* * * *
Brody stood close by Meg’s side as she held Lexie in her arms and soothed the crying child. He hadn’t meant to scare Lexie. He just needed to get them away from the Nephilim. He’d promised his friend Aiden that he’d do everything he could and he always kept his promises, but now he’d met Meg and it had become personal.
She was a beautiful person with the most shiningly radiant soul he’d seen in decades. A soul so special that he knew the Nephilim would never let her go. A Nephilim choosing to walk the dark path to immortality would see her soul as a means to centuries of life, not the wonder that it was.
A Nephilim’s life was meant to last a human lifetime and only the sacrifice of their humanity could extend it. The powers gained with this sacrifice further corrupted their own souls as they stole the purest ones they encountered. It robbed the world of the gift those people were meant to bestow by their very existence.
“It’s all right, pumpkin,” Meg said, trying to soothe Lexie’s tears. “Brody is back with us. He’ll take us somewhere safe if Nick comes here.” She looked at Brody and he nodded in reassurance.
“Caleb is going to send people here to help, too, Lexie,” Brody said, the tremor in his voice betraying his own fears to Meg. She smiled and reached for his hand, giving it a reassuring squeeze.
“I can hear a truck approaching. Will you please tell me what’s going on? Why didn’t Caleb come back with you?” Meg said. They were back in the bathroom between Caleb and Prescott’s bedrooms. It had been the first place Brody thought of that would be safe when he’d used his power to take them from the store in town.
“Stay here, I’ll go outside and see who it is?”
“Brody…” He didn’t hear what else Meg was saying as he was peering around the side of the barn an instant later. Two trucks had pulled up in front of the Alpha’s house. Two mean-looking wolves got out of one truck, and one angry giant squeezed himself out the other.
“Oh, dear,” Brody said, stepping back into the bathroom. “Three shifters just came. Two were wolves and one scent I couldn’t recognize. I hope they’ve come to help us because they’re the scariest-looking people I’ve ever seen.”
Meg smiled and squeezed his hand again. “Is one really, really tall, built like a barn with brown hair?”
“Yes, the others are nearly as big but have blond hair and huge frowns.”
“Come on, we’ll go downstairs before Landon tears the house apart looking for us.”
As they left the shelter of the bathroom, Brody smelled the unusual shifter’s scent stronger than before. “One of them is in the house already. Stay close in case he’s not this Landon fellow you’re expecting.”
Brody tried to stop Meg, but she sped down the stairs ahead of him, surprisingly quickly considering she still had her sister in her arms.
“Meggie, he just has to be the bear, he’s so big.” Brody heard Lexie’s excited voice before he’d finished walking down the stairs. A bear, so that’s what he was. Brody had never met a bear. They were not all that common amongst shifter breeds.
“Hello there, tiny person.” The voice boomed through Brody’s head. The bear had a voice that matched his size. Big.
Brody stepped into the kitchen behind Meg and looked up at the man smiling down at Meg and Lexie. His soft smile suddenly changed to a sneer as he growled loudly and raised his eyes to stare directly at Brody.
“Landon, stop. This is who Aiden sent to protect me.” Meg backed up toward him as she spoke, pulling Brody behind her smaller body until they were all backed against the kitchen wall.
The bear tilted his head back and roared. Glasses and plates fell from the shelves of the kitchen dresser, smashing silently to the floor as the man’s roar drowned out all other sounds. The two blond wolves appeared beside the bear, their faces changed in a deforming half-shift that Brody had never witnessed before.
Their faces had grown longer to accommodate their full wolf muzzles. Their teeth were all elongated, the canines terrifying as their muzzles pulled back in a snarl. The control and rage needed to perform such a shift was nearly impossible, but these two wolves had managed it. The effect was so horrible that Brody actually closed his eyes to block out the sight as he took Meg and Lexie back to the safety of the bathroom.
“Brody, they were members of Caleb’s pride.” She looked at Lexie and smiled at the little girl. “Our pride. We need to talk to them, they might know what’s going on.”
