Chapter 16
Chapter
Sixteen
CALEB
Jesse had been gone too long.
I looked at the clock on the SUV’s dashboard.
8:47 a.m.
Fuck, what time had he left? His shift couldn’t have taken more than a minute.
Even under shitty circumstances, the transformation had stolen my breath.
Forget dry-heaving in the snow. He’d moved like poetry, his limbs melting between one form and the next.
Then he’d sailed across the garage and out the fucking door.
Where the hell was he?
My heart beat triple time as I perched on the edge of my seat and strained for sounds.
The faint whiff of garbage leaked into the SUV.
Morning sunlight fell over a tall rack of metal shelves that held all kinds of tools and outdoor equipment.
A huge pair of pruning shears with blades as long as my arm hung from a hook on one side.
The door Jesse had disappeared through stood open, a slice of patio and the forest beyond it visible. Was he in those trees? The rogue could have lured him deep into the woods. If it attacked him, I was in no position to help—because he’d ordered me to stay in the car no matter what.
But he was my mate. The knowledge burned in the center of my chest. And his absence was an ache. It throbbed in the same spot, as if someone had thrust their hand between my ribs and squeezed my heart.
I stared at the trees through the door, blood pounding in my ears. The rogue had laid me out on that jogging trail. It meant to kill me. If it overpowered Jesse…
No, that would never happen. Rogues were feral. Jesse had his wits about him. And he was more competent than anyone I’d ever met. On the other hand, he’d admitted he was distracted by me joining him for the hunt. By insisting on coming, I made him less safe.
Fuck. Fuck.
Why couldn’t I have just listened to him? I should have stayed in Albany like he asked and let him take care of the rogue without worrying about me. The least I could do now was stay out of his way.
Resolved, I sat back in my seat.
Except what if he needed my help? My chest tightened, and my heart thumped faster. I’d just found Jesse. I couldn’t lose him.
A wolf’s pained yelp echoed from the direction of the patio.
I was out of the SUV in a fraction of a second, my blood singing with the need to reach my mate.
Halfway to the door, I stopped and yanked the pruning shears from their hook.
They were heavier than they looked, but I barely registered the weight.
The sound of the SUV’s idling engine accompanied my labored breaths as I raced to the door and burst onto the patio.
Jesse and the rogue were locked in a snarling, frenzied battle.
Fangs flashed. Blood spattered the snow and the patio underneath.
More snow flew through the air as the two enormous werewolves grappled.
They bit and barked and snapped at each other, occasionally rising onto their hind legs as they fought.
The fur on Jesse’s left flank was black with blood.
He was wounded. Every time he moved, more blood speckled the ground.
The rogue lunged at him. Jesse spun and ducked, narrowly escaping the rogue’s long, yellow teeth. As Jesse whirled, his rear paw slipped on bloody snow. He recovered quickly, but not before the rogue slashed its claws across his face. Jesse’s head snapped to the side. Blood sprayed from his snout.
Rage burst like a bonfire inside me. Between one breath and the next, I was moving, the pruning shears held high as I flew across the patio. Sunlight glinted off the blades, and a hoarse bellow tore from my throat.
The rogue spun. Bright green eyes filled my vision. In a blur of motion, the rogue launched itself at me, its fangs bared.
I swung the shears. The blades caught the rogue across the face, but it didn’t go down.
The motherfucker just winced and kept coming, its paws landing on my shoulders and driving me backward.
I fell hard, and pain shot up my elbow as the rogue landed on top of me.
Claws pierced my shoulders. I screamed, writhing under the rogue’s weight.
And then it was gone.
A high-pitched, canine squeal pierced the air as the rogue disappeared. I rolled onto my side in time to see Jesse pin the beast to the ground, dart his head forward, and rip out the rogue’s throat. Its body jerked once and then went still.
But Jesse wasn’t finished.
He plunged his head down again, biting and tearing. Bone crunched. Blood gurgled. Jesse fell into a rhythm, savaging the rogue’s open neck and then turning his head and spitting pulp and bone onto the patio.
Vomit burned my throat. It was worse than any horror movie. More gruesome than any nature show. My dad loved those things, and my childhood Saturdays had been filled with dudes with English accents narrating lions stalking and then devouring their prey.
This was nothing like that. Chunks of flesh wobbled on the snow. Splintered bone littered the space around the rogue, which was dead. It had to be dead. But Jesse continued to rip and tear, his jaws snapping. It went on forever. And then, finally, the rogue’s head rolled away from its body.
