“Yes.”
“Oh, when there isn’t a two year old witness, you are so dead, buddy,” Shona snapped.
Tess merely stared at him.
I just fought to stay standing, my mind fogged, my palms sweaty. “Jude.”
Tess’s expression pinched. “I’ve reached for him mentally, Ryan, but he has his personal wards up.”
I touched my chest lightly. “I need Jude.”
“I know you think you do,” said Tess, her gaze moistening. “But what you really need at this point is your mate. If only he wasn’t being a pigheaded jerk.”
Shona looked at me, concern in her eyes. “Ryan, what’s wrong? You never ask for Jude out right. Ever. And why aren’t you freaking out about who Hudson is?”
“What?” I tried but failed to concentrate on what she was asking of me. The room seemed to sway. It felt as if I’d been at sea for months and had just come onto land—everything moved back and forth, forth and back. I thought for sure I’d be sick. I probably would have been had I had any food in me.
“I’m reading her, Shona,” said Tess. “Ryan’s body is shutting down. She’s not focusing and she’s not making sense of what she’s hearing—she can’t. There is a block there. A mystical one. I can’t be sure but it feels like her own doing. A spell maybe. I don’t want to tamper with it. Besides, she isn’t ready to be told the truth. It’s right in front of her, but she’s in a state of denial. It’s her best defense when it comes to Cowboy.”
I swayed more and Porter caught me. My brain was in a fog, and try as I might, I couldn’t make sense of what was being talked about. It was reminiscent of how my head used to feel whenever I’d look at Cowboy’s face and see nothing but a blur there. Sort of my brain on Cowboy rather than my brain on drugs. All I knew for certain was, I felt like total and utter crap.
With a roar, Hudson moved to me and caught me in his arms, dragging me against his body and holding me close to him. He stared around the area, looking frantic. “If you’re really there, tell me how to fix her.”
The sicker I felt, the more I realized he was speaking to Porter who I no longer sensed near us. “He’s gone.”
Hudson squeezed me tighter to him. “No! Porter, come back. Help me help her!”
“Daddy yell,” said JP. “Daddy is mad. No yellin’, Daddy. Inside voice.”
Tess neared Hudson and put a hand on his shoulder. “This is for you to figure out, wolf. It is your mess to be cleaned up.”
“How?” he asked, his voice sounding small. “I just found her. I can’t lose her.”
Shona blinked back tears and I tipped my head, wondering what was going on. Try as I might to focus, it didn’t work. All I wanted to do was sleep, and I knew there was a chance I’d not wake up.
I didn’t care.
“Ryan hasn’t been able to keep much in the way of food down for months now.”
Hudson gasped. “What?”
I went to interject but he covered my mouth with his hand.
Tess nodded. “You’re a smart man to ignore her. She’ll lie through her teeth about how she feels. She’s been run down enough already, and using that much power today set her back. She’ll be better if she just takes a bit of time to relax. And there is no relaxing with a two-year-old running around.”
Hudson looked at James-Porter. “Would you like Mommy to get some rest and then play with you?”
“Mommy, shhh, sleep. Be good and go to nightie-nite.”
Hudson grunted. “See, he even agrees with me. You do realize at this rate we’ll be partners in crime in no time flat.” Hudson swept me up in his arms and faced Shona and Tess. “I’m taking them home with me.”
Tess laughed. “Why not just take her up to her apartment. It’s above the bar and much closer. We’ll watch JP. Ben will be here shortly to help. And George is in the back kitchen area. He’ll fix JP something to eat.”
I was in no shape to protest. As Tess led Hudson to the back entrance to the upstairs area, I put my head against his chest and the strangest of things began to happen—I felt the long closed link to my mate, my destined one, opening a small bit. It was enough to give me a tiny push of power from him. It made the pain in my body ease somewhat and the extreme, bone-tired fatigue lighten some. I was still tired but able to at least keep my eyes open.
Hudson marched me up the stairs, holding me close and I let him, enjoying the feel of his embrace. As my bare skin brushed over his, energy seemed to pass between us. Concerned I’d drain him without meaning to, I tried to get down. He held me tighter.
