Escaping Death
Chapter 23

Hunter

“Do you want me to come with you guys?” Dean offers and soon I can feel my anxiety dulling away into the background of my mind.

“No, I’ll be fine. They’ll need you more than we do.” He nods with understanding. Days like today are the toughest, the ones where we’re all multitasking. But that’s how we’ve grown to operate – always fighting wars on multiple fronts.

My challenge today is getting our payout and not getting killed by Solana. With any luck I may even be able to get her to hear me out, but judging by the way she reserves her scowls exclusively for me I doubt she’ll make it easy on me. Not that she ever has, and not that she is even now. I know she knows I’m watching her, though. I know she knows I see Eli standing behind her at the sink with his arms around her as they wash dishes together. I know she knows I see the looks she and Tate share from his position seated on the counter next to the sink.

“You know she still loves you, right?” Dean says, dragging my attention away from Sol and back to him.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” I scoff at him and slam down the last of my morning caffeine.

“Think about it, Hunt. Would she still be this hurt if she didn’t still love you?”

I huff out a grunt and turn my head towards Solana, making sure Dean can follow my line of sight. “Looks to me like she’s moved on,” I sulk.

Dean shakes his head and chuckles, “that’s harmless. That’s a game that started at Caligo well before we knew who she was.”

“Somehow, Dean, knowing they’re betting on who can get into her pants faster doesn’t make me feel better. But thanks.” I walk over and place my mug in the sink making sure my hand brushes against hers and harpooning Eli with a warning look. Eli backs off of her immediately but remains next to her.

The air is tense with unspoken anger – Sol’s anger towards me, Dean’s anger towards his brother and Eli, and my anger towards pretty much everyone in this house.

“Time to go.” Ace’s voice is like a boom of thunder against the static charge building in the air around us. He studies each of us with discerning eyes but says nothing more.

Tate jumps off the counter and disappears into the shadows.

Pussy.

Eli drops a chaste kiss to Sol’s shoulder and then follows Dean out to the cars.

“I’ll send her out in a minute,” Ace dismisses me and I make my leave but before I turn the corner I look back and catch Ace whispering something in Sol’s ear. His cheek is pressed to the side of her head and his mouth grazes the top of her ear.

To anyone else it might seem like an innocent enough sight but Ace doesn’t do gentle, so for him this act is almost…intimate.

I can’t blame him. Sol is just like her mother, she’s magnetic to everyone around her and she doesn’t even have to try. I’m not sure what about it angers me — is it the fact that every guy in this house knows who she is to me and yet they’re courting her like fucking peacocks, or is it that she’s letting them?

A few minutes later Solana climbs into the passenger seat of my car and from the lack of heat radiating off of her I’d say that whatever Ace told her calmed her down.

Our ride begins silently, the only sound to be heard is the cool wind whipping through our open windows. It’s killing me to be this close to her again and not be able to touch her. I’m fighting against muscle memory to keep from holding her hand, or squeezing her thigh, or tucking the stray strand of hair behind her ear.

That’s another thing I wanted to ask her about — her hair. Every woman in her family has the same pearlescent white hair. Her grandmother, Ianthe, her mother, and her sister, Calla. Solana was no exception. The only thing more singularly stunning than her hair were her eyes — another dominant trait passed down by her mother — bright green flames, always burning. Evergreen.

The Solana sitting beside me now has hair a warm, dark chestnut color, and rather than her infernal eyes she looks at me with no-less-beautiful forest green eyes flecked with gold.

This feels like a defining moment for us. Will we walk down memory lane and come out the other side with new understanding? Or will it hurt all the more? Either way, I can’t afford for it to continue like this, which is why I’ve been trying to figure out what I could say to break the ice and get her to do something other than brush me off.

I’m not the wordsmith in the pack. Dean is probably the best of us. Tate speaks almost exclusively in riddles, Eli is a perpetual flirt, and Ace speaks only when he has something to say. So if Dean were here, he’d probably think of something smoother to say than what ultimately rolls off my tongue.

