The Floorboards

Gabriel’s POV I was angry as f**k. The thought of her being around someone I didn’t know made my blood boil. What if something happened to her? I will kill everyone. I could see Nick was also angry. He was frowning and staring through the passenger seat window. We both hadn’t said a word since we left the girls. Suddenly, I had a craving for Louis’s cheap s**t he calls wine. I need to go to his bar soon and drink until I don’t care anymore. “Keep your phone on and close,” Nick finally spoke as we were pulling up my driveway. “Of course!” I grunted and left the car. We entered my house, and I went straight to the fridge. I pulled out two beers and handed one to Nick. “I have a bad feeling about this, Gabe,” Nick said, smirking. I sighed unhappily. “I know. Me too. But what can we do? They barely know us. And we barely know them. I get it’s weird for us to care this much already, and I don’t want to freak Aria out. Or Annie. I don’t want them to shut us out.” “I know, man,” Nick said, sipping his beer. “I really hope we find something in your house that will explain all of this.” “Where should we start?” I asked. There are tiles in the kitchen and in the bathrooms, but all the other rooms have floorboards, and it would be easy to hide something underneath. “Maybe we should start with your grandma’s study and her old room.” “Yeah. I will go to her room, and you will start at the study. Try and see if any of the floorboards feel loose,” I said, drinking the rest of my beer and putting the bottle away. “Let me know when Aria texts, okay?” Nick said and got off the chair. I nodded and went upstairs to my grandma’s old room. My house was big. There were four bedrooms, three bathrooms and a small library on the top floor. Downstairs there was a big kitchen, a living room, a guest bathroom, my grandma’s old study and a dining room we never use. I used to ask my grandma why there were just the two of us in a house this big, but she said it reminded her of my parents and she refused to move out. It will take us a while to check everything. I was right. We stumbled upon a couple of loose floorboards in my grandma’s old bedroom and in two bedrooms that are now empty. It took us a while to loosen them and look underneath only to find nothing. They were just loose. It was frustrating. We still had to check my bedroom, library, dining room and living room. It was around 9 pm when I got a text from Aria saying they are leaving Annie’s house. About 5 minutes later she texted they were at Mike’s. I was just finishing checking my bedroom and I found nothing. The top floor was clear. I went downstairs to check on Nick. He was in the dining room, and he was just loosening a board. “Aria texted,” I said. “They are at Mike’s.” “Good,” he got off the floor. “Hey, man, how about we order a pizza. I’m hungry. We can continue later. If there is nothing underneath this one, then there is only the living room left.” “Yeah, great. I’m also hungry,” I answered, getting the phone out of my pocket. “I will help you check underneath this one while we wait for the pizza.” It took us about 20 minutes to remove the floorboards but there was nothing underneath. “f**k,” I muttered. “It has to be in the living room,” Nick sighed. “Don’t worry. We will find it.” We put the floorboard back just when the doorbell rang, and our pizza arrived. Nick went to answer the door and I got us a couple of beers from the fridge. When I sat at the table, my phone rang. “Aria says she is fine,” I told Nick. “I wish she would just go home,” he sighed. “I know. Me too.” We ate in silence. I was too tense to talk, and I figured Nick feels the same. One of the reasons I love my friendship with Nick is being able to not talk and it wouldn’t get weird. “So, Annie is nice. Very hot,” he broke the silence. She is hot. Long blonde hair, brown eyes, nice t**s and an ass to die for. She is taller than Aria. And she is funny and outgoing. I like her. “Yeah, she is,” I nodded. “Are you thinking about asking her out?” I smiled. Nick frowned. “Nah, man. I was thinking maybe you would like her.” I was surprised. She was totally his type. I mean I like girls like Annie too, but I would think he would be all over her by now. “I don’t know. I mean I like her. So maybe,” I said, sipping my beer. “But I don’t want to hurt her. Or Aria. And she would be hurt if Annie is hurt. And you know I don’t date.” “Yeah. Neither do I. Maybe it’s better we don’t do anything.” I smiled and picked up my plate. “Are you done?” I asked