Page 13 of Healing His Darkness
“First you insult me by insinuating I sleep around, which I don’t. Then you kiss me like I’m the fucking cure for all that ails you. Make my toes curl and my heart stutter. Then you tell me it shouldn’t have happened. Out, just get out.” She opens her door, stomps her foot at me, and points out the door.
“I made your toes curl?” Her eyes narrow and her lips thin. I’m pretty sure there might be smoke coming out of her ears. Ducking, I narrowly avoid the lamp she rips out of the wall and throws at me. Damn she’s kind of sexy when she gets all riled up.
“Out.” She says between clenched teeth as I cross over the threshold I turn back to apologize, but she’s already closing the door in my face. “Just so you know I’ve been with one man Rooster, just one.” I can see the sadness in her eyes now and there’s a part of me that wants to push her back inside and finish what I started. But there’s a bigger part of me that knows that’s not fair to her. When she closes the door softly in my face, I can hear her slide down the door and start to sob.
It takes everything in me to walk down the stairs and away from her. My animal is howling inside me, mourning what he thinks he lost. He doesn’t understand that we had our chance, and we blew it. We chose Summer and Summer chose someone else. Therefore, we don’t get a do-over, you only get one mate. If I keep telling myself that maybe I’ll start to believe it, and eventually so will my animal.
Walking down the stairs hurts like a motherfucker. Every step down I take I have to grit my teeth to keep from yelling out. Those assholes the night before really did a number on me. I’m pretty sure I have a few broken ribs, definitely the remnants of a concussion, and based on the pain radiating from my back I’d say my kidneys took a pounding.
“Ah, here he is, the naked man in my daughter’s room.” Clay claps his hands together as I make my way down the last few steps into the kitchen area. My dad is sitting at the table with a cup of coffee in his hands. They both look pretty calm considering I was naked in bed with Clay’s daughter all night.
“Is George getting dressed?” Clay looks behind me questioningly.
“I’m pretty sure she’s up there planning my demise right now.” I respond clutching my ribs with one hand as I sit down at the table. Both my father and Clay look at me with questions brewing in their eyes.
“How you feeling son?” My dad asks as he gets up to make me a cup of coffee.
“Well, it feels like a Mack truck rolled over me, but I’m alive so there’s that.” I reply as I take a tentative sip of coffee.
“Damn I needed this.” A look passes between my father and Clay before they both shrug.
“Well considering you were attacked by about fifteen coyotes I’d say you got fucking lucky. What were you thinking starting a fight like that with no back up?” There’s worry marring my father’s brow, as he sits back down across from me.
“I was thinking George is human and couldn’t protect herself against that asshole and his pack.” Actually, I’m pretty sure I was thinking that Rodney needed to die for touching what was mine. But I’m not telling either of them that because she’s not mine. Not. Mine.
MINE!
Sometimes having another entity taking up space in your head is great. Other times, like now. It sucks donkey dick. My animal is confused; it’s as simple as that.
“Rodney can’t hurt George, it’s part of the deal we made.” My head snaps up, looking Clay in the eyes. What the fuck is he talking about deal? What kind of fucking dad would make a deal with that asshole for his daughter? Maybe because she was his adopted daughter, he didn’t value her as much as he did his real children.
“So, because she’s not your biological child she’s not worth your protection is that it?” I snarl out, and Clay’s hackles go up. I’m ready to jump up and beat his ass when my dad puts his hand on my arm.
“Calm down, Clay would never do anything to put George in danger. Ever. That’s why he made the deal to begin with, to keep George safe.” Reclining back against the kitchen chair, I bounce a look between the two men in front of me. I can tell there is something they aren’t telling me, something they don’t want me to know.
“What deal did you make exactly?” I ask, narrowing my eyes at Clay. If whatever deal he made puts George in jeopardy, I’ll just drag her back to Texas with me where she’ll be safe. It’s that simple, the club can protect her from Rodney and his measly pack.
“Why do you care?” Clay walks over to the table leaning down close to me. When I just sit there dumbfounded like a fucking idiot, he asks again.
“Why. Do. You. Care. Should be a simple enough question to answer.” He says slowly this time with a edge to his voice.
The animal in me wants to yell, “because she’s mine”, while the man in me gives me the bullshit answer of “because she’s a nice person”. The truth is probably somewhere in between, but there is no way I’m admitting any of that to her father. I’m definitely not admitting that to my father, he’ll have us mated, wedded, bedded, and having a litter of kittens before you can say boo.
“Yeah, son why do you care about some girl you just met?” My dad has this smug look on his face, like he knows something I don’t. Did it get hotter in this kitchen or is it just me?
“I feel like I’ve known her forever.” My dad and Clay both smile like the Cheshire Cat from Alice in Wonderland.
“Because you’ve talked so much about her. You talk about Clay and all of his kids, that’s all.” They both look at each other before they start chuckling like two schoolboys who just got away with egging someone's house. Frankly, they’re both starting to piss me the fuck off.
“I see he’s alive.” In walks Cole, Clay’s oldest son that I met last night at the bar. When I first saw him touching George, I had this compulsion to rip his head off and shit down the hole it left. Then Clay introduced him to me as his son. Cole grabs water out of the ‘frig and plops down at the table beside my dad.
“They tell you yet?” He says nodding to my dad and his with his chin.
“About getting the shit kicked out of me last night, no your sister did that.” I want to add right before she kicked me out of her room, but even if Clay is cool with me sleeping with his daughter her brother might not be.
“Nah man that’s not what I’m talking about.” He looks back and forth between our fathers and they shake their heads profusely at him.
“Alright, spill. What’s going on that I don’t know? Did I kill someone? Did I reveal myself to humans without knowing it? I mean I revealed myself to George, but she already knows about us so that can’t be it.” By the smirks on their faces, I’d say whatever it was it wasn’t bad. Maybe funny or even embarrassing. Cole looks like he’s about to tell me, but his dad puts his hand on his shoulder giving it a squeeze.
