Chapter Eleven
Hall of Mirrors
A
fter work, Jules went straight to the local fairgrounds to help set up for Aboit High’s biggest fundraiser of the year. She’d volunteered to oversee the carnival games with Gabriel.
She stood and held the end of the banner off the ground as he stood on a tall ladder, tacking it high above their heads.
“Give me a little more slack,” Gabriel said, tugging on his end.
Jules let a few more inches of banner slip through her fingers.
“Where has your mind wandered off to this time?” Gabriel teased as he tugged on the banner again and smiled down at her.
“It’s gone on vacation apparently,” Jules replied with a wide smile of her own.
It was nice to feel less tension between them. She and Gabriel had talked things through a bit when she’d seen him at lunch. Since then, he seemed to be much more relaxed. Apparently, Ricky’s lie had done the trick. He’d told her that he wasn’t comfortable with Ricky knowing what he and Jules were, but since there hadn’t been any more altercations with the Alpha, he would try to put the whole werewolf thing to rest. Jules appreciated the effort this must take on his part. She knew Gabriel had just reason to lack trust in werewolves. But she simply couldn’t judge the whole species for an act that only a few had committed.
Once, a few decades ago, she’d said this to Gabriel. However, he was convinced that it was werewolves’ very nature that made them dangerous. Jules had tried to argue that all vampire must then be judged by their species’ nature, and Gabriel hadn’t spoken to her for a week. He was wrong on this, and she believed they both knew it. But Eileen had lost her human life and Gabriel simply hadn’t been able to find forgiveness inside himself yet. He did say this afternoon that he would try to let it go. This gave Jules hope that Gabriel would, one day, find peace.
Just then, Gabriel finished that side of the banner, jumped down, and moved the ladder to the other end. Jules regained her focus and followed suit, keeping the banner out of the dirt below.
The pre-carnival atmosphere made Jules’s senses throb. The music had begun to emanate from the rides on the midway, which were set up starting one street over. The rising smells of the food vendors were wafting from near the entrance to the grounds. Excited teenagers were chattering and horsing around while they waited for their families and townspeople to arrive. All these things reminded Jules of a day long gone, when she and Gabriel had visited the first circus together.
“Alright, gather around,” Gabriel shouted as he jumped off the ladder again. Jules watched as several girls swooned. Slowly, all the students assigned to the carnival games meandered over.
Jules picked a clipboard up off the nearest table and handed it to Gabriel. Gabriel began taking a shrewd form of attendance and giving each student their individual assignment.
“Missy Thomas, Asher Danforth, Terry Pope, with me at the ring toss.” Several students’ faces dropped at not being able to work with their favorite teacher.
“Tasha Anderson and Ethan Martin with Ms. Bristow at the balloon pop.” Both students nodded. Ethan and Tasha glanced a little awkwardly at one another. Their families lived next to each other, but they didn’t have much in common. Normally, Ethan would have made some crack about not working at all, but Gabriel moved quickly down the list.
“Kara Willis and Amy Reynolds with Landon Reynolds and Seth Yang at the water shooter.”
“All of you freshmen and sophomores will listen to your upperclassman. Seniors, any questions see Ms. Bristow or myself.”
Amy scowled, possibly at having to work under her older brother. Seth and Landon high-fived, enjoying being in charge for once. Amy smiled at the girl, one year younger than herself. Landon winked at Kara, who giggled.
Nodding and muttering erupted all around, some students happy with their assigned group and some disappointed.
“I don’t have an assignment?” Ricky said quietly. He was standing a few feet behind Jules. Apparently, he was more comfortable with a vampire he barely knew then a whole bunch of peers he didn’t know at all.
“That’s okay. You can work with me.” She smiled softly at him.
He looked grateful at not being left out completely, not that he was the type to admit such things.
“Alright gang, the carnival opens in twenty minutes. Go prepare your booths.” With this, the groupings went their sperate ways. Jules and her unlikely trio took up position between Gabriel’s booth and the one being run by Seth and Landon.
When Jules entered her booth, Tasha was sitting on the front table and swinging her legs while Ethan lounged against a stack of heavy crates.
“Okay,” Jules began. But she changed directions when she saw that Ricky continued to stand awkwardly at her side. First things first. “Have either of you met Ricky?” Jules asked them.
“Nope,” Ethan said, “other than the fact that he gave me an extra hour to hide under the bleachers and make out with Kara Willis this morning, that is.”
“Ethan!” Jules said, aghast. “I told you to go to study hall.”
“Yeah. I didn’t do that.”
