THE STRAGGLERS PROTECT

by Misha Anderson

Hunter went to Dr. Bailey and told him that we were about to treat Adam at home, even though it’s crazy on our part and he resisted in letting Adam go, in the end he accepted and he wished us good luck.

  We took Adam from the hospital to Garrett ranch.

  Uncle Quinn greeted us from the door, taking us to a large, spacious and comfortable cabin. He set Adam and me in a wide room, simple but cozy.

  Hunter and Connor laid Adam on a bed and a short and stocky woman, with Native American features came to our room and asked me if I needed anything.

  “Good evening, I’m Ayobe, Quinn’s wife.”

  I stretched out a hand and we shook hands.

  “It’s a pleasure to meet you, I’m Samantha, Adam’s fiancee.”

  “I brought a jug of fresh water for you, dinner will be on the table soon, can I call you to join us as when it’s ready?”

  Adam sleeps on the bed, he still has a fever, I look and thank Mrs. Ayobe her offer.

  “Thanks, but I prefer to stay.”

  She lowered her eyes, stopping on my belly.

  “I thought you would prefer to eat here in the room by his side, you don’t have to worry when it’s ready I’ll bring you a tray with stew, I also made a strong dear and vegetable soup for Adam, do you want me o bring it?”

  “Yes, sure, please, Mrs. Ayobe.”

  Before leaving me alone with Adam, she smiled and said:

  “You’ll be a good wife to Adam and a great mother to this baby, Samantha.”

  Adam is back and forth in sleeping and waking up briefly, Mrs. Ayobe helped me to recline Adam on the bed and he had four spoons of the meat soup. Adam mumbles senseless words and I put my hand on his forehead, he still has a fever. Uncle Quinn came to the room with a mug of tea and spread a few macerated herbs on Adam’s forehead and on his wounds.

  “These are a tea and strong salve that my ancestors used to heal poorly healed wounds. The potion will help to end this infection and lower the fever. Later we’ll start the healing rites, rest a little, dear.”

  Adam remained resting a little in the room and I went to the living room to be with the boys.

  Uncle Quinn and Hunter watch the local news attentively and we all got surprised with what we just heard.

  “FBI detective Hector Lopez was found shot on the road near Vancouver, he was taken to Vancouver National Hospital, but he didn’t withstand the wounds. According to our sources, there are strong evidence that Quentin Taylor, the victim’s partner, is the author of the crime. The prisoner, Igor Kedrak, involved in a robbery at Center Bank Hall in New York, is now a fugitive.”

  We looked at each other, dumbstruck, how was that possible? Taylor? Lopez partner, kill him in that brutal manner? He was certainly involved in the robbery from the start. Another one of Igor’s thugs, another cop that he was able to corrupt. Hunter talks to Kayden, disturbed:

  “Kay, fuck, man! And to think that he was part of Sam’s rescue, he helped us all the time, can you imagine the opportunities he had in killing any of us, how he could do an atrocity like that with Lopez?”

  Uncle Quinn answers making us think with his words:

  “This is the result of greed, Hunter, we have to thank the universe the connections of our people, the lycans. Because, now a days, no one respects their brother, their fellow creature, all because of money. It’s always the same story, it just changes the actor, nephew of mine.”

  CHAPTER 23

  SAMANTHA THOMPSON

  Adam open his eyes and before he closed them again, he smiles at me, I kiss him on his warm lips and he falls asleep again. He’s fever has gone down, but my heart is recoiled, sad, for seeing my love like this, so frail.

  Uncle Quinn knocks on the door and enters with Hunt, Connor and Kayden, asking me:

  “How’s Adam?”

  I touch his forehead and watch his appearance that’s visibly better.

  “It seems that his fever broke but he’s still very weak, uncle Quinn.”

  He stared at me looking serious and then said it:

  “The warriors from Martin, Coulter and Person packs are here, all our people is gathered so we can invoke Mother Earth power and ask for Adam health. I know we seem savages, primitive, but that’s how we are Samantha. We are not ashamed of the animal, of the wolf that is inside us, we lycans with Cherokee blood believe that to reconnect with nature can bring the cure to Adam’s body. If you don’t want to be a part of it, you can stay inside the house with Ayobe. Hunter, Connor, get Adam carefully and let’s start.”

