“I’m not worried about your uncles. I can handle them.”
“I’m not worried about my uncles, either. I’m worried about me.”
“You? No one will harm you. You’re their golden girl.”
“No one will harm me, but what if I turn against you again? What if I decide you’re worth more in the ring than in my bed.”
He chuckled. “Was it really that bad? I enjoyed it myself.”
She kissed him long and deep. “I’m serious, Azer. I love you more than anything. I can’t stand the thought of anything happening to you. You won’t be safe until you get back home.”
“I don’t like the idea of running away.”
She rested her forehead against his cheek. “You planned to leave, anyway. You said there could never be anything between us.”
He gazed out the window. “No. There can’t be.”
“You see? It’s the best thing.”
He stroked her hair. “Yeah. I guess it is.”
She let the silence linger. “So…will you go?”
“I guess I have to. I don’t want to, but it seems like the only option. I can’t stay here. That’s for certain.”
She kept her eyes buried in his skin.
He pushed back against her head. “I don’t suppose there’s any chance you’d come back with me.”
“You know that wouldn’t work. I would be a pariah. I would be like Melody is now, and you would be caught between me and your family.”
“Yeah.”
She held him tighter, but he broke free and sat up. “If I’m going, I better get going.”
She turned her face into the pillow. What did she have to go giving him ideas for? Couldn’t she just enjoy him a little longer?
His arms appeared around her, but when he embraced her, she felt his pants around his legs. Oh, God, he really was going! What an idiot she was! She couldn’t let him leave.
He kissed her hair and murmured into her ear, “It will be all right.”
She flung her arms around his neck. She would never let him go. “How can you say that? Nothing will ever be all right again. How can I live here without you? Please don’t leave. I can’t handle this.”
He held her close and kissed her cheeks. “I have to leave. You know that, or you wouldn’t have suggested it. It wouldn’t work, here or there. It wouldn’t work at all. We’re too different.”
“I love you.”
“I love you, too. I love you more than my own life, and I don’t know how I’ll survive without you, but I have to go. If you hadn’t gotten your uncles to attack me outside, someone else would have. The longer I stay here, the more likely it is that someone will try to pull something.”
She hid her eyes from looking at him. A pained moan broke from her throat. What had he done to her?
He tried to sit up, but she held him down against her. “Don’t go out there. They’ll kill you.”
He pried her arms off his neck. “They can’t touch me. They might have stood a chance if they caught me by surprise, but now I know they’re coming. I can beat them with no problem. You gave me that.”
She couldn’t listen to his shirt rustling when he pulled it down over his chest. His belt buckle clinked. He was buttoning up his demon cock where she couldn’t get it. She would never get it again as long as she lived.
He took her hand and pulled her off the bed. “Come on and get dressed. If I get back to the bus station in good time, I can be gone before anybody realizes.”
She summoned all her strength to sit up. If he really was leaving, she had to go with him, at least as far as the bus station. She had to make sure he got out of town without getting hurt. At least she would know he was safe back on Bruins’ Peak.
She fought her way into her clothes and ran her fingers through her hair. She would face this day like she was going to the firing squad. What would tomorrow hold for her, when he wasn’t around anymore? She couldn’t go back to her computer and her ring schedule. She couldn’t face organizing another ring with the cub. What would Wyatt and Caleb do with the cub if Raven didn’t run another ring? What would become of Midnight Moraine without the extra income flowing in?
Raven’s life lay barren and hopeless before her. She caught a glimpse of something brilliant and magnificent last night. Now all that flew out the window. Sending Azer home was the right thing for everybody, but it left her soul in shreds on the floor.
He shrugged his jacket into place and shoved his wallet and phone into his pocket. He waited by the door until Raven got ready. He took her hand and opened that door on the future.
The whole house lay in darkness. Pre-dawn crept over the Moraine. Not even a bird twittered to announce the new day. Azer crept down the hall without a sound. Raven strained her ears to catch any noise, but she heard nothing. Where were those men hiding? She couldn’t give Azer a clue where they might attack.
