Claws (30 page)

“We will work this all out,” he told
her, staring down at her, his blue eyes filled with compassion.
“Does Jericho have some plan yet?”

Vivvie told him and he scowled. “There
is no other way out of this. She won’t stop until she has what she
wants. She refuses to see that it lies to her.”

“I don’t want you in there with her,
Vivvie,” he said through clenched teeth. “You could be trapped
there forever and none of us could get to you.”

“Elaina and Devon have my gift. One of
them could get in.”

“It’s too much of a risk,” he told her
and stepped away. “If it gets its claws into one of them, none of
us are safe.”

“It’s a risk we have to take,” she
insisted and drew in a trembling breath. “With her locked away, she
can do no more harm.”

“If I kill her, she can do no more
harm,” Eli said with deadly menace glowing in his eyes.

“This demon dwells within the mountain,
Eli. It isn’t leaving until it gets what it wants. She let it in.
We must figure out how to get it out.”

“I don’t want you anywhere near this
thing, Vivvie!” he snapped.

“I don’t have a choice anymore, Eli. It
won’t leave us be now and it’s my fault,” she disclosed and winced.
“I insulted the creature.”

Eli chuckled despite his fears for his
family, shaking his head. “Why am I not surprised? I’m sure you had
some choice words for it.”

“I antagonized it to get it after me
again and leave the children be.”

“Vivvie, this creature has one goal and
that is to have every soul in this tribe as it was promised long
ago. Any offering less than that wouldn’t be worth it’s time,” Eli
informed her with a shake of his head. “What was Tania thinking?
What could she want to betray us all this way? What did it promise
her?”

“Jericho went back to her to find out
what she’s up to. He thinks she wants to be human.”

Eli didn’t seem surprised to know
Jericho was back with the female elder and reflected her words
without comment. He seemed stunned to hear of Tania’s
goal.

“Human? You’ve got to be
kidding?”

“Jericho says she wants it more than
anything,” Vivvie said sadly and gazed at her husband with renewed
hope in her gaze, seeing he reacted better to the truth than she
thought.

“The demon will give her nothing,” Eli
predicted with a gleam in his eye. “She will find that out soon
enough.”

“We have until the first new moon of
the coming year to figure out how to deal with her.”

“That’s where you’re wrong, Vivvie,”
Eli said harshly and flung her a look of annoyance.

“What are you going to do?” she asked
in a whisper, seeing his face grow darker.

“I’m not that patient,” was all he said
as he stalked out the sliding glass doors and ripped off his shirt.
She watched him disrobe and bound from the deck on all fours,
leaping over the fence in a dead run for the compound.

Jericho cuddled Justice in his lap when
Eli arrived. He smelled him before he stood at his door, sensed his
leader’s fury, and knew the cause. He petted his son and the baby
panther purred.

“
I’d rip you apart but we
both know you wouldn’t heal,” Eli said in a dangerous voice, his
blue eyes filled with rage and hurt. “She told me the
truth.”

“It’s your right to do what I sense,”
Jericho said as he walked away from where his son dozed.

“You knew better than she did!” Eli
snarled and glared at the elder. “You spent enough time in that
place with Tania all those years! You took advantage of her
ignorance!”

“All true; I don’t deny it,” Jericho
replied and smiled sadly. “She went to visit her children and found
you with Tania. She came to me then and during her exile. She
needed someone and you tossed her out of your life.”

“Did you know she could conceive in
that place?” Eli whispered furiously.

“It’s never happened before, but we’ve
had our share of miracles this year, haven’t we?”

“What are you saying?” Eli asked in
irritation.

“First, you have two children with your
singular gift,” the elder began. “Then we reach immortality of all
things. Lastly, your mate gets pregnant in a dream. I don’t know
about you, but it all seems rather contrived to me.”

“You think the demon’s hand has guided
it all?”

“Eli, use your head and discard your
jealousy,” the leader replied and smiled sadly. “It’s not possible
to get impregnated in a dream. That told me more was at work here
than we knew.”

“Vivvie can’t fight Tania in there and
win, Jericho,” Eli said with an angry sigh. “There is no miracle to
allow for that.”

“You might be surprised.”

“After this last year, nothing
surprises me anymore!” Eli snapped and glared as Jericho chuckled
warmly.

“Eli, you have to have more faith in
your mate,” Jericho told him honestly. “You set you both up to fail
if you can’t see that. Vivvie loves you. She never wanted this.
It’s not like Tania all over again.”

“Why did she go to you?”

“Why did you really hire Erin when you
were in Florida, Eli?”

Eli glared at the elder, unable to not
feel the twinge of guilt for the barest of seconds before Jericho
latched onto it and grinned.

“I can’t change overnight!” Eli
exploded with his face reddening to know he hired the schoolteacher
because of a momentary wave of attraction and lust.

“But you expect Vivvie to change
overnight? My, you do have high expectations for her, don’t you?
Only a Newbreed eleven months, and she knows all there is to know
of our kind.”

“Quit twisting this around,” Eli
snapped and fumed as he regarded the elder. “One wrong doesn’t
justify the other!”

“Oh, so if she turned to Ty you’d be
pleased right now because you expected it?”

“What is your point, Jericho? I assume
you have one?”

“You aren’t willing to see you brought
this on yourself when you lost faith in your mate, Eli. Tania’s
little ploy would have never made it this far had you given Vivvie
the benefit of the doubt. You can still rip me apart, but that is
the truth here.”

Eli stared at the elder with a look of
despair and anger. “When this demon is no longer an issue and Tania
is dispatched to hell; I want you gone from here. You’ve consoled
my wife long enough.”

Jericho smiled sadly. “It was my
intention when I returned to help her. I’m taking my son with me
when I go.”