  I got up and asked Hunter if I could be a part of it, he nodded.

  We got outside the cabin, around thirty men were waiting for us.

  All naked, only their sex was covered with narrow leather strips. Tribal paintings were all over their body, besides necklaces with animal teeth and wild birds feathers. Hunter and Connor took Adam to the middle of the ranch, laying him carefully on a large leather blanket. Uncle Quinn tells Hunter, Connor and Kayden to remove Adam’s clothes, explaining:

  “Remove all his clothes. If he had a son, he would be the one undressing his father to Eithinoha, sacred Mother Earth and Geyaguga, Moon goodness, but as Adam still had no offspring, you, being his brothers, should undress him.”

  Kayden stops uncle Quinn and speaks out loud, so all warriors can hear, he points at me:

  “Adam has an offspring, it’s still small, but it’s growing strong inside his beloved female, Samantha.”

  Uncle Quinn signaled me to come closer, also speaking out loud:

  “Come closer, Samantha, you as his female and mother of the offspring, should undress him so the earth and the moon bathe his body.”

  I approached them slowly, out of place in the middle of those strong warriors, I crouched down and loosed Adam cotton pants helped by Hunter.

  I slid the pants down his hips and left him naked, stepping away right after and returning to the porch steps.

  Mr. Fleishner, leader of Coulter pack, comes towards Adam, he crouches down by his side and slowly offers a drink from a clay job, besides covering his body with leaves and ointments.

  Warriors from Garret, Coulter and Person’s pack circle Adam and chant louder and louder. Kayden, Hunter and Connor join them and even though I don’t understand what they are saying, my instincts tell me they are calling for Adam’s vital life force.

  They move their bodies, shoulder by shoulder, hitting their thighs and chests, opening their hands towards Adam, in an unison, a pungent gripping force.

  Uncle Quinn yells with his arms stretched out to the start sky:

  “Eithinoha, sacred Mother Earth of our Cherokee people, Geyaguga, Moon goodness, we lycans offer part of our strength to this warrior, Adam Vaugh. A brave lycan, valiant, another one of your wolves, one of your children, that asks for you blessing. The stars, drops of dew, the magic of the growing dark hours, together with our howl, our flesh, our blood, all of us, together, your children, the children of the night, we are joined together and we ask you long life and health for Adam Vaugh to be accepted.”

  In the middle of grunts and war cries, a long and strong howl cut through the night.

  Between the lycan warriors, Adam reappeared in his brown fur, shinny, huge and scary, the same way I saw him the the middle of the dark woods for the first time.

  The other lycans went quiet around him and he howls loud and strong towards the moon, he’s coming towards me. Uncle Quinn spoke out loud so I could hear him:

  “Don’t be afraid, Samantha.”

  I answered him touched, without being able to take my eyes away from the strong and imposing brown wolf coming towards me.

  Hunter, Kayden and Connor watched us moved, too.

  Adam circled me slowly, smelling my body, until he stopped in front of me.

  I took a knee in front of him, we were facing each other.

  I let the tears escape my eyes and wet my face, closing my eyes when I felt the humidity of his snout brushing my cheek and lowering through my collarbone, between my b
reasts until it stopped on my womb.

  He licked my womb and grunted, resting his snout on my lap.

  I caress his fur from his back, going up his face, his ears, getting out of him a coy grunt.

  I looked the warriors and whispered a “thank you” for them to have shared part of their strength bringing my man, my love back.

  “Adam, I know you can listen and understand me, in your skin or fur, you are and always will be the love of my life. I will always love you, you, whole, the wolf that protects me and the man who loves me. Both are perfect, my love, you’re perfect to me, the wolf and the man. I’m a lucky woman for having both protecting and loving me.”

  Hunter, Connor, Kayden and uncle Quinn come close to us and I thanked them, for not stop believing for a moment that Adam would recover, would come back to me.

  “Thank you, all of you, for bringing my love back.”

