Authors: Olivia Hutchinson
He
whispered in her ear, the sound of his voice making her cringe, “Give me a
reason, witch. Just one reason to snap your neck and I’ll do it.”
She
stopped struggling against him when she heard his threat, knowing her escape
attempts were futile. She saved what little energy she had left. He had her and
he wasn’t going to let her go no matter how much she fought him.
“The bracelet!”
the warlock demanded again, more forcefully, his palm out.
Gabriel
dug into his pocket and pulled out the bracelet. He held it out in front of him
and dangled it in the air. In a flash, the bracelet left Gabriel’s fingers and
flew through the air and landed in the warlock’s palm. He closed his fist
around it and she could feel him smile as he placed it into his pocket.
“Now
release her!” Gabriel demanded, taking a step forward just as the warlock took
a step back.
“You fool.
Do you really think I’d suffer a witch to live?” Her heart sank when she heard
him. He was going to try to leave with her, she determined as he took another
step back. Only she had no intention of going anywhere with him and she didn’t
have to see Gabriel to know he had no intention of letting her go.
Gabriel
charged at them full force. When she felt her feet touch the ground, she pulled
at the warlock’s arm and pushed her body to the side with all she had. The
warlock involuntarily released his hold, his attention focused on the werewolf
closing in.
She
fell on her butt when she got out of the warlock’s grasp just as the two men
clashed in front of her, their fists flying. She scurried away from them, never
averting her eyes from the fight. Within seconds Gabriel’s arms lengthened and
bulked out as he started to change.
“Lila,
run!” he yelled to her, his voice barely discernible as his teeth began to
elongate.
Lila
didn’t run. She wouldn’t leave Gabriel. Jumping to her feet, she ran headlong
into the fight. She barreled into the side of the warlock, sending him
stumbling away from the rapidly transforming Gabriel. He landed on his back on
the gravel. She was on his chest in a second.
“Where
is Andrea? What did you do with her?” she screamed, her fists pummeling his
face.
Enraged,
he pushed her off of him. His strength and magic sent her flying through the
air to land in a heap on the grass.
“That
bitch?” He spat blood from his mouth.
Lila
was struggling to pull herself to her feet when Gabriel came at him again, his
fists replaced by claws and teeth. His clothing had torn at the seams, some of
the fabric still clinging to his skin.
The
warlock screamed as Gabriel dug his canines into his shoulder, ripping away a
large chunk of flesh and muscle. A second later, the warlock sent Gabriel
flying through the air just as Lila had a second earlier. His body hit the side
of the garage, the concrete crumbling from the force of impact.
Lila
came at the warlock as soon as Gabriel hit the wall. Ready for her this time,
he ducked to the side as she swung her fist at his face.
“Where
is she?” Anger contorted her face as she swung again, this time connecting with
his jaw.
“Dead,
I hope.” He stepped back as she sprang for his throat, blinded by her fury.
He
punched her dead in the face, sending her to the ground. She couldn’t even feel
where he had hit her cheekbone, but for a moment she saw stars.
When
she heard the loud growls followed by the warlock’s screams, the hope of
getting any information from him vanished. Lila looked away until she heard the
thump of the warlock’s lifeless body hitting the ground.
Seconds
after he transformed back into his human form, Gabriel rushed to her and held
out his hand to pull her to her feet. He was covered in the warlock’s blood,
but she took his hand anyway, not caring. She was glad the bastard was dead.
She
wasn’t prepared to see the anger on Gabriel’s face. “I told you to run! Why
didn’t you listen to me?”
“I—”
“No. No
excuses. You promised me that you would listen to me if we ran into trouble and
you didn’t.” If it were possible, he looked angrier at her than he had been at
the warlock when he was trying to crush her windpipe.
“Gabriel—”
“Let’s
go.” He cut her off when he saw a light turn on in the window of the townhouse
closest to them.
Going
over to what was left of the mangled warlock, he dug through the pocket of his
pants until he retrieved the
bainise
bracelet. He held it as he grabbed Lila’s hand and pulled her behind him. She
had to jog to keep up with him.
“Keys,”
he snapped. She pulled them from the pocket of her hoodie and handed them to
him.
“What
about his body?” It wouldn’t be too long before someone found what was left of
the warlock, the pieces scattered around the drive.
Gabriel
jumped into the Jeep and waited for Lila to climb into the passenger seat until
he spoke. “They’ll blame it on a bear or some other wild animal. They always
do.”
“Seriously?
How many people have you killed?” He had the warlock’s blood spattered on his
chest and arms. The blood that was still dripping from his chin made her
cringe.
Gabriel
wiped his mouth on his arm before trying to answer her. “He was the—”
Numbers
were running through her head. “No. I don’t want to know.”
“Lila—”
“I don’t
want to know!”
Gabriel
had a death grip on the steering wheel as he maneuvered the vehicle through the
dark back roads. She could tell he was pissed at her, but she didn’t care.
Somewhere in the back of her mind, a little alarm went off warning her about
the dangers of pissing off a werewolf but she ignored them.
* * * *
Gabriel
was beyond livid. She had willfully gone against his orders and put her life in
jeopardy. Again.
When
the warlock had threatened her life, his heart had stopped in his chest. She
had been turning blue and he had known that she hadn’t had much longer until
she lost consciousness. It had taken everything he had in him to stay focused
on the warlock and not do something stupid that would’ve gotten her killed.
He had
told her to run and she had refused. Twice. She had almost been suffocated
right in front of him. She had put herself in the middle of a fight where he
could have easily injured her himself, either when she had launched in between
the fighting men or when he had transformed.
