0171
Abraxas
I'm on my feet seconds before his face comes back into view. Madison hovers behind me, her fingers working quickly to fasten her shirt.
The guy stares at me, I wasn't stupid, I knew he could smell her arousal but he doesn't say anything, he just turns and walks away, his fists clenched either side of him.
My hand fumbles for my gun, but Madison stops me, "Don't, it will just bring more attention. I will talk to him."
I grab hold of her wrist as she moves past me. "You will stay away from him."
"You don't get to make that decision for me Brax." She pulls her hand away and hurries off after him. I hear her calling his name, which gradually fades the further away she gets. Bollocks!
If he doesn't keep his mouth shut, they are going to think I'm a pussy. The Lycans will think they have the upper hand over me. I will become a joke to other Hunters. I needed to speak to Neah or Mallory, they were the only ones who knew the truth.
Making my way out of the forest, I couldn't see Madison or that prick anywhere, nor could I smell her, maybe she had taken a different direction and i hadn't paid attention.
I was closest to the hospital here and make my way over to it, hoping Mallory would be alone.
Thankfully she is.
She wipes her tears away when she sees me and paints on a smile. "Do you want me to get Klaus or Eric?"
"No, no, it's okay. Come in, come in." She waves me in.
"I want to say I'm sorry." I murmur. Mallory didn't deserve this. She is different from the other Lycans. I knew she had gone Rogue, but it wasn't the same and her soul is full of cracks like Neah's, I just hadn't told anyone. And now, there was a new one that worked its way through her soul and I felt responsible for it.
I may not have pulled the trigger, but it was my weapon that had caused all the damage.
"You didn't shoot me. Damien told me. Though for a moment, I did think it was you."
I nod.
"But that's not why you are here, is it?"
I scratch through my stubble and press my lips together.
I could still taste Madison.
"I am not the type of person to ask for help or advice." I force the words out.
It even felt wrong to say it, like they were somehow going to scold me.
"But you and Neah are the only Lycans I can tolerate." "Ah, this is about Maddie."
"How did you know?"
"It was either that or to do with Dorothy and Damien's connection." she shuffles on the bed and screws her face up from the pain.
"Madison and I have been meeting up." I leave it at that and wait for her response.
She smiles at me and then frowns as she clutches her stomach, "Oh I wish you didn't try and make me laugh, it hurts."
"It wasn't supposed to be funny." I grumble.
"Okay, so you're meeting up, and?"
"She's a Lycan."
"Yep, we have already established that." She mutters sarcastically.
"This was a bad idea." I get up to leave.
"Don't go. Please, this takes my mind off of...thinking." Her sigh is full of that same sadness she had when I first walked in here.
I stare at her and drop back into the chair
"So?" She questions
"I can't get her out of my head and I can't get past the fact that she is a Lycan either and the problems that it will cause."
"I'm a Lycan." She protests.
"I don't want to fuck you!" I snap and she rolls her eyes at me. It's a far cry from the way she was looking at me the night she arrived at my house. If I remember correctly, her mate had to keep reminding her he was there too.
"Fair enough." She frowns. "But you are a Hunter of Rogues, correct?"
"Makes no difference. If they are problems, I deal with them. You've seen that."
"Is Maddie a problem?" She puffs out her cheeks as I shake my head. "Then why don't you just claim her? She is your mate and from the sounds of it, you wouldn't be forcing her into it either. At the end of the day, yes she is a Lycan, but she can't shift, so what are the odds of her going Rogue?"
"What if I kill her?"
"What if you don't? Look, Eric was not my greatest fan either. When he marked me, it was an accident. In the same way you are having issues with Maddie, he had them with me, yet he couldn't stay away from me either. At the end of the day, you are the only one who needs to care who your mate is, screw everyone else!"
"There's a good chance a Lycan knows about us."
"And you didn't kill him?" She sounds surprised.
"Madison wouldn't let me. She thinks she can talk him into not telling anyone."
"Then beat him to it. I already know, Neah knows, there is probably a good chance Dane knows because Neah pretty much tells him everything or if she hasn't, he can read her mind, the same as Eric can read mine. Neither one has said anything because they are both mated to someone unexpected. And from what I know of Maddie, she hasn't got a problem with what you do. You did kill the man that marked her and was holding her hostage."
I nod, mulling over her words.
"Did you know then?" She asks. "Did you know she was your mate when I brought her to the house."
"Yes."
"And you've held off for all this time?"
"Yes."
"Because she is a Lycan?"
"Yes and because I would be replacing my dead mate."
"So you think that's it? That you are never allowed to have someone love you again?"
"It's more than that."
"It really isn't." She mutters
"It's complicated."
She chuckles and then scrunches her body up as the pain ripples through her. "I told you not to make me laugh!"
"I wasn't trying too."
"You think this is complicated?! This is the simplest problem you could have. At least she isn't human, could you imagine having to explain all of it then?"
Maybe she was the better person to speak to, Neah would have me questioning more than helping me find answers. Or I would get lost watching her soul.
"There is only so much I can say." Mallory smiles at me. "At the end of the day, you have to make the decision, not me, but if you can't handle it, let her go. It isn't fair, not after all the crap she has been dragged through." "That's part of the problem."
She cocks a brow at me.
"I can't let her go either."
"Or maybe you don't really want to." She shrugs her shoulders at me.
"Annoyingly, I think you are right."
"I generally am." She continues to beam at me with the 'I told you so' look
I look around, the hospital is dead, not a single soul other than us. "Where is everyone?"
"Eric went with Klaus to pick up supplies."
"He left you alone."
She bobs her head and the smile has gone. "I told him too because everytime I look at him, I want to cry."
"He doesn't blame...."
"I know he doesn't. It's like your problem, it's complicated. I know he can feel what I'm feeling and that somehow makes it a hundred times worse, when it should help. Does that make sense?"
"If I couldn't see your soul, I would say no, but you have a tiny hole in a place that was once complete. A hole that Eric doesn't have. He feels the loss, it's a little different for you, but he still feels it, don't push him out, he lost it too." "At least you didn't tell me I would get over it."
I frown at her. "Who would say something like that?"
"When I was human, my father said it to my mother right after he beat the shit out of her. She lost a baby because of what he did to her."
"Then it was a good thing you killed him."
She nods and looks past me, I could smell Eric heading this way and prepare to leave.
"Thanks for coming." She smiles at me
"I will see you later, I need to go and find my mate."
I head back into the forest where I had left Madison.
Her jasmine scent still lingered in the air, I follow it until I reach the back of Mallory's burnt out house. But oddly, her scent changes direction and heads south back into the forest. She's accompanied with the scent of a Lycan, a scent that belongs to the dickhead that was trying to get information from her.
I follow the scents and the tracks deeper and deeper until they stop. Her scent comes to a clear stop too.
"MADISON!"
She doesn't answer, but one of Dane's Wolf's appears. "Is there a problem?"
"How far south am I?" I demand
"You are almost at the border."
"No one has passed you?"
"I would have seen them if they had. Is someone missing?"
"To be determined."
I squat down, running my fingers over the last of the tracks. My eyes automatically go up into the trees, but I see nothing. Wolves can't smell Lycans in Lycan form, but I could and someone had shifted here. The fucker had taken Madison!