“I’m hurting you,” I said.
He gave me a warm look. “You’re doin’ nothin’ of the sort, sweet-pea.”
I blinked up at him. “What?”
Energy continued to seep from him to me slowly, but at a rate that helped with the extreme fatigue. While tired, I felt better than I had in weeks and Hudson didn’t seem to be the least bit drained. When we finally entered my place, I squirmed to get down. He let me but held my elbow while I got my footing. I was a lot of things, but a woman who needed a man to hold her nonstop wasn’t one of them.
He cleared his throat. “About what I said to you. You’re not immature or ignorant.”
I lifted my chin. “I know that. I don’t need you to confirm it.”
“Ryan, I’m sorry. I was hurt and angry. I lashed out.”
I eyed him. “Porter was right. You were an asshole.”
His lips twitched. “You really see him?”
“I don’t see him. I sense and hear him, but yes, it’s real.”
He touched my cheek. “You just keep on surprisin’ me.”
Bitter triumph passed over my face as I stared at him. “Yet you seem to find ways to always disappoint me.” I wasn’t sure why I said it, but it felt warranted.
He nodded. “I deserve that.”
“Yes. You do.”
11
Chapter 11
“Who restored the woodwork here?” Hudson asked as he glanced around my house. Technically it was an apartment, but it was the entire third floor above the bar, so it was huge.
I shrugged. “I did. I suffer from nightmares so I often try to find anything to do in place of sleeping.”
“This is amazing work. There are so many recessed areas that this must have been a huge undertaking.”
“No, it wasn’t that bad. I grew up watching a man do things like that all the time. He could build anything he wanted. Not just make a shelf or things like that. I mean anything. He made sure every piece of furniture he did was perfect. Once, I watched him spend ten months on a dining room table set. It was worth every minute. The ornate legs alone were worth all that time. He’d put the tiniest of wolf heads and these symbols that I’ve no clue what they meant on each leg. To someone just glancing at it, it looked like a fancy pattern of swirls. But up close you could see exactly what he’d done.”
Hudson’s brows drew together, the rest of his expression guarded. “Was this your grandfather, father, what?”
The way he asked said he already knew the answer.
Odd.
“No.” I slipped my boots off as I headed towards the bathroom in my bedroom. Glancing back, I found Hudson looking at me oddly. “I’d offer for you to make yourself comfortable, but I can’t seem to find living room furniture I like since the man I grew up around ruined me. I can’t walk in and just buy a sofa that was mass produced. Not when I watched a man build the most beautiful white sofa with his bare hands. Jude has bought me at least fifty different ones. He thinks I’m kidding about not wanting something impersonal. I’m not. I opted for the variety of pillows instead.”
One half of the room was covered in pillows of various shapes and sizes. They varied in color. Some were pale yellow, some were white. They didn’t look too bad and they were extremely comfortable. At least I thought so.
Hudson looked around, put his back to me and stared at my bookshelves. “I take it you like to read.”
“Yep,” I said
, undoing my jeans and sliding them off without a second thought. “I own a television. It’s hiding in behind that cream screen over there. JP watches it at times.”
“You never told me who the man was you watched work while you were younger.”
“It doesn’t really matter,” I said softly, sadness washing over me. “To him I was a ghost.”
Hudson stiffened, but didn’t turn around. “I heard you when I first came in, when you were talking about the guy you called Cowboy. The one I reminded you of. Is that who you watched work?”
I slumped, emotionally defeated when it came to talk of Cowboy and I wasn’t sure why Hudson was so stuck on all this. “You didn’t just remind me of him, Hudson. I firmly believed you were him for a split second. Sorry about that.”
He ran his hands over the spines of some of the books on my shelf. It felt as if he was going out of his way to avoid looking at me. “It’s fine. Really. So, what else can you tell me about him?”
