by Celia Kyle
The turmoil and anxiety still tainted the air, the emotions pushing a sharp tang into the wind, but there wasn’t much to be done about the burning stench.
He allowed Trista to lead, to gently choose their path. Every once in a while she’d bend and snatch up a stone, tossing it into the water and watching as the delicate ripples marred the surface. It was like their short relationship, smooth one moment and trembling the next.
Minutes sped past and darkness eased closer, the sun casting a multi-hued glow over the lake.
“Trista?” he murmured, not wanting his voice to destroy the calming peace they’d established. “Talk to me.”
She drew to a stop and turned to face the fading sun, drawing him closer until he wrapped his arms around her. He molded himself to her back, taking a bit of her weight when she leaned into him.
“I don’t want him to be my uncle.”
Keen leaned down and pressed his cheek to hers, enjoying the touch while hoping his nearness calmed her. “Why not?”
“Because it changes who I am. Because it means he didn’t care enough then so why should he care now? It means that my mom and I scraped and fought and got our shit together without him when he could have made our lives easier.” She turned her head slightly and nuzzled him. “Do you know what it’s like to be hungry? To not have a place to live because you can’t hold a job because you’re forced by what seems like everyone to stay in this god-forsaken area?”
“No.” His heart broke for the pain in her voice now and the agony she’d faced over the years without him. “No, I don’t.” He took a deep breath and released it slowly. “And I wish you could have had an easier life, Tris. But the fact is, I wouldn’t want yours, or mine, to have been any different. If it’d been easy, if we’d sailed through our childhoods without rage, violence, and hunger, we wouldn’t be here today. And I love where I’m at right now.”
He loved her. After five days of stress and happiness, he refused to entertain the idea of not spending the rest of his life with her at his side.
Trista sighed and turned in his arms, cuddling close to him and rubbing her cheek across his chest; over his heart. “I love it, too.”
He heard so much more in those few words and realized she felt the same as him. Or at least, close enough. Now wasn’t the time, not with violence and the threats hanging above them, but as soon as they ended the dangers, they’d explore those feelings further. Hopefully naked.
“So we won’t have regrets and we won’t think of what-ifs. I don’t care if you’re a quarter werebear and you can hate him for abandoning your mother—his sister—and you. You don’t have to ever speak to him again, if you’d like. But right now, if it’s true, we need him to save you.” God, they needed Terrence.
“I know.”
The squeak of the back door opening and then the thud of it slamming closed broke their sweet peace and Keen focused on the clan house in the distance. It was the clan house, not his house, or his childhood home. He had a new place, a place he’d fill with love and cubs once this nightmare was at an end.
His enhanced eyesight allowed him to identify the interloper with ease. Van. What the hell did his brother want now?
Keen stepped away from Trista and nudged her behind him, creating a barrier between his mate and a dangerous male. A rolling growl formed in his chest and the closer Van came, the more it increased in volume. Trista rubbed his back as if trying to soothe and calm him, but it wasn’t going to happen. With a mate, he was like a normal werebear and even a normal werebear would want to eliminate a threat to his other half.
Van had tried to kill Trista. Now Keen would kill Van. The bear thought it was a wonderful idea. It put brother against brother, but familial ties meant little when compared to Trista’s position in his life. Hell, she was his whole world.
Van stopped twenty feet away, his hands outstretched, revealing human fingers and furless arms. “I just wanna talk, Keen.”
Keen couldn’t stop the rumble. His inner-animal wanted Van dead beneath his paws.
Unfortunately, his mate disagreed. “Keen…”
It was a plea and a reprimand in one.
Keen looked over his shoulder at his pale mate. “He tried to kill you. He conspired with Reid and Quinn, Trista.”
“And I’m sorry about that.”
