Journey 'The Chosen One Trilogy: Book Two' (41 page)

“A combination of all of
them.”

She turned her attention to me and
started crying. “Did they…did they…”

I shook my head and tears welled in my
eyes. Of all of us, Shay was the only one who had no combat
experience and though she had been told of how things were in
Quelondain, knowing about something and actually seeing it were
completely different. She took a deep breath, wiped the tears from
her eyes and looked at Shawn as though she was seeing him in a
completely different light.

Shawn watched her closely and I saw
worry flit across his face before being replaced by relief when she
came to him and wrapped her arms around him. He kissed the top of
her head.

Ben grabbed a broken chair and started
carrying it out to the horse trailer that was backed right up to
the front door. Tara and I grabbed our own and followed suit.
Jasper and Shawn moved the bodies of the men.

When everything was in the trailer we
grabbed buckets of soapy water and washed the blood that was
covering most of the dining room.

“Hun, you’re bleeding.” The cut on his
back had reopened and the blood had soaked through the
bandage.

He stopped and smiled at me. “So are
you.”

I followed his gaze to my side. The
puncture wound had soaked the bandage enough that the blood was
showing through my tank top. “There’s no point in worrying about it
now. Let’s get this done first.”

He kissed my forehead. “You’re feeling
alright?”

I nodded. “That wasn’t my energy I
pushed into him. I have no idea where it came from.” Actually, for
some reason I couldn’t explain, I was feeling more than alright. I
knew it was a normal thing for me to feel sexual after a tense
situation like this, but what I was feeling was almost
overpowering. It was taking everything I had not to drag Jasper
upstairs so I could have my way with him. I let him get just a hint
of what I was feeling and looked into his eyes.

He looked around at everyone cleaning
the room and gave a low groan that only I could hear. I felt
everything in me tighten at the noise.

“Alright. I think that’s it.” Tara came
to stand by us. “We’d better get that trailer out of here before
someone says something.”

Jasper cleared his throat and
nodded.

Tara, Ben, Shay and Shawn jumped into
his truck and Jasper and I got into ours. He had pulled on a black
t-shirt that made his eyes look even paler than usual. Kip gave an
excited bark from the box of the truck and we were off.

We drove directly to the back of
Shawn’s field and unloaded everything into a pile. Shay made a
point of not looking at the bodies. Ben dumped a can of gasoline on
it all and threw the match at it. We all sat on the ground and
watched as wood and flesh burned.

I leaned back against Jasper, careful
not to push too hard. “Is that ok?”

He pulled me closer to him. His smell
engulfed me and I closed my eyes. It reminded me of my first night
in Quelondain when he had fought three Majs to keep me safe. I had
woken in his arms thinking there had to be only one man alive who
could smell so good after sweating and bleeding.

I moved his arm off of my shoulder and
put it around my waist to get it off of one of my cuts.

“Sorry.” His voice was just a
whisper.

I leaned my head back against him and
closed my eyes. “How do you think Shay is doing?” She had gone to
sit in the truck.

“I think she’s tough.”

I nodded. “She is. Remember how she
took the news that Shawn was from a different world and could shift
into a lion?”

“She’ll be fine.”

“I’ve been thinking about the energy.
Could it be what the Gysp was telling Marilynn about? My
curse?”

He thought about it for a moment. “That
might actually make some sense.”

Tara glanced over at us. “Why don’t you
guys head back to the house and take care of those cuts? We’ll make
sure everything burns properly.”

Ben nodded and looked back to the
flames.

“Alright.” Jasper stood and helped me
up. “Keep an eye out. They may not have been the only
ones.”

Tara patted her bow and arrow on the
ground.

We drove back to the house and made our
way to the bathroom.

“We’ll stop at that Friendly’s
Furniture on our way back and buy a new dining room set.” I took my
jacket off and was glad that there was minimal blood on
it.

Jasper chuckled as he pulled off his
shirt. “You know, that was a first for me.”

“What?” I pulled the bandage off of the
cut on his back to inspect the damage.

“Being thrown through a table. It’s not
an experience I’d care to repeat.”

I started to laugh. “How exactly did
they manage it?”

“When I opened the door Dave punched me
in the nose. While I recovered from that, two of them each grabbed
an arm and picked me up, then slammed me into the
table.”

I made him sit on the toilet so I could
have a look at his face. “Maybe we should cross so I can fix you.
That one on your cheek is going to scar.”

He shook his head. “They could have the
whole bloody army waiting for us to cross back.” He pulled my tank
top off carefully and looked at the bandages over my breast. He
swallowed hard. “Bastard.”

“Hun, I’m fine.” I leaned down, careful
of his face, and kissed him softly. I smiled. “I’ve had much
worse.”

A low growl rumbled through him. “If we
had been home, this would never have happened. I would have gone to
the door expecting something like this.”

“Yes, well, we’re not home.” My throat
tightened as I realized that I meant it. Even though I had been
raised here, this was no longer home. I had to swallow before I
could continue. “It never occurred to me something like this would
happen either.”

Jasper pulled me to him.

“I miss home.” It was barely a whisper,
but I knew he had heard it.

He took a deep breath. “Me
too.”

“I keep thinking about how the next
time we see Kara she’ll already be almost two years old. Tyler and
Trent will be thirteen. It will be their birthday in a few weeks
and we’ll manage to miss this one too.”

“Why don’t we go shopping tomorrow?
We’ll get them something from here as a souvenir.”

I nodded. “I really don’t think I want
to stay here.”

