Soul-Mate (Immortal Love 1) (23 page)

“I need to rest and get focused for tomorrow. Besides, I’m going to patrol the town.”

“I thought Shane had that covered for tonight,” I said.

“Oh, I’m not patrolling with the guys. I’m just going to make sure the boys aren’t partying until late at night. I don’t want them drinking and partying before the fights. They can party all they want after it, not before.”

“I could help you with that, and then we could go to James’s party just to see if there isn’t one of your fighters there,” Eve proposed.

“I really don’t want to bother you. I’m sure you have better things to do,” Sebastien said.

“Not really. Besides, the school year is finishing. I’ll go back home for a couple of months and… we might not see each other for a while.”

I smiled, staring at my bag. Sebastien was clueless or just trying to
seem
clueless. Either way, I felt like a third wheel. I also felt sorry for Eve: it was clear that Sebastien wasn’t into her. She shouldn’t be so insistent. Maybe she was just feeling lonely.

“What are you doing tonight, Annabel? Are Shane and you going to James’s party?” Sebastien asked.

“What? Oh no, Shane and I are going to Sam’s Bar to meet our friends. No wild parties for us.”

“It’s a pity. We could meet there,” Eve proposed. “Unless… I would love to go to Sam’s Bar, but I don’t want to go alone. You could keep me company and buy me a drink, Sebastien.”

“Eve, some other night. I wouldn’t normally say no to spending time with friends and colleagues, but tonight I really need to rest.” Sebastien spoke soberly; she simply sighed and nodded.

“It’s a pity that no one thought about a going-away party for the teachers. We may not be together next year,” Eve reminded us. “Are you going to keep teaching here, Anna? Since Shane and you are mates and there’s an open position for a permanent literature teacher here?”

“I don’t know,” I said, blushing at the direct question. I guess people were assuming that I was going to live there permanently, since I was Shane’s mate. James was pressuring me for a decision, but Shane knew better than to pressure me about anything. We had marked each other; it had been a huge step in our relationship. He had been understanding enough to know that I didn’t need to live there to be with him. There was an entire world outside the safety of that town, a world that needed me.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to pry,” Eve mumbled, noticing my thoughtful gaze.

“It’s okay,” I said, straightening up when I noticed that someone else was coming our way. Soon enough, the door opened, and James came in with worried eyes. When our eyes met, he sighed with relief and approached us. Everybody greeted him; he just grumbled some incomprehensible word, making us stare at him with puzzled eyes. He was normally a lot more cheerful and polite than that.

“Did you just see a cross and run?” Sebastien asked. He was funny like that, or at least he tried to be.

James ignored him completely, talking to me. “I’m glad you are still here. You need to come now. He’s here.”

“Who?” I asked, intrigued as the other two frowned.

In my mind, I noticed Shane question me about who was there, too, wondering what was going on that changed my mood. He could be clingy like that when it came to a change in my feelings. I replied that all was fine, that it was just James acting strange again; he became less worried.

“Cut the mind link,” James ordered, like he’d guessed. “The prince is here to see you.”

“Oh!” I said, finally understanding his nervous state.

“The prince! Such an honor, Anna!” Sebastien joked in a sarcastic voice.

“Don’t be a smart ass and show some respect. He’s older than you, and he was a good friend of your father’s.” James lectured Sebastien like a grandfather disciplining his grandson for disrespectful behavior. Sebastien pouted and rolled his eyes.

“As if I don’t call him by his first name,” Sebastien muttered, annoyed. “Dude, he’s my godfather!”

“Wow, you are friends with a royal vampire? Such an honor, Sebastien,” I teased back.

“Yes, I’m important like that,” he said with a boyish grin. “But I thought he was abroad.”

“He arrived today, and he’s in a hurry, so please don’t make him wait,” James said with a serious face.

I could not hear anything else that people were saying, because Shane was invading my mind with all sorts of questions. He wanted to know why the prince was there, why I hadn’t told him that he was coming, why James had called him there. I just had one answer for him:
I don’t know.