He paused inside the house door and laid his finger to his lips. Raven held her breath when he eased the doorknob around in a circle. He held up three fingers and counted them down in complete silence. 3—2—1….
The door crashed aside, and Azer exploded out of the house into the dark. Raven rushed out behind him, but he shifted before his feet touched the ground. He hit the ground on all four paws. His fur bounded with every loping step. The moment the door flapped back, four men darted into the open, two from each side of the house. They brandished clubs over their heads and rushed Azer from every side.
They started back in surprise, though, when they saw a bear coming at them instead of a man. They wouldn’t knock him out with their clubs now. For a fraction of an instant, they floundered in confusion. None of them knew how to approach him.
Azer didn’t give them a chance to consider. He galloped past the door and went for the two men on his right. He leapt through the air with his mouth open. Raven saw Uncle Caleb cast his club aside and jolt sideways to avoid those menacing jaws. Jordan tumbled the other way.
A moment later, two shimmering shadows glided over the ground where Caleb and Jordan used to be. They wheeled in opposite directions and spun around to meet Azer coming at them.
Jordan jumped first. He let out a shriek that would curl Raven’s straight black hair. He pounced on Azer’s head and sank in his claws to hold on. Azer shook his head to free his eyes, but Jordan hung on. He gnawed Azer’s ears and pierced the bear’s tough hide with razor teeth.
With Jordan blinding Azer, the others moved in. No one thought twice about clubbing him. Caleb ducked in low under Azer’s flank and sank his teeth into the soft meat where Azer’s hind leg met his hip.
Azer roared in pain. He tried one more time to shake the menaces off, but they wouldn’t give up their advantage. At the same time, Wyatt and Hunter raced in from the other side to join the fight. Hunter jumped on Azer’s back and ripped him with his teeth and claws while Wyatt dove for Azer’s throat.
Azer might have won on his own. Raven didn’t think of that. The moment she got through the door, all rational thought flew out of her head. She knew only the fury of watching these cats attack and maul her mate.
She flew out the door with a feral screech. She launched herself at Azer and shifted in mid-air. She hit Hunter broadside. His teeth met under Azer’s skin and ripped out a bloody hole. Hunter roared in rage and surprise, but Raven didn’t give him any opportunity to react. She slashed her claws across his face and gashed his cheek open with her ripping teeth.
She went after Jordan next. She crawled up Azer’s neck to where Jordan hung onto Azer’s head with all his claws. One swipe of her paw across his eyes sent him flying away in a hurry.
Now that he could see, Azer unleashed his full fury on Raven’s uncles. He couldn’t know the panther on his back was Raven. He shook himself and knocked her off. He batted Caleb away to bowl him along the ground. He spun a full circle and clamped his mighty jaws on Wyatt’s hind leg. The bone crunched between his teeth.
Wyatt screamed and whirled around, but when he came face to face with
Azer, he backed off faster than you can blink. He hugged his hind leg against him and dashed on three legs for the trees.
Azer wheeled back the other way, but not one panther remained to confront him. He found himself growling at Caleb, Wyatt, Hunter and Jordan all standing on their two legs in various states of injury and dishevelment. Wyatt crouched under a tree and nursed his leg. Caleb’s chest bled through the parallel rips in his shirt. Hunter wiped blood off his face with his sleeve. Jordan covered his eyes with his arm and howled out loud.
Azer surveyed the battle scene until he spotted Raven standing in front of the house. He trotted up to her and paced around her in a circle to stop at her side. He whooshed air through his nostrils, and the great bear dropped away. He stood up straight. His shoulders squared, and his fur vanished to become clear smooth skin.
He sniffed at the four men surrounding him. Not one of them dared come near him. He murmured to Raven and took her hand, “Let’s go. There’s nothing more for us to do here.”
Caleb took a step forward to block their path. He pointed in their faces, but he made sure not to come too close. “You’ll pay for this. We’ll get you for this if it’s the last thing we do.”
