Chapter 7 #2
The camera looked to be in working order and still had a charge.
I scanned through the reel, starting from the beginning and working my way forward.
I wanted to see if I could piece together her story, get a feel for her life and see if it revealed anything of importance.
Most of the pictures were nothing out of the ordinary.
Many were of nature, closeups of trees, flowers, birds, sunsets…
that sort of thing. A few were of a man of what I assumed to be Native American descent and a young blonde girl.
They were hugging, and the blonde had tears in her eyes.
Judging by the background and the suitcases around them, they were taken on the curb of an airport.
More pictures of nature followed. Drake would be disappointed, I thought. Nothing libidinous.
I paused when I arrived at a candid photo of the girl herself.
I hadn’t gotten too good of a look at her before she fell; I’d been concentrating more on the twins.
She was gazing upward, with a little pouty-lipped smile on her face and an ice-cream cone in one hand.
It had clearly been taken without her knowledge at the time.
I zoomed in and realized I had to disagree with Drake.
Beyond pretty, she was absolutely beautiful, as in heart-stoppingly, jaw-droppingly gorgeous.
Her long blue-black hair, like that of a raven, fell all the way down to her waist in thick waves.
Her skin was clear and light but with undertones of beige and olive, making me think her ethnic background was Middle Eastern or Northern Italian…
or maybe Greek. It was her eyes, big and doe-like, that made me stop and stare.
Their color was the smokiest shade of grey with spots near the pupils, so bright they looked almost silver.
They were her defining feature. Long, dense lashes gave them a sexy hint of mystery.
I thought back to this morning. The person I’d dropped off at the hospital looked nothing like this siren.
Her injuries were spiteful, an affront to her exquisite beauty.
“Alpha?”
I heard Dr. Distefano’s voice, and for some reason, my heart kicked so fast, I could barely understand him.
“She’s out of surgery.”
I took a couple of deep steadying breaths before I answered. “And?”
“She has a severe concussion, and we had to operate to close the wound on her abdomen. But aside from these and the many, many contusions and lacerations, I think she will be all right. She’s in recovery and will be sedated while she heals. We’ll be monitoring the swelling in her head closely.”
“Thank you, Doctor, for your work today and for letting me know.”
“Of course,” he replied. “I’ll be sure to update you if anything changes.”
“Very good.”
I couldn’t understand my reaction. My heart kept up its rapid beat, but at the same time, I was inundated with a feeling of relief at having learned she was going to live.
Maybe the news meant we were going to get some answers, especially since our only potential lead was going to survive.
If she was sent here as a spy, then it also meant having a possible bargaining chip.
But why the thought of keeping her as a hostage made me queasy was something I didn’t want to dwell on for too long.
Someone might be missing her back home, and if news of her slipping through the Aora got out, it spelled trouble in more ways than one.
I resumed looking at the reel, which contained more of the same subject: nature.
Safe to say she liked being outdoors. Some were of her and a good-looking middle-aged woman, to whom she bore a striking resemblance—her mother most likely.
They were decorating a Christmas tree. These were the last ones taken, before the dates skipped forward a few months and I reached the part I most wanted to see.
The latest photos were taken in the mountains.
They first started near the campgrounds and then each new frame told me she was getting nearer and nearer to our borders.
My stomach plummeted when I got to the last ten or so photos.
They were taken this morning on the cliffside, minutes before her accident.
She hadn’t been taking pictures of the general view.
Each was of our territory, zoomed in deliberately to capture the green of Crimson Halo’s landscape.
It was impossible, yet the evidence spoke for itself.
She had been able to capture what should have been hidden from human eyes. How?
I turned the camera off and put my head in my hands.
I mindlinked Dr. Distefano. “Doctor?”
“Yes, Alpha?”
“We’re sure she’s completely human?” I asked.
“We ran a complete blood panel, along with other tests,” he replied. “Nothing to indicate any sign of supernatural presence, wolf or otherwise.”
“I see.” I sighed into my hands. Being a pack elder, the doctor had to know where I was going with this.
“Let’s wait until she’s conscious, Alpha,” he said. “And we’ll go from there.”
I had to think logically. The people from the attack months ago had taken great measures to conceal themselves.
This girl had not. They had also been immediately hostile and knew what they had come for and what they were doing.
The more I thought about it, the more it became evident that these were two isolated incidents.
So who was she?
I was going to drive myself crazy. The camera reel only went back about a year and disclosed nothing of value, besides her ability to see the territory. The doctor was right. We’d know more when she regained consciousness. In the meantime, the best I could do was wait for Reece to get back to us.
