Page 67 of Jackal's Pride
“How do you even turn someone into a Reaper?” Jackal asked.
“We bestow our power onto them,” Mom answered him with a curious stare. “You interested?”
His gaze flickered to me. “No, but I’m available to help.”
“And why does the infamous Jackal have such a change of heart?” August asked.
Hearts.Stupid, pointless things. Maybe I should rip mine out and give it to him so he could be the one feeling this way instead of me.
“I don’t want Maureen to die when the human world does.”
My eyes widened like saucers. Not only me, he’d stunned my entire family, including Payne, into silence. That doubt in my stomach grew worse. I didn’t trust him. I couldn’t. People were not who they pretended to be. Everyone had a secret agenda.
“He should leave,” I clipped out.
“Maureen?” Mom hesitated suddenly confused as she watched us.
“It doesn’t make sense for him to be here. What if he’s listening to everything we’re saying only to use it against us?” My face was hot, but the need to salvage my pride took the forefront.
“I think we’re good.” Out of everyone, I never expected it to be August who trusted someone. He was with me about not trusting Isabella in the beginning so why not the same treatment with Jackal?
“He’s helped us even after the collar incident,” Dad brought up. “We need his help.”
“Whatever.” I got up, unable to bear a second longer with them. The only thing I wanted to do was fight everyone on why I was right about Jackal. I needed to be right. Jackal’s anger reached out to me as I strode past him, knocking him in the shoulder as I did.
Barron came out into the ballroom with me. I ignored him until I got to the double doors to leave the castle, and he stepped in front of me. “Move,” I told him.
“Will you stop?” he muttered.
“What am I doing?”
“Sabotaging your life.”
I squinted my eyes and scoffed. “You’re crazy to believe Jackal has no hidden agenda. You saw what he was like after I collared him. People don’t change that quickly.”
“Remember when we were kids, and we all promised each other we’d fight our curses every step of the way. I’d fight to stay calm, Sebastian fought to stay awake, August tried to stop stealing… We all made those types of promises to ourselves.”
“And?”
He exhaled. “You’re not even trying to fight yours.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I think…like Sebastian was with Isabella, Jackal is that for you.” Barron was almost quiet as he said it.
My heart stopped. “What?”
“Don’t pretend you haven’t thought about it. It’s probably crossed your mind a lot quicker than it had ours.”
“Ours?”
“We all think so.”
“Define we?”
“Stop, Maureen.” He pinched the bridge of his nose. “You’d never admit it to anyone, not even yourself.”
“He doesn’t even have a heart, Barron,” my voice broke that easily, “to… You know…” Why was I unraveling? Why was I being so unlike myself? Realizing how heartbroken I sounded, I recollected myself—piece by piece. I concealed the destruction and hurt tightening my cheeks and straightening my spine—whatever it took to fake it. Like I did a lot lately. “Besides, it’s not that. People are never who you think they are.”