That gave me pause. And made me a little nauseous.
“Annika?”
“Yes,” she replied, smiling more widely. “Has he mentioned me?”
It was at that precise moment, when my heart was final y making its way back up from the toes of my shoes, that Bo returned. If there was any question about her identity, he immediately put it to rest.
“Annika?” he said as he rounded the corner of the garage to the front steps.
I’d been so distracted with Annika that I had neither seen nor heard Bo’s arrival. I watched him approach the front steps, a look of confused amazement on his face.
“Bo!” she squealed, charging down the steps and launching herself at him. Bo reluctantly raised his arms, patting her back awkwardly as she hung from around his neck. “Oh thank God! I have looked everywhere for you.”
When she final y released him and stepped back, Bo began to smile a little, which only made me feel worse about the whole thing. He was glad to see her. Surprised, but glad.
“Annika, what are you doing here?”
“I have been trying to catch up to you for…a while,” she explained hesitantly. Annika slid a quick glance over her shoulder at me before she leaned in toward Bo and whispered, “Is she one of us?”
Bo’s eyes darted from Annika to me and back again. A frown flitted across his brow before he nodded.
“Yes.”
“Good,” she said hurriedly. “I have been looking for you since you disappeared from Lindersberg in 1916.”
“What?” Bo and I exclaimed simultaneously.
Annika laughed.
“Why don’t we go inside and talk? It has been a long journey.”
As she and Bo made their way up the steps toward the door, I was jarred from my shock, remembering the tal , dark stranger that had accompanied the beautiful Annika. He’d stood quietly by as the reunion transpired, but now I wondered about him.
As if reading my mind, Annika introduced him as she reached the top of the steps.
“This is Cade by the way. Cade this is Bo and…”
She trailed off, looking meaningful y over her shoulder at Bo. He moved past her and came to stand by my side, sliding an arm possessively around my waist.
“This is Ridley,” he supplied.
Annika’s startlingly blue eyes darted from Bo to me and back again before she smiled tightly and offered her hand.
“Ridley, it is nice to meet you.”
Politely, I took her proffered hand and pumped it once, cordial y, and then released it. Whether it was rooted in jealousy or something else, I didn’t like the fair Annika and I suspected that the feeling was mutual.
For the first time since their arrival, Cade spoke.
“Bo,” he said, nodding once in Bo’s direction before his obsidian eyes made their way to me. “Ridley, it’s a pleasure.”
His voice was a deep delight with a thick Texan drawl.
His lips curved into a smile and, despite Bo’s presence at my side, Cade made no effort to conceal the blatant appreciation in his eyes.
“And how do you two know each other, Annika?” Bo said, referring to Cade.
“We met a few states ago and discovered that we had much in common. We have been traveling together since.
We have a common goal.”
Bo nodded slowly, his eyes never leaving Cade. Cade just stared back.
Annika slapped the back of her hand against Cade’s chest.
“Stop that! Brothers are not supposed to compete.”
After a moment’s delay, Bo and I both gaped first at each other and then we turned our rounded, incredulous eyes on Annika. When we final y found our tongues, we both had one question. It came in the form of a word, a single word.
“Brothers?”
CHAPTER SEVEN
“I don’t have a brother,” Bo declared, turning a scowl on Annika.
“Yes you do.”
Truthful y, Bo didn’t have enough memory of his life to argue with her, which is probably why he chose to demand answers instead.
“Then tel me how it is that y o u came across this information, yet I did not.”
“Can we please take this inside?” she asked again, making every effort to keep her voice low and calm.
Bo glared at Annika and Cade for several long, tense seconds before he acquiesced. With a frustrated growl, he stepped aside, al owing Annika and Cade to enter. As Cade passed, Bo eyed him suspiciously, the tension between them nearly palpable.
Once they were inside, Bo closed the door, grabbed my hand and led the way into the den. After Annika and Cade had deposited their bags on the floor and taken a seat on one of the couches, Bo urged me to sit on the one facing them. He remained at my side, though standing, his arms folded over his chest in an intimidating posture that was rife with antagonism.
“Alright, we’re inside. I think you need to explain yourself.”
Annika snorted.
“I see that the fun-loving Bo that I remember has grown up quite a bit,” she began, her voice teasing. When Bo said nothing, Annika cleared her throat uncomfortably.
“Let me start with how I found you. I—”
“We can get to that later,” Bo interrupted sharply. “Right now I want to know why you think I have a brother.”
I glanced at Cade. He was watching Bo closely, as if puzzling over his reaction.
“You are just going to have to be patient, because it al starts with the night you disappeared from Lindersberg,” she said. “You and I were supposed to go hunting together. You were stil showing me the ropes, showing me techniques and how to avoid infecting people once my fangs matured.
Showing me the best places to find wil ing humans, al that.
Anyway—”
“I was hunting humans?” Bo interrupted, dismayed and a little disbelieving.
“Yes. Why would you not hunt humans?”
“I don’t drink from humans. The person you’re describing doesn’t even sound like me.”
“Wel , maybe not the current you, but it certainly describes the you from back then,” she declared. When Bo said nothing, she continued. “Anyway, you didn’t show, so I went to a place that we had been to before, thinking you might be there. And you were. You weren’t there alone, though. You were with a man, one I didn’t recognize. I waited for you to finish and then, when the two of you left, I gave you a few minutes and fol owed. By the time I got outside, however, you were already gone. Vanished. Without a trace. I looked everywhere for you, but it was as if you just disappeared.