When I looked again at everybody, James looked cranky, Sebastien was quiet and bored, and Eve was simply flustered. I was intrigued and gave her a questioning look. She formed the words with her lips, “The prince is gorgeous
!
” then sighed dramatically, fangirling over him. I laughed, which made everybody stare at me as if I was crazy. So another gorgeous man slash vampire slash immortal—what else was new? They seemed to grow on trees around there.

“Come on, don’t keep him waiting. He wants to talk to you.” James hurried me, more impatient than ever, like the world’s salvation depended on my meeting with the prince.

I got up, arranged my skirt and jacket, gave a smile to Eve and Sebastien who waved me a little goodbye with their fingers, and followed James to meet the prince.

I didn’t remember ever meeting a prince before. It was odd even that people called him “prince.” I guess they were royalty back in Europe and had decided to keep the titles. It was something to be proud of among vampires, especially purebloods. I was a bit curious to meet him, mainly because I needed his family’s help. But I didn’t have a clue as to why the prince wanted to talk to or see me.

We followed the empty corridor; I noticed bodyguards in every corner, dark glasses over their eyes and communicators in their ears. They looked like the Secret Service and followed our moves as if we were a threat. It was almost too unreal to be true!

It seemed the prince was waiting in the principal’s office, because that’s where we headed. However, before James could open the door, someone at the top of the corridor opened the school’s front doors and called for James. It was Shane.

“James, don’t even think about it,” he said, and I blushed from head to toe because he was just wearing a pair of jeans. Nothing more, nothing less. He was barefoot with messed-up hair, walking toward us and growling at the bodyguards who had taken a step toward to him. Then, they just went back and bowed their head. I frowned and folded my arms, staring at him as he came closer.
Was he being serious? Had he just shifted from his wolf form and come running to the school? Why? What was going on? Why did he seem so worried?

“He isn’t going to be happy,” James said, talking to Shane, who had just arrived next to us.

“And do I look happy to you?” Shane asked James, his face serious. His eyes were glittering amber, and his fangs were out. He was
not
happy at all! “Go outside, Anna,” he ordered, as if I were just some other person in the group, not his mate; probably because I
was
his mate. We had completed the marking, so maybe he assumed I was now under his orders or whatever sexist stuff was going on in that mind of his. Anyhow, I was getting mad, myself.
What the hell did he think he was doing?

I didn’t move an inch. And that was not unnoticed by Shane, but he didn’t growl at me. That would have been interesting to watch: him growling at me and me telling him to go to hell and then giving him my back.
We could be mated, we could be together, but no one would boss me around.
He had to give me a good reason to leave, because I was more than curious.

“Please go outside, honey,” he pleaded in a sweeter tone that was much better to hear than the previous one. “Or just go home and wait there for me. I have to talk to the prince.”

“Come,” Sebastien demanded, appearing like magic by my side. “Leave the grown-ups to their business.” He was playful, smiling at me; I smiled at him. He was cute, with an adorable smile. However, Shane didn’t like his hands on my shoulders and my smiling back, because he growled at Sebastien. It was interesting to see Sebastien’s eyes also change color as the Alpha in him surfaced to growl back at Shane.

Great, a contest of who would growl louder was all that I needed
!

“My mate. Keep your hands to yourself,” Shane said between his teeth, and Sebastien rolled his eyes and got his wolf under control. At least they were not going to measure who could growl
longer
. That was a relief.

“Possessive much, are we?” Sebastien teased. He should not do that, and I should not have laughed, but I did.

“Men,” Eve said with a sigh as she appeared by our side. I didn’t notice when she’d arrived, but wondered, had they all come to get me out of there? Sebastien had probably come because Shane had asked him to; Eve, likely, because she was stalking Sebastien. Yes, that explanation was more logical to me.

“All of you leave. I have to talk to the prince,” Shane said, out of patience as he put his hand over the doorknob.

James sighed, waving his hands dramatically. Sebastien pushed me away under Shane’s eyes. Shane seemed to talk to him in some sort of wolf-mind link. I was sure of it. Therefore, we left, and I noticed out of the corner of my eye as my hunk of a mate entered the principal’s office, followed by James. He sure wasn’t properly dressed to meet a prince, even if they had known each other for a long time.

