Tales of Aradia The Last Witch Volume 1 (32 page)

Dax remained impassive.
Aradia fought back the urge to throw up all over the offensive
man’s shoes.

“Look, um, dude,”
Aradia said as politely as she could. “I don’t mean to be rude but
my... uh... friend and I were on our way home. I’d really rather
not have any trouble, so I would appreciate it if you just leave us
alone.”

“Your boyfriend here
must be pretty stupid,” the same one said with a nod towards
Dax.

Dax stiffened while the
guy’s friends all chuckled again.

“Excuse me?” said
Aradia.

“I mean nobody but a
stupid boyfriend would let a hot looking girl like you out in
public,” he said with a fiendish grin.

He was so emaciated
that when he smiled, he looked absolutely skeletal. “If you were
mine, I would never let you leave my side.”

“There’s so much wrong
with that statement,” Aradia murmured. “Look, if I even stand near
you much longer, let alone by your side, I’m gonna need me some
noseplugs.”

Dax burst out laughing,
but the guy and his crew didn’t seem amused. They grew dangerously
quiet.

Oh
crap
.

“Yeah, that was rude.
Look, I’m sorry, I didn't mean to say that. I apologize," Aradia
said quickly, trying to defuse the situation.

Strangely, the guy
smiled at Aradia, looking pleased rather than angry.

“It’s alright,
sweetie,” he said to a confused Aradia. “But if you really want to
apologize, let’s kiss and make up.”

“Okay, that’s enough,”
Aradia said. “Leave us the hell alone, now, or we’re going to kick
all four of your pathetic asses.”

They didn’t seem
intimidated. They formed a loose semicircle around her and
Dax.

“You know something,
sweetie?” the speaker said. “You talk too damn much! C’mere with
you!”

He lunged towards
Aradia, but Dax had anticipated the attack. He stepped in front of
her and with one solid shove, used the goon’s own momentum to
propel him into a concrete support column. His body and face
contacted the column with a sickening thud. Aradia winced,
recalling the sound when she and Kasey had collided with the
pavement.

“Go near her and die,
you bloody sods!" Dax snapped angrily.

Although shocked by the
turn of events, the attacker, who appeared to be the leader of the
thugs, managed to stumble to his feet. The others waited for
guidance. Aradia was relieved to see Dax had not killed
him.

The leader’s expression
changed from surprise to anger.

“Get ‘em!” he yelled to
his crew, pointing at Dax accusingly.

These guys don’t
know who they’re messing with,
Aradia
thought, actually pitying them.
Or what
they’re messing with
.

The biggest guy of the
group, who was just as thin and weak looking as the others, only
taller, moved towards Dax. When he was two steps away Aradia moved
between the two and socked the goon right the eye. He landed flat
on his back, out cold.

The remaining two
uninjured assailants came at her. Without hesitating, she kicked
the first in his most sacred area. As he doubled over in pain,
Aradia grabbed the back of his shirt and threw him to the ground in
front of the other.

“We can do this all
night if you want,” she taunted.

The fourth guy bolted
from the garage.

Now all who were left
upright were Aradia, Dax, and the leader-goon. He was bleeding from
the forehead and looked like his nose was broken, but didn’t seem
to care.

He reached into a
pocket to pull out a switchblade. He grinned evilly as he saw
Aradia falter.

For two intense
moments, they just stared at each other until the guy lunged at her
with the knife. Aradia, a bit intimidated by the knife,
nevertheless caught the guy by the wrist. She then squeezed it
intensely and summoned a bit of flame, just enough to burn him
mildly. He dropped the knife, howling in agony. Aradia took no
notice.

She lifted him and
slammed him down on the hood of Dax’s car with such force that the
glass in windshield actually cracked.

By now the guy was
genuinely shaking with terror. “You don’t ever talk to a girl like
that or try to force yourself on one again, you hear
me?”

He nodded
eagerly.

“I swear if I ever hear
of anything like this again, I will find you.”

Then she let him
go.

Dax had stood by
watching Aradia, speechless.

He stood with his mouth
agape, staring at Aradia who just turned to look at him, and said,
“Still here, are you?”

“Is there a reason why
I would not be?” asked Dax.

Aradia shrugged and
said, “Most times when a guy sees a girl be strong and kicking ass,
they take off for the hills.”

“Can't imagine why,”
Dax muttered.

“That better be
sarcasm,” Aradia spat in a venomous tone.

Before Dax could even
answer, she made her way to the passenger seat of the car, opened
it, and sat down.

“You still want me to
take you home?” Dax asked.

Aradia shrugged with
total indifference. At first, Dax just stood stunned, but seeing
Aradia's expression he decided to let it go.

Nodding toward the
cracked windshield, Aradia asked, “You have full
coverage?”

“I always insure
against the unexpected.”

Aradia shrugged and
said, “Good. I’ll pay your copay or whatever for the
repair.”

Dax was stunned by her
attitude. He just replied, “That will not be necessary.”

As they were exiting
the parking garage and getting onto the road, Dax finally looked to
Aradia and asked, “What exactly are you, anyway?”

“You really want to
know?” asked Aradia.

“Yes,” he
replied.

Aradia slumped against
the window and said, “Me too.”

Soon they reached her
house, and Dax got out to open Aradia's door. She was already out
of the car, though, and coldly brushed past him to get inside. Then
she hesitated. She realized at this point that if she wanted to
know what was going on, it was now or never.

“Aradia, what is
wrong?” asked Dax.

She shook her head,
then turned to look up at him, eyes moist.

Dax stepped closer and
gazed at her.

