The Beast Within (The Elite Series) Read online

  “I didn’t expect to see you here, Larentia,” the stranger said. Connor picked up a slight German accent.

  Laren turned into the same stoic woman he had first met in the forest, the business-minded female he was introduced to at his mother’s shop. “Hello, Randolph. If I had known you were coming to dinner, we would have saved you a seat.”

  “Please, Larentia, we both know you don’t mean that.” Turning his unnaturally bright blue eyes on Connor, he continued. “How very rude of me not to introduce myself. I am Randolph and you are?”

  Sensing the tension, Connor decided to ask questions later and instead extended his hand. With a less-than-genuine smile of his own, he introduced himself. “Connor Moore. It’s a pleasure to meet you, Randolph.”

  Randolph’s hand felt cold and clammy, like a long dead fish.

  Upon embracing Connor’s hand, Randolph studied his eyes as though searching for something, not simply meeting his gaze, but rather trying to answer a question. “Very interesting.”

  Releasing his grip, Randolph turned to Laren. “Larentia, the company you choose to keep these days is, is—” he paused, searching for the word. “Unusual. Why, what would your family say if they knew you were publically associating with a hu—”

  Laren hastily cut him off. “Perhaps you should be less concerned with whom I choose to spend my time and focus on your tardiness. As I recall, you were absent for a prearranged meeting.”

  “Yes, you are right and I do apologize. My family chose not to attend the meeting because that would mean we are open to negotiation, which we clearly are not.”

  An awkward pause passed between the trio, Randolph’s unnatural blue eyes locked on to Laren’s emerald green. Just as Connor was about to break the uncomfortable silence with a hasty good-bye, Laren spoke. “I’m sure you’re eager to continue your night so we won’t be keeping you any longer, Randolph.”

  “Yes, do have a good night, my fellow Beastia.” Turning to Connor, he whispered, “And to you, Mr. Moore. Do choose your friends wisely.”

  With a few strides he was gone, leaving dozens of questions in his wake.

  Connor looked at Laren, and for the first time, he saw her worried. It seemed as if she was overwhelmed. Her mouth moved to speak but no words came out. Instead she gave her head a slight shake and looked at Connor apologetically.

  “It’s okay, come on.” Connor gently took her hand in his and led her outside.

  The night was cool. The shoppers that had lined the streets that morning had given way to couples and families out for dinner. The sky was clear and numerous stars shone down, tiny lights battling for their place in the darkness.

  Connor walked Laren over to her car, the two still silent. He positioned himself with his back to her BMW so he could look at her face to face. His heart went out to her, she was a picture of distress and doubt. She didn’t have to open her mouth, yet he knew what she was thinking. She was worried. She had to know he had so many questions from their run in with Randolph. Things had gone so well, too well, at dinner. She had even opened up to him about her and her family, but now there was a new set of questions, harder questions, that she might not be ready to explain.

  She moved to open her mouth, Connor already knew she wanted to apologize for the questions she couldn’t answer, the stranger she couldn’t reveal, and the normal girl she couldn’t be. Before she could say anything, Connor shook his head, shoving all of his questions aside. “You’re different. It’s not just the fact I think you’re incredibly attractive or the way you hold business meetings in forests, or even the weird acquaintances you have that talk like the villains in Indiana Jones movies.” She smiled. “I had a great time with you and I hope you felt the same way. I know we both have pasts that we’ll share with each other in time. But that’s exactly what we have, time.”

  A look of relief crossed her face. “Connor Moore, you’re going to be trouble for me but I don’t care.” She took a step forward, closing the distance between the two of them, and gave him a hug.

  The heat radiated off her body in waves and immersed Connor in her smell. Laren carried the scent of flowers with her. It reminded him of when he was a child and would run through a park, it was fresh, clean, with just a hint of wild.

  Breaking the embrace, Laren wasn’t finished. She gave him a small peck on the cheek as she pulled away.

  “I can get used to that,” he said.

