Chapter 362

“Yeah,” Luca snarls, coughing and glaring up at Jacks, his words wheezing out under the pressure of Jackson’s weight pressed tight against his chest. “I marked her – but she’s your fucking mate, you asshole. Yours! She fucking picked you, Jacks! So go and get your fucking girl and leave me the hell out of it!”

Jackson stills, staring at him, uncomprehending.

Luca laughs, letting his head loll to the side, giving up the fight as blood trickles out of his mouth and his nose. “She fucking picked you, Jacks,” he says, going limp beneath Jackson’s knee – finally, finally giving into it. “I marked her, and she still fucking picked you.”

“What are you talking about?” Jackson whispers, still baffled.

He lifts his knee, slightly, easing up. But it’s not mercy that makes him do it – just sheer confusion.

“When I gave her my mark,” Luca snaps, still not looking up. “She shoved me away. Told me she didn’t want it.” He turns his head to glare at Jackson, hate and desperate, jealous rage in every inch of his expression. “She wants you. Though I couldn’t tell you why. She’s always had shit taste –“

Jackson punches him, hard, across the other cheek.

Luca groans, coughing, his head snapping to the side, his eyes pressing shut with agony.

Jackson instantly feels guilty, further letting up the pressure on Luca’s chest and shifting to kneel at his side, still staring down at him.

“Will you just…go?” Luca murmurs, his cheek pressed to the grass and the dirt, his eyes closed. “You fucking won, all right? She wants you.”

To Jackson’s horror, Luca begins to cry, tears slipping from his eyes.

“She…she only wants you.”

Jacks stares down at Grant, his enemy, the man he came here to kill. The man who marked the woman he loves. But he just looks so pathetic now…

“I rejected her, so you should have smooth fucking sailing –“

“You WHAT!?” Jackson shouts, horrified. Luca gasps, still crying but turning his head back up to Jackson in surprise. When he doesn’t say anything Jackson grabs Luca by the shirt, hauling him up so that their faces are inches apart. “You did what to Ariel?”

“I rejected her!” Luca shouts, agonized and angry and horrified and viciously pleased to have hurt her in return. “You can have her! I don’t even want that bitch if she can’t –“

Jackson roars again and shoves Luca back to the ground, rising to his feet and giving Luca a sharp kick in the ribs. And then another for good measure.

“You fucking fool,” Jackson seethes, staring down at Grant, who just sobs in the dirt. “The Goddess laid the best thing in the world at your feet, and you’re fucking stupid enough to reject it, calling her a bitch and lying to yourself, telling yourself you were ever good enough for her.”

But Luca doesn’t respond. He just curls in on himself and sobs.

“You’re a fucking fool.” Jackson sneers at this pathetic excuse for a man and turns away, stalking back toward the woods. A moment later his walk turns into a run. And then he shifts, sprinting in his wolf form as fast as he can back towards the Castle.

Because he didn’t know. He honestly didn’t know.

If he’d have known, he’d never have left her.

Ariel, rejected. And him not there to hold her.

Fool, fool. He, too, was a fool.

The breath burns his lungs, but Jackson pushes himself faster, desperate to be at her side.

The helicopter lands not on the roof, where it usually does, but on the grass immediately outside the Castle’s front door. There’s no time to wait.

The blades continue to whirl as Cora steps out of the small body of the chopper, but she immediately scowls and throws up a little forcefield of air around her so that she can hear and doesn’t get blown away.

“Ella!” she snarls, turning back to the dark interior of the helicopter. “This is crazy! I –“

“Just do it, Cora!”

“But it’s just so stupid! We can just go upstairs!”

“Hello!?” A shocked voice calls as a woman comes stumbling out of the door of the castle. Cora spins, her eyes sweeping over the person and realizing that they’re not a Cadet but a member of staff. “Can – can I help you!? You can’t have this helicopter here – it’s dangerous!”

Cora glances back at Ella, scowling, but when Ella shoots out a foot and gives her a little kick Cora steps forward, grumbling, towards the shocked staff member and snaps her hands to her hips. “I am Duchess Cora Sinclair!” she intones, far more formally than seems necessary. “And I…demand that my nephew, Cadet Andrew Clark –“

“Ari! Ari Clark!” Ella hisses from inside the helicopter.

