Amber

by Sherry Foster

  The car slowed down to make the turn and soon was speeding away. She limped back to the edge of the road and started walking again. Her foot had started bleeding more and her pace was slower than before. She could feel every one of the tiny rocks on the edge of the road and she was certain she had stepped on at least half of them. She heard something in shrubs beside the road so she paused to listen and about that time she heard another car coming. She limped off the road and huddled down behind some brush and waited for the car to pass. But after the car was out of hearing she still hadn’t managed to convince herself to get up.

  Before she could give herself a stern talking about her responsibilities to her parents, friends, pack, future mate, and especially herself she heard a twig snap. She jerked her head up from examining her feet and trying to brush the debris from the abrasions and found herself staring into the face of a wolf. She screamed and scooted backward on her butt. The strange wolf did not follow, instead he tilted his head to the side and stared at her before he raised his muzzle. She saw his nostrils widen as he sniffed the air. He paced forward, which caused another squeak and another attempt to shuffle backward away from him. When he stopped abruptly and sat on his haunches she stopped moving. She could feel her heart racing and fear should have been bursting from her in waves but she didn’t feel afraid. Not as much as she thought she should. She looked to the side for a stick or a rock or anything she could use to protect herself but found nothing.

  The wolf approached again and this time she stood her ground, if sitting on your arse and not moving could be considered holding your ground. She barely breathed as the stranger got closer until he was within reach. His nose touched her arm just as she felt his wet tongue swipe out an lick her.

  She jerked her arm away, “eww, gross. Bad wolf. Bad wolf.”

  The wolf abruptly shifted into a man who sat on the ground beside her laughing. “He said he is not a bad wolf, he is a good wolf.” He grimaced and shook his head before his face broke into a grin. “He actually said he is a great and fierce wolf, defender of females and, well he is currently on a roll. We will be here all day if I just start repeating him. While I believe it to be a beautiful day, we do have a storm moving in, and while the scenery isn’t bad, it is a bit far for you to be out here. So what are you doing out here alone? Didn’t anyone ever tell you the world is not a safe place for a young female to be wandering around? Especially a young female shifter. You are bleeding, I see bruises, and I smell the taint of terror on your skin. Tell me little one, where did you come from and where are you going? And almost as important is, who did this to you?”

  “It doesn’t matter. I am not lost you know. I just had a bit of an accident. Do you have a phone I could, no, I guess you wouldn’t, not since you approached on four feet.”

  He sniffed again, “Too young to shift so telling you to shift and follow me is out. My wolf can’t carry you, and you are not walking with your feet like that but we do need to get you off the highway before the wrong type of male finds you. Now, what would you suggest we do?”

  “Me? I don’t understand? If you don’t have a phone you can’t help me.”

  “Well, I can’t very well leave you here. Not bruised and battered with no shoes. So what would you like me to do? I can carry you to my house, which isn’t far or I can carry you till I get tired and then we rest and do it all over again. I will admit, that is not my favorite suggestion.”

  “Then why did you make it?”

  “Because my parents raised me right. The female is to be protected and treasured at all cost no matter who the female belongs to. And when it comes to her safety and happiness she always makes the decision. Of course, I have to stipulate that I don’t exactly agree with that last bit. What if you like putting yourself in danger, how can you then be the best person to decide anything? If you don’t feel safe going to my home we have to figure something out so you are not alone, but I can’t leave you to make a phone call for you because if I leave you have no one to protect you and by the looks of you, whoever had the job before me was terrible at their job. If you need me to kill them I freely offer my services.”

  “NO, are you crazy? You don’t know me and I don’t know you and I do not want to go with a stranger.”

  “I don’t blame you. I don’t much like people myself but you see, I can’t leave you. I literally can’t leave you. So I am open for suggestions because we can’t stay here.”

  Amber shrugged her shoulders and exhaled, loudly. “You do not have to stay with me. I have made it fine the last couple of hours. I will be fine.”

  “Beautiful, you can barely walk. Now I don’t know where you are going or where you came from because, for some reason, you didn’t tell me but I do know I can’t leave you here.” He stood up. “I didn’t bring a change of clothes with me because I had no idea, when I started out, I would need to put clothes on today. However, if you will let me I will carry you to my house and let you make a phone call for someone to come get you. If that is why you are wanting a phone.” He offered her his hand.

  With little hesitation she took his hand and allowed him to pull her to her feet but one food landed on a rock and she moaned in pain. Reaching out he scooped her into his arms. “Little one, I would love to let you make the decision but I am afraid this time you are going to have to trust me and let me carry you. I have to clean those feet and get them bandaged or my wolf my rake a hole in my gut. You don’t want me walking around with my guts hanging out do you?”

  Amber twisted her head so she could see his face better and studied him for a moment before she spoke. “You know the wolf doesn’t actually do anything right? I mean, he can’t hurt you. Dawn says the males of our species are insane and should be watched carefully.”

  “My few friends have never accused me of being sane so I guess your Dawn was correct.”

  “You do realize telling a female you are insane while she is at your mercy is a terrible way to reassure her of your intentions, don’t you?”

