The Revolt (The Reapers: Book Two) by Katharine Sadler Page B

here?
You could have told us this over the phone.”
    “I’m here to get to know Kelsey better. That
seemed to be your main complaint against me, right, Kelsey, that we
don’t know each other very well. I want to fix that.”
    I opened my mouth to tell him my main
complaint was that he was a sociopath, but Jed stopped me with a
look.
    “That’s it?” Jed asked.
    Caleb took a step closer to me and I forced
myself to meet his eyes without flinching. “I know you love this
little town. I’m going to give it to you, so you’ll never have to
leave it again.”
    “And what do the reapers think of your plan?”
I asked.
    “They need me more than I need them. I’ve got
access to more power than all of them put together.”
    “What the hell are you talking about?”
    “I’ll tell you, if you let me in.”
    I looked at Jed, eyebrows raised. I was
curious to hear him out, but Jed shook his head and curled his lip
in a way that made it clear he thought Caleb was full of shit.
    “Guess I’ll have to find a way to live
without knowing,” I said, returning my attention to Caleb.
    “I’ll be going, then.” He bowed his head to
me. “I look forward to seeing you again, Kelsey.”
    “Screw you,” I said.
    He smiled and left.
    Jed slammed the door shut after him. “I know
you want to talk about this, Kelsey, but I need to hit something
right now.”
    “Can I be there when you do?”
    Surprise raised his brows and lit his eyes.
He smiled a sweet, slow smile. “You want to hit something,
too?”
    “Hell, yes.”
    As we walked toward the kitchen, Jed shoved
me hard enough that I fell over the back of the couch and into the
cushions. “First one down picks the music,” he said and sprinted
toward the door to the garage.
    I rolled off the couch and ran after him,
taking a couch cushion with me. I caught up to him halfway down the
stairs and used the cushion to knock him off-balance long enough
for me to get to the IPod first.
     
    “You believe anything he said?” I asked Jed
over a post-workout snack.
    “I believe he believes it, but I seriously
doubt the reapers are going to take orders from him any longer than
absolutely necessary.”
    “Any idea what he’s talking about when he
says he should own this town?”
    “Got me. It sounds like more of the same
crazy shit he says about the two of you being fated to be
together.”
    “Maybe,” I said, but it didn’t feel right to
me, and the look on Jed’s face said he doubted his own conclusion.
Or, I realized studying the furrow between his brows, he was
worried about something entirely different. My brain was beginning
to feel like mush, between all the training we’d been doing and the
lack of a good run to clear my head.
    “What’s wrong?”
    He laughed. “You mean besides the takeover at
Varius, the reapers trying to run this town, and Caleb showing up
on our doorstep?”
    I gave him several long minutes to tell me
what the trouble was, but he didn’t open up. “Yeah, there’s
something else bothering you. All the other stuff we already knew,
and Caleb showing up wasn’t exactly a surprise. You look more
worried than I’ve seen you before.”
    He gave me a long measuring look and nodded.
“It might not have been a surprise, but I’d still hoped I was wrong
about Caleb working with the reapers. He’s always been practical,
even in his delusions, but this… I’m not sure I know him at all
anymore.”
    That scared me. I’d been pretty much okay,
even when Caleb showed up, because I figured Jed could handle it. I
believed he’d protect me for Varius’s sake if for no other reason.
If he was lost, then I was, too. “What do you think he’ll do? Do
you have any idea?”
    “Hell if I know. Either he’s gone over the
edge, or he knows something, something big, something I’ve never
even heard of before.” He rubbed his eyes with the heels of his
hands. “I have a bad feeling about all of this, Kelsey, and I want
to tell you now that I’m sorry.