“Wel ,” Sasha said, settling in the seat. “So much for southerners having manners.

“Keep in mind Beth holds grudges,” I said, thumbing through papers on my desk.

“What do you mean? She’s... southern.” She said the word with disdain. I could see in her eyes that at least five generations of Eastern audacity had blinded her to how tacky she sounded.

I looked up. “Yes, wel …they’re polite. That doesn’t mean you can’t make an enemy out of them.”

“Oh,” Sasha said, looking back to the door nervously. “I…er…Grant wanted me to ask you about the Christmas party.”

I raised an eyebrow. “I have faxes coming out of my ears, and you’re shoving your way into my office to talk about finger foods? Don’t waste my time.”

“No, no….” she fidgeted. “I wanted your permission to chair it this year. I was hoping we could make it into more of a bal .”

“A bal ,” I deadpanned.

Sasha smiled widely. “Yes.”

I waved her away. “Check with Jessica on the second floor about the budget. Stay within parameters, and personal y, Sasha, I couldn’t care less.”

Sasha’s strained smile barely lasted until she reached the hal .

The rest of the day passed without event, or maybe it was because no one dared to approach with me with anything less urgent than my office being on fire. The consequential spunk the insufficient sleep had graced me with was working. I hadn’t enjoyed Titan that much since I moved into Jack’s office.

By the time five o'clock rol ed around, I trudged to the elevator and welcomed Jared’s arm when he offered it. The sluggish, heavy feeling over my body was familiar. I was reverting back to my former zombie days.

“No, you’re getting sleep tonight. Bex wil be there at seven.”

I wondered if I’d said anything aloud, but didn’t have enough energy to ask. Just sitting in the passenger seat, watching trees and pedestrians move past my window was exhausting. If I was coherent, I would feel ridiculous for the permanent shocked expression on my face as I tried to keep both upper lids away from the lowers by pushing my eyebrows as high as they would go—but I wasn’t.

Jared wrapped his arm around my waist, leading me into the house. When the old, heavy door closed behind us, Jared stopped.

“Nina,” Cynthia call ed, appearing from the hal way. “You have a guest waiting for you in the Great Room.”

I puffed.

“Let me take your things, Love,” Agatha said, pul ing my make-shift brief case from my hand.

“Thank you,” I mumbled. I walked down the main hal , into the Great Room, blinking to focus once I recognized that it was Kim sitting alone on our large, green sofa. She sat on the edge of her seat; her hands bal ed tightly together atop her knees. I sat across from her in my mother’s favorite Italian occasional chair.

It was then that I noticed Jared hadn’t joined us, but had gone upstairs to prepare for a night away, instead.

“Kim,” I said, blinking slowly.

“Looks like you need a nap,” she said.

“Nightmares.”

Kim looked to the floor, nodding. “Nigh, you don’t get to hate me. I would understand if the demonic voodoo stuff gave you the heebie-jeebies, but you’re just mad because you think I lied to you.”

The rankling produced a second wind. “You did lie to me. I don’t even know you.”

Her head popped up. “And I know you? Jared’s half-angel, and you’re not exactly your run-of-the-mil Brown co-ed yourself, Miss Merovingian.

Have they told you what that means?”

“They told me,” I grumbled.

“So, I just came to tel you that we’re stil friends. And you can like it, and let me piss you off like I used to without worrying if you’re real y pissed.

Got it?”

“Whatever, I’m pooped,” I said, pushing myself from the chair.

“Real y? We’re good?” she asked.

I turned, and seeing her expectant eyes, I smiled. “Yeah, Kim. We’re good.”

Kim stood, and then held out both of her arms, jutting her lip out. “Hugs?”

“Quit it.”

She let her hands fal to her thighs with a slap. “Wel , thought I’d try.”

I walked her to the door, and she leaned close to my ear. “I’m going with Jared tonight. I’ll try not to make out with him while we’re hunting down your book.”

“You’re a good friend,” I said.

“Kiss noise,” Kim said, jogging down the drive to her Sentra. How had I missed that horrid thing? I was more tired than I thought.