  “Well now, I don’t believe I said I was insane. I just admitted the few friends I have never accuse me of being sane. Do yours?”

  “My what?”

  “Your friends. Do they ever accuse you of being sane.”

  Amber wrinkled her forehead as she tried to follow his train of thought. “Well they never accuse me of being insane. I mean, not really. Maybe occasionally.”

  “So how did you end up way out here with no shoes?”

  “I was kidnapped. Well sort of kidnapped.”

  “How exactly does one get sort of kidnapped?”

  “We went to a festival and he kidnapped me from there.”

  “I will kill him for you.”

  “What? No. You can’t go around killing people for someone you don’t know.”

  The stranger shrugged, bouncing Amber in his arms. “Then I shall kill him for me.”

  “You are crazy!”

  “Well now that isn’t fair. I am not the one walking around with no shoes on defending someone who kidnapped me.”

  “I am not defending Fletcher. He did a horrible thing and I hate him for it.”

  “Good, we have a name. Fletcher. Now where can I find this Fletcher so I can kill him?”

  “Put me down.”

  “Sorry beautiful. I can’t do that. Have you seen your feet? What kind of male do you think I am? If I put you down I have to put you on your feet and they are bleeding and torn. That will hurt you and my mum would kill me for hurting a female.”

  “How would your mum even know?”

  He shrugged again. “Mothers always know. I don’t know how she would find out but I gave up long ago trying to figure out how they always know things you don’t want them to know. Now, beautiful, it isn’t far to my house, I will get your feet bandaged up and you can call someone to come get you.”

  “Quit calling me beautiful. I have a name you know.”

  “Do you? Imagine that. I know most people have names, but since I don’t know
yours I can’t prove you have one.”

  Amber laughed. “Well, you haven’t exactly told me your name either.”

  The man stopped walking, eyes wide he looked down into her face. His face turned red. “Now that is embarrassing. Shall we start over? Hello, beautiful, my name is Dylan, what’s yours?”

  “Hello Dylan. My name is Amber. I am pleased to meet you. I have to pee.”

  Dylan almost dropped her but recovered quickly. “That was unexpected.”

  This time it was Amber’s face that flushed red. “I can’t believe I said that out loud.”

  “If you can manage a few more minutes we are almost to my house.”

  Amber looked around and realized Dylan had turned off the small gravel road and was currently carrying her down a private drive. She pointed to the house in the distance, “Is that where we are going?”

  “Yep. So you see, if you can hold it a few more minutes we will be there. I don’t want to put you down here any more than I wanted to put you down back there, nothing but rocks under your feet.”

  “And you will let me use the phone to call someone to come get me?”

  “Of course I will. I can’t keep you. You are underage. And again, my mum would kill me.” He eyed the sky before turning his attention back to her. “I smell rain. I believe our beautiful day is going to get nasty in a short amount of time.”

  Amber sniffed the air, “I think you’re right.” She inhaled, deeply, “I don’t think we are going to make it to the house.”

  “We will if you hold on.” He started jogging and after one small squeak of surprise she tightened her grip around his neck.

  They almost made it before the sky opened and released torrents of rain. The wind howled as Dylan tucked his head and picked up the pace. They were both soaked to the skin by the time he got to the door. She felt him struggling to open it and twisted so she could get the handle. He kicked the door closed with his foot and carried her down the hall. Turning her head she tried to take in everything. He bumped a door open with his shoulder and she looked around in amazement. They were in the most beautiful and luxurious bathroom she had ever seen. She turned wide eyes toward him but before she could say anything he sat her on the edge of the tub.

  She stroked her hand along the marble and stared in awe at the size. The tub was enormous and she felt sure several people could sit on the edge of it and still have room. A towel dropped into her lap and she watched as he dropped to the floor in front of her with a towel around his neck. He took the towel and made a couple of passes across his hair and dried his face before dropping the towel and lifting first one foot then the other. He growled before he gently replaced her foot on another towel he placed on the floor.

  “I haven’t forgotten your need, so as much as I want to take care of your feet first I am going to leave you for a moment. Now, do you want me to leave you here and let you hobble to the toilet or would you rather I carry you across the room and place you by the door. The toilet, by the way, is just inside that door.” He pointed to her right and she turned to look.

  She started to stand and he jumped up and helped her balance. Seeing the grimace of pain cross her face he took the decision from her and gently lifted her into his arms again. He walked across to the door he had pointed out and carefully lowered her to her feet. He didn’t let go until she had the doorknob in one hand and the door frame in another.

  “You have it?” She nodded at him. “Alright. I am going to get the stuff together to bandage you up. When you get done just open the door and I will fetch you back.”

  Amber limped into the room and stared for a moment. She wondered if the man lived alone. His toilet wasn’t fancy but the room had book shelves all around. The only spot in the room with no shelf was where the sink was, and it didn’t even have a mirror above it. Just a small sink, not even a counter around it. She looked at some of the book spines as she took care of business and found some of her favorite books on the shelves. She was smiling when she washed her hands but the smile dropped a bit when she realized, the room was so stacked with books the man didn’t even have a towel rack. She tried to dry her hands on her shirt but it was soaked. She opened the door to find him waiting on her with a hand towel. He wore an expression of embarrassment and guilt on his face. He had put a pair of pants on while she was in the loo so he looked mostly dry now while she was still soaked.

