Onyx’s flailing movements diminished. She rolled her eyes, but she could see no way out. She waved her paws into he air, but she made no move to scratch Ebony. Ebony’s teeth met under the skin, and the air stopped moving in Onyx’s throat.
Onyx gave one more pathetic jerk and lay still. Her limbs collapsed on the ground. Ebony held her there, but didn’t move. All of a sudden, the panther jerked, and a curvy young woman took the cat’s place. Ebony sensed the change and shifted at the same moment. The fabric of reality shimmered. Ebony knelt over her sister with her fingers clasped around Onyx’s throat.
Onyx’s eyes widened when she saw her sister glaring down at her. She opened her mouth, but no sound came out. No air moved in her lungs. Ebony bared her teeth. “Don’t you ever let me see you near him again. Do you understand me? Don’t mess with me or him again. I won’t be so understanding next time.”
Onyx didn’t have to nod. Her eyes said it all.
Ebony jerked her hand away. “Get out of here. Leave us alone.”
Onyx hurried away. Ebony held firm until Onyx vanished down the street heading home. Only then did Ebony let her chin fall onto her chest. Jordan came up behind her and laid his hands o her shoulders. “You did good. You were magnificent.”
Ebony let out a shaky breath. “I hope none of my family saw that. I never thought I’d have to fight her. I wish there was some way to make up with her.”
“If they saw you, they’d be proud of you. I know I am. You deserve to hold your head up after that. I’ve got goosebumps all over from watching you. I’ve never seen a fight like that.”
She leaned against his protective bulk. She closed her eyes, but she couldn’t find any solace from what she’d done. She’d crossed an invisible border. She couldn’t go back. She’d done what she set out to do. She’d schooled her sister. Onyx would never bother her or Jordan again. So, why did Ebony feel so rotten?
Jordan massaged her shoulders and kissed her hair. “Come on. I think I better walk you home.”
She let him take her hand, and they wound their way through the streets to Ebony’s house. She stole furtive glances around. She didn’t want to see Onyx again, but she had no choice but to go inside to the room they shared. The sooner Jordan worked out another place for them to live, the better.
Jordan turned her around at the gate and kissed her on the forehead. “It’s gonna be all right. You’re a champion. You’re a warrior. You earned her blood.”
She sighed. “Yeah.”
He pressed her knuckles to his lips. “Did she hurt you?”
“No. I’m just sad, is all.”
“Whatever you do, don’t apologize to her for what you did. You make her come crawling to you. Make her apologize. If she’s too ashamed to bite the bullet, it’s her own fault. She deliberately provoked you, and she attacked me. The whole Moraine would turn against her for fighting panther against man. Everybody knows that’s not fair.”
Ebony looked away. “I wish it never happened. I wish somehow we hadn’t met her coming out of your house.”
“It would have happened one way or the other, if not today, then another day. She’s been working overtime to provoke you. I’m glad it happened now. Now we can move forward without worrying about her. I wish I could say the same thing.”
Ebony’s head shot up. “What do you mean?”
“I still have my pop and Hunter to deal with. I hope to high heaven neither of them challenges me. I don’t know if I could beat my pop in a fight, and I sure as eggs don’t want to fight Hunter. That would be my worst nightmare.”
“You would be fine.”
“I hope it never comes to that. I love ‘em too much. I don’t know if I could hold my own the way you did.”
“I’m sure you would. Once you shift and start fighting, the blood lust takes over. You’re a panther, just like the rest of us. I saw that when you attacked Hunter last time. You held your own then.”
“I hope you’re right. Now, go inside. I’ll see you later.”
She kissed him. “I love you. I love you forever.”
He held her close. “We’ll never be apart. We’ll always come back together. No one can keep us apart, not even in death. You’re part of me. I’ll carry you, no matter where I go. I’ll carry you here.” He lay her hand on his chest where his heartbeat drummed so strong and steady.
She squeezed his hand and broke away. “Bye.”