Ricky raised his eyebrows while watching the exchange between Ethan and Jules.
“Thanks, dude.” Ethan gave Ricky a wide smile.
Jules made an exasperated, older sister sound.
“I thought we respected teachers in this school?” Ricky commented to Jules, doing a nasally impression of Belinda.
Jules was about to respond when Ethan spoke again. “For the most part I do, but you see, Jules practically lives at my house.”
This time Tasha joined Ricky in the eyebrow raise.
“She’s is my sister’s best friend. So basically, she’s like another bossy big sister I don’t have to listen too,” he clarified.
“Oh,” Tasha added as she a Ricky nodded.
“Does he…?” Ricky began to ask.
“No, he doesn’t.” Jules cut him off before he could say anything that Ethan didn’t need to know. “Tasha, have you…” Jules began.
“What don’t I?” Ethan asked at the same moment Tasha responded to Jules’s first question.
“Ricky and I met this morning,” she said, looking over at Jules and then turned, smiling at Ricky.
“Good,” Jules said, ignoring Ethan completely. “Ricky and Tasha, why don’t you two work with the darts and re-tacking balloons, and Ethan you can fill more balloons.”
“Why do I get the sucky job?” Ethan asked.
“Trust me, you don’t,” Ricky said.
“What will you be doing then?” Ethan asked.
“Helping.” Jules crossed her arms and looked down at Ethan, who had dropped onto the dirt and gathered up the air hose to start filling more balloons. The first balloon Ethan filled, burst with a bang.
RICKY
The carnival opened and people began to team in through the front gate. Many went straight to the food or the midway, others meander toward the games. “You don’t strike me as a particularly social person,” Tasha said observantly. In fact, Ricky hated massive amounts of social interaction. When there were too many people around, he generally started to feel overwhelmed. “So why don’t I take the front office?” She motioned toward the front of the booth.
Ricky shrugged. But, in reality, he was relieved by the thought of not having to converse with hundreds of strangers throughout the evening.
In the first couple of minutes, Ricky could see why Tasha had offered to be the one who talked to the carnival goers. She thrived amidst the chaos. Talking to anyone and everyone seemed like a completely natural occurrence. Ricky was genuinely surprised that her personality was as openly vibrant as her hair colors. At first sight, he’d thought she was introverted like him, but now he could see that they were actually opposites. This intrigued him all the more.
He pulled the darts that had just been thrown from the board and handed them back to Tasha. “Better luck next time Mike,” Tasha said, waving off the customer who failed to hit his mark.
“Ethan behave,” Ricky heard Jules say.
Ricky rolled his eyes, he had tuned out Ethan Martin’s banter with the vampire long ago. He was amazed that the teenager seemed so comfortable around Jules. Still, he didn’t think Ethan knew what she was. So, he didn’t know that he should fear her.
The next person missed the board completely and Ricky picked the darts up off the ground, brushed them off on his shirt, and handed them back to Tasha for the next person to use. “Cheer up, Ricky Harrison,” Tasha said, taking the darts from him. “It’s for charity.”
“Charity?” Ricky repeated skeptically.
“Well not technically, it’s for the school. But it feels like charity on my part,” Tasha joked. It feels like slow, arduous torture to me, Ricky thought but didn’t say aloud. This was going to be a long night.
A little under an hour after the gates opened, a bi-racial couple arrived at their booth. Their gorgeous daughter stopped at the next booth over and kissed the senior named Seth on the lips. “So, do you get a break later?” she asked him.
“Probably not,” Seth replied.
Ricky heard a balloon actually pop. He walked over to pull the darts free and stapled another balloon in the empty space.
“Hey bud,” the man addressed Ethan, who was sitting on the ground filling balloon after balloon.
Ethan didn’t respond.
Jules tapped his leg with the toe of her shoe.
“Huh!” Ethan shouted, looking over at Jules, who pointed. “Oh, hi dad.” Ethan turned off the air compressor.
“Jules has got you doing the hard work I see.” Mr. Martin winked at Jules.
Jules left her spot near the front of the booth and walked to the corner closest to the middle-aged couple. “Oh yes.” Jules smiled. “He’s my least favorite student, you see.”
“I am not!” Ethan said, most likely not as offended as he sounded.
“How’s is it going sweetie?” the woman asked, but she wasn’t talking to her son. She was addressing Jules. This had to be Ethan’s, clearly human, family that Jules, the vampire, practically lived with.
“Pretty good,” Jules replied.
“Are you behaving?” Ethan’s mother asked her son, who had walked up next Jules’s shoulder.
