by M. L. Briers
“Don’t growl at her. I was leaving.” Kerry didn’t get the sniggered laughter that came from his brother, somewhere behind him. “I’m not a prisoner here, am I?” She demanded, still frantically trying to clear the water from her lashes only for more to appear. “I can leave when I want.” She added. Feeling the wind ease and the rain cease as the quietness of the house engulfed them.
Isaac resisted the urge to growl out again. He’d already done it far too many times and she’d picked up on it. He’d rather not explain his growling to her right now. Not when his beast was still so rampant within him.
“Get a damn towel.” He held the growling in check as he issued the order to his sister and she scampered away. A moment later she was back with a large bath sheet and he went to wipe the water from his mates face. Joel coughed loudly and Isaac’s eyes flicked towards him.
“You have a little something on your…” He motioned towards his own fangs and Isaac balked. He cleared his throat and made sure his fangs were all the way up before he gently wiped the water from Kerry’s eyes. She looked like a drowned rat, and if he hadn’t of been so damn mad he might have laughed at the sight of her.
Kerry snatched at the towel and buried her face within it. Rubbing away the rainwater that annoyed her so and pushing her dripping hair back away from her face. She lifted her head and blinked a few times like a set of windscreen wipers getting the last of the water from her eyes and clearing her vision.
She kind of wished she hadn’t. He looked mad. Damn mad. His eyes weren’t that milk chocolaty brown anymore, they weren’t even the dark chocolate brown, they were close to black. It was almost as if his iris’s had taken a back seat to his pupil’s, and the frown on his face, well scowl, had drawn those black eyebrows down so far that all she could see were those black eyes poking out, no lids. Boy did he look pissed.
“Don’t scowl at me like that.” Kerry was on the defensive in a heartbeat. She could see his lips getting thinner by the second, and he was doing that breathing down his nose thing again like a horse.
“Are- you- trying- to- get- yourself- killed.” He breathed his words between hard breaths that he forced down his nose, and she couldn’t help the rush to annoyance to give him more than a mouthful that surged through her system. Her irk gene was on butthole overload and he was the butthole.
“Yes.” She nodded her head just once, but it was emphatically and she saw the shock in his eyes and the surprise on his face as he glared down at her. Oh, but she wasn’t done. “I thought I’d try it once to see what it felt like.” For a long moment it didn’t register in his brain and then his scowl turned to annoyance and he pulled his head back on his neck and rolled his eyes.
“Give me strength…” He bit out between the teeth he was now grinding together. The sound of a masculine and feminine chuckle swept to her ears from around them, but it didn’t dissuade her or encourage her either way. She was about ready to tell this man exactly what she thought of his bombastic attitude…
“First I thought, let’s throw myself into a hole in the ground, because that sounds like fun…” Kerry shoved the towel towards him and he grabbed at it, the frown back on his face again. “And then I thought, why don’t I go out in a storm and have the tree throw a branch at me…” There were more sniggers, but not from him. The more she talked the more he seethed. “Maybe I’ll walk outside, drop my skirt, shove my backside in the air and stick a lightning rod up my ars…”
“Ok. Fine. That’s enough.” He was back to growling again. He thrust the towel back towards her and looked over her head towards his sister. “Get her some clothes and show her the bathroom in my room, before I say something I’m not likely to regret, but she is.” Isaac strolled away in the opposite direction to where he knew she was going to go. Right now he was madder than hell and his wolf was baying for him to show some dominance towards their mate.
“She’s full of spirit.” Joel announced from a couple of paces behind him. Isaac spun on his heels and by the time Joel realised what was happening he’d already walked into Isaac’s fist. Isaac hit him and he hit the floor. Both men growled long and hard. Isaac in sheer relief at the release of his built up tension and Joel because he’d just been sucker punched in the face.
“Women!” Isaac growled long and hard. His hands were still balled at his sides in white knuckle fists and he had the very real desire to hit someone again, namely Joel, which was one of the reasons his brother kept his backside firmly on the floor. Damn, but he felt the urge to shift and go for a ten mile run just to break a good sweat and calm the beast within.