  “Keep playing your cards right and there might be more.”

  The two stood, just staring at each other. Time held no power.

  Connor’s mind racing with new possibilities. Laren was still a mystery, but one he would do anything to solve. She was just starting to open up to him and there was so much more to her than a bold businesswoman. Tonight she had let herself be vulnerable, even if for just a few hours, and Connor wanted more.

  “Well, you’d better get going before your brother comes looking for you and I have to gently put him in his place.”

  “Hahaha. That I would love to see.” She unlocked her door and Connor opened it for her. Sitting inside the black leather interior, she looked up at him.

  “Thank you for a great night.”

  “You’re very welcome. Where are you staying while you’re in town?”

  “At the Sanctum, here.” She reached into the center console of her car and pulled out a business card. “Call me.”

  “I will.”

  Connor closed her car door and she was gone. Connor’s mind was reeling in so many different directions he didn’t know what question to answer first, or if he could even answer any of them.

  He looked down at the business card in his hand, what kind of nineteen-year-old girl had a business card? It was light tan with black writing. In bold letters it read Laren Abelardus. Underneath her name was what had to be her family business, Abelardus Real Estate, Inc. and her phone number. The card wasn’t fancy, and besides these two lines and number, would have been completely blank had it not been for a rough spot in the upper right hand corner of the card. It was stamped with an emblem, the same emblem Laren wore around her neck.

  CHAPTER 3

  THAT NIGHT CONNOR HAD A hard time falling asleep. Half his mind was still reeling from his incredible night. The other half was asking why Randolph had called her “Larentia” and what was that other word he had used—Beastia?

  A few years back, Connor came to the realization that Google was the answer to practically everything. He got up from his bed and crossed his small room. A large window sat across one wall, blinds drawn. His bed was in one corner, a computer desk, and an old wooden dresser that had seen to many years of service rounded out the furniture in his room. Sitting at his computer in a cut off sleeve shirt and black shorts, he started with her last name. Pages upon pages of information came up as a result from his search.

  The Abelardus family was one of the wealthiest names in New York. They owned hundreds of acres of property, acres of property that had been developed as well as land that was still forested. In fact, they even owned a large portion of the Catskill Forest Preserve.

  One website brought up a list of properties they owned, everything from luxury apartments in the city, to small businesses like his mother’s. It seemed as though they had their hands in everything. Try as he might, Connor couldn’t find any pictures of the family. Website after website was full of info on the family’s rich heritage matching the information Laren already told him and the meaning of their last name, “noble strength,” but no pictures.

  Abandoning that search, Connor tried a different route, looking up the meanings of Larentia and Beastia. His eyes widened as Google responded to his request.

  One belief in Roman mythology held Larentia, a modest shepherd’s wife, as the adopted mother of Remus and Romulus. Larentia saved their lives and nursed them when they were babies. As the two brothers grew up, they discovered their royal heritage. Romulus eventually killed his brother, Remus, over a land dispute and the empire he built, Rom
e, was named after him.

  The other mythological view told a similar story of the infants being abandoned in the wilderness and a female wolf providing for them and nursing them until they were found by humans and cared for. This wolf’s name was also Larentia.

  Connor didn’t know if this held any new information. Laren told him that her family was very traditional, so it wasn’t out of the realm of possibility that they had named her after the provider of the founder of Rome and possibly an ancient ancestor.

  Turning to his last word, Beastia, Google told him that it was the Latin translation of the English word, animal. What was the context that Randolph had used when he had referred to Laren?

  ‘My fellow Beastia? My fellow animal?’ What had he meant? Was it some kind of insult? But he had said it more as a fact, not so much as a slight.

  Now Connor wished he hadn’t even opened the question. It was like finally escaping a maze only to realize that the end of this maze was the beginning to a larger one.

  Connor forced himself to fall asleep that night and he woke thankful the next morning that his sleep hadn’t been disturbed by any sinister dreams.

