Monstrous Intent, page 24
I must fall asleep again because I don’t wake until Declan shuts the water off. Hell, I didn’t even hear him enter. He could have eaten me right up and I probably wouldn’t have noticed.
“You can eat me all up, if you want,” I assure him.
“What? Just… no. We need to keep moving. I’m going to go out and try to find some clothes for you,” he says as he drops a towel on me. “Stay here and keep quiet.”
“Got it,” I say as I hold my hand out to him. He wraps his fingers around it and pulls me to my feet. I feel unsteady as I’m guided back to the bed. “I think we should torture Roger again and tell him that his lethal dose fucking sucks because I’m still standing.”
“Barely. Now don’t die before we get out of here. Go stare at your godawful fish or something.”
“The real question is… why would you want to clothe this?” I ask as I wave at my body.
“Because I’m pretty sure we’d get arrested if you were strutting around like this,” he says, not giving in at all. I guess… maybe I don’t look the most attractive at this moment, which is reasonable.
And Declan kind of looks rough, if I’m being super honest. He’s wearing his shirt that’s been shredded in multiple places, hints of his tattoos peeking through. It looks like he might have rinsed it out last night or something.
“So you’re saying you’re jealous and don’t want to share my naked body with others so you wish to clothe me?”
His face immediately sours. “Alright. I guess naked it is. You ready to go? We need to get moving.”
I know he wants me to cave and tell him I’m joking and to please go get me clothes, but instead, I just give him a huge smile. “I’m ready.”
“Great,” he says as he turns, and I see his cut back through the tears in the shirt.
Anger immediately ignites inside me and instead of wandering off with him, I get the sudden desire to slay everything and anyone who might look at him funny. “You didn’t tell me you got hurt,” I say as I step toward him.
Declan waves me off like this could possibly not be a big deal. “Grab your fish and let’s go.”
“I will fucking kill them,” I decide. “Watch my fish.”
He puts out his hand to stop me before I can go destroy everyone who has ever even looked at him. “You’ll get slaughtered like that. We’re going somewhere safe where we can think this through and figure out how to regain control.”
Control? I don’t need control to kill them. To slaughter every last one of them for daring to touch what is mine. I can just envision my claws raking across their flesh, making them pay for what they’ve done. “Oh, I’ve regained control.”
I hurry toward the door, prepared to draw them to me and kill them all at once.
Declan grabs my wrist and I look down at it in surprise. “Did you forget what we faced in the cabin, Lake? There was a fucking… humanlike one! The goddamn monster walked on two legs!”
“Not when I’m done with him. I will break all his legs,” I decide.
“Lake, how many are like that? How many… humanlike ones are there?”
He holds my eyes, and I can tell he really wants me to tell him the truth, but right now, all I can think of is how I should go about making my family regret what they’ve done. I’m tired of running and letting them harass me. And now they’ve hurt my Declan? It’s time I—
Declan shakes me quite vigorously, which just hurts him in return by the look on his face. “Please focus.”
I don’t like the idea of Declan being hurt. “I am. I’m focused on the destruction of all who ever looked at you funny.”
“You looked at me funny.”
“Then I must destroy myself as well,” I say as I cup his handsome face in my hand. “God, I can’t wait until you moan my name.”
“I’m pretty sure you were telling me about these fucking human monsters.”
“I’m pretty sure I wasn’t.”
“You know what they are.”
“I do.”
“And you’re just… fine with them?”
How dare he think I’m fine with them? “No, I’m not. Did you not just hear me preach about how I was going to kill them all for looking at you? Didn’t you listen to me declare my love for you by showing you that I’m a phenomenal mate who will protect your honor?”
He just sighs and heads for the door, so I grab my fish and he takes his bag. “Why is this so heavy?” he asks as he opens it up and the chimera sticks her head out.
My heart and anger melt a little bit. “You two are so cute together.”
Declan tries dumping her out on the floor by flipping the bag inside out, but she clings on impressively tightly. “You… stupid… thing…” he growls with each shake, but even if she’s upside down, she’s hanging on with all four feet.
“Stop being mean and let’s go.”
“If I were being mean, I’d kill it. But instead, my brain has stopped functioning and I’ve allowed it to live. It doesn’t mean I want to carry it around.”
She’s staring up at him with the cutest doe eyes I’ve ever seen. “God, it’s effective,” I whisper.
He sighs and shakes her back into the bag before tossing his shit on top of her. She doesn’t care. She is pleased she’s conned the human. I am too. He’s so fun to con.
Naked as the day I was born, I yank open the door and come face to face with a woman who drops her bag. I stoop down and pick it up for her a moment before Declan drags me back in and slams the door shut.
“I thought you were joking,” he says.
“About? Oh… is this that jealousy thing? Being jealous of me showing others what is yours?”
He wraps a towel around my waist and tucks it in. It now looks like I just came from the beach, but it seems to appease him as we reopen the door and step out. He appears to be a man on a mission as he hurries off down the road.
“Where are we going?” I ask, curious if he has a plan or if we’re just moving to keep them off our trail.
“I… don’t know. Away. We’ll figure something out later.”
