Beautiful Sins: Leigha Lowery (17 page)

"Leigha…" Alex sighed. Within a flash, he was at my side, helping me to my feet. I could still smell the blood on his shirt. I felt nauseous.

"I think I'm going to be sick." I choked on the last word, turning away from him. I couldn't stop the vomit that erupted from my chest. Alex held my hair, rubbing small circles on my back until I finished.

"Get Randy here!" He ordered.

"No!" I argued between coughs. "Please, I'm alright. Just get me inside." I coughed. Alex scooped me effortlessly in his arms and carried me into the house.

"What's wrong with her?" My mother asked anxiously.

"Calm her." Alex demanded. Mina quickly moved to my mother's side and comforted her as Alex proceeded to carry me to my room. Once inside, I protested until he sat me down at my feet. I hurried into the bathroom and slammed the door shut.

"You can go away now! I'm fine!" I shouted as I hurried to the sink bowl and ran some warm water.

"Leigha, would you please open the door?" Alex begged.

"Go away!" I shouted again. The wind of his teleportation took me by surprised. I whirled, stunned to see him standing behind me.

"Do you understand how much this is freaking me out? Get out!" I shouted at him. He moved closer towards me and I flinched.

"Why won't you leave me alone?" I asked, trying desperately to fight back tears of fear.

"I've tried. Trust me, you have no idea how hard I've tried to stay away Leigha. But I can't. I can't stand to be away from you for more than five minutes." He confessed.

"The blood on your shirt…" I gestured towards his heavily stained white button-up shirt. With one swift movement, the shirt was in shreds on the floor, his perfectly tanned body exposed for my viewing. His beautiful chocolate brown eyes bored into mine, and I could feel his pleading radiating off his body. I could no longer rely on my legs for support. Alex caught me before I hit the ground. He carried me over to the bed, and sat me down gently.

I watched him carefully as he slowly removed my shoes, pulled the covers back and tucked me into bed, caressing my face gently as I drifted off to sleep.

My eyes fluttered open to Randy, and I groaned. He was not the face I was looking forward to seeing.

"Any more injuries and I'm going to have to deport you to the Islands." He joked.

"Any chance that we could just ship her off now?" Mina scoffed.

"Mina?" Caleb chided.

Alexander entered with a tray of food. Randy placed a cool hand over my forehead.

"How is she holding up?" Alex asked, placing the tray over my lap.

"She'll be fine. She just needs to rest up. That was a very traumatic experience for a human. You should be more careful with her." Randy scolded. Alex held his head down in shame.

"I suppose I do need to work on my anger." Mina tried to stifle a laugh.

"Very supportive Mina." Randy chided.

"How are you feeling Leigha?" Alexander asked.

"I'm still processing the day before last. Yesterday's events will probably catch up with me in a few days." I said sarcastically.

"She's so strong for a human." Randy observed. He flashed a bright light quickly between my eyes.

"She's holding up very well. No signs of shock at all." He observed.

"But she was so ill last night." Alex countered.

"Well, that may have been because of her aversion to the smell of blood. That's normal for a human, especially if they've never been exposed to it. It looks like she'll have to miss another day of school. She's very dehydrated. It's from all the nausea and vomiting. She'll be fine after she gets some rest." He explained, giving my mother and Alexander a stern look.

"Leigha, I'm going to take off work today to make sure these two are on their best behavior." He assured, gesturing towards the hunting party. Alex scowled at Randy, while my mother pouted.

"Now, let's give Leigha some time alone to rest." He demanded. Not even Alex could get in the way of the Physician.

"Wait. I need to talk to Alex alone for a moment." I said. Randy gave him a hard look before escorting everyone else out of the room.

He moved to sit beside me on the bed. He stared at his hands as he spoke.

"I didn't think you would want to see me after last night." I sighed. I shouldn't want to speak with him at all, but for some unfathomable reason I didn't want to be away from him.

"You went away and you didn't even say goodbye. Why did you do that?" I asked. It was something I had been wanted to ask him since he disappeared. I had been so bothered by it; it was the only thing that mattered to me at the moment. He stared at me warily.

"You're angry because I disappeared?" He seemed confused. I shrugged.

"I know I've been selfishly putting myself in danger and all, but you didn't even give me a chance to apologize. Do you really hate me that much?" He looked up at me with those deep chocolate brown pleading eyes.

"Leigha…" He sighed, shaking his head. There was a hint of laughter in his voice.

"You've spent the last few days, registering the fact that the Chronicles are real and you want to know why I disappeared…" He laughed. I frowned, letting my face slump in defeat.

"You are defiantly the perfect woman for the position." He murmured, tucking a lock of hair behind my ear.

"What job?" I asked. Why was everyone being so cryptic again?

"Leigha, this is a discussion for a later time." He said softly, gently stroking my bruised cheek.

"I wish you would let Randy take care of this.” He grumbled. I groaned.

"I just don't get it. I'm trying to stay out of trouble, but it just seems like trouble is out to get me or something. My karma has never been this bad." He chuckled.

"I'm glad you came back." I blushed. I didn't even understand why I blurted out such information. He smiled, flashing those perfect white canine teeth. He took my hand in his and I welcomed the coolness of his touch. These days, it actually felt weird to touch someone of the same temperature. But I couldn't help how I felt. I was just so happy that he had returned to me. So of course, I couldn't fix the stupid grin on my face. We stared in each other's eyes for a long moment, and then my brain began to kick into full gear.

"How old are you?" I asked. Alex broke out into a laugh. He shook his head dubiously as he spoke.

