by Celeste Raye
Isabo’s eyes flared. “Do you really think that you can keep me where I don’t want to be?”
He agreed and stopped her from standing up. “At least until you’re making sense again.”
The witch mumbled something, and Isabo fell back in the bed, asleep.
“What did you do?”
“Like I said, bear, you have to keep her calm; arguing with her like that isn’t going to do it. Take her home and come back for me. I will make sure that nothing happens to your kin or mine. I will get the coven in place.”
Fred was worried about what that would mean, but as he looked at Isabo’s serene face, he was thankful. The witch had given him hope.
After a few moments, he was able to get Isabo slung across his back for the long walk home. The witch was adamant that he be back as soon as possible, threatening him if he didn’t get back in time and something happened to Celeste. Knowing what Evelyn and her witch friends were capable of didn’t help. He knew that she would really get rid of him if she so desired.
That put a pep in his step. The spell would wear off soon, and then he’d have to deal with her. He didn’t want to be on the way back when she came to. It wouldn’t end well; Fred was sure of it. Isabo really didn’t have a chill button. When she was mad, she didn’t want to listen to reason, but Fred had to have faith that it would work out. She was carrying his child after all.
Hours later, when he walked through the clubhouse doors, Jake was pacing by the front and stopped to look at him. Fred could only imagine how he looked, carrying Isabo over his shoulder like he was.
“What the hell, man?”
“Evelyn put a spell on her so she wouldn't fight coming here.”
“So, when she wakes up, she's going to be pissed?”
Fred agreed, and Jake just chuckled for a moment before he got serious.
“Well, I can't say that that is our worst problem right now. The trial has let out for the day, but it will probably wrap up tomorrow. Please tell me you have some good news, because if not, I think we're all going to burn.”
Fred was immediately taken aback.
“I am going to get Evelyn now. She wants me to bring her back here as quickly as possible. Basically, she told me that she would castrate me if I were late. Her niece means everything to her, and I think she is willing to do whatever is necessary to end this.”
“But killing ancients, that might uproot our whole society.”
Jake agreed. “It's what has to be done. I'm not saying that I want to do this, but if it comes down to us or them, you know it's not going to be us. I don't know if Evelyn and Celeste are going to have enough power for it. How much power is needed to kill the ancients?”
“I don't know, but she's bringing the whole coven, so...”
Jake smiled. “Well, there you go. Whatever happens tomorrow, let's just hope that they have a change of heart, because if not, it's going to get messy.”
Fred pressed his lips together and then started walking towards his room. They had a lot to deal with, but at the moment, he still had a ticking time bomb on his hands. He wanted her to be in his room and away from prying eyes when they finally had it out. Since they had the night to do so, Fred figured that it was best to bite the bullet and just do it. It was going to be unpleasant, but it would soon be over.
Chapter Twenty-One
The first thing Isabo saw when she opened her eyes was Fred. He wasn't smiling. He was looking at her with apprehension, and her eyes started around the room. It was a different room than before, brighter and better maintained.
“Where am I now?”
“You are at my place.”
“At the clubhouse?”
He agreed, and she blew out a breath. She wasn’t happy.
“I can't believe that you brought me here. You know that I don't want to be here, Fred. I don’t want to be here around your murderous family.”
He moved towards her but slowed down and came to a halt several feet away when her eyes got smaller and smaller.
“It's like you said to Evelyn: you don't have any family at home because of me, and you need to be taken care of. You're just going to have to let me do it.”
Isabo didn't know what to say. She still wasn't sure she believed she was pregnant. It was not even something that she had been thinking about. Isabo had a lot on her shoulders, but she didn’t think that motherhood was one of those things. How would it even work? How was she going to be able to raise a kid with her enemy?
“So, you really expect me to stay here? After everything that has happened, you thought that I would be okay under this roof? Really?”
“Do you have a better option?”
Isabo wanted to lie and say that she did, but she couldn't even come up with something to make it seem true. Her mind was still a little frazzled from whatever it was that the witch had done to her.
“How do I even know this is true? How am I supposed to believe you and a witch about if I am pregnant or not? Don’t you think that I would know?”
“What part of it do you think is not real?”
“I don't know; there's a lot to take on all of a sudden. One minute, I'm never going to see you again, and now, I am supposed to live with you and let you take care of me for months? That seems a bit out of the realm of possibility, and I don’t know what I am supposed to think about it.”
“Like I said before, Isabo, what alternative do we have? You give me one, and I will consider it.”
“How about you just leave me be and forget about all of this. Forget about what you heard and just leave me be, Fred. That’s what the alternative is, and I think it should sound pretty good to you.”
“I can't just forget about it; that's my child you're carrying. Unless you're going to tell me that you were with someone else. I mean, it is possible.”
That made her mad, and she turned away from him. Of course, that would be something that he would say. An accusation that she had waited years and years to have sex, and now she was getting it on with the whole world.
