“Just an old friend I’m trying to get ahold of," I croak, still not all the way awake.
“Gotcha, what are you up to today besides sleeping?” Mave teases.
“Hanging with you obviously," I supply.
“Excellent. You need a swimsuit, a towel, and a desire to walk on the wild side.”
“Check, check, and check. Where should I meet you?”
“I’ll text you directions, and you can come pick me up.”
“Sweet, I’ll let you know when I’m on my way.”
Mave hangs up. Nogoodbyeorsee you laterand it makes me laugh. She’s definitely my people, straight to the point with no side of bullshit.I roll out of bed and get cleaned up. I open my swimsuit drawer and pick out a bikini. I throw on a loose tank top and some denim cutoff shorts. I use my magic to counteract my bed hair, and it’s shiny and voluminous in seconds. Man, I love magic.
The drive to the address Mave sent me is beautiful--not that there’s much ugliness in Solace in general. The trees are much more condensed where she lives, and I picture wolves and other shifters being right at home amidst this wilderness.
Mave and three other people are standing at the end of a dirt road that apparently leads up to where her pack lives. I pull over, and everyone climbs in.
“Vin this is Kaika, Tru and my little brother Macon.”
I say hello to all of them and throw in a friendly wave. They all grunt various versions of hello, and one semi-grumpyhey.
Kaika and Tru look like they’d fit right in with Jacob fromTwilight’swolf pack. They both have black hair, black eyes, and tan skin. Kaika’s hair is long and straight, and Tru’s is buzzed. Macon looks like a smaller version of Mave. He has the same lanky build and heart-shaped face. He’s missing the septum piercing, and instead of having magenta pink hair like his sister, his is a medium length, blue-black.
“Nice wheels,” Mave tells me, rubbing a hand over the interior of the door.
“Yeah, did daddy buy it for his little princess?” Kaika mocks from the back.
I find his eyes in the rearview mirror. “No, I bought it from all the money I made being a badass," I say, overly sweet and cryptic while fluttering my lashes at the presumptuous prick.
“Kaika, shut up.” Mave turns around and punches him in the thigh. “I told you she’s cool. Try to be at least ten percent less miserable, so you don’t scare her off."
She turns back around, and we smile at each other. I pull off on a dirt road that takes us to a bigger dirt clearing that Mave tells me to park in. We all unload, and I follow them through the trees to a lake that’s surrounded by a sandy shore. Solace is seriously the land of endless lakes.
Mave points out some layers of cliffs to our left. “That’s what we’re doing today. You ready for a cliff jumping good time?”
I laugh as I take in the rocky wall face. Macon doesn’t wait for anyone’s invitation. He strips off his shirt and sprints away, leaving a trail of hoots behind him. Mave cracks up.
“He’s the adrenaline junkie in the family. As soon as he caught wind that I was coming here, he was begging me to come. We probably won’t even see him again until it’s time to leave.”
I chuckle and watch him disappear around a huge boulder. Tru lays out a blanket, and we settle our stuff on it. We all strip down to our swimsuits, and I excitedly follow Mave to the second level of cliffs. The trail up to the different levels of rock is smooth, which shows just how often people trek up here to do this. There’s a light breeze that’s keeping the heat at bay, and the water below us is sparkling and inviting.
“Tru, you jump first to show Vinna the best way to do it," Mave instructs.
Tru nods his head and without any hesitation leaps silently from the safety of the cliff’s edge and plummets toward the water. My heart picks up its pace, and I quickly move to the rocky edge so I can see how he enters the water. Tru breaks the rippled surface feet first and starts paddling to shore.
“Do you want to watch again, make sure you’ve got it?” Mave asks me.
“Nope, I think I’m good,” I say enthusiastically. “Any rocks or other things down there I should be worried about?” I ask as I assess the cliff’s edge around me and the water below.
“No rocks and the lake monster only hunts at night, so we’re good.”
I stare at her, trying to figure out if she’s serious or not. My initial instinct is to laugh and blow off her obvious joke, but now that I know there’s this whole paranormal world out there, I’m not so sure she’s not completely serious.
Mave stares at me straight-faced before a smart-ass glint sneaks into her features.
“Vin, you’re making this too easy.”
