“What would your father say if he knew you beat your wife when she didn’t make dinner correctly?”
Darius laughed and stepped closer. “He would say, ‘Good job.’”
Knox had said there were guns and knives all over the house. Could some weapon be in his room somewhere? She didn’t remember ever seeing one when she cleaned. Maybe in the drawers.
“Then your dad is as sick as you,” she said.
He leapt at her and she didn’t have time to think about finding a weapon. He grabbed her wrists and pushed her to the floor. He climbed on top of her and pulled Knox’s t-shirt up to her waist.
“You are my wife. Now do your wifely duty.”
She screamed again and clawed at his face. He leaned back and smacked her hard across the cheek. With as much force as she could gather, using all her fear and adrenaline, she pushed up with her hips, tilting at the same time, and managed to throw him off balance enough that she could slide out from under him.
She ran faster than she ever had before. When she came to the end of the hallway, she nearly collided into the wall, she was running so fast. She gripped the railing tight, almost tripping several times before her feet landed on the floor of the entryway.
He was right behind her. He reached out and grabbed the end of her shirt, but she took off again, out the front door, and pulled out of his reach.
The gravel on her feet hurt. She ran into the grass, which was softer, but she was heading for the woods. How she wished she hadn’t changed yet and still had her sneakers on.
Her feet hit the first branch of the woods and she crumpled for a moment in pain. She could not run fast in the woods with all the rocks and branches, no matter how badly she wanted to. She hurried along, but with Darius right behind her, and him wearing his thick boots, he caught up to her quickly.
He reached out and closed his wrist around her arm, then yanked her back so hard, her face smacked into his head. She felt dizzy with the shock and pain and tried to yank free. Once she regained herself, she kicked him hard in the knee. He cried out, but didn’t let go.
Then he pulled out a knife from his waistband.
“I really didn’t want to have to use this,” he said. “I wouldn’t want to damage that pretty face of yours, but I guess I have no choice. Maybe if I cut you up, this bear man won’t want you. No one will want you then.”
She tried again to pull free. She kicked him. She tried to hit him. But he was faster and he still had shoes. He pulled her along, deeper into the woods.
She couldn’t think or decide what to do. If she couldn’t get away, what else was there? She realized she was outside now. And so were Knox and his friends. If she screamed here, they might hear her.
Jasmine opened her mouth to scream, but instead of her voice, heard a thunderous roar. She whipped her head toward the sound and saw a huge black bear bounding toward them.
The relief was so great that her knees failed, and she fell to the ground. Darius let her go and faced the bear, knife in hand.
“This is between a husband and his wife. This is not your business,” Darius said. She thought she could hear the fear in his voice, though.
Knox charged at him. This time, instead of running, Darius charged back and sunk his knife blade into Knox’s stomach.
Jasmine screamed. This scream, for fear of Knox’s life rather than her own, was more horrified than terrified. She needed him. If anything happened to Knox, she was at the mercy of Darius.
Knox roared loudly and swiped his paw across Darius’s face. Darius cried out in pain. Knox swiped at him again, and sent the knife flying through the air. Jasmine saw where it landed and scooted her way over to it.
Her fingers closed around the handle. She glanced down at it, at Knox’s blood all over the blade, and her hand shook. She got to her feet, trembling. She could barely hold onto the knife. As she reached for a nearby tree to steady herself, Knox took another swipe at Darius, who was trying to protect his head.
Jasmine stumbled her way over, holding onto trees, until she was behind Darius. Then, with wild determination, she hobbled forward. Knox probably saw her. She didn’t look at him. Darius was so focused on the bear in front of him that he hadn’t noticed she moved.
She took one step, then another, her feet aching with the pain of twigs and rocks. She took one more step, and sunk the knife blade deep into Darius’s back.
He cried out and spun, his eyes savage and horrified. He fell to the ground, grasping the place in his stomach where the tip of the knife stuck out, blood pouring free around it.
Jasmine was panting. She watched him lie there, blood gushing from his stomach and dripping from the cut on his face. She braved a glance at Knox, who sat still, observing.
The woods seemed to go eerily quiet. Darius started to shake, then he was still.