“The witch also said that I was supposed to stay calm. I don't think I'm going to be able stay calm around you.”
He backed off, telling her that he would find her some things and would be back in a little bit. Isabo didn't even try to be pleasant about it. She was confused and didn't know how to feel. The idea of staying there with the enemy was hard on her. Was it something that she could really do? Could she really do that with their baby?
Isabo closed her eyes and wished for sleep. It was the only thing that was going to take her out of the pain that she was feeling, if just temporarily. That sounded pretty damn good.
Isabo dozed off for a little bit, but she was awakened when he came into the room a little while later. He has brought some clothes for her to wear and something that smelled good. There were also drinks, and he had his arms pretty full of things for her. As she saw him set down a brush, she automatically put a hand to her hair and realized that she probably looked like a fright. He was quite thoughtful about what he chose, but she remembered that he wasn't being nice. He was making her stay there. She was a prisoner, and Isabo didn’t want to make it any easier on him.
“What is all of that?”
Her tone was harsh, and it took him by surprise. Fred didn't take long to pull the shock off his face. It was replaced with a smile, and even though Isabo was trying to be mad at him, she wondered if it were real. How could he still be smiling at her like that when she was being so mean to him?
“You're going to need some things. Since you’re on bed rest. I brought some books and magazines, but I really don't know what you would like. All you have to do is ask and I will find what you want. I really do want this to be as comfortable for you as possible. I want you to be happy, Isabo.”
“You mean as good as it can be with me as your prisoner?”
He shrugged. “If that's how you want to see it.”
Isabo didn't think there was another way to see it. She wanted to leave,
and he wouldn't let her. It didn't matter that she didn't have anybody to go home to. Isabo wasn't even sure that she wanted to have the baby. A baby was the last thing on her mind. She had been trying to figure out how she was going to take care of herself, and the idea of taking care of a vulnerable and innocent child was hard to even fathom. Knowing that she was going to do it alone made it even worse. Raised with an enemy, she couldn’t even think it.
She tried to ignore the smells floating around and her growling stomach, but finally, she asked him what there was to eat. Isabo blamed it on the baby.
“There is a little bit of everything I could find in the kitchen. It's kind of like the book situation. Tell me what you want, and I will make sure you get it.”
“What happens if you aren’t here?”
“Then ask one of the servants in the clubhouse. Well, more like initiates that haven't quite made their way up the ranks yet. I will send one in at different times throughout the day to make sure that you have everything you need. Beyond that, I will be taking care of you, and I don’t plan to be gone much.”
Of course, he would be the one to take care of it. The man that she was still unsuccessfully trying to hate.
“And what if I want to leave?”
He sighed like they had had the same conversation a million times.
“You're not going anywhere. I will force you if I have to, but I don't want to.”
The determination and the way he said it made her believe him. It also was a bit shocking, considering how easygoing he had seemed all the other times. Now, he was a little scary, and she didn't know what to think. In reality, it just reminded her that she knew very little about Fred.
“Well, if I don't have a choice, I don't have a choice. It doesn't mean that we have to pretend that we like each other, though, does it?”
He shook his head and scoffed. “No, I guess it doesn't. This is what you will make it.”
She said something about needing to get some rest, and it was her way of trying to get rid of him. While it was crystal clear what she was doing, he just went along with it.
“Where are you going to sleep? Do you have a girlfriend to go to?”
“No, you killed me on dating and all of that. I will just sleep on the floor.”
“Oh.”
He didn't say anything else and just walked out. Isabo looked at all the stuff around her and felt a little guilty. He was trying, that much was clear, but she wasn't giving him a chance.
She liked him a lot before, so much that she had made him her first. Everything that happened after made it hard to feel the same way. Now, this. How was she supposed to get over everything that happened and get back to where they were before? Did she even want to?
Isabo made her way to the table that had food laid out, and again, she was remiss in how she treated him. She hadn’t been all that rude to Fred considering the fiasco with her cousins. But there had been her betrayal in the courthouse, yet he was still treating her well.
Isabo wanted to keep him at arm’s length because she knew that if he got closer, something between them might spark again, and she couldn’t afford it. Her heart couldn’t take such things. Not again.
Chapter Twenty-Two
“Was that you and Isabo yelling earlier?”
Fred looked at his oldest brother and knew that he was going to have to say something. He had brought her into the clubhouse and hadn’t really said much of anything to anyone else. The alpha was asking, his older brother was asking, which meant that he had to explain it all somehow.
“Yeah, it was. Sorry if we kept anyone up or something.”
“No, it’s nothing like that, but, um, what’s going on with the two of you? She took off, and you didn’t see her for a month. You walked out and followed her after she testified against us. What is she doing here now?”
“Well, she ran off because you killed her cousin in front of her, and she probably figured that you were going to kill her too. We made promises, on our honor, and you broke them.”