The more we talked about it all, the more it felt as if an icy hand was squeezing my heart. I’d have cried, the swell of emotions too much for me, if I’d have had the energy. “Why do you want to know about my mate? Like I said, I was just a ghost to him. He’s not in my life. In fact, he was technically only in my life for one night when I was face-to-face with him, in the flesh. Want to take mean jabs at me? Want to accuse me of lying? Or of pulling some truth about him out of your head?”
“I’m sorry I reacted poorly at the mention of Porter.” His apology came as he continued to face away from me, stealing some of its sincerity. It didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that with as alpha as Hudson was, he didn’t like putting his feelings out there for everyone to see and know. Not many people really did enjoy making themselves vulnerable.
I know I didn’t.
“Are you really brothers?” I asked, the question gnawing at my gut. It was impossible to keep thoughts of Eliza from my head. If someone I didn’t know well claimed they could communicate with her in the great beyond, I’d have been pissed too. In fact, in hindsight, Hudson took it all better than I would have.
“Yes.” His voice was barely there. I could hear the heartache choking him and I fought to keep from going to him. We needed to have this out, at least to some degree.
“You’re a Guardian. Why haven’t you seen him around? He’s a Soul-Guardian.” It stood to reason the two would overlap.
Hudson drew in a long measured breath. “I don’t know. There is probably a good reason. He died right after we’d had a fight, so maybe he’s still pissed at me. I can’t blame him. When you talked about him it caught me off guard. I’m sorry I said what I did, Ryan.”
I nodded and then realized he couldn’t see me. “I’m sorry I sprang Porter on you. I had no idea he was your brother. I’d have thought of a more delicate way to bring the matter up. I know what its like to lose a sibling. I didn’t mean to cause you pain.”
“I know you didn’t,” he responded, his voice warm. “I have so fucking much to be sorry for. Can you just let me have this?”
I had to bite back a smile. “Yes. And thank you for the apology.”
He cleared his throat. “About your mate, I know him well. Very well. Though Tess hinted that it might be best to hold that information a bit longer.”
That surprised me. Why would Tess want him to keep such a significant detail from me? She knew how important it was that JP be protected at all costs when I died. That meant Cowboy needed to know he existed.
“Ryan, explain what you mean by ‘ghost to him’ and tell me about this night you spent with him.”
I’d said enough. No good could come of me diving into more detail. The only thing that would happen is I’d hurt more. I was already emotionally naked before Hudson. I couldn’t offer more. Not if I didn’t want to totally break. “No.”
“Will you at least tell me about the ghost portion?”
Surrendering somewhat, I steeled my nerves. “I’ll show you. Don’t turn around. I can place-jump and I don’t have a time limit on when I have to become corporeal or even have to take my physical body with me. I can do it in reverse too, but this is how I’d visit Cowboy when I was growing up.”
Hudson didn’t move as I spirit-walked out of my body. It wasn’t odd anymore. It was second-nature. I was used to it. To me, it felt just a tiny bit different than being in myself. I walked around Hudson slowly. He closed his eyes and drew in a deep breath. Clenching his fists, he let out a soft sigh.
“I can smell you near me,” he whispered, wonderment on his face.
I smiled as he stood there with his eyes closed, seeming to savor the moment. Lifting my hand, I touched his scruffy cheek. My hand went right through him. Hudson gasped and bit his lower lip as he nodded.
“Now, if The Powers That Be blurred your face to the point I couldn’t make out your features, you’d have to convince me that you aren’t Cowboy.” I leaned into him and let my body pass through him a bit. He did a full body shudder and I smiled.
“See, I’m way cooler than the invisible man,” I said, laughing, firmly believing he’d be like everyone else. Only Cowboy and two of my friends could hear me when I was like this.
Hudson laughed softly. “Yes, you are way cooler.”
I froze. He couldn’t be Cowboy. The odds Hudson was not only Cowboy but standing before me as my Guardian were too great.
“Ryan? You’re upset. Why?”
I jumped into my body quickly. “I’m not upset. Just a bit spooked. I’d rather not keep associating a man who is temporarily charged with keeping me safe with a man who is the reason the bad guys started hunting me, that’s all.”
