BLACK

(26) Unspoken

EDITED

His breath was hot against my neck, skin searing along my own. His hands stayed by his sides and mine stayed crossed along my chest. His overbearing height was bent down, face pressed into my neck under my hair, the warm tip of his nose teasing my skin. I breathed deeply, uncertain of how to react. His tortured grey fur had been replaced with his pale skin, long blond hair and holy golden eyes. Somehow he'd found grey sweats to cover his legs, the right leg pushed up to bunch over his cast, and covered his chest in a faded black hoody. Heat still poured from his close proximity with lust, and I crushed my hands into my elbows further, eyelids shut, trying to repress whatever emotions came from the mate bond.

I didn't stay long to talk with Cassandria after. I had basically handed her my letters and left, my stomach tossing and turning. A few times on the way back I dry heaved, leaning against trees with headrushes. Whether my sickness was physical or mental, obviously my train of thought wasn't helping.

I didn't ask for help, but that doesn't mean I don't want it. In every possible way I wanted to leave Black and never see him again, but that wasn't particularly how shifter culture worked. I was his mate. No matter how much I refused to verbally accept it. I was his right. Which meant if anyone hid me from him, it was his right to eliminate them.

It wasn't fair of me to ask my packs for help either. To put them in harms way of Black. I was embarrassed, that in all of this mess, losing mate after mate, abandoning my son and miscarrying my unborn child, then being abducted, that is was all only due to an eighth mate. If anything, I should have been an expert on how to handle another possessive shifter in my life, yet somehow this Alpha-gone-rogue insane shifter had destroyed everything in my life, and kept me prisoner.

I couldn't run away alone. He would find me instantly. I couldn't go back to any of my packs. They already dislike me. Yet I had thought Cassandria, with all of her dislike to Black, enough to physically strike him, would understand. And I'm sure she did, just not enough to help me escape him. Perhaps she thought I deserved this, after what I had done to her brother, but I couldn't believe it. Cassandria was good. Yet bad, for I kept coming back to the same question;

Why did she claw Black?

It was difficult to believe he didn't hit her first. For her to strike like that, so vividly. Not a punch, or a push, but four curved lines scarring down his cheek. How much had they fought— What over? That much wasn't as hard to guess, but I was still confused. Cassandria's temper was always so calm, Black's not. Her story made no sense, and the distrust that she would lie to my face, made me feel this sick. Yet very quietly, on the other side of my brain; what if she wasn't lying?

When I came up the shallow slope to the trailer, regret filled me. I didn't want to be here. I had my chance to run, to not look back, and I wasted it. I might never have that chance again. But with deep breaths and bravery, I forced myself through that clearing of overgrown trees and brush to face the shifters human body.

"You came back," A darker, less enraged voice than this morning came from his throat, but I still recognized it as the shifters voice. I was thankful he had finally quit the telepathy. Instead of yelling at me or grabbing me like I had anticipated and braced myself for, he stuck his face in the crook of my neck and spent the next few minutes reassuring whatever doubt he had in me.

My breathing sharpened again as he ran his nose along my skin, loudly inhaling my scent once again. "W-who are you?" I coaxed my eyes through my stutter, seeing just his shoulder and locks of blond hair.

I felt his human smirk against my neck. "It's me," He says easily, and I take it that Oren thrived in skin, Black in fur. "Black."