Target (Complete)

Target 19

When Finn came to, about twenty minutes after he lost consciousness, he found his friend and the girl he liked looking like scratching postS instead of people. 

Lucian was still in wolf form, whimpering softly next to Alex, who was on the floor, making a bandage for her arm with the tatters that used to be his shirt. She had tear-streaked cheeks, and a trembling chin. And she was shaking slightly. 

"You don't have to lick me better, Lucy. You just have to have my back because we just killed another wolf, unsanctioned." A few more tears rand down her cheeks. "Fuck....fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck me sideways with a chainsaw...shit..." She punched the floor with what appeared a mangled arm and hand.  "We could have fucking died today, Lucian. For reals."

The words he needed to get out were not going to be sufficient with a wolf's whimpering and grunting. He bowed down to her and started walking away, while slowly changing back into bipedal.  "You should go check on your men and have some help come here to clean and re-protect the perimeter. Maybe the ones who are watching the north fields? I have a feeling any moment, the Calvary will get here and they'll need some answers I need to think off. Bring her to your room so she can clean up in peace." His voice was not cold, but resolute. 

Finn didn't question his commands and just picked Alex up and brought her distraught shape upstairs, in silence. He had a feeling she was not going to want to talk about it. 

He left her in his bathroom and went to look for a first-aid kit and some more of his mom's clothes that would fit her.  He left them on his bed. 

It was almost lunchtime, and her hair was dry and she had patched up herself to the best of her abilities. Her father would probably have to set her arm right, because she had a feeling she'd done it wrong. Slamming her side on the wall was probably not the best medical way to fix a dislocated, maybe broken, shoulder. He leg was a whole other story. 

Based on the time, she figured they had maybe a couple more hours until freaking Jillian Hobbs got to them in the middle of freaking wolf-suburbia. And this time, when she suggested a break, she was gonna take it. 

Hell, she'd take a final paycheck or severance, if they asked somewhat nicely. Which she had a hunch they might. This was a catalyst that signal the dire need of a change in the way wolves protected themselves, how the council worked, and who got the lucky chance to be watchdogs. 

She wasn't thrilled at the idea. 

She'd been playing candy crush on one of Finn's secret hook-up cellphones, the ones he gave to potential booty-calls and other girls he didn't want to have his real number, or name. Depending on the girl. She was on level fifty-two when Lucian walked in. He still smelled like the soap he'd used to wash off the blood, and he'd clearly scrubbed himself raw because there was not a drop of anyone else's smell on him other than that, and his perspiration. And a little bit of Finn from his clothes.

"Lucky for us, the cameras you put up, and the house's security cameras, caught everything that happened so we hardly have to explain ourselves. You know...when Council Member Hobbs gets here. That's who you called, right? Lady Dragon herself." 

She tried to smile from the fort of pillows she'd made on his bed. She had also wrapped herself on his coziest sweater. "Yeah. I had a feeling she'd be the one person who had the resources to get us safely and legally out of here. I am thinking Germany because of the trees but...a hidey-hole can be made anywhere. And while my parents have their own lives, I feel like they'd like to come hide in a hole with me...so I have to pick somewhere they'd both be happy. Or adjacent happy." 

He was at a loss. "What?" 

"Oh...you know is just a thought. I need some seriously extended R & R. Lots of Netflix and HBO. Books. There are a ton that I haven't gotten to read on my list. You know I still haven't read The Book Thief? And I need my dads, because I don't think I've let myself be pampered enough...I mean..." she put the phone down, her eyes getting moist against her wishes, she didn't want to look him in the eye.  "...you only live once after all. I haven't rested enough. I haven't spent a lot of quality time with my dad...and if I die soon..."the tears spilled slowly then, and she couldn't talk anymore. 

He was not a comforting kind of man, but his embrace, to her, felt safe. 

The little hic-ups she let out between sobs were a little cute, but still, it physically hurt him to see her even a little bit broken, and he didn't know how to put her back together. He could only hold her tight.

"You know. Because I already did my crying in the shower, and punched myself sore trying to put some semblance of a man who knows what he is doing...I'm afraid too. I was afraid. Heck, was I was terrified shitless. I never in my life thought I could walk away from that, and we mostly did. I didn't set my arm right, and I lost so much blood, a paper-cut could put me in the hospital. Maybe I'm too lightheaded, but you are the most badass wolf I've ever met in my life, not the most badass woman, but the most badass wolf. Because I wouldn't trust another man to have my back like you did this morning.  I wouldn't trust Finn to rightly pass me the salt at a table, but I knew that you knew what to do in our situation. I knew you knew what I was doing. I know, you know, that no matter what comes at you, you will know how to handle it."

She pulled away from his, her tears had mostly dried up, and she was coming around to her mostly normal self. She faced him, stone-serious. 

"I am not afraid of dying. I know I'll probably die in a really cool way when I'm in my fifties, maybe my sixties. I saw my life, the things I'd leave behind, when he was trashing around in my arms, and I didn't like it. I only saw the two people I care about most in the world on his list, I would't be able to protect them. Right now, I can't protect them. I don't know if they were targeted too, if someone has eyes on them. They didn't have a pack to protect them. I didn't have anybody else to rely on protecting them...and that thought was excruciatingly painful. My egotistical selfishness, my inability to commit to a pack, to friends even...wanderlust or whatever. I don't even know what I want in life..."

She was about to spiral again. So he took a huge chance, that could either end whatever hopes he ever harbored, or not. 

He kissed her, tenderly, softly. Almost a whisper against her lips. As if his lips were asking permission to touch hers. 'Wast this okay? Will you let me in?'

She tensed up by instinct. But only for a moment. Her body had a slightly different idea about what it wanted. Her brain was scattered and didn't want to make a decision about what it wanted to do or what it's opinion was on the matter. 

She  kiss him back, opening her mouth, inviting him in, thoroughly tasting  his essence once he happily obliged. She pressed herself so hard against him she found herself on top of him. He got the idea and shifted himself on her fort of pillows so that she could sit on him and straddle him comfortably. It wasn't completely sexual...yet. But she knew she wanted him to touch her, everywhere. And she knew this was not the place, the time, and she wanted to do things right. She also knew that as soon as his mouth left hers to wander, and  her hands left his face to make some exploration of their own...that would be it. If his hands moved either further south or north, she wouldn't be able to come back. And she wanted to, because he wasn't in the right head space. He'd feel like he'd taken advantage of both their vulnerable state. 

He wasn't joking when he said he'd already done his crying. She believed him, saw the sign on his eyes and the tremble of his lower lip that he let escape once in a while. 

She broke their kiss and pushed herself away from him. "After I glue myself back together...we'll talk."

A couple more chapters and we are done!