Framed (18 page)

Maybe a cage was exactly where I belonged.

I schlepped myself back to the apartment and jumped into the shower. I needed to wash the sweat, dirt, and self-loathing off. Letting the water beat on my face, I contemplated how best to handle the Matty clusterfuck that was boiling over. I couldn't tell Sean for fear of the outcome, and I couldn't tell Cooper for fear of making him complicit to the infraction. Peyta would be no help in the matter, and telling Ronnie would only further her argument that good people only get hurt around me. Sophie was out because, no matter how sincere she'd seemed the other day, I still didn't trust her as far as I could throw her. Without any other
otherworldlies
to confide in, I was back to just little old me, left to deal with the situation. Yet another serving of shit to pile on my plate.

I shut the water off and grabbed a towel and wrapped it around me as I walked out of the bathroom. With no Cooper in sight, I made my way to the bedroom to dry off and get dressed. While storming around the room, trying to find my favorite jeans, I managed to slip on the cell phone I'd thrown to the floor after Matty called. There was a text message flashing on the screen.

“Can't wait to see you”, it said. Matty had written it on his way up to my place, and that sentiment no longer rang true. I dejectedly slumped onto the bed, staring at the screen, tears forming in my eyes. I wanted to make it better somehow, erase what had been done, but I knew I couldn't. There was no going back where Matty was concerned. With the loss of Matty came the loss of his family too. No sooner than I'd been initiated, I managed to alienate myself from them, indirectly.

I sighed and gently tossed the phone onto my nightstand. Beside it lay the paper with Kristy's number on it. I picked it up and ran my finger down the paper in one long, slow stroke before shredding it into little pieces and tossing it into the trash. I made a choice—a choice to save that life rather than destroy it. If knowing me was poison, then I would happily give her the antidote.

Grabbing a t-shirt and pants to throw on, I headed for the living room. My night had popcorn and movie written all over it, preferably one that was gratuitously fraught with angst, drama, and sadness. I hoped Cooper would be out late. I wanted to cry alone and wallow, if only for an hour or two. Maybe the universe would love me enough to grant me that one concession.

Then again, the universe and I weren't on the best of terms.

17

I managed to studiously avoid telling the boys about what happened; mum was the word on the Matty incident. For two days, I bit my tongue and acted as normal as possible—impending doom, murder wraps, and lunatic courtiers notwithstanding.

I sent multiple texts and made dozens of phone calls to Matty, all of which remained unanswered. Something needed to be said to him before I saw him in class, but it seemed that he was as serious as he sounded about never wanting to talk to me again. It wasn't like I could blame him for that, but I was legitimately worried about his reaction and desperately hoped that he hadn't fallen apart. I hoped he hadn't told anyone either.

With a lump in my stomach and an uneasiness that made it hard to focus on the road, I left for Boston. I prayed during my commute that Matty would be in class, willing to hear me out, and, by some miracle, ready to forgive me. In truth, I never expected that to occur, but I clung to the delusion tightly nonetheless.

When I didn't see his car outside upon my arrival, I started to panic slightly, but then quickly reminded myself that he liked to ride his bike when it was temperate outside. It had been a nice enough day that I found the option plausible.

I ran up to the building, frantically trying to secure my bags on my shoulder and thrust my keys into my pocket. Opening the door with a newly freed hand, I took the steps two at a time as the music from upstairs got louder with my approach. I looked for his shoes when I reached the changing area. They weren't there. He occasionally enjoyed wearing them into the studio, much to the director's chagrin, but my hopes for a reconciliation were rapidly dissolving.

I threw my things about randomly in an attempt to get dressed as quickly as possible. Once I was finally ready, I stood nervously, staring at the opening to the studio. Closing my eyes, I took a deep breath in through my nose and out my mouth. I kept my eyes closed as I made my way toward the vast room, navigating my way along wall. I counted the paces in my head—it was the one habit I still retained from my sightless years; I always knew how many steps it took to get from one room to the next.

My entrance must have looked terribly dramatic, or completely ridiculous, to those in class. When I was truly unnerved, I found darkness to be oddly soothing to me in an unexpected way. Before I could bring myself to reveal who was in the studio that night, a voice startled me suddenly.

“Ruby!”

My eyes shot open.

* * *

I left class feeling more depressed about things than ever. Deep down, I knew that he wouldn't be there, but somewhere in my being I'd hoped he would be, if for no other reason than to prove me wrong. It was one time that I would have been thrilled to be.

After class, I walked to my car, deeply contemplating my next move. All my mental threads wove the same pattern—I was going to have to tell Sean, regardless of the outcome. I remembered him saying that he'd be in Boston that evening, and, since
Vain
was a veritable PC headquarters, I decided to start my search there.

Hopping quickly into the TT, I floored it to the downtown area of Boston that was peppered with nightlife. On the way there, I thought a lot about how best to broach the subject so that his overreaction would be minimized; the best it earned me was the start of a headache. There was no way to preheat the stone cold fact that Matty knew about me, Cooper, and the werewolf world in general. Regardless of whether or not I was going to be alive to deal with the backlash,
someone
was going to have to clean up the mess. Secrecy was key to our existence and, like it or not, the PC needed to know what happened so they could do what needed to be done. I hoped they had some sort of memory wiping or mind control voodoo so they could pull an Obi-Wan on Matty and tell him, “These aren't the droids you're looking for.”

That was my best case scenario.

The worst was one I chose not to think about. Sean had always be stingy with the details about
how
the balance had been kept for centuries, but I was certain it didn't involve pep talks and warm fuzzies—Sean was not the caring and sharing kind. Elimination at all costs seemed far more likely to be his M.O. The one thing I knew I could count on was Sean being pissed off when he found out.

