Hunter - Book 2 of the Hunted Series

Chapter 10 - Wolf cub

 At my expression, Nick laughed, coughing, and swung around to get into the back seat with the three of us, finding a way to somehow sit between my legs in the gap there. "I'm kidding, I'm kidding, I haven't forgotten. Bad time for jokes, I guess. I guess we can try it. Our baby."

Clayton kicked him, relieving me of the need, and he shook his head. Relaxed.

We returned our attention to the fire. Elena was talking with the fire fighters, her silvery blonde hair reflecting the orange and red flames, while Jeremy sat in the car. He was in shock now, hand shaking in mine, with Clayton on the other side. Nick settled down between my legs in the gap, resting against my knee as he stared up out of the window.  

When it got late, we decided we had to get back to the other house and keep warm, so the two cars were bundled up, an address given to the fire fighter in charge, and we made our way back slowly. Matt didn't wake, Pav carefully injected him with something again, and when I asked why she hesitated and looked at Jeremy.

"I'll explain later." He answered, glancing at the child, his eyes darting to Clayton and back to Matt. Clayton had been surprisingly protective of Matt, hovering around him, keeping an eye on him. I guessed it was because Matt was roughly the same age as Logan and Kate.

The kitchen in the other house, which was apparently called Forestwatch, was pretty bad looking too. I helped cover up the gap the window had caused with plastic and duct tape, as Pav and Elena went around somehow getting enough beds and bedding for everyone, the twins coming an hour later and taken up to one of the spare bedrooms that they'd have to share with their parents. We took one look at the size of it, and the amount of them, and Nick agreed with me that they should take the bigger bedroom we'd claimed over the garage. We didn't need that much space and they did.

When I asked where Matt would go, Jeremy frowned and glanced down. Towards the basement.

"There's a cage down there now, isn't there?"

"It's a little better than ...well, it's not too bad. But yes. I'm afraid we need to keep him somewhere he won't hurt himself if he wakes. I'll be sleeping down there." Jeremy seemed apologetic.

"Why didn't you tell me about him?"

"He's not well. Did you smell him?" Jeremy hesitated again. There was something wrong and he didn't seem to want to tell me.

"Yeah." He smelt like wolf too. But I didn't think his father was a werewolf. "I don't understand."

"I'll tell you more in the morning when I can. I really need to rest tonight and so do you." He leaned over to hug me, and I couldn't press him any more, he really seemed to be upset. "Goodnight."

I watched Jeremy go downstairs, Jamie not far behind, Matt in his arms as he carefully made his way downstairs. It was obvious that the last thing he wanted was to hurt him and I had to trust him.

In the kitchen, Reece, Noah, Morgan, Antonio, Clayton and Elena were organising night shifts for patrol. It seemed that myself and Nick weren't allowed to take part and I was too exhausted to argue with them. Instead, when Pav was done checking Nick and giving him the all clear, I let Nick led me upstairs and into the smaller bedroom, crawling into the bed. It was smaller, only a double, but somehow that worked better than the bigger ones. Having Nick so close helped my tense body relax and before I knew it I was asleep.

I woke up at around three in the morning, according to the cell phone Nick had dumped on the bedside table, and couldn't sleep. I could hear the faint sound of voices downstairs though and I slid out of bed after fifteen minutes of restless twisting and turning to join whoever it was. Not before I checked Nick though. I bent over to touch his head, where he'd clearly run into something, brushng the curls to one side to see the other spot. Just little lumps.