by Meg Ripley
“That would be the logical next step,” Keira agreed. “But for right now I’m kind of happy just lying here.” Raul chuckled, brushing a lock of hair out of her face and leaning in to kiss her lightly on the forehead.
“You wanted this, right?” Raul pulled back and met her gaze, looking down at her intently. “I could feel it in you, but I want to hear you say it.”
“Against my better judgment, yes,” Keira said. She could feel her nerves still tingling, and a more concerning phenomena: she had a sense of Raul’s emotions, dancing just out of the reach of her mind, a shadow-suggestion that was both like and unlike the connection she felt with her clan-mates. “I definitely wanted to screw your brains out—or have you screw mine out. And I wanted to be your mate.”
“You really wanted it,” Raul said again, his voice uncertain.
“You’re the only one I’ve met so far who’s been able to pin me,” Keira admitted. “Even if you were tricky about it.”
“We were both tricky,” Raul countered. His lips slid against her cheek, along her throat, and Raul pulled her around. Keira let her body be manipulated, snuggling closer to the wolf, closing her eyes as the movement sent jolts of sensation from the bite at her neck, the deep ache in her hips, the parts of her body that had received the most attention from Raul. “Next time we spar I’ll let you win.” Keira growled, glaring at him.
“Do not even say you would ever let me win,” she told him, springing free of his embrace and using her momentum to shove Raul onto his back. “If I best you it’s going to because I’m better,” Keira insisted.
“If you best me,” Raul countered. His hands fell to her hips and he grinned up at her. “Give me a chance to recover and wait for the dust to clear on this mess we’re in, and we’ll have a rematch.” Keira looked down at him for a long moment, considering. She had let him take her as his mate; she had let him mark her. She was committed to him. Their bond would only increase in time. The tendrils of feeling that she was receiving from Raul’s contented, satisfied mind would deepen, and she would be as aware of him as she was of any of the members of her clan.
“Can you…feel me?” Keira felt the heat in her cheeks as she blushed.
“Oh yeah,” Raul said, his voice rippling with amusement and desire. “I can feel every inch of you.” Keira rolled her eyes and swatted at him, half-wishing she had her paws instead of normal human hands.
“You know what I mean,” she said sharply. “Can you…feel my mind?”
“A little,” Raul said, nodding slowly.
“It’s going to get more intense every time we have sex, and the longer we spend time together,” Keira said, thinking out loud.
“That does sort of come with the territory of mating,” Raul pointed out. “Are you sure you’re okay with this?”
“I’m okay with it,” Keira said, nodding quickly. “It’s just weird is all.” Raul kissed her on the lips.
“Let’s go inside, have something to eat, and get a shower,” Raul suggested. “You can contemplate all you want about how much of a comedown in prestige you’re suffering while we’re away from the mosquitoes.” Keira laughed and sat up; the sun was beginning to sink in the sky, and Raul did have a point. If they remained outside, lounging in the grass, they’d be attacked by droves of mosquitoes.
She stood and offered Raul her hand; Keira was both surprised and not surprised that he didn’t balk, but merely accepted her assistance, pulling himself up and then immediately wrapping his arms around her waist to hold her close. “I can’t wait to take you again,” Raul murmured in her ear.
“You have to earn it,” Keira told him tartly. “I want to be on top next time.”
“I could go with that,” Raul said, grinning. They went into the safe house together, and Keira checked in the kitchen; there was plenty of food for both of them, even as ravenous as they both were in the aftermath of their mating. “We’ll go to the elementals first thing in the morning,” Raul suggested. “For now, I want to do everything I can to solidify our bond, to cement the fact that we’re mates.” Keira looked at him sharply.
“You think they’re going to try and separate us,” she said; there was no need to specify whom ‘they’ were.
“Pretty sure,” Raul said with a nod. “Either your Alpha or mine.”
“You said Reginald tried to ambush you before—before my people came into the battle,” Keira said, remembering the details that Raul had recited when she’d cleaned his wounds earlier in the day. “Where did he go?” Raul shrugged.
