Page 43 of Legally Mated
"A while, but I have to go make more money for the firm at some point, or they'll revoke my super cool defender of the wrongfully accused card." Then, he lifted my hand to his lips and dropped a kiss on the knuckles before letting it go. "You up for some legal discussion, or would you rather play a little chessinstead?"
"Chess, I think. I'm sick of my journals." I cleared the maligned journals off my little table and we set up the chessboard. Truthfully, I would have enjoyed a legal discussion with him, but chess was easier on the brain, and I needed that right now. There was a hint of sadness about Laine that didn’t seem connected to the shooting, and I wanted brainpower to think about it, and time to see if I could tweeze some more clues out of him to tell me what it was that was casting that shadow over him. “I’ll play white this time. Since I’m hopped up on morphine. I need theadvantage.”
He grinned and the shadow shifted. “I’ll concede thepoint.”
I made my first move and the rest of the evening passed in peaceful chess combat, until I fell asleep between one move and the next. I half-woke briefly when he tucked me in and pressed a kiss to my forehead, but I was too groggy to do anything but mumble “Love you,” to him. He must have understood it, though, because he ran his thumb over my lower lip and cuppedmyjaw.
“Get well,” was the the last thing I heard him say before I was goneagain.
Chapter35
He was gonewhen I woke again, the morning sunlight slanting in across the ceiling still faintly orange. In his place was Holland andthebaby.
“Morning,” Icroaked.
“Morning,” he said, his eyes kind. “How are youfeeling?”
I paused to do a quick evaluation. “Not bad. A little sore.” I was looking after my own pain relief now and I pushed the button on the morphine pump that was never far from my hand. A few moments later I breathed a sigh of relief as the drug whispered through my veins, brushing away the pain as it came. When I focused on Holland again, he reached over to a little table by the head of my bed and picked up a plastic hospital cup with its ever-present bendy straw hanging overtheedge.
“Here, your mouth must be dry. The air here islikedust.”
Obediently, I sipped at the water, letting it coat the inside of my mouth with the taste of plastic and chemicals, but it was still wonderfully wet. “Thank you,” I said when I’d hadenough.
He nodded and put the cup back. “I heard yesterday that the man who shot you is being charged with attempted murder. Laine is responsible for that, I’m told. They were originally going to use some combination of assault and dangerous use of a weapon or something.” His eyes crinkled. “He’s not Quin, or Abel, but he made me think of them, how they get when they’re on their high horse. Duke went down to watch and he tells me Laine was fearsome in person at thecourthouse.”
I could believe it—Laine was an alpha trapped in a human body. Watching him in court was addictive—it wasn’t only because I was a disadvantage to him in the courtroom that I stayed away when he was arguing a case. “Was hesarcastic?”
“I don’t think sarcastic is the right word, but it’s in that family. He was like a parent dealing with a particularly stubborn and not-so-bright child. Duke says it was brilliant. If they had a vulnerability, he picked it right out and went for it. It’s a shame he’s human.” The wordsHe’d make a good mateandit would all be easier if he was one of ushovered in the air, but at least he didn’t rub salt in that wound. “The doctor wants to keep you in for another couple of days, but then he’ll be more than happy to release you to Adelaide’s supervision.” His nose wrinkled and then he shrugged off their prejudice. “It’s probably just as well—Quin’s nearly frothing at the mouthoverthis.”
“I don’t think he can blame Laine for it,” Iremindedhim.
“No, he can’t, but it’s Laine who’s tempting you outside walls this much. Putting you in situations where humans might find it easier to blame you than the person really responsible for their bad luck or whatever thing they’re upset about is. And I have to agree with him. In fifty years, maybe twenty, you and Laine might be completely unremarkable. In ten, if things go well, this maybe wouldn’t be cause for concern, or not much. It takes generations to change attitudes like this.” He leaned over and gripped my hand. “We don’t want toloseyou.”
I didn’t want to lose me either. But staying away from Laine felt a bit like I was going to lose something anyway, the part that was a lawyer, that part of me that enjoyed word play and looking for the meaning behind the words. I’d only started rediscovering myself since we’d met during my search for a lawyer to plead Jason’s case so many years ago, and the thought of going back to that gray existence after all this time in the technicolor of Laine’s aura made me feel even more tired than the bullet wound did. “I don’t plan on being lost to the pack, but I don’t want to lose meeither.”
He bowed his head and I had a moment to feel like shit before he lifted it again and gave me a stern and solemn look. “I know. But in this, you’ll obey your Alpha and his Mate. Right now, your work for the pack is more important than you chasing your hormones, and so that will have to come first.” Then the look crumbled a bit around the edges. “Get this done, it will open a lot of doors for both of you. With the pack distracted by this new freedom, we can have him established as yours before anyone really wakes uptoit.”
“AndQuin?”
“Let me deal with Quin,” he said grimly, and I had a glimpse of why Cosimo of the battered journal called omegas ‘the dark side ofthemoon’.
“All right. But I don’t want to wait four or five years for him.” Holland wanted me to open myself up to my ‘heritage’—well, I could be the dark side of themoontoo.
We engaged in a silent battle of wills for a moment, then Holland said gently, “I waited nineteen years for Quin. Two of them in disgrace deep enough I considered killing myself. Four or five years is long, yes, but there are worse things to wait for.” He watched me for a moment, then sighed. “Give me time, okay? I’m feeling my way through this, just like you. You’re certain you want him? Even though you can’t have pupswithhim?”
“I don’t like pups.” My eyes fell on little Vawn, peering curiously around. “No offense intended. They’re cute, but I like to be able to give them back whentheycry.”
Holland’s lips twitched, and then he was doing a remarkably poor job of stifling a laugh. Looking around as if checking for witnesses, he leaned forward and whispered conspiratorially, “Tell you a secret? Sometimes I wish I could give them back too.” He winked, and I feltbetter.
“So, one or two more days here, then I cangohome?”
“The doctor said as soon as your appetitecomesback.”
Hmmm. “Then bring on the food. I’ll find an appetitesomewhere.”
Chapter36
I’d expectedit to take longer to convince the hospital to let me go home, but they’d apparently verified Adelaide’s credentials and were quite happy to free the bed up for someone more human. And I’d had an egg and half a slice of toast for breakfast, then had been hungry again at lunch, so they’d declared me on the road to recovery and sent me home with a packet of instructions bigger than some of the legal files I’dworkedwith.
