Escaping Death
Chapter 17

Tate

Solana pales in front of me, the color draining from her face like sidewalk chalk washed away in the rain. She’s lost in some memory and it has a firm grasp on her mind, she doesn’t respond to me when I call out to her or try to shake her back into reality.

“Sol!” I whisper-shout. There are wolves crawling all over this building with far better hearing than I have, I can’t risk drawing their attention our way.

“Keep your fucking hands off of me,” she finally speaks, but is clearly disoriented. I reach for her but she swats at me, doing everything she can to stay out of my grasp. I manage to snag her and bring her to me, cradling her head in my hand and pulling her against my chest.

I remember Eli was a fucking wreck when we first found him. Ace would sit next to him and his chest would rumble lowly, like a purr, and Eli would settle down a little. It wasn’t until later that Ace explained to me how wolves will comfort their mates by purring for them, calling them to settle. But an Alpha could do that for anyone in his pack. It wasn’t as intimate as with a mate, but it was a special bond between Alpha and pack member that allowed the member to feel safe and protected by their Alpha.

I’m not a wolf, but part of Solana is. I’ll probably look stupid as fuck for even trying this but fuck it, I can’t take her distress.

I hum lowly, my chest rumbling from the vibrations. Gods this is probably the dumbest idea I’ve ever had by far.

“Woah, Solana. It’s Tate, you’re safe.” I keep up my attempts to soothe her. Since the moment I saw her at Caligo she always came across as hardened and tough. Her Houdini acts and constant tug-of-war with us further confirmed my initial impressions. Not to mention her blood lust. It troubles me deeply to see a stone-cold dragoness like her crack over this.

Solana forces her way out of my arms, shadowing herself and racing to the door. What she doesn’t know is that I can still see her. I’m an umbral. I can see into the shadows. I’ve watched her every time she snuck off, and watched her as she crawled back in. I didn’t expect her to come back after she took off the first night. Tensions were high. Ace was furious. Hunter looked…haunted.

The door flies open and I fear that she’s been found by the guards. I grab my bag and fly towards the door where she stands still as a statue at the threshold. Voices of nearby guards can be heard from down the hall. I can almost hear her mind thinking over her choices — run or hide.

She’d be stupid to run. The guards would scent her immediately. Her delicious vetiver smell. She smells like home.

I risk her wrath and pull her back into the room, one arm around her middle and the other hand covering her mouth so no one can hear what I’m sure is profanity leaving her mouth.

In the back corner of the room there’s a small nook created by a column next to a wall. I direct her there, finding that it’s a tighter fit than I first thought. We’re packed together so tightly that any movement of hers causes her round ass to grind against the front of my pants.

I cover her body as much as I can in a hasty attempt to conceal her scent from the guards who are rushing through the rooms on this floor.

Seconds pass by like hours, tension gripping us and gluing us together. The guards pass us by and move on to the next room. I wait a few more minutes for good measure, ensuring they’ve moved on to a different floor before attempting to extricate myself from the position Sol and I are in. What’s more is she doesn’t make any moves either.

I drop my chin to her shoulder, my lips skimming across the warm skin of her neck. “Are you okay?” I ask her gently.

“I’m fine. Just…old bullshit.”

Lie.

“You don’t have to tell me the truth, but don’t let Ace catch you lying. Death has no secrets.”

“But I’m not part of Death, now am I?” She whispers back. Under the bitter bite of her tone there’s a subtle and delicate sadness.

There’s nothing I can say to her because we both know she’s right. She’s not part of the pack, this is temporary. What she doesn't know, though, is that I don’t think there’s a single guy in our house who wouldn’t jump at the opportunity to keep her. But even that idea is just smoke in my hands…she’s made it clear that she doesn’t want to be kept and forcing her to stay will guarantee that she’ll run.

I slip out of the nook first, latching onto her hand and pulling her along behind me. The hallway is clear of guards. They’ve moved the ones I tied up and left to search the other floors. At the end of the hallway by the elevators there’s a small lounge with floor to ceiling windows but they’re sealed on all sides. None of them open.

Solana takes out the blade Hunter gave her and begins to cut the glass along the frame in a giant rectangle, then she presses the tip of the blade against the center of the square and hammers the back of the handle with her fist, driving the blade into the glass and shattering it within the space she outlined.

“Age before beauty,” she gestures for me to jump out first, a self-satisfied grin replacing the terror her face wore minutes ago.

“No, please…ladies first.” I’m glad we’re out of the nook. Seeing what she can do with a knife has left me with an expanding hard-on and I don’t think she’d have appreciated it pressed between her ass. Not yet at least.

I don’t need to ask her twice. Solana jumps out of the window into the shadows then ascends into the clouds. I follow her into the sky but I don’t like that she can’t see me, or at least that’s the excuse I’ll use to get her back into my arms.

I flip upside down so my back is parallel with the earth beneath me, and I fly up underneath Solana. She looks down when I come into view, fighting to subdue the smile dimpling her cheeks.

I open my arms, making my intentions known, and she readily accepts my invitation by closing her wings and wrapping her arms and legs around me.

I take longer than is necessary to fly home, stealing every moment I can to be this close to her because I doubt that I’ll get another chance any time soon especially since Ace has made it clear we’re not to get involved with her. Not until he’s had her.

When Ace dropped that on us the first night she was with us I was perplexed by his decision. He’s never stopped us from our pursuits, jointly or otherwise, so I found his behavior with her rather uncharacteristic. When it comes to her though it would appear that what Ace says and what Ace does are two mutually exclusive entities.