He kissed his fingertips and blew her a kiss. He just started to turn away when a motor revving drew both their attention to the shed behind the house. They turned around at the tame moment to see the shed door slide back.
There was Cole with a dozen of his buddies. Cole leaned on a truck’s fender with a shotgun over one shoulder and double holsters hanging off his hips. A Bowie knife stuck out of his belt. All the men bristled with weapons.
Cole directed two men to the truck’s tailgate. They dropped the tailgate and started rifling through crates and boxes. Fuel canisters, water jugs, and steel locking ammo crates piled under a tarp to mound over the pick-up’s sides.
Ebony gasped, but she kept her voice below a whisper. “Look! They’re moving out. They’re getting ready to invade Bruins’ Peak.”
Jordan sighed. “Dang. We’re too late. Nothing can stop them now.”
Ebony looked everywhere. “We have to stop them. We have to do something…”
He set his hand on her arm and murmured into her ear, “Don’t bother.”
She spun around to confront him. “How can you say that? How can you stand by and let them do this?”
He shook his head, but he didn’t take his eyes off the men. “They made their choice. I tried to talk them out of it, and they turned against me. I thought they were my friends, but they don’t want that anymore.”
“But they’ll attack defenseless women and children. You don’t know how many people they’ll kill.”
A sad smile touched his lips. “They won’t kill anybody, or if they do, they’ll kill very few before the Bruins stop them. Don’t you remember what Melody told us about that wedding? The Bruins have as many guns and rounds of ammo as these guys, and they’re bears. I mean, they’re bears. These guys can’t win. I feel sorry for them, you know? I care about them, but I doubt many of them will come back alive. I would be surprised if any of them came back alive.”
Ebony’s shoulders drooped. “Then it really is hopeless.”
“I’m afraid so.” He took her hand and turned her away. “Come on. I already told them what I think, and not many people think the way I do. Of those that do, no one else will stand up to them. There’s nothing we can do.”
Chapter 13
Jordan cast one last glance over his shoulder at the men clustered around the shed. Something didn’t sit right with him. Cole and his friends uncovered one truck after another loaded to the gills with every kind of hunting, camping, fighting, and general mayhem equipment. Jordan frowned and humphed under his breath.
“What is it?” Ebony asked.
“I don’t see Hunter anywhere.”
Ebony snorted. “I’m not surprised. He has to catch up on sleep after his wild night with Onyx.”
“Are you kidding? He doesn’t need to catch up on sleep after a wild week or two with three or four women at once. You know that. I wonder why he’s not there. I don’t like it. Something’s not right. I’ve got a bad feeling about this.”
“Maybe he’s doing something different for them. Maybe he’s gathering more somewhere else and will meet up with them another time.”
Jordan shrugged. “Yeah. Maybe.”
“Maybe he changed his mind. You never know. We could get lucky.”
Jordan shook his head. “He didn’t.”
She put her arms around his neck to kiss him. “It’s gonna be okay. Don’t worry about Hunter.”
“I can’t help it. I don’t want to see him gunned down over nothing.”
She pushed him away. “Go home. He’ll turn up.”
J
ordan nodded and headed down the street. He didn’t see Ebony linger at her front door to watch him out of sight. His mind turned on a dozen things, but mostly he surveyed the houses on both sides. Where could he take Ebony to live? None of these houses offered him sanctuary anymore. All he ever did was love her. Now he was outcast among his own people.
He could understand Raven running off the way she did. No one in their right mind would want to live around a bunch of hostile people, even if they were your own flesh and blood. She might have mated with an alien, but the Faulkners and the Archers acted like Jordan and Ebony had done the same thing.
Jordan paused around the corner. His eye rested on a bare patch of dirt between the Archer family home and the dense forest beyond. No one used that piece of ground for anything. Maybe Ebony’s father would let Jordan build a cabin on it. It couldn’t hurt to ask. The worst he could do was say no, and then Jordan would be back to square one.