Azer jerked his chin at the man. “Yeah? I don’t think so.”
“Get out of the way, Caleb,” Raven told him. “Put your finger in your pocket and don’t bother us again if you know what’s good for you.”
Caleb sliced his finger through the air to include both of them. “You’ll pay for this. Do you think you can attack your own clan and get away with it? You betrayed your own people. You’re our enemy now. Don’t ever forget that.”
Raven glanced around at her cousins, but they weren’t there. Jordan’s broad back slipped between the trees, but Raven didn’t see Hunter anywhere. He slunk away unnoticed. Wyatt couldn’t leave on his own, though. He had to wait for Caleb to support him on one leg.
Wyatt hugged Caleb around the shoulders, and the brothers headed down the street toward their house. Caleb looked back over his shoulder to aim a warning finger at Raven. “You remember what I say.”
Chapter 16
Melody tore off the last piece of tape to secure the bandage to Azer’s back. “It’s not the prettiest dressing in the world, but it will do the trick until you get home.”
He slipped his tattered shirt over his shoulders. “I don’t care what it looks like. I don’t have to look it.”
“It’s a pretty bad tear. Are you sure you’re okay?”
“It hurts like you wouldn’t believe, but what’s life for, anyway?” He gritted his teeth and got to his feet.
Melody stood up. “Do you really have to go? You just got here.”
“Yes, I really have to go. If I didn’t know it before, I know it now. Now that I schooled those guys in their own patch, every man and his dog will be gunning for me before nightfall. The sooner I make myself scarce, the better.”
Melody put out her hand, but she stopped herself from touching him. “I wish you’d stick around a while. I sure do miss you and the rest of the family.”
He fixed his eyes on her. “I’m leaving, Melody, and I won’t come back. This could be your last chance to get out of here. I can see you’re not happy here. Come home with me. You don’t want to stay here.”
She gave him a sad little smile. “You’re right. I don’t want to stay here, but I will. This is where I belong now. I miss everybody more than you can know, but I won’t come home.”
“What will you do if Foicks and the others attack Midnight Moraine? You could get caught in the middle.”
Melody shook her head. “Don’t make this any harder on me than it has to be. I made my decision, and I’ll stick by it.”
“Maybe Riley could come back with you. You could make your home there just as easily as here. Then it would be Riley living with strangers instead of you.”
“Are you kidding? Walker Cunningham would have Riley’s liver on a plate before he got off the bus, not to mention the whole Mackenzie tribe trying to pay him back for running off with me. At least here no one is trying to kill me. Riley’s safe. You might not understand how anyone could care about that, but I do.”
Azer glanced at Raven. Through his whole conversation with Melody, Raven didn’t venture onto the porch. She wouldn’t come near Riley and Melody’s house, not even to help Melody patch up Azer’s torn, bloody back. “I can understand it. I can understand it probably better than you would believe.”
Melody cocked her head. “Are you really going to be all right? Are both of you?”
Azer sighed. “I have to leave. That’s all I know. I have to leave the same as you have to stay. It might not make sense, but that’s the way it is.”
Melody held out her arms. “I love you. Give my love to all the folks at home.”
Azer hugged her. “Good-bye, Melody. I hope I see you again someday.”
Melody watched Azer and Raven out of sight until the woods swallowed them up. Azer fell in behind Raven, and they ran faster than the wind through the woods, all the way to Burkes Road.
The bus already stood ready behind the station. A line of people waited to board. Azer got his ticket. He looked around the station and fidgeted from one foot to the other. “Well, at least I didn’t miss the bus.”
Raven swallowed hard. “You’ll be all right, won’t you?”
He shrugged. “As all right as can be expected. What about you? Will Caleb give you any trouble?”
“I’m fine, he won’t bother me.”
Azer couldn’t look at her. “I don’t like leaving you in any danger.”
She smacked her lips, and when he looked up, the first tear streaked down her cheek. “I’m in more danger from you leaving than anything else.”