Was she
going to forever put herself in harm’s way? How was he supposed to protect her
if she had no care for her own well-being?
The
warlock had been the first person he had killed and he didn’t feel bad about it
in the slightest. After he had threatened Lila, there was no way he was going
to let him live. His beast had recognized that fact just as much as his
conscious mind had.
He only
wished it hadn’t happened directly in front of her. He hadn’t known how she was
going to react after seeing the warlock in pieces.
He
still didn’t. She was quiet as he drove, her gaze fixed on the passing scenery.
Gabriel
jerked his hand through his hair in frustration. He would try to explain things
to her when they got back to her house and see where she stood. He wanted to
ease her fears and let her know that killing wasn’t something that he did on a
regular basis as she had assumed.
They
turned down her driveway a few minutes later. She climbed out of the Jeep as
soon as he pulled the emergency brake up and the vehicle stopped. She raced up
the steps, not sparing him a single backward glance.
He let
her go. He had enough common sense to know that he couldn’t go chasing after
her still covered in the warlock’s blood. He doubted she’d even hear a word of
what he had to say if he came after her like that and tracked it inside.
Going
around the side of the house, he found the spigot and hosed the blood off with
the freezing water. The blood and dirt ran in rivulets down his body. As it
washed away, so did some of his anger. Part of him was glad that she hadn’t
abandoned him to face the warlock alone. Sure, he was still bothered that she
had taken an unnecessary risk with her life, but it was more complicated than
that. She had cared enough to stay.
He
raced up the front steps a minute later and pushed open the front door. The
sound of the shower turning on in her room greeted him as soon as he stepped
inside.
Gabriel
grabbed his bag from the floor in the living room and went into the guest
bathroom. He showered off, careful to scrub any lingering traces of the warlock’s
blood off his body and out of his mouth. He pulled on a pair of sweatpants
Kaleb had packed for him and felt marginally like himself again.
He
wrapped the
bainise
bracelet in a
washcloth and put it in the bottom of his bag. He still hadn’t figured out what
he was going to do with the information about the fae and the warlocks, but he
would have to figure it out soon.
When he
went into the living room, she still hadn’t come out of the confines of her
room but he could hear her moving around the bedroom, opening dresser drawers
and closing her blinds. He decided to start a fire in the fireplace while he
waited for her to come out and it proved to be a nice distraction.
He was crouched down in front of the
roaring flames when her door finally opened. She had dressed in blue flannel
pajama pants and a black tank top that showed more skin than she probably
realized. Her long hair was damp and hanging loose down her back. She glanced
at him before trudging into the kitchen without saying a word.
He wasn’t
going to wait for her to start up a conversation with him. He threw another log
onto the fire and then followed her into the kitchen. She was putting water on
the stove and he waited for her to finish, leaning against the counter with his
arms folded over his chest.
She
stiffened when she realized he was there, but even then she didn’t speak.
Reaching up into a cabinet, she pulled down a mug and a box of herbal tea bags.
She flipped a bag into the mug and stood, staring at the kettle and waiting for
the water to boil.
“I’ve
never killed anyone before. I don’t want you to think that I’m some out of
control werewolf who goes around taking chunks out of people at random.”
She
turned to face him when he spoke, her brow lifted.
“Why
would I think that?”
She was
the most confusing woman he’d ever met. “You think that I kill people.”
“No, I
don’t.”
“In the
car—”
“I don’t
think you go around randomly killing people. I think that you did what you
thought you had to do in the situation we were in.”
A beat
passed and he didn’t know what to say. So much for explaining himself. She had
taken the words right out of his mouth. Hell, it made his life easier.
But she
wasn’t done. Whatever calm demeanor she had before vanished before his eyes. He
could see the anger rising, her neck and cheeks quickly turning red. “What I
don’t understand is why you killed him when we could’ve gotten information out
of him. We could’ve used him to find Andrea. He knew where she had been.”
“No, we
wouldn’t have gotten any information out of him.”
“How
would you know? You killed him!”
“There’s
no way we would’ve found where they were holding her. Warlocks are unable—through
magic and protective spells—to disclose the location of their compounds. He
never would’ve told us her location, even if he had wanted to. Don’t think it
hasn’t been tried before.”
She
instantly deflated. “Oh.”
He
could feel the renewed hopelessness in finding her cousin alive and he hated
that he had been the cause of that. He didn’t know how to fix it, if he even
could. He wanted to see her smile again. Laugh, like she’d do when she came
into The Wolf’s Den with her friends. But he understood her torment. If it had
been his cousin who had been taken, or his brother, there wouldn’t be a warlock
left alive.
The
sound of water boiling distracted him from his thoughts and she leaned over to
turn off the burner. She filled her mug and put the empty kettle back on the
stove. Standing quietly in front of the kitchen window, she held the steaming
liquid to her chest as she stared out into the darkness.
“I told
you that I would protect you,” he said softly. She turned her head to look at
him. “You can’t go running into fights. I told you twice to run and you didn’t.
How am I supposed to protect you when you won’t do the simple things I ask?”
“I won’t
apologize,” she said. “I don’t feel bad for not leaving you there.”
“You
put yourself in danger when you didn’t have to. Do you think I’m incapable of
protecting you?”
“No.
You proved yourself very capable tonight.” He stepped toward her, slowly closing
the distance between them.
She
turned, her back pressed against the sink. With every breath she took, her
breasts heaved. Her nipples tightened beneath the thin fabric of her shirt and
his mouth watered. What he wouldn’t give for just a taste of her. He had wanted
her for years, had dreamed about a moment in time when all the bullshit faded
into the background and he could have her.