by Woods, Erica
“Tell me what you are,” he said in a voice so cold, so detached, I felt like I was trapped in a storm of howling gales and pelting hail. “What manner of creature can avoid the detection of an assembly of lycans while tricking our senses into believing they are human?”
“I am human!” I cried, and it was probably the worst thing I could’ve said. My guilt, the small voice in the back of my mind that whispered, you may be human, but you also harbor a monster, sliced straight through my claim and left it sounding so unsure, so thin and weak and flawed that even I didn’t believe it.
“You dare stand there and lie to my face? Again?” He advanced on me, only stopping when I had to crane my neck to meet his glittering gaze. “Do you take me for a fool?” he hissed. “Do you think you can use your body—”
I shrank back and closed my eyes, waiting for the words that would pulverize my heart and leave me a battered, broken shell.
But they never came.
After the tense silence stretched so thin it threatened to shatter, I dared a peek that ended with a startled gasp. Lucien’s eyes were closed, a pained grimace twisting his lips and drawing lines between his brows. His hair looked like he’d been violently yanking at the short, dark strands, and the collar of his shirt was missing two buttons.
Then his eyes popped open and the dangerous, cold force behind them slammed into me. “Tell me the truth. For once in your miserable life, tell me the truth!”
Though they were not the words I’d expected—the ones that would’ve left my heart in shredded, unsalvageable ruin—they still cut.
“You said you wouldn’t hurt me again,” I whispered.
Lucien recoiled, amber liquid sloshing over his hands with the force of his movement. Muscles corded in his neck, his jaw clenched and released, clenched and released, like he was fighting words, fighting himself, fighting a horde of unleashed demons. For several seconds, he hesitated, glaring at the liquid he’d spilled and pulling at the collar of his shirt like it was choking him. Then suddenly, violently, he grabbed it, yanked, ripped it straight down the middle.
“Explain yourself, female,” he hissed, not looking at me but staring at the buttons scattered across the floor.
“Y-you . . . Earlier you said you wouldn’t hurt—”
“Not that,” he snarled. “The lies, the betrayal, the Hunters!”
Panic clawed at my throat and clamped around my neck like steel jaws. I opened my mouth but had no air to speak.
“Silence?” Cold, accusing eyes stabbed at me over the rim of his glass. “That is your response? Silence?”
“I’m trying!” I cried in a burst of startling sound. “But it’s hard—”
“And how do you suppose I feel?” Lucien hissed, ice burning in the gaze he raked over my exposed skin. “You’ve lied to me, again and again. Each time I choose to believe you, you tear that belief down with another stack of falsehoods! How many are there? How deep does your deception go?”
Too deep.
I’d lied about Matthew.
I’d lied about my abusers, about my past, about my monster.
I’d lied about everything.
Chest aching, I reached out, wanting to offer apologies, to fix this, fix us, but he jerked back and gave me such a quelling, narrow-eyed glare that my heart flinched and froze me to the spot.
“Tell me this at least, female . . .” A sinister, ruthless edge underlined his words, and they were all the more menacing for the quiet, soft way they’d been spoken. “Are you conspiring with the Hunters?”
I froze as every muscle in my body locked down tight. Bile rushed up my throat, flooding my mouth with bitter saliva. “Conspiring?” I stumbled back, clutching at my chest while the world spun rapid circles around me. “You think I work with the Hunters? That everything I’ve shared with the others, everything I’ve shared with you was all part of some evil plan? A plan to . . . to do to y-you what was done to me?”
Lucien’s expression twisted. He moved, reaching for me, but again, I stumbled back, a strange darkness spreading over my vision.
“I know I’ve lied. I know I’ve hidden things from you, but for you to think that I . . . that I could do something s-so vile . . .” My voice broke. “You think I’m a whore.”
“No!” Lucien’s response was a sharp bark, but I could barely hear it over the pounding in my head. “ . . .not what I said!”
“A whore who’s used her body—”
“No!”
“—to lure you in—”
“Damnation, Hope, listen to me!”