  Connor woke late and had to skip his run. It was Wednesday. That meant it was delivery day at his mother’s store. Grabbing a brown banana, Connor headed out the door. Jumping into his truck, he rambled down the suburban road on the way to his mother’s shop. The day was cool and Connor was thankful he had decided on a flannel shirt, work jeans that pleaded for the washing machine, and brown boots.

  He pulled up to the store and was greeted with a warm smile. “Well; hello sleepy head. I was going to wake you but you looked so peaceful, I decided to let you sleep in.”

  “Thanks, after my date with Laren last night, I was beat.”

  His mother gave him a quizzical look. “Laren is—?” Realization hit her like a hammer. “Connor, you’re not going out with the daughter of our landlord, are you?”

  Connor stuck out his lower lip and raised his eyebrows. “Maybe.”

  “Connor Moore, you stop teasing me and be serious.”

  “Whoops, look at the time. I’m going to be late with all those deliveries. Got to go!”

  He left his mother in the store shaking her head. More than likely, she was rolling her eyes and laughing, but Connor was already out the door.

  Grabbing the delivery order form from the back wall, he began loading his truck with supplies that customers had ordered. His mother used to hire men to do all the deliveries for her. Seeing the money she was paying for this service, Connor insisted that she allow him to make all the deliveries himself. They had agreed he would do the majority of them, save the orders that required a heavier truck due to weight issues or the need for more than one man to lift the material.

  Donning a pair of ancient work gloves, Connor attacked this assignment with fervor. Having missed his morning workout, he used this opportunity to get some exercise. Lifting, pulling, and tugging, he loaded his truck with the supplies for the day’s deliveries in record time. Perspiration gathered on his brow as Connor pulled from his seemingly unlimited supply of energy.

  As he finished lifting the last bag of mulch into his vehicle, he saw the other delivery truck pulling up. It was a burly F-350 with added support to the rear axle to compensate for weight. At one time the truck had been bright fire engine red, but that time had passed many moons ago. Now it was a chipped, dented, faded maroon. The color resembled a piece of clay after being shaped and placed in the furnace.

  Jumping out of the truck were two men, Joe and Pete. Physically, two people couldn’t be more different. Joe was a stocky middle-aged man with a button nose and a smile that was too big for his face. Pete was tall and about the same age as Joe. Pete’s ears seemed to get larger every time Connor saw him and every year that passed brought more and more wrinkles to line his ever-grinning face.

  Joe and Pete saw Connor and waved. They had both been working for his mother ever since Connor could remember and seemed more like uncles than anything else. Connor walked over to the two men as they discussed the best way to arrange the supplies they needed to deliver in their truck.

  “No, we should put the two palm trees in first so they’re not leaning up against the tailgate,” Joe explained in a motherly tone to Pete.

  “Joe, how many times do we have to go through this? The heaviest items need to stay in the rear right over the axle, where there’s the most support.”

  “Pete, you have to trust me on this one. You know I aced math in school.”

  “That was eighth grade!”

  “Well, I still did.”

  “Are you guys arguing on how to load the truck again?” Connor reached the two with a smile on his face from hearing their debate; it reminded him of two dogs arguing over a bone.

  “Just discussing the proper way, Cowboy,” Joe explained.

  Because the two older men had known Connor for so long, they had taken to calling him ‘Cowboy.’ When Connor was little, he would run around his mother’s store with a cowboy hat and a homemade horse, a wooden broomstick with a brown, stuffed animal horse head attached to one end. Since then, the men had called him Cowboy and the name stuck.

  “You two need any help?”

  “Thanks for the offer, but that’s why your mom pays us,” Pete reminded him.

  “Where you headed today?” Joe asked.

  “Haven’t looked yet. Just finished loading up the truck.”

  Joe took Connor’s delivery sheet and whistled, “You have yourself a drive today.”

  “What do you mean?” Connor asked.

  “You’re delivering to the Hubers and you have a run into Catskill.”

