“I will do everything in my power.”
“That’s all I ask,” she said, wiping a tear as it trailed down her weathered cheek.
Chapter Five
“Did you think I wouldn’t find out?” Kye roared, pacing a hole in Evie’s bedroom carpet. She felt bad for lying to him, but he needed to understand where she was coming from when it came to her decision.
“I had hoped that you would be a little more understanding when you did find out,” she whispered.
Things had changed for her. She was no longer afraid of anyone’s anger. An outburst by a male didn’t send her cowering in the corner like a scolded animal. Her panther was stronger now, too. It didn’t recess in her scarred mind when it was scared. Evie felt like the predator she was born to be.
“Ranger touched you,” he pointed out, taking a knee in front of her. He reached up and cupped her face, staring into her icy blue eyes. “He hit you…on purpose, Evie.”
“I was training, Kye,” she sighed, rolling her eyes. “We were wearing boxing gloves. I promise that he never left a mark on my skin.” Kye’s eyes roamed her exposed skin. Evie knew he needed to see it for himself to believe that she was okay.
“He broke the rules of the pride,” he continued, ticking off all of the things Ranger had done. All of them were illegal in their world. “Females are not allowed to fight. It’s too dangerous.”
“Kye,” she began, but he cut her off to stand again. She sat back on her bed and folded her arms over her chest as he returned to pacing.
“I cannot forgive him for touching you,” he declared, running his hand through his dark hair.
“We are not officially mated,” Evie reminded him. “It was better to have him train me now. If I’d waited until I was into my full maturity, I wouldn’t have been able to learn the things I have.”
“Why?” Kye asked. “I want to know exactly why you asked him.”
“Are you wanting to know why I asked Ranger, or do you want to know why it wasn’t you?” Evie guessed Kye was jealous. She could see it in his eyes.
“Yeah,” he breathed. “I want to know why you didn’t ask me.”
“Because you would’ve told me no,” she replied.
“Damn right, I would’ve told you no,” Kye yelled, throwing his hands in the air. “Because females are not supposed to fight!”
“I disagree with the rules,” she huffed, standing up from her perch on the bed. She wanted to be on equal footing with Kye, even if he was half a foot taller than her. “Liberty is right. We should know how to defend ourselves. Her father taught her how to handle guns when she was just a young female.”
“She was also human,” Kye explained. “Damn it, Evie! It’s a male’s honor to protect the females of the pride.”
“Males are dumb,” she snapped, placing a hand on her hip. “You treat us like we are fragile…like we are porcelain dolls!”
“To us, you are,” Kye admitted, reaching to take her face again. She felt a thrill when he touched her. It was the same feeling she experienced every time he touched her. She closed her eyes and inhaled deep when his mating scent reached her, dissolving some of her anger. Every day that they were together and moving closer to his twentieth birthday, the scent became stronger. “Females cannot protect themselves against another shifter. Especially the males.”
“Did my right hook hurt you?” she asked, raising a brow. When Kye winced, she knew she had her answer. “That’s what I thought.”
The black and white images of the grounds behind the alpha’s home played in real time as Talon waited impatiently for any evidence to prove what his eyes had seen. There were a hundred questions rolling around his mind about the sheriff.
“Here you are carrying Liberty to Harold’s office,” Ranger said, pointing to the screen. Talon watched as he ducked into the healer’s home, disappearing with his mate. The window in the office that overlooked the side of Harold’s home was visible on the screen. Talon focused on the area, hoping to see something.
“You said his eyes flashed white?” Winter asked, rubbing his chin.
“Completely white,” Talon mumbled, his eyes never leaving the screen.
“Wait! Stop the video,” Noah barked just as the screen lit up with a flash of blinding light. If anyone had blinked, they would’ve never seen it.
“What did you see?” Talon asked, looking up at his brother.
“I don’t know.” Noah shook his head and asked Ranger to play back the video at half the speed. All of the males cursed when the flash was slowed down, but it still didn’t show anything but the light. “Can you slow it down more?”