He says he’s too focused on this new job to fuck around with her, but yet he’s the one that gets to crawl into bed with her every night. He’s the one that climbed into the shower with her. I was still outside on the roof after Solana had slid back in through the window. I listened as she sang to herself in the shower. The poor thing can’t carry a tune to save her life. When I heard her shriek I looked in to see what caused her panic only to find Ace barging in.

In all fairness it was his time. But still. For someone so concerned about appearing uninterested in her, he’s not very subtle. Unlike Eli who wears his lust for her openly. I’m not sure how Dean would react to knowing what I saw on the other side of the shower door. Would he be jealous that I was watching, or would that just further excite his denial and make the game he plays with himself even more pleasurable?

And then, of course, there’s Hunter. The night we brought her home, after Ace had gone up to bed with her, Hunter shifted and took off into the woods. He was gone all night. Didn’t see him again until he came back panting through the yard covered in dirt and blood the next morning.

That’s the one piece of this puzzle I haven’t figured out yet.

But I will.

I always do.

I land just at the bottom of the steps to our back deck with her still in my arms, clinging to me like a baby monkey. She makes no attempt to let go, so I carry her up the deck and sit down on one of the benches letting her take whatever time she needs. My fingertips run up and down her back almost instinctively.

The house is quiet meaning the guys are still out, so there’s no urgency to move. Holding her like this is definitely not a hardship for me.

Without warning she sits straight up, still straddling my lap, and she begins to unbutton my shirt. I watch her as she works, making no move whatsoever lest she snap out of whatever impulse this is and stop. She slides my shirt down my arms so that from the waist up I’m laid bare before her.

Her eyes trace the lines of my tattoos first, then her hands slide up from my wrists to my shoulders before she lies back down on my chest, now tracing the designs with her fingertips.

“I was curious.” She whispers by way of explanation. “Your shirt didn’t cover them completely. It made me curious to see the rest.”

I chuckle lightly, “like what you see?”

She nods her head against my chest, her fingers gravitating towards the tattoo I have on my ribs near my heart. Two dragons standing back to back sharing one pair of wings.

“Come what may?” She reads the words written at the dragons’ feet.

“Dean has the same one. We got them the year after our mom took off.”

“What do you mean? Took off where?” She asks gently.

“It was decades ago. Dean was 50, I was only 25, neither of us had seen much of the world. One day we woke up to a note that she had left. We had no money, no family besides each other. It was a tough year. We had to grow up fast and learn to adapt. After we met Ace things got better.”

“How’d you guys meet Ace?”

A loud laugh bursts forth from my chest, “Oh, Gods.” I smile at the fond memory of meeting Ace. “I robbed him blind. He was at a bar in town and I had lifted his wallet and his phone. If he wasn’t an Alpha I would have gotten away with it, but Ace was suspicious when he could smell me but not see me. Imagine my surprise when he didn’t duck and cover when I blew fire at him.”

I’m still laughing at the memories. It seems like a lifetime ago, but no matter how much time has passed Dean hasn’t stopped feeling responsible for me even though we’re with Ace.

Solana doesn’t smile or laugh, she simply continues to trace the two dragons and the script below.

“I’m sorry that happened to you. It wasn’t my mom, but I know what it feels like when someone you love walks out on you.”

I tilt her head up to look at me with two fingers under her chin, “I find it hard to believe anyone would walk away from you.” I don’t know where that comment came from. I’m not Mr. Affectionate, I won’t rain kisses and gentle caresses down on a woman. I won’t touch them until they’re bound, gagged, or both. No escaping.

Maybe it’s knowing she has a knife in her possession and I know she knows how to use it, maybe it’s because she smells like home – like the life not lived. Either way, I don’t want to cage her here, but I’m not sure I want to let her go either.

“Do you want to shift and go for a run? It’ll save you from having to sneak out tonight,” I offer.

She sits up in my lap and props herself up with two hands on my chest. She studies me with suspicious eyes before her smile breaks the purse of her lips like the light of the dawn breaking over the horizon.

“And ruin the lingerie you bought me?” She bites down on her plump bottom lip but her giggle still escapes her.

My gaze upon her darkens with forbidden desire, it’s one thing to buy her lingerie, it's another to know she’s wearing it. “You’re certain it was me who picked it out?”

“Ace and Hunter gave me theirs personally. Eli mentioned something about my high heels and his shoulders,” she rolls her hips causing her core to rub against my now obvious erection. I throw my head back desperate not to moan at the thought of tearing off any of the panties I bought her and fucking her with her heels still on. “And Ace let slip that Dean bought me the basket. Which leaves you and the lingerie.”

“Keep squirming like that and it’ll be me shredding your panties, not your wolf.” I growl at her in a not so playful warning.

My admission gives her pause. Her supple lips pop open in surprise and if I didn't know any better I’d say flames erupt in her eyes for half a heartbeat.

My hands slide slowly from her knees up the sides of her thighs coming to a rest on her hips.

“What makes you think I’d let you anywhere near my panties?”

“Well, it’s not very far from here to here,” I drag my hands from her hips to the tops of her thighs, rubbing circles on the insides of her thighs with my thumbs. “And then to here,” I graze the seam of her leggings, applying just enough pressure on her center to feel her rising heat.

“T, get in here!” Ace’s voice sounds faintly from inside the house.

Fuck, the crew is back.

Hunter is the first to find us and when he does he summons a large, heavy ax. Solana keeps her eyes down, trained on my chest. “Ace wants you both in the house.” His gaze drops down to where my hands are resting on her legs and his eyes blacken. “Now,” he snaps at us and marches out into the backyard to split firewood.

I sigh and swat her on the ass with a bounce of my legs, “sorry about Hunter. I don’t know what’s been up with him lately.”

She abandons my lap, taking her warmth with her.

“I do,” she says. “He’s the one who walked out on me.”

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