“Cobalt,” Rath snapped and grabbed his brother from behind.
Cobalt roared and wrestled to get free as Rath managed to get his arms beneath Cobalt’s, hooked his hands over Cobalt’s shoulders and hauled him backwards.
“Calm down.” Rath struggled to keep hold of his brother, his hands pressing into the back of his skull to subdue him.
He gritted his teeth and grimaced as Cobalt sharply twisted and managed to jam an elbow into his cheek.
Ben remained terribly still on the grass, blood leaking from his wounds. She focused on him a little, and relief crashed through her when she managed to detect his heartbeat. He would make it. Rath had stopped his brother just in time.
Although, it wasn’t over yet.
Cobalt swiftly bent to one side, broke free of Rath’s right arm, and tried to hit his brother. Rath was too fast for him, easily capturing his arm again before he could launch an attack. She flinched as Rath twisted Cobalt’s arm behind him, viciously enough that it tore a pained grunt from his brother.
Flint shot out of the woods, panic washing across his face as he spotted Cobalt and Rath, and she stepped aside as he ran past her, yelling, “Yasmin!”
Cobalt tried to bite him when he went to help Rath, which earned him a glare from his youngest brother but did nothing to deter him.
“Dial it back,” Flint gritted out and grabbed hold of Cobalt, helping Rath restrain him as Yasmin appeared on the other side of the clearing, a duffel bag gripped in her right hand and her wavy black ponytail bouncing against the shoulders of her jewel red jumper with each step as she ran towards them.
“What happened?” Yasmin’s slight French lilt warmed her voice as concern filled her dark brown eyes.
They flickered between Ben and Cobalt, and finally settled on her mate, Flint.
“Just a little falling out. This one is going to need some patching up. Care to work your magic, Doc?” Flint went to grin, but it disappeared as Cobalt renewed his struggle, almost managing to get his left arm free.
Yasmin sank to her knees beside Ben, and Ember joined everyone in watching her as she silently assessed his injuries, shaking her head the entire time. When Yasmin levelled a dark look on Cobalt, Ember wanted to say that it wasn’t his fault, wanted to ask her not to blame him.
Cobalt had only been trying to protect her.
Ben groaned and rolled onto his side, and Cobalt growled and tried to get to him, his face a mask of dark fury as he flashed his fangs and fur washed over his skin.
“Fucker is going to shift,” Flint muttered, voice strained as he tried to keep hold of his brother. “If he shifts…”
Flint didn’t need to finish that sentence.
If Cobalt shifted, Yasmin would be caught in the crossfire and Ben was as good as dead.
Cobalt’s more human nature would instantly be repressed and his animal instincts would rise to the fore, overwhelming him with a need to fight and eliminate the male, his competition.
Rath checked Flint had a good hold on their brother and then moved his right arm, bracing it across Cobalt’s throat from behind. “I really don’t want to have to take you down.”
Cobalt bared long fangs at that.
Revealing there was a part of him that was aware of what was happening.
Which meant he was doing his best to regain control, was fighting his instincts and slowly winning. They just had to give him time.
Time she might be able to buy him.
Ember took a step towards him. Just one step.
His golden eyes instantly leaped to her, the entire weight of his focus settling on her and sending a delicious shiver over her skin.
Surprise rippled through her when she did more than buy him time just by taking a single step closer to him, and away from Ben.
The haze of hunger in his eyes lifted, the fight visibly draining from his body, leaving him shaking as he breathed hard and sagged in Rath and Flint’s grip, coming to rest against them rather than straining away from them.
Rath released Cobalt’s arms but kept hold of him, and she had the feeling he was doing it to stop Cobalt from collapsing.
Cobalt blinked and his bright golden eyes shifted from her to take in the scene.
Her heart ached for him as they widened, horror flashing in them a split-second before he averted them.
He lifted his bloodied hands, staring at them as he turned them over, and swallowed hard. Blood arced across his face, splattered his chest and neck, making him look like something out of a nightmare judging by the way the pride were looking at him, a mixture of shock and fear on their faces.
Ember only saw Cobalt.
She only saw his pain.
Felt it tear through her as he blinked and looked around again.
He shoved his hands through his hair, painting the platinum-blond strands crimson, and gritted his teeth, his face contorting to reveal the depth of that pain to her.
His eyes danced over everyone.
Landed on her.
His face crumpled on a pained growl and he pushed away from Rath and marched into the woods.
She silently cursed when her mother joined her, making it impossible for her to go after him as she wanted. She needed to let him know he was wrong about her, that he had misinterpreted the look on her face, mistaking it for another emotion. She wasn’t mortified like the rest of the pride, wasn’t disgusted by what he had done.
She wasn’t like everyone else.
It hadn’t been shock that had had her staring at him with wide eyes.
It had been worry and a need to go to him that she had been too afraid to go through with.
At the time, anyway.
As she watched Yasmin work to fix Ben’s injuries with Flint’s help, and listened to Rath berating the other two males who had been involved in the unsanctioned fight, she steeled herself, building her resolve little by little, until she was determined to slip away and see Cobalt.
