Taming the Heart (Creatures of the Night Book 2)

by Tisha Wilson

  It would happen to him. It would happen to her too, and it wasn’t fair. He was tired. He was tired to the bone, but he sat up again. Maybe a few more baseline tests and then back to formula. Maybe he would stumble across the answer. Maybe he would have immortality and then go straight to Karen and tell her that he loved her. Maybe he would tell the balance and the protector that they were meant to be together. Maybe.

  Chapter Nine

  “Again!”

  Miranda was breathing hard as she went to retrieve the knife that had gotten lodged in the tree. She was beginning to hate the word again. She positioned her chair at the spot he had marked out and took aim. She stilled her breathing and blocked out all other sounds as she focused on the small red dot painted into the tree. Finally, when she felt grounded, settled, she tossed the blade. It was left of the target, but not by much.

  “Again,” she heard his gruff command.

  “I know,” she said angrily as she wheeled over and took the knife from the wood.

  “Then do it and hit the target.”

  “Won’t I be all… changed when I have to fight the creatures?” she asked as she made her way to the spot yet again. She took a moment to survey the damage done to her gloves. They were nearly split open and there was a bit of blood from handling the daggers.

  “Apparently you are not going to be a hunter all of the time and you are going to have to learn how to defend yourself while you are human as well. Now. Focus.”

  She did as she was told and gave a triumphant cry when she hit her mark.

  “Good. Again.”

  “Is that the only word you know?” she snapped as she went to get the knife.

  He sighed heavily as he waited for her to take her place. She hated when he got frustrated with her. He always took on this same sanctimonious attitude with her. She knew the speech was coming and didn’t have to wait long for it.

  “If you are going to be a hunter you are going to have to be able to defend yourself and innocents. You have to be prepared for any possibility. We don’t yet know what will happen when the wolves are at hand. Do you want to-”

  “Be responsible for the death of innocent people?” she finished for him in that imperious tone he used. He growled at her.

  “Save your bark for someone who doesn’t know you any better,” she snarled back.

  “And you presume to know me so well? There are very few things that are left to me in this world. Being a hunter is one of them. And I would rather-”

  “Feed you to the wolves than have you make a mockery of this,” she finished for him in that same mocking tone.

  “All right. You think this a game. Let us test your readiness to fight for the innocent.”

  She eyed him warily. She gripped the arms of her chair and braced herself. Was he going to kick her out of her chair again? He had done it twice more in the past week, when she hadn’t been expecting it, and she had broken his hip bone and arm in response. They could almost make a list of the things she had broken on him. He crouched down before her so he could look her directly in the face.

  “I want you to think of your sister.”

  “What?”

  “I want you to imagine her. Close your eyes.” She looked at him oddly for a moment before she complied. “I want you to picture her face. I want you to see the color of her eyes, her hair, the way she looked as she smiled at you. I want you to see the lines in her face, feel the love you have for her in your heart.”

  Miranda swallowed back tears as she did what he asked. The image was so real she could reach out and touch it.

  “Now, she is over there behind that tree screaming for your help. I am a creature and I am going to get her.”

  Miranda’s eyes flew open as she heard him moving away. He was fast. She barely had the knife near her ear when he reached the tree. With one even swing he hit the tree so hard it snapped in two and fell with a deafening thud. When the dirt cleared he strode back to her.

  “Do you understand?! Now someone’s life is over, a family is destroyed and all you can do is clean up the mess. We are not gods Miranda, but we must do what we can to make sure that doesn’t happen!”

  He strode away from her making his way towards the cabin. She just sat there for a while looking at the destroyed tree. Her heart was pounding fast and the grief… it was overpowering. He was right. She didn’t want to be a hunter, didn’t feel suited to it, but who ever asked for this? Braden was an experienced hunter, yet he hadn’t been fast enough to save her or Katie.

  She thought that over for a moment. She had asked him why he was helping her, why he had taken her in when he didn’t have to. Did the fact that he hadn’t been fast enough to save them have anything to do with it? Did he feel like it was his fault? He should be old enough to know that he couldn’t have prevented what happened but there it was.

  What would it be like to have so much strength and so many gifts, only to have them fail when someone needed you most? She went to another tree, used the knife to carve out a target. She began tossing the knife again, only this time faster, and with more determination than before. There was no triumph or defeat in this. There was only the fight and she needed to learn how to keep going when she only wanted to give up. For the innocents. For her sister. For Braden.

  She stayed out until dark fell, and even then she kept on. She ate dinner without conversation and by the time she made it to bed she fell in exhausted. She fell asleep with the knowledge that she would get up tomorrow and do it all over again, for Katie.

  * * *

  Forest. Dank, cool, dark, and electrifying. Miranda could feel the earth as she ran through the night. The moon was bright and flashes of silver hung off the leaves and early morning dew. The moon was about to set. She had never seen a moon set before. She made her way to a clearing so she could fully appreciate the majesty of the big orb of silver light sinking behind the horizon.