“So, what have you been up to these last few years?” I cringe as soon as the words are out. Hunter you fucking idiot.

She huffs out a humorless laugh, “oh you know, living the dream.” She tosses a sardonic smile at me over her shoulder then she turns back to look out the window, favoring the passing landscape over facing me.

“Really?” I can’t help but ask. It would make me happy to know that she’s been happy, even if it hurts that I played no part in it…at least she wouldn’t be hurting.

“You’re really asking me that? After you destroyed everything good in my life?” Her words bite at me. “Gods, Hunter, you used to be the smart one.”

“I’ve never been smart when it comes to you,” I mutter under my breath but she hears it because of her alpha blood.

This time when she huffs it’s with genuine, albeit sad, amusement. “I suppose that goes both ways,” she whispers, her gaze returning once more to the window.

A few minutes pass between us. My thoughts feel loud amidst the silence in the car, but the tension that once existed is lessening.

“How are my parents?” I ask softly after some time has passed. I made a clean break when I left. I had to. I sacrificed a lot that day and one of those sacrifices was my family, my parents.

She doesn’t respond right away. She looks down at her hands and wrings them together before finally saying, “I’ve heard they’re doing well.”

When she reads the confusion on my face she elaborates with a small voice, “I haven’t lived there in four years. Calla calls me every few months, though. Usually to gossip or when she wants something.”

Every time she answers a question I have ten more to ask. Like why hasn’t she been home all this time? Where has she been? With who? Somehow I feel worse finding out that she left when I did.

I bite back the urge to press her for more and instead I focus on the rest of the drive down to the marina. Now that she’s started, hopefully she’ll keep talking to me when we get home.

— — —

Solana

Eventually we pull into a parking lot overlooking the marina. It’s a beautiful, cloudless day, and the docks are busy with people eager to set sail.

My hand barely skims the door handle before I feel Hunter’s large, warm hand gripping at the exposed skin on my thigh.

The air rushes from my lungs at the familiar contact, at how much I’ve missed his touch and the crackle that runs up my spine like a lit sparkler.

“Sol,” my name on his tongue melts me like butter before I can think better of it and stop it. “These men are not good people. Say nothing. Keep your head down and we’ll be out of there as fast as possible.”

I come to my senses and push his hand off of me, steeling myself against our history and his charms.

“I’m not good people, either. So I think we’ll all get along just fine,” I snap at him and all but throw myself out of the car.

I lead the way down the stone steps to the main dock but usher Hunter ahead of me to guide us to a large yacht at the furthest end of the longest dock.

Two beefy men in black suits and sunglasses, who look more like grizzly bears than men, stand guard as gatekeepers at the bottom of the gangplank.

“Reef’s expecting us.” Hunter says to the bears in black.

One of the grizzlies grunts which is apparently the signal Hunter was looking for as permission to board.

We’re led to the front of the boat where there is a lounge area occupied by two men surrounded on each corner by more grizzly guards.

“Where’s the rest of your pack?” One of the seated men asks Hunter. “I thought you never traveled alone.” His tone darkens and his scarred lip twists up in a sinister smirk.

“Are you blind, Danny?” The other man belittles his friend. “Do you not see the beauty he’s brought with him?” The man stands up and walks past Hunter straight to me. He slips his hand beneath one of mine, raising it to his lips so he can plant a kiss there. “If I were Hunter, I’d keep you to myself too.”

Hunter’s growl pulses across the deck. “Reef,” he bites out in warning. Ah, so this is Reef.

Reef releases my hand and slaps Hunter on the shoulder, turning back towards the area where he left Danny sitting. “Lighten the fuck up. Sit.”

“We’re on a tight schedule today, Reef, perhaps another time. Pay up and we’ll be on our way.” Hunter argues.

“I said, sit.” Reef commands with a deep growl.

