RED ROCK SHIFTERS

Chapter Eight

(Izzy's Pov)

I watched Jace leave as I clutched my daughter tight.

I couldn't believe it when I'd looked up and seen him sitting there watching me. Panic had risen swiftly in my chest. I was sure that the second he realised what I had hidden from him he would be breaking down the door and taking her from me. I couldn't risk that happening.

"You okay?"

I spun round and saw one of the other girls stood there. My heart still beat wildly and I knew what I had to do. I couldn't sit around and wait for Jace to come back. He might have left easily enough now but there was nothing to stop him from coming back and taking my little girl.

"I have to leave,' I said aloud and the other girl looked confused but just shrugged and walked off. I wouldn't be missed here.

The only reason I had taken this job was because I couldn't risk taking anything else. I knew that any shifter worth their salt would be able to smell the two unmistakeable scents of Jace and me on my baby girl. I couldn't risk anyone finding that out and telling Jace.

"It's okay sweetheart," I murmured as I rocked her in my arms. Luna was the only good thing that I had ever done in my life and I refused to let Jace corrupt that. No matter how good his intentions were he could never prevent the harm that the pack would cause. I refused to allow that to happen to my baby.

Jace was an alpha and I knew what that meant. Luna would be expected to follow in his footsteps and I would be pushed aside and forced to watch as my baby girl lost her innocence to blood and greed.

I refused to let my daughter grow up the way I had. I knew that Jace wasn't my father and that he wouldn't intentionally force our daughter down that path but it didn't matter because it would happen anyway. I had thought that Jace and I were so different but in the end he had been raised the exact same way I had. I wouldn't let that happen to our daughter.

It took longer than I expected to get our things together. When it had just been me it was easy to disappear but with Luna it took a lot longer. I couldn't just replace anything I left because she would cry constantly if she didn't have the exact right bobo or her teddy with his tatty ear and faded colour. Having a baby was hard work but I wouldn't change her for the world. She made every day worth living.

When I'd left Red Rock I hadn't even realised the miracle I was taking with me. It shouldn't have been possible for me and Jace to conceive at all, never mind the fact that it had only taken the one night to achieve that impossible feat. That was why I hadn't even realised what the changes in my body meant for the first few months. I had assumed that the sickness was just from my guilt at leave Jace like that and the occasional dizzy spell was just because I wasn't taking care of myself properly. I had been so busy running from town to town and never putting down roots that I hadn't even had time to consider the possibility that I might be pregnant.

I had been six months along before I acknowledged the truth and even then it wasn't me who realised it. I'd noticed that I had been putting on a little weight and that my breasts seemed to have jumped up a cup size or two but I hadn't really thought anything of it. Even the small flutterings that I felt were put down to nerves and regret. Everything seemed to have a perfectly normal explanation. Until the night that I stayed at a boarding house where an elderly shifter maintained order. She was a sweet woman but not someone that you wanted to mess with. I'd been avoiding shifters because I didn't want to get sucked back in to that world; I simply wanted to pretend that I was like any other human out there. It didn't take long for my own world to be destroyed with just a few words.

"Will the father be joining you?"

I hadn't understood what she meant at first so she had rubbed my belly and given me that look that told me she was in on my little secret. The problem was that I'd had no idea what that secret was. When I'd figured out what she meant I couldn't believe it. I was just lucky that she was so past it she hadn't realised that the father was a shifter or else I wouldn't have been able to simply slip away and hide from the world. When there was a full shifter pregnancy everyone knew about it. Especially in the case of little girls because they were so rare that everyone knew of every full shifter girl born in the last fifty years.

It had taken me a while to come round to the idea that I really was pregnant with Jace's baby. Even now while holding her in my arms I couldn't believe it. How did such a beautiful little miracle happen to me?

She fussed in my arms and kicked her little legs and I couldn't help the little chuckle that escaped me. At seven months old she was already showing that she had a big personality just waiting to escape and I couldn't wait. I know that everyone always said that their kid was the most beautiful but Luna truly was gorgeous. I'd never really been a big fan of kids. They were fine as long as they belonged to someone else, but I had resigned myself to never having them. And then Luna had come along and I could barely remember my life before her. She had these cute chubby cheeks that you just wanted to pinch all the time and these amazingly big blue eyes that instantly reminded me of Jace. She didn't have the jaded look that he generally held in his though. She had the smallest amount of pure blonde hair that held that softness that you only associate with babies. She was almost the double of Jace and I knew that if he ever got a good look at her then there would be no doubt that she was his. She had a cute button nose and the softest skin I had ever felt. She still had that adorable baby smell even all these months later. I loved to simply hold her and inhale that scent. It reminded me of why I had put up with this hellhole for all these months and why she was the most important part of my world.

I wasn't the same person I had been when I arrived in Red Rock and I couldn't afford to let my emotions rule me. Everything I did now was for Luna and I wouldn't let anyone get in the way of what was best for her. My past didn't matter, only her future.

With that in mind I gathered my daughter close and collected all the necessary things we would need. I placed a kiss to her fair hair and watched as she gave a sleepy yawn.

"I will always protect you Luna. No matter what," I promised. And then I snuck out the backdoor and hightailed it to my car. I had to get us out of there and fast.