Life's Sweeter with Revenge

It didn’t take long for Aiden, Jason and Roger to show up at the site. Each of the wolves wore a grim expression after taking a quick sniff at the place as well as the rearview mirror.

Aiden was the first to speak, “Any evidence that might have been left here is long gone.”

I could feel a tightness grow in my lower stomach and unconsciously reached up a hand to touch it. There was nothing left? My eyes drifted over to Victor who was standing right beside me. Even though it was now dark outside I could see that his complexion had grown pale and that his hands were shaking at his side.

“What do you mean?” He asked roughly with sneer directed at Aiden.

Aiden took a step forward with his palms up in Vic’s direction. “I know it’s not something you wanted to hear old friend, but nature has taken away any evidence that might have been left behind from the vampire that attacked your family.”

“But I found the rearview mirror!” Victor shouted before taking a threatening step in Aiden’s direction. His tone and advancement that he had taken with Aiden must have been some kind of a challenge to a werewolf because the next thing I knew both Jason and Roger were stepping in front of their Alpha and growling at Victor.

Aiden didn’t even think twice about Vic’s behavior and simple shoved his friends out of his way and took a step closer to Vic.

“What do you expect me to find on that thing? Blood?” His voice was filled with anger but it felt as if it was directed more at not finding anything evidence more than at Vic. “Do you really believe that I can get a valuable scent off of something that has been out in the wilderness for over two years? I may have super sniffer but you’re asking the impossible here.”

I could feel the desperation and anger pouring out of Vic and quickly took a step towards Aiden. “Isn’t there anything else we can do?” I begged more than asked him.

Aiden looked over at me and I could see his eyes soften. Aiden and I had never really gotten around to getting to know each personally but we shared a sort of bond nonetheless. He was mated to my best friend and boyfriend’s sister, he was brother to another one of my friends as well as friend with Vic. So in some way I thought of his as family.

He held my gaze for a moment as he thought something over in his head. After a couple of minutes he let out a sigh before lifting up his hand and scratching the back of his head. “I suppose we can take another look around this place.”

The tightness in my stomach lessened as hope filled my chest. I reached a hand up to where my heart was and clenched my shirt between my fingers. “Thank you.”

“It’s the least I can do.” He nodded in my direction before looking back over to Victor. “But not tonight.”

Vic’s mouth twitched into a snarl and for a slight moment he held it but just as quickly as it had appeared it vanished. Victor averted his eyes from his friend and then quickly started to march his way up the hill. “Fine,”

I could feel my chest grow a little tight at Victor’s anger and I wanted to run up to him to comfort him but I knew that right now he wanted to be alone. With a sigh I started making my way up after him but was suddenly stopped when Aiden grabbed ahold of my wrist. Surprised that Aiden would touch me at all I quickly snapped my head back in his direction with a confused frown on my face. Strangely enough he wore the exact same expression.

His dark eyes stayed trained on me as his nostril flared from taking in a deep breath. His frown became deeper and his lips turned into a hard line. I knew what this expression meant instantly because Victor used to wear it often whenever I said something that he didn’t like but for the life of me I couldn’t think of what I had done to make Aiden mad.

I tugged on my wrist but he only tightened his grip. Feeling a little bit worried as well as mad I ended up stuttering, “Is there s-something that you wanted?”

Aiden’s eyes flashed a yellowish gold color before he took a step forward. I could feel my stomach turn into knots at the sight of his golden eye. Danyelle had told me once before that Aiden’s wolf had golden eyes and sometimes when his wolf was upset about something it would influence his actions more heavily.

His lip turned into a snarl as his yellow eyes drifted from my face down. I could feel my face heat up when his eyes continued to drift lower and became furious with him. How dare he look at me like that! I gave another hard tug on my wrist but still couldn’t get it loose from his grip. He growled at me before lowering his head down towards my face.

I was about to yell out for Victor when the tip of his nose touched my neck but then he did something weird. He sniffed me. Suddenly he was gripping both of my shoulders and shaking me back and forth.

“Are you crazy?” He growled in a low menacing voice. “What do you think you are doing trotting around this kind of terrain in your condition?”

The last part caught me off guard. “My condition?”

He released my shoulders only to grab onto my left upper arm and jerk me closer to him. “You know I knew that something was off with your scent at the graveyard but I couldn’t place until now.”

I could feel the blood start to drain from my face at his words. My scent had changed? Oh this is bad. I thought worriedly. Did Victor notice this yet? Oh god what was I going to do?

I did the only thing I could do in that moment and prayed that Aiden hadn’t really figured out my little predicament. “What are you talking about?”

His eyes narrowed even more as another growl rippled from his lips. He leaned in closer to me until I could feel his hot breath on my skin. “You’re pregnant.”

With those two little words I felt something inside of me break and crumble to the ground in tiny pieces. I could feel the tears running down my cheeks as I tried desperately to convince him that I wasn’t pregnant.

“That’s not true! It’s not. You can’t smell if someone is pregnant and damn it I’m not. It’s a lie.” I cried banging my small fists on his chest.

He looked down at me with hard Alpha eyes and shook me again only this time it was more gently. “You’re pregnant and you know it. What I want to know now is why you haven’t told Victor about it.”

