Sophie stared at her, and Cara shook her head. “Don’t do that.”
“Do what?”
“Feel guilty. They knew what they were doing. They chose it. They had the right to sit it out, and they didn’t and the chief was too stupid to keep them back. He and Jack were good friends,” she added. “If… when Bryce gets out of here, he’s the alpha,” she said quietly, and Sophie stared at Layla.
Layla raised haunted eyes to Sophie. “As an alpha, it’s his job, his and his mate’s, to protect the pack.”
“He won’t set you aside,” Cara said.
“It’s his duty to. He has to do what’s best for the pack now.”
“Screw that. Bryce loves you. He’ll have you or no one. You know this,” Cara hissed.
“Yeah. How many alphas do you know who have a cripple as a mate?”
“Don’t call yourself that!” her mother said, glaring at her. “Have a little faith in the man.”
“I’m fresh out of faith, mama. And I need to think about what’s best for him, even if he won’t.”
Sophie was about to say something when a nurse walked up to them and sat on the chair beside Sophie’s.
“You all are with the wolf attack victims, yes?”
They all nodded, and Sophie clasped her shaking hands in her lap. The nurse gave her a quick glance and shivered, seeming suddenly uncomfortable or afraid or both. She’d also noticed the shifter women becoming more antsy and agitated as they’d waited. Only some of that had to do with the stress of waiting. The rest was being so close to Shadow.
“All three are in recovery now. They’re insisting on going home, and we don’t have the power to keep them against their wills. Do they have someone who can take care of them?”
“Yes,” Cara said. She shot a look at Sophie. “We’ll take Bryce and Jon.”
Sophie nodded.
“Can we see them?”
The nurse nodded. They had to sign in, and then the nurse led them down the hall, directing Layla and Cara into one room, then directing Sophie down the hallway to Calder’s room.
She thanked the nurse and stepped inside. He was in the hospital bed, eyes closed. His chest was covered in gauze, as were his arms, his hands, his neck. He had a long strip of gauze down one side of his face. Sophie quietly walked over to the bed and stood next to it.
She bit her lip, trying to keep back the sobs that wanted to escape, and she covered her mouth with her hand.
“This was not the night I had planned,” Calder said, voice scratchy and a little muffled from the swelling of his lips. She couldn’t help it then. She cried, still clamping her hand to her mouth. He opened one swollen eye. “Don’t cry, kitten.”
“I’m so sorry. Oh, god, Calder,” she said, trying and failing to stop the tears.
“Sweetheart, calm down. You don’t have a goddamn thing to be sorry about.”
“It’s my fault they thought it was you,” she whispered, and he knew what she meant.
“Believing something doesn’t make it true, and that was on them. Did you send Bryce and the others?”
“I called to ask what pack justice was and they took off.”
“It’s a good thing you did. Without Bryce I might not have had it in me to get through them all.” She didn’t say anything, and he glanced at her. “Don’t look like that. I have enough guilt for both of us. But I also know it was me or them.”
“I’m glad it wasn’t you. This is still my fault, though.”
He sat up with a groan and she rushed to help him. “We can play the blame game, or we can go home.”
An hour later, Layla’s mother was driving Sophie and Calder to Sophie’s house. It would have been too conspicuous to witchwalk with Calder, and she wasn’t sure she could bring anyone along when she did it, anyway. When Layla’s mom dropped them off, Sophie thanked her and put an arm around Calder’s waist, helping him up the stairs and into her house. She directed him toward the daybed near the fireplace and pulled the covers back.
She stood in front of him and gently unbuttoned the shirt Layla’s mom had found for him to wear home from the hospital. He was also wearing an ill-fitting pair of sweatpants. As she undid the buttons, she was aware of his eyes on her.
She pushed his shirt off and then started pushing at the elastic waistband of the pants, careful not to snag any of the many bandages on his stomach, hips, and thighs as she guided them down. She knelt in front of him and tried not to blush like a fool at the erection that greeted her.
