Seven Days

by Richardson, Shari

I sighed deeply, a sound of relief that brought Lane's eyes to me where he locked his gaze with mine. I shuddered under the weight of those eyes. I hadn't noticed how like Xavier's eyes Lane's were. And never had I seen such envy in the eyes I loved. Lane's gaze held a weight so heavy I could almost understand what might have made him want to hurt his own child as he had. Almost.

  “She doesn’t run from you,” Lane rasped, still looking at me. “Even when you are your beast, she runs to you, loves you.”

  Xavier glanced over his shoulder and saw me in the doorway. The sad smile lifted only the corners of his mouth, but love shone in his pale green eyes.

  “Kerry loves me no matter what,” he said. “But that doesn’t answer my question, Lane. How could you make me what I am after having suffered what you did? You knew what kind of life you condemned me to when you attacked me. If you loved my mother as you claimed to, how could you try to destroy the child you made with her? How could you hate me so much? As he spoke, the anger drained from Xavier's voice and left behind a bewildered pain I realized I could eliminate with an explanation Lane would never give him.

  “It wasn’t you he hated, Xavier,” I whispered. Xavier shook his head, not understanding.

  “She’s a smart one,” Lane said. His voice grew stronger with each passing moment and I knew that if his revelation took much longer, Lane would have healed enough to be dangerous again. “I’ve never hated anyone as much as I hated the woman who should have loved me.”

  “Mom,” Xavier said, still shaking his head slowly. “I don't understand. You claimed to love my mother. How can you hate her?”

  Lane's bitter laughter sent chills down my back. “Did she tell you that she left me alone in the swamp by the pond? Tell you that because I was alone, sleeping, and hung-over that the panther who infected me found me easy prey? Did she tell you that when I told her what had happened, showed her what her leaving me alone had meant to my life, she ran from me? Ran right to that mealy-mouthed northern boy who had taken her love from me? Did she tell you any of that, boy?"

  "No. She only told me that after her night with you by the pond, she realized she still loved my father and went back to him."

  "Your father," Lane spat. "I was your father, but Dot took you from me, made sure I wasn't welcome when you were near. Tyler was always the one standing between us. He took Dot from me and then he took my son away too.”

  Lane panted and I saw that his wounds were beginning to close. He’d be healed soon I knew he wasn't going to give up his plan of destroying Xavier and his family. He would fight until the last drop of blood dried and every heart lay still. I rose and tried to catch Xavier's attention, but he was engrossed in the tale Lane spun as he healed.

  “I saw you playing in the yard in Florida that year and you smelled like her” Lane whispered. “You were so much like I was at your age and so beautiful to me. And then I heard you call Tyler ‘daddy’. You can't know how deeply that cut me, boy. Rage was all I had left.” Lane’s face crumbled with agony so sharp I could almost taste it. My soft heart wanted to comfort the man he'd been ten years earlier, but knowing what he'd done since then--to me and to the others he'd harmed--I let go of any compassion I might have for him.

  “I followed you into the swamp to punish Dot,” Lane said. “To make you what I was so she would have nothing left she could love. So that you wouldn’t be perfect in her eyes ever again.”

  “You son of a bitch,” Xavier said. The dead tone of his voice brought tears to my eyes. I wanted to erase the words Lane had spoken so Xavier could live without the knowledge he now had, but I knew I could do nothing but repair the damage as best I could when the battle was over.

  Xavier's shoulders tensed and the electric charge of his panther flowed through the room. He was on the edge of losing his control and there was nothing I could do about it.

  “But it didn’t work, did it,” Lane spat, bitterness stealing any remaining humanity from his voice. “Dot didn’t run from you. She ran to you, to where you lay at the edge of the woods. She nursed you until you healed and when you changed, she held you and sang to you. She didn't care that you were a monster. It mattered that I was.”

  “You did this because my mother didn’t love you?” Xavier’s hollow voice pulled at my heart. I wanted to weep for his loss, for his pain. “You destroyed so many parts of my life, changed my future because you couldn’t get it through your thick, stupid skull that my mother was in love with another man.” Xavier trembled and I clung to the doorway. I knew there was no turning back. Xavier meant to end Lane's life no matter what I said or did. I could only hope to be able to repair the damage when it was over.

