CHAPTER 21
Over a week later, and things had been pretty calm. Even the girls at school seemed to have calmed down on the name calling and bullying, all except May, who it seemed would always have a vendetta against me for dating Cole. That was fine though, I could handle her and her followers.
Kade and Kyle had been working crazy hours trying to track down The Shadow. The trail on his van had run cold, and their desperate attempts to find out his identity had come up empty. Even though they had an image of his face, they simply could not identify him. Kade thought maybe he had always lived off the grid, out in the woods, and that was why no records of him seemed to exist. So basically they had nothing, except knowing the general ten mile area they thought he was hiding out in, but since that area was seventy percent forest land, they were searching for a needle in a haystack, all the while knowing a little girl was depending on them to save her.
Otherwise things had been pretty calm. Evie and Keira were doing better since the day in the parking lot, though Evie had been much more attached to me since then, and panicked if she didn’t know where I was, much like my guys, who also needed to know exactly where I was at every minute of every day. Cole and Matt never left my side at school, except for in art class, when they had made Charlie, who shared that class with me, swear to never leave me alone.
They were scared, and I got that, because I was scared too. It had been one thing to know my kidnapper was still out free in the world somewhere, but it was another completely knowing he was out there and trying to take me back to The darkness with him. I was terrified he would find a way to grab me and return me to that hell and so, I had no intention of putting myself at a greater risk by arguing with the guy’s protectiveness. I was more than willing to be suffocated by their concerns if it kept me with them and out of the clutches of The Shadow.
“You tired, Cariña?” Matt asked from the driver’s seat of his truck. We were on our way home from another very long day at school. I still struggled with the long days there, and it had only gotten harder with the added exhaustion of constantly monitoring my surroundings for danger, and running solely on the small amount of sleep I was getting each night between nightmares.
“A little.” I agreed from where I sat in the back, my head leant to the side against the cool window.
Thankfully I had completed all of my homework during our last free period, and Kyle had promised a night off from our training, so I knew I could just relax for the evening once we were home. The tub was calling my name, a long hot soak sounding heavenly.
We pulled into the driveway and Matt parked up in front of the garages.
Cole jumped out first and instantly came to my door to help me out. He wrapped his hands around my waist and lifted me down as he studied my face way too hard.
“You’re pale Livy. Are you feeling ok?” He asked with concern as he kept his hands tight around my waist.
“I’m just tired, and I think maybe I have one of those headaches coming on. I’ll be fine as soon as I take some pain pills and relax for a while.” I assured him. Cole glanced across to where Matt stood a few feet away with a look of worry, then back down to me.
“Come on. Let’s get inside, out of the cold.” He said. I nodded and sank into his outstretched arm, hugging his right side as we climbed the steps into the house.
We all quickly toed off our boots and hung up our coats. I put my boots in the neat little cubby they lived in, and turned only to find both guys right behind me looking awkward. Usually they would have gone on ahead into the kitchen, in search of food.
“What’s going on?” I asked with amusement as I looked up to their very shifty facial expressions. They were definitely being weird.
“What? Nothing. We were just waiting for you.” Matt answered hurriedly. Cole nodded in agreement, far too vehemently.
“I know you two are up to something.” I chuckled as I picked up my backpack, and bypassed them both to head into the welcoming warmth of the house.
It was only when I got to the kitchen that I realised what was actually going on. The entire space, kitchen and dining room, were adorned with hundreds of colourful balloons, pinned to the walls and cabinets, and floating all across the ceiling. There was a huge painted banner that said ‘Happy Birthday Olivia!’ and Keira, Grant, Evie and the guys stood in the middle, wearing goofy party hats and beaming.
“Happy birthday Cariña.” Matt whispered in my ear as his arms came around me from behind and held me close to his firm body.
“But it’s not….” I began, then I realised I was wrong. It was my birthday. In all of the chaos of the last weeks, and all of my worry over The Shadow coming for me, I had lost track of the date. It was my eighteenth birthday.
“Happy birthday Honey.” Keira said brightly.
“Happy birthday.” Everyone else said in sync together.
“Thank you.” I felt shy and flustered with the focus entirely on me, and also kind of stupid that I hadn’t even remembered my own damned
