~
For three weeks in a row, like clockwork, Kai was waiting for her at the bottom of her family’s massive stair case. He had accompanied her on drug deals and illegal buys and gotten into a few fights for her. Nothing that colored her completely impressed yet, but he had noticed the looks she gave him slowly starting to change.
“I’m getting Titanic vibes like when Rose comes down the stairs and Leo looks on and just knows he’s in love with her now,” Kai sighed dreamily.
“Do you want me to shoot you again. Because I swear to God, I’m not afraid to shed blood in my mother’s house.” Her lip curled at the flowery description of her.
“Under all that psycho, somewhere way deep down in there, there’s a woman who likes to be flattered.” He wagged his finger at her.
“And right on the surface, literally standing directly in front of me, is a man getting ready to be splattered.” She mimicked his finger wag, and he was officially put out.
“Do you own any clothing that doesn’t look like you’re getting ready to go to a beach BBQ?” she asked, reaching the end of the stairs. “Shouldn’t you at least try to look intimidating? I’ve never had a bodyguard who didn’t wear either a black suit or black BDUs and a black t-shirt.”
“Right, and all of those guys are dead, so you’ll have to excuse me if I’m not chomping at the bit to follow the trail they set. Anyone who sees me should be intimidated. I’m usually a head taller than any man I meet and twice as broad. If they decide they want to fuck with someone that much stronger than them, it’s their funeral.” He shrugged, unconcerned. “And how about a reverse question. Snakebite? Do you have any clothes that don’t look like you’re going to a funeral?”
She looked down at her own clothing, seeming mildly offended.
“Just because it’s black doesn’t mean its funeral clothes.” She side-eyed him.
“No, black can be a very sexy color… debatably the sexiest color, but you don’t want to be sexy. You want to be big and bad and scary and for all men to fall to their knees in fear of you.” He certainly hadn’t figured out everything there was to know about her, but that much was evident.
“Correct.” She nodded easily. “I wish I was one of those six feet tall women, but sadly, my growth is stunted.”
“You’re only a little short, and you know, if you were that tall, you would probably be crying about how hard it is to find jeans long enough for you. The grass isn’t always greener on the other side.” He held the door open for her, and they strutted through.
“I don’t give a shit about jeans. I only care about fear,” she corrected him.
“Yes, yes, fear, and blood, and death, and torture, and revenge. I know, you’re a walking sunshine bear, you know?” He rolled his eyes at all of her doom and gloom. How had he gotten a mate so opposite of him?
“Would you be surprised if I told you I used to be as a little girl? My mother forced me to wear nothing but dainty clothes like a doll and spent all her time hovering over me, teaching me manners, and planning my life out for me.” She grimaced, and the look in her eyes was far away, clearly momentarily lost in her past.
Kai held the back seat door open for her and then climbed into the driver’s seat of their heavily reinforced SUV.
“So, what caused the change? You just got so fed up one day you went out and bought a ton of goth clothing and set your dresses on fire?” He laughed but could honestly see her doing that.
“When my older brother was killed, my parents just… fell apart. My mother sort of forgot about me. I think she forgot about herself, too. I started doing whatever I wanted because, for the first time in my life, I didn’t have to do anything. There wasn’t anyone smothering me, or correcting me, or doing things for me. Some days, it was a miracle if she got herself out of bed, so how could she micromanage me? I don’t think I’m a gothic person. I like black because it’s strong and powerful, and when everyone else in my family fell apart, that’s what I needed to be,” she finished her sentence while looking out the window and avoiding his gaze.
He wanted to tell her that he could be strong for her, that she could lean on him, and he could carry her and her family through anything. But that wouldn’t be what she wanted to hear. She might have started being strong out of necessity, but once she started it, she loved it. It made her happy, and ultimately, that’s what he wanted more than anything.
“Well, you’re one of the strongest people I know, and I would be honored to follow you wherever you’ll let me.” He didn’t look back at her or try to make the moment more intimate than it was. She had kicked him in the balls enough to teach him that he would have to let her lead in this dance, so instead he just started the car and took off.
From the rear-view mirror, he stole a glance into the back seat and saw that she was hiding a wide and appreciative smile. He was right about her; no matter how much she hated it, deep down inside, there was a girl wanting to be loved.
~
As the car began moving, Katya tried to ignore the flighty pitter patter of her heartbeat. This Maori mountain of a man had been slowly and deliberately needling his way into her affections. She hated the idea of it but, for some reason, couldn’t stop herself in the moment. It was like loving the feeling of being drunk but knowing you’ll hate the hangover in the morning.
With her life, there was no love, and true loyalty was rare and only created through blood and fear. This man could not understand her world, and while he may have been harder to kill than most, she knew that one day, someone would find a way. That was, of course, if he didn’t betray her first or simply get tired of living in her desolate world and leave for his home.
He and the men he had brought with him were bright and charming and full of love and laughter. She had never seen a group of people like the Maori warriors before. It’s not that they thought life or the tasks that they had been given would be easy, but they didn’t seem to care. If she asked them to spend their entire night digging holes in her backyard, they would know the task was pointless and annoying and a waste of their time, but she knew they would do it with no complaints; and if she listened at her window, she would hear them laughing loudly through the night.
