Chapter 14 - Sam #2
My hand reached out and touched the cut along her cheek, which was already turning bright red and a little puffy around the edges. I let out a low, furious growl.
“I should have done a lot worse to those assholes,” I said.
“I’m fine,” she said. “Really.” She gnawed the inside of her cheek as she glanced down at the floor, embarrassment radiating off her, as if ashamed she hadn’t been able to handle it herself.
My hand lingered on her cheek for a long moment.
“I thought you were supposed to close with someone,” I said.
“They shouldn’t have been able to ambush you like this. ”
She flushed. “Normally, I do,” she admitted. “But Liv needed to leave early, so I told her I would close on my own.”
I stared, mouth opening slightly in frustration and disbelief. She had decided to close on her own?
“How could you do something like that?” I demanded. “Don’t you know how dangerous that is?”
Her eyes flashed with frustration. “It isn’t like I expected those guys to try and rob the place.”
“They were trying to do a lot more than that,” I barked.
“And they didn’t.” She jutted out her chin as she glared up at me. “I managed to hold them off.”
“Only because I showed up when I did,” I fired back.
Her jaw dropped as her eyes flashed with anger. “I held my own,” she said. “I would have been able to manage on my own.”
Sighing, I pinched the bridge of my nose, trying to get through to her.
“You can’t do this sort of thing,” I said.
“I got Amelia to teach you that so you could protect yourself when I can’t be there, not so you could put yourself in danger like this, or go up against two shifters nearly three times your size. ”
“I wasn’t trying to fight them. I was protecting myself.”
“Apparently not enough. I could feel your fear.”
She gave an exasperated laugh as she flung her hands in the air. “Of course, I was afraid. That doesn’t mean I wasn’t able to handle myself.”
“You aren’t strong enough,” I said. “You should have told me you were closing on your own. I would have come over.”
“I’m more than capable of closing a store on my own without you looming over me,” she snapped.
I gestured all around us, at the handful of items still on the floor.
“For fuck’s sake, it isn’t as though this is an everyday occurrence,” she snarled.
“Regardless, I don’t want you closing the store anymore.”
“That’s not your decision.” She folded her arms and stared up at me. “I don’t have any say in that, and you know it.”
I growled, glaring back at her, trying to make her understand that I was just trying to protect her. “If you’re going to keep insisting on closing, then I’m going to start walking home with you. I’m not going to let you stay out here on your own this late at night again.”
She gaped, incredulous. “God, you are so controlling,” she exploded. “Just because we’re mates doesn’t give you the right to dictate every little thing I do.”
“I’m supposed to protect you. Whether you like it or not.”
She opened her mouth to argue, then closed it as she looked around the store. Her lips thinned into a line.
“I’m going to finish locking up,” she said and walked away without another word.
***
“Thanks again, Sam,” Emma said, sand crunching beneath her feet. “I was itching to get in a hike.”
The sun beat down as Emma and I walked down the trail together.
Elias and Grace were having a father-daughter day in Adobe Creek, going to a show Grace had been pestering him about for weeks.
Emma had told him she wanted to go on a hike, pointing out an area where there hadn’t been any wraith or demon sightings.
We’d heard of recent sightings on the opposite side of town, so it was the safest place we could go.
After a bit of convincing, Elias had agreed, but he wasn’t going to let his mate go out into the wilderness on a hike on her own.
So I had offered to stand in as her bodyguard.
“I’m surprised Elias is even letting you out of the house,” I said as we trudged up a steep slope. “With everything going on.”
She laughed. “I didn’t give him much of a choice,” she said. “I told him that if he tried to keep me locked up, I’d make sure he spoke three octaves higher for the rest of his life.” She flashed an amused grin.
“Effective,” I admitted. “Still, I don’t know how he isn’t sick with worry.”
I could feel her staring at me with interest even as we kept walking. I didn’t glance over.
“Why do I have the feeling that this has very little to do with Elias and me. How’s Rachel?” Emma asked.
When I let out a frustrated growl, she snorted and gave a knowing look. “That well, huh?”
“She’s fine,” I answered. “But she’s also stubborn as all get out. She thinks she can handle things, but she’s too weak and refuses to admit it.”
