Page 31 of Until Forever Comes
He cupped my cheek and kissed the tip of my nose. “You’re good at it.”
“Yeah?” I gave him a small smile. “I’m glad.”
Miguel peered into my eyes. He furrowed his brow. “You’re still upset,” he said.
“Not at you,” I assured him. “But”—I flicked my gaze over the map—“my pack lives in Miancarem, my family.”
“Yeah,” he said, and then he took in a deep breath. “But you don’t live there anymore.” He took my chin in his hand and held me still, locking his gaze on mine. “Right?”
I trembled. He’d pushed me away from the moment I’d met him, and right then, it felt like he was pulling me closer. It felt good.
“Yes.”
“All right, then. You’re leaving anyway, so it doesn’t matter who owns that land.”
I cocked my head to the side and furrowed my brow. I was confused by his reaction. “’Course it matters,” I said. “It don’t rightly matter if I live there or not. My pack is there, Miguel. My family.”
He stared at me, and I could tell he was thinking about what I’d said, trying to figure it out. Did he not have family? Was that why he didn’t understand? As I thought about it, I realized I didn’t know much about vampires. Mostly I’d heard stories about vampires being immoral, heard they fixated on the carnal, that they had no sense of loyalty or commitment. I knew they couldn’t be in the sun, knew they fed on human blood but were allergic to shifter blood, and knew they were skilled fighters. ’Course one of those things hadn’t turned out to be true. At least not when it came to my mate and my blood.
“Miguel?”
“Yeah.”
“Do you, uh—” I gulped and licked my lips, trying to figure out how to ask about his past without causing him pain. “Do you have family?”
“No,” he answered simply.
I thought that’d be it, that he wasn’t going to say no more. And based on his expression, the hardness in his eyes, I reckoned that was how I’d need to leave it. I wanted to know more about my mate, sure enough, but it’d come in time. Or it wouldn’t. I’d be able to deal with either outcome. I had him and he wasn’t fixin’ to leave me behind. That was the only thing that meant anything. I held him tight, rested my head on his shoulder, buried my face into his neck, and inhaled his scent. He smelled right fine.
“I had a family once, obviously,” he said, catching me off guard after many long minutes of silence. “But they died a long time ago. Before I was turned. Except for my youngest sister. She lived. Had a son and a granddaughter, even. But Sheila was killed young, and our line ended with her.”
My heart ached for him, for the pain he must have endured after losing all his kin. “I’m sorry,” I rasped, my throat thick with emotion.
“Nothing to be sorry about,” he answered, his voice clear and strong, showing no indication that we were talking about something horrible, tragic. “It was a very long time ago. Before even your great-grandparents were born.” He chuckled darkly. “Hell, it was long past that.”
I kissed his neck tenderly. “I’m still sorry, Miguel,” I said. He shrugged and grunted. “I have a sister too,” I added, figuring I should share with him if I expected him to share with me. “She has five boys. Just the other day, she told me she’s expecting again. She’s right certain it’ll be a girl this time. Two, actually. Twins.”
“She’s the one I scented?” he asked. “That night in the alley, after you were gone. She’s the one who came for you?”
I nodded. “Yes. That was Crissy. She left pack lands without anybody knowing, not even her husband. She came all on her own to collect me and take me on home to Miancarem.” I tipped my head back and met his gaze. “She’s strong, my sister. Special.”
Miguel met my gaze and something passed in his eyes, emotions I couldn’t recognize.
“I can’t fix things for them if they insist on thumbing their noses at the humans,” he said eventually. “But if they’re willing to cooperate with them, to work in the system, I can help them keep their land. I can probably even manage to create a barrier between Miancarem and Kfarkattan, enough that the pack lands will never be a highly populated city.”
“Really?” I sat up straight and felt the tightness in my chest loosen. “You can do that?”
“Not me. Them. I said I canhelpthem. I can’t do it for them, Ethan. If those shifters can’t learn to live in the world, they won’t be living a generation from now. I’ve been around a long time. When I was your age there were twice as many packs as there are now. Did you know that?”
Know? Probably not. But I’d heard tale of packs that weren’t around no longer. Actually…. “I’ve heard folks say vampires came after some packs. Burned down dens, schools. That’s why the pack don’t want vampires around, why we try to scare them away when they come near. We’re just defending—”
“Bullshit,” he snapped. I stayed silent, waiting for an explanation. I was starting to get to know my mate, starting to understand that his reactions were a mite rough, that it took him a bit to share, but share he would. “That’s yet another ridiculous story shifters came up with to justify their actions. We have no reason to go after them. I was there, Ethan. Maybe not for every pack, but for enough of them to know why they’re gone. More humans came and the land changed around them. The shifters refused to adapt. Some took to their animal forms. Others fled. Vampires had no part in it. We stayed away.” He closed his eyes and shook his head, disgust clear on his face. “We mind our own business. But like I told you, we need the humans, wewerehumans. When the shifters decided to destroy everything around them, when they went after the humans, burning down buildings and trees, thinking that’d keep the humans away, vampires stopped them. We didn’t go looking for a fight. That’s the shifter way, not ours. If anybody was defending, it was us. Vampires defended humans. We defended the land shifters said they considered precious until somebody else wanted it. That was us, the soulless bloodsuckers.Us.”
My brain raced, trying to catch up to what Miguel said, to his version of events. It was too much to process at once, too horrible to be possible. And yet, there was enough familiarity there to make me pause before I denied it outright. What would my kind do if our pack lands were threatened by the humans? How would we respond? Would we behave exactly like Miguel said? A cold shiver wracked my body. I didn’t want to find out.
“Will you help us?” I beseeched him. “Please?”
“You don’t need to beg me, baby,” he said, losing that hard edge he’d had just moments prior. “I’ll try to help your kind.” I’d breathed a sigh of relief and opened my mouth to thank him when he cupped my cheeks and pierced me with his gaze. “But listen to me carefully. If they don’t listen, if they start to fight, they’re on their own. I’m taking you and leaving this town, leaving this state, maybe the nation. We will be long gone before they can get to you.”