Begrudgingly, Hunter takes a seat opposite Reef and Danny, and looks to me to join him. Reef and Hunter break out into small talk while I distract myself with the view. Jet skis whiz through the canal, speed boats take off towards open water. Children squeal as they’re flung from inflatable tubes being dragged behind boats. I’m hard pressed to remember the last time I felt happiness like that, with such purity.

My attention is dragged back to the boat I’m on when Hunter drapes his arm behind me on the back of the chair. The men across from us might not detect it, but Hunter is nervous. I can feel it weighing on his chest as if it were weighing on my own.

“The problem, Hunter, is that I was paying you to take out Sebastian and bring me his newest batch. You did the first part well, but,” Reef gestures vaguely around the yacht, “where is the rest? Where are the girls?”

“And I’ve told you, Reef, you need to hire better intel because the girls weren’t there. Just Sebby and his beta.”

Reef tongues his cheek and scoffs, rubbing his chin thoughtfully before speaking again. “Here’s what I think,” he begins slowly. “I think the girls were there. Maybe you killed them, maybe you sold them… or maybe, you kept one.” Reef’s eyes fixate on me. “Either way, I’m still owed my due. Those girls were worth a fortune at auction and I’d bet my bottom dollar that this one here couldn’t make me back that money twice over.”

“She’s not a fucking breeder,” Hunter replies and my world comes to a screeching halt.

“A hybrid like her? She’ll be worth millions.”

I bite my tongue so hard I draw blood, anything to swallow the bile rising in my throat.

“Keep your fucking hands off me!”

“Shae!” Hunter barks and my trembling body stills, my head snaps to his, and my breathing evens out. There’s only one reason why Hunter would call me by my wolf’s name. At least, one reason other than because I’m being hunted.

“Kneel.” The command drips slowly out of his mouth, steaming with authority.

I read his eyes to help me understand but he levels me with “the look”, challenging me to challenge him, and I can feel his wolf calling to mine. Slowly, I assume the position, kneeling beside him with my head down and my palms flat on my thighs.

“She’s not a breeder. She. Is. Mine.”

I hear Reef laugh with delight. “I never took you for a Dom,” he breathes with fascination. “I bet she’d suck your dick right here and now if you told her to.”

Hunter smooths his hand over my hair, petting me affectionately. “We all have our kinks,” I can hear his smirk, “she’s not quite there yet though. She’s a mischievous little minx, it’s been fun teaching her. Hasn’t it, Shae?” Hunter asks me.

“Yes,” I say with the full knowledge of what will happen next.

Like no time has passed at all, like it was fucking yesterday, Hunter pinches my chin between his thumb and index finger, “yes, what, Shae?”

“Yes, sir.” I breathe huskily, putting on a show and trusting that Hunter won’t betray me twice.

“Good, girl,” he praises me, but doesn’t release me from my position on the floor. I suspect it’s to keep me close to him, or maybe that’s just wishful thinking. Hope that he fucking cares that much.

Reef groans shamelessly, “I can’t convince you to sell her, can I?”

I practically choke. History is repeating itself.

“No, I don’t think so. I haven’t had my fill of her yet.” He says the words like he means them, but I refuse to let myself believe that. Not after what happened.

“Find out what happened to those girls, Hunter. I want to know who fucking stole from me.” A duffel bag lands at Hunter’s feet with a loud thud.

“Now get out of here before your pet drips her slick all over my deck.”

“Up, Shae. Time to go home,” Hunter wastes no time ushering me off the boat. We may be on the docks but we won’t be safe until we’re in the car and driving away.

I’m shaking so badly my steps falter, but strong arms band around my waist before I fall head over tail into the water.

“Get to the car, Solana,” he grits out lowly in my ear. “Get to the car and I will hold you together so you can fall apart.”

I want to crumble at his words but his hold on me tightens so I do what he says. I muscle up and walk my ass off the docks and up the stairs like the last twenty minutes didn’t just happen.

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