“Can’t live with them, can’t… not when they are your mate.” Joel offered unhelpfully and his Alpha growled down at him again.
“You’re not funny!” Isaac snapped. Turning on his heels and pacing away from Joel. Joel went to push up from the floor, but his brother spun around and paced back towards him. Joel let his backside down to the floor again, still not willing to be in arms length of his brother again so soon.
“You need to calm your beast, Isaac.” Joel offered as Isaac spun on his heels again and paced back the other way. Breathing down his nose like a demon and mumbling dark curses under his breath.
“Twice.” He announced like it was a Eureka moment. “Twice that woman has come close to death today…”
“By that woman I’m guessing you mean your beloved?” Joel leaned back against the wall as Isaac spun again and started towards him. Fire burned in his dark eyes as he glared down.
“My mate.” He announced as if it was an alien concept all of a sudden. “She’s a damn disaster waiting to happen.” He chuckled with the irony of it. He’d waited this long to find his mate and she was cursed with bad luck. “At this rate, she’s unlikely to survive the damn night.”
“Which night would that be? Tonight, or the mating night, or is tonight the mating night?” Joel teased, he even added a small smug grin just to twist the knife a little and his brother growled another warning.
“Hell’s fire, but the woman is cursed.” Isaac stopped dead in his tracks and scowled down at his brother. “We need a witch!”
“One mate isn’t enough for you?” Joel chuckled to himself as his brother rolled his eyes to the ceiling and then down to him.
“To break the curse.” Isaac explained it to him like he was five.
“So she’s cursed, well that explains her being your mate…” Joel moved fast when his brother came for him. Spinning sideways and launching himself up from his hands and knees off the floor, he ducked into the first doorway and across the living room in record time, even for him, as Isaac followed on another growl of annoyance.
Joel stopped and held up his hands in front of him in mock surrender, but the gleam in his eye and the smile on his face was still there. “I’m warning you, Joel.”
“I get it. You’re worried, but a witch, Isaac?” Joel tossed his hands up in the air.
“Who’s a witch?” The velvety tones of the Vampire filled the room and made Isaac growl all the more. Not because he was a Vampire, but because somehow he didn’t think the Vampire was here by chance.
“Tell me you didn’t call Count Dracula…” Isaac raised just one pleading eyebrow at his brother. He didn’t believe that Joel could stoop so damn low as to bring the Vampire to their door, and yet from the way Joel’s smile spread across his face he knew he had. “Damn it, Joel. She’s human.”
“And that reminds me, I missed lunch.” Tobin watched the Alpha’s head twist around on his neck until he looked like a damn owl. With a quick, smug smile, he waved a hand in dismissal of his concerns. “Now don’t go getting all territorial, Alpha. I prefer Fae blood as you well know.”
“Lucy?” Joel thought the old witch was just a little to set in her ways to be offering the Vampire her blood.
“God, no!” Tobin looked suitably horrified by that remark. “I hate to think what spell that woman would cast if I so much as showed some fang around her. I value my life and my balls and i
f she didn’t stake one she’d certain stake the other.” Tobin gave a theatrical shiver.
“That I’d pay good money to see.” Isaac growled at his friend. The not-so-subtle grin that swept over Tobin’s face was a cross between devilishly evil and devilishly roguish, either way there was definitely the devil in him. Just the way he liked it.
“Olivia.” Tobin announced. Ignoring the Alpha with words and just giving him a vague nod of his head in response.
“Olivia, who’s Olivia?” Joel thought he knew everyone on the Isle. Obviously not. How had a witch come to their home and not sought out the Alpha?
“She’s a guest of mine. I brought her back with me from the mainland last week…”
“Of her own free will?” Joel shot back. Tobin didn’t look impressed.
“Unlike you, Joel. I don’t have a problem securing company. And this company is very…tasty.” Tobin dropped down onto the sofa with a little less grace than he normally showed.