  Uncle Quinn smiled and said to me, moving away from the boys right after:

  “Take good care of him, Samantha, you’re a lucky female for having a male who loves you so much and a wolf who protects you with his own life, if he has to.”

  “I know that, uncle Quinn, that’s why I love him so much.”

  My man, my wolf, the father of my baby, Adam Vaugh, ah! How you make me happy, I’m really a lucky woman.

  EPILOGUE

  Adam Vaugh

  Peace? Tranquility? That is for common men, mere mortals, not to me, the leader of a pack of straggler wolves, damn messy guys that because of a Mother Nature’s joke, are my brothers.

  Even though I live is a short distance from these guys, still, there’s no day that they don’t knock on my door to bother me and my female. I open my eyes annoyed for having to wake up so early and then I stare at the alarm clock, I confirm it’s eight o’clock in the morning, hell, eight o’clock, I’m going to get to the police station late again.

  I was a punctual sheriff, until my little bunny got pregnant and her huge belly bothered her when it was time to sleep.

  I take a long time to get to sleep with Samantha tossing and turning by my side until she finds a comfortable position. The result of all that it’s that I end up sleeping late and I miss my time to wake up.

  Fuck! Who’s knocking on the door at this time, this desperately? I walk down the hall still sleepy and I open the door. Connor invades my living room without saying good morning and starts to jam like a scratchy phonograph.

  “Sam di... didn’t w... want to w... wake y... you up an... and sh... she w...went to m... my hou... house, sh... she sta... stared to fe... feel the p... p... pains, fu... fuck, I’m ne... nervous.”

  A jet of adrenaline runs through my veins and I wake up on the spot, my eyes are wide open, while I get my wallet and look for my damned badge and my gun.

  “Why Hunt or Kay didn’t come in your place, Connie? You took suck a long time to say that Sam is having our baby. Fuck! Where is the damned baby bag, come here, you fuck, help me look for it, Connie.”

  Connor and I searched the yellow wardrobe in the baby’s bedroom and we found the bag with the baby’s clothes and all those trinkets we have to take to maternity.

  Shoot! I’m going to be a father! I look at the badge in one hand and the gun in the other thinking why the hell do I have that, it’s not like I’m going to the police station or to arrest some suspect, I’m going to take my little bunny to the maternity.

  Today I’m going to have my little baby in my arms, I laugh out loud clapping my hands in joy and I leave the house in a hurry.

  I enter the truck and after going a few feet ahead, I park by the cabin where I lived with my brothers my entire life.

  Connor opens the door and I find Sam sitting on the couch, holding her voluminous belly with her face distorted in pain.

  Kayden gets out of the bathroom, in a clumsy state and puts a towel on Samantha’s forehead.

  Samantha, Connie and I look at Kayden and to the damned towel and he insists in rubbing on my wife’s forehead and says upset, as if he didn’t understand our look of surprise.

  “Why are you looking me like that? I saw it in a movie that’s good to put a towel on the pregnant’s forehead, I think it’s for diminishing the pain or is it to lower the baby’s temperature? It doesn’t matter, don’t remove the towel from Sam’s forehead, you’ll see how you’ll feel better.”

  Sam twists her body during one strong contraction and she bends her back, removing the towel from her forehead and burying the wet cloth in Kayden’s face.

  “Ouch! That hurts, Sam.”

  I knelt down in front of her, complaining about her not waking me up, and after the contraction is over, Sam holds my hand saying she’s sorry.

  “I thought it was a false alarm, but I don’t think it is anymore, let’s go, before the baby is born here at the ranch.”

  Connor and Kayden helped me sit Samantha carefully on the back of the car, Connor took the keys from my hand and sat on the driver’s seat, saying:

  “Sit do... down be... be... side Sam, you’re ner... nervous, let me dri... dri... dri... ah! Fuck! Y... you get it.”

  Kayden got his truck and accompanied us. Connie drove like a mad man through the road that led to the hospital and we almost got to the hospital with our pants soiled, so scared we were.

  As soon as I got out of the car and I was able to find steadiness in my legs again, I complained with Connie:

  “I promise you, Connor, that when your kid is born I’ll make sure to drive for you, did you want to kill us?”

  “No, b... but it wa... was go... good, we g... got here fa... fast.”