They made fun of each other constantly, but they never got angry or offended. It didn’t make sense to her. They still played and wrestled and joked like children did, but they were grown men who handled their business with brutal efficiency.
There was something magical about Maori men. She wouldn’t admit it out loud, but she had started to believe this with all her heart. It was like their spirits could float, and no matter how hard life and circumstances tried to drag them down, those buoyant spirits would just keep floating to the top, laughing all the way.
Katya and her family were like anchors. Yes, they laughed; and yes, they had fun and even loved; but it was nothing, nothing, like the Maori.
So far, they had worked hard on Kai’s promise of finding out those who had killed her brother. They tracked down trails and tips relentlessly. Those in her father’s cartel had worked hard as well, but they worked hard because they had to for money and for their living. To them, finding her brother’s killer was part of their job, but it wasn’t personal. They didn’t really care. Outside of her blood relatives, the entire cartel was made of strangers who had simply formed an alliance with them and chosen their cartel over others.
The Maori however, worked at this problem like it was their own brother who had been killed, not a stranger’s, and they did it all simply because Kai had asked them to.
She wondered why they worked so hard for him. Maybe he was a king to them or had some sort of ownership over them. But she really couldn’t see that. They didn’t show fear around him. Their allegiance wasn’t forced. This was a labor of love. They loved him, so they worked for him.
The most important question of all, though, was why did he want them to help her? Why did he give a shit about helping her? Why had he come all the way here to become her b
odyguard when he clearly had an empire back home where he happily lived in paradise?
The question gnawed at her, but every time she had brought it to her father’s attention, he brushed her off. He assured her that he had done his own research and that there were no evil intentions.
It still didn’t make sense and still bothered her, but her father had no interest in going any further in the discussion, and neither did Kai. In fact, they both seemed to want to avoid the topic as much as possible, which led her to believe that whatever the reason was, it was something between the two of them.
Maybe the Maori vampires had found themselves in desperate financial times, and her father had offered to bankroll them if they sent their best out to protect his daughter. Money was something they had in abundance and something her father would not mind parting with if it meant finally keeping his daughter truly safe.
“What’s going on in that noggin, Snakebite?” Kai cleared his throat from the front seat, and she realized she had been lost in thought for quite a while back there.
“Just trying to figure things out.” She didn’t really know what else to say. She could just come right out and ask him, but if he was planning something untoward, it wasn’t like he would come right out and confess it.
“You know, life isn’t really all that complicated. It’s people who make it that way. Sun goes up, sun goes down. Tide rolls in, tide rolls out. It gets too cold out, snow falls. It gets too hot, snow melts. Humans are the ones who come in with complex emotions and hard to grasp reasoning.” He looked at her through the rear-view while they waited at a red light.
She nodded her head, understanding what he was trying to say and maybe even feeling a little impressed with it.
Bright lights from an oncoming car blinded her for a moment, and she held her hand up to cover her eyes.
“You buckled in, Snakebite?” he asked calmly from the front seat.
“Yes, why?” she asked confused.
“Okay, hang on for a second,” he said as calmly as if he were putting her phone call on hold.
The massive truck that had just blinded her with its headlights smashed into the front passenger side of the car, narrowly missing her as she was sitting in the middle of the back seat.
Katya screamed as she was jostled around the back seat, and the impact caused them to spin out several times.
“And that’s why I told you I never wanted you sitting in the front with me,” Kai grunted as he dove for the gun under his seat.
Bullets began to erupt, and she lay down in the seat, covering her head.
Get up and help him! Get up and help him! She yelled at herself. Laying here helpless and dying in the backseat was not the way she wanted to go out.
Through the whiplash and cuts from broken glass, she pulled her side piece from her jacket’s inside pocket. The car was still spinning, making her nauseous, but now was not the time for throwing up.
When the car revolved in the direction of the truck again, she took aim and squeezed off a few rounds.
“Good shot, Snakebite!” Kai called from the front seat, seeming utterly unbothered by the situation they were in. “I hit the emergency alarm, so the fam is on the way, no worries.”
As the SUV lazily spun away from the truck, she leaned over and unloaded her dinner on the upholstery.
It was Kai’s turn to take a few shots, but she didn’t have any words of encouragement for him once it was done. With a shaky hand, she wiped her mouth on the back of her jacket sleeve and frowned at the mess she made.
“The thing is totaled anyway; a little bit of upchuck isn’t going to hurt anything now,” he said kindly and added, “Just hang on. I’ll stop us.”
She didn’t have any idea what he meant by, “I’ll stop us,” but she certainly was not expecting him to jump out, grab the door, and dig his feet in until the SUV finally halted.
“Vampires are fucking strong,” she said dumbly, her eyes wide as she watched him pull this off without even breaking a sweat.