“And it looks like the little witch is wearing you out.” Joel chuckled.
“Why are you here, Tobin?” Isaac demanded as Tobin went to open his mouth and give the Beta yet another comeback.
“He called me.” He pointed an accusing finger towards the Beta and watched as Isaac turned towards his brother looking fit to kill. Joel swallowed hard and took a step back. His hands were out in front of him again and he gave a small chuckle.
“Now hold onto to that thought of pounding me into the floor for one moment while I explain.” Joel knew he was wasting time, but he was sure his brother would already have launched himself across the room at him by now if he hadn’t.
“Make it fast and make it good…” Isaac warned.
“I said I would be there to defend your mate with my life. And I thought what better way, if things went wrong, to stop that from happening than have Tobin wipe her a clean slate so you can start again. Kind of a groundhog day for mates, you get to do it over and over until you get it right.” He held his hands out like a magician waiting for the praise at the end of a magic trick and Isaac held his ground on a low growl of consideration.
“That’s not a bad idea…” He admitted, twisting his head and thinking about it some more. “Could work.” He agreed and scratched at his head as if he had an absent itch.
“Settled then.” Tobin rubbed his hands together with glee. He just loved to watch the mating ritual from up close. It was always so intriguing. Never having found his own mate, he’d never had to suffer through it himself, but he did enjoy watching the angst of others.
“I still need a witch to break the curse.” Isaac looked down at Tobin expectantly.
“What damn curse?” Tobin shot out the side of his mouth towards the Beta.
“He thinks his mate is cursed.” Joel gave a shrug off his shoulders and rolled his eyes.
“First she fell through the earth at Craggy Point…” Isaac informed Tobin and the Vampire sneered in disbelief.
“Who goes to Craggy Point, is she insane?” Isaac growled a warning again, but Joel nodded in agreement with that assessment.
“Then the damn tree falls down right on top of her…or would have been if I hadn’t of grabbed her.”
“A tree?” Tobin’s smile grew slowly across his face.
“Yes, a damn tree. The one in the driveway.” Isaac looked at the Vampire as if he was an idiot. Surely the Vampire could see that his mate was cursed, especially as he spent so much of his time with witches.
“Oh.” Tobin said, not committing himself either way as he looked to the Beta for his response. Joel just shrugged again. “Hmm, and how did this mysterious tree just fall on her?” Tobin knew. He’d seen the scorch marks from the lightening strike himself.
“The lightning hit it, but that’s not the point…” Isaac lifted his index finger to make his point, but Tobin cut him off.
“Perhaps the fact that she was stupid…” He heard the low growl and corrected himself. “Unwise enough to be out at Craggy Point was the reason she fell through the ground, and I don’t think you can class a lightning strike as a cursed experience.” Tobin took a long moment to consider his words and then nodded his agreement at his summation.
“Well a witch couldn’t hurt.” Isaac spat out. Cursed or not the woman was having a run of bad luck, a little blessing here and there couldn’t do any more damage to the situation could it?
“Well that all depends what the witch is into.” The devilishly rogue smile was back on the Vampire’s face and Isaac groaned out a long growl this time as he turned on his heels and tossed himself down into the armchair. He was surrounded by idiots. And cursed women.
“Look, if it’ll make you feel better, when the storm ends I’ll go and fetch Olivia.” Tobin offered, slightly reluctantly. He didn’t like to share, but needs must.
“Thank you.” The Alpha shot back sarcastically and Tobin nodded.
Kerry stepped out from under the shower and wrapped her body in the soft warmth of the oversized bath towel. She thought she’d seen enough water today, but the shower was actually a welcome relief to her body. Her shoulder and ribs still protested the movement of something as simple as wrapping the towel around her, and yet they had eased a lot after the warmth of the spray. She much preferred being under that kind of shower than the one she’d experience outside.