“Yes,” he said.
His mother looked at him skeptically.
“That’s half true,” Jules told her.
“Traitor,” Ethan grumbled.
Ricky heard a pop which indicated that someone had hit their intended target. He turned and watched a girl hit two more in a row.
“Great job!” Tasha praised.
Without comment, Ricky walked over, returned the darts, and stapled three more balloons over the empty rubber carcasses of the last. As he did so, he continued to watch Jules and the humans from the corner of his eye.
“Jules.” Ethan’s sister finally left Seth’s booth, joining her family at theirs. “You should probably know that I’m coming over tonight. I feel like I haven’t seen you in forever. I mean, I see you in the mornings but I haven’t actually spent time with you since…”
“Monica, really,” her father chided.
“What?” Monica shrugged.
“Inviting yourself over to other people’s homes whenever you want. Where did we go wrong?” The man asked his wife, but it sounded like a joke.
“It’s Jules,” Monica said as if this was an obvious exception to propriety.
Ricky was watching this family’s interaction sadly. Three days ago, that was him. Happy family, loving parents, snarky teenager who they loved and adored. It was very different now. His mother wasn’t the same person she’d been last week. He assumed she was upset about his father’s murder somewhere deep inside, not that she had shown that to him. But it was his dad, not his mom, who had always been the one to let Ricky in on the inner workings of his mind and emotions.
“You okay, Ricky?”
Ricky turned, expecting it to be Tasha who’d inquired, but she was making some grand gesture, calling people over to the booth to take their chances. It was Jules who had momentarily turned away from the human family and spoken to him.
Ricky scrubbed a tear from his cheek that he hadn’t realized he had shed. Instead of answering her question directly, he said, “so, does she know what you are?”.
“Who? Monica?”
Ricky nodded.
Jules hesitated for a moment as if deciding how much to say. “She does.”
“And she’s okay with it?” he asked, astonished.
Jules looked him dead in the eyes as she spoke. “I don’t hurt people.”
“I believe you.” Ricky turned at another set of multiple popping sounds.
“That’s the best round so far!” Tasha said, congratulating the man standing in front of her. “For that, you get a bunny.” Ricky handed Tasha a blue, stuffed rabbit, who passed it to the victorious customer.
“Luca!”
Ricky’s attention was jerked to the next booth over. Luca, along with the couple whose wedding reception he’d skipped out on last night, approached the booth next to theirs. Between the hunt and the reception, Ricky had put together that Amy, Landon, and the newly-wed wife were siblings.
“Kyle, I didn’t know you knew Hayley Reynolds,” Seth said, looking from one werewolf to the other.
“That’s Hayley Reynolds-Cooper to you,” Kyle said, putting an arm over Hayley’s shoulders.
“You’re married?” Seth asked astonished.
Ricky saw a scowled cross Landon’s face, but Landon remained silent.
“Look who it is,” Monica whispered to Jules. “I know you like him.”
“Don’t,” Jules said.
“Luc…” Monica began to shout in his direction.
Jules grabbed her waving arm. They exchanged a weird glance and then Jules shook her head minutely. But it was too late, Luca had already turned in their direction. His eyes met Jules’s for the briefest of moments and then he turned his back, stepping between Jules and the other werewolves.
“I’ll explain later,” Jules whispered so lowly to Monica that Ricky almost missed it, even with wolf hearing.
Monica nodded and stepped away from the balloon pop booth. “Mom, Dad. This is Seth’s friend Luca Cain,” Monica introduced, drawing all nearby attention. “And Hayley Reynolds, she was on cheer squad with me and I’m sorry. I don’t know your name?” she said to Kyle.
While the newly-arrived werewolves were distracted, Ricky saw Jules discreetly take a few steps farther into the booth.
Ricky decided belatedly to be helpful and stepped in front of Jules, obscuring her from the view of the others.
There was another pop.
“That’s a turtle,” Tasha said. Ricky didn’t move to hand her the prize. Tasha looked around confused, but Ricky pretended not to notice. Tasha rolled her eyes and walked over to retrieve the small turtle shaped bag of beans herself.
Ricky looked behind him. To his surprise, Jules was gone.
GABRIEL
Gabriel’s ship was running quite smoothly, so to speak. He had picked three kids to work with that were likely not to work well under lesser authorities. One was a detention-prone sophomore, one was a social outcast, and one had the richest family in school, along with a severe authority figure problem. These three students were part of opposite sides of the school hierarchy, and yet, they were some of his favorites this year. He enjoyed teaching the smart, well-behaved students of course. But the challenging ones always seemed to tug on his heart-strings. Every student had a story, Gabriel had learned not to ignore the ones with darkness in theirs.
“Gabriel,” Jules called from just outside the back of his booth.
“Missy, you’re in charge until I get back,” he said to the social outcast. The boys groaned. He ignored them and joined Jules on the other side of the tent flap. “What is it?” he asked her.
“Werewolves,” Jules whispered, peaking around the edge of the tent. “You’ll leave them alone, right?”
“You think I’m going to make a scene in front of my students?” He was a little offended, to be honest. He may have overreacted at the Promenade that night, but he definitely knew where to draw the line.
“No, of course not. But…” She back peddled.
“I’ll be sure to avoid them and, yes, I promise I won’t make a scene,” Gabriel interrupted. He would never risk the safety of his students that way.
“Okay,” Jules said, looking like she felt a little awkward about pulling him away from his booth.
“Thank you for warning me, Jules.” Gabriel squeezed her arm, hoping to make her feel a little more at ease. They exchanged a smile and he left her, returning to the inside of his booth. “Terry give that back right now!” he ordered sternly as the detention prone boy held Missy’s cell phone above her head. The rich kid wasn’t laughing but he wasn’t helping restore order either. “You have customers.” Gabriel pointed to the front of the booth. He turned and stuck his head back through the tent flaps. Jules was just about to step back into her own booth. “Jules!”
She turned toward him.
He walked back out and met her halfway. “Can you check in with the other booths? My leaving these three doesn’t appear to be possible.” Gabriel looked over in the direction of the front of Jules’s booth. He could just see the Beta werewolf conversing with one of Jules’s students.
“Sure,” Jules replied. “My kids will be fine for a little while.”
“Yeah, you got some easy ones.”
“You totally did that,” Jules pointed toward his booth, “to yourself.”
“What can I say? These are the ones who need me,” he said with a shrug and a smile.
Just then, Gabriel heard shouting from his booth. “What now?” he muttered and then went back to work.
JULIANA
Jules was moving to step back through the flap in the back of her booth when she discovered that the entrance was being blocked. What on earth? But as she peered in the small opening she could see Ricky standing in the entrance, holding the flaps of heavy plastic together discreetly. “Bye Mom, bye Carson!” he shouted a little louder than was necessary and stuck his hand through the flap, palm out. Probably signaling that she should wait there. Jules waited. After a few more moments, Ricky stepped aside.
“Sorry about that,” Ricky said quietly.
“Thanks, you didn’t have to do that,” she said. Understanding that he’d just put himself between her and the Alpha.
Ricky shrugged.
“Dude your stepfather is a beast,” Tasha said once both Jules and Ricky had joined her closer to the front of the booth. “He popped like eight balloons in a row.”
“He’s not my stepfather,” Ricky said flatly.
“But he is a beast.”
“You have no idea.” Ricky said this under his breath, but Jules heard it clearly.
“Was that really your mom?” Ethan asked.
Jules cut him off, “listen up guys…”
Tasha rolled her eyes and groaned.
“And girl,” Jules added. “I need to make a run to the other booths. Tasha’s in charge until I get back.”
Tasha smiled widely at this.
“Why is she in charge?” Ethan asked incredulously.
“Because she’s the girl,” Jules teased, raising her eyebrows at Ethan. “If you need anything, Mr. Prentiss is right over there,” she told Tasha.
Tasha nodded.
Jules left them to their own devices and walked by Seth’s booth. Silently, she asked the question of ‘how’s it going’ by moving her thumb sideways and up.
Seth gave her a thumbs-up and she moved on down the long row of booths. She was just about to check in with the forth booth when her phone beeped in her pocket. She stopped in the middle of the humans meandering the strip and retrieved it. The message was from Luca. It read, “meet me at the funhouse.”
She knew that she shouldn’t go but hesitated only a moment before replying and changing directions, heading toward the midway.
This section of the carnival was far busier than her own. The humans were more crammed together and much louder. She passed the ticket booth, which was being overseen by the administration staff. Then dodged around the Ferris Wheel, and approached a small, colorful building that was adorned with a creepy-looking clown.
She looked around for Luca but didn’t see him standing outside or anywhere near the funhouse. Shrugging, Jules entered through the clown’s open mouth to see if he was somewhere inside.
She walked up a moving staircase, across a bridge jerking this way and that, slid down a twisting slide, and walked into yet another room. This one contained a springy rope obstacle course. The family in front of Jules was giggling wildly. Jules supposed something like this would be fun with loved ones to share it with. For her, it was frustrating and unamusing. The family ahead of her skipped into the next room gleefully. Jules stopped short. She couldn’t enter. The room in front of her was a maze of mirrors. She couldn’t see the expression on her face, she never again would. As they bounded away, the family’s reflections were warping into many different shapes, sizes, and contortions.
Jules looked behind her, she couldn’t go back but she couldn’t go forward. The family successfully made it to the other side just as another group entered the rope room. It was now or not at all. Jules sped through the maze, her lack of reflection accosting her from every side. She hit a dead end, spun, and tried another angle. The next group was catching up to her. She heard them enter the mirror maze just as she ran into the next room.
The world around her went dark. The music was wild. Lights were flashing; obscuring her sight. It was enough to make you dizzy and disoriented, which Jules guessed was the point. She was just about to rush from this room as well when she felt herself being pulled across it. For a moment, she thought it was part of the funhouse until she realized it was strong arms moving her into position against the wall. A tall body pressed against hers.
The whites of his eyes were glowing down at her. “Hi,” Jules said, looking up at Luca.
“Hi.” Luca put one hand on her back and one behind her head. She stood on her toes and he bent to kiss her. She gave into the moment, her body desiring more and more of him. Their kiss intensified and then it stopped as Luca pulled back just a little. “Thanks for meeting me.”
“I wanted to see you,” she said, her hands coming to rest over his white tee-shirt.
“I’m sorry.” He looked at the wall over her head for a moment.
“Why?” she gazed questioningly up at him.
He dropped his gaze back to her. “Because I forgot to tell you something earlier.”
“Is that so?” she asked. “Let’s hear it then.”
“I don’t know if you’re ready to hear it,” he said, his hands coming to rest on the sides of her neck. He bit his lip as he stared down at her.
“I’m in love with you,” Jules said in a rush. She wasn’t sure what possessed her to say such a thing in this moment. Why was now, in this dark, dizzying room, the right time to inform him that she’d fallen completely in love with him?
Luca’s eyes grew wide. He seemed taken aback until an intoxicating smile spread across his lips. He laughed.
“Why is that funny?” Jules asked, trying not to be stung by his reaction.
“It’s funny because that is precisely what I was going to tell you.”
“There is still time,” she commented, stretching up on her tiptoes again.
“Nope, you’ve ruined it,” Luca said. “You...”
“Luca.” She said his name softly. “I love you,” she said again, looking up into his eyes.
“I love you too.” With this, he pulled her even closer and kissed her again.
CARSON
As the carnival began to die down, Carson meandered back through the games. The music from the midway started to fade into the background and the smells of the food vendors grew closer. Carson had come to this event to support his town and the local high school. He had encouraged his entire pack to do the same. As the leader of so many, it was Carson’s duty to enrich the community in which the majority of his wolves lived.
He had elected to come without the Den members. There was a lot of tension in the Den at the moment, between Kyle’s betrayal and Luca’s rebellious words. Luca, at least, seemed to be coming around. He had told him that the red-haired vampire was the school’s librarian.
Carson’s arm was draped lazily around Demetria’s shoulders. She was tall, shapely, and strong. He’d originally wanted someone younger to be his mate. However, his first love, the one that should have been his years ago, seemed like a deal he couldn’t easily pass up. Especially now that his first choice had been stolen from him.
Demetria squeezed his hand. “Let me go see if Ricky is ready to leave,” she said, sliding out from under the weight of his arm.
“Do you have to?” Carson asked with a playful whine. He grabbed the back of her dress and held on for a moment.
She turned back toward him. “He’s my son.” She walked over and kissed his lips quickly. “So yes, I have to.”
He took her face between his hands. “Alright.” He kissed her again and then released her.
She walked across the dirt while he watched her go. That’s when he saw what, if he was being honest, he’d really come for. Proof of Luca’s intel. The ancient red-headed vampire was inside the booth with Demetria’s son. It chatted lightly with Demetria for a few moments while Carson watched.
It was smaller than he remembered and young looking, despite the fact that it was supposedly on staff at the high-school. At first glance, the little vampire looked harmless, and yet, he knew it was a monster, more deadly and grotesque than all others.
Carson desperately wanted to run across the way and rip its head off where it stood. The world would be better off if he did but he resisted. There was a time and a place for such executions. He had tasked Jed with tracking its movements. The time would come. There was already a plan in motion that would ensure the vampire’s demise. Soon enough, Aboit and the wolves under his care would be rid of this threat forever.