we can get through it together. If you’ll trust me…” Amun let the sentence hang, unsure how to go on. If it wasn’t about him, then what could be bothering her so much? What could she possibly be afraid to talk to him about?
“Amun… I’m just a little sad about a lot of things right now. Stupid things. Nothing I want to talk about right now; especially not when I’m going to be late to meet the girls. They’ve become downright militant about this ceremony.” Jess tried to laugh about it as she stepped out of Amun’s arms and began gathering together clothes, but Amun could see through her façade.
He watched as she disappeared into the adjoining bathroom and vowed to have a private chat with Maggie at some point today to see if she would tell him what was wrong with Jess. His decision made, he made his way down the short hallway into Lily’s room to get her ready for her classes with the other children.
Jess took a deep breath to stop the urge to break down and sob as soon as she shut the bathroom door. She quickly began running the water and set the temperature, entering the water as soon as it was ready.
She allowed the hot water to sluice down her back and relax her muscles a little; her mind racing with ideas. Everything led back to the same solution. The one she dreaded the most. The one she knew she had to do.
Slowly, she began resigning herself to her decision, knowing it was the right thing to do. She needed to harden herself enough to keep the others from finding out she was up to something and forced herself to bury some of her emotions deep enough to do what she had to. She’d had years of practice burying her true emotions; she could do it again.
*****
Reven laid on his back; a sheet tucked loosely around his waist and stared at the ceiling deep in thought. Something was wrong. He knew it… he could feel it. He ran through every part of his conversation with Jax over and over in his head and still couldn’t figure out what he was missing. Nevertheless, he knew he was missing something; he had no doubt about it. She was deliberately hiding something from him; he could tell by her body language.
He’d spent so much time just watching her, her easy smile for the other women and the little ones, her grudging respect for some of the other warriors when they sparred; the way her distrust of all the Valendran’s showed in the slight tightening of her mouth and the tick in the vein in her neck whenever she was near one of them. Including him.
It was his knowledge of her normal body expressions that told him that she wasn’t necessarily lying to him, but she was keeping something very important from him. And he was determined to find out what it was.
Feeling a burst of energy he sat up and grabbed his scanner. After entering in his person access code, he flipped through his personal files until he came to the video of the meeting he’d just had with Jax. Against protocol, he’d recorded it, why he didn’t know, but at this point he was glad he did.
He watched with fascination the unspoken exchanges between Jax and Gibly when his back was turned to the whiteboard; and saw (to his embarrassment) when she, and Gibly knew when Ivint and Banatar were coming down the hallway towards the conference room and how oblivious he had been to their presence behind him.
He spent hours watching the video, ready to kick himself when he had to keep restarting it and paying attention to her body movements instead of her gorgeous body. He had to keep stopping himself from staring at the way the fuzzy pink pants molded so perfectly to her round bottom when she stretched to write on the board; which flawlessly distracted him from what appeared to be subtle hand (or should he say hand and paw) signals between Jax and Gibly during certain parts of the conversation.
Turning up the volume, he forced himself to stop staring at her body while he replayed the video again and again until the reality of what was truly going on rocked him. His mind immediately began making the connections between certain movements and behaviors; he'd seen recently filling in the blanks of the puzzle in his mind.
He sat back roughly against the wall as the ramifications of what he knew ran through his mind. He knew what was going to happen. He knew what the real plan was now. Now he had to decide if he would trust the beautiful but angry female, and the truly brilliant plan that she had already set in motion or create a plan around hers to make sure she wasn’t working with the traitor. Even though he didn’t know the entire specifics of her plan, he knew that he could easily adapt an alternative plan based on what he did know.
Before he could really think about it, he began detailing what he needed to do. If Jax was truly working in the best interests of their people, then his plan would give additional support to hers. If she was working with the traitor, then she would be taken down with the traitor.
He sighed as he rubbed his burning eyes; he’d been up way too long. He felt better now that he had a counter plan in place, but the thought of Jax working with the traitor twisted him up in knots inside. He couldn’t help but admire her inner strength, the way her brilliant mind worked. He snorted out a short laugh and shook his head against the wall.
“Oh hell! That freaking woman is going to drive me insane!” He screamed into his own head. Too tired… he was way too tired right now to try to figure out the devious little warrior’s plan within a plan; and
why she wanted him to figure out what she was doing.