“Those three are terrifying. The bear looked like he was going to eat me. Doesn’t he know I’m here to help?”
Pounding on the door to Prescott’s room shook the walls and made all three of them jump. “Let me go, Josh.” The bear’s statement was followed by the sound of furniture breaking in Prescott’s room.
“What’s wrong with you, Landon?” Meg said. “Brody is my friend.”
“I’m here to protect all of you.” Landon said each word slowly.
The words sounded strained and forced. Brody didn’t trust him. “He’s going to kill me as soon as we open that door. I’m certain of it.” Brody tried to think of another safe place to take Meg and Lexie.
“Never!” Landon’s bellow was so loud that Lexie put her hands over her ears and started to cry.
“This is insane,” Meg said, her voice pitched high with her rising hysteria. “We have Nick in town somewhere. Caleb didn’t come back with Brody and I don’t know where Lachlan and Prescott are.”
Brody reached for Meg to reassure her when she suddenly clutched her free hand to her chest and screamed. She fell to the tiled floor with Lexie landing on top of her. The door shattered into toothpick-sized pieces as Landon pushed himself through it.
Brody didn’t know whether to take Meg with him or simply flee the bear by himself. He looked up at Landon with only the fraction of a second remaining to make up his mind and froze. The bear was staring directly at Brody, his face showing neither the anger nor rage he’d anticipated. He looked blissfully happy.
Chapter 12
Prescott snarled from his position halfway down the sheer cliff. He’d shifted fully and slowed his descent by digging his claws into the rock until a slim ledge had afforded him something to cling to.
“Prescott? Are you alive?” Caleb’s voice roared through his mind, making him growl in pain.
“Not really, but I’m not dead yet, either.”
“Thank God. I thought the fucker had killed you,” Lachlan said.
“He tried and he still may succeed. I’m hanging off a ledge halfway down Burnt Bridge Gorge, on the roadside. The bastard dropped me off the edge.” He snarled as his claws slipped a little n the narrow rock ledge.
He didn’t dare move enough to look down, but he could see the top of the gorge and knew he was still a long way from the bottom. There was a stream that ran through the bottom of the 200-foot gorge, but with snow in the mountains that fed the stream, it would be dry or frozen over in mid-January. Had it been summer the drop may still have been fatal, even for a shifter.
“Caleb has shifted and is sending help your way,” Lachlan said. “Hang in there.”
”You’re hilarious. Did Meg and Lexie get safely away with Brody?” Prescott needed to know she was safe, even if it was his final thought.
His cat snarled at his fatalistic thought. It would never give up fighting to return to its mate. Prescott forced his claws deeper into the rock and ignored the screaming pain in his limbs. He dug his rear claws into the rock. They didn’t go in far, but they gave him a little more purchase.
”They’re at home with Brody. Landon will be with her by now,” Caleb said. “Brayden and Dad are on the way now with some rope.”
Prescott felt better knowing Meg was safe, but it didn’t diminish his drive to survive. If anything, it strengthened it. If Meg had already been killed, he’d have been hanging on simply to kill the bastard who’d taken her from him, but now he was determined to survive to get back to her. They had a long life together ahead of th
em and he wasn’t going to let anyone rob him of that promised life with his magnificent mate.
* * * *
Meg clutched at her chest in an attempt to ease the pain in her heart. It was squeezed so tight that the feelings of fear and panic threatened to make her shift. Her mate was dying. Prescott was close to death and she was helpless to assist him. Her fear was paralyzing her.
“Meggie, what’s wrong? You’re scaring me. Please say something.” She felt herself shaking, her mind unable to conceive of one her mates dying.
She was lifted and held tight in someone’s arms. Lexie’s face swam into view through the tears flooding her eyes. She tried to talk, but her mind refused to give life to the words. She couldn’t say it. She wouldn’t believe it. It’s Prescott. My Prescott is dying.
