Chapter 15 Hawk
Chapter Fifteen
Hawk
She stares at my hand for so long that I start to worry something is wrong. Every other time we’ve reached for her, she’s come straight away. It’s as if her mind has gone somewhere else.
I wonder if it’s just me she’s hesitating for, but then I recall how relieved she was to see me when we found her in the woods.
I try not to clench my hand into a fist at the thought of losing her, and what almost happened. It was my fault she was taken from right under my nose. We would have found her faster if our minds had been steady. But in the panic, it was hard to figure out which direction she was being taken.
Maybe that’s why she’s hesitating; she doesn’t trust me to keep her safe in the water. My heart aches at the thought of my mate not trusting me. I start to lower my hand as I tell her, “I will get Bo to take you swimming when he returns.”
Her head tilts up, and her beautiful hazel eyes meet mine. “What?”
I gesture toward the cave opening. “When Bo returns, he can take you in. I know you feel safer with him.”
“Hawk, no,” she says, shaking her head. “That’s not why I was hesitating.” A small glimmer of hope starts to ignite within me, and I stay silent, hoping she’ll continue explaining. “I was just thinking about my sister, Izzy.”
Even though it pains me to say, I remind her, “We will help you find her after the Mating Hunt.”
She bites her lip before asking, “Even if that means returning to my world?”
I nod.
A myriad of emotions cross her face, as if unable to settle on a single one. “You’d let me go?” Her voice wavers on her whispered words as her worried eyes stare deep into mine.
I reach for her hand and kiss the back of her fingers before I tell her, “No. You misunderstand me, angel. We’re not letting you go. If you choose to return to your world, we will come with you.”
The second the words leave my lips, I know them to be true. Her eyes widen. “You’d leave your home to come with me? To my world?”
Unable to resist touching her, I reach my free hand out and cup the side of her face. “You’re our home, angel. We’d follow you anywhere.”
I see her swallow heavily as she stares back at me in stunned surprise. When I realize I’ve rendered her speechless, I drop my hand from her face and squeeze her hand, gesturing toward the water.
“How about that swim?” She nods her head, still speechless, and I lift her onto one of the large rocks surrounding the small pond. “Take a seat here while I get in.”
She sits down, her feet dangling in the water as I sit beside her and push myself into the pond. I move around to test the depth, finding the deepest part is in the center. I can still stand with my head above the water, but she won’t be able to anywhere in here.
Stepping in front of her, I try not to ogle her beautiful body. She’s still far too thin, but I can already see her looking healthier than she was only a couple of days ago. “Come here,” I say, reaching up to grip her under her arms as I lift her into the water.
Her hands fly to my shoulders, and she lets out a small hiss as the cool water covers her skin.
She instinctively wraps herself around my front, and I’m unable to stop myself from hugging her tightly to me, one arm under her backside with my hand on the very top of her thigh, partially on her ass, and the other on her back, near her neck.
I gently sway us a little back and forth as we get used to the temperature, but the heat from where the front of our bodies are pressed together is scorching.
She’s uncharacteristically quiet, even for her, so I find myself gently pulling my head back so I can look at her. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah,” she says with a little nod. “The water just makes me a little nervous.”
“I won’t let any harm come to you,” I remind her.
“I know,” she says, offering me a small smile.
“We don’t have to stay in here if it makes you uncomfortable.”
“The water feels nice. I’ve never been in anything like this before coming to your world.”
It’s hard to picture her upbringing. She hasn’t told us much, but what she has doesn’t sound appealing at all, and I’m desperate to know if her entire world is like that, or if her situation is unique.
Either way, I will do everything in my power to make sure she’s never treated like that again, even if that means giving her skills that will make her less dependent on us.
Selfishly, I like taking care of her. I like that she doesn’t know how to swim, so I have to hold her in the water. I like that she doesn’t have shoes, so I have to carry her through the woods. But I also realize how dangerous both of those things are.
At least I can continue caring for her in other ways: feeding her, keeping her warm, protecting her.
“Would you like me to teach you to swim?” I ask, going against my instinct to keep her latched onto me like she is.
She glances around the pond, then nods, looking nervous.