Keen refocused on his brother and Van continued. “I am sorry, Keen. If I’d known about your mating… I thought I was doing a good thing, the right thing. I didn’t mean…” His brother shook his head. “It doesn’t matter what I thought or what I didn’t mean to do. I came out here to apologize and to let you know that Ty left a message for Terrence. There’s no news yet, but Dad doesn’t think staying out here much longer is a good idea. Reid should adhere to clan laws simply because Trista is your mate and that places some restrictions on his behavior. He’s just not sure if the wolf’s control will endure the temptation you two out here alone presents.”
Instead of snarling at his brother, attacking him for the havoc and pain he’d caused, Keen kept his mouth shut and jerked his head in a stiff nod. He couldn’t speak, not yet and not now. Someday he might have a kind word for Van, but that wasn’t today.
Van slowly turned and retraced his steps, retreating and finally disappearing into the house.
“You should forgive him.” Trista’s words were hesitant, but he caught them nonetheless. “He’s your brother.”
“Would you?” He couldn’t keep the harshness from his voice, the disbelief.
Trista stepped around him, stopping once they faced one another. She reached for his hand, and he allowed her to direct his movements, to place his palm on her throat and his fingers to curl around her neck. “Do you feel them? The scars?”
He did. He’d seen them and kissed them and he prayed there weren’t any others marring her body. “Yes.”
“They were formed the day of my fath— Brigham Scott’s funeral. Heath’s claws were tainted with poison. He made sure they’d scar, that I’d always remember that day. If Heath had come to me and apologized, if he had welcomed me into his home and tried to love me as a brother should, I would have forgiven him. Even after this”—she squeezed his hand, encouraging him to feel the marred flesh—“I would have forgiven him.”
Keen snatched his hand away and stared at her, reading the emotions cascading across her face. She pleaded with him to understand, to accept and relent his anger.
“He set this up. He is—was—trying to send you to your death.” It hurt, dug into his heart and burrowed into his soul. His brother betrayed him and he wasn’t sure he’d ever get over it.
Trista shook her head, a sad smile on her lips. “No, he contributed, but he didn’t put this in motion. It’s been coming for years. It’s convoluted and twisted now, but Reid has been after my mother and me since I was a child and it was only a matter of time before Quinn came after you. It just so happened that the stars didn’t only align, but folded and turned in on themselves to create what’s happening now.”
Keen ran a hand through his hair, accepting Trista’s words as truth, but the bear still raged at his brother’s behavior. “I can’t forgive this, Tris.”
“You can.”
He shook his head, anger burning hotter at the suggestion. “No.”
“You will because I’m asking you to.”
The growing rage deflated, crashing back to Earth in a wheezing heap. “You can’t.”
“I can.” She hooked a finger through his belt loop and tugged him closer. “Because if I… When… You’ll need them and I don’t want you to go through this alone.”
A new shade of anger pulsed through him, one tinged with disgust and he even hated himself a little for that emotion. He cupped her cheeks, forcing her to focus on him. “Are you giving up? Already? Before the fight has begun, you’re rolling over? I may talk about the possibility, because let’s be honest, there’s only one winner in a fight to the death, but it sounds like you’re throwing in the towel. Is that t
he type of woman I mated?”
A wave of burning heat struck him, Trista’s emotions searing him with their strength. “Fuck you, Keen.” She brushed off his hold and stepped back. “It’s not giving up, it’s being a realist. We already know I’m not running because I’ve been running my entire life, but we also know that Adrienne is going to step into that yard on four feet, not two. I’m three-quarters some kind of shifter, but she’s gonna have fangs and claws while I’ve got a fat ass and blunted teeth. So fuck you very much for me knowing that tomorrow will go one of two ways and wanting someone to be there for you.”
Trista’s hair was carried away and stroked by the wind, tendrils waving in the air. The waning sun made her pale skin glow and her eyes sparked with her anger. She was… beautiful. Pissed off or coming apart in his arms, she was gorgeous.