He had a few days before the ceremony, so he had plenty of time to figure out what she was doing; right now, he needed some sleep.
Laying back down on his bed, he still tossed and turned for several more hours before finally drifting off into an exhausted sleep.
Chapter Fifteen
Amun was more nervous than he’d ever been in his life. It was much more than the fact that he was an hour away from the mating ceremony with Jess. In fact, that was the only thing he wasn’t the least bit nervous about.
As much as Jess had tried to pretend, nothing was wrong for the last few days, Amun had known. She couldn’t hide the glimmer of sadness in her eyes from him. They had originally agreed to the earth tradition that the bride not sleep with the groom the week of the wedding. However, every night, Jess had found her way into his bed and made love to him with a fierceness she’d never shown before. Even in her sleep she clutched at him as if afraid to lose him somehow.
Amun knew that they were probably going to use this day to try to capture the traitor, hell it made sense that the traitor would use today to plan something big thinking they were distracted. The slight movements of his fellow Valendrans and the female warriors also did not go unnoticed; and the tension in the air had become so thick you could almost taste it.
He may have chosen the field of medicine, but that was after warrior training as was the custom among his people; and the warrior in him knew something was wrong, and it involved his mate. His beast had stalked beneath the surface roaring at him all morning that he needed to go to his mate, but he’d pushed back. He needed to wait.
Whatever was going to happen, everyone else was itching and ready for; the problem with that was that it was much easier for accidents to happen when everyone was over anxious. If he did anything drastic, he could cause a chain reaction that could get someone killed. Instead, he packed an emergency field kit and hid it in a pocket of his uniform pants, quickly followed by an assortment of weapons and other medical devices until his pockets were packed as if for battle. The only thing he was missing was his sidearm, which was hidden in his boot.
He stood at the front of the dining hall, waiting with dozens of others for the ceremony to begin as people slowly came in as they came off duty or woke up and got cleaned up. He’d woodenly smiled and accepted the enthusiastic congratulations from everyone when they came into the room, his eyes scanning them for what… he wasn’t sure. However, he looked for something anyway.
Most of all he kept a close eye on Reven; he had to know what was going on, he was tense, fully armed and constantly talking to someone on a private comm. No one else seemed to notice the casually attired, yet armed warriors carefully stationed around the only open entrance into or out of the dining hall, but Amun counted five.
Reven stopped talking into the private comm for a moment and turned catching sight of Amun. Reven’s eyes immediately took in the pockets of his uniform pants, looking into Amun’s eyes he gave him all the answer he needed; with a slight nod of his head, he turned and left the room. Amun ran after him.
Without thinking he took off down the hallways, following Reven as they dodged past dozens of figures in white dresses with white veils over their heads all going in the direction of the dining hall. Amun knew that none of them were Jess; Reven would take him to Jess.
*****
Jess was so nervous she’d been on the verge of vomiting all morning long. She knew she had to do this; and inside she felt strong enough, tough enough to go through with it. But her hands still wouldn’t stop shaking, and her stomach was still doing flip flops. She nodded at Maggie, who was dressed in a plain white shift dress with a veil over her head.
“Come Lily, give Jess a kiss, and we’ll go with Tarvok to wait for her like we planned. Remember, no talking.” Maggie led Lily over to her and Lily immediately ran into her arms for a hug. Jess held her little body close and squeezed her tightly, breathing in the clean scent of her baby shampoo. Jess fought her tears as she sat Lily back down on the floor and kneeled down so that she would be eye level with the little girl.
“You remember what we talked about right? Can you do this for me? It’s just a little joke on Tarvok and Amun. I’ll be in there soon.” Jess brushed the hair out of Lily’s face. Lily didn’t look happy at all; her lower lip stuck out; she wouldn’t meet Jess’s eyes, and she still wouldn’t answer. Jess looked nervously up at Maggie, who was waiting to take Lily to the dining hall.
“Lily, I know you’re upset because we changed things a little, but we really don’t have time to discuss it right now we need to go, or we’ll be late.” Maggie tugged the little girl reluctantly to the door, but Lily turned around and ran back to Jess giving her another hug.
“I love you.” Lily said as she held Jess tightly.
