Don't feed off them again, you're putting yourself and them in danger. Trust me on this one.
It's signed simply with a T.
I pocket the note, careful not to let Jase see it. Unfortunately, as we clear the crowd, Richard grabs my belt loop and pulls me to him, his fingers dip into my pocket and he pulls the sheet of paper free.
"Love letter?" I shake my head at his question. "Not a love letter, a warning. Alright out with it, what happened and who is T?"
"Torren, the guy I texted you about earlier. He's obviously not giving up easily. Think we should call the council and deal with him?"
I so desperately want to ask who the council are but when Richard growls out, "No and don't mention them again, not here." I wisely keep my mouth shut.
"Beautiful, there you are, I been looking everywhere for you." I'm suddenly pulled into a warm embrace, the vanilla scent fills my nose and despite being unsure of how to react, I inhale the scent deeply.
"What the fuck? We can't leave you alone for a second." Richard grabs my arm, trying to pull me free. "Let her go right now." Richard snaps at Derrin.
I stay frozen to the spot, too scared of causing a scene to move.
"Chill man, I'm Derrin, your sister's boyfriend."
"She's not my sister and you are not her boyfriend. Now let her go, we have a class to get to." Richard is livid, I push against Derrin's chest, he's forced back a couple of steps from the strength I use. Derrin's dark eyes narrow at me, his head cocked to the side in thought. I can’t help admiring his beauty as he studies me, I almost regret it when he suddenly snaps, "You're ditching me for him?" the pointed look he gives Jase is enough to make me feel defensive of Jason. It’s as though Derrin has deemed him unworthy in some way.
"She's not ditching anyone, she's only been here a few hours, there's no way you had enough time to ask her out and knowing someone only a few hours is not long enough to be touching her so freely." Jason snaps stepping in front of me. I shake my head, trying to clear it of the haze being in Derrin's arms put me in, but it lingers along with that vanilla scent. There's something about him that is drawing me to him, but I can't figure out what.
"Fine, don't want to get involved with a cop's kid anyway." Derrin snaps slipping through the door to the gym hall.
"Explain." Both Jase and Richard say at the same time.
"It's nothing, he's just a guy I met this morning." I say, directing my words to Richard. “Or rather last Friday night at the bonfire party.” I correct realising I’ve known him longer than just today. Richard nods once, but I know he's going to grill me over this later. Richard and Jase start moving again and I follow behind them.
I know I'm supposed to be calling him Char but when he gets all bossy like this, I can't help thinking of him as the cop, Richard. It's almost like he has two different personalities at times. Char the sweet guy who wants to try to be my friend and Richard, the cop who likes to boss me around. Of course, he also has the personality that likes to take over after I've fed on him, the one that gets all hot and heavy at a moment’s notice. Damn it all, I'm looking forward to the next time I feed off him.
I can't wait to see if he'll kiss me again, or even if he'll take things further and finally admit that he likes me.Of course, I still can't be sure whether or not it's just the bond forming that makes him feel that way.With that thought my feet stop moving and I stand there staring after both him and Jase.
"You're starting to see why we don't feed from humans, aren't you?" I jump at the sound of Torren's voice in my ear.
"Would you quit creeping up on me." I toss the words over my shoulder as I start jogging to catch up with Jase and Char.
"No, if you were properly trained you wouldn't be so jumpy all the time, not to mention..." He trails off as we reach the rest of the health class. "This conversation will have to be continued at lunch, sweetheart." He whispers in my ear.
Fifteen
Jason
“Char, I can’t do this.”
“Do what?”
“Have you seen the way every guy in here is looking at her?” I nod my head to draw his attention to Rose, another guy has approached her but she’s not even responding to him. If we were anywhere else I would have pulled her away by now but Richard wants us to keep our cover and grown ass men shouldn’t beat up stupid teens for hitting on their girl.A girl, I mean she’s not ours. Fuck I’m screwed.
“They’re just kids, she’s not interested. See that’s twice now she’s been approached and just brushed them off. She’ll be fine.”
“Twice?” I snap, I didn’t see the first one. “When was this?”
“About five minutes ago, chill, she’s fine.” Just as he says that another guys approaches Rose, leaning far too close to her for both our comfort. Richard’s fists clench at his side and I give him a “really?” look which he just shrugs off. The coach yells for the guys to gather round him and Richard and I move along with the rest of the masses.
“Keep your eyes on the coach, something’s off about him.” I nod but don’t otherwise respond.Focus Jase, you’re here to find a murderer not to obsess over Rose.
The female coach tells the girls to run laps while the male coach has us guys working out on the gym equipment. About half way through the hour-long class, I see Richard eyeing Rose off again, she’s running laps around the other girls and more than one guy is watching her instead of working out. I don’t know how Richard does it, I want to punch the lot of them, yet he’s as calm as can be.