Blood and Bone | 1

5 | 2

A few long hours after our conversation about Hundsen, Jaxon got the truck running again. We drove all through the rest of the night. When I woke up in the dimly lit truck, the sky was an ashy mauve, meaning that the sun was rising again.

      After the others had awoken, Jaxon told us, "I don't know how much longer this truck has before the engine gives out again. To be safe, we should take the A26 train that goes almost directly to the French harbor."

      Finn pointed out, "We have no boarding passes and no money. How are we going to get on that train?"

      "Well," Kane broke in, looking up from the computer he'd just been typing on, "I may or may not have just hacked into the station's database so that it looks like we bought electronic tickets for both the train and the ferry."

      "You didn't," Arlo said, shaking his head in disbelief. "How is that even possible?"

      "I did," he replied, showing a rare smile on his handsome face. "Once I got into the station's mainframe and past the security program, it was easy to make it to the secured infrastructure. I got the tickets for the ferry the same way."

      "God, you're such a nerd," Riley teased him with a smirk on her face.

      "That's mean."

      She shrugged. "It's true."

      Kane gave her a narrow-eyed look.

      "Hey," Riley assured him suggestively, "I never said that it was a bad thing."

      Kane suddenly became very absorbed with something on the computer screen. Riley's grin widened at his response to her unabashed flirting.

Jaxon stopped the truck in a parking space and unlocked the back of the truck to let the rest of us out. We had to gather the few things that we'd brought with us because we weren't coming back to the truck.

Inside the underground station, it was busy. Mostly men and women clad in suits and buisness-attire walked through the station, some with a coffee in hand. It was that time of the morning where businesspeople were rushing off to the metro to get to work.

A woman's cool voice made an announcement over the loudspeaker in rapid French. "Come on, I think that's us," Finn stated, gesturing for us to follow him to board the train.

      Soon, we were aboard the locomotive and ready to go. The wheels started to turn and the dark walls out the window began to move back. The scene out the window got brighter and brighter as the train increased in speed and neared the end of the tunnel.

      Once we were above ground, the small city opened up around us. Old-looking buildings were clustered together and people milled about on the sidewalks and in city squares. A river snaked its way through the city and we crossed over a bridge as the stream took a sharp turn to the right.

      "Delphinium?" asked Finn, who sat to my left.

      I focused my gaze on him. "Yes?"

      "I just wanted to let you know that I'm sorry about the other day. Particularly what I said."

      I frowned, not knowing what the incident was that he was talking about.

      "It was when you and Jake had saved us," he clarified, looking slightly embarrassed. "I was nervous, given everything that had happened, and didn't know who I could trust. I didn't know if I could trust you."

      "And do you now?"

      He hesitated. "I think I can trust you. You've helped us a lot against Hundsen and, after all, you were the reason that the six of us got rescued. But Jake...I don't trust him at all. He's too ruthless and he only does what's best for himself; he doesn't do anything unless it profits him in some way."