Chapter 12

Riley's POV

Something didn't feel right about going to Seattle tonight. I hadn't been there since my classes ended a month ago. I had been living north of there before and had gone every weekday when I first came to La Push. Nothing about Seattle scared me, but part of my mind was telling me not to go there tonight. Both Embry and Rachel were excited about taking me to dinner so I got ready to leave anyway. Even Paul seemed to like the idea of going. I considered telling him how uneasy I felt, just thinking about going but I didn't want to ruin everyone's fun.

So, I made sure my hair curled perfectly and that my make-up was done just the way that my mom had taught me. Then I put on the dress that I had gotten and some matching shoes. I instead that we take my car though. Embry had been wanting to drive it anyway and since he was the only one that knew the restaurant he was going to drive. I sat in the front passenger seat and Paul and Rachel in the back. I told Paul that he could be the one to drive home though.

When we got to Seattle we had about a five block walk from where we could park the car to the restaurant. Embry had given me the keys back after he had locked the doors. Everything was going well, we had a nice dinner and were waiting for dessert. Embry had got up to go to the men's room. Suddenly my uneasy feeling got worse but I tried to ignore it, thinking that I had just already had too much food for me. I closed my eyes and listened to all of the sounds around me. I could hear the main door open and before it had time to close, I could smell the unmistakable sent of vampire. Not just any vampire either one that had been tracking me.

I sat up in my chair trying not to draw any attention to our table.

"Paul, they are here. One of the vampires just walked in the door."

I handed him my car keys under the table as he glanced toward the door.

"I have to go. I need to leave before they see me. Take Rachel and Embry back to La Push. They won't fallow you."

"You were sent to the pack so they can protect you. You need to go back too Riley."

"I can't. I can't put the pack in danger like I did my family. Tell Embry that I love him."

He grabbed my hand before I could get up.

"Embry is your wolf. You at least have to take him with you. Your father would kill the whole pack and me if you went off on you own."

"Fine, just take Rachel home out the front door. Walk normally and calmly. I'll grab Embry and go out the back. Head home and tell the pack to be on alert."

"Be safe Riley."

"I will Paul. I love you and Rachel both."

As I got up from the table I dropped what was about three times the amount of cash on the table as our bill was. Rachel looked at me all confused but Paul shook his head at her. I walked over to the restrooms and grabbed Embry's wrist just as he came out the door. He was about to say something but I put my other hand over his mouth and shook my head telling him no. Trying very hard not to rush we slipped through the door into the kitchen and out the back.

"Riley what is going on?"

I could feel tears welling up in my eyes threating to fall already. I didn't want to put Paul, Rachel, and the pack in danger but I had.

"We have to go. The vampires that are hunting me came into the restaurant while you were in the restroom."

I could feel him start to shake with anger.

"Not here, Embry there are too many people."

I continued leading him down the back ally in the opposite direction of the car. Once we were out of sight of the building I picked up the pace to a run.

"Where are we going?"

"Well I wasn't sent into the city every day without an escape plan we just have to find the right parking ramp."

"Will you at least tell me who is after you now?"

"Once we get the car."

I never let go of his hand as we ran. The city is big and we were about fifty block from where we needed to be. I was too scared to take the time to see if they had actually fallowed us. When we finally got to the parking ramp I could tell that it had been a long run for Embry by the way he was breathing.

"We are almost there. We just have to get to the top floor."

"We should really be going back to La Push."

"We can't, I won't put the pack in danger."

"The pack can fight them."

"If it was really that easy then they wouldn't still be after me."

I was so relieved when I caught sight of the mate black car with the super dark tinted windows in the corner. I only let go of Embry's hand so that I could find the key on its little hook up under the driver's side back fender. I unlocked the doors and as soon as we were in, I let the engine purr to life. Putting it in drive, I reached in front of Embry and pulled and envelop out of the glove box and handed it to him.

"Please read what it says."

Embry's POV

I was so angry when Riley told me that the vampires had crashed our dinner. I didn't fully understand why she didn't want to go back to La Push. I could tell that she is very scared though.

"It says where the fruit and the land meet, is where you will find the grey wolf. What the hell does that even mean?"

"That is where we are going. There is a place in British Columbia called Peachland. It's the last place that my uncle and I lived with my aunt. We have just enough gas to put us somewhere between five to ten miles out of town."

I reached over and placed my hand on top of her's on the gear shift. Trying to help calm her. Once we hit the highway she sped up to about ten miles over the speed limit. I could sense that she wanted to go faster but I could also tell she didn't want to attract attention.

"I know you want answers and you deserve them. My family and I were on vacation in Romania. When we happened to come across the vampires. Apparently they were attacked many years ago and their legend says that one who escaped the attack will come back to finish the job of wiping them out. It said that she will visit once to see her enemy and a second to destroy them. For some unknown reason, they think that I will be the one to destroy them. So they are trying to take me out first before I can build my army."

"That is nonsense, you wouldn't hurt anyone."

"They don't think that though. I don't even know what I could have possibly done for them to think that it was me."

"I won't let them hurt you."

"I know you won't"

Tears started to fall down her cheeks and I just wanted to hold her tight. I wanted to take her mind off things.

"This is quite the car."

"Thank you, my dad and I built it. Well, rebuilt it. The body is a Mercedes guardian, we put extra reinforcements under the body. And build a custom engine, it can almost go up to 200 miles per hour. We decked it out for street racing when we lived in Salt Lake. That way we could take it racing out in the salt flats. My mom wasn't happy about it."

"Street racing?"

"Yeah, I will have to take you sometime and show you how I beat all the guys. Or maybe dad would let you drive his and we could race each other."

"I don't know if I like the sound of you racing, you could get hurt."

"Alright, mom, well just so you know this car was built to be bullet proof and protect a very precious cargo. I know that was before dad and I played with the engine but it's still really durable."

I started to yawn a couple times.

"We still have two hours left of drive time. You should get some sleep we will probably have to run again."

"What about you? I know you don't sleep much, Paul was telling me about it."

"I will be alright I promise."

When she thought that I had fallen asleep she pulled her phone and tried to call a few numbers but none of them answered her call. After a while I actually did fall asleep.

I woke up when the car stopped moving and I could feel a breeze coming in the open driver's side door. I started to panic at first, but looked up to see Riley run and jump into someone's arms. The guy picked her up and turned some and I realized that it was Jake. I could see that they were hugging each other tightly and that Riley was once again crying. I felt slightly jealous for a moment and then everything seemed to hit me at once. Why Riley needed to hunt, how she was a wolf, why she was sent to live with Paul and Rachel and how she got in the situation of being hunted by vampires. For some reason until now, seeing the two next to each other, I hadn't notice how much Riley looks like Jake. She said something to him and I couldn't hear what it was but he looked up at me.