  “I keep meaning to take a shelf out and put a hand towel rack in there, but, well, I would have to pick which books to move and I can’t decide. I don’t get many visitors so it hasn’t seemed important.” He picked her up and carried her back to the tub. A dry towel was folded and resting where she had sat before and he lowered her to the towel. Beside her was a dry shirt and a pair of sweats. He handed her a couple of towels and she started drying her hair while he sat on the floor at her feet. Her breath escaped in an audible gasp when he started cleaning her foot and he stopped.

  “I am sorry, but it will hurt. You cut them up pretty bad. When I get your feet bandaged we can get you in some dry clothes.” He pointed to the clothes she had already noted. “Why don’t you tell me about yourself and help take your mind off the pain. Where did you come from and how did you end up out here?”

  Amber swallowed hard as tears filled her eyes. She inhaled and exhaled a few times and tried to organize her thoughts. Her feet hurt but she could tell he was trying to be gentle. Gathering her thoughts she told him.

  “My twenty-first birthday is in a few days—” She stopped and cocked her head, she would have sworn she heard him say Thank God. “What did you say?”

  He looked up from her foot with an innocent expression on his face. So innocent it screamed guilt. “Me? I didn’t say anything.” His eyes shifted left them right before he coming back to her.

  She narrowed her eyes at him and stared but he went back to cleaning her foot. “So your birthday is in a few days. I’m listening.”

  She shook her head, “Yeah, so one of my best friends, well I thought he was, arranged a birthday surprise for me. I got my very best friend to come with us and we went to the Maidenwell festival. But she got scared and wanted to go home so we left early.”

  This time she was sure she heard him mutter “Smart girl.”

  She sniffed, “Anyway. So Fletcher, that was my friend, told me he would take me back so we could spend more time at the festival. He said he would get a tent and we could stay the night and, well he made the plan sound good when he was telling me. But he only wanted to get me away from the pack so he could ask me to be his mate. I told him no and he… Why are you growling?”

  “Me?”

  “Yes you.”

  “That wasn’t me, it was my wolf. I am not responsible for, uh, anyway, you were saying? Your pack? What pack do you belong to?”

  “Edward’s.” Dylan dropped her foot at her announcement. “Ow, oh my god, that hurt.”

  “Edward? The Edward? Ten feet tall? A thousand pounds of rage and fury? That Edward?” he started sliding away from her as he eyed her like she was a dangerous creature.

  “Edward is not ten feet tall. I don’t think he is over seven and a half, at most. He is the best Alpha in the entire world!”

  “Hey, hey don’t get upset.” Dylan swallowed hard and his attention seemed to wander away. Amber knew he was communicating with his wolf and wished she could hear their conversation. She wondered what it was like talking to yourself but not exactly yourself. She would have been shocked and amused if she could hear the conversation between Dylan and his wolf.

  I don’t care. Mate. We keep. Kill guy.

  Kill which guy? Did you hear who her Alpha is? We can’t kill him. Are you crazy?

  Not crazy. Not kill Edward, kill other. Take her from Edward. He no protect mate. He can’t keep her.

  He will kill us. Edward is insane. He will never let us have her. We don’t have a pack.

  I need no pack. I fierce fighter. Protector of females. Destroyer of evil. Super-wolf — without s
tupid cape. Defender of the innocent. You should be repeating this to mate.

  You want me to tell her you call yourself Super-wolf? She will run screaming from the house.

  Not run. Raining out. Feet hurt. Can’t run. How we win her if you no listen?

  I suggest slowly and without the insanity.

  Too slow. She not know how great and fierce and incredible and awesome and —

  Okay, let me stop you right there. I obviously need to stop reading books out loud to you. Let me do this my way. After her birthday you can tell her yourself how wonderful we are, deal?

  You scared of her Alpha. We never get her if you listen to you. You listen to me we have mate.

  Of course I am scared of her Alpha. You are scared of her Alpha.

  Yeah, so? Never show fear. Be sick later. Never show fear. Bravery doing right even when scared.

  I definitely read way too much to you.

  Amber watched the conflict on Dylan’s face before snapping her fingers. “I don’t like to point this out but I am bleeding on your beautiful floor a little.”

  His snapped back to the present and looked at the floor. With a mutter he slid back to her feet. “I am sorry. You took me by surprise with your announcement. Edward doesn’t play games and he doesn’t suffer fools lightly so how did this Fletcher guy think he would get away with taking you?”

  “I don’t know. We were friends for most of our lives. I loved him like a brother. I don’t understand what happened. One minute he was one of the greatest guys in the world and the next minute he snapped. Although, Nadia didn’t really like him. I thought she was jealous of the time I spent with him, but now I think she saw the real him. I feel so stupid.”

  “Hey. None of that now. You are not stupid. You made a foolish mistake because you trusted someone from your own pack who should have protected you. There is nothing wrong with trusting someone.”

  “Do you trust people and end up getting hurt?”