“Renee,” Derek called out, then fell onto the skull covered wall.
“Derek?” I ran to him. All joking had come to a halt. “We need to hurry and get to that room.”
“Let me take him,” Martin said, moving me gently with his hand on my shoulder.
“Please, allow me. He is my friend.” Fala nodded once to Martin and as Martin stepped back, he lifted Derek and we continued.
Sydney was also too weak to walk and was being carried by Garvin, while Martin leaned on me. After another turn, we were there. Monroe and Cates moved the stone door and helped everyone in, closing it afterwards. Most took the main room floor but Martin and I lay together on one of the small grooves that had been carved for the dead in one of the little areas off of the main room. Tammy and Cates had taken the other. As always, Fala slept with his back to the door in the event that anyone should try to gain entrance.
“Martin, may I ask you something?”
“Of course,” he replied, pulling me in closer.
“Was the man that you call your Pa, really your Pa?”
“He was the only father that I ever knew. But, no, he was not my birth father. He raised me and kept me as a normal until I was the age of twenty seven or eight. I can hardly remember.”
“One day you’re gonna have to tell me your story,” I spoke as the day began beckoning for my daily death.
“There will be plenty of time for that, my love. You rest now. Tomorrow we go retrieve the rest of our family and leave this place.”
I fell asleep in his arms with a smile in my heart. Our family, those words coming from him had given me more comfort than anything that I had felt since I was back home on my farm.
Chapter Thirty Two
The feel of his arms around me when I woke was absolutely amazing. I knew he was awake without opening my eyes. I could feel him breathing and his flesh was soft. Martin also knew I was awake for the same reasons. Once his hand moved on my waist, I rolled over and put my face up against his chest and took as much of his scent in as I could in one deep breath. Waking up with him like this every night was going to be the golden lining around our very dark cloud.
Martin ran his hand up under my shirt on my back and onto my neck, and then back down again. He would go lower every time he repeated the motion with his hand, running his little finger under the top of my leggings and causing me to become aroused in ways that I had never felt before. I wanted him to take me like he had taken me the night of our first joining, only this time, I was ready to participate on a much larger scale. I leaned back a bit and took the hand that had been on my back. As I looked deep into Martin’s eyes I placed that hand on my breast as my lips met his and he took full advantage of both.
“Excuse me, Renee,” Fala said in a low voice. I pushed Martin back so fast that I rolled out of the narrow stone slab and all but bounced up on my feet. “Yes, yes, what do you need, Fala.” I was pulling down on my filth covered shirt, making sure the buttons were in place and doing it all very fast, as Martin lay there with a smile from ear to ear, watching me.
“It is of great need that I relieve myself. Now that you and the master are awake, may I remove the stone if I do not venture far?”
“Of course, Fala. You never have to wait to go to the bathroom, not ever.” I stayed where I was when I spoke. I was too embarrassed to move. I had completely forgotten about our werewolf who had better ears than we did; and we could hear ten times better than any normal. I was mortified. Showing them that I loved Martin by holding him in public was one thing; having him almost make love to me in the next room with no door was a totally different story.
“Do I see a hint of red on those lovely cheeks?” Martin patted the spot where I had been lying.
“I think we better go in the next room and wait for the others to wake. Jacob and Cates are in there right now waiting for us to come join them and hearing every single thing that’s going on in here. So, no…you get up, I will not come back over there.”
“Oh, go ahead, give the man a wee bit O’ love. Tis a small thing to ask,” Cates laughed and Jacob joined him.
“See what I mean.” Then I whispered. “We can’t do that unless we have privacy.”
“If you have a hard time using the word ‘sex’, then call it by its true name. What we do with one another, Renee, is called making love.”
“Yes, I know that. I was trying to be discreet but you fixed that.”
“We are one,” he stood and stretched, “and all know that you cannot resist my overwhelming charms.” He grabbed me around my waist and picked me up. I couldn’t help but to start laughing.
“Is that right?” I kissed the tip of his nose.