  She used her senses to guide herself to an area that felt freer, lighter, not so dense. She was naked and it didn’t seem to bother her at all. Her hair was as long as it had ever been in her life. Even as a girl it had been slightly wild and damaged, but right now it was silky and she could feel the wind as it blew through.

  When she finally stepped into the open space she noticed that she was not alone. She walked out into the middle of the moonlight, and he followed her. She waited for him and when he tried to pounce she leapt out of the way. She turned on him and he was crouching. Braden was so handsome as he stood in the moon light. He was as nude as she and as unashamed as she.

  His hair was wild and free with one braid hanging loose from his left temple. His golden blond hair was so stunning. She had never seen anything like it. They circled each other a few times before she allowed him to come to her. They crouched in the grass and he turned her as he grasped the back of her neck. He pulled himself inside of her and it was deep, penetrating… heaven.

  Miranda woke up as an orgasm rippled through her whole body. She looked down to see that Braden had his face between her thighs. He slid one finger out of her as he kissed the soft flesh at the inside of her leg. He had not done that before. Up until today he usually got straight up and headed for the bathroom when she was finished. He seemed to linger longer than usual. Perhaps today, he would finally…

  Her legs went limp with the last of her orgasm. At that exact moment he released her and strode off towards the bathroom. She wanted to scream with frustration. Okay, so she had been shy the first time they had tried this. She was a virgin, what did he expect? That didn’t mean she wanted to spend the rest of her life with nothing but foreplay. She wanted the real thing. But why would he want the real thing?

  She was only here out of some sense of nobility he had, not because he actually wanted her here. Plus he only did what he did in the mornings to keep her from jumping him when her hormones went all wacky. Why would she complain? All he was trying to do was help her. It wasn’t like he would have ever really been interested. Maybe if she was s
till the head cheerleader.

  Back then she had been able to date pretty much any guy that she wanted to. Her fall from grace had been so sudden and so disastrous that it had ruined any confidence she’d had. Apparently her main appeal had been her ability to look cute in a skirt and to cheer her heart out. She had had so much fire and so much drive back then.

  That thought hit her in the head like a sledge hammer. She hurried from bed and dressed. She wheeled herself out to the living room and grabbed her knives. She was about to head outside when she stopped herself. Braden wouldn’t like it if she headed out without him. He seemed to be really strict about his weapons. She wheeled back and pounded on the door.

  “What!” he yelled from the other side of the door. Geesh. What a grump.

  “Hurry up. I want to get started.”

  Her mouth almost watered when he stepped out of the bedroom and his hair was still wet. His new shirts clung to his muscles in a way that made her jealous. With a great effort she waved him towards the door. They were nearly to the front door when he pulled to a halt.

  “But you must eat. Humans eat three times a day do they not?”

  “It won’t hurt me to skip. Come on,” she said as she wheeled over, grabbed his arm and tried to pull him towards the door. She was not very successful.

  “As a rule. I like to make sure my soldiers are fed regularly. It is good to get into a regimented-”

  She rolled her eyes and left him behind as she went over and flung the door open. She rolled outside and he finally followed without further argument. She stopped on the mark he had set out for her a few days prior. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath as she cleared her mind. A cheer came to mind and she used her arms to clap it out.

  “What are you-”

  Before he could finish his statement she had counted out the last of her cheer in her mind and on the last move she pointed, aimed and… the knife hit the mark dead center. He looked from the knife to her and back to the knife. He pulled it out and handed it to her. He was silent this time as she counted it out. Again she hit the mark with dead on accuracy. When she hit the mark three more times without fail he looked to her arms crossed.

  “Okay. I know you stayed behind to practice but…”

  “Like I told you, I was good with flags and batons but most of the time it was counted out and to dance routines. If I can work some of this knife tossing and combat stuff into a few of my old cheer routines I could nail them. I could even make a few new ones of my own.”

  He looked supremely impressed. “A huntress cheerleader. I have lived a long time and I will say that this is the first.”

  “Do you think you can get me to change? If I could get my legs under me I could really-”

  “You already know that if I try when you know I am trying it will not work. We will simply have to keep this in mind. In the mean time we will have to do all that we can the way you are.”

  Braden tapped his chin for a moment. “There is a female hunter down in Peru. I think she uses some type of staff with silver blades at the ends. That would probably be a better close in weapon for you. I don’t see you using any type of sword or blade for the up close kill. Yes. You would be able to twirl a staff the way you needed to to work it into your… routine.”

  She clapped her hands in delight, feeling a glimmer of hope for the first time. Maybe she could do this after all. Braden looked to the heavens and took a deep breath. He was probably praying for patience. She smiled all the more. She would show him a thing or two he had probably never learned before.

  * * *

  Two weeks. It had been two weeks and Braden felt like he’d never been more tortured. The days had followed almost the same pattern every day. She woke in need. He satisfied her need by any means except the one that he really wanted to use. Then he took himself immediately to the bathroom. The first few days a cold shower had done the trick, but now, now he had reverted to masturbation. As far as he knew he hadn’t performed the task since he had been human.

