Page 16 of Kidnapped Rejected Mate
I feel the thing blink out like a light, its last dying scream swallowed by the sonicpopit makes when it disappears, leaving nothing behind but a couple of black spots on Soren’s fur.
“Aurela,” Soren says the moment he’s shifted back, but I’m already leaning on a tree, exhausted from the fight, black spots moving into my vision.
“Don’t touch me,” I protest weakly, but he’s already scooping me up, undoing my path back toward town with a steady march in the direction of the cabin.
“You could have been killed,” he hisses, jaw set tight as he stares straight ahead, holding me effortlessly despite the fact that I weigh well over twice what I did in high school. I try notto be impressed with the fact that Soren has no qualms about scooping a woman like me up into his arms.
“Why do you even care?” I mutter, head lolling against his chest despite my best efforts to hold it upright and off him.
“Because Ido,” he says, and for some reason, I’m inclined to believe him. “I need to know what happened, Aurela. In order to protect you.”
“I don’t need your protection.”
“Yes, you clearly do. Just tell me the truth—did you start that fire?”
“No,” I snap, jerking in his arms, but obviously too weak to get away from him. “I would never do something like that. I would never try to hurt the people in this town. Andfuckyoufor even thinking that of me, Soren Riggs.”
Apparently, that little speech takes up the rest of my energy, because in the next moment, the world goes black, and I relax completely into his arms.
Chapter 9 - Soren
When Aurela comes to again, I’m tending to the cut on her arm. It’s seeping with the sticky black stuff from that thing. I have no idea what it was—some sort of cryptid—but I know better than to let that residue linger. It could make her sick or cause her arm to fall off without intervention.
“Hey,” I say softly, taping off the bandage and moving into the kitchen to get her something to eat. She’s pale, breathing hard, and I can’t stop thinking about the way she killed that thing.
Aurela is stronger than I thought.
I return with beef jerky from the stores and a little cup of trail mix. There are preserves in the pantry, but I’ll need to go hunting if I want meat to cook with the tomatoes and other vegetables.
“Thank you,” she says weakly.
That surprises me, considering the way she talked to me just before she passed out.
I would never try to hurt the people in this town. And fuck you for even thinking that of me, Soren Riggs.
Still, the sound of my name coming from her lips makes a shiver run the length of my spine, sending shockwaves through the rest of my body. But this time, there’s a tinge of shame attached to it.
“I believe you, Aurela,” I murmur, watching her as she takes a bite of the beef jerky and immediately follows it with water, coughing at the salt. It’s the meat my grandpa cured, and if I know him, it’s definitely saltier than necessary.
“Sorry,” I say. “It’s probably pretty strong—”
“It’s good,” she cuts me off. “Thank you.”
“I believe you that you didn’t start the fire,” I start again, staring down at the quilt on the bed. “But I didn’t know what to think when I found you out there withher. Didn’t you see the missive Xeran sent out to the pack?”
She shakes her head, and I suck in a shuddering breath. The thing is practically ingrained in my head at this point.
“He said, to make it clear that if anyone is harboring Tara, they will be executed. If they make contact with her and don’t immediately tell us, they will be executed. If he finds out a single member of this pack is connected to her, or these fires, in any way, he’s not going to show mercy.”
Aurela’s pale face pales a little further, and I can’t believe it took me this long—and two escape attempts on her part—to tell her why I brought her up here.
“Nothing was on purpose,” she says, her voice small. “Not back then, and not now.”
I sit up, blinking at her. “What do you mean, back then?”
With clear suffering written all over her face, Aurela lifts her quivering chin and meets my eyes. “I was part of the group involved with the fire all those years ago, Xeran. Actually…Tara and I were best friends.”
The breath I suck in is so sharp that it makes me cough. I’d always suspected that, somewhere deep down, but hearing it from her now is wholly different. How did I not know this? How didXerannot know this?
