Page 17 of Fat Enemy Mate

“Inside, Lara, or I will carry you.” He half-snarls.

"I won’t let you take me to your town," I tell him.

He pauses. His hand doesn’t move from my neck, but it loosens slightly. He looks down at me, and the height difference is something that I hadn’t fully appreciated until this moment.

“You heard the call,” he says, realization flashing across his features.

“I heard the call,” I confirm.

“I was going to talk to you about it today.” He sighs, and I find myself rolling my eyes, which may not be the smartest reaction.

He sighs, his hand still at my throat. “Believe it or not, I am trying to help you.” He says, “You wouldn’t last five minutes out here. What the fuck are you thinking, trying to run through the snow?”

“I don’t want your help,” I say, knowing that’s a stupid thing to say when I nearly died.

He grimaces, “That may be true, but I’m not letting you run off and die in a snowdrift or get captured by those rogues. If you can help us figure out what the rogues want, is that too much to ask?”

“I’m not going to your town.” I snap. “A town full of shifters. I would rather take my chances out here.”

He sighs. “You’d never make it on that ankle. My pack isn’t racing up the mountain in this snow, and you’re safer in there than out here. You’re already shaking. Let’s head inside and get you warm. Ok?”

I am shaking, even if I’d rather he didn’t point it out. I feel my frustration building as I realize this was my one chance to escape, and I’ve blown it. He’ll be watching me like a damn hawk now. He suddenly moves to pull me toward him, and I feel panic surge through me at the thought I’ve blown it.

“No.” I push back, and what happens next reminds me of when the rogues tried to attack me in that hut. The pressure and strange sense of power that followed. I see it land in theway his forearm jerks, his eyes shifting from green to gold as the monster rises to the surface. He rocks backward but doesn’t let go.

For one brief moment, I think, surely this is going to work again, but then his golden eyes refocus, and he tilts his head, standing firm. How can this work and yet not work at the same time? What has changed?

I panic and twist in his arms, but he holds me firm.

“Ok, enough with the games,” He says quietly. “Tell me what the fuck you’re doing and how?”

“It’s not…” I start, but trail off.

“Bullshit,” He says. “That’s twice now; don’t even try to tell me I’m imagining things. I can see it written all over your face, Lara, you know what you’re doing.”

I shake my head, well aware that a pissed-off shifter is a dangerous shifter. “I don’t know what it is, ok. It started after they took me, but I don’t know what it is or how I’m doing it. But that’s why they didn’t kill me, they couldn’t.”

He releases my throat and steps back from me. Stupidly, I almost miss his warmth.

“Alright,” he says. “We’re not doing this out here in the snow. Inside.”

He walks me back up toward the cabin, not commenting when my ankle gives way and I stumble. Instead, he just grabs my elbow and stabilizes me until we reach solid ground on the cabin's back porch.

I stand in the hall, shake off my coat, and take off my boots as my ankle protests. I bite my lip, determined he’s not going to see me struggle. I can’t quite bring myself to look at him as the tension simmers between us.

“I’ll go make us a coffee. Go sit by the fire.” He says, and I watch as he makes a point of setting the security system before walking back to the kitchen.

I stand for a moment at the porch door and watch as fresh snow begins to fall.

Chapter 9 - Wilf

I put the coffee in her hand and took my own to sit in the chair opposite the fire. There’s enough wood for now, but I’ll have to finish what I started with the store later; if I hadn’t come back in because I forgot the axe, she would have gotten even further with her little escape. She wouldn’t have made it far out there, though, and I think she knows it deep down.

She’s on the couch, wrapped in one of the wool throws. The dressing on her hairline had come loose, probably when she took the hat off. It’s still weeping occasionally and needs fixing, but I decide not to mention it for now.

“Let’s start at the beginning,” I tell her.

She focuses on her coffee and doesn’t look up. “I already told you most of it. I didn’t lie.”