Chapter 12
Chapter Twelve
Dane
This is total bullshit.
I was getting somewhere with Raine, and we had to be interrupted. I didn’t give a damn if my sister was worried or that my Prez wanted to know what the fuck was going on. That he was checking my pulse.
I didn’t need him doing that, nor did I want my sister butting in. It’s bad enough being so close to Raine, smelling her and not touching her, that it’s warring inside me. I’m doing my best to keep her comfortable without pressuring her. I probably shouldn’t have pushed her after she started asking questions, but fuck me, it’s fucking with my head. I keep playing the night over in my head. It’s how I realized I knew who Raine was, and she’d confirmed it. She knew her attackers.
Now, I just need to get her to open up and tell me who the fuck hurt her and why.
Only to get her to do that, I need her to know she can trust me.
She knows she can trust us. My wolf shouts in my head, furious that our time with our mate is being interrupted.
Doesn’t seem that way.
With Raine holding tight to me, I head for the clubhouse. She tried again next to my bike to get me to take her home, but I wasn’t letting her go so easily. She agreed to watch movies and have pizza, and I’ll make sure I feed her. The prospect was gonna bring the pizza back to the clubhouse. I’m sure he’ll have even more because of it being the clubhouse, and it didn’t matter what type of shifter we were, food was food, and we’re men. We eat every damn thing in sight.
Well, for the most part.
The prospect had best have the rest of what I told him to pick up for Raine. If he didn’t, I’m gonna get pissed, more so than I already am.
Pulling into the lot for the clubhouse, I grit my teeth together at the sight of all the bikes. Not all of them are my brothers. I Guess Bandit wasn’t down for me being with his sister.
“What is my brother doing here?” Raine asks, over the throttling of my bike.
“Don’t know, dolcezza , but we’ll find out,” I shout back. Never before did I ever think to have a helmet, but right then I wish I did so I could speak to her through Bluetooth rather than yelling.
I guide my bike to where I park near my brothers and put the kickstand down. I don’t wait around, giving Raine time to get off by herself. I climb off my bike and pick her up easily from the back of it. Though I take care to be gentle with her.
Keeping my hands on her hips, I hold her in place in front of me, her body pressing into mine, those little hands of hers clenching in my shirt.
Fuck me.
“Your brother tries to take you from me, I won’t let him, Raine. This is the only warning I’m giving you, I wanted to talk about this shit later while we were still enjoying our date, but you gotta know before we go in there. If you leave with him, I’ll lose my mind. It’s a delicate hold right now I have on my sanity.”
“Why?” she asks staring at me, not understanding what I’m talking about.
“It’s because of a curse placed on my family years ago. I don’t know much more about it than what I found out last night, but my wolf and I are just not connecting. We’re good for now, but I’ll tell you, if you leave us, I’ll lose the fight for my sanity.”
“What does that mean?” Her brows draw up, creasing.
“I don’t know how to fully explain it to you right now, but my wolf and I have evidently been two separate beings sharing our body. We weren’t one with each other, until last night. Now, we’re trying to find the balance between us. If you reject us as your mate and move on. One of two things will happen, I shift and stay that way, or I’ll lose my mind and find a way to die.”
“Whoa,” she murmurs, talking to herself.
“Yeah,” I grunt.
“Well, I don’t want you to do either of those things,” Raine remarks, tugging my shirt. I cock a brow, about to say something else when she goes on. “I mean, we need to be able to see what this is between us, right?”
“Right,” I answer, my lip twitching. Fuck me, she can be damn cute when she wants to be. Okay, I don’t think she can not be cute. But right now, it’s a different kinda cute.
“You won’t go insane on me while we’re getting to know each other?”
“So long as you don’t reject us,” I confirm with a nod. “Maybe later, after we deal with this BS, we’ll go out, and I’ll allow my wolf out for you to play with.” I grin. I hadn’t missed the look she’d gotten on her face when she told me about being with her family while they were shifted. I also didn’t miss the fact she wasn’t like everyone else. Where her whole family is shifters, she’s a human.
