The Return of Jonas (Pearl Vampire Chronicles #4) (12 page)

I waved at him as Matt ushered me out the door.  As soon as we were in the hall, he cradled my face in his hands and began giving me one of
those
kisses.  My heart began racing, my breathing deepened, every nerve in my body began responding.  I didn’t care that we were in the hallway, I didn’t care who saw us, I didn’t care that this couldn’t go farther and I didn’t care that Jonas was still in my head, snickering.  I wasn’t going to be the one to spoil this moment for Matt.  Even though what Matt was doing was amazing, I was actively trying in my head to figure out a way to force Jonas out.  I had managed to push him away far enough that I could barely hear him, but that was all I could manage this time… it would have to be enough for now.

Matt finally stopped, he knew when that line had been reached by both of us, and he placed his forehead on mine.  We closed our eyes and just stayed that way for a few minutes, completely oblivious of the people moving past us, until we could both move again
without him walking with a big tent in his pants and my legs feeling like Jell-O.

We turned and walked down the hall, and I stopped trying to force Jonas out.  I chuckled.

“What’s so funny?” Matt said

I pointed to my head
. “Jonas. He’s singing ‘I’m Henry the Eighth, I am’ over and over.”

Matt growled and I squeezed his hand to calm him.  “Take a walk with me?” he said.

“Sure, where?”

“I want you to show me the cave Malina was in,” he said.  I stopped dead in my tracks.

“What?” he said, but I held up my hand to stop him.  We were next to Tanya’s desk and I motioned to her for a pen and paper, which she quickly gave me.  I wrote,
‘Jonas stopped singing for a second when you said that.  Do you think he might be hiding there?’

Matt took the pad and paper from me and wrote,
‘He might be.  Do you still have the map showing where it is?’

“I think so,” I said.  I handed the notepad and pen back to Tanya
. “Thanks,” I said, then I grabbed Matt’s hand and we quickly made our way to our room.  I started searching through the dresser drawers.  “I don’t remember exactly where I put… oh, here it is,” I said, handing it to Matt.  “Wait,” I whispered. “What if he can see what I see when he’s in my head.”  Matt stopped what he was doing and just stared at me.  He looked dumbfounded.

“What?” I said.

He smiled.  A sad, hurt smile.  “You haven’t noticed, have you?” he said.

“Noticed what?” I said.

“That’s just you and Carlos, and anyone who happens to be linked with the two of you at the time.  I realized that after we figured out that it was him who linked with you when he was in that ship.  Most vampires can pass images back and forth, but we can’t see what the other is seeing in real time.  At first I thought it was a special ability that you had.  Something that was unique to you. I thought maybe you could see other vampire’s thoughts in real time.  But it’s not.  It’s only you and Carlos.  You are the only two I’ve ever heard of or seen who can see what the other one is seeing when you’re linked.  With everyone else it’s just thoughts or pictures,” he said.

I just stared at him for a minute, unable to speak.  “No,” I whispered, “you must be wrong, Matt.  That can’t be.  Why?  Why would that happen?”

Matt shook his head.  “I don’t know, Sarah.”

I started shaking my head
. “No, no, no, no, no,” I began saying as my breathing deepened.  I was shaking all over, I felt like I was going to hyperventilate.

Matt reached out to me
. “Sarah?” he said, but I shrunk away from him.

“Don’t touch me,” I said as I jumped up and started backing towards the door.
I began talking to myself between gasps, my eyes closed as I prepared to run.  I was going to run far away, as far as I could go. I started mumbling, “Great, Sarah, you’re a real fucking winner. Now you’re hurting him by doing shit that you don’t even know how you’re doing it. Super. I give up. It’s time to for me to go now.”  I turned around to open the door, but Matt was standing there blocking it.  He grabbed my shoulders.

“STOP!” he yelled as I tried to squirm away.

“NO!” I screamed, squirming harder. “My heart cannot handle hurting you anymore, Matt.  You’d be better off without me.  All I ever do is cause you pain.”  I wiggled and tried to throw his hands off of me.  His fingers dug in to my arms as he held tight.