Footsteps thudded against the dirt for a moment as Emma remained silent. “Are you sure that’s the case? I’ve spent time with Rachel. She’s stronger than she looks.”
I didn’t respond right away. Rachel was tiny and so delicate. She was willowy in a way that made it seem like a heavy breeze would knock her over. She was beautiful, and I liked the way she looked. But strong? That was never a word I would ever attribute to someone as tiny and light as her.
“You’ve seen her,” I said. “She can’t defend herself.”
“Because no one ever gave her the opportunity to learn,” Emma pointed out.
“You’re the first person to even try to get her some sort of training.
And that doesn’t come right away.” Her lips tightened as she gave me a dangerous look.
“But even if that weren’t the case, exterior appearances have nothing to do with strength, and if you think it does, then you have a lot to learn. ”
I grumbled, staring out at the landscape as I tried to find a way to get Emma to understand. “I’m just trying to keep her safe, and she’s making it nearly impossible.”
Emma tilted her head as she looked at me, an intrigued smile playing on her lips. “And why do you care that much? I thought that your mating was supposed to be perfunctory.”
I kept my stride even as my insides froze. She couldn’t know.
“It is,” I said. “I care about her because she’s Elias’s sister. He’d kill me if anything happened to her.”
“He would,” Emma conceded with a small laugh. “But is that your only reason?”
No. Of course it wasn’t. I had always wanted to keep Rachel safe.
I always would. I was always painfully aware of wherever she was at any given moment when we were in the same room, as if unconsciously tracking her.
I hated it when she wasn’t near me, when she was too far away for me to know she was safe.
Elias might kill me if anything happened to her, but that was nothing on what I would do to myself.
Except I couldn’t tell Emma any of that, because admitting it was entering dangerous territory that I had no intention of stepping into.
“What does it matter?” I grunted.
“It matters because I’m your luna and want to keep track of the goings-on in my pack,” she said, her voice sharp and authoritative in a way I wasn’t used to from her. “Keeping things secret is what gets people hurt.”
This was one secret that I wasn’t going to share. I didn’t care what Emma thought. I wasn’t going to admit any of it.
When I didn’t answer, Emma asked, “What about—”
“Shush.” I held up my hand as my ears pricked at a strange sound. One I had heard before, one that was getting closer and closer.
It was the sound of whirling sand.
“Fuck.” I grabbed Emma and spun her around, tearing away from the sound and what accompanied it. As we ran, another sound joined that of the swirling wind behind us: demons cackling as they grew nearer, appearing on either side of us as they began to pin us in.
One of the demons lashed out, trying to grab Emma’s hip. I lunged out, swatting it away with a clawed hand, snarling. If we had the time, I would have shifted and gotten her to get on my back, but it would have cost precious seconds. So we kept running.
At least until we came to a steep rock face, with demons flanking us on either side, blocking off either exit. We’d been led straight to where they had wanted us, and there was no easy way out, not two-on-ten.
Make that eleven, because when we turned back to look at the way we had come, the sand wraith loomed in front of us.
“I’ve been looking for you,” it hissed in its gravelly voice.
Both Emma and I knew it wasn’t talking about me, even if its attention hadn’t been entirely focused on her.
Emma reached for the canteen of water she carried everywhere, preparing to let it out.
But the canteen was gone, lost somewhere in our race to get away.
I remembered the wraith that had made a dash for her and realized with a sickening dread that the canteen had been its main target, rather than Emma herself.
The wraith laughed, the sound like rocks scraping against one another. “It seems you’re out of tricks,” it said, stepping forward.
Sand stung my face as granules tangled in my hair. Without even thinking about it, I moved to block his path to Emma, a low growl reverberating in my throat. The wraith paused, staring at me with those unnerving, glowing eyes.
“Step aside, wolf,” it hissed.
“Yeah, that’s not going to happen,” I said, my hand out, keeping Emma behind me. “Sorry, but if you’re going to go after Emma, you’ll need to go through me.”
It leered, then gave a gravelly laugh that grated against my ears.
“That can be arranged,” it said, then lunged toward me.