Growing Wildflowers | WLW

Drooping Trillium

"This is Mrs. Vanderbilt's friend." I tell the others. My eyes lock with Sophie's. "Her work friend."

Sophie sighs. "For Christ's sake." She shoves Leah toward John who fumbles to hold onto his box and Leah's arm. "We don't have time for this." Sophie says and before I can figure out what her plan is, she throws her fist into the man's jaw hard.

I flinch. Jamie gasps.

Brian doesn't have time to react. He's unconscious when Sophie's fist makes contact.

"Oh my god." Jamie mashes the words into one and catches Brian before he hits the ground. I help her lower him to the ground.

When I stand up straight, Leah's smirking at us.

Jamie's spilling through questions. "What am I supposed to do with him now? He's going to wake up eventually and he's not going to be happy when—"

"Lock him in the basement." John cuts her off. "We'll take care of him when we get back."

Jamie looks at me with worried eyes. "Take care of him?" She whispers only to me. "What does that mean? Are they going to kill him?"

"No." I shake my head. But then again... I look at John. "You're not going to kill him, right?"

He shrugs. "We'll see where the night takes us."

Leah motions to the device on the ground. "What's that?"

Sophie grabs her arm again. "You're not really in a place to ask questions." After a pause, she picks up the device and looks at me. "What is this?"

Leah rolls her eyes.

"It's um... It's a machine that indicates whether you're human or not."

Her eyebrows scrunch together as she turns it over in her hands. "Bullshit. There's no way."

Leah is looking over her shoulder. "Advanced technology indeed."

Sophie holds a hand up. "Can you let me breathe?"

Leah sighs and takes a step back.

Sophie's fiddling with the machine when she looks at Jamie."Hey, hunter. You know how this works?"

Jamie clears her throat. She nods and steps forward. Once Sophie gives her the machine, Jamie follows the same steps Brian did. She takes Sophie's ring finger and presses the machine against her finger. Sophie doesn't flinch when Jamie pulls the trigger, only watches the screen curiously. After a moment, the screen flashes red.

Sophie's shoulders fall, like she was expecting it to be a fluke. "What is this bullshit?"

"I'm not really sure," Jamie answers. "I haven't seen one until today. Brian told us he's here to hand them out to the humans so they can..."

"So they know if we're living amongst them," Aurora finishes Jamie's sentence for her.

John squeezes Aurora's hand. "That's a battle for another day." He's speaking only to her but his words act as a reminder that we need to keep moving.

"John's right," Sophie says. "We need to meet with Leroy soon and hand Leah over."

My blood runs cold. "We're going into the city again? Why doesn't he come here to get her?"

"He doesn't trust us," Sophie answers. "He wants to meet somewhere neutral in case we're planning something sneaky."

Aurora's making rounds, handing a blood bag out to everyone who needs one, including Leah. "The faster we get Leah back, the better," she says. "These were the last two boxes I could find at the blood bank in town. If we don't restore the balance of things, well... We have to drink blood to survive and... I haven't drained a human in decades."