Chapter 15 #2
I nodded slowly before realizing he couldn’t see me. “I think the fates bring about our future in very confusing ways. I mean, I am glad your father had you, even though he’s a piece of crap. I am also glad you came up from Under to arrive at the institute. I can’t imagine not meeting you.”
A happy sound broke from his throat as he offered me a somewhat vulnerable expression. “Yeah?”
“Yeah,” I whispered happily.
The RV suddenly jostled, and Damian pitchforked up and placed a hand on my chest to stabilize me.
I almost tumbled out of bed but gripped onto him, the lights flipping on as the RV went into park and I fumbled for my glasses.
I slid them onto my face as I heard a commotion taking place outside the window.
“Stay here.”
I didn’t respond to Damian, because I could one hundred percent assure that ‘staying here’ wouldn’t happen.
Looking down at what I was wearing—an oversized knit sweater, leggings, and socks—I opened the door to the room.
I walked forward quietly and found Blackwell standing in the door of the stopped RV, the others talking to a group of rather large individuals outside.
I briefly checked the time, realizing that it was nearly two in the morning, so you could imagine I was confused because who the heck were these people? I even considered they were human at first before noting their size and the intensity radiating off of them.
Nightmares? Okay. Neat. Unlike Love and Drive, I didn’t get a bad feeling from them, and as I neared the door, I found myself eager to meet them.
“Blackwell,” I whispered as I walked up behind him.
Over his head I noticed we seemed to have pulled off on some type of exit, a thick forest ahead of us.
I suppose it was good we were no longer on the highway, considering the type of attention our group would garner at this time of night.
The last thing we wanted was more human interaction of any kind.
“Blackwell.” I murmured again, tapping his shoulder. He turned sharply, clearly not having heard me the first time, or having been so tense that he hadn’t been able to turn around.
His eyes widened on me as he nodded back towards the bedroom, making me frown and shake my head.
I tried to slip past him, but he wrapped an arm around my waist to stop me.
I ducked down and escaped him, agilely jumping onto the ground.
I looked up at him and offered him a smile, but he didn’t seem nearly as amused.
“Who is this?” A female voice had me snapping my head over.
The woman who asked that was dressed in what appeared to be hiking gear in fairly standard dark colors, but there was something unique about her, and that would be the fox ears and tail that she had. I couldn’t lie, that was pretty cool.
“Arabella.” I ignored the larger nightmares around her and walked right up to her, offering her my hand. “What’s your name?”
“Kalinda,” she answered, meeting my hand as her eyebrows rose with interest. “You are a human.”
“Yep.” I nodded and then threw my thumb to the others behind me. “And these are my mates. Which reminds me…”
I turned my back to her, ignoring the sounds of shock at my words. “Why are we stopped?”
Razar snapped me up and pulled me fully against him, his hand pressing to the back of my head to keep me shielded from the others. No one answered my freakin’ question.
“You mated with a human?” one of the males asked, causing me to turn around in Razar’s arms. My eyes narrowed on his muscular build and the way he was staring at me with interest, despite not addressing me directly.
Razar still had me plastered against him, his hand was partially wrapped on my neck, this thumb running over my pulse. I wouldn’t lie, his touch really caused things to light up inside of me, and I tried to tamper that down but I wasn’t sure it would work.
“Who our mate is, is none of your business,” Razar bit out.
I found myself softening and looked up at him. “You said it.”
Razar looked down at me, the others around us talking as his eyes turned darker with emotion, his fingers twining through my hair.
He had called me his mate. I couldn’t even express the amount of satisfaction that gave me, along with a bunch of other feelings that we totally didn’t have time for right now.
“Why are we stopped?” I asked again. Sensing the tension, I turned back to the other nightmares, who were focused back on me.
I didn’t pay attention to anyone outside of Kalinda, who I assumed was the leader.
Not because they intimidated me, but I could practically feel the violence under my men’s skin, waiting for an excuse to come out.
“They stopped us because of what happened at the gas station restaurant,” Saint explained.
“Probably wanted to make sure we weren’t a threat.” Damian added.
“To nightmares? No. To humans? Yes,” I clarified before arching a brow. “Mostly humans that are rude, though.”
“You slaughtered an entire restaurant,” one of the men pointed out.
“There were like six people, and they were being jerks.”
“We try to keep this area peaceful,” Kalinda explained patiently. “What you did is not acceptable.”
“And we are just passing through. We plan on driving straight into the city and then north,” I noted before continuing.
“You are currently impeding the process of a mission directly assigned from ISS, so unless we have anything else we need to talk about, we really need to get back on the road.” Before my mates kill all of you.
Oh, now I was referring to them as my mates.
“You are from ISS?” the third man asked, the one on the other side of him still continuing to stare at me, something Amun noticed because he literally stepped in front of the nightmare’s line of sight, forcing him to break contact.
“Yes.” I nodded easily.
“Why are you in the area?” Kalinda looked concerned. “We haven’t done anything that would warrant being picked up.”
“We aren’t here to pick any of you up,” I explained. “We are looking for Hate. He was seen last in— What was the name of it again?”