“Well, at least one part of you isn’t injured,” she murmured.
He laughed. “Thank God.”
She shook her head and stood back up, guiding him down onto the bed, then covering him up. He reached out and snagged her wrist.
“Where are you going?”
“I’ll just be right over on the couch,” she said.
“The hell you will. Come to bed.”
“What if I bump into you or something? You’ve got dozens of stitches and bruises—”
“I’ll heal,” he argued.
“You might not, if I’m next to you,” she argued, raising her eyebrows. “And you need to rest and I know nothing is restful for you when I’m around.”
He held her wrist tighter and pulled her toward him. “Sweetheart, you are what you are. I’m not going anywhere. Which means we need to make this work.”
“Okay. But not right now,” she argued.
He pulled the blankets back. “Yes, now. Undress and get under here with me.”
She wanted to keep arguing with him, but she also wanted, just as badly, to be close to him. She pulled off her jeans and sweater, stripped down to her lacy bra and panties, and slipped into bed, carefully, next to him. She faced him in bed and he rested his big, warm hand on her hip.
“Jack told me you didn’t let him take you that night, or ever,” he said.
Her gaze shot up to his. “When did he tell you that?”
“Earlier tonight. And no, I didn’t kill the bastard,” he muttered. “He was fine when I left him. We had a beer. He told me the truth, that it was all an act.”
“He was supposed to keep his mouth shut,” Sophie said. “It was how I got rid of the curse. Now what if it comes back because he told you?”
“Soph, from what Jack said, you had to break the curse by breaking my heart.”
“Yeah.”
“Well. You did,” he said softly, and she ran her fingers gently over his shoulders, trying to find some part of him that wasn’t injured, bandaged, bruised, or stitched. “You broke me,” he said, his eyelids growing heavy.
She watched his face.
“I’ve never been more broken in my life,” he said quietly, slowly, in a voice that was hoarse and slow with sleep. “I felt crazier that night than I ever did with the curse.”
Sophie blinked back tears and gently traced his bicep with her fingertips.
He opened his eyes. “And you took it. You took having me think you were the kind of woman who’d cheat on me.”
“It was the only way to save you,” she whispered. “I was losing you, and I was tired of seeing you suffer.”
“What if I hadn’t stuck around, kitten? What if I’d walked away?”
“That was a risk I had to take. Your life means more than my happiness.”
“Yeah? And your happiness means more than my life, so…” he squeezed her hip. “Thank you, Sophie.”
“I love you, Calder.”
“I love you too,” he said sleepily. He pulled her closer, and, though she tried not to press against him, he pulled her tight to his body anyway.
“You want me to feel better? I need you close to me,” he said, and she stopped trying to pull back. In the next instant, his arms were wrapped around her, his thigh pressed between hers. She watched him as his face slackened with sleep.
He was alive. That in itself was a miracle.
But as she lay in his arms, rage washed over her. Someone had wanted it to look like Calder had killed
Jack. And now Jack was dead, the pack was decimated, her friends’ lives were never going to be the same.
When Sophie woke up the next morning, she was still in Calder’s arms. She stayed where she was. If he was all right, then she was in no hurry to be away from him. She let her gaze take him in, bit by bit. His dark blond hair, his long eyelashes, the shape of his lips and the breadth of his shoulders. He opened his eyes and his gaze met hers.
“One of the nights, I’m not just going to sleep next to you,” he said quietly, and she smiled.
“Good. How are you feeling?”
“Like I fought twenty really pissed off wolves,” he said with a wince. “I think right now even my fingernails hurt.”
“Maybe you’d feel better if I—”
“If you suggest moving away from me, I’m going to lose it.”
She clamped her mouth shut.
“You’re not getting it, Sophie. I’m here, forever. I’m not going anywhere. My bear and your Shadow will just need to learn to deal with it, because I’m not being away from you more than I have to.” He paused. “Unless you need space, and I’ll gladly give you that, too.”
