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“That makes sense.”
“I’m not going to lie, Tay, when you called me at the clinic and you sounded like you were in danger and our daughter might be in danger or like there was something horrific that had happened, my bear nearly ripped right out of my skin.”
“I put our daughter in danger.”
“No. This man is not right. There’s something seriously wrong with him. He hunted you down. Hetrackedyou.”
“He’s not a bear. His scent was off. I could tell.”
“But was he human?”
She froze. Something hit her hard. Something, but she couldn’t name it. It was batting at her mind, but it was like there was a shield up there to keep it out. “No, that much I could tell. What other shifters are there?”
“Wolves, for sure. We’ve had some run-ins with them in the past. Probably so many others that we don’t know about.”
“Jesus.”
“This smacks of wolf behavior. If this guy had no money, how did he track you? He couldn’t have hired someone. Either he’s really good at that himself, he knew the right people, or he’s been keeping tabs all along, and even then, he’d still have to know the right people to talk to.”
“I don’t know that he doesn’t. A wolf? What are the chances of that?”
“They don’t always live in clans like we do. There are so many of them that are—”
“Lone wolves?”
“Yes. As corny as that is. Maybe that’s why you never told your family?”
Tears of frustration rose to the surface, and she brushed them away roughly with her knuckles. “I don’t know. I can’t remember. It would make sense, but it would also make sense if he wasn’t. Then again, from what I was told I was scared of telling my family about you, and you’re a bear shifter—based on that, if I was seeing a wolf then I would have definitely kept that from them.”
“I think we need to take action. That’s the only way this is going to stop. It’s the only way to ensure you, Onyx, your family, and your clan are safe. This is a clan issue now. It’s a Pinefall and a Greenacre issue. We can tackle it together or separately, but it’s all of our problem because this guy has a video. It’s potentially dangerous, even if people say it’s edited. Even if it’s shit quality, there’s always that one person who might believe. Someone who just won’t leave it alone, sensing a big payoff. Imagine breaking a story like that. That other species exist. We’d never come back from it.”
The tears did fall then. A fresh batch, hot and wickedly angry. “I’m sorry.” She hated herself for crying right now. For letting any of this happen. For putting everyone in danger by being so careless. “I never should have let this happen. I never should have gotten involved with someone like this.”
“People can be deceptive. Shifter or human. This could happen to anyone. In the past, not everyone from our clan was careful. Not everyone was from yours either. Sometimes we’re not always as cautious as we should be when we’re young or when we’ve been living sheltered in our clans. I mean that about shifters from Greenacre too. Not just your clan.”
She bit her lip as the tears kept coming. Her stomach spun like she was going to throw up. “You can’t find him and kill him. Promise me. That’s not how we fix this. Not with you going to jail for the rest of your life. That’s why I didn’t go straight to my family. Because my brothers would hunt him down. He’d become the prey. They’d tear him apart. They would tear his heart out. Jesus, no.” She shuddered. Why had she thought of something so specific as that? “No. I don’t know. They’d just beat him to death or something equally as awful. Tear him apart as bears. Jem would probably do that. But not Clay. He’d use his fists and his body as a weapon. They can’t go to jail because of my stupidity either.”
She was still waiting for Kier to be angry or disappointed with her, but he wasn’t. He just looked at her with naked understanding. “I do want to find this guy and rip him apart, I’ll admit it, but that’s just my rage and protectiveness in the moment. I’m going to get a handle on it. I’m mated to you, it’s my natural response to want to protect you. Onyx is my child. And Misty. I want to protect them both as well. My clan. I’m a guard. That’s what I do. I guard people against danger. Invaders. Threats. I’m trained for this and I’m good at it, but I’m not going to let it get the best of me.”
“What are we going to do?”
“I think that, for starters, you need a bodyguard. If you’ll accept me. I want to keep you and Onyx safe, and to do that, I do think you need to be with me. Even if you wanted to fully reject me, I’d still want to keep you safe. I think you need to move into the house with me and Misty, even if it’s not permanent. Then, we need to come together as two clans—or if not, then at least we need to go to Sam and Clarence with this. Alphas should know first, since this guy is potentially a threat to the whole clan. Then we figure out how best to deal with it together. Cooler heads will prevail. Your brothers will be tied down to keep them from being rash if that’s what needs to happen.”
“Clarence is too old. He’d never order that.”
“I’ll tie them down myself, then. I’ll make sure nothing happens to either of them until their emotions cool.”
“They won’t thank you for it. Clay would beat you bloody.”
“Then he beats me bloody. We fight as bears. I don’t care what it takes, I won’t let your brothers go to jail over this prick. Keeping you safe means keeping your family safe.”
Had she ever felt as strongly for this man as she felt for him right now? Monsters lived everywhere. They didn’t just exist in the dark. But her mate was brave and strong. He was understanding and wise. He’d keep her safe. He’d keep her safe even if he had to sacrifice his body to do it. Even if it meant keeping her safe from herself, or keeping her family safe from themselves.
She’d felt so exhausted when she’d arrived home. Not physically, but mentally. Her heart was sick. She was weary down to her bones of all the shit that life kept throwing at her. But now, she felt hope. Hope that somehow this would all be okay. She no longer wanted to curl up in a ball and weep. She no longer felt that she was just this huge problem in everyone’s lives. She didn’t have to live with all those regrets coming at her. She didn’t have to hate that black hole in her head. Kier had come. He’d come and he’d filled it up. He’d filled up that horrible vacuum in her chest as well. Replaced it with goodness. She’d had her guard up so high, but he was here, tearing through it with his unflagging kindness.
She didn’t really know what she was doing, but she was still wearing her seatbelt and she slipped it off. The click sounded so loud in the silent truck. Kier’s breath audibly caught.
She was moving before she even thought to hold herself back. There were no thoughts of holding back. She didn’t want to do that anymore. She’d gone from being a thing of pain, to having a body that ached. There was only one solution for that ache.