My back stiffened at his words and I could feel my stomach drop. “You’re not going to tell him are you?” I asked hysterically. “You can’t tell him that I’m pregnant. Nobody can know.”

“Why not?” He shouted a little harder than he meant to. “Give me a reason as to why I shouldn’t go up to him right now and tell him that his knocked up girlfriend is putting his child in danger by walking around this forest? What the hell are you thinking Vanessa? What if you fell?”

I shook my head at him with my tears dripping off of my cheeks. Damn hormones. “I can’t leave him alone for this. I can’t.”

“What do you mean you can’t?” He snapped at me. “It’s not like we are fighting a horde of vampires here. He’s not going to die by falling down the hill either so tell me again your reasoning of risking your baby’s life.”

“You know that if Victor finds something it is going to lead to something big.” I shouted back at him letting my anger start to take control and when he snapped his mouth shut I knew that he thought the same thing. “There is no way a pureblood vampire could get away with turning a rogue especially when Prince Winden was still in power. He would have had that vampire slaughtered in a blink of an eye unless that vampire was high up. If he had some kind of power or treaty with Winden then I can assure you that he is going to be way too much for Victor to handle on his own. And I can’t….I can’t be that girl that is trapped at home waiting for the news that the man she loves is dead. Not when I know that there is something I could do to help him.”

My breathing was labored as I stared at Aiden’s softening expression. He was still pissed I could tell, but his eyes were back to their brown color. He held my gaze for a long moment before letting out a growl and brushing his hand through his hair.

“I don’t exactly agree with your way of thinking Vanessa and I want you to know that I can’t back you up when Vic finds out about this but I need you. I know that things are going to get hard for Vic and you’re the only one he really listens to. So what do you want me to do?” He asked.

I could feel the anger and sadness just wash away from my body. I was truly grateful that he was going to allow me to stay with Vic and even more so that he wasn’t going to tell on me either. With a weak smile I told him, “Make sure that I don’t fall.”

His eyes traveled down to my still flat stomach and for a second he just stared at it. When he was done thinking about it he snapped his head to the side and huffed. “Fine.”

With a sigh of relief I said. “Thank y-

His yellow eyes cut me off. “I will keep your secret only because it is not my place to tell him but if you put yourself in any immediate danger just once I will have you shipped home until this whole thing is taken care of is that understood?” I nodded my head quickly at him. “Good.”

He then took a step passed me and started walking up the steep hill. I hurried myself along as carefully as I could and after a few steps I was beside him. “So if you could smell my pregnancy then does that mean that the others will to?”

His eyes flickered over to me. “If they haven’t picked up on it already then they certainly will once you get farther along but there is nothing that you need to worry about. They won’t know what your change in scent means until you start showing.”

I tapped my hand to my stomach and smiled. “Good.”

We continued walking for a while in silence and for a second I thought that that was the end of our conversation until Aiden broke the silence.

“When the mother is pregnant with a werewolf child they only carry for about five months, the mother’s will experience a heightened sense of smell as well as endurance, and they are just as mood and picky as any other pregnant woman.”

Not quite understanding what he was getting at I cocked my eyebrow at him. “So,”

He grumbled something incoherent out before replying. “So… is there anything I should be prepared for?”

I hissed in a gasp at his question. “You not so much.” When I didn’t continue he nudged my elbow with his. I rolled my eyes at him. “I’ll start craving more blood.”

“That doesn’t seem so bad.”

I shook my head at him. “No you don’t understand. I’ll start craving Victor’s blood.”

“What?” He practically shouted and I quickly had to shush him since our group wasn’t too much further ahead of us.

“Damn it Aiden you’re going to get me in trouble.”

“Right sorry about that but what the hell Vanessa? You’re going to kill him?”

“What kill Victor? God no! I’ll just start getting my food from Victor after he drinks. It’s reassuring for the baby.”

“Reassuring?”

I nodded my head in reply. “Yeah, the baby is making sure that his father is still around to protect itself and the mother.”

“What if Vic’s not around when you have these cravings?”

I rested my hand on my stomach. “Then the baby will die.”

“What?”

I looked over at his shocked expression and smiled sadly. “It’s just how my race works Aiden. Our children are weak and small when they come into this world so they need the protection of both parents and ‘no’ a substitute father won’t work either.”

He frowned down at his unasked question. “Why not?”

I shrugged my shoulders. “I don’t know.”

“Ah,” He spoke softly as we continued walking. “So you have another excuse for following Vic into danger.”

I smiled to myself again before touching a hand to my chest. “Yeah I guess so.”

In the distance I could make out the faint shapes of our friends and knew that the conversation between Aiden and I was going to come to an end real quick.

“So when will you start doing that?” He questioned once we became in ear shot.

I looked over at Vic who was leaning up against the hood of his car. His pale skin shown in the moon lit night like a beacon. I could trace every curve of his face from his upturned lip to his frowning brow. The thought of running my fingers along his skin sent chills to my stomach. Within seconds I felt my skin grow tight and gums ache.

“Soon.” I spoke worriedly. “Very soon.”