Jared met me at the bottom of the staircase. He held my arm for a few steps, and then gave up, lifting me in his arms, and carrying me up the stairs.

“Shower,” I said.

Jared lowered me to the overstuffed mattress in my room. “In the morning. Bex is here. Sleep.”

I'm not sure when I fel asleep, or how long Jared stayed, because I was unconscious the moment my head hit the pil ow. The nightmares stayed away, even after my previous nightmare of Shax being in that very room. I was so tired, and slept so hard, that I didn’t dream at al .

I peeled my eyes open to see Bex standing at the end of the bed. “Just so you know, that’s creepy,” I said, rubbing the sleep from my eyes.

“Not as scary as your hair,” he frowned.

“Wow, you’re grumpy this morning.”

“Cynthia doesn’t trust me in the kitchen.”

Three knocks at the door, and Cynthia backed in to my room, a tray in her hands. “Good morning. I thought I would bring you breakfast.”

“Does Agatha have the day off?” I asked.

“No, she’s downstairs. Why?” Cynthia asked.

I watched my mother for a moment in disbelief, and then shook my head. “Nothing. Thank you.”

Cynthia left as quickly as she came in. “Mind the coffee, Dear, it’s hot,” she call ed back as her heels clicked down the hal .

Bex’s eyebrows were nearly touching as his frown deepened. He had never been to my parents’ home, to my knowledge, and he wasn’t enjoying it at al .

“She warms up,” I said.

“That’s not what I’ve heard,” he grumbled.

“I’m going to hop in the shower. Has Jared call ed?”

“No,” he said, picking up the remote control, switching on the television. “But he’s on his way.”

I thought about that for a moment, and decided I already knew the answer. They could sense each other, and Bex was the most in-tune out of the three Hybrid siblings.

My morning routine finished without event, including Jared's return home. “I thought you said he was coming,” I said, tightening my robe.

“He is,” Bex said, his eyes stationary on the screen.

“Nina, Love?” Agatha call ed from the hal .

“Yes?” I said, opening the door. Agatha was holding several bags, and Beth stood behind her, her arms ful of bags as wel .

“You said you lost everything,” Beth said, brushing past me to the closet. She disappeared into my walk in, hanging the plastic-covered clothing on the nearly-empty iron rods.

I opened the door, watching her pul shoes boxes from one of the large sacks. Once she was finished, she looked at her watch. “Crap! I gotta go.”

“Beth.”

“Yes?” she said, whipping around.

“Thank you.”

She smiled. “Don’t thank me. That was so fun. I think I went a little overboard.”

She waved, and then rushed back the way she came, her legs moving a thousand miles per hour. I shut the closet door behind me, and pul ed the first outfit I touched off its hanger. When I walked out into the bedroom, I froze in my tracks.

Jared stood in the center of my room, covered in dirt, blood, and his was face scraped and blotchy.

“Oh my…oh my God!” I yel ed, rushing over to him. “What happened?”

Kim walked in behind Jared, untouched. “I told him not to go without me, but he’s faster than I am.”

I touched Jared’s face. “What did you do?”

He grimaced. “The book was in my hand. I had it.”

“Where were you?” I said, helping him pul off his jacket. He was stiff, and cringed with pain.

Kim’s usual y stoic expression twisted as she watched me pul his t-shirt up and over his head. “Warwick,” she said. “We got the book, but Donovan was there.”

Six raw, bloody and swol en bul et holes dotted different areas of Jared’s torso, accompanied by a large gash along his shoulder blade.

“Jared!” I screamed.

Bex left without a word.

“Where are you going?” I call ed after him.

“He’s going to find something to pul the fragments out.”

I helped him to the bed, and then took a deep breath. It didn’t help. Tears wel ed up in my eyes. “You’re going to be okay, right?”

Jared managed a smile. “Yes. I’ll be good as new this time tomorrow.”

Bex returned with a towel ful of different items. “Isaac too much for you, huh?”