Late into the night, Drake knocked on the door. I was still in my office, drawing up different scenarios, thinking up different theories, and going through all the records again, both ancient and more recent, hoping I’d missed something.
“Anything?” he asked sympathetically, eyeing the stacks of books and papers.
“Not a damn thing,” I replied. Everything that had happened was new and unprecedented.
I noticed he was carrying the girl’s backpack. “That was fast,” I said.
He sighed. “Reece is good, but you’re not going to like what he found.”
“Well?”
“Nothing. Zero. She’s about as normal as they come.” He exhaled and flopped onto the armchair like he’d done earlier.
“Give me the details,” I said and rearranged the paperwork on my desk.
“Honestly, there isn’t much. Dad died young.
Mom passed away a few months ago. She had a twin brother, but he disappeared and is presumed dead.
She and her mom sold their house and moved far away from where she grew up.
Reece ran their backgrounds too, including the brother’s.
Parents were born outside the States, came here and had kids. Normal jobs, normal family.”
“No one knows what happened to the brother?” I asked.
Drake shook his head. “There are transcripts of the statements the family and his friends gave to the police. He was an extreme athlete, did all kinds of stuff… went on trips for long periods of time. The story everyone seems to land on is that he probably got hurt on one of these trips. It’s speculation, but it fits. ”
“Hmmm, and Reece wasn’t able to dig further into that?” I asked.
“I asked.” Drake nodded. “But it was an open-and-shut case. The brother was by all accounts a good guy—worked hard, took care of sister and mom.” He suddenly grinned. “Her though…”
I put down the book I was flipping through. “What? You said there was nothing interesting.”
“Nothing interesting pertaining to our dilemma…” he replied, still grinning like an idiot. When I let out a low growl, he threw up his hands. “She’s got priors.”
“Seriously?”
“Yup, misdemeanors committed when she was a minor and expunged from her file, but hey, you know Reece.”
Drake took out his phone and read the confidential report.
“Public intoxication, indecent exposure, disorderly conduct, driving without a license, petty theft… She was entered into court-ordered therapy and had to do community service as part of her plea deal.” He looked up from the screen.
“Well anyway, I’m going to drop this off”—he stood and picked up the backpack— “at the hospital. She’ll probably want it if she wakes up. Want to come? We can check on her.”
“Yeah,” I replied. I needed to get up and stretch my legs. “Dr. Distefano said she’s going to be fine, by the way.”
“Well at least that’s something.”
We got to the hospital and were directed to her room.
The lobby and hallways were silent. No one else was around, being so late in the evening.
I stood outside her door, while Drake took the backpack to be stored away.
As far as I was concerned, we were done with it.
The camera, however, I was keeping for now.
Her room was dark, the only light coming from the machines and monitors she had attached to her. Her face, wiped clean of the blood and grime and semi-visible under the gauze, was bruised terribly. Bandages covered her arms. Her head was wrapped, and she had on a neck brace.
Drake made a sound as he leaned against the door. “Oof.”
“Yeah,” I agreed. I was sure both of us were on the same train of thought. She was in bad shape, but she was lucky to be alive.
An elongated groan from the bed caught both our attention. It was faint at first but then continued to get louder.
“She’s waking up,” Drake said and sprang forward, causing the automated lights to turn on.
One of the machines beeped loudly, and the girl opened her eyes.
Out of nowhere, the scent from the morning hit me again.
It was strong enough that I could at last define it.
Jasmine. My eyes flew to where she lay. Apollo stirred, urging me to step forward.
He was being driven mad by the fragrance, which was growing stronger by the second.
My heart beat furiously, but I stayed where I was.
“Easy, you’re okay,” Drake said soothingly. He stared at the girl, who looked like she was struggling against her bedding. “How are you feeling?”
She opened her mouth to reply, but instead her face twisted, and she cried out in pain. I closed my eyes, careful not to say a word as her pain slowly became mine.
“Someone get the doctor!” Drake shouted to no one in particular.
I felt a figure brush past me.
“I’m here. The morphine has worn off.” Dr. Distefano got to work quickly, inserting a syringe filled with liquid into the IV bag. I looked at the girl. She had closed her eyes, and I could feel her consciousness slipping away again.
Apollo howled low, not wanting to let her go.
She faded further and further away until what I was left with was the black in her mind.
Apollo let out a sound, both sad and jubilant, and one word flashed repeatedly before my eyes, causing everything around me to make sense. It had the weight of an anvil, dropping lower on my heart… becoming heavier with each beat until the word itself was the only thing I could see, feel, or hear.
Mate.
Mate.
Mate.