He needed someone to be there for him, and she would be that person for him. She would show him that not everyone at the creek feared him, and would find the strength to tell him that she had been worried about him, not afraid of him.
Ivy met Rath as he trudged back towards his cabin, her hazel eyes bright with worry. “Is Cobalt alright?”
Rath shoved fingers through his thick brown hair and wearily nodded. “He will be.”
Ivy glanced towards Ben where he still lay on the grass, struggling to breathe.
Yasmin calmly worked to clean his broken nose and inspected his busted jaw, her voice soft and low as she said, “You’re going to be down for a while. This is a nasty combination.”
Ben started to growl, clearly not happy about that, but it ended on a pained grunt.
“What happened?” Ivy’s gaze shifted back to Rath, who smiled softly as he smoothed her chestnut hair behind her ear and stroked his fingers down the gentle curve of her jaw.
“Ben should have known better.” Rath didn’t say anything more than that, but even if he had, Ember wouldn’t have heard it over the ringing in her ears.
Cobalt knew.
Cobalt knew she was his fated one, and Rath knew too. It was the only explanation. Rath wouldn’t have blamed Ben for the fight if he hadn’t been aware that she was Cobalt’s true mate. He would have blamed his brother’s temperament.
He blamed Ben because seeing the male attempting to seize hold of her had sent Cobalt off the deep end, awakening his more dangerous side.
Rath slid her a look that confirmed it, his eyes narrowing as he subtly jerked his chin towards her.
Ember looked around, pulse pounding, her heart hammering against her ribs as she realised that her mother had moved away and was talking to some of the other females who were huddled together near the trees.
This was her chance.
She slipped away as her mother turned her back, stealthily moving towards the river. When she reached it, she picked her way across the larger boulders to the other side, and crept into the
thick pine forest, using a secret path through it that would take her to a spot opposite Cobalt’s cabin.
Not that she watched him without him knowing about it.
Much.
Ember moved from tree to tree. The clearing that formed part of Cobalt’s territory came into view through the thin, densely packed trunks of the pines, and then his cabin. She stilled and hunkered down, breathing quietly as she slipped into hunting mode, something she couldn’t stop herself from doing as she waited.
She didn’t have to wait long.
Cobalt slammed the cabin door open and jogged down the steps, growling as he tugged at his stained grey t-shirt and raked hands over his hair, frustration and anguish rolling off him in powerful waves that rocked her and had her wanting to go to him.
She couldn’t. Not yet. It was hard to wait, but she had to do it. Right now, he would turn her away if she went to him.
No.
He would drive her away, and that would only make him feel worse.
He didn’t want company. She could see it in him as he paced, taking fast agitated strides across the clearing in front of his raised cabin, his chest heaving with each laboured breath as he fought with himself.
He didn’t want company, but she could feel that he needed it.
He needed to see that someone was on his side, that someone wasn’t afraid of him.
The afternoon was wearing on, and her legs were getting cramped and achy, by the time he finally pivoted away from the patch of green and went inside. Ember stood and stretched, monitoring him as best she could with her senses as he moved around his cabin and she worked out some kinks in her muscles.
She eased forwards enough that she could see the sky.
Pink laced the fingers of clouds and gold tipped the towering mountains that surrounded the forest on all sides.
She would be missed if she didn’t return soon, and gods, she cursed that because she knew her mother would go to Rath and force him to form a damned search party if she failed to show up before it got dark.
She wasn’t a cub anymore.
She was a grown female, here because she had matured. She didn’t need her mother to protect her anymore, or to tell her the right and wrong thing to do, or control her life.
It was time she broke free of the cage she had been placed in the night her father had died.
Let her mother call a damned search party.
Cobalt needed her.
He emerged again, a fresh pair of dark grey sweats riding low on his trim hips and his chest bare, still glistening with water in places. His damp blond hair stuck out in haphazard spikes, the blood gone from it and his face, and the rest of his delectable body.
She frowned as she lowered her eyes to it, meaning to sneak a good look at him before she risked approaching him, and her heart went out to him all over again.
His skin was red in places, scrubbed raw in a clear effort to rid himself of the evidence of what he had done.
Ember slipped through the woods, the need to speak with him and show him that she wasn’t afraid of him, and set him straight about everything, pounding in her veins, driving her swiftly back across the river and into the forest on his side of it.
She needed a reason to speak with him.
It hit her like a thunderbolt.
A little like the sight of him as she broke cover just metres from him.
Gods, he was gorgeous. Breathtaking.
Roused feelings in her, needs that were startling and still new to her, and a little overwhelming at times like now, when she was faced with the full masculine rawness and beauty of him.
He sat on the solitary wooden chair on the high deck, his long legs stretched before him and bare toes pressing against the lower beam of the railings.
A whisky rested on his thigh, held in his left hand, and his eyes were back to their usual sharp and flinty grey as he stared at the mountains, the warm hues of sunset bathing his bare skin.
The gold might be gone from his irises, but a feral glint remained, one that made him look every inch the predator he was and made her feel like his prey as they came to rest on her.