He pulled me down so that I straddled
him and he could pull me close. “We’ll talk about it some more when
we’re a little calmer.”

I rest my head in the crook of his neck
and breathed deeply. A groan escaped my throat.

“What?”

I thought about it for a moment, not
sure how to phrase it then chuckled. “It’s just that, well, you
always smell so good after a fight.”

“Do I, now.” He bent his head to my
neck and took a deep breath. “Hmm. So do you.” He ran his tongue
along my collar bone and I shivered.

“Hayden, Jasper? Are you guys alright?”
Shay’s voice was followed by the sound of the entire crew walking
into the house.

I sighed. “We’re fine!”

“Ok. Let me know if you need anything.
I’ll find you some shirts and put them outside the
door.”

“Thanks, Shay.” I looked at Jasper and
bent my head to his ear. “There’s only one thing I need right now
and you’re the only one who can help me with it.”

“Is that so?” He ran his teeth over my
jaw. “Then I guess we’d better get going then. If you keep looking
at me like that I might start to think it acceptable to just have
my way with you here.”

I smiled and we got dressed.

Shay gave us each a hug when we got
into the living room. “Do you guys want a drink?”

We looked at each other.

“Um, no.” I gave her another hug.
“Actually, I think we are going to head home. We have to pick out a
new dining room set and get that set up…plus a few other things
need to get done.”

Tara started to laugh. “I thought we
had given you enough time for those other things.”

“We had injuries to look after.” I
blushed.

“Well, get home and get to it, then.”
Tara shook her head. “I don’t know how you’ve managed this
long.”

We said our goodbyes and almost ran to
the truck, leaving Tara to explain to Shay what ‘other things’ had
to be taken care of after a battle.

Chapter Twelve

Jasper looked at everything on the bed
and swallowed. This was ridiculous. There was no reason to be
nervous. It was a fight. He’d been fighting and killing since he’d
been fourteen years old. He took a deep breath. It wasn’t the
fight. It was not knowing who he was fighting, or how many of them
there were going to be.

“What are you thinking about?” Hayden
walked up behind him and wrapped her arms around him from
behind.

“Tonight.”

“The wedding?”

He shook his head. “The
fight.”

“Hmm. I’m trying to not think about
it.” She stood beside him and looked at the bed. On it were the two
packs they used for travelling, their deerskin pants, tunics,
belts, daggers, and her swords and healer’s bag. “Do you think the
blue bird got our note to Luke and Alex?”

“I don’t know. I hope so. Our odds of
surviving this would be much better if we were nine as opposed to
four.”

Hayden started to pack the bags. “Do
you have your stone?”

“In my pocket. I’m not taking the
chance that something happens and we have to cross early and I
don’t have it on me.”

The phone rang and Jasper could hear
her mother on the other end.

“Hayden?”

“Hey, mom, what’s up?”

“We’re heading out and wanted to know
if you needed us to pick anything up.” She sounded like she’d been
crying.

“Oh, mom. Don’t cry. We’ll be back. I
promise. Even if we don’t decide to come live here, we’ll for sure
come visit.” Hayden cleared her throat and he could see how hard
she was trying not to break down.

“I know, hun. Just promise me you’ll be
safe.”

“Of course I’ll be safe.”

Jasper held in his urge to grunt. In a
few hours, they would be knowingly walking blind into some sort of
an ambush. If they survived that, it was off to Howel where the
chances that they would be executed were large. And after that, if
all went according to plan, they would be marching off to the
Northern Regions to take on the humans. He really didn’t think
there was any part of their plan that would qualify as
safe.

He finished packing the bags and heard
Hayden reassure her mother that they didn’t need anything and they
would see them at the wedding.

She took a deep breath once she’d hung
up. “I don’t like lying to her.”

“You’re not outright lying to her.
You’ll be as safe as you can be.”

She raised an eyebrow at him and smiled
when he shrugged.

“I’ll take this stuff out to the truck.
You’d better get your dress on. We have to be at the church in an
hour.” He leaned down and kissed her softly.

She smiled and he had to remember to
breathe. She gave her head a shake and the loose curls bounce
around her face.

He started to leave but remembered
something he wanted to bring along. Hayden smiled when he took the
painting she had done of him roping and started to laugh when he
took the picture of Dodge as a colt.

Kip barked excitedly as Jasper opened
the truck door and put everything behind the seat under a
blanket.

“Sorry, buddy. You have to stay here
for now. We’ll come get you after the church stuff is
done.”

He headed back to the bedroom and
stopped short. Hayden was sitting on the bed with her head down,
twirling her ring around her finger. A tear slipped off of her
cheek and landed on her lap. She was getting much too good at
shielding her feelings from him. He hadn’t had a clue she was
feeling down.

“Hayden?”

She cleared her throat and wiped her
tears with the palms of her hands.

“Shlova, what’s wrong?” He went to sit
on the bed with her. She leaned against him and he pulled her to
his chest.

“Nothing’s wrong.” She took a deep
breath. “Everything is wrong.”

“What is?”

“God, Jasper, I don’t even know how to
start…”

“Is it the fight tonight?”

She shook her head.

“The wedding? Do you want a
wedding?”

No to that also.

“Rainen? Braw?”

Again, she shook her head.

“Shlova, you’ll have to help me out. I
can’t think of anything else.”

She took a deep breath and the
butterflies in his stomach started to fly. Whatever it was, it was
bad enough she wouldn’t look at him. He rested his chin on her head
and closed his eyes.