“Okay, what you need to know is that moving your arms and legs is how you stay afloat and how you move. First, I’m going to hold you around your waist, and I want you to gently move your legs back and forth, almost like a slow kicking motion. Ready?”
She nods, and I quickly move my grip to her tiny waist and hold her out in front of me so only the tips of her shoulders and head are out of the water. Her hands fly up to grip my arms as her legs start kicking wildly.
“Slowly now. I won’t let you go under,” I tell her, and it takes her a second, but she’s soon able to relax a little when she realizes she’s not going to drown. Her legs are a little uncoordinated at first, so I keep encouraging her until they are moving more fluidly.
“Good girl. Now, instead of flexing your feet with your toes pointed at me, point them downwards a bit so the tops of your feet are leading the way, and flex them when you move your leg backward.” I look down through the water and watch as she tries to figure out what I mean.
It takes her a minute, but she finally does it.
“Perfect. Now we need to work on your arms. I’m going to set you on the rock so I can show you.” I lift her out and show her how to move her arms at her sides to stay a float, then, I show her a few ways to move her arms and legs so she can swim instead of just stay afloat.
When I bring her back into the water, she struggles more with this part. After a few minutes she’s panting heavily, so I lift her back out of the water.
“I think that’s enough for today.” She looks a little discouraged, so I squeeze her knees and offer her my attempt at a smile.
“You did excellent for your first lesson. Nobody learns it all in their first attempt. Besides,” I nudge my chin in the direction of the other two. “Dinner will be ready soon.”
“Oh! I didn’t realize they were back.” I try not to show my pride knowing that I had managed to keep all of her attention for so long. Ronan and Bo had returned fifteen minutes ago, and the meat is already cooking on the roaring fire.
Placing my palms on the rock beside her, I hoist myself out of the pond, taking a few seconds to let the water run down my body, enjoying the way her eyes track the movement.
I reach out a hand to help her up as I ask, “Would you like to put on your… pajajas?” I ask, trying to remember the word.
A giggle escapes her as we walk toward our bags. “Pajamas,” she corrects me. “And yes, thank you.”
I find one of the small cloths and give it to her to use as a towel, along with the nightdress. She takes both, thanking me, before scurrying off to her changing space.
I quickly change back into my leathers, and lay my strange leaf covering she made me near the fire to dry for sleeping in.
“Everything go okay?” I ask the other two as I approach the fire.
They both nod, as I expected since they looked calm.
“No sign of the charm, but we have enough meat to last us through tomorrow and the following day,” Ronan explains. “And the traps we set aren’t visible from outside, so nobody would know we’re here unless they climb up into the entrance. They will trigger them if they try to come back here.”
I nod, satisfied knowing that we are far better hunters and trappers than any of the mainlanders.
They won’t expect that. The trap isn’t meant to kill them.
It’s meant to trigger a lot of noise so we know they’re here.
It gives us the opportunity to let our guard down a bit while we’re in here without constantly having one of us on guard.
“Were you teaching her to swim?” Bo asks, distracting me from my thoughts.
“Yes. She did well. But she will need more lessons before she can swim on her own.”
“This is the perfect place for that,” he says with a nod as he looks around the cave.
“A lot has happened today,” Ronan says as he stares into the fire. “After we feed her, we need to get her to bed so she can rest.”
“Agreed,” I say, just as movement to the side catches my eye.
I suck in a sharp breath of surprise when I see her.
The dress, if it can even be called that, barely covers her thighs.
The neck line is so low that, combined with the thin straps over her shoulders, it shows off a lot of her beautiful pale skin.
Even though she was wearing less before, this dress makes her look even more beautiful.
“Remind me to find out who designed such a garment and thank them,” Bo whispers, and I find myself nodding along. Even in our tribe, women tend to wear less revealing items. Maybe I’m just transfixed because every inch of her makes my heart race with the need to touch her, to be close to her.
“Come, sit with me,” Ronan says to her as he reaches out a hand in her direction. She bites her lip, a habit she does when she’s feeling nervous, but does as he asks anyway, slipping her hand into his and letting him pull her into his lap.