“What if we head toward Sy?” I suggest. “I think he’s their weakest link, and there’s the possibility I could bully him into following me.”
“The last person we tried working with… we don’t even know if he’s alive or not,” Declan reminds me.
“They won’t have killed Indigo. He’s too valuable of a fighter. They’ll find a new fun way to threaten him, and he’ll come to kill us before long.”
“What the fuck is wrong with your family?”
“Well… I just came out so damn perfect there wasn’t enough left for anyone else, you know?”
He doesn’t seem to know as he makes a noise of displeasure and keeps moving. When we reach a bus stop, Declan gets on. The driver assesses us but doesn’t care enough about his job to not let us on. Thankfully, Declan’s gun case is pretty discreet. We take a seat toward the back of the rather packed bus which leads us to getting quite a few stares.
“We don’t stand out at all,” Declan says.
“You just have to own the towel. The moment you own it, everyone just goes along with it,” I promise him.
He doesn’t seem to care about how well I’m owning the towel right now as he says, “Let’s go back to these human things.”
“Ah yes, humans. A unique breed of animal. I have the perfect specimen right here before my eyes. Rugged. Handsome. Sweet. Kind. Selfless—”
Declan seems to flinch with each one. “Please stop.”
I reach up and pet his face. “Don’t hate the compliments, my savory lover. Embrace them like the kabob you are.”
“I’m not…” He sighs. It’s the kind of sigh someone gives when their soul dies a little bit. “Even nearly dying didn’t fix your brain, did it?”
“No, I actually think the poison hurt it, you know? But that’s okay. All is well when you’re in my world.”
“The humanoid monsters; let’s please talk about them.”
“Maybe they were aliens come to probe you?” I ask. “What they don’t realize is that I got first dibs on probing you.”
We’ve gained the attention of a woman in her early twenties who is blatantly staring at us. I give her a huge smile which oddly makes her seem suspicious of me. Humans are so fickle sometimes.
Declan grabs my chin and forces my attention onto him. “Do you actually want to keep me alive?”
I lean into him, loving the touch of his hand on my face. “Of course I do.”
“Then you’d give me all the information you have,” he says. “Who are you trying to protect? Them? You care about them more than me?”
What a stupid question, but at the same time, he’s quite right. I don’t care about them more than him. He might be a hunter, he might be the very thing I was taught to despise, but hasn’t he taken better care of me than my family ever has?
My family wants one thing from me, and that’s my power. And this man… what does he want? Companionship? Someone to fight with? Someone to fight for? He’s an enigma is what he is.
And right now, he’s mine to protect.
“Stop giving me those eyes,” he grumbles. “It’s like I can’t tell if you’re going to eat me or are coming up with some irritating plan to try to seduce me or something.”
That makes me grin at him. “All of the above.”
He just sighs and lets go of my chin.
“Fine, fine. Only two of my siblings can shift like that,” I say. “Mona is one and my oldest brother Niles is the other. Just because they’re using two legs instead of four doesn’t mean they’re weaker. In that form, they’re ridiculously quick on their feet and brutal.”
“So that was Niles, then?”
“It was. Honestly, I’m surprised what we did made him back off, but maybe it’s because he was dealing with me and didn’t want to be at a disadvantage while doing so. Or maybe he couldn’t handle your sexy shooting.”
“Yes, I’m sure that was it. He just saw the way I held my gun aimed at his face while promising death and went ‘Goddamn, I can’t kill you, you’re too sexy.’” Declan says it so dryly it makes me laugh. I swear I see the smallest hint of a smile as he tries not to roll his eyes. It wouldn’t be manly enough to roll his eyes.
“How long are we going to be on this bus for?” I ask as I poke his bag that’s moving a little. It draws still again.
“Until I see something worth getting off for.”
“I’d get you off,” I mumble.
“Not like that.”
I can’t help but wonder why he loves ruining all fun. “What’d you name her?”
“I’m not naming it.”
“I bet she’d like a name.”
“Well, I’m not doing it,” he growls, like to name a creature instead of calling her “it” would be a horrible sin.
“Do you want me to name her? I named Sir Reginald.”
“Absolutely not,” he says. “It’d probably rather become fur mittens than end up with a name like that.”
“What about something like Lady Beatrice?”
“I’m literally going to turn it into mittens when we’re someplace that it won’t be frowned upon. I doubt they’d appreciate a skinning in the back seat of the bus.”
I look around. “Honestly, probably not the worst thing that happened on these seats. What about Mittens?”
“Sure. We can call it Mittens. It’s not a name. It’s a threat. It’s a promise of what its fate is to become,” he says.
The look on his face just tempts me more. “You’re so sexy when you’re evil. You don’t want to arouse me with this towel on,” I warn him.
The woman won’t stop staring at us. Somehow, we’re the weirdest thing she’s witnessed on this bus.
“Let’s get off here, there’s a store right there,” Declan says as he puts his hand on the seat to push himself up just as I go to stand up. What I don’t realize until it’s too late is that he put his hand on the towel, ripping it off me.
“Huh,” I say as I lower the fish tank over my quite on display penis. Now the woman’s face is red as she stares at me.
