Page 20 of Hunted Mate
“Stop, Ragnar!” Someone booms the order. “She’s just a baby!”
The jaws leave my neck, and next thing I know, an argument is ensuing.
“She saw us! She saw us shift.”
“Nobody will ever believe her. We’re going to let her go.”
“The law says we kill anybody who sees us. We’ve killed hunters who saw less than she saw. We’ve got to kill her.”
He sounds excited at the prospect. He’s not scared that I saw them. He’s angry that he’s been stopped from bleeding the life out of me. The hazy feeling I had before is starting to fade.
“We’re not killing a girl because the scouts fucked up and the guards didn’t guard. She’s one kid out here on her own. Does she have a phone on her?”
I am rifled through in the dark.
“No.”
“So she hasn’t even recorded it. And even if she did, it wouldn’t matter. How many times have they gotten Bigfoot on film and nobody believes it? Let her go.”
“It’s against the law, Lachlan.”
“I am the law, Ragnar,” the voice says. “I am the law and I say she lives, and I will spill the blood of anybody who tries to hurt her. Melody, Serena, take her to safety. She will need treatment for the bite. The rest of you, get the fuck away from her. Now.”
I feel and hear the others retreat at their leader’s orders. Their desire to kill me is not stronger than their need to follow the orders the man just gave. Lachlan. I’ll remember that name for the rest of my life. He’s the only reason I’m alive.
I lie in the dirt, whimpering. A pair of sympathetic female eyes swims into my vision. I bet they were predatory just like the others a few minutes ago. I bet she would have joined in with tearing into me.
But now she’s going to be nice. Now she’s going to keep me alive. Because Lachlan told her to.
“Here,” the pretty lady says. “Chew this. It will take the edge off the pain.”
I let her stuff the leaf into my mouth, and I do as I am told.
It does take the edge off the pain. It also sends me into the fucking stratosphere. I start to see things. I start to hear things. I stop worrying about the pain because the pain feels like a separate thing right now. It’s not part of me. I’m something different. I’m okay. I’m warm. I’m safe. I’m going home.
I blink and I am back in my fancy bathroom with a man who is looking at me as though I am a victim. Gray. Fucking Gray. I’ve gotten even more sober now. Remembering the most terrifying part of my life, the one that changed my trajectory forever has pushed away all the alcohol haze.
“You were bitten by something,” he says, like he has the right to comment on my body. “When? Looks like you must have been a lot smaller. That is a big wound.”
“It doesn’t matter.”
“Of course it does.”
This fucking asshole has the nerve to burn my research and then come to my house and ask me questions about what happened to me like he’s a friend. Like he gives a fuck. He’s not capable of caring. He’s a fucking arsonist, and I need to keep him here long enough to get him arrested.
“You didn’t find out what it was when you were getting all the information you needed to hunt me down and ruin everything I’ve been working for all these years?”
“No. Clearly not,” he deadpans. “Tell me what happened.”
“I don’t feel like telling you what happened, so I’m not going to.”
He starts talking, and what comes out of his mouth is the worst thing he could possibly say. “You were attacked by an animal. You thought it was a human. You became confused and…”
Smack.
The sound of my hand hitting his face echoes through the room like a gunshot.
“Don’t you ever,” I say, my voice shaking with rage, “gaslight me. I know what I saw. And I know what happened to me.”