  “I did it so she would see that what I was didn’t change who I was,” Lane said. “She saw you change and she still loved you, but she wouldn’t come back to me.” Lane had levered himself onto his hands and knees. His skin rippled and trembled with his oncoming change. The battle was about to resume and I could do nothing but watch and wait.

  Xavier advanced on Lane. “My mother didn't care that I was a werepanther because being a werepanther doesn't change who you are,” he said. “My mother was smart enough to know that. She knew you were a selfish, angry and homicidal man who loved no one but himself. Who could love that?”

  Lane roared his fury and his body began to flow slowly into his beast. “If I am selfish and homicidal, how will your girl feel when she’s seen you kill another human being, son?” he asked, nodding toward me. “Will she still run to you? When she changes in two more days, will she still love you? Will you still love her?”

  “Yes,” Xavier said simply.

  “Are you sure?”

  I shuddered under the weight of Lane's bitter words. His insightful attack had touched on every concern I'd had from the moment he’d clawed me. It became clear how deliberate every piece of his plan had been. He’d done everything, from attacking Xavier, to killing girls who looked like me, to clawing me with the single, focused goal of inflicting the maximum amount of pain he could on Xavier and Dorothy.

  Lane’s body flowed into his panther at the same time Xavier transformed. Lane and Xavier charged each other, but at the last moment, Lane's beast side-stepped and he came for me. I screamed and clung to the door frame. I knew, Xavier couldn’t turn quickly enough to stop the other cat from reaching me and the only escape I had was the kitchen where Elise and Claude would be as helpless as I was. Christian tried to step in front of me, but I clung to the doorway and wouldn't allow him to take the hit I expected. I wasn’t going to let Lane hurt anyone else, and so I stood my ground.

  I closed my eyes, whispered a prayer that we would all survive and a word of love for Xavier. I waited for the end of my life with Xavier's name upon my lips. When the hit came, pain bloomed in my chest before I was weightless and flying. The kitchen counter caught me across my lower back, forcing all the air from my lungs and leaving me struggling for breath on the kitchen floor. When I caught my breath, pulling a shuddering gasp of air into my lungs, I forced myself to open my eyes and see what damage had been done.

  Mathias crouched protectively over me. The low growl that slipped from between his lips raised gooseflesh on my arms and I trembled. Here was the beast my whole family feared when Mairin was with Mathias. This was the killer who had taken lives in order to sustain his own for a century. I backpedalled until I was pressed against the cabinets. My movement caught Mathias' attention. The deep black orbs he turned toward me did nothing to ease my fear of him.

  "Kerry, are you injured?" he asked. His rough voice was yet another reason to fear the monster who looked like my sister's boyfriend.

  "Kerry? I must know if you are injured."

  I shook my head and Mathis nodded once before resuming his protective stance over me. My heart thundered in my chest as the battle sounds from the living room echoed in the kitchen. I could see Elise holding Claude in the farthest corner of the kitchen, but Mathias refused to let me see past him. I could only listen to the roars of th
e pride and Lane and pray that when the silence came it would bring peace with it and not pain.

  When the cats fell silent in the living room, I waited for Xavier’s voice, but it didn’t come. Fear that I had lost Xavier overrode my fear of Mathias and I shoved at him until he turned to face me again.

  “Mathias, you have to let me up,” I pleaded. "They need my healing in there." And I had to know if Xavier's silence was permanent.

  Mathias turned slowly and backed away from me. His eyes were wide and he appeared to be holding his breath. I smelled the heavy copper scent of blood, a lot of blood, and knew Mathias needed to get out of the house immediately. He’d been on his way to feed when Lane had attacked. The battle and the blood were too much for my sister’s normally civilized vampire and I could see the hunger riding him hard.

  “Go,” I said. “We can do this.”

  He nodded and slipped out the door quickly. I stood and walked blindly into my future.