“— so I could . . . so I could . . .” My stomach wrenched and I clapped a hand over my mouth, on the verge of vomiting. So I could trade my torture for yours? But I couldn’t say it. Could barely think it. It was too ugly. To evil.
And all too possible.
If I hadn’t escaped, if the Hunters had managed to break me, mold me to their will . . .
“Hope . . .” Hand shaking, Lucien put his drink on the counter and started toward me. But when I shook my head, using the couch as support to drag my weak, trembling body away, he froze.
“The Hunters . . .” A despairing, hoarse laugh bubbled in my chest. “They were my jailors. My tormentors. My nightmares . . .” It was as though saying it out loud leeched all the strength from my body. My legs gave out and I collapsed in a heap on the ground. “I’d rather die than help them.”
Lucien said something, something hoarse and raw and pleading, but I didn’t hear it. My eyes had drifted shut, and was curled into a ball. It was safer that way. Booted feet and angry fists couldn’t rupture important organs when they were protected by knees. A skull couldn’t split open and crack when shielded by arms.
I’d learned long ago that, whenever possible, this was the position to adopt when under attack. And though no one was hitting or kicking or cutting with their evil knives, I felt bruised and battered.
Besieged.
A hand touched my shoulders, the back of my head, and something inside me broke.
63
Ruarc
We were almost back at the cabin when I heard it. Faint at first. Disrupted by the wind, the trees, the critters brave enough to be out among lycans. Still caught at me, though. Prickled up my back, kicked at my gut, drew claws.
“Hear that?”
Jason shook his head, but Ash stopped. Cocked his head. Then his eyes bled black, and I stilled.
Seconds later, I heard it too. My female. Crying like her heart was broken, like her soul had been shattered.
Like she was fucking dying.
Roaring, I threw my body into motion. A distance that should’ve taken least two minutes to cross flew by in less than twenty seconds. The door was nothing but an obstacle. I barreled through, chest heaving, fangs dripping; preparing to tear meat and break bones. But at the hellish scene playing out in the middle of the living room floor, I froze.
What the fuck?
Lucien. My brother. A male I’d trusted with our female was hovering above her crumbled form, tendons straining in his neck, gaze hard and relentless as it swept over her shaking shoulders.
Took me a murderous second to see the contempt behind his cold mask and recognize it as aimed inward.
As it fucking well should.
A savage growl thrummed in my chest, and Lucien turned. Resignation tightened his jaw a second before he stepped away from my female.
I rushed forward—suppressed the urge to pummel the other male into the ground—and gathered the slight, feminine bundle against my chest. A strange scent clung to her, one I didn’t recognize, and another, more familiar one.
Lucien’s.
“Mo chridhe.” I supported her with one arm and used the other to do a quick sweep of her body. Fuck, but her bones were fragile. Vulnerable. And protected only by a thin layer of fat and barely any muscle. “What hurts?” Felt her wrists—too fucking delicate—her pulse—too fucking fluttery—her ankles and calves and stomach and shoulders. No obvious injuries. “
Talk to me. Where’re you hurt?”
She didn’t answer. Continued with that terrible, heart-wrenching sound.
It twisted me up inside. Knotted my guts, shredded my lungs, pulverized my ribs. My female was hurt. She was hurt, and I had no idea how to help her.
A crimson haze bled across my vision.
“Ash!” I roared, cradling Hope protectively while Jason lost his shit and launched himself at the male who’d left her weeping on the ground. Weeping, after leaving his fucking scent all over her. Lucien didn’t fight back, his silent acceptance undeniable proof of his guilt. “Ash!”
“I am here, niijikiwenh.”
Hadn’t noticed. Couldn’t tear my gaze away from Hope’s face; the tears wetting her cheeks, the pointed, stubborn chin, the tightly shut eyes that needed to open and smile at me; smile the way only she could, all bright and shiny and so fucking beautiful it hurt.
“Fix her!” It came out strangled and fucked up. Poisoned by fear.