Jasmine waited a while, but eventually went over to him and, with extreme caution, picked up his wrist. She felt for a pulse. She waited to feel or see something moving in him. But there was nothing.
She looked at Knox, still terrified, but now at herself, at what she’d done, at what he’d think. She could go to jail for this.
“He’s dead,” she whispered. “I have to run. I don’t want to go to jail.” Tears began streaming down her face.
Knox’s golden bear eyes looked sympathetic somehow, if that was possible for a bear. He stood up on all fours, swiped the knife out of Darius’s back, and with large, fast movements, used his claws to cut him up, in the spot where the knife wound had been. He flipped him over and continued to maul him.
Jasmine watched, realizing finally that he was covering up what she’d done. He stopped and checked the body, sniffing around it. Then he sat down again, and laid down on his side.
Strange, she thought. She’d never seen a bear act like that, but when the bear started to shrink and the hair receded into skin, she knew he was changing back.
He stood up, and he was naked. Blood poured out of the stab wound in his stomach, but he hardly seemed to notice. He covered himself with one hand and wrapped his other arm around her. “Are you okay? Did he hurt you?”
She shook her head. “I don’t know, not really.”
Knox backed up and looked her over. “You have a bump on your head. A few scratches. Your cheek’s red. Did he hit you?”
She touched the place on her forehead where she’d banged into Darius, then where he’d slapped her. Her feet, too, hurt and she lifted one, then the other.
“Okay, we need to get back to the house. Can you carry the knife?”
She went over and picked it up.
“Try not to get blood on you.”
In one motion, he picked her up and carried her out of the woods.
It felt weird, knowing he was naked. But she buried her head into his chest and breathed in the smell of his sweat. His arms, tight and strong around her, were like a security blanket. She held the knife away from her and him, trying to do as he’d asked.
* * *
She knew when they were close enough to the house for the others to see because they all started calling things out to them at once.
Someone opened the door for them and Knox carried her to the sofa.
“We’ll need to call the police soon,” Knox said. “Someone has been killed by a bear.”
The chatter stopped.
“Are you sure he’s dead?” Beck asked.
“I’m sure.” Knox grunted as Slade pressed a towel to his wound.
“You need stitches,” Slade said.
“Now, how’s that going to look,” Knox said. “I go to the hospital for a stab wound and there’s a dead guy in my backyard.” He pulled on a pair of shorts that someone had handed him.
“You have to go, man,” Daxton said. He looked over at Jasmine and took the knife from her.
She was afraid to touch anything with the blood still on her hand.
“First, we need to get Jas cleaned up,” Knox said. “Burn the shirt.”
Amir
came to her and helped her up from the sofa. “Let’s go get you in the shower.”
She looked back at Knox with a pained longing. “It’s okay,” he said.
Amir led her upstairs and got her into the shower. He closed the door and said, “I’m not looking, but I need you to take everything off and make sure you scrub everything really well. I’ll get you a towel and something to wear when you get out. Are you wounded?”
“No,” she croaked. She pulled the shirt off and wrapped her underwear in it, then handed them out of the shower. She turned on the hot water and scrubbed, as he’d instructed, until her skin felt sore.
When she shut off the water, Amir handed a towel into the shower. “There’s a shirt out here for you, and shorts. I’m going to stand just outside the bathroom door.”
She dried off and pulled on the clothes. She had to roll the waist band of the shorts several times to get them to stay up. When she came out of the bathroom, Amir took her arm and guided her back downstairs.
Knox was sitting in the kitchen on a chair, Slade inspected his wound.
“Hey, you all cleaned up?” he asked.
She nodded. “Are you…” Okay seemed so far from the truth that it was ridiculous to even ask.
“I’ll be fine.”
“You have to go to the hospital,” she said.
“Good luck,” Slade said. “I’ve been telling him that for twenty minutes.” He stood up and put his hands on his hips. “I don’t have enough medical training to know if it hit anything major. Does it feel like it hit anything major?”
Knox shrugged. “It doesn’t hurt that badly.”
“Yeah, well, you could be going into shock,” Slade said.
The tears returned and Jasmine shook her head. “What if you die?”
Knox looked at her and his tough-guy face softened. “I won’t. It’s really not that bad.”
“He stabbed you!” Her words were getting hysterical now, and she could feel herself losing it.