* * * *
Brody held Meg and tried to give her warmth as she shook and cried in his arms. He was sitting on the cold tiles, leaning against the wall and trying to comfort the small woman on his lap. The bear was just staring at him, his mouth slightly open and the room filling with his scent. It was heady and rich, a pleasant smell that Brody had never encountered before.
“Is she going to be sick?” Lexie said. She handed a wet washcloth to Brody.
“I think she might, Lexie. Come sit next to me and hold her hand.” Brody could detect a change in Meg’s natural scent, but he wasn’t a shifter. He didn’t know what it meant.
“Mr. Bear, is she in pain? I know something’s wrong with her, but I don’t know what it is.” He looked at the huge man and hoped he’d be of more help than just filling the room with muscles.
“Landon. My name is Landon Damarin,” he said. He squatted down in front of Brody and smiled, his huge canines retracting back into his gums. “She’s feeling fear and pain. The Nephilim took Prescott. She’s probably feeling his pain through their bond.”
Brody held Meg tighter as a sob escaped her. He knew from living with the wolves how painful it was for them to lose a mate. He didn’t want the sweet woman in his arms to suffer through that agony.
One of the wolves appeared in the doorway, his naked body filling the space where the door once stood. “They’ve found Prescott. He’s alive, Meg, they’ve gone to get him from just outside of town.”
Brody lowered his gaze from the huge wolf’s naked body. “He’s alive, Meg, do you hear that?”
“Get out, Josh,” Landon said. “You’re naked.” He stood and blocked the doorway, pushing the wolf back into Prescott’s room.
“Where is he?” Meg said. She quickly stood and tried to get past Landon. “I need to get to him.”
“We need you to stay here,” Landon said. “Caleb wants you here.” The bear had turned to face them, but his gaze was fixed on Brody, not Meg, as he spoke. “We’re all here to keep you safe.”
“Do you have a problem with me, Landon?” Brody was used to shifters thinking of him as a lesser being. The wolves had treated him like dirt for the last sixty years and he’d tolerated it because he’d never known anything else. But the cats had treated him differently and he didn’t want to go back to feeling worthless again.
Meg had treated him like a friend. Her mates saw him as powerful and had entrusted their most precious possession to him, their mate. He’d be damned if he’d slip backward now when he’d finally started to come into his own.
He stood and walked up to the bear, invading his personal space in a show of bravado. It was all a show though. He was terrified, but he had to start growing some balls. He was so close that he ended up glaring at the bear’s chest, so he tilted his head back until his neck creaked, trying to glare at the giant’s face.
“So brave, little Brody, even though you look terrified,” Landon said. He cupped Brody’s face gently with both of his huge hands. Brody shivered at the shock the contact brought to his senses. “You never have to fear me. Be afraid for anyone who ever thinks to harm you.”
* * * *
Prescott sat at his kitchen table and held his mate tight to his chest. She had her head buried in his neck as she straddled his lap. He kissed her soft blonde hair over and over as he whispered to her that he was safe. Their kitchen was full to bursting as his mother made coffee for everyone and Brody walked around offering everyone a slice of the cake he’d made earlier.
His homecoming had been both sweet and surprising. His father and Brayden had arrived with the rope and made short work of lowering Caleb down the cliff to wrap a rope around Prescott’s shifted form. Once they started pulling, he easily managed to claw his way back up to the top.
By the time he’d arrived home, his shredded fingers had fully healed and he easily caught Meg in his arms as she threw herself off the front porch. She’d held him tight even as Caleb and Lachlan had kissed her. They needed to get her to bed. They all needed to mark her again after the drama of the day. Their cats were possessive and territorial and the threat today had taken them from their mate and they needed to reconnect to her.
As his erect cock jumped at the thought of claiming Meg, she nipped at her mark. He growled softly at her in warning. “I’ll take you right now, Meg, and everyone will see you’re mine,” he whispered.
“I was scared, Prescott.” She lifted her head and he saw the tears still swimming in her eyes. “It hurt so much.”