Eli turned on his heel and left,
leaving Jericho alone with his turbulent thoughts. He expected no
less. He was the only one who wasn’t surprised by the outcome of
Eli’s learning the truth.

~ ~ ~

Vivvie knew Eli was hurt. He slept with
his back to her, not in the guest room at least. He came back from
wherever he went and refused to talk about it. They had much to
talk about. This couldn’t work.

“Are you going to ignore me now?” she
asked quietly and saw his back go rigid. “We have to talk about
this.”

“I’ve forgiven you, Vivvie,” he said
wearily. “Isn’t that enough?”

She got angry now. No, it wasn’t
enough. He might have forgiven her slip, but his actions still very
much punished her. She sat up and glared at his back.

“This is the reason I can’t talk to
you!” she snapped as tears filled her gaze. “You would rake Jericho
and I over the coals and you have done no different than
us.”

Eli rolled over and anger flared in his
gaze. “Leave it be, Vivvie! I’m hardly holding it against you! I
realize I deserve this. Can I feel bad for that?”

“Eli, we didn’t do this to hurt you,”
she whispered. “I never meant for any of this to
happen.”

“No but my actions were very much meant
to hurt you, wife,” Eli acknowledged with a taut look. “I can
hardly say my behavior with Tania was even justified. This is my
fault! Let it be!”

“I don’t care whose fault it is, Eli.
It’s here, between us now. You say you forgive us both, but I can
see in your eyes you don’t.”

Eli sighed and looked away. “Why
couldn’t you come to me instead of him, Vivvie? Why didn’t you pull
me out of bed that night? Why did you never try since?”

Vivvie couldn’t answer. She didn’t know
why either. A voice in her mind whispered she’d used their
separation as a means to explore the curiosity she’d always had of
Jericho. She knew that was only part of it. She knew a need to have
his approval. Coming to him with such worries and concerns only
screamed she was failing as one of them.

“I didn’t feel like I could tell you
the things I was feeling,” she admitted and a sad look crossed her
face. “I see now I should have come to you when I started feeling
overwhelmed and inadequate.”

“Do you think I would have made fun of
you? I see how hard this all is for you, Vivvie.”

“I don’t know why I didn’t talk to you.
I didn’t want you to see how much I struggled with certain
feelings.”

“For Jericho, you mean?” he asked and
tensed.

She looked away and nodded. “I felt
like I betrayed you by just thinking about him. I didn’t understand
why I was so happy and in love and this was happening.”

“Its part of our nature, Vivvie,” he
said with a trace of regret. “I hired Erin because I was attracted
to her; you’re right. I was also mad as Hell at my mate at the
time. I would have never acted on that after you came home, Vivvie.
I don’t care what Ty saw. When we came home; I have been with no
other.”

“
I struggled to not think of
Jericho that way. He was my friend. I never expected
this.”

“Vivvie, had you come to me, we could
have talked of this. Why would I hold it against you because you
have thoughts? Desires? Do you think it’s any different for me?” he
scoffed and shook his head. “Vivvie, I have females lifting their
damn tails in front of me all day long. I have women at the office
who throw themselves on my desk with their tongues out. Do you
think I don’t know?”

“I’d rather not know how many lift
their tails with their tongues out,” she admitted with a sad laugh
and saw him grin.

“Go ahead and ask it then; I have
nothing to hide from you,” he encouraged.

“Fine, how many lift their tails to
you, husband?” she asked and cringed to know the answer.

“All of them,” he said honestly and she
saw no arrogance in his expression. “I am Chief of the tribe,
Vivvie, and the leader of the nine. Do you think rank doesn’t have
its privilege? Half the time; I think they come to me for that
alone. The humans just sense the animal in me; nothing
more.”

She smiled, thinking they knew what
they were after. Her husband was a total hottie. He was being
honest. He struggled more than she did.

“Have you ever taken any of them up on
it?”

“Once,” he admitted wistfully and she
forced back her resentment. “It was after the twins were born. I
was out for a run and came upon a female in heat. I couldn’t
resist. I haven’t since because of the guilt I felt. We were happy
then. I didn’t know why it happened at all.”

Vivvie stared in pained shock. “You
have other young from this female?”

“Six to be precise,” he said and shook
his head sadly. “I knew I should have told you. I didn’t think you
would understand how hard it is to not let the animal take over.
You had such a human approach to everything then. I didn’t want you
to see how difficult it was for me; for fear you wouldn’t try
anymore. I only want to be with you, Vivvie, no other.”

“We have to work at it every day, Eli,”
she told him and touched his rugged cheek in acceptance. “We have
the rest of our lives to get it right.”

“I would like to try again, Vivvie,” he
admitted with his heart in his eyes. “Don’t ever keep these things
from me. You’re my mate. You have to share such things with me. I
have to be able to tell you these things too, without worry you
will leave me or not love me anymore.”

“Never,” she said and felt tears
pushing forth. “Loving you has always been the easiest of all of
this, Eli.”

“Never be afraid to tell me anything,
Vivvie,” he said as he kissed her hand, his teeth grazing her
knuckles. “I want to know; even if it hurts.”

“Alright, for starters, this rule about
female’s doing all the hunting is a total joke,” she complained and
missed his relieved smile at her words. “You might be Chief at the
compound, but here you’re just my husband, and it’s your job too. I
don’t want to come home from work every day and be pressured to go
out and bag dinner every night.”

“We’ll share the hunting from now on.
Anything else?” he asked and his eyes glowed.

“
Come to think of it, you
could start picking up after yourself,” she pointed out. “Devon and
Seth are going to learn those crappy habits. I’ll be walking behind
them too.”