Chapter 34
Jayden falls down with a turd as soon as the wolf has disappeared in the trees.
He has taken the brunt of the attacks in the fight. Kira knows now that he was holding back, keeping his strikes on the surface level so as not to hurt the younger man beyond recovery.
Liam, it seems, had no such qualms. Had the wound at his throat been inches higher, it could have been deadly.
Kira whines to be released from her bonds, but Jayden isn’t speaking. Maybe he isn’t even thinking.
His chest and belly heave with exertion. Noel darts to his side, and Kira screams in anxiety.
The sound is so human that he pauses. Her wolf might submit to Jayden’s orders, but she knows she’d never submit to a man, as a human.
Jayden would always treat her as his equal. He wouldn’t bind Kira’s humans to a command.
She shifts back, stumbling through the rapid transition to her human form, and Noel turns with a panicked snarl.
'Stay back!' Even in this form, Kira could hear Noel’s voice in her head.
She isn’t safe.
She can see it. Jayden is more animal than man, wounded and defensive.
He snaps even when Noel gets too close. But Kira steps forward anyway, relieved to find that her legs work again.
She knows Jayden wouldn’t hurt her. His wolf knows hers.
She reaches out her hand, as she would approach any wounded animal. Noel tries to block her, but Kira just ducks around him and there’s nothing the wolf can do.
He could hardly bare his teeth at a vulnerable human.
When Kira gets close, Jayden snarls again, but he doesn’t snap his teeth at her.
‘Kira!’ Noel says in a warning voice.
Kira ignores him and steps into Jayden’s space.
“It’s me. It’s just me,” she murmurs, and as soon as she presses her hand to Jayden’s side she can see the wolf settle.
He’s panting so heavily that Kira thinks it’s a miracle he’s still conscious. With this much blood dripping from him, it’s a miracle he’s conscious.
Kira strokes her fingers into his shaggy black fur and finds one of the wounds. Jayden whines but doesn’t bite.
Kira swallows, looking down at the blood on her fingers.
“It’s your Kira,” she whispers, stroking Jayden’s face with the back of her hand.
“And you’re in big trouble when we get home because of what you pulled today!” She says, scolding but relieved.
Jayden nuzzles against her hand, so tender that Kira can forget he’s a wolf and imagine that he’s nothing but a giant, fluffy puppy.
His breath was red-hot on her skin. He curls his legs into his body and lowers his chin down to the ground, until Kira has to crouch beside him to still reach his face.
She scratches behind his ears, anything to soothe him, because he knows there’s nothing she can do about the wounds.
“Kira?”
She turns around, relieved to see the pack has arrived. Frank and Chris are in their human form, while the others have wolfed up.
They approach Noel, while Frank brings a bundle of clothes to throw to her.
When he gets too close, Jayden snarls, and Frank backs up, raising his hands to show he isn’t a threat.
“Kira, he’s dangerous”
“He’s mine,” Kira chokes, and with the last of the pack here she can let her emotions rise up through her chest to her face, and she wipes a tear away angrily.
“He wouldn’t hurt me. Stop thinking he will hurt me"
The wolves fan out, guarding the trees, and Kira is confused to see Hannah and Sam join them, and even Ava, who shadows Noel with a low, ashamed gait.
Kira can see it in her posture.
“Jayden?” Frank says, crouching to the ground in what must be another sign that he’s no threat.
“You need to shift.”
Jayden snaps again, baring his teeth, and Kira catches his face in her hands to calm him.
His eyes look wild but when they settle on her, she sees a flash of her Jayden again.
She strokes the fur down under his eyes and runs her fingers through the thick hair on his neck and chest, checking for the worst of the blood.
The wound to his throat seemed, at least, to be superficial. Kira should have been there. She should’ve been tucked under him, protecting that part.
“We need to get you home. It might not be safe out here,” Frank pressed with his ever calm voice.
With his pleas achieving nothing, Kira buries her face in against Jayden’s flank and presses a kiss to his muzzle.
It was scratched badly during the fight, but Jayden didn’t pull away.
“Listen to Frank,” she murmurs. “Come back to me.”
Jayden whines softly against her hand and Kira has never heard a sound like that from him before.
“Let me take care of you.”
Watching the transition back to human form makes Kira shudder, but she keeps her eyes on him so that Jayden can be calmed by her gaze.
Worse even than the change is the vision of Jayden drenched in blood on her own body. It’s so much worse.
The wounds might seem smaller, but there’s no hiding them beneath a layer of fur. His blood drips onto the forest floor, not matting close to the gashes anymore, and Kira has to turn away just for a moment, afraid she is going to be sick.
Reason two why she chose law over medicine.
Frank curses and crouches beside Jayden, helping him rest up against the rocky outcrop behind him.
“I need to call my father.”
Kira looks up at that.
“He’s a doctor. The doctor, I mean, the only doctor in town,” Frank says.
Kira’s nausea is low on her list of priorities now, so she forces herself to look back at Jayden, cradling his head with her hands because he isn’t strong enough to hold it up for himself.
Blood streams steadily from his ear, and Kira’s stomach drops when she remembers Liam tearing, she is sure, a chunk of skin or flesh through him. With the amount of blood, she couldn’t see the wound. That’s a relief.
“Kira?” Jayden croaks out. His face is pale and sweat drips down his forehead even though it’s a freezing night. He’s panting heavily.
“I’m here, baby,” she whispers, leaning in close.
Jayden takes shallow, shaky breaths, like he’s preparing to say something profound, and turns her head to look at him.
“Do you...”
Kira nods, encouraging him to get the words out.
“Do you think I look sexy, covered in blood?”
Jayden says raggedly, and a small, crooked smile pulls up one side of his lips.
Kira is flabbergasted