“That is a fact if I have ever known one. I can resist you. Your charms are nothing that I would be concerned about,” he said with one side of his mouth lifted in a devilish grin.
“You are just too funny for your own good, aren’t you?”
“And I can be very serious,” he said, letting me slide down in his arms, my body as close to his as two bodies could get. I stood up on my toes as he kissed me, his hands exploring my body; my sides, back, and lower as his mouth moved from mine to my ear then to my neck.
“No more,” I spoke as low as I dared next to his ear. “Please, Martin.”
He stood straight, licked his lips and smiled. “The others should be waking soon. If we get the others from the village, we can have my ship ready to follow yours and out on the open water before midnight.”
***
Finding our way through the tunnel was much easier with Martin as our guide. He knew where he was going due to the many years he had used them. He also knew another way to Cornelle’s hidden village; one that would get us there faster and I, for one, was ready to see my baby brother. I couldn’t help but wonder what he was going to think of his mommy bringing home a daddy.
Jacob was walking in the front of our group with Monroe when his hand went up and all of us went down on one knee, all but Martin. I reached up and pulled on his sleeve and he, too, knelt down. We were almost to our destination so I didn’t know why Jacob was bringing us to a stop. Most had no care to go anywhere near the leper colony, not even those who lived under the cover of darkness. I saw Jacob point to the right and Monroe took off and disappeared into landscape as if by magic. His ability to blend with the shadows was uncanny.
A few moments later Monroe came back. “The village has been under attack.”
“No.” It was all I could say as my body took off in the direction of Cornelle’s home where I had left my most prized treasure.
My whole crew was running with me at full speed. My feet never stopped but my heart dropped when I saw the smoldering embers of some of the homes as we ran past. It wasn’t the elders’ people; I knew that without a doubt. Monroe was one of them and he had killed the other. I was at a loss of who could have done this. “Johnny!” I yelled at the top of my lungs when I saw Cornelle’s home in ruins. “Shyanna!” I prayed she would hear me and come to me. My eyes searched the dark sky to no avail. “Where are they?” I asked as my voice began to break.
“Here, over here!” Cates called out and I ran as if my soul was on fire.
“Oh God, Cornelle,” I dropped to my knees by her broken form. “What happened? Who did this to you?”
“We fought, but they were too strong.” She closed her one good eye and swallowed. “They took them…they took them all.” Then she turned her head away from me and started weeping.
“Who took them, Cornelle?”
“Renee,” Fala said my name but I didn’t turn from Cornelle, I wanted an answer. “Renee.”
“What Fala?” I snapped, finally turning to see what he wanted, wishing I hadn’t when I saw what he held.
“No!” Then I grabbed my face and broke down. He held one of Shyanna’s little green scale covered fingers and my heart broke into a thousand pieces.
“It was the woman,” Cornelle coughed. “The woman of the west.”
“Renee,” Cornelle grabbed my hand. “They killed our Lilly and my husband when he was bringing her in from his brother’s boat. They made us watch as they killed them and burned your ship. They took no one off.” She coughed once more then fell unconscious.
Jacob had walked to the water’s edge, with Monroe standing a few feet behind him. I wasn’t sure if he had dealt with this sort of thing but I couldn’t take anymore. I could see the others talking, but I couldn’t hear a word they were saying. They took my child and I knew where they were taking him. They were going to take him to those who thought he was an abomination and should be put to death and that was unacceptable. My rage hit a point that it did not know and I exploded.
The more the rage built inside, the more I could feel it on the outside. I began pacing back and forth, completely blocking out that anyone else was in my world. The want to follow and kill those who touched my children was overwhelming and I screamed, dropped to my knees and pounded my fist into the ground as hard and as fast as my body would allow. Feeling the bones shift in my face was unexplainable, as well as how my teeth elongated twice their length. I must have looked very much like Jacob when he witnessed his sister being hurt in Cuba.
“Renee,” Martin tried to grab my arm.
I continued breaking my knuckles on the ground. I felt someone touch me and I jerked away, I even heard my name but I had no idea who said it until he slapped me across the face. “You must get control of yourself, my love, for the sake of those who were taken.” No sooner than the words left his mouth, a fist came out of nowhere and knocked him to the ground.