He stared at her face contorted in misery. “Don’t, baby. Please don’t cry.”
Her eyes overflowed, and the tears brimmed over. “I can’t help it. I don’t know what’s the matter with me. I never blubbered like this over any man before. I can’t go back. I don’t know what I’ll do. I can’t live like this. The minute I get home, my family and friends will start trying to hook me up with someone or other, and I never want to look at another man again as long as I live.”
He hugged her head against his chest. Her tears wet his shirt and scarred his skin. “You have to go back. It’s the only place in the world you’ll be safe.”
She sheltered in his arms. “I don’t want you to leave. I know it’s the only way, but it’s killing me. I can’t stand this.”
He murmured into her hair. “I know. I feel the same way, but what can we do? Neither of us can live with the other one’s people. Look how miserable Melody is.”
She sniffed under his arm. “You don’t have to tell me.”
He held her in silence. What could either of them say? A shout went up from the bus. “All aboard!”
He pushed her back. Her fingers clutched at his neck so he had to twist them off. She sobbed in anguish. “No, Azer!”
He kissed her knuckles. Then he laid a quick kiss on her lips. “I love you. Don’t ever forget that. I love you more than anything.”
He didn’t look back. He ran for the bus, handed the driver his ticket, and climbed aboard. Tears burned down Raven’s cheeks, but she could only stand there and watch her future drive away into the sunrise. This was her life crumbling to pieces around her ears. This was all her love and hope and energy gone down the toilet.
Her shoulders heaved with racking sobs, but she couldn’t close her eyes to the tragic reality. He was gone forever, and she would never get him back. He took her life with him and left her dead to the world.
Azer’s face appeared in the bus window. He set his jaw in a firm line and pressed his hand to the glass. The engine roared, the wheels turned, and the bus rolled out of the station. Raven compressed her lips together, but salty tears leaked into her mouth and dripped off her chin.
The bus rounded the first corner, and that was the end of Raven Faulkner’s life.
She had nothing left, not on Midnight Moraine or anywhere else. She had no reason to get up tomorrow morning, no reason to talk to anybody, nothing in the world worth living for.
When the bus vanished around that corner, the last shreds of her resolve disintegrated. She doubled over in choking sobs. She covered her face with her hands and howled all her pain and desolation to the empty street. No one saw her. No one cared.
She left town long before the tears died away. She cut around behind her aunt’s house so she wouldn’t see anyone she knew. She hit the trail, but she didn’t run home. She walked the long weary miles over Midnight Moraine. She had no reason to hurry to meet any preordained destiny waiting for her. Running always made her happy. Nothing made her happier than running with Azer. She would never run with him again, and she didn’t want to be happy. She wanted to die.
A few miles away, the bus rumbled down the road toward the highway. Azer rested his head on his seat back and closed his eyes. The image of Raven sobbing her eyes out was seared into his brain. He’d broken her heart. He’d hurt her far worse than Walker Cunningham or any other Bruin could with guns and knives and clubs.
The bus rolled around curves and bounced over railroad tracks, but a half a mile from Burkes Road, it pulled over on the shoulder. The door opened, and who should jump down the steps but young Azer Mackenzie. He called, “Thanks,” over his shoulder. The driver’s voice drifted through the door before it closed, “Good luck, kid.”
He watched the bus out of sight. The dust cloud blew away in the wind, and the bus turned onto the highway. Azer waved, but as soon as it dwindled to a speck in the distance, he turned on his heel and plunged into the woods. The trees closed over his head, and he set off running, over mountains and dales, on the trail back to town.
Chapter 17
In the dark of night, the little black bear cub lay on the bear-baiting ring floor. The iron shackle around her leg rubbed a welt in her ankle, but at least the place was quiet now. No men or dogs bothered her anymore, but she never moved from her post. She rested her chin on her paws in a catatonic stupor. All the shock and horror of her ordeal destroyed her mind. She couldn’t respond anymore if she wanted to.
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