Fred was still unhappy about it all, even though he could understand it. What Jake did ruined what was going on between the two of them. He wondered about the ‘what-ifs’ and what would have happened if things would have been different.
“I didn’t know.”
“I know.” Fred sighed and tried not to show his aggravation. Everything that he wanted was ignored, and now he was never going to have those moments back with her.
“So, why is she here now? I knew you were going to find her, but I didn’t expect you to bring her here!”
Fred had many reasons, but the one that his brother would understand was clear. “She is pregnant with my child. She passed out, and I had to take her to the witch since she was close. Witch says that she needs to stay unstressed and with a lot of help. She has no family, so I brought her here.”
Fred wanted to say more. He wanted to tell Jake that he’d fallen for her. She was his first. He wanted to marry her.
“By the sound of the two of you tonight, I don’t know if I should tell you congratulations or not.”
Fred shrugged. He wasn’t sure about it either because there were so many unknowns that had to be figured out. He wanted to believe that she would somehow forgive him, but it wasn’t guaranteed. Even if it wasn’t, though, Fred couldn’t think of anything else that he would want to do. He had to make her fall for him again if she didn’t hate him forever.
“I don’t know, Jake. She isn’t happy to be here if you can imagine. I have her in my room, but that isn’t going to last too long. She has to stay on bed rest, so I am trying to keep her calm.”
Jake snickered. “Sounds like you have yourself a lively one. I knew that something had changed with you. I didn’t know that it was going to be her.”
Fred didn’t know that it was going to be her, either. She was stuck in his brain. It was hard for him to focus now, and he wasn’t even worried about the consortium. That’s what they were there for anyway. Jake and Fred were the first ones there, but the rest would be arriving soon. The witches would be there soon as well, cloaked in the cover of darkness. They had agreed to come o their own, without Fred returning for them.
“Now I don’t know what to do, Jake. I know that this is a bad time to ask you all sorts of questions, but I have no idea what I’m supposed to do with her, with women.”
“What do you want to happen?”
“I want her to fall in love with me and marry me.”
“Just like that?”
Fred agreed. He knew that it wasn’t normal, but he just knew that she was the one. Jake asked him if he was sure and if he was rushing it, but Fred just disagreed.
“I don’t know if I am rushing it or not, but I want to convince her before she has the baby. You know, if everything doesn’t go to shit before then.”
He waved his younger brother off. Jake told him that it was going to be fine. “The witches will help, and we’ll be back to it in no time. Don’t give up on her, Fred. You’re the best person I know. She’ll see that.”
Fred wished he were so sure. Jake hadn’t seen the way she’d looked at him.
“How do I get her to forgive me?”
Jake didn’t have an answer. “Just be there, and it will come together. She will see, after time, the man that she liked enough to sleep with. I am sure that it will be fine, Fred. You’re the best out of us.”
Fred left the conversation with determination that he was going to have to see it through. He couldn’t give up.
As soon as his other brothers got there, Fred didn't really have much else to say. He had already told Jake all about it. He had made all of the warnings that he was supposed to make, and now it was up to Jake and the rest of them to come up with some sort of plan. Fred had never been the plan person, although he did have a few thoughts in mind.
Charlie and Celeste were the first to come up with something. They wanted to use the witches in the covenant to just simply take them all out. The ancient consortium
was only about twelve people, and half of them were at the clubhouse. How hard would it be to just take them out completely?
Celeste wasn't as completely behind it as the rest of them. Fred knew that she was still reeling from the fact that she had killed so many Bennigans. While she had been trying to save Charlie and the rest of them, it was far more violent than she was used to. She did not want to keep on in the same ilk.
“I just don't want to take more life if I don't have to.”
“From what Fred has told us, Celeste, you don’t have much of a choice.”
She looked over at Fred, and he smiled inconspicuously. India had made it clear what would happen to them when they lost. They were all going to die. Fred would probably be the last one standing. Why would he want to when all of his brothers were gone? His mother and father were already gone. Whatever the plan was, it just had to work. He was prepared to do far worse if need be, to keep them all safe.
Celeste made a face at Jake. She didn't want to hear about what she did or didn't have to do. She had been pushed into enough already, and just the idea of it made her frown.
Charlie got in the middle of it and told her that it would only be used if they had no other choice.
“I know how you feel about it, Celeste. I will do anything that I need to keep you guys safe. If I could take out the ancients myself, I would. Just so you wouldn't have to do anything. We wouldn't have to ask your aunt. But that's not going to work. I can't take them out. I need your help, Celeste, we all do.”
Her expression almost immediately softened, and Fred knew then that that's what he needed. He needed that rapport back with Isabo. He needed her to trust him again.
Fred tried to keep up with the conversation and everything that was going on around him, but it was hard. He was too interested in everything else. His mind was already trying to plan ways to get Isabo back so she would finally forgive him. Then they could be together and mate. It was obviously the next step since she was carrying his child.