I rounded the corner to the club, driving past it in hopes of finding a spot on the street. I searched up and down looking for any hint of a place that I could park the car just long enough to run in, find Sean, drop the Matty bomb on him, then run for dear life. Just as I caught glimpse of a small vacancy in the line of vehicles, I caught a glimpse of something else—a vision.

It was accompanied by the usual stabbing sensation in my skull and, though I fought to maintain consciousness, I couldn't. I involuntarily clutched my head in an effort to keep it from splitting open. It was a fight I couldn't win. He took over my mind while my car accelerated, careening toward the others parked in my path.

He watched from the safety of the shadows on the opposite side of the street as the two familiar men entered the traditional brick building. His heart beat loudly in his chest as he leaned back, breathing deeply to take in their smell. Ambling casually across the road, he neared the entrance without an ounce of anticipation
—
it was a dangerous curiosity he felt. He was playing with fire and he knew it; the thought brought a smile to his face.

I watched him enter the building, and followed close behind him through the foyer, up the stairs, and down a narrow hall to the apartment the two men had entered. The voices behind the door got louder as he approached the door
—
I knew them both. Neither gave any sign that they knew he was coming for them. The Rev stopped just a few feet short of the entrance before he turned to look back at me, as if I were really there. He said nothing, only smiled.

“Tell Scarlet this is my gift to her,” he whispered, as he moved closer still, pressing his ear to the door. “Tick-tock, Ruby. You'd better hurry. There isn't much time.”

I knew that place.

I knew those men.

I also knew that Scarlet could stop him if she could just get there in time.

Light headed from the impact, I felt slightly nauseous as I drifted back to consciousness. Something was tickling my forehead, so I gingerly rubbed it, trying to nullify the sensation. When I pulled my hand away slowly, I found it covered in blood. I couldn't figure out what exactly I'd hit, but I knew that my double vision wasn't helping me solve that mystery.

The enormous airbag hadn't deflated after the crash, so I had to fight my way around it to get out of the car. I stumbled to my feet, avoiding the attempts of several good Samaritans to usher me to the curb and wait for the paramedics. Instead, I wobbled across the street, leaving the scene of an accident to try and stop the Rev.

“Jay,” I uttered, stumbling through downtown as quickly as I could. It was only about four blocks to his apartment. I'd recognized both him and Jer from my vision. I had always entertained the possibility that the Rev was responsible for the PC killings, but never had any proof. I certainly hadn't expected to have it handed to me on a mental platter—a present indeed.

As I willed my vision to improve, Scarlet prowled through my mind, wanting to come out in the worst way. She wanted the Rev desperately, and I was completely on board with that, but having her run through a populated area during primetime hours seemed ill advised. I needed to get her there as quickly as I could and then let her run free. It was a risk with the shoot to kill orders the PC had on her, but there was no way for me to stop the Rev on my own.

The thought of the whole thing being a trap crossed my mind, but it was an acceptable risk, and I was willing to take it. More dead PC brothers were bad for me any way I sliced it. Unless the Rev was going to be kind enough to hang out and wait for Sean to show up and admit to everything, I needed to catch him in the act and, preferably, stop him. If Scarlet and I were able to pull it off, we would not only be cleared of the murders, but also gain a little acceptance with the brothers—maybe even with Jer.

I picked up speed as I rounded the last corner to Jay's place. Unable to contain her enthusiasm any longer, Scarlet had bled through our divide, taking control of the rescue mission right before entering the building. At that point, it was in both of our best interests and, though I knew that her presence evoked something within the brothers, making tense situations volatile, there was no way around it.

She was the cavalry.

I was the bugle boy—all noise and bluster, with no real firepower.

She took the four steps leading into the building at once and nearly took the door off the hinges, smashing it into the wall and shattering the glass. Subtlety wasn't in her game plan. In a blink of an eye, we were on the second floor just as a guttural scream came from Jay's apartment. Without pause, Scarlet crashed through the apartment door, prepared for a fight with the Rev. She was not, however, prepared for the scene playing out before her eyes.

Neither was I.

There were only two men in the room—and the Rev was gone. Jay lay bleeding heavily on the floor while Jer hovered above him, his back to us. Scarlet stormed into the apartment on high alert. She methodically smelled the air inside; there was no trace of the Rev from within the dwelling.

Jer turned slowly, exposing his blood splattered face to her. His right hand held what I could only describe as a half bear trap on a stick. The semicircle of jagged and razor sharp teeth was strapped to a thick, black metal bar that looked heavy and able to deliver a weighty blow. It was crude, brutal, and exactly the type of thing you'd want to use to inflict the severity of wounds needed to frame a werewolf for murder—maybe even a very
particular
werewolf.

“You stupid fucking bitch,” Jer growled affectionately. “You just have to mess everything up, don't you? No worries though...now I can just kill you and be done with it, finally.”

Scarlet snarled at him in return while I remained completely dumbstruck, only reinforcing why she was the go to girl for all emergency and life threatening situations.

“Step away from your brother,” she said, emphasizing the “brother” part. “He's got enough blood on him...he doesn't need yours too.”

“I'm going to enjoy this,” Jer continued, as though she'd never addressed him. “I've dreamt about this for months.”

“Your death?” she asked mockingly, while an evil smile spread slowly across her face. “That would be the only thing we have in common, Jer. I've dreamt about your death for months too.”

He scoffed at her as he positioned himself in the center of the room, just feet away from her. She never wavered under his approach, but widened her stance as if preparing for a charge.

“Are you going to use your home ec project there, or are we gonna do this like men?” she asked, staring him down. “Bare handed.”