“No idea,” Raul said. “By the time the skirmish ended, he’d disappeared. I suspected he went home injured, but there’s no way—right now—to know for sure.”
“We need to watch out for him,” Keira said.
“We’ll worry about that tomorrow,” Raul told her. “Tonight is just for us.” Keira looked at him intently for a moment and then nodded. She could feel the tendrils of Raul’s thoughts worming their way into her mind, working their way deeper. She had done something absolutely irrevocable in letting him take her, letting him mark her as his mate. Raul took her hand and led her towards the bathroom, and Keira let herself be led, trying to decide which of their clans was more likely to pose the most immediate threat. Keira knew instinctively that she and Raul would be making love throughout the night—but she wasn’t certain, given how much the situation surrounding them weighed on her, just how thoroughly she would be able to give herself to Raul. We need to find allies, she thought as she stepped into the shower, ducking into Raul’s ready embrace as the water sluiced down from the showerhead. We need to get some people on both sides who can keep Harold and Reginald both off of us. She told herself that she would broach the topic with Raul later; for the time being, she wanted to just enjoy him.
****
Raul woke with a start, at first uncertain what had awakened him. His preternaturally acute vision made the darkness in the bedroom of the flophouse almost insignificant; as he looked around, he saw that there was no one else in the room—just him and Keira. She stirred next to him, and Raul felt the strange, tingling sensation of thoughts that didn’t belong to him—or to the pack—swirling to life in his mind. They were little more than fleeting, sleepy impressions, nothing substantial enough to truly “read,” but he knew them immediately for Keira’s waking thoughts. Something—not him—had pulled her out of sleep as well.
At once, Raul was out of the bed, moving to the window. Keira was no more than a step behind him, and Raul forced himself to focus on the task at hand—finding out what had awakened them both—rather than the way the moonlight through the window silvered her skin, highlighting the curves of her voluptuous body. “Did you hear something?” He kept his voice to a whisper so low it was almost a breath.
“I felt something,” Keira replied, sounding almost confused. “Like some kind of twitch.” Raul nodded.
“Same for me,” he said. He looked out through the window into the darkness; the moon had already set for the night, and there wasn’t much light from the stars, or from the house, to pick out details. “Let’s get this open,” he suggested. Next to him, Keira nodded. Raul opened the window just a crack and knelt down, sniffing to try and catch any trace of scent. Rabbit, deer, beaver, opossum… wolf. Wolf? Panther. His heart started beating faster in his chest. “We’ve been found,” he said to Keira, his mind shifting into a blur of animal reaction and military training.
“No one’s attacked yet,” Keira said quietly. She shut the window quickly but quietly. As if on cue, a howl cut through the air; the next instant, Raul heard glass breaking.
“Get back!” he whispered hoarsely to Keira. Raul’s years of training slipped into place, keeping a slight rein on animal instincts that welled up. You have to protect her. Raul stepped out in front of Keira as they both left the bedroom, headed into the living room where the window had been shattered. A wolf and a panther dove through the jagged opening, both narrowly missing injury, and Raul pushed Keira behind him, ign
oring her angry growl. He glanced quickly around the room and found a silver-edged knife he’d brought with him as a precaution, laying on the table. Raul grabbed the hilt as more wolves and panthers darted through the broken window; one—he recognized Mike from the Pack, injured but apparently healing quickly—transformed back into his human form and darted to the door, opening it.
As soon as the door was open, chaos descended, and Raul fell into trained instincts, keeping one eye on Keira at all times as he tried to sort through the members of his Pack and the members of the panther clan that had come to attack the house. Raul kept the knife in his hand, slashing and stabbing with it, in the defensive crouch that his training made second nature. He couldn’t tell if the panthers and wolves were working together or fighting each other—and he wasn’t sure, in the few moments that he could spare from reacting to the conflict unfolding in the living room, whether the two groups knew for sure themselves. One moment, panthers and wolves attacked each other, growling and snarling; the next, both groups pushed forward, one of each kind attacking him, trying to get past him to Keira, who had changed into her own panther form at some point in the melee.
