unbroken (unexpected series)

Chapter 28

“It’s a shame… that’s all… Pat should be here. I know he made mistakes, but I haven’t seen Oakley this happy since – in forever. And Ben? He’s always had little anger phases, and now… he’s so much calmer. He’s missing all this…” What Julia was saying was easy to understand, I could empathize with the statement, but the fact remained that Pat wouldn’t just up and choose Oakley and Ben.

Julia and I ate in comfortable silence, Ava doing most of the talking but her words becoming slurred mid-meal until exhaustion took over and she leaned her head on the table. “I have to put her to bed,” I said softly standing from the table, lifting Ava in my arms. Chelsea Logan is here, Gabriel said just as I made it to Ava’s room. I’m just putting Ava to bed, laying her down, I went to her dresser getting out her pajamas changing her quickly while she remained knocked out. It wasn’t her bedtime but since we had gotten here, Gabriel and I decided she should start in taekwondo, she did training in her wolf form and like other kids her age on the island she attended school. Not use to being so busy – she normally tired out and fell asleep near 7pm now.

Once I put her dirty clothes in the hamper, I fixed her blinds, turned on the night light and closed her door, heading straight to Gabriel’s’ office. Entering I saw Logan, his young face, his normally shaggy brown hair styled neatly on his head, black jeans and shirt, across from him Gabriel and near his feet were the three brown worn violin cases.

“Took you long enough,” I said jokingly, it had been nearly two weeks since he had checked out the location that Nora had given me. When he found the concrete slab just as she had said he immediately brought it over to his place in California, working with his men to carefully extract the violin cases. We had already read him in on why the violins were important, “Have you had time to go see Rainy?” he asked before I had a chance to sit down, I shook my head regretfully, “No, Oakley fell and then-” a knock on Gabriel’s door stopped my words. Standing he went opened the door revealing Lux.

“As I was saying – Oakley fell and then-”

“Teresa Hellmann bit her husband and daughter,” Lux interrupted me my eyes widened as I turned to face him; surely I had heard him wrong.

“She did what?”

He nodded, “Yes, she just bit them – Lynn and Greg.”

“How long ago?” I asked him dryly. Why isn’t she… what am I missing? Lux asked himself. “The last time they were not on the island it was nearly two years ago… when they left the ‘real’ world, anyone could change a human into a wolf…” I shrugged, “I took his wolf away, but her biting him isn’t going to work, all she’s doing is forsaking them to a very long and painful death,” I said knowingly.

“She thinks that you will save them if it fails,” I snorted, shaking my head, “why would I do that? If anything it’s more understandable that I’d let them suffer a painful death for going against what I did…” Logan chuckled stopping when we all turned to watch him. “You’re not joking,” he said swallowing. Turning back to Lux, “How long ago?” I asked him, but Gabriel answered, “two hours ago.”

“Wait you knew?” Lux asked Gabe, he nodded, “I decided to give Chelsea a break, she’s been listening to them for days now. Thought I’d give her the night off,” how thoughtful of you… Lux thought but said nothing out loud, his face utterly blank.