Page 43 of A Hunter Turned
To distract himself before he gave Jamie more reason to want to throttle him, he went to check on Marcel. The bullet had been removed, he'd been stitched up, and his soldier was quite happy to take some time off from his duties and let his wife play nurse.
Next, he checked on Cady. His parents had come in from the city, happy to watch their granddaughter. They were also both eager to meet Jamie once she was feeling better, neither one of them batting an eye when they learned his mate was a vampire.His mother had simply pulled him into a hug, patted his chest, and told him, “You’ve had such anger and sadness inside of you, Archer. Too much for one so young. If she makes you happy, then we love her already.”
The statement had gone a long way in easing some of his tension. Archer may be alpha, but his parents’ approval would always be important to him. They were elders, their wisdom necessary, both to him and the pack as a whole. In fact, with their approval, he might just manage to convince the dissenting females, if not to like Jamie, then to at least accept her as the mate of their alpha and thus, a member of the pack.
When he returned to the dragon’s lair, Marguerite was just leaving and he practically knocked the healer over in his impatience to get inside. Jamie was in bed, and upon seeing him, she pulled back the covers and patted the mattress in invitation. He didn't hesitate to join her, yanking his boots off his feet and throwing them behind him as he practically dove into the bed.
Jamie let out a breathy little laugh at his impatience and Archer drank in the sound as he looked her over in the dim light provided by a small bedside lamp. Her eyes were heavy-lidded, but from exhaustion rather than arousal, the bruise on her face now gone thanks to his blood coursing through her veins. She was no longer gaunt, or pale, and the bloody, makeshift bandages she had had on her wrists when he’d found her had been replaced with clean, white strips of gauze.
Reassured by his visual inspection, he cupped her cheek in his big hand. “I’m sorry I was such an ass earlier,” he said sincerely. “I just…”
Touching her fingers to his lips, she stopped him. “Don't apologize. Honestly, if you had been sweet or gentle, I probably would have broken down on the spot and bawled all over you I was so relieved to see you.” Her grin lit up her face and made Archer’s heart stutter. “Dickhead Archer brings out my fighting instincts and I needed that.”
Her fingers rubbed back and forth over his bottom lip and archer kissed them, gently pulling her closer as she whispered, “You always seem to know exactly what I need.”
Smoothing his hand over her hair, he cupped the back of her head and brought it to his shoulder. “And right now, I think we both need sleep.”
Jamie cuddled close with a yawn. “You stayed up all night searching for me, didn’t you?” she asked with a smile in her voice.
He had. He might have insisted others of his pack search in shifts and take breaks to rest and refuel, but he’d been unable to stop until he knew she was safe. Stroking his hand over her back in soothing circles, he kissed the top of her head. “I’d move mountains for you,” he whispered against her hair.
Jamie let out a pleased little ‘mm’, and the fingers stroking beneath his ear began to slow as she drifted off into sleep, her quietly uttered, “I love you, Archer Langley,” the last thing she said before she succumbed to exhaustion.
Archer’s heart sang with joy. He wanted to shout his happiness from the rooftops, but with a soft, comfortable bed beneath him, the warmth of Jamie’s body pressed safely against him, and the soothing feeling of her deep, even breathing against his neck, the stress and exertion of the night finally caught up with him. He was smiling when he too, drifted off to sleep.
∞∞∞
Morgan, Kane, and Travis were still discussing the new witch twist scenario as they approached the structure that housed Travis’s sister and he slipped the key in the door to unlock it. “She may be under duress. Being blackmailed into helping them.”
“I don’t know,” Kane mumbled, running a hand through his hair in agitation. “Mighty coincidental that that vamp’s brains were melted just as he was about to give up a possible location.”
Travis went inside and lit the lantern, turning up the wick just as Morgan said, “You think she’s the missing Evangeline and doesn’t want to be found.”
Kane said something in reply, but Travis didn’t hear a word of it, his blood a roar in his ears as his breath left him in a surprised hiss. In the time they’d been away, the small fissure in Sophia’s stone casing had become a massive crack running diagonally from her wing, across her torso, to the base.
Laying his hands on the cold stone, his voice was frantic as he yelled, “Sophia! Can you hear me? It’s Travis, baby sister. I’m here. You’re safe.”
His eyes focused on the crack, hoping to see it spread further, or start crumbling at the sound of his voice. Nothing. Silence. And then Kane’s voice, barely a whisper, “This is good, right? I mean, it’s progress.” Hesitantly, he tacked on, “Right?”
Travis couldn’t reply, not in his human voice. A loud, clicking purr rose in his throat, his dragon talking to his sister.
He vaguely heard Morgan tell Kane, “Let’s give them some privacy.”
Lifting his hands high above his head to reach, Travis held the rough surface of his sister’s face with his fingertips and cleared his throat. A lullaby he’d sung to her when she was small and couldn’t sleep broke free. It was hesitant at first, off-key, his voice rusty, and he hummed in a few places where he couldn’t remember the words, but by the third time through, his voice was strong, the memories flooding back.
The rock beneath his fingers began to vibrate, the feeling subtle at first, only to grow into a quaking that caused the ground beneath his feet to tremble. Travis stepped back but continued to sing, his voice rising as another crack appeared, this one across the long, scaled neck beneath her uptilted chin.
Joy suffused him as he waited with bated breath. She was coming back, trying to break free. When the vibrations ceased and nothing further happened, Travis began to sing once more, his eyes trained on the stone in hopes of another quake, another split.
He sang for hours until his voice gave out on him and his legs refused to hold his weight any longer. No more progress was made. Collapsing on the ground at Sophia’s feet, he noted that someone, most likely Morgan, had brought him food and he slowly, methodically, went through the offerings without tasting a single bite. He’d refuel, rest for a little bit, and then begin again. Sophia was coming back and he’d be there when she emerged. However long it took.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Jamie awoke to the feeling of someone finger-combing her hair and the thick length of an erection pressed against her backside. With a grin, she wiggled against Archer and heard him growl. Sleepily, she murmured, “I like waking up like this.”
Turning over in his arms, her toes skated over the rough denim encasing his shin. “You’re wearing too many clothes.”
With a mischievous grin, Archer’s fingers plucked at the shoulder of the pale blue pajamas she’d donned when the healer insisted on putting her to bed. “I could say the same about you.”