  Chapter 8

  The carnage in the living room was something out of one of my sister’s night terrors from when we were kids. Three panthers lay panting and bloody on the living room floor. Blood dripped and pooled everywhere I looked. The carpet, the walls, the ruined furniture. Blood soaked into them all. I wondered idly how Elise was going to get the blood out of everything. There was only so much soap and water would do.

  Lane’s body lay against the wall under the shattered window, twisted, broken, and still. I watched for the rise and fall of breath on his chest, but nothing moved. The man who had wrought such destruction on so many was dead.

  Of the three panthers who lay wounded on the floor, I only recognized Xavier. I knew his markings well, but had only seen the other members of the pride either in their human or cat forms. Until the fur flowed back to flesh, I wouldn't know who was who.

  I assessed the damage and knew Xavier needed my help before the others. Long claws had torn gaping holes in his side and the blood pool beneath him continued to grow. I dropped to my knees beside Xavier who growled at me. “No attitude from you, buster,” I said as I lay my hands against his side and felt the heat roll up my back. The same forceful rush of energy I'd felt when I healed Claude slammed into me, through me, and into Xavier. The cat beneath my hands roared and the fur became a flow of flawless flesh beneath my hands. Tears slipped down my cheeks as I realized that no matter how well I could heal his body, I could do nothing for Xavier's soul. Instinctively, I knew he had struck the killing blow. The death of the man who had made his life possible was a wound I couldn't heal.

  I took the blanket Elise offered me and laid it over Xavier before turning to work on the other pride members who had sustained injuries during the fight. Andre and Randal had broken bones and slashing wounds, but the increased power of my healing made short work of their injuries. It seemed only minutes later that the two boys huddled under blankets, stuffing their mouths with the food Elise brought from the kitchen. When Andre and Randal could rise, Elise led them and the rest of the pride into the kitchen. Mairin came out of the back of the house, pulling at Ronnie's grip on her arm.

  "Kerry, are you okay?" she asked. "This brute wouldn't let me out of Elise's bedroom."

  "I'm fine, not a scratch."

  Mairin glanced at Xavier, but said nothing. Her sad eyes were enough.

  "I promise I'm fine, sis," I said. "Elise could probably use help in the kitchen, though."

  Mairin hugged me, whispering, "I'm here if you need me."

  "I know," I said. I let my sister hold on just a little longer, taking strength from her, before pushing her gently toward the kitchen.

  She went, reluctantly, and I was finally alone with Xavier.

  Xavier pulled his knees up to his chest and wrapped his arms around them. He stared, eyes wide and shining, at Lane's body, refusing to look at or talk to anyone else.

  "Christian?" I called. He appeared in the doorway to the kitchen, nodding when I pointed to Lane's body. Andre and Randal helped Christian lift Lane's body and carry it away from the house. I heard them make their way toward the back of the house, but blocked out the sound when I heard the wet tearing of flesh. I didn't want to know what they were doing to make Lane's presence disappear from the lives of the pride members.

  When the body was gone, Xavier made his way to the couch, the only piece of furniture to have survived the battle in one piece. He sat down and laid his head in his hands.

  “It was all because Mom loves my dad,” he whispered when I curled against him on the couch. “Because Lane couldn’t accept that my mom didn’t want him, he destroyed all those lives, killed all those people, for my mother.”

  “You can’t think of it that way, Xavier,” I said, winding my arm around his waist. “Lane had very deep-seated issues with rejection that had to have begun long before your mother. He used her as the reason to justify what he knew was evil, but the truth is he was just a sick man who acted out of pain.”

  “He used you as an excuse, too,” he said. Xavier kissed me gently. “He saw us that night in Florida. He saw that you loved my panther as much as you loved me as a man and he hated us for that. He envied me and wanted me to hurt the way he did. He went for you because you love me. He went after the pride when he couldn't reach you. He did everything he could to hurt those I love.”

  “I do love you,” I said. “No matter what.”