him. “Yes,” he said and handed me his plate. “I’ll start checking the living room.” He got up and walked out of the kitchen while I loaded the dishwasher. I went to the living room and started checking the floorboards. I got another text from Aria saying she is fine. We checked everything and found nothing. I was losing my mind. “How about under the couch?” Nick said. I looked at him and got excited. “Come on, help me move it,” I said, hurrying him up. There was a loose floorboard underneath, and it was much easier to remove than the others. This has to be it. I looked underneath and found a box. I pulled it out and looked at Nick. “Of course, it was in the last place we checked,” he muttered. “Come on, open it.” I opened the lid and there was a note, an USB and a smaller box underneath. My heart started beating fast. I opened the note and saw my grandma’s handwriting. Dear Gabriel, Before you open the smaller box inside this one, look at the video on the USB. I am sorry I didn’t have the time to tell you this in person. I love you so much. Grandma. Nick ran upstairs to my room to grab my laptop. I sat on the couch trying to calm my breathing. He came back, I plugged the USB and opened the video file that was on there. My grandma’s smiling face popped up on my screen. Aria’s POV When the guys left Annie and I went to our bedrooms to shower and get ready. I chose a tight, black dress with long sleeves that fell a little above my knees and had an open back, and my black high heels. I curled my hair and let it fall freely down my back. Annie will do my makeup. I left my room and knocked on Annie’s door. “Come in,” she yelled. I opened the door and saw her standing in front of a mirror doing her makeup. She was wearing a strapless red dress that barely covered her ass and black high heels. She looked amazing. “Wow, Annie. You look hot,” I smiled and sat on her bed. “You think?” she smiled and twirled in front of me. “Definitely,” I laughed. “Are you done with your makeup?” “Yes. Just need to add a bit more lipstick. How would you like me to do yours?” “Hmm. How about a thin eyeliner, a little bit of mascara and lipstick?” I rarely wear makeup. And when I do I like to keep it simple. Not Annie though. She had a smokey-eye look, bold eyeliner and red lipstick that matched her dress. She looked amazing. And she knew how to wear it. “Okay, great. Come on, sit,” she said and waved me over. I sat on a chair and let her do what she did best. When she finished, I looked in the mirror. “Wow, Annie. It looks great. Thank you.” “You are more than welcome. You look amazing, A,” she smiled and went to the bathroom to put away her makeup bag. I was glad she didn’t put much lipstick on. She put on pink lipstick, but it was subtle. Almost like my natural lip color. She came back and we did some last-minute fixes. “You look amazing, Aria. That dress is to die for,” She smiled at me. “If you weren’t smaller than me, I would definitely borrow it sometime.” I laughed. “Oh, come on. I am not that much smaller. You are borrowing it.” “It will barely cover my butt.” “This dress barely covers your butt,” I laughed and pointed at her dress. “You are right. I guess I’m borrowing it then,” she winked at me and grabbed her purse. “Come on, let's go.” I ran to my bedroom to grab my coat, my purse, and my phone. Annie was already downstairs waiting for me. “Don’t forget to text your boyfriend,” she said and rolled her eyes. “Come on, Annie,” I whined. “Please don’t call him that. It’s freaky.” “He is freaky,” she muttered. I sighed and pulled out my phone to text him that we are leaving the house. She was right, though. It was a little bit freaky. I know it is because Gabriel feels this connection to me, but still. “I know it’s weird Annie. But I kind of feel that connection that Gabriel was talking about. I can’t explain what it is, but it’s there. They just want us to be safe,” I said as we started walking to Mike’s house. “What do you think it is?” she asked me. “I have no idea. I thought maybe he is a distant cousin. But my grandma told me we don’t have any family left. It was just the two of us. And she would mention Claudia being my relative in her letter.” “Do you think he could be your mate?” “What, like werewolves have?” I smirked and she nodded. “No, definitely not. We don’t have mates. And as far as I know, mates are like an instant connection, deep attraction, love at first sight and all that. I mean, you should know, you are a werewolf. And aren’t they rare?” “Yeah, they are. Not