Jesse eased back from the rogue. He watched the remains of the other wolf for a moment, then lowered his head.
I couldn’t move. Couldn’t breathe. I lay on my side in the bloody snow, unable to tear my eyes off the grisly scene in front of me. Jesse remained still, his head down and his sides heaving. Then he lifted pale golden eyes to mine.
His power struck like a hammer, bowing my head before I even realized what was happening. Emotion blasted across our bond.
FURIOUS.
His rage punched into me and stole my breath. I curled into a ball, instinct driving me to escape it. But there was no escape.
Jesse was furious with me, the beats of his anger pounding like a drum between my ribs.
It was worse than the silver. Worse than the power he’d displayed when he took the knife from me in his kitchen.
In some dim corner of my mind, an angry little voice hissed at me to get up.
My humanity rebelled against the idea of groveling at Jesse’s feet.
But another, larger part of me sought to make myself as small as possible.
Instinct whispered through my veins, urging me to shrink from the force of a more dominant wolf’s wrath.
I tucked my chin to my chest and waited, my heartbeat loud in my ears.
Eventually, other noises intruded. Scuffling sounds. The pop of bone I recognized as Jesse’s shift. More scuffling. A moment later, strong hands pulled me into a sitting position, and a nude and fully human Jesse crouched before me.
“Are you all right?” he demanded hoarsely.
Blood covered his chest. Traces smeared his jaw, but his face was mostly clean, and I realized he must have scrubbed snow over the worst of it.
His eyes were the eerie gold of his wolf, and his expression was stark.
Tendrils of his anger brushed me, but now there was a stronger, more insistent emotion.
Fear.
He didn’t wait for an answer, just ran shaking hands down my body, turning me this way and that as if checking for injuries.
“I’m fine,” I said. “I’m not hurt.” When he didn’t stop, I grabbed his shoulders, halting his frantic inspection. “Jesse, I’m fine. I promise.”
He closed his eyes, and his lips parted as he released a shaky breath. “One day, when I’m not angry anymore, I’m going to put you over my knee and wear your ass out, Caleb.”
Heat coiled low in my stomach, the familiar combination of lust and humiliation like my own personal blend of cigar. Do you promise? The question was so loud in my head that I might as well have spoken it.
On the other hand, why the hell did I deserve a spanking?
“I saved your life,” I said, shoving away my inappropriate horniness. “The rogue was beating you.”
Jesse opened his eyes—then widened them in obvious surprise. “No, he wasn’t.”
“I saw it.” I slid my hand down his arm and leaned forward, craning to see his flank. “Your side was torn open. You’re covered in blood.”
“Most of it’s not mine. Here.” He grabbed a handful of snow and rubbed it down his side. Where the blood cleared, his skin was pink but whole.
“What…?” I shook my head as I tried to make sense of what should have been impossible.
He grasped my jaw in cold fingers and forced my attention back to his face. “You’ve never seen werewolves fight. It’s fast and brutal. It’s definitely not pretty. I took a few hits, and it was a bitch fighting on this ice, but I was never in danger of losing.”
I touched tentative fingers to his ribs. “But that wound was so deep.”
“Shifting is excellent for speeding up healing. I’ll be sore for a day, but it’s nothing I can’t handle.” He flashed a rueful smile. “Easier than handling you.”
Embarrassment flashed through me, and I pulled from his grip.
“Sorry I got in the way.” I sounded bitchy, and the knots in my gut weren’t the good kind.
Yeah, this brand of humiliation sucked. I opened my mouth to take it back, but my throat tightened.
With rising horror, I realized I was seconds from crying.
I scooted backward on my butt, prepared to shoot to my feet and get as far away from him as possible because what the fuck was wrong with me?
“Hey,” he said, seizing my arm before I could bolt. The anger flowing from him vanished as he went to his knees and put his hands on my shoulders. “It’s okay. Everything is okay. You thought I was in danger, and you acted on your instincts.”
I swallowed against a burning throat. “Yeah, well, it’s stupid to cry about it.
” I’d taken some brain-scrambling hits as a tight end.
My sophomore year, one of the lineman had blown out his knee and snapped his fibula in half.
Bone had stuck out from the skin like something out of a Halloween display.
Blood and pain weren’t new to me. So why was I whining like a baby?