The door closed, and I looked at Sebastien. He was still pushing me away, because I was not really in the mood to leave. If anything, I was curious and wanted to see the prince. I had lost a really good opportunity to meet a pureblood vampire, thanks to Shane!

“What just happened?” I asked them, not understanding all the fuss about the visit of the prince or the reasons Shane had had for my
not
meeting with the royal vampire. It was beyond strange. And he’d looked stressed and worried, but mostly he’d looked mad. Not at me, but at James and the prince.

“I have no clue! Shane just reached me on our mind link, out of the blue, and asked me to go and get you and take you out of here,” Sebastien clarified.

“And I just came after Sebastien,” Eve said, shrugging her shoulders, not seeming really curious about all that had happened. Well, her stalking Sebastien—I had already figured that out.

My phone started to vibrate in my pocket and stopped me from thinking or saying anything else. I reached for it and noticed a text-message from Jason. That was weird and, at same time, worrying. The strangest was that he was asking me to meet him outside the town.
He was nearby the same town that I was and that could not be weirder! What could he possibly be doing there?

I tried to reach Shane to tell him that I was going to meet my cousin, that my cousin was in town, but I got no response. Sebastien and Eve were in the middle of the corridor, waiting for me to start walking again.

“Shane is not answering me in my mind link, and I have to go meet someone,” I shared with Sebastien.

“He probably blocked everybody out of reaching him so he could talk to the prince without interruptions. I can tell him for you when he gets out of there.”

“Blocking? Can I also block him out?”

“Of course. It goes both ways. You just need to want to. You just need to concentrate, clear your mind, and build a wall around your thoughts. It’s really helpful, since werewolves can go mad with so many voices in their head if the whole pack decides to have a little chit-chat. Someone can actually think they are schizophrenic!”

I stared at him and sighed about his lame attempt at a joke. Anyhow, his information about the blocking was really useful. If Shane was blocking me, two could play that game. He was being too weird for my taste.

“Okay, thank you. Just tell him I’ll see him at home,” I said, going to get my purse so I could leave to meet my cousin.

Sebastien and Eve remained in the corridor, Eve smiling creepily while he scratched his head. He was going to be left alone with her, and it seemed he was afraid of what she could do to him. That was a bit funny: a grown man slash werewolf Alpha afraid of a sweet stalker and innocent vampire hottie!

I MET MY COUSIN
in an almost-empty diner outside the town, where humans were the only ones we had to worry about seeing us together. I was feeling anxious and unsure of the reason he was there. I hated to keep secrets from him. I was also still troubled by what had just happened at school. Shane was acting weird and, to make things worse, I had to face Jason and come clean about him. I was hoping to have a bit more time, to tell Shane first and then tell my cousin. Shane was happy that I was going to spend that Saturday with him, so we could go to the prom together. We had to chaperone the students, but there would be lots of time to dance and enjoy ourselves.

Jason seemed impatient and rattled. He wanted to know why I wanted to spend more time there, and why I was so keen on defending the people of that town. He knew that I was hiding something important; therefore, I decided to tell him the truth. I told him about Shane being my soul-mate, and how I wanted to tell Shane all about me and my real job and to introduce him to my friends and family. I also wanted to tell Shane about Kevin. I thought that Jason would understand and give me the benefit of the doubt, but he became really quiet. He actually stared at me, dumbfounded and incredulous.

“You are really silly, Annabel,” he finally said, and I lost my good mood and waited for another sarcastic, mocking remark. “Did you really fall for it?” he asked. “You have been here for at least two months now, and you didn’t find out anything about the purebloods who rule over this community. You continue here even when you know we need you elsewhere! When we talked last weekend, you misled me into thinking you just needed a few more days to find out about the royal family that lives here. Now I find out that the real reason you are staying is because you are dating a mutt, and worse than that, you are believing the bullshit that he’s telling you about being your soul-mate! Annabel—we are hybrids. We don’t have a soul-mate!”