“I love you too. I’ll be with you again soon. Now go on.” Jess gave Lily an encouraging smile and pushed her gently towards Maggie.
“Jess, are you sure?” Tara asked nervously wringing her hands in front of her.
Maggie and Lily waited by the door while Jess walked over to Tara and gently squeezed her hands.
“I’m very sure. I need you to go now before Tarvok gets curious. Go!” Jess smiled as she shooed Tara towards the door and hid behind a closet door while they went outside. Jess heard what must have been a brief exchange with Tarvok before their voices trailed off down the hallway.
Squaring her shoulders she walked over to the full-length mirror and pulled the veil down over her face and tried to gather her courage. This was it.
She walked out of the door and turned the opposite way from the dining hall, knowing the exact path she needed to travel. It wasn’t until she’d almost reached the east entry that she felt someone behind her; nervously, she picked up her pace, determined not to turn around and see who was behind her.
“Jess, wait! Please!” Jess’s heart nearly sank to her knees when she heard Lily’s voice behind her.
Turning around, she saw Lily running to catch up to her. She’d barely caught the little girl as she flung herself into Jess’s arms.
“Honey, you have to go back! Please! Go to Amun now!” Jess told her as she set her back down on the floor.
“But Jess…” Lily began before she was interrupted.
“Ladies, I don’t think either of you should be here. I’ll escort you back to the others.” Jess glanced up as a tall Valendran she’d seen many times before walked up to them.
“Hi Atane!” Lily greeted him as he stopped in front of them.
“Hi Lily. Come we must go now before someone worries.” Atane reached down and touched Lily’s arm to turn her around when he was thrown back slightly by a shock. Shaking his head, he just stood there for a moment stunned, while Jess grabbed Lily and looked around the hallway for someone who may have shot at the Valendran. There was no one there.
“Jess why did my arm bands shock Atane?” Lily’s innocent question rattled Jess, and she brought shocked eyes up to meet Atane’s. The flashing of his eyes momentarily froze Jess to the spot, until Lily looked up at her with her big blue eyes.
“Lily, you need to run. Now! Run to Amun!” Jess shoved the little girl towards the hallway past Atane a little more roughly than she intended.
“No Lily, you should stay with me and let me get you and Jess both to safety.” Atane countered through gritted teeth, not taking his angry eyes off of Jess.
Lily looked between Jess and Atane with a confused look on her face for a moment before she began slowly sliding along the wall past Atane.
“Let her go. She’s just a little girl. She’d only slow you down.” Jess said, desperately trying to distract him from Lily’s escape as she moved closer to him.
Just when Jess thought Lily would get away, he reached out and grabbed her at the last second; grabbing her violently around the upper arm. The sizzling flash could be heard loudly before Atane hit the wall with a resounding thud.
“Run
Lily! Run! Go get help!” Jess screamed at Lily, running over to the little girl; she shoved her down the hallway while Atane struggled to get up.
She waited until Lily was out of sight before turning back to Atane, by then it was too late. He grabbed her by the upper arm hard enough that she knew she’d have a nasty bruise from it.
“I’ll get her later. You and I have somewhere to be, so let’s go. And if you try anything I have orders to kill you right where you stand.” The angry glint in his rapidly changing eyes terrified Jess into compliance as, he pulled her roughly towards the east entry.
*****
Reven cursed under his breath as, he, and Amun dodged all the women and little girls all dressed in the exact same white dress and veil. It was slowing them down as they tried to get past them in the hallways. Damn that woman! He didn't expect her to use the others as a distraction like this. The only good thing was that if they didn’t know which one was Jess, maybe the traitor wouldn’t either. Which was obviously Jax’s intention. And with Amun by his side, he knew Jess would call out to him the moment, she saw him.
Reven was taking a big chance, but with all the little surprises Jax had thrown into this plan, he was short of time and tired of scrambling to try to keep up with her antics. The trickle of women going through the hallways had slowed down enough for them to pick up their pace, as Reven led them to the only place where he knew there was an intentional hole in the plan.
He said a quick prayer as he threw open the east entry door and slid to a startled stop right next to Jax. He turned just in time to stop Amun from charging across the short bridge.
“Hold yourself together warrior! We need calm and thought right now!” Reven growled sharply at Amun, using far more effort than he wanted to admit trying to hold the man back.