“And I like the way you do that,” I answer, tangling my fingers in the cool silk of his hair as I arch against him.

“Good.” He skims lower, nuzzling the collar of my shirt down a little so he can kiss along my collarbone. “Because I plan on doing it for a long time to come. Mate.”

“Jesus. Corny much?” Hudson butts in out of nowhere. He looks as sleepy-eyed as Jaxon, and half his hair is sticking straight up. But—per usual—his sarcasm is absolutely on point. “I mean, seriously. Surely my brother can come up with a better line than that. Or is he just planning on stamping his name on your ass and calling it a day?”

I pull away from Jaxon with a groan before turning to face Hudson, who’s now leaning against the doorframe. “You know what? Bite me.”

“I’d love to,” he fires back, his midnight-blue eyes burning hotly into mine as he leans in close and shows a fang. “Any particular place you have in mind?”

Out of the blue, a not-altogether-bad shiver makes its way down my spine, which in turn freaks me out so much that I jerk back so quickly—from both of them—that I nearly fall flat on my ass.

“Hey, you okay?” Jaxon asks, reaching a hand out to steady me.

“Yeah, of course. I just…”

“I think I know.” He lifts a brow. “Hudson’s awake?”

“Something like that, yeah.” I bend forward, rest the top of my head against his chest. And whisper, “I’m sorry.”

“Never apologize,” he answers. “At least not for that.” Then he steps back into his room, gesturing for me to take a seat on the couch while he heads toward his bedroom. “Give me a couple of minutes to brush my teeth and get dressed. Then we can go.”

“No hurry. We’ve got time,” I call out as he closes his door. Mostly because I’d planned for us to have a few more minutes before we went down to hang with the others…and before Hudson woke up. Apparently, I should have skipped the cafeteria run. But Jaxon looked so run-down all day yesterday that I wanted to make sure he got something to eat.

“Drink.” Hudson flops down onto the chair facing the couch. He slouches into the seat and stretches his long legs out in front of him, arms tightly crossed. His jaw is clenched. And he sounds pissier than I’ve ever heard him—which is saying something.

It’s also fine with me, because I’m feeling pretty damn pissy myself. “What are you talking about?” I ask flatly, as I have no interest in being cordial right now.

“He drinks, not eats.”

“Whatever.” I glare at him. “And will you please stop eavesdropping on my thoughts!”

“It’s not eavesdropping when you’re projecting them through your whole head like a bloody carnival barker,” he shoots back. “No offense, but it’s pretty hard not to listen. It’s also nauseating as fuck.”

“You know what? You’re being a jackass and I don’t even know why. Or did you just use up your entire niceness quotient for the month yesterday?”

“Don’t you mean the year?” he asks with an obnoxious smirk.

“More like the decade, apparently.” I stand and make my way to the table by the door to pick up my hot chocolate—and a book. Because there is no way I’m going to spend the next however many minutes listening to Hudson whine.

“Make sure to check the shelves at the back of the room. I’m pretty sure there’s a book of fairy tales in there somewhere. I mean, if you want to keep telling yourself a bunch of lies.”

“Oh. My. God!” I whirl on him, my fists clenched and a scream building in my throat. “What is your problem? You’re acting like a douche!”

At first I think he’s going to answer me—it certainly looks like he’s got a lot to say when he gets up in my face—but then he just stares at me, eyes blazing and mouth pressed into a line so tight and straight that it has to be painful.

Long seconds pass, and the tension ratchets up between us more and more until it feels like the top of my head is going to explode. Just when I’m about to lose it or scream at him—or both—Jaxon walks out of his bedroom, black jacket in hand.

“I didn’t know if you remembered to bring a coat,” he says, holding the jacket out to me. “The playing field is heated, but the walk there takes a few minutes.”

Hudson turns away, muttering something obscene-sounding under his breath, and there’s a part of me that wants to grab his arm. That wants to demand we finish this argument that makes no freaking sense.

But Jaxon is waiting for me, looking sweet and also sexy as hell in a pair of slim-fit black track pants and a black compression shirt that shows every muscle he’s got. And he’s got a lot of them.

“I brought one,” I tell him, nodding to the back of the couch where I dropped my coat when I first got here. “But thanks. I appreciate it.”

“Of course.” He grins as he grabs an empty backpack and stuffs it full of water bottles—then reaches into the closed cabinet under one of his bookshelves and pulls out a box of my favorite granola bars and adds a couple to the bag.

