Chapter 12
MY MATE
Luckily for me, I’m down but I’m not out.
For a few seconds, I do see stars. My head screams with the pain from his hit, but whether he didn’t want to do too much damage to his ‘little mouse’ or I just got real fucking fortunate, I’m still conscious.
It sucks to have to push past the sudden throbbing in my head, but I do it because the alternative…
yeah. I’m not about to let this huntsman prick get a hold of me again.
Only it’s too late, damn it.
While I’m trying not to puke, strong hands haul me up before I can fully recover, dragging me against him once more as I struggle to stay upright.
“Let me go,” I snap.
“Don’t fight me,” he orders. “You’ll like me more if you don’t fight, m?uschen.”
Ugh. I might just hurl after all. “Stop touching me, dickhead!”
Where’s a lunch tray when you need one? Hell, I’d take his axe, but the huntsman dropped it to the ground so that he can grab me. So though I twist, wriggle, and kick, doing anything and everything I can to break free of his hold, I’m trapped. He’s too damn strong.
“Stay calm,” he growls, shifting his grip, hugging me to him as he starts to lift me up.
“No!”
Breaking through the pain in my head, I tap into enough adrenaline to give me the nerve to fight back some more. I slam the heel of my boot down on his foot as hard as I can, and because he wasn’t expecting it, it was enough.
The huntsman swears, though I can’t tell if he’s cursing because I actually did any damage—or because he released me just long enough that I’m able to wrench free of his hold, catching myself in time so that I don’t fall flat on my ass.
Instead, alarm bells clanging in my head—or maybe that’s my new concussion—I turn and run.
I couldn’t outrun Wolf. Maybe, with a little luck on my side, I can run to him and far, far away from the huntsman—
Oof.
A heavy hand slams into my back, sending me crashing face-first to the ground. All of the air in my lungs rushes out upon impact as I just manage to break my fall by throwing out my hands.
As quick as I can, I try to push up, but it’s pointless. The huntsman has grabbed me again, using the back of my cloak to drag me so that I’m sprawled at his feet.
“I told you. You will listen to me, little mouse, and you will give me what I’m owed. For so long, I waited for you to arrive in Blackmoor. Now you’re here, and I won’t be denied.”
Yes the fuck he will.
I tug the cloak. “Get off me!”
The huntsman grips my shoulder, throwing me to my back.
“I was going to lead you to my home. I could’ve treated you like a wee thing deserves, laying you out on a bed and showing you how the story is supposed to end.
But you’d rather rut in the dirt with the beasts.
” Leaning down, he grabs the front of my nightgown, ripping the top wide open with one forceful yank.
“If that’s what you need from me, then that huntsman will provide. ”
As though my shouts didn’t already alert Wolf to where I am, I take a deep breath as the blond bastard starts to lower himself on top of me, then scream with everything that I am.
A quick slap across the face kills my scream, and the way the huntsman’s green eyes burn with violence tells me that the rest of me might follow suit if I don’t shut up and take it.
Fuck, no. If I could train a werewolf that he has to wait until his mate agrees to the act, no way in hell am I letting some human monster touch me ever again.
All I wanted to do was survive Blackmoor, and I thought I did. But if this is how I go out… hell, no. I’m not making it easy.
I kick out at the huntsman. In return, he bends low and yanks my hair. I scream again, and he grips my chin, forcing my mouth into an open position.
He lets out a husky laugh that turns my stomach.
“There. Stay like that, m?uschen. I’ll let you show your forgiveness to me by sucking my cock and then, if you’re a good little mouse, I’ll fuck you until we both forget you ever let that wolf touch you.
And when I’m done, I’ll rip open his stomach and mount his head on our wall so you never forget who you actually belong to. ”
He’s crazy. That’s all there is to it. Maybe in his head, he’s supposed to be the good guy, but fuck fairy tales. I don’t want the huntsman to save the day. I want the big, bad wolf to come and kick his fucking ass.
Even with his hand squeezing my jaw, I scream out his name. “Wolf!”
In answer, he howls, and the sound reverberates so loudly, I want to cry in relief. He’s here. He’s here. He’s—
The huntsman has the nerve to caress my jaw. “Stay here. I will take care of the wolf, and when I’m done, you will accept me as your husband as I fuck you in his spilt blood. Then I’ll have a cloak made of his carcass, and everyone will know that Red Riding Hood chose the huntsman over her mate.”
It’s the way he sneers ‘mate’ like that that catches my attention.