“I know, baby. I was scared for you, too.” He kissed her chastely and blushed as his mother sighed.
“Cake, Cynthia?” Brody said. He smiled at Prescott and ushered Cynthia away.
“Does he know?” Prescott said. That was the surprising part of the homecoming. Landon had found his mate.
“I don’t know,” Meg said. She looked at Brody as he offered some cake to Landon. “He has no scent, so I can’t tell what he’s feeling. He seems a little scared of Landon.”
“I’ve seen him naked,” Lachlan said. “I’d be scared to be his mate, too.” He kissed Meg and sat down next them.
Meg stifled a giggle and put her hand over Lachlan’s mouth to stop him saying anything further on the subject. Landon had invited his twin brother, Elliot, over and they were standing side by side, their eyes fixed on Brody.
They’d never made a secret of the fact they were both gay. It had been the reason they’d left their birth sleuth. The narrow-minded attitude of the sleuth’s Alpha had made it impossible for them to stay. Here in Pine Falls they were a vital part of Caleb’s mixed pride. They were strong and loyal and everyone here was thrilled they’d found their fate-chosen mate.
“I’m happy for Landon and Elliot,” Meg said. “But I’m even happier for Brody. He was abused back with the wolves and I wanted to keep him, but this is even better. He has mates and a real home now. They’ll treat him like the special person he is.”
Caleb walked over with Lexie on his hip. She had cake all over her face and Caleb had the same amount on his shirt. “They’ll love him even more when they’ve tasted this cake,” Caleb said.
“It’s the best cake in the world,” Lexie said, a huge smile on her face. Prescott marveled at the resilience of the child. She’d had her world turned upside down, but loved Meg so much that she was happy just being with her sister.
Meg’s brother was not going to be welcome at their wedding. He’d kept Meg and Lexie apart and not treated his little sister well. The man had a beating coming. Lexie was his little sister now, and he’d see that she was always safe and happy.
The sound of plates breaking pulled Prescott out of his musing and he stood with Meg in his arms, ready to battle the devil himself to keep her safe.
“He’s here,” Brody whispered. The room was full of shifters. They all heard him.
Prescott walked to Brody and placed Meg in his arms. “Take her wherever you have to, but keep her safe.”
“Take them both, Brody.” Caleb put Lexie down at Brody’s side and walked outside with Prescott and Lachlan.
* * * *
Meg looked at the door Landon had just closed. The only ones left in the kitchen were Cynthia, Bro
dy, Lexie, and herself. Everyone else had gone to face an adversary they had no hope of stopping just to protect her. She felt sick. If even one person was hurt trying to keep her safe she didn’t think she’d survive the guilt.
She pushed herself free of Brody’s arms and looked up at the demon. “You’re the weapon Aiden sent to protect me and all they’re letting you do is transport me away. You said you were stronger than a Nephilim.”
“I am, even if he’s accumulated extra powers.”
“Then you can fight him without getting hurt yourself?” Meg wanted Nick gone, but not at the expense of Brody’s life.
“I told them I could fight him, just not kill him. I can hurt him enough to buy us some time for Aiden to return with his weapon.” Meg liked the hint of pride and confidence she saw on Brody’s face. He wasn’t weak, he’d just been made to feel that way for far too long.
“Then let’s go hurt him, Brody.” Meg linked her arm through Brody’s and walked toward the door leading to the porch.
“My boys will die if you get killed, Meg. I can’t let you put yourself in danger like this.” Cynthia stepped in front of them, her expression grimly determined.
“You’re right,” Meg said. “But Brody can save them all. Your mate is out there, too.” Meg nodded at Brody and hoped she’d done the right thing as Brody disappeared.
Chapter 13
Caleb watched the man walk up their drive. He looked out of place in his three-piece suit and dress shoes. He could detect no scent from him, but the malice pulsed off him in waves. He must have a way to shield his power when he wished to, because the air around them was now shimmering with it.
Fighting Heaven for Love [Pine Falls 2] (Siren Publishing Menage Amour) Page 9