“I do not know what ails her.” Dangerous emotions shadowed his face, but it was nothing compared to the living volcano erupting in my chest.
“Fucking find out!”
“Use your senses,” Ash said in a voice that was too calm, too quiet. “No scent of blood, no visible wounds, no struggling pulse.” He brushed a hand over her forehead. “These wounds she has suffered, they are not physical.”
Chills raced up my spine. Chest felt like it had been kicked by a moose then crushed between the jaws of a gator. I jerked around and glared at Lucien. “What the fuck did you do?”
He didn’t react, just lay still and accepting beneath Jason’s punishing blows.
If Hope hadn’t needed me, I would’ve thrown myself into the fray and torn him apart until I got the answers I needed. Brother or no, no one was more important than our female.
No one.
The terrible sound that would haunt my nights for years to come suddenly stopped. The female in my arms stirred, and when she spoke, her hoarse whisper was the most beautiful thing I’d ever heard. “Ruarc?”
“Mo chridhe . . .” A hiss of air passed through my tight throat. “Thank fuck.”
“W-what’s going on?”
“He hurt you.” The counter I’d grasped for support groaned. Tried to relax my grip, but my fingers wouldn’t loosen. The tightness in my chest wouldn’t loosen.
Crack!
Pieces of marble crashed against kitchen tiles.
Squeezing my eyes shut, I concentrated on my female, on her warmth, her scent and the sound of her breathing. Soft, trembling fingers wrapped around my wrist, touching me the way she did when she sought reassurance, and I shuddered.
My fist opened. Crushed marble tumbled to the floor.
“Banajaanh.” Ash put a hand on Hope’s wet cheek and used a thumb to swipe away a wayward tear. “What happened?”
Was obvious, wasn’t it? Lucien had hurt her.
But Hope didn’t answer. She stared at Jason’s momentarily suspended fist. “Jason? What . . . what are you doing!”
Jason didn’t move. Awkwardly crouched over Lucien, he remained still while the other male’s cold, green eyes locked on the female he no longer had a right to behold.
“Lucien? Oh my god, Lucien!” She struggled in my hold.
Through the metallic taste of blood coating my tongue—my damned fangs having pierced my gums once again—I could taste her fear. Her desperation.
My arms tightened as red hot rage breathed fire down my throat. “Won’t hurt you again.”
“What?” Wide, red rimmed eyes stared up at me. “Who won’t hurt me again?”
“Lucien,” I growled, burying my nose in the long mane trailing down her back.
“He didn’t . . . I mean . . . Let me down!”
The pleading crack in her voice was unacceptable. Begrudgingly, I did as she asked but kept a hand on her shoulder—didn’t want to let her out of my sight. But the stubborn, brave little female jerked out of my hold, ducked under Ash’s outstretched arm, and sprinted to Jason’s side.
I bristled, but didn’t move. If our female needed the comfort of one of her other males, I wouldn’t deny her. Not until she calmed down and was able to see reason again.
Then she won’t leave my side for a year. Maybe two. Fuck it, the rest of our lives.
But when she brushed past Jason and knelt next to Lucien instead, only Ash’s hold on my arm stopped me from storming over there and throwing the reckless female over my shoulder. “Wait.”
I spun around, breaking his grip and baring my teeth. “Back off.”
He cocked his head, the mahír fáinn prowling behind his gaze. “She needs him. She needs all of us.”
“He fucking hurt her!” Claws shot out from the tips of my fingers. I curled them into fists and ignored the sharp stab of pain. Wanted to run to her. Tear her away from the other males and lock her in my room. She was mine! Mine to protect, to cherish, to love, damn them all to hell!
“He knows. But we do not know the entirety of the story. So wait. Trust that your female knows her heart.”
I snarled. Turned my back on the annoying bastard. “She’s too forgiving.”
“That is only a flaw if her males do not know how to shield her.”
“This is shielding her?”
“This is allowing her to choose.”
Choice . . .
Fuck, Ash knew that was one thing I’d never let anyone steal from her. Not again. So I stayed, glaring at the offensive scene playing out before me and fighting the urge to ram my fist down Lucien’s throat.