  Connor grabbed the delivery manifest. Sure enough, Joe was right. He had a total of five deliveries that day: two to jobsites he had already been to the week before, one to Morrigan Hayes, who was a regular; one to Katie’s family, the Hubers; and the last one didn’t even have a name, just a place—the Catskill Forest Preserve.

  Connor said his good-byes to Joe and Pete. He left them to discuss who got better scores in eighth grade math and how to position the plants.

  Peeking his head inside the shop, he saw his mother watering some hydrangeas by the flower display. He asked, “Mom, did you see this last delivery to the Catskills? That’s two hours away, we don’t usually deliver that far.”

  His mother looked up and smiled, “Yes, I hope you don’t mind. They called in first thing this morning, insistent about the delivery. I told them it would be an extra fee and they said that was fine. Even stranger, did you see what they ordered?”

  Connor looked down at his sheet. Whoever had phoned in the call had only asked for a small container of bug spray, two bottles of generic water, and a very large, very expensive, silver-headed pickaxe.

  “Okay, I’ll be back,” Connor said with a confused look.

  “Be safe.”

  Getting into his truck, Connor decided to do the two construction jobsite deliveries first, head over to Mrs. Hayes’ house, the Hubers’ next, and save the Catskill delivery for last, since it was by far the furthest.

  The first two deliveries went smoothly. He had delivered to both jobsites last week and the foremen knew him. The next delivery, however, was to Mrs. Hayes. Mrs. Hayes was a widow of at least eighteen years. Connor couldn’t ever remember meeting her husband. She must have been in her seventies or eighties by now but it was hard to tell with how active she stayed. Being an avid gardener, she ordered from the shop at least once a week.

  Pulling up to her light brown house, Connor exited his truck and unloaded her order of fertilizer, an assortment of seeds in small pouches, and a new pair of gardening gloves. Walking up to her fence, he admired her immaculate yard. It seemed as though not a blade of grass was out of place. Her rows of vegetables were neatly placed on the right side of the house and to the left were flowers of every kind. An assortment of colors entertained the eye, bright yellows, deep reds and luxurious purples were radiant with life,
and this is where he found her, hunched over her work.

  She was wearing a large flower-printed shirt that was much too big for her, tan pants that reached just shy of her old brown boots, and a floppy straw hat that kept sliding into her eyes. Looking up from her work, she smiled at Connor.

  Most people would have taken her smile for a threat, her crooked teeth were stained yellow, the way her eyes disappeared when she grinned also didn’t help the effect. Connor knew differently, having been acquainted with her for so long. She was harmless, crazy maybe, but completely harmless.

  “Well, hello there, young Mr. Connor.”

  “Hello, Mrs. Hayes. Here are the items you wanted. Where should I put them?”

  “Just there. We have bigger matters to discuss now.”

  Connor placed her things down beside the house and looked at her as she stood up and approached him. Her usual wild grey and white hair was stuck up in her straw hat and her light brown eyes twinkled with excitement.

  “Three of the Five Families have been reunited, whether they know it or not. It’s a very exciting and dangerous time now, Connor. But you’ll be safe because they don’t know it’s you, now, do they? She has a feeling, though. She is drawn to you and she is more than you think.”

  Connor looked at her with a blank expression. This was normal. Mrs. Hayes had been babbling things every time he saw her. She was constantly going off about how she knew of secret things and secret people. Connor was always polite and amused, but today, with the sun beating down on them and still two more deliveries to go, one all the way to the Catskill forest, he decided to cut it short.

  “Yes, yes. The three families, so, anyway I have to get going. Your yard looks great. Let us know if you need anything else.”

  But she wouldn’t let him go that easy. “Connor Moore.” She ran to him incredibly fast for a women of her age and grabbed his hands in her own.

  Her worn, wrinkled palms contrasted his young, strong hands. She looked into his eyes and held his gaze for a moment, much like Randolph had at the restaurant the night before, looking into him rather than at him.