There were storms and then there were storms. That was a storm and a half. When this part of the country did rain, it really did rain. It was like standing in the firing line of a coach load of elderly people with confetti at a wedding. If there were such things as Angels, she’d expected that they had been standing with buckets tossing that water down on her. But the tree? Well, she doubted Angels would be chucking around lightning bolts into poor unsuspecting trees.
This break wasn’t turning out to be anything like she’d imagined it to be. Firstly, she didn’t feel so bloody relaxed and carefree as she thought she would. Secondly, she missed home, well, not home, but a good Latte wouldn’t go a miss to steady her nerves, or give her a boost, one way or the other she missed coffee. Perhaps it was time to cut her losses and head home?
Sleep, she craved sleep. Now she knew what it was like to be an insomniac. Maybe tonight she should put on the radio in the background. If only they had a radio station dedicated to idiots hitting their car horns and cat fights she’d be sleeping like Snow White in no time, minus the apple of course, unless Mother Nature was planning to poison her fruit too. Maybe she shouldn’t eat any more apples while she was here.
She frowned into the steam that covered the mirror. Wiping over it with the palm of her hand she noted the way her eyes had slight bags beneath them, unheard of in the city, she always got a decent night’s sleep. Right now she didn’t care two figs and a hoot about how she looked, she told herself as she pinched a little colour into her cheeks and smoothed over the bags with her fingertips, except, maybe she did. No, she didn’t, she told herself with an affirmative nod of her head.
Turning on her heels she pulled open the connecting door to the bedroom, and made sure the bedroom door itself was firmly closed before she headed over towards the bed and the pile of fresh clothes that Verna had left there for her. Why should she care what he thought of her…? Him of the scowling angry looks, and the sexy puppy dog eyes… Kerry gave a snort of contempt. The man was infuriating. Not only infuriating but… different. He growled for god’s sake. Who growled?
She opened the front of the towel and tried to get some kind of grip on it with her lame shoulder, stretching her arms out to the side, she very gently moved the towel from side to side to dry her back, and that’s how she stayed when the door to the bedroom was thrust open and Isaac’s eyes took her in from head to toe. Caught in the intensity of his gaze, Kerry froze in place, arms out wide and as naked as the day was long.
Isaac came to a complete halt as if he’d hit an invisible brick wall. His jaw slipped open, his eyes widened and she was sure that he was drooling… and growling!
CHAPTER F
OUR
The high pitched shriek that came from her lips made him wince in pain. Snapping his mouth closed and slapping his hands over his ears, Isaac recoiled from the sound of his mate’s obvious distress. In a heartbeat he’d backtracked his steps inside the room, took a command decision to risk his hearing as she continued to shriek, and he reached for the door and slammed it closed in his own face. Blocking out the tantalising view he had of her naked body, but putting a small buffer between her shrieking and his possible loss of hearing.
His brother and the Vampire were at his side in an instant, both looking perplexed as they looked from the closed door to him and back again. If she was in any danger then why wasn’t he inside protecting her? If she wasn’t in danger then why was she shrieking? And why were they all standing there wincing with the still deafening shrieks coming from the bedroom when nobody seemed to be in danger?
“Bloody hell’s bell’s it’s like the wailing cry of a banshee.” Joel gave out trying to figure it all out and shook his head in amusement.
“Spider?” Tobin offered towards the Alpha and the man growled long and hard.
“She was naked…” Isaac shrugged his shoulders innocently.
“Score.” Joel grinned. The Alpha growled in annoyance and he shrugged an apology.
“Do you think she’s going to stop shrieking any time soon?” Tobin asked with amused innocence as all three of them stood there staring at the closed door. Isaac just shook his head in quiet disbelief. How could anyone be so guarded about their body? It was a beautiful body, a body he couldn’t wait to explore, touch, feel, lick… Damn, he ached for her. He adjusted the proof at his groin and cleared his throat.
“Humans are… strange.” Isaac had considered his words carefully, but that was what he came up with. The sound of silence greeted their ears and they all took a moment to look at each other. Hopeful it was over.