Keeper - Forever #4 (Sample of Published Book)

Chapter 1 - Part 2

Bay

I stared at him, waiting for him to say something, but he remained quiet as he stood watching me. There was no warmth in his gaze. It wasn't like I expected him to act different but I was still disappointed. The ache in my chest worsened but I pushed my chin up slightly, refusing to show how much it hurt.

My hopes that had sparked from a young werewolf's view of true love had died with the reality of having a mate who believed I was evil.

His eyes dropped to my knees and he frowned. My jean shorts showed off my long legs with blood-scraped knees.

"What happened?" he asked softly, bending down to take a closer look.

"I'm fine," I stated, stepping back in case he reached to touch me without thinking.

The last thing we needed was to make it more difficult by touching. A touch between mates reinforced the connection and would make it harder to keep away from each other.

Why couldn't I have a werewolf mate who would love me the way I had always wanted? Instead of like the conditional love I had received from my parents, I had a mate who was unable to love me at all.

He rose up to his full intimidating height. "You need to get it seen to."

"I'll be fine." It was only scrapes on my knees. His concern was over the top.

"You should go," I said, not wanting to be a moment longer in his magnetic presence.

His scent enveloped me, urging me closer. I wanted to give in. The urge to touch him was difficult to fight and I had to concentrate hard not to make the mistake of running my hands through his silky hair or to reach up and brush his cheek with my hand.

"I will take you back to the compound," he said.

"I can take care of myself," I stated, defiance flaring up inside me like a sparked flame, breaking his hypnotic spell. I crossed my arms as I made my statement.

"It's too dangerous to allow you out here alone."

"Allow?" I spluttered, dropping my arms to my sides as I glared at him, but he gave me no reaction.

"Yes, allow." He seemed confused by my obvious anger.

"You don't get to tell me what I can do," I stated, barely containing my anger.

The slightest action of his jaw tensing was the only sign that anything I had said had gotten to him.

"Being irrational will get you hurt," he stated in an even tone despite the twitch in his jaw. "Maybe it would be a good idea to think before you act."

I frowned at him. "Are you trying to say that I shouldn't have done what I did to save the people I loved?"

He refused to answer. His cool eyes held mine.

My fury amplified. "If I hadn't, you would have slaughtered my brother and the people I loved without a second thought."

The silence was deafening because what I had said was the truth that he couldn't dispute.

"Or are you just angry because you did something stupid?" I said. I knew exactly what I was doing. I was trying to get a rise out of him. "In a split second you threw away everything you had ever worked for and now you're stuck on a side you don't want to be on."

He held my gaze, refusing to look away. "Saving you wasn't stupid."

I swallowed the emotion his words evoked. I had been so stupid. Our connection and my brief encounters with him had made me believe that there was something good in him despite what I had been told.

It was the reason I had helped Crystal to free Flynn before Kyle, Crystal's mate, could kill him to keep Crystal's true identity safe. She was half-Keeper, half-werewolf. A hybrid between our two species. The Keepers believed she was an abomination that needed to be ended. Her existence was forbidden in their world where there was no mixing between our kinds.

Kyle had believed the only way to keep his mate from danger was to kill Flynn so he would not be able to spread her secret. But Crystal hadn't seen it that way. In her eyes his death would have led to war with the Keepers. They were much stronger than us and we had no way of evening the playing field, so their victory would have been guaranteed.

She'd taken Flynn to the Keepers, prepared to give up her life to keep our packs safe. But Kyle and my brother, James, had gone after her even though there hadn't been a way out. It had been a suicide mission.

I had followed blindly after them and when I had arrived, to my horror, Flynn had been beating my brother. It had been the first time I had seen the true ruthlessness that governed him. I had begged and pleaded for the life of my sibling but he had ignored me. In that moment I realized any good I had seen in him had been in my imagination. He wasn't who I thought he was.

Travis, who had been in charge of the Keepers, had hit me when I had refused to keep quiet, and I'd lost consciousness.

"That's a lie," I threw back. I wanted him to get angry. I needed to know he was feeling as conflicted as I was.

It was only when I had regained consciousness back in the safety of our medical center at the compound that I had discovered Flynn had turned on Travis, killing him in seconds. But his actions had been too late to recover what I had felt.

"Don't." He shook his head.

"Have you told anyone?" I asked, feeling apprehensive that he knew what we were. Had anyone else figured it out?

"No."

I let out a relieved breath at his welcome answer.

"How did you figure it out?" I asked, needing to know how someone who didn't know the ins and outs of it had discovered it.

"Harrison told me about Crystal's mother. He told me enough for me to figure it out."

"You can't tell anyone. I don't want anyone to know," I told him.

He frowned slightly, his lips thinned. "Why?"

"It'll just make things complicated," I said. It was the story of my life—poor Bay. The one who kept breaking all the rules just to get some sort of attention to make up for the lack of love and affection she'd grown up without.

He regarded me thoughtfully.

It was getting dark and I didn't want to stay out any longer. The last thing I needed was my overprotective brother to come looking for me to find me with the Keeper none of us trusted. Besides I didn't want him asking questions or taking a closer look in case he discovered what I was trying to keep hidden.

"Come, it's getting late," Flynn said in a forceful voice. His hand reached out but before it made contact with my wrist he retracted it when he remembered the ramifications of a simple touch between us.

I relented and started to walk. My knees still throbbed a little but I refused to allow him to see me as weak. I walked with determined steps to get as far away as possible from him.

He followed silently behind me. The chill in the air made me shiver as I walked, knowing exactly where I was in the familiar forest.

"Do you want my jacket?" he asked softly behind me.

"No."

What I wanted from him he couldn't give me.

Why did everything in my life have to be so hard? We both didn't want what connected us so what could we do now? Step one, keep it a secret and that would make it easier to move on. Step two, try and find someone to fill the gap and hope it would be enough.

It wasn't like the rogue-murdering Keeper was going to embrace our connection and what that entailed. I had to suppress a hysterical laugh at the ridiculous thought.

But as much as I wanted to wave it off, it still hurt. But I wouldn't allow anyone to see.

It was what fairy tales were made of. The reality was I had been mated with someone incapable of love. That left us pretty much where we had started off before, as strangers.