"What am I going to do with you?" He sighed, pulling me into his arms.

"Don't do that again." I warned. His arms tightened around me.

"I promise you, I will never do something like that again. And if I ever leave you, I will always return to you." He vowed. That was all I needed to hear. I wanted to stay in his embrace forever, but my stupid stomach growled. He chuckled, disentangling himself from my arms. He pulled the tray forward and gave me a stern look.

"All of it." He demanded. I rolled my eyes.

"You are so bossy." He shrugged indifferently. I broke off a piece of my bagel and popped it in my mouth.

"By the way, I'm four hundred twenty six." He murmured, picking up the Chronicles effortlessly. That book must have weighed six pounds. I swallowed hard, forgetting to chew my bagel and began to choke on it. Alex began to worry, quickly grabbing the orange juice and handing it to me.

"Are you alright Leigha?" He asked nervously. There was a hard knock on the door.

"I'm fine!" I said between coughs. I knew it was only Randy, worrying about me.

"Here, drink this." Alex offered. After a few sips, I scowled at Alex.

"Are you trying to get me into more trouble?" I grumbled. He rolled his perfect brown eyes.

"Leigha, I'm not sure if that's possible. My father is already furious with you." He sighed.

"Opps." I said in defense. "This is all your fault anyway." I told him. He glared at me.

"My fault?" He tried to gain clarity on the subject.

"Yes, if you just would have gotten the wolves under control, all of this would have never happened." He rolled his eyes at me.

"Leigha, you have no idea how many covens of Werewolves alone reside here. You actually attend school with a few." I stared at him in awe.

"It's all about conversion love. The more of us that are willing to convert to the new lifestyle, the more our population's sore. Of course, there are a few of our kind that are not willing to let go of the old way." He explained.

"But why change in the first place? I mean, don't get me wrong; I'm all for the 'conversion process' but why bother? You are the top of the food chain and all." I wondered.

"That's a good question Leigha, and you are not the first to ask it. We've lived centuries as monsters and it has gotten us nowhere. Consequently, we are forced to live in the shadows. Now we have been given the gift of light, we now understand that is something we cannot take for granted."

"But I don't understand…" I trailed off. I needed a better insight on why these monstrous creatures suddenly wanted to become civil citizens.

"Change occurs everywhere. Why not with us? We have been giving the opportunity to walk in the light, so now we must adjust."

"But what about your appetite? How do you balance that out as civil?" I asked. He smiled.

"We have our ways Leigha. I haven't hunted in over two hundred years. However, we do slip sometimes. When the blood smells just a little too good."

"How often does that happen?" He laughed.

"Leigha, please stop worrying. You're going to turn yourself grey." I rolled my eyes.

"There are just so many questions I want to ask." I whined.

"And I will answer them all for you. Now, just rest. Don't you want to go to school tomorrow? It's your last day in town before we leave for the weekend." He reminded. I sighed in defeat and began to finish my bagel.

Alex shook his head as he flipped through the Chronicles.

"How much of the story is true?" I asked. I needed to know. That book was my guide these days.

"Most of it. This revision is actually some of their best work. Those pesky Akalians are becoming excellent journalists." He commented.

"The Akalians are real?" I said in disbelief. He rolled his eyes and held the thick book out to me.

"Who do you think Chronicles these books?" He laughed. I pushed my tray aside and grabbed the Chronicles.

The Akalians, physic detectives, chronicle the lives of the paranormal, to notify the humans of their existence. Never in a million years did I ever think they truly existed.

"Only the most gifted can become an Akalian. They only accept the most intelligent of the human race." Alex explained.

"It's so funny. I used to fantasize that I was an Akalian when I was a little girl." Alex frowned at that.

"Oh yeah, your kind isn't very welcoming to the Akalian kind.” He nodded.

* * * * *

Oddly Missing

It was my last day of school, so I decided to make the most of it. Alexander had completely ruined my perception of the students there, now I was constantly trying to figure out who was human and who wasn't. I scowled at my notepad in English. What I thought were notes from the Beowulf film that we were watching, turned out to be lists of names of everyone in the class. I groaned.

I was elated that lunch had arrived. I would join Tiffany, Jenny, and Naomi and listen to their normal rants about shopping and new cheers for the squad. They were serving pizza today, so I grabbed a few slices of the veggie and proceeded to join my friends. I scowled at the empty seat today.

"Naomi's still sick?" I wondered. Jenny nodded.

"Whatever she has, it must be really bad. She's been out most of the week. She sounded so horrible over the phone yesterday. I'm starting to worry." Jenny admitted.

"How about we stop by today, just to see if she's okay." Tiffany suggested.

"It's not like Naomi to miss school. It's so odd." Jenny spoke. She seemed disturbed about something.

"Yeah, she's oddly missing in action." Tiffany joked. "She's going to be furious when she finds out about those hot guys we met at Deathrocks yesterday.

"Hot guys?" I asked. Tiffany ignored me. There was apparently, something more serious on her mind.

"I'll tell you about someone oddly missing. Look…" She said, gesturing towards the empty table behind us. Mina and Caleb weren't in school today. I thought something was strange when Randy offered to personally drop me off at school.

Where was everyone? Alex was gone this morning when I awoke, and Randy assured me that he just had a few errands to take care of.

"How odd." I murmured to myself. Tiffany stared at me, curious about something.

"Mina and Caleb never miss school, unless there is something going on at court. What's going on Leigha?" She asked. She knew since I was a newly member of Royce's court, I would have some inside information. However, the truth was not something they would want me to reveal. I had to come up with something quick.