many wolves find their mate. But I thought maybe witches and warlocks could have them too. And you are just the first ones to experience it,” she shrugged. “No, I don’t think that’s it,” I shook my head. “I mean, I feel something for him, but I don’t want to kiss him or anything.” “Kiss. You are adorable,” she laughed. “I could think of a lot of other things to do with him.” “I wouldn’t like to do those either,” I smiled. We arrived at Mike’s, and I texted Gabriel again to let him know. There weren’t many people inside. Music was playing in the background. There was a table with drinks and snacks and people were sitting on a couch or on the floor. When we walked in, Jack came to grab our coats. “Wow, girls. You look amazing,” he smiled at us and kissed Annie’s cheek. “Thank you, Jack. You are hot as hell,” Annie said and winked at him. She was right. He was hot. He was wearing jeans and a simple black t-shirt that was tight and it showed his muscles. He had rolled his sleeves, and his tattoos were showing. His brown hair was messy, and some strands were falling on his brown eyes. He laughed at Annie’s flirty comment and turned to me, “Aria, welcome.” “Thank you, Jack,” I smiled brightly. Mike came from the kitchen and hugged Annie. “Hey, girls. I’m glad you came. Grab a drink and sit.” Annie made us gin tonic and we joined the circle. There were a couple of werewolves, some vampires, and some werewolf vampire hybrids. I was the only witch. They were all really nice and we talked and laughed a lot. It was nice to let go and have some fun after everything that happened. I made sure to text Gabriel every half hour as he requested, but after my fourth text, he stopped responding. He probably fell asleep. Somehow, I ended up talking to Jack the most. I learned that he was 24 years old, and he lived alone in an apartment not far from here. He worked at an IT company as a computer engineer. He talked a little about his work and it sounded amazing. His parents lived in another city nearby and he came here to work. He had a little sister that still lived at home, but she was planning to come to live with him soon. I told him a little bit about myself too. I left out everything that happened in my village, because I didn’t want to cry, and this fifth gin tonic was making it hard not to start if I spoke about it. So, I told him I would like to study architecture one day and how much I love music and miss playing the piano. He didn’t ask me about my family. I had a feeling he figured out I didn’t want to talk about it, and he didn’t mention it. I was grateful to him. “I like you,” he said after we finished talking about our lives. “Would you like to go get some coffee with me sometime?” “I would love to, Jack,” I smiled. “Great. I would love to get to know you better. You are amazing,” he smiled brightly at me, and I blushed. “Thank you. So are you,” I said, smiling back at him. Annie sat beside me on a couch and sighed, “I am so drunk.” Jack and I laughed. “I think it’s time we go home,” I said, getting off the couch. “Yeah, I miss my bed,” she said, got up and walked over to Mike. “Mike, we are leaving, please go get our stuff.” Jack went to the kitchen and came back with his phone. “Can I get your number?” I smiled and told him. He called me so I would have his. Annie was having trouble putting on her jacket, so I helped her. We said goodbye to everybody and left. “So, Jack, huh?” she asked me once we were outside We walked hand in hand because we both needed a little bit of support. Annie was making some strong drinks and she had more than me. “He is nice. We talked a lot,” I smiled. “Did he ask you out?” she smiled brightly. “He asked me for coffee,” I smiled back. “Oh, my Goddess, yes!” she yelled. “When?” “Annie! Quiet,” I shushed her. “I don’t know when. We will text and make plans.” “I am so happy. My two best friends. He is a great guy,” she said. “He is. I like him. And I would like to get to know him better.” Annie didn’t stop smiling all the way home. She was already making plans for us, and I was glad her house was nearby. If it was any further, I would be having kids with him in her plans. We arrived at her house and went to our bedrooms. I took my makeup off, brushed my teeth and hopped in the shower. I put on my pajamas and got under the covers. I thought about texting Gabriel when we arrived home, but I didn’t want to wake him up. He didn’t respond to my last text, so he must be asleep. I will see him tomorrow anyway. I turned to my side and fell asleep.