Chosen

just thought if you knew how it happened, that might help you to fix it."
    I looked into his eyes, wishing the sick feeling in my stomach would go away. "You can't tell anyone about this, Loren. Not anyone, not even Neferet." I tried to be all High Priestessy and firm, but my voice shook and broke.
    "You don't need to worry, love! Of course I won't tell anyone." Loren held me close and stroked my back. "But who else knows besides you and me?"
    "No one." The lie was so automatic it shocked me.
    "What about Aphrodite? You said you're using her garage apartment to hide Stevie Rae, right?"
    "Aphrodite doesn't know. I heard her talking to some kids about her parents being gone for the rest of the winter. She was saying that they should use the garage apartment to party, but, well, everyone's pretty pissed at Aphrodite, so no one took her up on it. That's how I knew the apartment was empty, so I snuck Stevie Rae up there." I hadn't consciously meant not to tell him about Aphrodite, but it seemed my mouth had already made that decision for me. I mentally crossed my fingers, hoping that he couldn't tell I was lying.
    "Okay, that's probably for the best. Zoey, you said Stevie Rae's not herself, and can't communicate very well. How do you talk to her?"
    "Well, she can talk, but she's confused and … and …" I floundered around trying to figure out how to explain it without giving more away than I should, "and sometimes more animal-like than human," I said inanely. "I just saw her earlier tonight before Neferet's ritual"
    I could feel him nod. "That's where you were coming from."
    "Yeah." I decided not to mention Heath. Just thinking about him made me feel guilty. Our Imprint was gone, but instead of being relieved I was weirdly hollow.
    "But how do you know she's still at Aphrodite's apartment and okay right now?"
    Distracted, I said, "Huh? Oh, I gave her a cell phone. I can call or text her. I just checked in with her a little while ago." I motioned to my cell phone, which had fallen out of the pocket of my dress and was lying beside it on the floor next to our pallet. Then I shook Heath from my mind and focused on my more immediate problem. "I might need to ask for your help."
    "Ask me anything," he said, gently brushing my hair back out of my face.
    "I'm going to need to either get Stevie Rae in here to the school, or get the gang and me out there to her."
    "The gang?"
    "You know, Damien and the Twins and Aphrodite, so we can cast a circle. I have a feeling I'll need the added strength they bring to their elements to help Stevie Rae."
    "But you said they don't know about Stevie Rae," he said.
    "They don't. I'll have to tell them, but I'm going to wait till right before I try the fixing of Stevie Rae thingie." God, what a moronic thing to call it. I sighed and shook my head. "I'm definitely not looking forward to telling them, though," I said miserably, meaning the Stevie Rae thingie and how pissed my friends were going to be that I'd been keeping important stuff from them.
    "So are you and Aphrodite really friends?"
    Loren asked the question in an off-hand way, with a smile and a tug on one long strand of my hair, but like with Heath, our Imprint linked us and I could feel the tension hidden inside him. He cared a lot more about my answer than he was letting on. That worried me, and not just because my gut was cramping up again and warning me to keep my mouth shut.
    So I tried to match his "whatever" tone. "Nah, Aphrodite is awful. It's just that for some reason—totally not understood by Damien and the Twins and me—Nyx has given her an affinity for earth. The circle doesn't work as well without her, so kinda by default she's in. It's not like we're hanging out or anything like that."
    "Good. From what I've heard Aphrodite has some major problems. You shouldn't trust her."
    "I don't." And as I said it I realized that I actually did trust Aphrodite. Maybe even more than I trusted Loren, who I'd just lost my virginity to and with whom I'd just Imprinted. Great. Just my luck.
    "Hey, relax. I can tell talking about this has upset you." Loren caressed my cheek and I automatically leaned into his hand. Whenever he touched me it just felt so amazing. "I'm here now. We'll figure this out. Take it one step at a time."
    I wanted to remind him that Stevie Rae really didn't have much time, but his lips were on mine again and all I could think about was how good he felt against my body… that I could feel his pulse speeding up …