Midnight Wolf (Shifters Unbound #11)(46)
Ciaran, on the other hand, let go of Angus to turn a cartwheel, his long legs nearly smacking into a chair. “Sweet!” he shouted. “I love Tamsin. She’ll make the perfect mom.”
“She isn’t here.” Dylan’s clipped words were barely audible over Ciaran’s triumphant shouts. “She can’t answer.”
“But I can still make the claim, in front of witnesses.” Angus’s heart thumped, but he held himself steady. “So if you want Tamsin, you have to go through me.”
“Fine.” Dylan struck fast, like the cat he was, his fist catching Angus on the side of the head even as Angus ducked out of the way.
Ciaran shrieked. Angus blocked Dylan’s next punch and came up swinging.
Dylan was one of the best in the Austin fight club. Not the top, but not far from it. Except this wasn’t the fight club, with its rules, as minimal as they were.
The no killing rule wouldn’t apply in a motel room in Central Texas. Dylan had a Guardian here to send Angus to dust, and a vacuum cleaner would take care of the rest.
But no way was Angus letting Dylan past him to find Tamsin. She wasn’t a flash drive of information to be passed from hand to hand. She was a living, breathing woman, and Angus was now her protector.
He kept punching. Dylan dodged his blows and got in damaging ones himself—to the shoulder, rib cage, jaw. Ciaran’s shouts turned to howls as he shifted to his black wolf cub, his distress shrilling through the room.
Sean grabbed his father by the arms and dragged him back. “Dad! Stop! You’ll have the cops on us in a trice. Ciaran, lad, shut it!”
Dylan let Sean pull him from Angus. His face was bloody, his breath labored, and Angus tasted blood on his own lips.
Angus caught the squirming Ciaran in his arms. The furry black cub cut off his howls, but he continued to whimper, his gray eyes wide with terror.
Dylan drew ragged breaths. “This is your answer, then.”
He stepped away from Sean, wiping blood from his face with the back of his hand. Dylan was a stickler for Shifter law, an ancient code that went back centuries, before humans put forth their restrictions. He wasn’t happy with Angus, but he’d abide by his decision.
His laconic words acknowledged the mate-claim. Though Angus and Tamsin weren’t officially mated by the claim—and Tamsin, if Angus ever found her, would probably tell him to take his claim and stuff it—Angus now protected her. Every other male on the planet—father, brother, son, uncle, clan leader, Shiftertown leader, Dylan—would face Angus’s wrath if they went anywhere near her.
Sean looked pained. “Goddess, the pair of ye. Angus, get after her and keep her safe. I can’t answer for Dad, but I’ll try to keep him hosed down. That lass obviously needs you.”
Dylan retreated to the bathroom during this speech and returned with two towels, one of which he handed Angus. “It’s important you find her,” he said, mopping his face. “I hope you understand how important. I won’t hurt her. But please, bring her to me.”
Ciaran started howling again. Angus scrubbed the blood from his mouth with the towel and kissed the top of Ciaran’s head. “It’s all right, son. We’ll find her. We’ll keep her safe.”
Ciaran settled into the crook of Angus’s arm. Sean had to help gather up both Tamsin’s clothes and Ciaran’s, Sean’s look sympathetic as he opened the motel room’s door.
“Go find her,” Sean said quietly to Angus. “Make her your mate in truth. Trust me, lad. It’s the best thing.”
Tamsin paused at the edge of the farmer’s field and gazed back at the motel. Lights glinting between cracks in curtains told of people settling in for the night, watching television, catching some sleep before continuing their journeys tomorrow.
She sat on her haunches, cool wind ruffling her fur. They’d left the rain behind, and the night sky stretched above her, thick with stars.
So why was she loitering in the breeze and the night instead of hightailing it out of there? Angus had known exactly what she’d do as soon as Sean mentioned the window in the bathroom, but he’d done nothing, said nothing. Even his body language, which Shifters were good at reading, had remained neutral, not betraying a thing.
Tamsin had, in fact, become stuck halfway through the window, cursing herself for eating every bite of that po’ boy and following it up with cheesecake.
A frantic wriggling and her sleek fur had popped her through, and then she’d had to dig her claws in hard to the concrete wall to keep from falling twenty feet and landing on her face.
A few seconds later, she’d been on the ground, leaping across the asphalt and over the wall to the fields beyond, Sean’s shouts fading behind her.
Now she sat thirty yards from the parking lot in the shadow of a stand of trees fed by a trickling creek. Rabbits in the field behind her were cowering, silent, waiting for the predator to go.
Go she should. Tamsin needed to run far and fast before Dylan came out of that motel. He’d turn into whatever badass Feline he was and track her without a problem. His son would be right behind him, and Angus too.
She told herself she was waiting to see whether she could slip inside and retrieve her clothes and money as soon as they bolted out to hunt for her, but she knew that was bullshit.
Tamsin had abandoned clothes and money several times in her past and managed to survive. She’d learned the fine art of resourcefulness and never had to resort to theft. People could be persuaded to part with clothes they didn’t want, or they’d pay her to go away if she was enough of a nuisance. She’d do an honest job for wages as well, walking away with a cheerful wave as soon as she got paid. If she could find a nearby poker game, all the better.