“Oceanic Forest.”
I smiled at Blackwell as the group of five before us all exchanged concerning looks. I leaned back into Razar, trying to ignore the fact that he was hard, as Kalinda finally met my gaze.
“I don’t know who Hate is, but I doubt he would go there,” she said. “No one goes there and lives, even nightmares. Those creatures haven’t seen the light of civilization, ever. The forest stretches all the way up through the mountains, and once you enter, almost no one returns.”
I couldn’t lie, the part that really caught my attention was the one regarding the nightmares who lived there. Instead of finding myself worried, I was more excited than anything.
“Hate is a god terror,” I pointed out. “He would have been fine.”
Kalinda’s eyes widened. “Why would you go after a god terror?”
“Doesn’t matter.” I offered a dismissive wave. “But thank you for the heads up. I really mean that. We promise to not slaughter any more humans.”
Kalinda appeared in front of me then and offered me a small wooden token, speaking quietly.
“We keep the peace around here between nightmares and humans. We protect everyone… We don’t usually enter the woods, but if you need help, we are here.
ISS and our organization align in a few ways, so I have to assume that your mission is necessary. ”
“Very much so.” I nodded and took the wooden coin. “Thank you for this.”
“If you need us, burn it and we will be there.”
Kalinda shifted then into a brightly colored fox and began to sprint towards the forest. The four men behind her followed, the last one trailing in human form, his eyes moving back to me before shifting into black smoke and disappearing.
I had no idea what it was, but the silence of that individual, paired with the way he was staring at me, had me worrying about who he was.
But I knew there was nothing we could do about it right now.
“Back on the road!” I announced, leading everyone back into the RV. I went to climb the stairs but was lifted off the ground by Razar and pressed against the vehicle, my legs wrapping around his massive frame as he pressed his forehead to mine and let out a rumble.
“You okay?” I asked, running my finger through his shaved hair.
“I have been fucking this up,” Razar grunted and began a ramble that was so unlike him it took me a second to catch up, “I am not good at handling change. I thought I would never get to have you in any other way besides being my best friend. I thought you would never truly be mine despite feeling like you were. Then I suddenly find out it’s possible but the tradeoff is letting go of control of a part of myself that not only wants to actively terrify you but also to mark you up.
I have been trying for years to restrain that urge, to work with my nightmare side so that we could protect you instead of do shit to freak you out.
I know in order to make this work I have to let go, but what if I take it too far?
What if you wake up and instead of being in the corner of your room, I have you dangling off the edge of a building?
I don’t want you to be scared of me, Arabella, but I also don’t trust that other side of myself. ”
Okay, lots to unpack there.
“Razar, does the other side of you want to hurt me? Not scare me, not mark me, but actually physically hurt me?”
His frown deepened. “No.”
“So even if I woke up hanging over the side of a twenty story building, I could trust that you would never allow me to fall and go ‘splat’ on the pavement?”
“I would never let you hit the pavement,” Razar murmured before admitting, “But I may want to drop you, just to freak you out.”
I let out a small laugh at that before shaking my head.
“Okay, so you want to scare me, but you would never let me actually get hurt. I can’t get scared, but it is like a compulsion for you to try.
So if you start acting out on those compulsions, would it make it easier for you to accept the marking aspect also? ”
Razar’s eyes darkened. “You would let me try to scare you?”
“I have never stopped you from trying to scare me; I actually like when you try to scare me,” I murmured.
“The others would kill me.”
“No they wouldn’t,” I teased.
Razar seemed on the edge of a decision, and when my fingers gently brushed his jaw, I saw him make it.
I let out a squeak of surprise as I was suddenly airborne, the wind rushing over my ears as I felt everything turn upside down, tendrils wrapping around my ankle as the ground seemed to grow further and further away from me.
The sound of leaves and the scent of pine filled my senses as animals moved out of the way.
When we were finally at the top of the tree that overlooked the RV down below, I realized we had to be maybe fifty feet up in the air.
Although it was hard to gauge since I was upside down, being held just by my ankle and spinning a bit.
Unfortunately for him, I couldn’t find it in myself to be scared. Honestly, I was quite the opposite.
“Oh, Razar!” I slowly rotated towards the tree. “There is an adorable squirrel family glaring at us. They have a baby! Oh my, the mama squirrel does not look happy.”
When I suddenly dropped, I relaxed my frame, briefly seeing someone step out of the RV. I wasn’t concerned, though, and right before I hit the ground, I landed in Razar’s arms. I smiled up at him as I saw authentic hope filter through his gaze while examining my expression.
“You are completely fine?”
“Better than fine,” I insisted. “Did you see the squirrels up there?”
Razar just stared at me, looking like he was having some life-changing revelation instead of answering my very important squirrel question.
“Did you just drop her from the top of that tree?” Cy asked, suddenly appearing and looking down at me in concern.
“Sort of asked him to.” I booped Cy’s nose. “We are going to be working on ‘accepting’ Razar’s urges to scare me, so we need to let the others know so they don’t flip out.”
“You may face problems with that,” Cy mused.
I had a feeling he was right.