“Cadet Ari Clark!” Cora says, lifting her chin and regally pretending the mistake didn’t happen. “Appear immediately! With, um, my kid! Jesse! And my other nephew! Rafe!”

“Wh-what?” the staff member says, staring at her, baffled.

“Oh, will you just go get Ari, Rafe, and Jesse?” Cora sighs, dropping her hands from her hips, her shoulders slumping. “Oh, and the seamstress! The pretty one! Now, please,” she slaps on a charming smile. “It’s important.”

“Um, okay?” the staff member says, looking at the duchess like she might be insane. But she scurries inside, intent on the task.

Two minutes later, the doors open again and Jesse and Rafe appear, Ariel awake and bundled in Rafe’s arms.

“Mom!” Rafe calls, worried, striding for the door to the helicopter. “What the hell are you doing!? Why didn’t you just come inside?”

“Because we’re not going inside,” Ella says, gesturing for Rafe to climb into the helicopter and then reaching for her daughter.

“Mama,” Ariel croaks, quite tender, reaching for her mom and wrapping an arm around her neck, burying her face in her mother’s shoulder.

“There, baby,” Ella coos. “I’m here now. We’re going to take you on a little vacation.”

“What!?” Rafe breathes.

“What’s going on?” Jesse asks, giving his mom a hug but then frowning at her. “Ariel can’t travel, she –“

“Listen, it’s Ella’s world when one of her kids is hurt,” Cora sighs, shaking her head at Jesse. “She gets what she wants, and she wants to take Ariel away for a few days so she can recuperate.”

“Yes, you go now,” Ella says, giving Rafe a little kick on the rump. “I love you, but go away.”

“What!?” Rafe gasps, staring down at his mother and his sister. “I –“

“It’s a girl’s trip, Rafe,” Ella says, giving him a glare. “She’s been too long with all of you boys, she needs girls.”

“But –“

“Go!” Ella growls, baring her teeth to let her son know that she’s serious.

He groans but does as he’s told, knowing that not only is Ariel in the hands of a very capable magical healer, but that Ella is the best person in the world for making someone feel better. If Ella says Ariel needs a girl’s trip, then that’s what she needs.

“Where’s Daphne?” Cora asks, peering over Jesse’s shoulder.

“What?” Jesse asks, going still and staring at his mom as Rafe hops down out of the helicopter. “You’re taking…Daphne?”

Before Cora can answer the girl in question peeks wide-eyed around the door, a little grey kitten peering out from the pocket of her sewing smock.

“Oh, good!” Cora says, beaming at Daphne and striding around her son to take the girl’s hand. “Come on, we’re abducting you.”

“But –“ Daphne gasps, looking desperately at Jesse. “I don’t –“

“Ariel’s been rejected and needs girls,” Ella says, smiling warmly at Daphne as Cora helps her into the helicopter. “And she loves you! So, I figured you’d want to come along. You like spas, right?”

“But I – have work –“ Daphne says, sitting down even as she looks desperately at Jesse. The kitten ducks low in his pocket, hiding. But then Daphne’s head snaps back, shock written all over it. “Wait, Ariel got rejected!? Oh my god,” she snarls. “I’m going to kill Luca.”

“See, you’re already in the right spirit for this trip,” Cora says, clapping Daphne warm on the shoulder.

Ari just sobs quietly into her mother’s shoulder.

“Be a dear and close the door, Meatball,” Ella says, smiling gently at her son. “You did a good job – but we’ll take it from here.”

Rafe sighs and reaches out for the door as Jesse stands pale at his side, his eyes darting between Ariel and Daphne. “You’ll keep us updated? Let us know that she’s all right?”

“Of course, baby,” Ella says, stroking Ariel’s back. “Just keep your phone on.”

Rafe nods once and then closes the helicopter door, knowing he did everything that he could – that Ariel’s in the best place she can be.

Almost immediately after the door is shut the helicopter lifts into the air, heading off into the night.

Just as it begins to fade from sight, a huge wolf bounds from the treeline and into the field.

He spins, horrified, watching as the helicopter pulls away.

And then he howls, full of grief, and falls panting to the ground.

He doesn’t tear his eyes from the helicopter until it fades into the distance, vanishing from sight.