The briefest flicker of surprise crossed his eyes before his features set in an unreadable mask and he looked away from her.
“What do you want?” His brusqueness didn’t dissuade her.
If he thought to drive her away, he was going to have to try harder than that. It was going to take more than a few cutting words to make her leave.
She kept hold of her courage and continued her approach, not stopping until she reached the stairs of his deck and her view of him became unobstructed.
It wasn’t nerves that arrested her steps. It was the sight of him and how fiercely her body reacted, flushing with prickly heat that had her itching to forget talking and just show him how she felt.
Ember fought that urge, but it was hard. The vision of him in just a pair of worn sweats that hugged his lean legs and other places to leave nothing to her imagination wreaked havoc on her, had her pulse thrumming and blood pounding in her veins as the instincts she wrestled on a daily basis tried to master her.
She silently struggled against them, trying to push them back down and retain control so she could speak with him rather than stand by his feet lost in appreciation of his masculinity, the raw strength that he exuded—power that spoke to her on a biological level, tugging at her to seduce him because he was a male in his prime and one she desperately wanted.
Forget the others. Cobalt was the only one she wanted. He was the one she needed.
And she needed him right now.
Oh gods.
Maybe this had been a mistake.
She hadn’t realised how fired up the sight of him fighting for her had got her. She had been swept up in worry at the time, but now flashbacks were hitting her in waves that stoked her feelings until they grew stronger with each one, and she verged on doing something crazy.
Like stepping up onto the deck, cupping his cheeks and kissing him.
How would he react if she surrendered to that urge?
She shivered, hot and achy as her mind filled with a fantasy of him seizing her nape in his strong palm, clutching her to him and claiming command of the kiss, his desperation matching hers as they poured out every ounce of need, of desire, that had been building inside them.
His grey eyes slowly narrowed on her, his pupils expanding in their centres, a hint of emerald forming around them as the silver began to turn gold.
Gods, that wasn’t helping her.
Whenever he looked at her like that, as if he was hunting her, as if he wanted her, a hot shiver ran through her and had her need burning hotter.
Ember clumsily cleared her throat. “I heard a rumour around the creek that you have plans to replace the roofs with protective metal.”
He arched an eyebrow. “I do. If you want to talk about it, you can talk to Rath.”
“Rath told me to talk to you.” Which was actually the truth.
She had approached him about it when she had overheard a few of the males talking about it, and now she had a feeling she knew why his brother had directed her to Cobalt.
He was meddling, trying to give them a reason to talk to each other.
Cobalt huffed, swirled his whisky and then swigged it. “I’m sure you’re better off talking to my brother.”
There was bitterness in those words that felt like an accusation, although she wasn’t sure what she had done to deserve it. Was it because of what her mother had said this morning about how she had approached Rath?
That hadn’t been Ember’s fault, and it certainly hadn’t been her idea, so he had no reason to be bitter with her about it.
She wasn’t going to let him sit there thinking that she wanted Rath either, that she had wanted his brother to ease her needs, and she most definitely wasn’t going to let him try to push her away and make her speak with Rath rather than him.
She frowned at him. “Why? You’re the one overseeing the projec
t. Surely it’s better to talk to you if I have concerns?”
His mood shifted. She felt it turn as his eyes narrowed on her again.
“Concerns?” His sandy eyebrows dropped low, knitting hard above his straight nose. “What concerns?”
He lowered his feet and sat up, looking delicious with all that honed muscle on show, his hair mussed in a way that made her want to straddle his lap and run her fingers through it before seizing it and tugging his head back so she could claim his mouth.
Rich golden sunlight played across his skin, accenting the sharp planes of his face and shining in his eyes.
Sweet, sweet gods, he was gorgeous.
Her pulse picked up again, heart pumping hard as he stared at her, the hard edge to his expression only making him even sexier.
Devastating.
His expression started to shift and she sensed his need to say something to fill the silence.
Ember shook off the urge to kiss the ever-loving hell out of him, because she could feel that he thought her concerns stemmed from his problem and what had just happened, and it wasn’t the case at all. “I’m concerned there won’t be enough money in the coffers for all the roofs and I wanted to get an estimate for my family’s cabin so I can talk to my mother about providing the required funds.”
Could she sound more business-like and cold? She shuddered. She sounded like her mother.
Coming here to talk about the roofing was meant to have been an excuse to get him to let her stay a while, a reason to be near him so she could find her voice to say what she had really come to tell him. But now her voice had frozen up again and her damned hands were shaking, palms sweating as she wrestled with the words.
“I can do that.” He leaned back in his chair and his eyes drifted to the sunset.
When she didn’t leave, had been stood there for five minutes like a statue, just staring at him as she fought her rising nerves, determined to say what she had really come here to say, his gaze roamed back to her.
“There something else?” Those sandy slashes dipped low again, his eyes narrowing in a way that warned her that he wasn’t happy that she hadn’t left yet.
His dilated pupils said it wasn’t because he wanted to be alone either.
Craved by her Cougar (Cougar Creek Mates Shifter Romance Series Book 4) Page 5