I’ll wait til later to see if she ever thought about finding out anything about where she came from.
For now, we’ve got to get in there and find out what her brother and the others are doing here. On top of me finding out why we had to come to the clubhouse in the first place.
“Raine,” Bandit calls, nostrils flaring, eyes blazing with fury. “Why did you leave the house with him?”
“Mom knew I was with Dane, Bandit. You can calm down before you give yourself an aneurysm,” Raine snaps, not moving from where I placed her at my side, my arm wrapped around her shoulders. “Is that why you’re here? Are you mad I didn’t stay or let you know I was leaving the house?”
“Raine, baby,” I murmur, smelling the anger rolling off her. “Calm down.”
“I don’t want to calm down,” she says, tilting her head back to look at me. “I want to know why my brother is here, ready to do his dictator impression.”
“Dictator impression.” Cyrus snorts. “Sounds about right.”
Bandit shoots Cyrus a glare before returning it to me. “You wanna let my sister go.”
“Considering she’s my mate and she’s not rejecting me, the answer to that is no.” I wasn’t going to let her go. My wolf refused to let her go. He was on high alert and didn’t like what was going on here.
“Raine,” Bandit growls and looks to my mate once again. “You wanna step away from him so that we can fuckin’ talk?”
“Bandit, just tell me what it is you want to tell me. We were going to be eating pizza and that got interrupted. I’m hungry, and I want to get back to Dane’s so we can watch Meg 2 . If you want to talk, then let’s get on with it.”
This time, it was Corbin and Justice who both snort and chuckle .
“For a human, I gotta admit, she’s ballsy,” Abel states and laughs.
“Well, you grow up with a big brother like Bandit, and you learn to be.” Raine huffs, not taking her glare away from her brother. “Well,” she draws out.
“We need to know what the hell happened last night,” Bandit grunts. “You need to tell us so we can deal with the situation.”
Raine’s body stiffens, and I can smell the hurt mixing with the anger coiling inside her.
“No offense, Bandit,” I snarl. I look from him to my Prez while putting myself in front of Raine and moving my gaze back to Raine’s brother. “You need to leave. I’m not going to let you come in here and force Raine to talk when she’s not ready. You want to know something we all want to fuckin’ know, but I ain’t forcing her to talk. Nor am I gonna let anyone else.”
He doesn’t need to know what I know so far. Maybe if he didn’t go about this shit the way he did, I might have spoken with him to get his input, but now . . . no fucking way. My wolf is clawing at my insides, beating against my brain, wanting out.
She’s fine. We’ve got her. She’s protected. I tell him but it still doesn’t work.
“Cyrus, brother, you might want to get your people out of here,” Corbin warns. I could feel his eyes on me. He knows I’m close to shifting and letting my wolf out.
“I’m not leaving my sister,” Bandit announces.
“Bandit,” Cyrus growls. “She’s with her mate. He’s not going to hurt her. Let’s give him space right now. We’ll find out what happened, brother, I promise.”
Bandit visibly clenches his teeth and gives a jerky nod as he grinds out, “Fine.”
“Bandit,” Raine calls but doesn’t move from behind me, “love you.”
“Love you too, Rainy,” Bandit mutters, his face visibly softening. “Call me later and let me know you’re good.”
“Okay.”
My wolf eases slightly as we notice the tension leaving her body.
Fuck.
I wait until those of the Iron Howlers MC leave the clubhouse before I finally breathe easy, my body relaxes, and my wolf calms down. We’re two being coming one, and it’s sure as fuck not easy. My wolf has his own emotions, and I’ve got mine. It’s like we’re interlocking everything we feel, weaving them together, and it’s fucking us up more than I thought it was.
“I don’t want to rile you up again, brother,” Corbin remarks, coming forward. “But we need to talk.”
“I know,” I grunt.
“Can it be after pizza?” Raine asks quietly, though we all heard her.
Corbin cocks a brow and grins while a few others chuckle.
But I look over my shoulder, down to her, and answer. “Yeah, dolcezza , after pizza.”