“I don’t care what the reason, don’t you ever put your hands on her. Do I make myself clear, Martin?” Derek was furious.
Cates had stepped in and grabbed hold of Derek, while Garvin and Sydney intervened with Martin. Tanda was holding Fala’s hand with tears rolling down her face. Tammy was sitting on the steps of Cornelle’s home, rocking back and forth and crying just as hard. I looked around at all of them and then threw my head back, and with every ounce of air that I had, I screamed, “Jacob!” then collapsed onto my side. What I needed at that moment was my mentor, not my lover.
He was holding me in his lap on the ground when I came back around, and for the first time, I saw crimson lines on his cheeks. Jacob gave me a sad smile and one small nod as I sat up. My eyes couldn’t settle on one of his and I didn’t know what to say. Half of his being was gone and he had to be hurting like hell not knowing what was happening to Jessica. We were thinking the same thoughts. We needed Martin’s ship and we needed to get out into open water right away.
“We have to move fast if we are to reach them before they reach the elders,” Jacob spoke first.
I couldn’t control my chin from quivering. “Do you think the twins are together?”
“I do not know, why do you ask?”
“What if they are together and try to split our family up?”
“Martin has a plan, Renee. He and the others are getting things ready for us to leave as we speak.”
“What sort of a plan?”
“Come, let us go to the dock so he can explain everything to everyone at one time.”
“Am I remembering right, did Derek hit Martin?”
“He did, indeed,” Jacob nodded. “They are fine. Martin is very fond of our Derek and knows you have a valuable warrior in him.”
“What about Cornelle? Did they take her to Martin’s ship?”
“I’m sorry. She did not make it.”
“Son-of-a-bitch, Jacob,” I shook my head as the tears began to fall again. The longer we walked, the more I realized how stupid I had been by hitting ground. It didn’t fight back, but it had sure kicked my ass. My hands hurt like hell and they would for a few nights. Every time I bumped one of them on my legs, I wished I had had more control. But I couldn’t imagine any mother controlling their rage if their child had been taken and it was killing me. Nothing I had been through from my birth into the normal world, to my birth into the dark world, was as horrid as the feeling of losing Johnny twice. This time seemed worse because I had grown to think of and love him as mine.
“How are you controlling your feelings, Jacob?”
“Jessica will do everything in her power to keep the two little ones safe, including giving her allegiance to the twins. She will tell them anything that they wish to hear. Jess has been trained to do as she is told, no matter the deed, Renee. She will do whatever it takes to keep them from harm’s way until they reach the elders.”
“I don’t want her to be hurt for anyone’s sake, Jacob.” My mind was swamped with horrible thoughts of what they could be doing to my little ones and I hated myself for leaving them. “And now I’m going to get my brother killed; all because I changed him. I’m always getting someone hurt, Jacob.”
“Why would you say that? If not for what you have done, none of us would be walking free right now. We will get them back before they reach the elders, we will.” He stopped and pulled me into a hug.
“Oh, Jacob, he is just a little boy…he’s a baby! They can’t kill him, it’s not his fault, it’s mine.”
To be continued in the book of: Bloodbreeders: The Elders
Coming soon:
Bloodbreeders: The Elders Book 5
Piper Vale: Please Don’t Hurt Me: Book 1
Soon to be re-released:
Bren Woodard: Hatred With a Passion
When She Wakes
After Hours
The Tale of Two Toodlegnomes
About the Author:
Robin Renee Ray is known as a Multi-genre Author. She's only been writing for seven years, but has come to love everything about the world of being a novelist. She began in the paranormal romance/dark fantasy genre, jumping into horror, then right into suspense thrillers. 20 novels and numerous short stories later, she is well on her way! She resides in Southern New Mexico with her husband, David, and lives very close to her two granddaughters.
Other than her grand’s, her Bloodbreeders are her babies...Babies with fangs. : )
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Bloodbreeders: Lies Beneath London Page 30