She studied him, and he went on.
“You love me. I know that. But you also need time by yourself to work through everything and focus, and I’ve been shit at listening to you when you told me what you needed me to do.”
She kissed his throat, avoiding a bandage there. “And I understand why that is. Your bear wants to protect me. You want to protect me. We’ll work it all out.”
He held her a while longer. “I need to get up and go see Bryce in a while.”
“Not today.”
“Yes, today. He tell you he’s alpha now?”
“Cara said so last night. It’s true, then?”
“Yeah.”
Sophie lay in his arms, and he ran his fingertips up and down her spine. “Layla thinks he’ll have to set her aside now,” she said quietly.
“Bryce would never do that.”
“Would they expect him to, though? They said the alpha and his mate had to be strong, to defend the pack.”
“One or two might say some bullshit like that, but Bryce would never go along with it. You know he’s crazy about Layla.” He paused. “And he’s not a dickhead.”
“No, he’s not.”
“He won’t do it,” Calder insisted. “He’d step aside before he’d even consider it.”
“And who would be next in line after him?”
Calder furrowed his brow, thinking it over. “I’m not sure. I can’t remember everyone I took out last night.”
“Will the police get involved? Officially, this time, I mean?”
He shook his head. “The pack deals with its own shit. I don’t doubt they’ll want another shot at me, but I expect that Bryce will do what he can to calm them down. And if they’re smart, they’ll listen. You really don’t want to mess with bears too much.”
“Or, at least not two particular bears,” she said.
“Exactly.” They lay in silence for a while. “I wish it hadn’t been necessary. Those are people I’ve known a long time, people I grew up with, in some cases, and now they’re gone. I did what I had to do, but there’s no getting past the fact that they were here yesterday and now they’re not.”
“I know,” she said quietly, snuggling closer to him.
“It’s different in the light of day. Last night, I was all adrenaline and painkillers. I think it’s starting to hit me now.”
She held him tighter, all thoughts of pulling away from him abandoned. Calder was generally a reserved man, except with her. He didn’t wear his heart on his sleeve, and he kept his opinions to himself. But he was hurting now, and she knew the guilt would eat at him for a long time.
After a while, he sighed and gave her rear end a pat before slowly sitting up.
“You’re going to bust your stitches,” she muttered.
“Most of these have probably healed already. They’ll heal faster if I shift.”
He walked, slowly, toward the bathroom and she watched him. Muscles, bare flesh, dark hair. She could have sat there looking at him all day if the rest of the world would just go away for a little while.
But he had a shifter pack and his best friend to deal with. And she had the couple dozen Shadow witches camped out in her yard.
She grimaced and stood up and walked to the kitchen window. At least the number of witches arriving had slowed.
What the hell was she supposed to do with them?
They’d come in handy last night, watching over Calder and backing her up when she’d faced Esme.
She thought it over as she made a pot of tea and sat down with a cup. Calder came out of the bathroom a while later and then went into her bedroom, coming out a few minutes later dressed in some of the clothes he kept there for when he spent the night.
Really, at this point, they may as well be living together. He only went to his house to change and work.
He walked over to her and gratefully took the cup of tea she poured him. He swallowed it in a few large gulps and smiled at her. “I’m gonna go talk to Bryce. Do you need anything while I’m out?”
She shook her head, and he bent down and kissed her, lingering, a promise of what they still both needed. When he pulled away, she smiled up at him.
“I’ll be back soon,” he told her, and she nodded. She watched him walk out, then got up and got dressed. She shoved her feet into the boots she kept near the back door and stepped outside.
The air was brisk. If it wasn’t for the Shadow magic making her less susceptible to it, she would have been shivering immediately. A strong wind whipped through the trees, making the tops of the pines behind the barn dance wildly.
