A small prayer left her mouth before her eyes closed. “When my mate dies allow me to follow him joyfully.”
*~*~*~*
“What the hell just happened?” Caden asked looking at Enzo and Deja on the ground.
All eyes turned to look at Declyn.
“I don’t know.”
“What is she?” Avel asked staring at her like everyone else.
“My mother.” Ven stood in front of them defiantly.
“Stand down Ven. No one is going to hurt them. We’re just trying to figure out what happened here.”
“While you’re trying to figure this out, Enzo is dying.”
“When did you rise, Tristan?”
“I’ve been up for a while now Alpha. I was lying low, but you need me.”
Tristan was the healer, and he was right they needed him.
“You’ll also need me.” Cait came out of the shadows with her mate standing at her side. “I think we should let everyone know our secret, Declyn.”
“Let’s get them into Enzo’s house and then we’ll sort the rest out. Ven check on Mia and the girls. Make sure you let them know that everything is fine, and they can get some rest. The rest of you clean the streets and take care of yourselves. We’ll have a meeting tomorrow Avel.”
He gave a nod of his head. “We will be going; I want to catch any incoming call from the other ship if there is one. We have dead to bury.”
“Thank you, Avel. We’re alive because of you.”
“Maybe, let us hope that we have dodged the Las coming straight at our heads.” The Thalians drifted off carrying the bodies of their brothers and sisters with them.
“Get them into the house.”
“Carry them together,” Cait said before she disappeared inside.
Deja and Enzo were lying in his master bedroom, but no one had moved to do anything since they laid them down.
Ven walked into the room to see them standing around staring. “What’s happening?”
“Nothing, I want to work on your father but I can’t because she has her wing wrapped tightly around him.”
“She is Deja, his mate, and my mother. She claimed me.”
“Mom?” Ven walked to the bed and sat on the edge of it next to Deja. She looked so different from her normal self. She looked like the creatures his mother used to describe to him as a child. The ones that created the universe and could destroy it with a breath.
His hand reached out and touched her face. “Mom, we can’t help dad unless you take your wing away.”
He waited either they were a family, and she would respond, or it had all been a dream that would fall apart.
She opened her eyes and smiled at Ven before she took her wing away. She closed them again and remained unmoving.
“Did you see the color of her eyes?”
“I did.” Xander and Caden left the room.
“I’m telling Cole to open The Wolves’ Den if he hasn’t already.” One of them called back into the room.
“Drinks on the house,” Declyn shouted before the front door closed.
“He should be dead,” Tristan told them as he ran a modified scanner over Enzo.
“She’s holding him to his body.”
“She can’t do that.”
“Then tell me how a human can turn into a creature everyone thought of as a myth? She’s holding him to his body.”
“And how do you know this Cait?”
“I’ve been studying human medicine and have several degrees to prove it. I never thought I would need it, but I wondered since they looked like us on the outside if there was any connection between us.”
“Did you find one?”
“No, I found something else.”
“Something you think explains what we are seeing?”
“Yes, but I need blood and more people like her to be sure.”
“What are you doing?”
He turned his head to look at Declyn. “I’ve been working on this, modifying it so the government can’t trace it. Now’s the time to see if it works. If it doesn’t, he’s dead and so are…”
He turned to stare at Deja never finishing his thought.”
“Give it a try.”
He turned it on and started taking care of the worse of Enzo’s wounds. Several hours later he stepped back.
“All we can do now is wait.”
They nodded and left the room.
“Ven.”
“I’ll stay here Alpha if that is okay with you.” He took a seat in front of the door. “I’ll call if anything happens.”
He pulled his phone out of his pocket and gave them a tired smile.
“I know they will be happy to have you close.”
He was beginning to wonder if they even knew he was here. He had been watching over them for five days, and they hadn’t moved. Tristan grunted every time he was in the room saying Enzo was the same. Cait told him to have faith it would all work out, and he sat in front of the door wondering if he was going to lose the family he just found.
“Ven.” It was soft as if carried on a breath but he heard her call his name. He stood and straightened his shoulders before he opened the door.
Deja was lying under the cover with a smile on her face.
“You’re back.”
“Where did I go?”
“I have to tell Tristan and Cait you're awake then I’ll tell you all about it.”
“Wait can I have some water first?”
“No, not until they say you’re healed.”
He ran out the door before he remembered his phone in his back pocket. He called the healers then Declyn.
“How long has Enzo been out?” She turned to her side to look at him. “I feel sore like somebody beat me up. Did I get into a fight? I remember the Thalians coming after me; I killed them.”
She stopped and stuck the heel of her hand into her mouth and rocked a little.
“I had to Ven. They would have killed me and maybe Jessie and the children.”
He reached down and hugged her not knowing what else to do. She sniffed and hugged him back.