“Impressive right?” He waggled his eyebrows at her. “Just do me a favor, and stay down in there. I know you’re gonna want to get out and fight, but you probably need a hospital. And I don’t want to get puke on these shoes, so just let me handle this one, yeah?”
He had been right; she did want to get out and fight and kick the ass of whoever had dared to fuck up her perfectly pleasant evening so far. But she was pretty sure she had a concussion and also pretty sure she would barf again if she tried to move.
Instead of trying to argue with him, she just sat low, her eyes barely over the ledge of the window so that she could just see the fight.
Men with guns jumped out of the bed of the truck – as well as a few from inside of it though they seemed less steady on their feet.
Kai didn’t seem bothered by either the car wreck or the men with guns. He simply pulled the shotgun from the middle of the SUV and double loaded it.
Even with the numbers on their side, she could see the men flinch a little as a nearly seven foot tall, linebacker wide, Maori badass walked around their half decimated SUV and cocked a shotgun.
Bullets flew back and forth from both sides, the difference being that when they hit Kai, he simply jerked back a bit but kept right on double loading and firing off his shotgun. Meanwhile, the other side went down hard, and usually permanently, when they were sprayed with shrapnel.
The thundering roar of motorcycles let her know that Kai’s family was here. Two motorcycles began circling the scene like something out of the Thunder Dome while the third came right up to her door.
“Time for a checkup, I think,” Tama said cheerfully as he wrenched the door open and held out his hand. “Sadly, I’ve only got the motorcycle with me, so you’ll have to hang on while we get there.”
“But Kai…” She looked over nervously in his direction.
“She’ll be right,” he waved nonchalantly in his friend’s direction as they heard another booming shotgun blast.
“What?” Katya blurted, confused at the phrase as he shuffled her off towards the motorcycle.
“It means it’s all good. Off we go,” he insisted. It might have been the middle of the night in Russia, but police had still most likely been called, and by the time they got there, ideally, all parts of their party having been there would be gone.
As they took off, through the gun smoke and debris, she saw his form again, this time walking over to a man on the ground still clutching a gun to his chest. In Russian, the man screamed, calling him a demon, before the shotgun blast splattered him.
Her eyes met his as they flew past, and he did look like a demon. His eyes were glowing, his shoulders heaving with rage. He’d torn his shirt off during the fight, and the blood from the gunshot wounds mixed evilly with his tattooed skin.
Kai, the Maori warrior, was not just the happy clown she had made him out to be. Inside, he held darkness too, and while she froze hers, he clearly set his ablaze.
She shivered hard at the sight of him, but it was not from fear.
~
It was not very often that Kai let his rage out so blatantly. He didn’t normally like to be out of control, with his feelings on display, but he had never had a mate before. His feelings for her could become all-consuming, and when they tried to hurt his, the hatred ate at his flesh like fire until the only thing he could do to calm down was kill them.
They had to die. No one could threaten his mate and live. It was hard for him to calm his breathing, almost like the anger wasn’t satisfied with just their deaths.
He needed to get to the hospital where she was headed, though, so he had to calm the fuck down. She didn’t seem to be hurt when he last saw her, and the car was so heavily reinforced she probably had whiplash at the worst of it, but he couldn’t leave that to chance. His instincts were going haywire.
“Bro, you all good? We’ve got this. Just go,” Ari reassured him, seeing the crazed look on Kai’s face.
“This mate stuff is
crazy. I feel fucked. My emotions are everywhere. My instincts are everywhere. My need to be overprotective is out of control.” Again, Kai tried to calm his breathing so he could take one of their bikes to the hospital to see her. He needed to go, or things would get worse. He didn’t know how he knew that, but he did.
“Sounds disgusting. But again, we’ve got this, so just go on.” Ari shooed him off.
“Before I go…” Kai pulled a blade from his pocket and hacked at one of the dead men on the ground. The easiest way to figure out who these men belonged to would be to match their tattoos up to the local cartels. “When I see you next, tell me who these men belong to, yeah? I think it’s time I started to scare the shit out of some locals and make a name for myself.”
He grabbed one of their bikes, knowing that they could just share the other back to where they were staying.
Speeding down the cold Russian streets, he couldn’t get his mind off of her. She had been so fragile after the impact, so shaky and delicate. Things that she normally hated to be but simply couldn’t help in this case. He had wanted to hold her so badly, to comfort her, and wrap her in his huge protective arms.
She would have hated it, he knew, but he also knew that he would have just let her be angry and dealt with it. In life you had to choose your battles, and comforting her would always be something he chose, no matter how angry it could make her.
The hospital staff tried to stop him as he burst through the doors after her, not really sure how he knew where she was. He could just feel her… everywhere… all-consuming. He had to know that she was okay… had to.
Once he found her room, and she assured the security guards that he was safe to be there, the guards left. For a moment, it seemed like they might want to bother him, but after a few seconds of him staring them down, they relented and fucked off.
“Are you all right?” His voice came out more demanding than he had intended it to.
“Fine, just a little neck pain, no concussion,” she assured him, but he didn’t like how weak her voice sounded.
Immortal Protector: Vampire Mates Page 4