Hudson stiffened. “What do you mean? How is he the reason you’re hunted?”
I found it odd he refused to face me, but didn’t comment. “Remember how I read you and explained the dark ones want you to step to their side of the fence, and they know they can do it if they can just manage to—”
“Kill the one person I love most.” He drew in a sharp breath and shook his head. “They want to kill you to push—”
“Cowboy over the edge. Yep. You have just pegged the original reason they came after me.” Running my hand through my hair, I snorted. “They seemed to miss the memo that he’s either forgotten I exist, never believed I was real to begin with, or doesn’t give a damn. Hell, last I knew he was still with some woman he proposed to. I can’t change that. Whatever the reason, he’s not here. He’s never been here and he never will be. He told me I could find him anywhere with the ring I wear and that he’d remember the second he saw it on me.
“He lied. I tried to find him for the first six months I was pregnant, but I didn’t have any luck.” Remembering that dark time wouldn’t do me any good. I’d been powerless to stop it all then and couldn’t do a thing to change the past now. All I could do was move forward, as best I could with the time I had. Still, a pained laugh escaped me at the irony of it all. “The sad part of all of it is that for the longest time I believed him. I thought he would come, that he would protect me from the bad things in this world. I was pathetic.”
Hudson stood silent for a moment, his body taking up so much space, yet at that very second there was a certain vulnerability to him. As if his guard was down and I was getting a glimpse at the man behind the curtain. Instinct told me not many were gifted the insight. “Ryan, can I please see the ring he gave you?”
“You honestly think you know him?” Hope wanted to come, wanted to take root in me, but I didn’t dare let it. My hopes and dreams had been dashed too many times before. There wasn’t enough of me left to have it all built up only to crash down on me again. Still, I edged forward with the intent to show Hudson the ring.
“I take it you don’t have a name for me to go off of,” he said as I approached him slowly.
“No, The Powers made it so I couldn’t hear his name. If someone said it, I heard a loud squelch that made my ears hurt in place of the name. And I can’t remember what his face
looks like. They made it so it was blurry for me all my life. I know I saw him once, but the minute he left, it faded from my memory. So you can see why I had a hard time making any headway in finding him.”
Standing just a hair behind Hudson, I took the necklace off and ran my hand down his arm. I placed it in his hand and closed his fingers over it, feeling naked and exposed without it. “If something happens to me, give this to JP and tell him to find Daddy. I mask JP’s scent now to keep the bad guys from knowing who his real father is. That will drop when I pass away. If his father is even a quarter of the man I firmly believed he was for so many years, he’ll at least protect JP until Jude can help him.”
“Wait, you’re saying JP’s father is your true mate?” The disbelief in Hudson’s voice caught me off guard.
“Yes.” I began to sweat again and feel dizzy. That wasn’t a good sign. It meant I was burning through the boost I’d gotten from Cowboy and Hudson. And that meant, I was closing in on the end fast—that my body was so damaged it was probably beyond repair.
Hudson was quiet a moment. “Ryan, I know your mate. He has never mentioned being with you or having a child. He knows deep down to the bone that you’re his, but he’s never slept with you and he hasn’t fathered a child.”
“Oh yes, he has. He just can’t remember.” My actions all those years ago still haunted me. Giving in and casting a memory spell had been the worst move I could have made.
“What do you mean? Why can’t he remember?”
I didn’t want to go into detail, but as a Guardian sent to help my son and myself and as the man who might know where Cowboy was, Hudson needed to know the whole truth no matter the personal cost to myself. I staggered slightly, draining fast. It took me longer than it should to focus. “Because I had to use my magik to make him forget our night together. It happened before it was destined, before The Powers That Be had okayed the meeting. Just two months, but those two months could have meant our lives. To protect him and myself, the choice was made to take the memories from him, like it never happened, but we didn’t know I was pregnant. You can’t take that away. You can’t cast a spell and make that never happen. I had a full reminder of our time. I had JP growing in me. My mate had nothing.”
Crossing Hudson Page 11