“STOP SQUIRMING SARAH!” he bellowed, flipping me around so my back was pressed to his chest.  He pinned my arms across my chest
. “All you ever do is give me more love than I deserve, more love than I could ever hope for.  If you left you would cause me more pain than I have ever felt in my life.  My heart would be broken and I wouldn’t survive.  Do you hear me?  I would cease to exist.  So you have a weird connection with him, so fucking what?  If the only part of you that I have to share with Carlos is your mind, well, hell, I can happily live with that, because, believe me, I was willing to share more, a lot more, if that’s what it took to keep you with me.”

I hung my head and stopped squirming, as the sobs started.  He turned me around and I buried my face in his chest.  He picked me up and carried me to the couch, laying me across his lap, waiting patiently until I had no more left to cry.  As I began to quiet, I stared at the scar on my hand.  “Why, Matt?
Why do I keep hurting you?” I mumbled.

“Sarah, you’re hurting yourself a lot more than you’ve ever hurt me.  You have got to stop beating yourself up all the time.  If I was hurting bad, I’d let you know.  But I’m not, and I never have been, not by you, or Carlos.”

“You’re only saying that to make me feel better,” I said.

“No, honey, I’m not.  Okay, look.  It hurt a little when I saw you kiss him.  It hurt a little when I could see and feel how drawn you two were to each other when I came back.  It hurt a little when I saw the connection you two have.  Honestly, I’ve said it before, you two are more compatible than anyone I’ve ever seen and yes, that does scare me a little.  But all of that was nothing compared to how much it hurt every time you and I had to be apart for work.  Or the hurt I felt when the Elders separated us.  Or the hurt I felt when I had to go to Peru by myself.  Or the hurt I felt when Malina took me.  Or the hurt I felt when she forced me to see how much pain you were in and I couldn’t do anything to make you feel better.  All of that hurt a lot, so much more than anything you’ve ever done or think you may have done, so much more.
So, please honey, I’m begging you, please stop beating yourself up over something so… small.”

“It’s not small to me,” I whispered as I looked at him and tried to smile.

“Yeah, I noticed,” he said as he leaned in to kiss me.  “Now, how about that walk?” he said.

“You
still want to go?  Even if…” I said, the grabbed pen and paper.
‘Even if he might be there?’
I wrote.

He nodded and pointed to the map, showing me he wanted us to come around the back side of the cave, from the top, then he took the pen and wrote,
‘Not to confront him, just to scout the location.  Verify that he’s there.’

I nodded, then got up and changed into jeans, a t-shirt and hiking shoes.  We headed out the back door and jumped the wall by the waterfall.  We’d gone about a hundred yards when I stopped him.  “Is there anything else?” I said.

“Anything else?” he said.

“Yeah, besides this weird link with Carlos, is there anything else between he and I that I haven’t figured out yet?  Because, if there is, I’d really like to know about it now and no
t be surprised anymore.”

Matt smiled at me
. “Well,” he began, “you share the same birthday, but other than that, I can’t think of anything.”

“We share the same…
so our anniversary is also his birthday (we’d gotten married on my birthday)? Why would you have agreed to marry me on that day then?” I said. “Why didn’t anyone tell me this before?”

“Probably because he never celebrates it.  Birthdays don’t mean much to us anymore.  I’m probably the only one he’s told when his birthday was
.”

“Okay, I can live with that.  But that’s i
t? There’s nothing else?”  Matt nodded.  “You swear?” I said.