Raul threw himself into the battle; for the moment, he ceased to see the people coming into the flophouse as friend or foe, or to even attempt to discover what the motivations of the combatants were. He tried to keep Keira in the corner of his vision as he attacked and defended at the same time, using the maneuvers drilled into him in Basic. Don’t treat the wolves any differently from the panthers. They’re both invading—they’re all enemies. The air was a dizzying combination of the sounds of growling, barking, shouts, shrieks, and groans, along with the smells of more than a dozen panthers and wolves, blood and—Raul caught the scent of smoke and decided to worry about that later.
“Get him with the silver!” Raul heard someone—he wasn’t sure who—call the command, and then searing, sizzling pain wrapped around him, touching his bare skin everywhere. He howled, the silver net around him sapping his strength in instants. Raul felt his knees go weak, felt himself tumbling forward, gloved hands grabbing at him even as he snarled and twisted, trying to get free of the net. He tried to bite—but his teeth met the silver and electric agony shot through his skull.
“Got her!” Raul flailed and fought, and barely caught sight of people swarming Keira—cornering her and throwing a net over her. He couldn’t recognize the people; Raul thought they must be panthers. He tried to squirm free of the net that seemed to tighten around him moment by moment, but no amount of kicking or thrashing broke him free of its bonds; the more he fought the more the silver seemed to affect him, weakening him, hurting more and more. He felt himself lifted off of the ground and then into the darkness he went, howling, struggling as much as his feeble strength allowed. Raul barely saw the shape of a van—he thought it belonged to Reginald—before darkness of a different kind began to swirl in his vision, pulling him under in spite of the pounding of his heart in his chest and the ache in his throat from howling for Keira. The last thing he thought was that he would have to break free in order to have any hope of finding out where the panthers had taken Keira. Have to get to the Elementals…have to tell them…have to get to Keira. Raul groaned as his body hit the hard floor of the van, sending a shockwave of pain through him; then everything went dark.
****
“She’s coming around,” someone said. Keira kept her eyes closed, and tried to keep her breathing slow and even, but as she swam up out of unconsciousness, she knew from the mental impressions around her that she was among the members of her clan; they would feel the shift in her mental signature, they would know immediately that she was no longer completely out. Not like it matters anyway. Let them know that I’m awake. I don’t have to talk to them.
Keira felt a hot lump of fury in the pit of her stomach at the memory of watching the attackers carry Raul off into the darkness, just as her own people surrounded her and looped silver chains around her. Had the wolves and panthers coordinated to catch up to the two of them? Had Harold revealed their secret—for them to both receive what was apparently going to be some form of punishment? Look at that: we brought them together for the purposes of punishing both of us. That’s an accomplishment, she thought wryly, in the most private part of her mind. She remembered Harold mentioning that he would have to put “the matter” of her “taking up with a damned wolf” to the clan; and apparently somehow the word had gotten out that Raul was with her.
“You can stop pretending, Keira,” she heard Harold’s growling voice a few feet away. Keira kept her eyes closed a moment longer. She ached all over; between the battle and the silver, she wasn’t sure if she could even fully stand, much less manage a transformation. She could smell five panthers in the room with her—wherever she was—including Harold. There was no sign of wolves present, but she could smell wolf blood, lingering on the people around her. They were fighting each other, too. So obviously if they were working together, it wasn’t all that willingly. Keira reached out mentally, trying to push past the chatter of clan minds, trying to find the elusive thread of Raul’s mental presence. They had mated; she should be able to feel him, and he her. But it was as if she had stubbed her toe, somewhere deep down in her mind. He’s just unconscious. He’s not dead. Please let him not be dead.
Keira opened her eyes. Harold—scored with scratch marks, gouges from bites on his arms and shoulders—stood over her. Other members of the clan watched from a yard away, glaring and scowling, looking as though the slightest provocation might trigger them to shift into their animal forms. “I thought we had an agreement, Harold,” Keira said, keeping her voice level and unwavering with an effort.