“God, I love you.” The words escaped, slicing through her ranting and silencing her in an instant. That’s when he realized what he’d said, what he’d admitted, and he held his breath. He was such a fucking girl, but he hoped she’d return his words, mirror his emotions. He knew it was new and fast and yet…
“You love me?” She raised her eyebrows high and he nodded. “You love me? After I said… And tomorrow…” He nodded again and she glared at him. “How am I supposed to stay mad and finish yelling at you if you say something like that?”
Keen shrugged. He kinda hoped she wouldn’t.
Trista remained rooted in place, her attention locked on him, and he let his emotions shine through, allowed the bear to push forward and add his feelings to the moment. Right, wrong, or indifferent, he wouldn’t call the words back for anything.
“I don’t want you to love me.” A tear trailed down her cheek. “And I don’t want to love you.”
“Why?” He managed to shove the word from his throat.
“Because then it won’t hurt so much. Tomorrow…”
“C’mere.”
Keen stepped forward and she eased back. He moved toward her again and this time she didn’t move away from him. Instead, she stayed cemented in place and he reached for her hand and brought it to his mouth. He brushed a soft kiss across the back, breathing in her sweet scent. The smells of the lake still clung to her skin—they hadn’t showered after their mating—but beneath that her true flavors lurked. He flipped her hand over and pressed a hard kiss to her palm.
“Tomorrow we’re going to face Quinn, Malcolm, Reid, and Adrienne, and we’re going to have this out once and for all. I have no doubt that my family is inside making every phone call they can and pulling every string available.” He took a deep breath and held it a moment before letting it escape his lungs. “I have no doubt tomorrow will be difficult, I have no idea what’s going to happen, but I will be with you and I will protect you with my dying breath.” He tucked stray tendrils of her hair behind her ear. “I love you and I’m not about to lose you to some upstart bitch.”
A woman’s voice interrupted their moment, crashed and stomped on it as if it’d never existed, and Keen cursed Van for being right. “Upstart bitch?”
Chapter Sixteen
The words scraped down Trista’s spine, the high voice digging its nails into her flesh and grating her nerves. She didn’t recognize the speaker, but the tone was right, belligerent and aggressive and tinged with a hint of a growl.
Trista looked past Keen, focusing on the female behind him, and was unsurprised at what she saw. “Adrienne.”
Keen tore away from her, blocking her from the she-wolf, but then Reid stepped out of the woods and into the rapidly lessening light. There was just enough glow to make the handgun sparkle in the sun. She didn’t know anything about guns, but when it came to firearms, details weren’t all that important, were they? No matter the size, it could still kill.
And right then, it was aimed at Keen’s head.
No one moved. It was if they were frozen in time; no one breathed as decisions were made in a split second. Options, scenarios, pinged through Trista’s mind. Should she rush Adrienne? Or run? Jump in front of Keen? Or try and shove him down?
She readily admitted that none of the options appealed to her. Each one ended in pain… or death.
“Step away from her.” Reid waved his gun, the barrel wavering and sliding through the air.
Keen crossed his arms over his chest. “No.”
With the weapon aimed at her mate, she wished he would do whatever the Alpha asked. She could live through pain, deal with what these two had in mind, but she couldn’t abide Keen being injured.
Reid smirked, evil and wicked. “No?” The wolf raised his eyebrows. “We’ll do this then.” The man strode forward, stopping just outside of reaching distance, and extended his arm. “Trista, I’m going to count to five and if you don’t step out from behind him and go to Adrienne, I’ll pull this trigger. You can face the Challenge head on or you can watch your man die and then still have to fight your way free. Which is it?”
Nothing. She wanted nothing. She didn’t want a choice, she didn’t want the wolves on bear land. She wanted it to all disappear.
But she had to face this, face the fucking wolves with their fucking ultimatums and pain. She’d have to face pain.
Trista took a step toward the woman, easing half of her body from behind Keen.
“Trista…” Keen’s voice rumbled in warning.
Her life didn’t matter when it became a choice between her and Keen. She’d pick him every time. Just as she was doing now.