“Christ.” Declan snatches Sir Reginald from me and scurries off the bus, leaving me to struggle to get covered back up before rushing after him. I finally catch up to him outside the store because while he’d love to pretend he’s running away from me, he always ends up waiting. He shoves all of the stuff he’s carrying into my arms. “Stay here.”
“Where do you think I’m going to run off to?” I ask.
“I honestly don’t know and maybe I don’t care.”
“You do care,” I proclaim. “I think you should marry me. Please buy fish food, oh and some lube!” And he’s gone. He shows off his disappearing skills by rushing off, leaving me with my towel, fish, and his rifle case and bag.
For a few minutes, I stand and wait patiently, pleased to feel at least semi decent until I sense that I’m being watched. I stare in the direction I know the chimera watching me is in so they’re aware they’re not getting away with shit. I’m not that naïve. If they want to face me, I can merrily destroy them.
On one hand, I could go tear them into five million pieces for my mate. On the other hand, I’d leave Declan exposed, and I sure as hell am not going to be lured into that. If they want a word, they can waltz right up to me.
No one seems interested in doing that, so are they watching us to see where we go next?
That’s when I realize that it’s not just them. Someone else is watching me too. A hunter? Multiple hunters?
Fuck… this isn’t going to turn out well.
DECLAN
Our money is dwindling too quickly… well… Emma’s money. If we stopped getting hurt or needing new clothes, it’d help. Clearly, Lake is perfectly fine to run around with his towel and his fish, so I probably shouldn’t have wasted money on clothing him.
Just as I cram the bill into the self-checkout machine, Lake comes rushing onto the scene, looking a little bit panicked.
“What’s going on?” I ask since we’re drawing attention with his current getup.
“We’ve been followed. Hunters and at least one chimera,” he says as he tugs at my wrist.
“Fuck,” I say as I grab the bag and look around. “There might be a way out in the back.”
“Yeah, let’s go,” he says as I quickly move deeper into the building. When we get to the employees-only area, Lake takes the lead. I’m not sure if he’s sniffing his way out or what because he seems to have a good idea of where to go when it all looks the same to me. A woman notices us and quickly heads our way.
“Hey! You can’t be back here!” she says, hurrying after me.
“It’s an emergency, we need out,” I say as I push past her.
She rushes off, probably to call for someone, but we’ll be long gone by then. Lake finds the door leading out and pushes through it.
“Can you hotwire a car?” Lake asks. “Because that’d be really hot right now.”
My eyes scan the parking lot, looking for something to assist us. “I can do one better,” I say as I rush over to an employee getting out of their vehicle. “Give me your keys.”
The guy, probably late teens or early twenties, stares at me in absolute horror before simply handing them over.
“We’re going to leave it at the bus station, alright? Pick it up later,” I say out of this weird sense of guilt for making him absolutely horrified.
The guy just mutely nods as I get into the driver’s seat and Lake gets into the passenger side. The moment we’re rolling, I press down on the gas, causing the car to putter down the road while the vehicle kind of feels like it might fall apart before we even get there.
“That was so sexy,” Lake whispers, sounding mystified by the whole thing.
“No.”
Lake leans into me, like he thinks I didn’t hear him, pressing his naked chest against my shoulder and making me ridiculously aware of his presence. “That was so sexy,” he whispers in my ear.
“No,” I repeat, which he responds to by nipping my earlobe. Hell, does he sure know how to make me question my resolve.
I will not fuck a monster. I will not fuck a monster.
“God, I want to eat you up,” he says, voice low.
NOPE. I will not fuck a monster.
Quickly, I push Lake back into his seat using “I can’t see my mirrors” as an excuse. How the hell am I supposed to do this? And he’s wearing that stupid towel that’s gaping open.
I will not fuck a monster. Simple as that.
“Get dressed so when we get there, we can just grab a ticket and go.”
“Are you sure?” he asks.
“Positive,” I say, which makes him grudgingly comply.
The bus station is just a few minutes away, which works in our favor since I’m sure the car has already been called in. We ditch it when we arrive, and I enter the station wearing the new shirt I’d bought.
“Here,” Lake says as he points. “The bus leaves in five minutes. Let’s do that one.”
“Okay,” I say as I head up to get our tickets. It might be leading us farther from our destination, but honestly, as long as we put some distance between us to give us time to figure shit out, I’ll be happy.
Even at a jog, we just barely make it onto the bus before the door closes. We head to the back where we find two empty seats and squeeze into them.
“Here’s for your dumb fish,” I say as I hand him some fish food. He lights right up when he sees it, like I bought him something of huge value.
“Aww, look, Sir Reginald! Your new daddy got you some food,” Lake says as he sprinkles some in. I’m honestly amazed when I see the fish swim up to eat it. I’m not sure it’s ever moved that fast in its life. It never seems to burn enough calories to even need to eat.
“Take that back,” I decide before he starts off on the wrong path.
He looks confused. “What?”
“I’m not your fish’s… father.”
“You don’t want to be a fish daddy?” Lake asks, like this is of actual concern. Like anyone would want to. I decide the best way to end this conversation is if he just goes to sleep.