“Isaac.” Jared scoffed, rol ing his eyes. Donovan and his Glock. And I plowed through approximately eighty demons before I got to them.”

“If you would have waited for me to catch up with you, you wouldn’t have had to waste your time with them,” Kim snapped. She looked to me, “The second he learned the location of the book, he took off. I was twenty minutes behind him.”

I glared at Jared. “That’s not like you to be so impulsive and reckless. What were you thinking?”

Jared sighed. “That I wanted this to end.”

Jared cringed, and then I heard a plink from behind him as Bex dropped bul et remnants into a bowl.

“I can’t watch,” I said, covering my eyes.

“You can’t go anywhere until we’re finished here. Then I’ll take you to work,” Bex said, pul ing out another bul et.

“Watch the blood. Don’t get any on her sheets,” Jared said, cringing again.

“I’ll get new sheets,” I moaned. I took Jared’s hand in both of mine.

“It’s okay,” he said. “We’l try again.”

“And hopeful y not be so stupid about it this time,” Kim said from the door way.

“Do you think I care about that? I don’t want you near that book ever again!” I said, my voice higher with each word.

“Okay…okay,” Jared said. “Don’t get upset.”

“Why would I be upset? My boyfriend comes home looking like he just escaped from a horror movie.” I took one of the wet cloths Bex had brought upstairs and used it to wipe a deep cut above his eye. “Tel me everything.”

“The details aren’t important,” Kim said.

“The bottom line is, I failed,” Jared said, his teeth clinched.

Kim shrugged. “We know who’s guarding it, what they’re capable of, and every angle of their defense, Jared. I wouldn’t call that failure.”

“So what’s Isaac like?” Bex said, dropping more fragments into the plate.

“He’s highly trained,” Jared answered.

“And psychotic,” Kim said. “You should have seen them. It was like a scene from Rambo. Neither of them would quit, and they’re both Hybrids, so it was like a never-ending fight scene. One punch here, knife wound there, elbow, face punch, and then one of them goes flying across the room.

Lather. Rinse. Repeat.”

“That’s enough,” Jared said.

My stomach wrenched at her words. “Please don’t go back. Not until Bex or Claire can go with you.”

Jared looked away. “It’s not that I couldn’t handle it on my own, Nina.”

“That’s not what I meant,” I whispered.

He frowned, apology in his eyes. “I know. I’m sorry,” he said with a sigh. “Kim’s right. We did learn a lot last night. The problem is, Claire’s not here, and Bex has to stay with you.”

“What about someone else? Another Hybrid?” I asked.

Bex laughed once. “If it comes down to it, we’l have to take Donovan down. No one is going to help us down another Hybrid without good reason.”

I looked down at Jared’s bloodied hands, and then back to his stormy blue-grey eyes. “And saving me isn’t good enough for them.”

Jared nodded. “We have to persuade them that something big is coming, and to do that we need the book.”

Kim knocked on the door jamb. “Now that’s irony. C’mon, Nigh. I’ll take you to work.”

“Is that okay?” I asked Jared.

“I’d rather you wait,” he said.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Kim said. She pul ed up her shirt, revealing a handgun stuffed half-way into her jeans. “I’m packin’, demons run when they see me coming, and as Donovan learned last night…my right hook is wicked accurate.”

The glance Jared and I traded turned into involuntary smiles.

“Bex wil be right behind you,” Jared said.

I kissed his cheek. “Maybe I should stay home today.”

“This is nothing. You should see the other guys,” Jared said with a wink. “Go on.”

Kim lifted my briefcase off the floor, and held it out. I rushed to the bathroom, washed the blood from my hands, and then fol owed her down the stairs.

“Let’s take my car,” I said.

Kim shrugged. “Whatever.”

As promised, the ride to work was safe and uneventful, and Bex pul ed into the parking lot on his new, barely-street legal Ducati Streetfighter just as I stepped out of the car. Kim stayed behind as I rushed into Titan, thankful that being the CEO sort-of-in-training granted me a spot on the elevator.

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