My Heart To Hold

Chapter Eight

I pulled Ryan's hand trying to get him to turn back the way we came but he wasn't budging.

"Ryan, run!"

"Why?" he asked with concern.

I spun back around to face him and to show him the threat. But the threat was no longer there. There was no sign of Leo anywhere near the car.

"He was here, Ryan. Leo was here."

"What do mean he was here?" he said as he pushed me back behind a wide tree.

"When- when we walked up I seen him sitting on the hood."

"Juliet listen to me, Okay? I want you to close your eyes and focus. Tell me what you feel."

"Feel?"

"Yes, feel, sense. "

"Ryan, I don't think-"

"Try."

Taking a deep breath, I gave in and closed my eyes. A whole lot of things become clear as I did so.

"Now I want you to focus on the dirt, the trees, the sky and the car. Do you feel them?" I nodded in response, unable to break through the trance I put my self in. " Now last of all I want you to focus in on Leo."

Once I focused in on Leo a whole scene unfolded behind my eyelids. I watched as Leo in wolf form sniffed around the car. His followers no where in sight.

Slowly my vision clouded over to show me and Ryan walking through the forest being followed by Leo's men. But they didn't stay long. They ran out of view as my vision billowed and showed Leo again.

He was sitting on the hood of the car waiting. Once the two men arrived they began to converse.

"Boss, the girl is the Alphas mate," said one.

"We over heard them talking," said the other.

"The locket that she wears around her neck is the Alphas soul," continued the first.

"What?" Leo growled.

"Yea. We over heard him say that if anything happens to that locket he would die," the second finished.

"Change of plans boys," Leo said as he turned into his human form and removed a piece of plastic from under the drivers side door. "We're going to make this a whole lot more personal."

He then put the piece of plastic on the ground and started tearing it apart. Only then did I realize it was a bomb. Once he was finished he kicked it in the bushes to the left of where I was standing now.

My vision faded as he turned back into his scrawny wolf self and ran away from the car.

Coming out of the vision was difficult. I couldn't breathe properly, my head was spinning and the lighting was off.

Ryan caught me as the strength in my legs gave out, "What did you see?"

Unable to talk I gestured toward the bushes. He got the gist of it instantly and slowly lowered me to the ground and went and investigated.

Like I suspected he pulled out the destroyed bomb, " Ryan, he knows about the locket."

*****

We pulled up to my house to find that my parents were gone, "Do you want to come inside?"

He merely nodded and helped me out of the car.

Once we were upstairs in my room I decided to ask, "What are we going to do?"

"Dammit, why couldn't I sense them?!" he growled, ignoring my question.

"Ryan, you can't beat yourself up over this. It could've happened to anyone."

He spun around to face me, "You could've been killed, Juliet. Don't you get that? If I had been more worried about your well being then my twisted idea that we could be together none of this would've happened. They wouldn't know about the necklace. "

"Twisted idea?" I repeated in surprise.

"Juliet, I didn't mean it like that. I just I don't know," he said as he ran his fingers through his dark hair.

"What? Now that he knows of an easy kill strategy on you, you don't want to be with me?"

"No, that's not it at all."

"Then tell me. What the hell is it?!" I yelled.

"If I had been on my game then we would be able to be together without the issue. But now the ball is in his court and now there is going to be a lot more issues then we expected."

"So, you don't hate me?" I asked in a childish voice.

He started laughing, "There is no way I could ever hate you. I hate myself more than anything right now," he finished with a sigh.

Instantly gaining some confidence with him I grabbed either side of his face and said the words that I wanted to say for the past eight years, " I love you."

Instantly the anger and self pity melted from his eyes and his lips collided with mine. There was no fight for dominance as he was the alpha after all. He began to lower me down on the bed when we heard a car pulling into the driveway.

He pulled me up not letting the kiss end and dragged me toward the window. He planted one more kiss on me before saying, "I love you, too," and then he just hopped out the window.

I wish I could say that I slept blissfully. That my mind was consumed with images of his lips on mine. Of his hand in my hand. But it was no where close to bliss.

Leo invaded my dream, that and Ryan's dead body by his feet.

Ryan had some serious explaining to do.