“We had an agreement that you could leave my house, and that you would avoid the clan’s running lands,” Harold said firmly. “I also put it to the clan—the fact that you were taking up with a wolf—and let them decide what to do with you.” Keira glanced quickly at the few members of the clan in the room with her; based on the thick reek of anger and acrid undertone in their pheromones, she thought she knew pretty well what the clan had decided.
“Were you working with the wolves then? Sure seems like you coordinated with them, since they grabbed Raul and you got me.” Keira bared her teeth, narrowing her eyes, unquestionably a challenge to the leader of the clan—but one that wasn’t enough to require him to directly correct her. The other panthers in the room snarled, beginning to lunge forward until Harold let out a low growl.
“When you’re recovered from your punishment, I’ll have you in the challenge for that bit of insolence,” Harold told her, scowling.
“So, tell me my damned punishment and get it over with then,” Keira said. In the back of her mind, she could sense the evanescent tendril of Raul’s mind—he was awakening, too. Something in Keira’s body relaxed at that realization.
“For taking up with an enemy of the clan, you’re going to be flogged,” Harold told her. “And you’re going to bring your godforsaken mate to us.”
“Flog me if it makes you feel better,” Keira said, shrugging; the pain had begun to slowly ebb, and she realized that she was only bound at the wrists and ankles with silver—they’d done away with the rest of the netting. There was some hope to be found in that, Keira thought. “But I’m not going to let you murder my mate just to salve your pride that you weren’t able to protect Lachlan and Gary.” Keira considered bringing up the outside female that Harold had allegedly brought in—but stopped short, uncertain of if he had told anyone in the clan about her.
“You’ve turned your back on our ways,” Harold told her, his voice taking on a low, warning-growl note. “After you’ve been flogged, you’ll have a chance to think about who your allies are. You either renounce your mating with that wolf and consent to a mate of my choice in the clan, or you’ll be put to death.” Keira glanced at the others in the room; Tammy and Garrett looked uncertain, but Nathan and Brad were nodding along with Harold’s edict.
“I’m bored,” K
eira said, stretching in spite of the shiver of pain the movement sent through her spine. She had to appear as confident, as unconcerned as possible; she couldn’t let any of the people in the room with her know her fear. “Either go ahead and flog me now or leave me alone—I have a right to that as a member of this clan, under punishment or not.” Harold growled again, but stepped back, and Keira held his gaze for a long moment before looking away.
A few moments later, his point proven, Harold left the room, taking the others with him, and Keira waited until even her preternaturally acute hearing couldn’t detect their footfalls before slumping against the wall they’d propped her against.
Keira knew what to expect from her clan; they viewed her as a betrayer. She would receive the bare minimum until her punishment was carried out, and they’d probably isolate her on top of that, even after she was flogged. She closed her eyes, tugging at the silver binding her wrists and ankles. Whoever had been responsible for it had bound her tightly enough that escape would be difficult, and Keira smirked to herself; whoever it was would have had to have handled the silver without gloves to get it that tight. Hope it burned the hell out of them, the asshole. She bit her bottom lip as she tested the chains again and again, trying to find the least give in them. She had to get away; she had to get to Raul, and they both had to go to the Elementals. There was no way around it; they needed outside intervention, and if they went to the elementals they’d at least have protection. Please let him be in better shape than me, she thought. Let him be able to get free and get to the Elementals. There was no longer even a question of finding anyone in their respective groups to ally with—they were both on the outs. Keira paused in her struggles for the moment, taking slow, deep breaths. She would need to conserve her strength. She might get an opening when they unbound her to take her out onto the clan’s running lands for the flogging. There isn’t a panther in the entire clan who can take me if I do it right, she thought. Bide your time, Keira. Wait for your opportunity. Don’t be like one of those stupid wolves caught in a hunter’s trap and chew off your own leg to get free. Be smart. Keira tried to fall into a light doze, but the fear persisted: what if they waited until the silver completely sapped her strength? She couldn’t count on the clan—in its current fury—to stick with the legal ten lashes, or to not put her to death. Focus on getting out of here at the first opportunity. That’s the best thing you can do. Keira settled in to wait.