Fresh snow crunched under her boots, and she wondered for the thousandth time how the hell her life had gotten to this point. The enemy was camped in her yard and at her command. There was nothing in her past, nothing in the things she’d learned about magic or the way she managed her life, that could have prepared her for this. She was clueless, and the only thing she knew for sure was that she couldn’t let Esme get her hands on the coven. She’d made a move for Calder last night, which had been brazen and quite possibly stupid.
The thing was, she didn’t think Esme was stupid. And that made it all the more frightening. She knew Esme hated her, mostly because of her tie to Migisi, but at least partially for whatever she thought Sophie had done to her. She hadn’t tried taking Esme’s powers, at all, and she still wasn’t totally convinced that she had.
But she knew it was something she could do.
When she reached the area where the tents were set up, it was to find several witches sitting on logs and lawn chairs around a large fire. They started to rise as she approached, and she waved them back down.
They watched her expectantly.
“You can’t just stay out here,” she began. “And I don’t have room in the house for you. It’s time to go home.”
“We serve you,” Jayda said.
“Do I look like I have anything for you to do? You’re mine, sure, because I sure the hell don’t want you going to Esme.” She took a breath. “And you deserve to actually live, not wait on someone’s whims and moods. And it’s freezing out, even if you can’t feel it. This is just insane.”
Jayda screwed up her face in confusion. “I don’t get it.”
Sophie shrugged. “You know. Go home. Cook dinner. Play video games. Have a life. Whatever that looks like. Did you just spend all of your time sitting around waiting for Marshall to use you?”
“Yeah, pretty much,” one of the warlocks said, and the rest nodded in agreement.
“Well that is goddamn ridiculous. You’re not servants.”
“But we actually are,” Jayda pointed out.
“Can’t you be set free of whatever bond or whatever the hell this is I have with you?”
“Why would you want that? You have a ridiculous amount of power now. You don’t just give that
up,” Jayda argued.
“I never wanted power.”
“Maybe that’s why you should take it,” a voice said behind her. Sophie spun, hands up, ready to do… whatever the hell it was she did now. She saw the one elderly Light witch from the house with the three witch sisters she’d visited a few days past. She kept her hands up anyway.
“Relax, Sophie. Light witches don’t attack unless provoked. Remember?”
She lowered her hands. “Yes.”
“Good.” She looked behind Sophie. “Marshall’s coven is bigger than I realized.”
“Mine, now,” Sophie muttered.
The Light witch took a breath and studied her. “You’re self-taught, yes?”
Sophie nodded.
The Light witch looked away, her light blond hair blowing crazily in the wind. “I’m going to regret this.” Then she turned back to Sophie. “We should talk, Migisi-who-is-not-Migisi.”
Sophie nodded. “As long as you stop calling me that, sure.”
The Light witch shrugged. “Have it your way.”
Sophie turned back to her Shadow coven. “Find shelter. Actual houses. Go home. If I need you, I’ll be able to call you. Right?”
Jayda looked at her, unsure.
“I wouldn’t do that,” the Light witch said.
“See? Even she knows better,” Jayda said, and Sophie shook her head.
“They can’t stay here, camping in my meadow. This is stupid.”
“The further they are from you, the less you’ll be able to keep track of what they’re up to. And I know you want to trust them, but they are Shadow. You know, I hope, what the temptation is like, to put your Shadow powers to work?”
Sophie glanced back at Jayda. “Sit tight for a while. I’ll figure something out.”
“Boss,” Jayda said.
“Yes?”
“You know… the cold never bothered me anyway.”
Sophie groaned and turned away. “That was terrible.”
“And yet perfect,” Jayda called to her, and all Sophie could do was shake her head as she led the Light witch into her home.
Chapter Seven
Sophie made a fresh pot of tea, keeping her eye on the Light witch sitting at her kitchen table. She was very old, but most of her age was in her gaze, in the depths of her eyes. She looked, at a glance, like a woman perhaps in her fifties.
Light's Shadow (Copper Falls Book 3) Page 7