“I killed them. You just wounded them, but we protected our families. War isn’t pretty, and people die.”
“You’re right I just never thought to see a war in my city.”
“Can I get in on some of that love.”
They looked around to see Enzo smiling at them.
“Group hug.” They held onto him tight.
“Casualties?” He looked at Ven.
“We lost four.”
“Declyn?”
“Right here.” He walked into the room.
“You look like hell.”
“If you could see yourself you wouldn’t say that about me. You almost died. You both almost died.”
“I remember falling and nothing else. They were on me, and I lost consciousness quickly. Who saved me?”
“Your mate.”
“You saved me?”
“I love you.” They forgot who was in the room as he pulled her into his arms and kissed her.
Chapter Twenty-six
The Wolves’ Den was closed although it was filled with many of the leaders of the Kur’iks and the remaining Thalians.
“First order of business.”
Amera and Lazaro walked up to Declyn.
“The first order of business,” Amera said smiling, “Is to name our daughter.”
A soft chant went up in their native language as they gave thanks for the second child born to one of them.
“Lazaro and I have talked about her name, and we decided we want to honor Deja. Without her, our child may have died from the things we didn’t know. We are naming her Jade.”
A cheer went up as everyone gave out claps on the back as if they had made the decision.
“Deja and Enzo will also be the Godparents. A tradition on our new planet that she explained to us.”
Enzo went a little grayer as Deja picked up Jade and placed her in his arms.
“You won’t drop her, and one day we will give Ven a sister or a brother so you might as well get some experience now.”
The club filled with laughter putting them at ease.
“Second order of business, Avel.”
“There have been no further communications; we have scanned as far out as we dare and can find no evidence of them closing in on our position.”
“We have also scanned and can’t find any trace of them. At this point, we need to stay watchful but continue our daily affairs. This brings up the third order of business.” Declyn held up a square alien device for everyone to see.
“This is a treaty for peace between the Kur’iks and Thalians on this planet. Everyone has signed this; we even have Jade’s fingerprint. The only person who hasn’t signed it is Deja.” He handed her the device. “It won’t be official until you sign.”
She took it from him. Enzo already read it to her line by line several times since it was written in their language. He even offered to translate it and write it down for her, but she didn’t need that. She understood what it said. Each of them had sworn never to fight against their brothers and to stand as one battalion if any Thalian or Kur’iks came to retrieve them.
She was the only holdout. Not because she was against the treaty. She was all for it. It was the symbolism behind it that bothered her. When she signed, it would say to her and them and even the world if they found out that she was acknowledging to be human and something else. She was admitting to being something more. How did you go from the ordinary girl down the street looking for a job and a good man to date into some huge alien being?
She had tripped and called herself a monster Enzo and Ven came to her defense immediately. She wasn’t a monster, but somehow it looked like she was derived from the beings that colonized the universe that was a lot to deal with at one time.
Cait had a theory, but she wouldn’t share unless more women or men like her showed up. If their nails changed into small daggers and their dentist no longer recognized their teeth, then she would talk.
She looked at the tablet—she called it that because she couldn’t pronounce the name.
“Deja Brown formally signs the Treaty and commits to an alliance with both the Kur’iks and the Thalians.” That fast it was over. She watched as her name was written on the last line and the Treaty went into effect.
There was a cheer in the club and drinks were ordered. She handed the tablet back to Declyn and looked around. The club was filled with her friends, her family. She had gone looking for a job and found a community.
Enzo walked up to her and took her hand, together they walked outside.
“You weren’t expecting any of this when you walked down this street.”
“No, I wasn’t, but have you ever had that feeling like you just don’t fit in? Or asked the question, is there anything else? All my life I felt like I should do more like I could do more. Maybe this is what I was feeling. That part of me that I’ve kept locked in a cage is free now, and she doesn’t scare me anymore.”
“When we first landed here we lived in fear. Fear of your government and fear that our people would come for us. After a while, we just lived moving through each day. Then you came shaking us up. Shaking me up, challenging me. Standing up to the kur’iks in the bar and suddenly we weren’t just making it through each day, we were living and planning. Maybe that’s part of what you were feeling, the need to hurry up and find me.”
“I was definitely feeling that.”
He pulled her into his lap kissing her.
“Is there room for one more?”
“Definitely.” Ven came and sat next to them.
She didn’t know what was going to happen tomorrow, but she was staying with her man who happened to be an alien and her son. They would weather it all together. A happy smile touched her lips when Ven placed his hand on her arm linking the three of them together.
She gazed into the sky a prayer on her lips that she would only ever see stars.
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Love Me Harder Series
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Alien Mates Series
Soul-Bonded to the Alien Book 1
Rylan’s Heart Book 2
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Enzo: The Wolves Den: A BBW Scifi/Paranormal Romance Page 16