Matt smiled and held up two fingers
. “Scout’s honor,” he grinned.  Then he reached out and pulled me toward him.  He pointed up, indicating that we were going to fly from here, and I nodded.  We rose above the trees.  I pointed to the area above us where the cave was, and Matt headed a little to the right of it, landing softly on the roof of the cave.  Malina’s scent was still here, but it was mixed with another scent, one that I hadn’t smelled the last time I was here.  I squeezed Matt’s hand tight and nodded to him.  We crept to the edge and lay down on our bellies to peak down.  I held my hair to keep it from falling over the edge as I looked and listened.  Matt tapped my arm, shook his head and shrugged his shoulders, mouthing, “I don’t think he’s here anymore.”  He stood up, pointed to the ground and held his hand out to me.  I took it and we silently jumped to the ground just to the side of the cave.  We crept around and peaked inside.  His scent was everywhere, but it wasn’t fresh, he was gone.  We walked to the entrance and he dropped my hand. “Wait here a second, I just want to take a quick look around.”  I stood watching him for a few seconds and then I felt it.  I completely tensed up, wanting to turn around but afraid to.  I could feel his eyes on me.  As if in slow motion, I slowly turned around… and met Jonas.

He stood about twenty feet behind me, grinning, with his arms crossed, leaning up against a tree. His voice popped in my head
. 
‘Don’t make a sound or the cave will collapse,’
he thought then he showed me the small detonator he had in his hand.
‘Walk towards me.’

I looked up and found the wiring and the explosives embedded in the rock.  I knew
what he had it rigged for.  I don’t know how I knew, I just knew.  It was rigged to just collapse at the mouth of the cave, trapping anyone inside.  If I walked forward, Matt was still inside.  I looked at Jonas and thought,
‘No,’
while crossing my arms across my chest.

His grin went wider
.
‘No?’
he thought.
‘That’s pretty bold considering the situation you’re in.’

‘If I step forward, you’ll press tha
t button and trap Matt inside,’
I thought as I was trying to determine if I could get to Jonas fast enough to knock that detonator out of his hand before he could press the button.  If I could just distract him or something,

I took a deep breath, and thrust my chest out a little farther
.
‘Come to me,’
I thought.

His eyebrows shot up
. 
‘Excuse me?’
he thought.  That had thoroughly confused him, good.

‘Come to me, Jonas.  Come to me now
,’

He stopped leaning against the tree, hesitating as he tried to work through the confusion in his head.  He was supposed to be in control here, he was the one with the detonator.  But I knew how much he wanted me.  He had let me know that over and over again, and I could feel it in him. 
‘I’m right here, Jonas.  Come to me.’

He covered half the distance to me in the blink of an eye…
and then I got the distraction I needed.  From behind me, Matt’s voice said, “What the…?”

Jonas’ eyes darted to Matt, who had just noticed him.  I sprung at Jonas, and before he could react, I knocked the detonator out of his hand.  Then I landed on top of him.  I heard Matt growl from behind me as Jonas began to recover himself.  He pinned his arms around me and jumped back to his feet.  He spun me around so my back was pressed into him and he pinned my arms across my chest.  I tried to struggle, but his arms were like a vise.  I had never felt someone so strong.

“STOP!” he bellowed and I heard a crack as he broke my wrist.  He dropped my arms and pinned his arm around my neck.  “I’ll snap her pretty little neck if you come any closer,” he said to Matt, who instantly stopped moving.  Matt’s eyes met mine and stayed there.

“I’m extremely disappointed,” Jonas said
. “I was expecting a lot more from you.  You two are making this way too easy.  You’ve got to improve before our next meeting.  Yes, I’m going to let you go in a minute, but first, allow me to introduce myself,” he said as he began kissing the back of my neck.  I reached up with my good hand and tried to pull his arm away from my neck. It had no effect at all, he just squeezed slightly tighter and said, “Now, Sarah, please don’t make me kill you yet.  I have big plans for you and me.”  His other hand moved around to my stomach, trying to find the bottom of my shirt.  As it slid underneath and began to move up, towards my breasts, I reached my mind out to Matt.

‘Turn around,’
I thought.  Matt didn’t move, he just stood there staring and growling as Jonas’ hand reached my breasts.  I could feel Jonas’ body responding, the hardness in his jeans, as he pressed into my backside.
‘Damn it Matt! For God’s sakes turn around.  He wants you to see this.  If you turn around he’ll stop,’
I thought.  That finally got through to him.  Matt blinked, as if coming out of a trance, and slowly turned around.  I smiled as I felt Jonas’ hand stop.