  He would say that he had never done it but was sure that every teenage boy had done it at some point. He took a deep breath and sighed heavily. After the ‘awakening’, they went about their day as if nothing at all had happened. It was getting harder and harder for him to do that though.

  The more she had begun to apply her cheering, the more adept she had become with her knives. It was uncanny how quickly she picked up the concept of using proper weights and balances. She tossed them as well as anyone he’d ever seen. If only she could find some love for the guns.

  Guns were going to be safest for her, especially when she was confined to her chair, but he supposed her appreciation for guns would only really come when they were under fire and she really had to use them. She would get plenty of practice once Alaric began to run the wolves back their way. She was bathing now while he prepared her some pan seared trout. It was a real struggle not to imagine her naked body all soaped up and… Stop, he commanded himself. The tension was so extreme that he had to concentrate to keep from walking around all day as hard as a rock.

  He had managed to get her mad enough to change two more times in the last week and each time he had had to keep himself from chasing her down right there in the woods and taking what he wanted. She was normally beautiful but there was something about the way she moved when she had her legs under her. She was as graceful and fluid as a butterfly. Plus, whenever he got her angry enough to change, she wouldn’t really concentrate on anything but the feeling of nature. He needed more time with her while she was changed in order to help her control it but she was hard to anger and very... playful with him when she was.

  Kicking her out of her chair when her guard was down seemed to work the best but he hated to do that. He hated to see her sprawled out of her chair. It made him have a violent reaction. He wanted to break his own neck. If anyone else dared to push her out of her chair and into the dirt he would have their heart for dinner.

  He plated the fish with some fresh veggies and a baked potato. It had been a long time since he’d had anyone to cook for and he forgot how much he liked it. Food was easy. Food did what you wanted it to every time if you used your nose to guide you. It was people that made things more difficult than they needed to be. The food smelled so good that he made a small plate for himself. It might make his stomach upset later, but it seemed worth it.

  She came out of the bedroom in a pair of soft cotton pajama pants and matching top. He rolled his eyes and heaved a sigh. Ponies, and the shirt read ‘I love ponies.’

  “Is there anything that you don’t love?” he asked as he sat the plates to the table.

  “You’re going to eat too?” she asked as she pulled herself into her chair, ignoring his bluster. People were doing that a lot lately.

  “I like fish sometimes.”

  “Does it… I mean how… when you eat does it…”

  “I can eat food but my body is not nourished by it,” he replied to her unspoken question. He poured them both some wine and sat it near their plates. “You may want to get out of the habit of wearing pajamas.”

  Her mouth fell open in shock as she looked at him. It took him a moment to realize the way she had taken it. Then the most amazing thing happened. He felt a blush creep up his neck.

  “Not like that. I mean you should get used to wearing clothes that you could easily go on the run in when you sleep. Sometimes things happen and you’ll want to be able to move quickly. Running through the woods in what you have on now would be very uncomfortable.”

  “Oh,” she said as she picked up her fork and looked down at her plate. She dug in and he watched her in appreciation. He loved the way that she seemed to absorb everything with such rapture. Especially when she woke and…

  He forced himself to look down at his plate. He took a bite of the trout and tasted the flavors in a way he hadn’t in… forever. Why had he given up cooking and food? He had gotten tired of it he supposed, just as he had gotten tired of so many things abou
t living. That was before Miranda. She made food taste good again. She made him feel passion, life, fear, anguish, everything he had thought dead to him. It was like being reborn in a way. If only she would feel the same way about him.

  If only… what? If only he had met her some other way? It wasn’t likely that she would have ever hung out in the types of bars he haunted when he was looking for a donor. And it wasn’t like he would have looked twice at her if she had. She was pretty in a petite dainty sort of way, but that had never been his type. He would have been more inclined to think he might hurt her, still thought that in fact. He snuck a look at her.

  Her spirit more than made up for her tiny stature. It was as if she were a gravitational force, pulling you in with her smiles and cheerful ways. Even now she was humming while she ate. He had never been one for cheerfulness but there was something about her that just made you want to… smile. You wanted to make her happy and comfortable. She made a man want to protect her, treasure her. He put his fork down and wiped his mouth. He got up and went to the trash bin and was about to scrape it.

  “If you don’t want that…”

  He went to her and scraped his portion off on her plate. It disappeared quickly. She didn’t apologize for her appetite and he was glad of it. Women were always trying to pretend that they didn’t like to eat, but who didn’t enjoy a great tasting meal? It was silly to apologize for eating plenty of good food. He washed his plate and then joined her at the table again.

  She took a sip of her wine and then watched him seriously. He nearly smiled. She had that look on her face. She was about to go into one of her interrogations and he waited patiently.

  “You haven’t been to sleep for days,” she stated plainly.

  He could have denied it but didn’t. “Hunters don’t always have to sleep. We can go for days even weeks without it.”