Taekook and the ECLIPSE

8 | Sitting On a Hot Stovetop

"Oops!" he said. "Sorry." He locked his lips again.

His response was easier to read when I got to the part about the Volturi. His teeth clenched together, goose bumps rose on his arms, and his nostrils flared. I didn't go into specifics, I just told him that Taehyung had talked us out of trouble, without revealing the promise we'd had to make, or the visit we were anticipating. Minghyu didn't need to have my nightmares.

"Now you know the whole story," I concluded. "So it's your turn to talk. What happened while I was with my mom this weekend?" I knew Minghyu would give me more details than Taehyung had. He wasn't afraid of scaring me.

Minghyu leaned forward, instantly animated. "So Scoups and Soobin and I were running patrol on Saturday night, just routine stuff, when out of nowhere — bam!" He threw his arms out, impersonating an explosion. "There it is — a fresh trail, not fifteen minutes old. Jackson wanted us to wait for him, but I didn't know you were gone, and I didn't know if your bloodsuckers were keeping an eye on you or not. So we
took off after her at full speed, but she'd crossed the treaty line before we caught up. We spread out along the line, hoping she'd cross back over. It was frustrating, let me tell you."

He wagged his head and his hair — growing out from the short crop he'd adopted when he'd joined the pack — flopped into his eyes. "We ended up too far south. The Cullens chased her back to our side just a few miles north of us. Would have been the perfect ambush if we'd known where to wait."

He shook his head, grimacing now. "That's when it got dicey. Jackson and the others caught up to her before we did, but she was dancing right along the line, and the whole coven was right there on the other side. The muscular one, what's-his-name —"

"Hoseok."

"Yeah, him. He made a lunge for her, but that redhead is fast! He flew right behind her and almost rammed into Dino. So, Dino . . . well, you know Dino."

"Yeah."

"Lost his focus. Can't say that I blame him — the big bloodsucker was right on top of him. He sprang—hey, don't give me that look. The vampire was on our land."

I tried to compose my face so that he would go on. My nails were digging into my palms with the stress of the story, even though I knew it had turned out fine.

"Anyway, Dino missed, and the big one got back on his side. But by then the, er, well the, uh, blonde . . ." Minghyu's expression was a comical mix of disgust and unwilling admiration as he tried to come up with a word to describe Taehyung's sister.

"Rosé."

"Whatever. She got real territorial, so Jackson and I fell back to get Paul's flanks. Then their leader and the
other blond male —"

"Namjoon and Yoongi."

He gave me an exasperated look. "You know I don't really care. Anyway, so Namjoon spoke to Jackson, trying to calm things down. Then it was weird, because everyone got really calm really fast. It was that other one you told me about, messing with our heads. But even though we knew what he was doing, we couldn't not be calm."