“Hang on,” Ranger mumbled as he pressed several commands into the tablet. The male was a genius when it came to technology, and at the moment, Talon was more than thankful for him being there.
As the images began playing, Talon was glued to the sight in front of him. The light started out as an orb about three feet off the ground. As the bright light expanded, a silhouette of a human body formed. In slow motion, they could see the body elongating, changing. There wasn’t a sound in the office as the frames ticked by, revealing something they’d never seen.
“Holy shit!” Noah yelped, backing away from the screen as if the image would jump out at him. “It’s the sheriff.”
“Are those…wings?” Ranger asked.
The sheriff’s body shimmered once. Huge white feathers extended about halfway before they curled themselves around the man’s body. There was another flash of light, brighter this time, that swallowed up the blurry image of the lawman.
“What is he?” Talon asked, his voice turning deadly.
“He’s an angel?” Noah asked, looking up at Talon with wide eyes. “Is that what I’m seeing? Because I swear, my mind just isn’t registering it.”
“It has to be,” Ranger whispered. “I mean…we are a thing of human myths. What is there to say that angels don’t walk among us?”
“What I want to know is how the hell is the sheriff some sort of an angel, and why is he so concerned with my mate?”
“We cannot deal with the sheriff right now, Talon,” Winter informed him. “The Solstice must occur tonight. We will patrol and keep an eye on the pride.”
“If anyone so much as catches the lawman’s scent on my land, I am to know about it immediately.” Talon’s order was final. His Guardians nodded in agreement, then made their plans while Talon took care of last minute preparations for the dominance fights.
He would confront the sheriff, and if he was here for any reason that would bring harm to his mate and pride, Talon vowed to mete out his own justice to the lawman.
Talon watched Liberty standing at the living room window that looked out over the back yard. He wasn’t going to tell her what they’d found in the video until he confronted the sheriff and got solid answers. He had to take care of the Solstice dominance fights first. This was something that could not be postponed.
The pride had started gathering around the circle where Talon conducted the Solstice and Equinox meetings. The only addition this time was a fighting area marked by red spray paint in a perfect circle. The width was about fifteen feet across and it didn’t look like there was enough room for the large males to do their dominance fighting. That was part of the test.
“Do you promise me that the males will not be harmed?” Liberty asked, chewing on her bottom lip.
“I promise,” Talon chuckled. “Just a little blood and bruising.”
Liberty shot a hard look over her shoulder, then smiled when she saw the smirk at the corner of his lips. Talon walked forward and wrapped his arms around her waist, kissing the mating mark on her neck.
“They will fight for blood,” he warned. “I don’t want you to worry. This is the way of our world, Liberty.”
“I know this, but they are so young,” she worried.
“I want you to stay inside tonight,” he ordered, tightening his hold. His thumb traced circles on her belly as he nuzzled her neck. “They will get heated and possibly out of hand. I don’t want you getting hurt.”
“I need to be there with you.” Liberty turned in his arms as best as she could with the baby between them. She kissed his jaw, and he knew she was taking in his mating scent by the way her body relaxed even more.
“Any other time, I would love to have you at my side, my queen.” He smiled at her. “The pride will understand.”
She nodded and resumed watching the pride arrive while Talon held her. As soon as the sun started to set, the crowd began to part. Four males dressed in white, gauzy pants arrived at the platform, kneeling in the grass and lowering their heads.
“I will stay here.” She nodded toward the makeshift bed on the floor.
“I need to go,” he said, taking her lips for a heated kiss. Her arousal was thick in the air, and the last thing he wanted to do was leave her there alone. “Mmm, your scent drives me wild.”
“Hurry back,” she breathed, releasing him reluctantly.
Talon stepped out onto the porch, pausing for a moment before walking out to the circle. His pride was silent as he approached the platform. The four males were in position on their knees, none of them seemed to be so much as breathing.