He continued on his way, and a whistle came to his lips. He would plaster the inside walls and whitewash them. He would make it pretty for Ebony, with lots of windows to let in the light. She would hang white cotton curtains around the windows, and they would flutter in the summer breeze. Jordan would come home from work and find her humming to herself in the kitchen. He would kick off his shoes, and the two of them would settle into a comfortable domestic routine.
What could be better than that? No man could function in life without a woman at the hearth. Her contended smile lit up his life. That bright dream kept him putting one foot in front of the other. It kept his hopes alive even when all else looked black.
He plotted the lay-out of the house and the furnishings. He planned the building project and where he would get the furniture. He even decided how to keep it secret until the last moment so he could surprise her. Peace and happiness waited for them somewhere around the next corner. All he had to do was get there. He had to get there in one piece, and so did she.
He turned his feet toward home with a spring in his step when the whistle died on his lips. His hand rested on the gate still open behind him when he spotted Hunter coming out of the house. Jordan froze, but Hunter walked right up to him. “I’ve been waiting for you.”
Jordan’s spine prickled. His cat awareness sensed danger. “What do you want?”
Hunter jerked his chin at Jordan. “I challenge you, claw to claw.”
Jordan’s eyes flew wide open. “Challenge me! For what? I haven’t got anything.”
Hunter leveled his eyes at Jordan. “For Ebony.”
Jordan’s jaw dropped. “Ebony!” A moment later, he swelled out his shoulders and faced his brother. “You want Ebony? You can’t have her.”
Hunter shook his head, but he didn’t back down. “I don’t want to mate with her. I challenge you to release her. If I win, Ebony will become fluid again, and you two will forget all about mating for life. You won’t mention it again, and you won’t try to convince any other Midnight to do it.”
Jordan stared at his brother in blank incomprehension. Hunter couldn’t mean this. He couldn’t seriously expect Ebony to turn fluid again, just because Hunter won some stupid challenge.
His surprise turned to rage. He bared his teeth, and his fists curled into iron knots. “I will never turn my back on Ebony, and I will never stop trying to convince other Midnight to mate for life. As long as I’ve got breath in my body, I’ll go on loving Ebony. I’ll fight you to the death, but I’ll never give her up.”
Hunter nodded. “How did I know you would say that? Come on. There’s no time like the present.”
Hunter turned away, but Jordan yanked him back. “Where do you think you’re going? You can’t drop a bomb like that and walk away. You want my claws, come and get ‘em.”
Hunter didn’t try to pull out of Jordan’s grasp. “We’re not fighting here.”
“Where, then?”
“Rocky Point.”
Jordan rocked back on his heels. Rocky Point! Hunter couldn’t mean this, but the direct gaze in his face told Jordan he couldn’t be more serious.
Hunter gave him a brief nod and walked away into the forest. Jordan had no choice but to follow. Rocky Point! They were going to Rocky Point! They would fight to the death, claw against claw, at Rocky Point?
No one had been to Rocky Point since long before Jordan and Hunter were born. No one fought challenges at Rocky Point unless they wanted to decide some major issue affecting all Midnight everywhere. Midnight fought out challenges at Rocky Point to decide who would take contested Alpha positions, to settle burning questions of life and death no one could solve any other way.
Hunter wanted to fight at Rocky Point? He wanted to settle the whole question of mating for life, once and for all, for all Midnight. If Hunter won, the Midnight would remain fluid. Those couples already mated for life would become outcast if they didn’t give up their mates. Jordan would have no choice but to keep his mouth shut around Midnight Moraine from now on. If Jordan won, Hunter would have to pull his head in—if he survived.
Jordan strode through the forest, but he couldn’t feel his wooden legs thud on the ground. He kept Hunter in sight, but he didn’t want to go to Rocky Point. He didn’t want to fight Hunter at all, and he certainly didn’t want to fight for every Midnight’s right to mate for life.
How did he become a firebrand for this issue taking the Moraine by storm? He never asked for this. He only wanted Ebony, to love her and protect her and give her a nice home. What could be wrong with that?
The hill climbed up the Moraine. The trees still blocked out the sky, but in a few minutes, they would part. They would open on the rocky mountaintop. Hunter would turn around, and Jordan wouldn’t be able to back down.