Despite all of his posturing that Blackmoor’s version of the fairy tale is supposed to end with Red and the huntsman together, why would he say that I’m Wolf’s mate.
I mean, Wolf called me that plenty of times over the last couple of days, but the huntsman didn’t say that I was Wolf’s mate. He said that Wolf is mine.
Because he is, I realize. That tug I’ve been unable to ignore… the pull that stretched behind me, whispering that I should return to the cottage… the connection I felt from the moment I looked into Wolf’s golden eyes and saw more than a wolf-man… he is my mate.
He’s coming for me, too, and this bastard knows it.
Without looking back at me—something that Wolf rarely was able to do considering he always had his eyes on me while awake— the huntsman crosses the clearing in time to swoop up his fallen axe just as Wolf comes crashing out of the woods.
I heard him howl. I thought that meant he was chasing after me in his fur as a four-legged wolf. And though the creature that appears between the huntsman and me is definitely the Wolf I know, he’s… different, too.
He’s larger than I remember. His body is still hunched forward, all those muscles coiled under a mix of skin and fur, his shoulders wilder, his frame more…
wrong. Not fully beast, not fully man, he’s almost a complete meld of man and wolf, with claws and fangs that remind me just how dangerous he can be to anyone that isn’t me.
I’m not afraid of him. I haven’t been in a long time, but when his wild gold eyes lock on me, I realize that I’m terrified for him. He has claws and fangs, sure, but the huntsman has an axe and Wolf… he has his back to the man.
A low rumble sound builds in his chest, part anger and part relief. “Red. Wolf found you.”
He did. “I’m sorry,” I blurt out. “I didn’t mean to—” I stop. Because that? That’s a lie, and it doesn’t feel right to lie to my mate. I shake my head. “I’m sorry.”
Behind Wolf, the huntsman sneers again. “You’re not sorry enough, m?uschen. But you will be.”
Shit. Lost in Wolf’s golden gaze, I completely forgot about the huntsman. Wolf didn’t seem concerned about the man, but maybe that’s because he doesn’t know that the creep ridiculously considers Wolf his rival—or that the man has an axe.
Before I can shout a warning, the huntsman slices at Wolf. In his haste to attack my mate, he doesn’t swing deep enough, but the cut tears a pained yowl out of my mate before he dances forward on his paws before spinning around, claws outstretched.
Wolf tears a chunk out of the huntsman’s arm. “You took Wolf’s mate,” he growls.
The huntsman tightens his grip on the axe. “She’s not yours, beast. She’s mine.”
Yeah… that’s the wrong thing to say. I finally can think clearly enough to realize that hanging around in the dirt while these two guys go out it… not a good idea. I force myself to my feet, hands clasped in front of me as I watch the way that Wolf’s body goes still.
“Red is mine,” he says, so simply I don’t know how I ever doubted it.
And then, before the huntsman can retort, he moves. I don’t even see it. Not really. One second he’s there, and the next? He’s on top of the huntsman.
He tries to lift the axe, but he’s not quick enough.
Wolf slashes his claws down the length of the huntsman’s forearm, forcing him to drop the haft.
After that, he slams into the huntsman with a force that sends them both to the ground.
They roll, each fighting for the top position, before Wolf pins the huntsman flat on his back.
He touches his nose to the huntsman’s, making sure those green eyes are staring into gold while his fangs flash wickedly. “You touched Wolf’s Charlotte.”
His words are low. Deadly. And, even so, my heart skips a beat to hear Wolf use my name like that.
The huntsman struggles, twisting under him, trying to get some leverage so he can push him off, but he doesn’t. He can’t. Wolf is too big, too strong, and he wants to be the victor too, too much.
Because he wants me.
“I was helping her,” the huntsman grits out at last. “She wanted to leave you.”
Dick. I mean, I was, but that was a dick move, buddy, rubbing it in Wolf’s face because he has you at a disadvantage.
“Wolf can’t make Red stay. He can only hope she chooses him.
But she will never choose you.” He closes his fist, hiding his claws, before slugging the huntsman once.
His head basically knocks back and forth while Wolf climbs off of him.
“That was for hitting Wolf’s mate. Now the huntsman goes with the knowledge that Red… she didn’t choose him, either.”
Because, to Wolf, it would be far more merciful to die than to live out the rest of his existence without his mate—just like I was ready to do to him.
Once standing again, he starts toward me. I stand there, waiting. At first, I was worried about the slice on his back, but I guess it’s part of the magic of Blackmoor because it’s already mostly healed by the time he got the huntsman down on his back.
No. That’s not what he has a pained look in his eye, is it?