“Okay, calm down.” He got up, despite Slade hollering at him, and came to her. He held her the best he could.
“At least hold something on it,” Slade said, the disgust obvious in his voice as he pressed the towel to Knox’s stomach again.
“It’s okay, Jas.” He wiped her tears and, while she liked the way it felt and how he called her Jas, which he hadn’t done before today, she didn’t think she’d stop crying anytime soon.
“You—have to—go,” she said through sobs. “I can’t—lose you.”
He took in a deep breath and kissed her.
“I will. Okay? I will. We just have to go somewhere far and we might have to lie a little, okay?”
She nodded and tried to calm herself.
“You stay here and I’ll go and get stitches and come right back.”
“No!” she wrapped her arms around his neck.
Beck came into the kitchen. “You’re in luck. Greg is on his way.”
“You’re a lifesaver,” Knox said.
Slade snorted. “Yeah, maybe literally. Stubborn ass.”
“I’d just rather not get us all in trouble or go to jail,” Knox said.
“Who’s Greg?” Jasmine asked, wiping away new tears.
“He’s our friend who was in the army,” Beck said. “Luckily, he has plenty of basic medical training and can do stitches. It’s gonna hurt, though. I doubt he has morphine or anything.”
Jasmine sat in the other room while Greg worked on Knox’s wound. Every time he yelled out in pain, she gripped Amir’s hand or Daxton’s hand. Beck and Slade were in there with him, probably holding his hand as he squeezed through the pain, too.
When it started to grow quiet, she heard Greg say, “You’re lucky. It wasn’t bad at all.”
She sagged in relief. He left a short time later, and Knox walked into the living room, leaning toward his injured side.
“We decided it would be best to call about the body tomorrow,” Daxton said. “If it was a real bear attack, we wouldn’t necessarily know right away, and since he was kind enough to not park his car at our house, we wouldn’t know he was here. We’ll say we heard animals in the woods fighting, went to check it out, and found the body.”
Knox nodded. “Sounds good.”
“I wonder if he could be the one who killed the bees,” Beck said. “We found out what caused it. The report came back today. Toxic smoke.”
Jasmine shook her head. “I don’t think he would have been that smart.”
“It does seem a little far-fetched,” Amir agreed.
“I can think of someone who might have had something to do with it,” Daxton said.
“Who?” Slade asked.
“Same people who were pissed when Blair’s store stopped carrying their products. Same people who’ve tried to run us out of business for years.”
“The Harper clan?” Slade asked.
Daxton nodded. “When they found out Blair pulled the SheBear Honey line, her store got egged, and she got threats for weeks. She had to call the cops.”
“I’ll look into it,” Slade said. “Seems like a likely suspect.”
“We’re going to bed,” Knox said. He took Jasmine’s hand and led her slowly up to the bedroom after they’d said goodnight to the guys.
He closed the door behind them and pulled her close. “I will gladly sleep on the floor or downstairs, but I really—”
“No. Please. Stay close.”
He chuckled. “I was going to say that I really want to stay close to you.”
She set her head on his shoulder. “I’m sorry you got hurt.”
“I’m sorry you had to do what you had to do. But it’s over now. He can never, ever hurt you again.”
She took in a slow deep breath and wondered how long it’d be before that fact seemed real to her. Knox released her just long enough to slip carefully into bed and pull her close again.
“Tomorrow, I want every detail of what exactly happened,” he said. “I could kick myself for leaving you in the house alone. I just never thought…” He growled softly. “When I saw you run out of the house and him following you, I lost my mind.”
“I’m glad I got out of the house. I didn’t think I was going to get away.” The things that could have happened to her right here in this room... She shivered with the fear of it. But he was right, Darius would never hurt her again.
Knox kissed her, and this time, their kissing became heavy and passionate. His hands caressed her stomach and back. He ran his fingertips over her skin, sending chills of pleasure to replace the chills of fear.
“I want you,” he whispered.
She hadn’t been with anyone but Darius. When she was with him, it was always forceful and often painful. The thought of having sex scared her. But with Knox, she knew it would be different. She felt so safe with him and knew he’d never hurt her. Maybe it could even be good. And she wanted him, too. Her whole body was hot and tingly with his touch.
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