My female was comforting the asshole who’d hurt her . . .
“Oh, Lucien,” Hope whispered brokenly, running a gentle hand over Lucien’s battered face and wincing like she was the one who was hurt.
The undeserving male stared up at her and said nothing.
“Can you talk? Is your jaw injured?”
“I’m fine.”
While Jason watched Lucien with narrowed, accusing eyes, Lucien only had eyes for Hope. He tracked her every movement, every flinch and every hard swallow. Watching her too damned close.
“Are you . . . Can you stand?”
“Yes,” he said, but made no move to get up.
“Here.” Hope grabbed his hand, and the annoyingly unhurt male quickly interlaced their fingers. “Let me help you.”
I’d had enough.
Stalking across the room, I grabbed Lucien’s shirt and yanked him to his feet. “Talk.”
Instead of answering and sparing himself further pain, he looked at Hope. And then he waited.
“I . . .”
My gaze whippet to my female. She’d let go of Lucien and was wringing her hands, staring down at her feet.
“I s-snuck out and went to see Matthew—”
“Who the fuck is Matthew?”
Hope winced, but didn’t speak. Didn’t move. Not when Lucien stiffened, staring down at her with an inscrutable expression, and not when Ash and Jason moved closer. She just stood there, looking so alone and desolate that my heart ached.
I reached for her, but she stepped away and hunched her shoulders, looking at me with tormented, watery eyes. “He’s the guy who—the male you wanted me to tell you about. The one I said I . . . I couldn’t discuss. Not before I talked to him.”
My hands clenched, and I wished I had more fucking marble to destroy. “You left the house? In the middle of the night? A-fucking-lone?”
“Yes, but I had to! So I could tell you guys everything—”
“Think we value your secrets over your life?”
“Nothing happened—”
“But it easily could have,” Lucien said. “Matthew was going to betray her.”
Not a sound could be heard in our little cabin as we absorbed the full meaning of those words. My body was still, every muscle taut in preparation for a fight that would not come. Not until every last secret had been spilled and I knew exactly who to kill.
And how much to make them
suffer.
Hope swallowed hard. “I . . . I thought that—”
“Don’t,” Lucien hissed. “I cannot listen to this tale again. It is utterly ridiculous, and if you recall, it ended in an activity I doubt you are in the state of mind to repeat.”
My nostrils flared. Wanted to kill Lucien all over again, but before the snarl ripping at my throat was fully formed, he detailed the sordid story about Matthew and explained our female’s pitiful reasoning.
For once, my female’s bleeding heart didn’t impress. It’d placed her in danger. Risked her life. And that would’ve been bad enough, but Lucien wasn’t done.
Our female had been a captive.
A storm howled through my skull.
She’d been treated so poorly she’d formed a connection with a lithbhár that cared nothing for her.
It dove down my throat and rattled my ribs.
She’d been hurt.
My jaw locked, teeth grinding together as I fought to contain the guttural roar brewing in my chest.
She’d been hurt.
“—Hunters. That’s who had her.”
Hunters?
I froze. My eyes locked on our female, noted her trembling lips, her hunched shoulders, the way she waited for a blow that would never, ever come.
Between one breath and the next, I’d dragged her into my arms. “Will kill every last one,” I vowed, ignoring her startled protest and her immediate, idiotic concerns for my safety. “And I don’t care,” I growled while she stilled, slowly raising her eyes to my face. “Don’t give a shit why you were there. An unlucky human or a supernatural in hiding—fuck, wouldn’t even matter if you were a bloody hellspawn.” Despite the roar in my ears—blood rushing through my veins with such furious velocity I was left damned near deaf—I heard her sharp intake of breath. “You’re mine. Mine.”
It was time my female learned. Learned who she belonged to and just what lengths I would go to keep her.
“But, Ruarc, I . . . I lied,” she whispered. “Not about everything,” she hurriedly added and clutched at my shirt like she thought I’d throw her away for her sins.