“Where’d you get those?” I ask, a little surprised and a lot touched.

“I ordered them when we first got together, along with some Pop-Tarts in case you’re ever hungry when you’re hanging out here. They came when you were…” He waves a hand to encompass everything that happened. “So I put them away for when you got back—and here you are.”

“Here I am,” I repeat, nearly swooning at the way he takes such good care of me, even when I don’t know he’s doing it. “Thank you,” I say again.

Jaxon rolls his eyes. “Stop saying that,” he tells me as he zips the backpack before picking up my coat and helping me into it. “None of this is a big deal.”

“That’s not true,” I say, snagging his hand when he would have started for the door. I wait until he turns toward me to continue. “It’s a very big deal to me, and I appreciate it.”

He gives a little one-shouldered shrug, but I can tell he’s pleased by my words. Still, looking at him out here in the light, I also realize the tiredness I saw on his face from earlier wasn’t just sleepiness. He’s feeling drained, even though he won’t say so. I can tell, from the open books scattered all over the table by the window, he’s been burning the candle at both ends researching the Unkillable Beast. We know it’s on an enchanted island in the Arctic, but he wanted to learn more about it to help us prepare. Plus, he’d mentioned earlier trying to find a weakness.

My chest tightens. I know the horror is weighing on him of what Hudson could do if we bring him back with his abilities.

“Ready?” he asks, taking a step back. “It’s almost nine.”

“Almost ready,” I answer, wrapping my arms around his waist. As I do, I reach for the mating bond, which is easy to find after last night, when I discovered all the different threads inside me.

“What are you doing?” he asks.

Instead of answering, I grab on to the black string with green streaks and start channeling a bunch of energy down the mating bond and straight into him.

“Stop!” Jaxon pulls away. “You don’t have to do that.”

“I don’t have to do anything,” I answer. “But I’m doing this.” And now that I can hold the mating bond in my hand, it doesn’t matter if I’m touching Jaxon or not. I’m not letting go of it until it looks like Jaxon has all the strength and energy he needs.

“What are you doing?” Hudson demands. “You can’t just send all your power into him! What are you going to do when you need it?”

I smile at Jaxon, but I’m answering them both. “I can do anything I want—and what I want is to take care of Jaxon.”

Hudson throws his hands in the air. “Maybe you’ll feel differently when you get your ass handed to you on the practice field today.”

My breath hitches. I know he meant to hit back at me, but I’m still surprised when I feel the punch in my chest. Just a reminder I’d started to let my guard down around Hudson, started to believe he really thought I was stronger than everyone else gives me credit for. And I have no idea why finding out that he doesn’t suddenly makes me so sad.

Besides, he’s completely wrong. We have a plan, and now that I can shift into my gargoyle, I know it’s going to work.

Win the Ludares tournament and get the bloodstone.

Grab a bone from a graveyard.

And well, yeah, stealing the Unkillable Beast’s heartstone feels a little iffy, but Jaxon is positive we can do it.

Once we do all that, we’ll get Hudson out of my head once and for all—and he won’t be able to hurt anyone else. Jaxon can finally get some sleep and we can maybe, maybe have a normal end to our senior year.

Or, you know, at least completely doable.

For the first time since I learned Hudson is stuck in my head, I can’t help the smile spreading across my face. We’ve got a plan: Win the game. Get the bone. Kill the beast. As Macy likes to say, easy-peasy. We’ve totally got this.

Jaxon and I head out of his room hand in hand, a lightness in my step that’s only marginally dimmed when I think I hear Hudson mutter, “We’re all doomed.”

59

Two Vampires

Too Many

Jaxon and I are the first to make it to the practice field. Because I’m bundled up in four layers of clothing, he insists I strip off the top two layers—which doesn’t sit well with me, considering I’m still freezing from the walk through the forest, but he says if I start to sweat, it will make the walk back a million times worse.

I mean, the temperature isn’t terrible—at least not by Alaska’s standards—but something tells me I’ll still be cold here in the middle of July.

“So what are we going to work on today?” I ask as I strip out of my coat, my hoodie, and my ski pants. The fact that I’m still wearing my fleece pants, leggings, a tank top, and a long-sleeve thermal shirt makes my head spin—and I’m pretty sure it always will. I guess it really is true that you can take the girl out of San Diego, but you can’t take San Diego out of the girl…