She took another step and her mate’s arm shot out, hand reaching for her. She darted away again, bolting out of reach until she stood between the man she loved and the woman who’d gladly end her life.
“Trista, get your ass back here.” Her mate’s words were hard and commanding.
“Move and he dies.” Reid was calm as could be, as if he couldn’t care less. The male wanted her gone, wanted her to face the Challenge and disappear. The grudge he held for so long was finally culminating in this moment.
But why?
Fuck it, she was already losing, she might as well find out why. “Why this? What have you got against me? My family? Why’d my mother have to die and why did you chase me every day of my life?”
She kept her attention split between the three people occupying the small area. She was aware of the home looming behind them and just as aware of the fact that they were hidden—partially or fully—from the house’s occupants.
“Why?” she tried again.
Red suffused Reid’s face, anger and heartache overcoming him. The muscles in his arm bulged and skin strained, his hand tightening ever so slightly on the gun. Asking had obviously been a mistake.
“I’m older than you.” He curled his lip and she nodded. He’d always been the big, bad wolf. Older than her by at least five years. “So you don’t know what your daddy”—it was a slur and curse in one—“did to our pack.”
Adrienne shifted, feet crunching and snapping the dried twigs and leaves beneath her. Trista shuffled back, still between her mate and the female, yet farther away.
“Your daddy caught my mother on his lands. She was there to pick up a few things for the pack since Redby’s store was out of stock. Your daddy didn’t listen to those laws of visitation. Instead, he took her.” A ripple of fur slithered along Reid’s arm, attesting to his wavering control. “He took her. And beat her. And raped her.” The snap of bone cut through the air. “And when he was done, he kicked her over the border with a note pinned to her chest, in her flesh, that thanked my father for use of his whore.”
The air rushed from Trista’s lungs, stealing her breath and punching a whole in her chest. She’d hated Mr. Scott for as long as she could remember, he was a bastard, but she hadn’t ever heard…
“You wanna know how your daddy died?” He didn’t wait for an answer. “My father gutted him. Found the bastard close enough to the border that he dragged the asshole onto our territory and tore him apart. I did the same to your brother. Parker’s kidnapping was
the perfect reason to join the bears’ fight and it gave me the chance I needed to go after that piece of shit.” The Alpha focused on her fully, yellow eyes boring into hers. “And you’re the last one, the last piece of shit in that family. But I don’t kill women, I don’t fight women. So, Adrienne is going to take care of that for me.” Reid waved the gun between her and the she-wolf. “Get to it then.”
The rest was a blur. Trista went from panicking on the inside, heart racing and pounding, to battling for her life.
Adrienne was on her, teeth exposed, hands curled like claws and aimed right for her. She heard Keen’s roar, felt the sound vibrate through her bones, but she couldn’t spare him a glance. If he was making noise, he was alive, and that’s all that mattered as she fought for her own existence.
Since Heath’s attack on her at thirteen, Trista had taken a few free self-defense classes at the various YMCA centers throughout the towns. They came in handy now. If only the lessons included ways to defend herself from teeth and claws.
Adrienne struck out, claws extended, and Trista jumped aside, tripping on her own feet as she scrambled away. Her shoes slid in the damp dirt, but she managed to clamber out of reach.
Then the woman pounced, flying through the air. Fur sprouted and the she-wolf’s mouth formed a muzzle as she sailed toward Trista. Teeth lengthened and became more menacing, deadlier.
Roars and growls came from her right, Keen’s animal battling Reid. The Alpha kept her mate occupied while giving Adrienne the chance to get the job done. She turned her head, worried for the man who’d become her whole world, but was only able to spare him the sparsest glance.
Because suddenly the woman was there, on top of Trista, claws aimed for her throat and open maw heading toward her head. Death lurked in Adrienne’s eyes, the promise of a quick, painful demise.
That expression had Trista’s inner-animal raging against the situation. It was stuck inside her, deep within her body and unable to emerge. She was a shifter, but not, and it enraged the beast in her heart.