  I helped Sam to get out of the car and we went straight to emergency, a nurse attended to us really quick and she took Sam to be examined by the obstetrician.

  Kay called Hunt who was in therapy and told him the baby was going to be born soon. In less than half an hour Hunt got to the hospital hugging me tight the moment he saw me.

  “Be cool, old man, Sam and the baby will be alright.”

  A nurse came to me and said:

  “Samantha is ready for the delivery, would you like to participate?”

  Hunter and Kayden slapped me on the back encouraging me.

  “Go, man, she’ll feel safer during the delivery.”

  The nurse oriented me as how to behave in the surgery room and took me to a room to put on some sterilized scrubs to accompany Sam deliver our baby.

  Sam held my hand as soon as I sat by her side.

  “I thought you weren’t going to come, love.”

  “I would never leave you alone in a moment like this.”

  If I were Pinocchio my nose would definitely grow now, but how to explain to Sam that I’m in terror for seeing her in pain?

  She squeezes my hand tight and bites her lower lips, letting out a moan of pain, I look to the medical team apprehensive.

  The minutes are dragging themselves and Sam’s contractions are getting less spaced out. She wanted a regular delivery, but I’m starting to think if it isn’t better to do a Cesarean. My baby is born, mom is also in pain, my love. The medical team encourages Sam to push and when I thought she wouldn’t stand any longer, I hear our baby crying, loud and strong.

  The doctor hands me the baby so we can see and it’s a boy, she wraps our son in a cloth and puts him in Sam’s arms.

  I, who was always a tough guy, am not embarrassed of crying hugging my woman and my baby. Sam also cries and laughs at the same time, kissing my mouth tenderly.

  “It’s a big and grumbler boy, just like his father.”

  “I’m not grumbler, I don’t know where you got that from.”

  I kissed my boy’s little fingers and he grumbled, sniffing Samantha’s breasts full of milk.

  Some time later, Sam feeds our baby for the first time, he opens his blue eyes just like his mother’s and watches us with a curious air. I look at my son, so beautiful, with his rosy cheeks, his dark brown hair like mine and I think he’s a miracle, a beautiful present from Eithinoha, Mo
ther Nature, in our lives.

  Connor gets close the baby and asks, almost drooling over his nephew:

  “He’s so be... be... beautiful, have y... you pi... picked a na... name yet?

  Sam smiles and answers:

  “I thought about Jeremiah, you guys always say that your father was a special man, I thought we could honor him naming his first grandchild after him.”

  Hunter hugs me touched and I smile trying to hide how much I’m moved by remembering my father.

  “Jeremiah, I like it, Sam. That you may be a valiant man like you grandfather, my son.”

  Kayden kissed Sam’s forehead and Jeremiah’s cheek. Sam looked at Kayden and asked embarrassed:

  “Kay, do you know if he’s like you guys, a lycan?”

  Kay looked at me and to Sam, answering her back with another question:

  “Would it matter to you, Sam, if he was a lycan?”

  Samantha shakes her head, kissing Jeremiah’s little fingers.

  “No. Wolf, boy, it doesn’t matter to me, he would be my little boy the same way.”

  Kayden slapped my back confirming with a smirke:

  “He is, he’s lycan blood is strong, Sam.”

  “Oh, my God, two wolves in the house wanting to dominate me, that’s what I was missing.”

  I complained, teasing them.

  “The only alpha in this pack is me and no one else, you can be sure that I’ll show him who is in charge here, right, Jerry?”

  Hunter teased me, making everyone laugh.

  “And just for the record, who is in charge in your house, Damy?”

  I looked at him smiling and then I pointed to Samantha, laughing out loud.

  “She is, are you, little bunny?”

  Sam laughed kissing my unshaved beard.

  “Yes, I am.”

  I held her chin placing a kiss on her soft lips.

  “It’s only you, who’s the boos of my house and my heart, are you, Misses Vaugh?”

  I replied pouting.

  “For now I’m Thompson, you put a baby in me, but you still haven’t married me, mister Adam Vaugh.”

  I slapped my thigh and said it out loud smiling, announcing so all my brothers could hear: