I managed to hang up with shaky hands. I needed to collect my thoughts as questions fired left and right. How did she get Jordyn’s phone? If she had it, that meant Rianne was in town and with Jordyn. But how did Rianne know where I was? And oh my God, was Jordyn okay?
Or maybe I was having a nightmare.
“Breathe,” Conrad said as he sat beside me. “I heard your heart go from sixty to a hundred and ten in seconds. Who was that?”
The phone vibrated again in my lap.
Conrad glanced at the screen as Jordyn’s name flashed on it.
“I can’t answer,” I said. “Not yet.” I inhaled a trembling, aching breath into my lungs.
“I’ve been around Jordyn long enough to know her voice, and that person I heard wasn’t Jordyn,” Conrad said.
The vibration finally stopped, only to start up again.
That time Conrad answered. “What?” His tone was lethal as his fangs elongated.
“Put my sister on.” Rianne’s voice was loud enough for me to hear.
Conrad’s vampire-black eyes widened as he ended the call.
I still couldn’t speak as shock rolled through me. My brain hurt trying to figure out how she knew where I was.
Even Conrad looked confounded. “That was Rianne.” He knew Jordyn’s voice well, but he had to know Rianne’s too. He’d been the scout who had watched the Aberdeen family for years.
Suddenly, déjà vu hit me. The last time Rianne and I had been on the phone together was in Montana while Conrad and I sat in his car in the Deer and Elk parking lot. That day had changed the trajectory of my relationship with her when she had officially jumped to the dark side.
Adrenaline powered through me, clearing the dizziness but not my confusion as to what the fuck she was doing in Maine. “I need to go. Rianne has Jordyn. She must be at the diner.”
Conrad’s large frame blocked me from moving. “Not so fast.”
I pushed him, but the muscled, toned vampire didn’t budge.
“Rianne will not give up. If I keep ignoring her, she’ll come to the house.” She couldn’t be here with my children. She could never know I had more than one. If my grandmother found out, she would burn the planet to get her evil hands on them.
“I’ll call Rebekah,” he said, whipping out his phone.
Wherewasthe she-wolf? Surely she could handle Rianne, who was human—or at least my sister had admitted as much at the press conference, although that had been three weeks ago. She might be a monster now.
Rianne called again. That time I held up my hand to Conrad. “I got this.” Fear for Jordyn wormed its way into my skin, digging in like a tick into a dog. “Where are you?” I asked Rianne as I answered.
“Waiting on you at this shabby diner. Holding Jordyn and, oh, about six or seven others hostage.” Disgust bled through the line. “If you’re not here in five minutes, then Jordyn and your wolf will be injected with our spanking newserum.” She emphasized the word spanking. “Do you know what happens when a wolf has the serum in their system? It’s a unique transformation to watch as they suffer a slow death.”
Conrad was listening intently.
I rolled my shoulders back. “The serum kills everyone subjected to it.” Maybe not Ben or Matthew, but they were a product of Patrick Mason’s genetic-altering concoction, and he hadn’t mixed vampire DNA with shifter DNA like Carly had. “Why are you here?” I had an inkling.
“First, sis,” Rianne said, “I want you to come down to the diner. I know the town is full of vampires. But none of you will hurt me. If you try anything, I have a reporter with me and a cameraman who is videotaping everything. I’m sure my death broadcast on national television will incite more violence and anger. People are rooting for me, Layla.”
I stuck my finger in my mouth to mime gagging, but she couldn’t see me. I hadn’t seen the news in several days. As hard as it was, I hadn’t read the headlines on my phone either.
“You're telling me it’s just you and a couple of journalists in town. They’re your bodyguards?” I refrained from unleashing a condescending laugh so that I didn’t disturb my babies.
Rianne’s demented chortle pierced my eardrum. “I can handle myself, but the reporter is an added benefit. You see, I know vampires worldwide are cringing that the public knows about them. Just think what will happen if the news stations converge on this small town. I also hear the vampire government is hunting Sam, and there is a contract out on his head. Are you just beside yourself, sister? Wouldn’t it be fun to see a slew of hunters like our family chasing down Sam? I’ve even suggested to a few of my fast friends that vampires look great strung up over a firepit.”
“Reporters don’t scare me, and neither do hunters. You should know that.”
“Layla.” She said my name with that tone I was accustomed to hearing whenever she rolled her eyes. “You should be afraid of this reporter. Because if I give him the signal, he’ll call the human cops. And last I checked, you were still human, which means if I press charges, they can lock you up.”