  Xavier shook his head. I could see him wrestling with the need to tell me something he knew I didn't want to hear. My heart thundered in my chest and I suddenly understood the look on Mairin’s face when she'd realized Mathias planned to leave her after the problem in England. I could see it in his eyes. Xavier wanted to leave me to keep me safe. I was not going to let that happen. I would fight for him, even if it meant fighting against him.

  Xavier reached for me, cupping my face in his palm. “You could have died because you love me. I’m not worth that,” he said.

  I sat up and took Xavier’s face between my hands, forcing him to look me in the eyes. “Never say that again,” I said. “You can’t protect me from every evil thing that comes into our lives. I could easily argue that you’re in more danger from monsters because of me than the other way around since my family seems to be the magnet for monsters in this equation. No matter what, you can’t keep the monsters away. But never, for one moment, doubt that you are worth more than I can ever give you in return.”

  “Kerry, by the night after tomorrow you could be a...you could be like me and if you are, it will be my fault,” he said, turning his face in my hands and kissing each of my palms. The pain in his eyes tore at my heart. He’d hidden his worry from me very well, but now, when he was vulnerable, I finally saw the terror in which he’d lived the past several days. He was angry and afraid. He worried what would happen if I changed, and what would happen if I didn't. I ached to realize he had been going through the same cycle of despair and anguish I had been, but he'd done it alone while I'd had him to keep me strong.

  “You didn’t attack me, Xavier,” I said. “You didn’t make Lane the sick, broken man he was. You didn’t put me in the parking lot with Lane. You did nothing wrong and I will not let you blame yourself for what happened to me.” I kissed him. “And no matter what happens when the full moon rises, I love you.”

  Xavier bowed his head and laid it against my chest. “I killed Lane, my own blood, not because of what he’d done to those girls in the alleys, or even to Christian or Claude, but because of what he’d done to you.” He hitched in a breath. “I let my beast take my heart and control my body and I killed him with your name on my tongue. I hated a man enough to kill him because he hurt you. What does that say about me? How can you love me after that?”

  I held him and let him cry silently against my neck. I wanted to take away his pain the way I had taken away his injuries, but my power only worked on flesh. I had no healing for his soul. I could only hope to make him understand that no matter what he thought his own motivations were, Lane had meant for one of them
to die that night. Xavier might believe he killed Lane because of what Lane had done to me, but I knew he had saved himself and taken the life of the man who would have killed him if Xavier had not been the victor.

  I stood up when Xavier's tears had dried and he turned his agony filled eyes back to me. He took my hand and allowed me to lead him to his bedroom where I crawled into the bed and pulled him down with me.

  “Lane would have killed you if you hadn’t beaten him. He came here intending that one of you would die. No matter what you think about your motivations, you know Lane would have continued to kill if you had allowed him to live. It wasn't as though you could have called the police and had him arrested. Doing so would have placed the pride under too much scrutiny. You did what you had to do and you are going to have to let go eventually."

  “If it had been pride business, I could let it go. You’ve seen me do that before. This was personal...more than personal. This was you, Kerry.”

  “Fine, it was about me,” I said. “You love me. I can live with that. What I need to know is if you can live with that.” My heart thumped heavily in my chest as I considered the possibility that Lane’s death might be enough to separate me from Xavier. If he couldn't release his guilt and forgive himself for killing Lane because Lane had attacked me, I knew Xavier would eventually come to hate me. He'd be lost to me then. I knew there was no way I could ever make up for that kind of guilt if he wasn't willing to release it himself.

  “Can I live with loving you?” he asked. “That’s what you want to know? I can’t live without loving you, Kerry. I told you last night that I want to marry you. I haven’t changed my mind about that or anything else to do with you.”

  “I just don’t want you to blame me...”

  “Kerry, I killed him, not you.”

  “But you did it for me...because of me. What if there comes a day when that’s too much. What if you some day realize that I’m not worth that kind of guilt.”

  Xavier held me, kissing me gently and then not so gently. I let him show me with his lips and hands what he couldn’t seem to put into words. We let our bodies speak to each other on a level that was beyond words, beyond the physical world. I felt our souls touch in those moments and I wanted to stay in that place with him for all of eternity.