Page 19 of Monsters Within (The Creatures We Crave 1)
Alexandra
Crossing my arms over my chest, I stared at Hannah indifferently. She wasn’t worth my rage or time, honestly.
Her eyes were wide as she reached for my arm, which I dodged. “Alex! Who are those three random men? Did they do anything to you?”
Oh, she was going to act like she cared about my well-being all of a sudden? Interesting.
My lips thinned as I rolled my eyes at her. “I’m fine, Hannah. What do you want?”
I was honestly mentally exhausted from the emotional manipulation.
As her eyes darted around, seeming like she was floundering for words, I took in her disheveled state. Not that I was one to talk—I’d just rolled out of bed and was still wearing the same clothes as the last time I’d seen her. But her eyes were puffy, as if she’d spent all night crying, and her skin had a sickly pallor. To top it all off, there were red wine stains dappled across her gray sleep shirt.
“I want to apologize,” she started. “What I did was so fucked up that I can hardly believe I went along with it. That isn’t who I am—or at least, it isn’t who I want to be.”
Did she really think I was going to fall for this twice?
As she waited for my response, I merely raised my brows as if to say ‘if you have anything else to say, spit it out before I slam this door in your face.’
Her chest heaved as she inhaled deeply before exhaling and putting her hands on her hips. “Look, you don’t have to forgive me. I accepted the fact that you probably wouldn’t before I even came over here. But when you told me last night that they probably weren’t my friends if they would run back to Chloe, it really stuck with me.” Running a hand through her ponytail, she added, “And what I said about you giving me hope was true. You showed me compassion and had no reason to. That’s the type of person I want to be.”
“Good for you,” I tossed out, trying to stay impassive to her words. I couldn’t let myself soften to her, no matter how much I wanted it to be true deep down. She’d proven once before that she would exploit my kindness.
Her shoulders sagged at my response ,and her eyes dropped to the floor. “I had to come tell you what Chloe is planning on doing.”
That made my ears prick. I straightened up as she glanced back at my face. Nodding to herself, she explained, “So, I know she said she was going to turn you in to the President today, but, Alex, it’s so much worse.”
My blood boiled at her calling me Alex still, and I couldn’t hold it in any longer. “Stop fucking calling me Alex. A shortened name for someone is considered a nickname. A nickname is something a loved one or friend uses. You are neither of those.”
The words hung in the air between us awkwardly, and a part of me almost apologized for the harsh tone I’d used, but everything I’d said was true. I had given her the rare opportunity to become a friend, and she’d proven that was a mistake.
She winced, but quickly conceded before ducking her head and dropping her eyes from my face. “I’m sorry, Alexandra.”
Taking a calming breath, I focused back on her previous words. “What is Chloe doing?”
It was probably another ruse, but it couldn’t hurt to hear what she had to say in case of the 0.001% chance she was being honest.
A weird twitchy energy took over her as her eyes darted around, and she shifted her weight from foot to foot before leaning in. I fought the urge to back up as she whispered, “She’s putting your name on the list.”
“What list?”
Her eyes bulged and she whisper-yelled, “What list!? With all of your interest in the supernatural community, you don’t know about the list?”
“If I knew, I wouldn’t be asking you,” I muttered blandly as I rubbed my eyes with my fingers, trying to clear them of the lingering sleep haze.
With a huff, she relented. “It’s for bounty hunters. They hunt magical entities that are hiding in our plane.”
A door opened down the hall, causing her to jump back from me quickly. She opened her door and rushed inside before turning to look back at me. “I don’t want her to suspect I’ve told you. Who knows what she would do if she thought I’d spoiled her plans. Just watch your back, Alexandra.”
With that, she closed the door, and I was left staring, more confused than ever.
Magical bounty hunters? I had never heard of that before, and considering our conversation last night when Hannah made it clear she preferred to act like other planes didn’t exist, I wasn’t inclined to believe her on this topic.
She could just be trying to draw my attention to something other than the fact that Chloe had been in my dorm and likely planted something in there.
I rubbed my face once more before turning and heading back into my dorm. Closing the door, I quickly put my locks back in place just in case someone really was waiting to take me down.
Although, would a few locks on a door deter them if they were magical bounty hunters?