He couldn’t back down if he wanted to, anyway. Hunter challenged him. Jordan couldn’t live on this mountain if he didn’t answer that challenge. Every step got harder until he dragged his feet. He forced his body through some thick substance that hauled his limbs backward. How could he fight his own brother?
The trees thinned, one by one. The sun twinkled on the rocks high above. A hawk keened and tilted on the wind. The whole mountain range spread out beyond the trees.
Hunter strode along the broken ridge line. He picked his way over boulders to the farthest pinnacle overlooking the wide horizon. Thousands of miles of forested mountains dotted one behind the other as far as the eye could see. Over there, Renegade Ridge jutted into the air between a dozen sheer monoliths. Bruins’ Peak stabbed the sky in the far distance.
Hunter turned a complete circle until his eyes locked on Jordan where he still hung back under the trees. Jordan read the challenge in Hunter’s eyes. Was he going to come out and meet Hunter, claw against claw, or was he going to cower in the woods for protection?
Jordan would have backed down if a different thought hadn’t popped into his head at that moment: Ebony. She lay on the other side of this fight. He was fighting for her—not to keep her for himself. He already had her, heart and soul. He was fighting for the right to declare his love for her to the world. He fought for their future together, for the same recognition of their bond and their commitment every Midnight deserved.
At that moment, he accepted the burden thrust upon him. So, all Midnight wanted to mate for life? They needed him to fight for them? Okay. He would do it. If getting through this fight gave every Midnight the chance to experience the kind of love and happiness he got from Ebony, he would do it. He would die for that, and he would die happy.
He strode the rest of the way through the trees. He didn’t have to look where he put his feet. He kept his eyes on his brother’s face. Nothing else mattered. He would rise to this challenge, and he would conquer.
Chapter 14
Ebony collapsed on her bed. Her eyelids weighed a ton, but she couldn’t rest. She spent part of a day and one night with Jordan in the glade, and their tryst cost her more energy than three weeks with him and Hunter before they mated for life.
How could loving one man drai
n her of all her vital energy? She couldn’t go on and on for days the way she used to. It meant too much. Every touch of his fingers on her skin blasted her apart until she couldn’t bear it. Every look in his eyes made her want to cry, it hurt so much.
She gazed out the window, but she didn’t see anything. She didn’t feel anything except her own battered heart. He split her in half and filled her with himself so nothing else fit in her life. Ebony didn’t care if Onyx came back with her mouth full of nasty words. Ebony didn’t care what her parents and brothers and cousins and neighbors said. Nothing existed but Jordan.
His face hung before her eyes the same way it did when he kissed her. His eyes searched her soul. They excited her and completed her in impossible ways. She mated with him for life in that glade, and they would never go back.
What would happen to them? How long did she have to live here in her parents’ house before she could get away? How long before she could spend every waking minute with him in their own place?
He said they couldn’t live in the glade, but that’s exactly what she wanted. She wanted a place all to themselves, the way Riley and Melody had their cabin. Where could they find that place? Midnight packed every house on the Moraine with large extended clan groups. Mates came and went. Couples shared rooms and partners. Jordan and Ebony couldn’t live like that anymore.
Wherever they lived, it would happen. She could rest in that certainty now. She returned to her family home now, but this wouldn’t last. They would find a place, and they would leave together. Maybe they would leave Midnight Moraine altogether.
Her heart broke at the thought of leaving her family, her people, but even that didn’t matter anymore. Nothing mattered but being with Jordan, every hour of every day.
Ebony curled into a fetal ball. She hugged her knees against her chest. The sun flickered outside her window, and her eyes started to close. She could rest now. She could sleep and wake up refreshed.
She tucked her chin behind her knees and tugged a blanket toward her from the bed when a crash startled her awake. She sat up just as Melody Mackenzie burst into the room. The door slammed aside. “Quick, Ebony! Get up!”
Bruins Peak Bears Box Set (Volume II) Page 46