“Has anyone ever told
you how magnificently beautiful your eyes are?”

Boy! Is he pouring
it on thick
, Aradia thought to herself
bitterly.

“I know I haven’t been
really good to you lately, Aradia, but from this point on that’s
going to change. I will start taking our relationship more
seriously. I will always be there. From now on, Aradia, I will do
anything for you. Anything at all.”

“You don’t have to do
that, Dax,” Aradia replied, looking down at her feet.

“No, I don’t. I want
to, love,” whispered Dax. He hadn’t used ‘love’ as a pet name for
her since their first couple of dates.

Aradia said nothing.
She just squeezed her eyes and decided that if she was ever going
to do it she had to do it now.

“There is one thing you
can do for me, Dax,” said Aradia, still looking at the
ground.

“You need merely put it
to words,” said Dax.

“The thing that you can
do for me,” said Aradia as she brought her face up to meet his, “is
hold still.”

With that, she wrapped
her arms around his neck and captured his lips with her
own.

At first, Dax’s eyes
grew wide with surprise, but then as the kiss went on, he slipped
his arms around her waist and pulled her closer, savoring it.
Aradia, however, was getting a different experience from the kiss
than Dax.

Slowly at first, then
in a rush, she saw through his eyes the moment he had first seen
her in Algebra. She saw and felt his raging jealously as he had
watched Roy and her dancing at Jayce’s party. She saw him hiding in
the woods, recording her use her powers on his phone. She heard Xan
proposing a strategy of how to investigate Aradia from the source.
The last memory was too much for Aradia. She lost her
concentration, and the visions faded.

She ended the kiss.
Angrily, she shoved Dax away. He stood confused and perplexed,
dazed from the suddenness of the kiss. No sooner did he reach out
for Aradia’s hand than she raised that same hand to slap him hard
across the face. Stunned, Dax withdrew his arm. Aradia looked at
him as ruthlessly as a boa ready to pounce on a bird with a broken
wing.

“You know, Dax, I
really did like you,” she sneered. “But I guess for some guys such
as yourself that just isn’t enough!”

Shaking with anger and
sadness, Aradia stomped into her house and slammed the door behind
her. Dax stood on her porch and considered her words.

Aloud he spoke, “She
knows.”

Chapter
Twenty-Six

The first thing Aradia
did was throw herself on her bed and cry to herself for twenty
minutes. Second, she called Rhonda, who did not answer. Third, she
called Roy and told him everything. She had not intended to, and
she knew sharing this would only add fuel to his fiery hatred of
vampires, but at the moment she needed a friend more than she
needed to soothe race relations.

He was surprisingly
quiet through most of the conversation. She didn’t know what he was
thinking. It didn’t even cross her mind to wonder. After venting
her anger, she felt ever so slightly better. She thanked him for
listening and got off the phone.

Afterwards, Aradia
stomped about the house looking for her mother and father. In the
kitchen she found a note on the fridge:

Dear Rai
Rai,

Your father took me on
a surprise date night. We’re going to the silent film festival.
Might be back late. Lasagna in the fridge.

Love,

Mom &
Dad

After crumpling the
note in frustration, she decided to go to the basement freezer to
get some ice cream. What she needed, besides an opportunity to run
down Dax with his own BMW, was comfort food, and as far as she
knew, no comfort food was better than Chunky Monkey. She made her
way towards the freezer, too angry to sense her surroundings. Most
especially, most unfortunately, she was too angry to notice the
dark green eyes staring at her from the shadows, eyes which tracked
her movements as she descended the stairs.

“There you are,” she
said to her delicious prey as she pulled it from the back of the
upright freezer. She swung the door shut and in the silver handle
caught a most unsettling reflection.

At first, she thought
it was only the reflection of the vacuum or some other basementy
appliance, but then she started thinking, since when do vacuums
creep ominously towards someone? Quickly, she spun around in terror
to face whomever was in her house.

She immediately
recognized Dereck from when she’d seen him at the courthouse,
despite a few differences. Then he’d been dressed attractively in a
casual suit, had been clean shaven, and had only seemed mildly
menacing. Now he was stubbly and scraggly, carried a stinking wet
cloth, and clearly came across as highly dangerous.

“Dereck?” Aradia
whispered, jumping back out of his reach.

The man glared with
unimaginable fury. “You have nerve, child, meddling in my
plans.”

She backed away from
him slowly. He matched her step for step. The only escape was the
stairway, and fortunately she was between it and Dereck.

“Why? Why would you try
to stop me?” Dereck demanded.

“Um, maybe because I
think senseless murder is bad?”

She took another
backwards step, being ever so careful not to stumble.

“Senseless!” he cried.
He was hunched slightly and his eyes were wide. “Senseless! You
silly, silly girl.”

Maybe it’s best not
to antagonize him
. “So killing Mr.
Hitzig wasn’t senseless, I guess. You killed him to cover your
tracks.” She took another step toward escape.

“I never killed anybody to protect
myself,” Derek stated simply and proudly, “or for money or for any
other reason so base. I only killed as my role required.”

“What about Mr. Hitzig?” she said. “You
killed him because he was onto you about Stanley.”

Dereck smiled condescendingly, as if
Aradia was a small child trying to convince him that the man in the
red suit she’d met at the mall was really Santa. “I killed the
lawyer because I needed another werewolf, and he came along at the
right time. That’s all, sweet girl.
What led you
to me?”

Aradia groped for a
believable answer, but found nothing. Instead, she said, “Does it
really matter now?”

Surprisingly, this
answer seemed to calm the killer. He shook his head and said,
“You're right. It doesn’t.”