PS02 - Without Regret (28 page)

her face before she stubbornly crossed her arms over her chest, “I think it would be best if we didn’t speak until you drop me

off.”

“That’s more than fine with me,” he said, shutting the door, not bothering to explain that he wouldn’t be dropping her off

anywhere, at least not until this bullshit was done. As long as she was willing to keep quiet and let him pretend that she wasn’t

there then he really didn’t feel the need to piss her off by enlightening her of the fact that she was bait.

********

“I thought you said you weren’t going to speak to me,”

Chris said as he slammed his fist against the dashboard and cursed when the air conditioner didn’t kick in.

“I also didn’t think I’d be stuck in a sauna roasting my ass off for six hours straight,” Isabella snapped as she gave up trying to

get the window down any further.

She’d been lucky to get it to go down three inches and now it was time to face the facts.

Chris hotwired a lemon.

None of the electrical equipment worked. None of the controls for the back doors worked at all. The radio only came in on an

AM Spanish talk show. The air conditioner didn’t work and the headlights and windshield wipers turned off and on at will.

“It’s not that bad,” Chris muttered.

“Not that bad?” Isabella demanded as she gave up on staying the hell away from him and climbed into the front bench seat,

“accidentally” kicking him in the head in the process.

“Hey!”

“Oooops, sorry,” she mumbled, secretly pleased that she got at least one hit in after all those failed attempts earlier.

“How exactly is this ‘not that bad’?” she asked, looking pointedly at his sweat slicked bare chest.

“Hey, no one told you to wear a flannel shirt. Take it off if you’re hot,” Chris said, finishing off the last of the water they’d

bought an hour ago.

“I can’t,” she muttered. “I’m not wearing anything under it.”

“You’re kidding, right?” he asked, looking over to frown at her.

“I wish I was,” she mumbled pathetically.

“Why the hell didn’t you put something else on? It’s not exactly winter, Munchkin. When I sent you upstairs with Madison and

Jill I told you to borrow something of theirs. If you had just done as you were told you wouldn’t be sweating your ass off now,”

Chris snapped, sounding pretty pissed, which only pissed her off more.

It was hot, she was freaking exhausted since she hadn’t had more than an hour of sleep in the last forty-eight hours and she was

starving since the only place he would stop at only sold beef jerky, pork rinds and large individually wrapped pickles. She

was hungry, she just wasn’t pork rind-beef jerky hungry. Not yet anyway.

“Look, you big jerk!” she snapped, turning in her seat to glare at him as she let him have it, “I did exactly as you asked. I went

upstairs with them and tried to try on some shirts, but none of the females in your family are as well-endowed as I am and I

couldn’t pull the damn shirts over my tits if you must know!”

“Why hell didn’t you just take one of my tee shirts?” he demanded in an accusing tone as he shifted in his seat, again.

“Because I was freezing my ass off and I wasn’t given much of a choice. Joshua tossed the shirt in the room and told me that I

had to move my ass!”

“Why the hell are you yelling at me?” Chris snapped back.

“Because this is all your fault!”

“How is this my fault? I didn’t tell you to create that fucking program!”

She opened her mouth to argue only to have to snap it shut. The jerk did have a point after all.

“Fine, okay this isn’t your fault. Do you have a shirt in your bag that I can borrow?”

“Yeah, I have two, grab whichever one you want. We’ll pick some clothes up later,” he said as he rolled his head and groaned.

“Are you sore?” she asked, feeling kind of bad since it really was her fault that they were in this mess.

“Yeah,” he said, trying to rub his neck.

“Here, let me,” she said, reaching over to help rub his poor neck and shoulders only to have him snap at her.

“Don’t touch me.”

She stilled, shocked by the vehemence in his tone. “I was only trying to help.”

“I don’t want your help and I don’t want you touching me,” he snapped.

“What the hell is your problem?”

“You’re my problem.”

She frowned at him as a thought occurred to her. “This has something to do with that little question of yours after the kiss,

doesn’t it?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he grumbled as he looked away from her and she knew that she was right.

“I don’t understand why you care if I’m a virgin or not.

It’s not like it’s any of your business,” she continued as she watched that tick in his jaw work double time. “In fact I don’t know

why you would even assume that I was. In this day and age it’s very rare to make it to twenty-seven and not have sex before

so-“

“Because you are a Sentinel, Munchkin. That’s why I assumed you were a fucking virgin,” he said, looking down at her as if

she were a whore.

“Who the hell do you think you are?” she demanded, not liking the way he looked at her one bit.

“Your mate, Munchkin,” he said tightly, his hands noticeably tightening around the steering wheel.

“And you thought what? That I would wait for you and pine for you? Well, here’s a new flash for you, Chris. Up until yesterday

morning I had absolutely no idea that any of this existed and I’m pretty confused about the whole thing, especially the part

where you think you own me!” she shouted.

“You really want to do this now?” he demanded harshly.

He didn’t wait for her response as he suddenly took a right turn into what appeared to be an old abandoned industrial park. He

headed past several large gloomy buildings covered in graffiti and the remains of a fire and pulled behind the last building

where no one passing along the road would be able to see them, which was good since she fully planned on kicking his ass

now.

He threw the car in park and turned to face her. “Then let me clear a few things up for you, Munchkin,” he said quietly, but no

less menacingly. “First off, I don’t give a flying fuck when you found out that you were a Sentinel. You’re my wife and no other

man should have been allowed to lay a finger on you never mind fuck you.”

When she opened her mouth to share her thoughts about that he just kept going, cutting her off. “You are a Sentinel. Your job is

to protect humans from the fucked up world they really live in and yeah, you might want to accept the fact that you are not

human. You are supposed to be faster and stronger than a human and be there for your mate, but so far I haven’t seen shit from

you.”

“Because you haven’t given me a chance, you asshole!”

“No, it’s because you’re fucking pathetic. You’re no better than a human and to top it off you’re nothing but a whore.”

*********

“Oh, this keeps getting better and better,” Kale said, chuckling as he looked over Isabella’s most recent credit card activity.

Austin, Texas indeed, he thought with a rueful shake of his head. He already knew that every Master in the world was going

nuts by sending in every mercenary they could find to Texas right now. The good news was that it got every second rate

mercenary out of his hair for a little while. At least until they figured out they’d been duped.

The bad news of course was that now shifters and demons knew about Isabella McGuire and as soon as they realized what the

Masters were planning they would join in on the hunt. He’d hoped to have a little time before the war started, but it looked like

time just ran out.

When his cell phone rang a few minutes later he wasn’t entirely surprised.

“She’s headed to Austin, Texas. Where are you?” Logan said in lieu of a greeting, not that Kale expected one from the man. He

didn’t.

“Nowhere near Texas,” he said as he passed a sign welcoming him to Rerum, New Hampshire.

“Then I suggest you get on a plane and head in that direction before someone else grabs her,” Logan bit out, sounding pissed

again. This just kept getting better and better, he thought.

“You don’t want me to get on a plane and head to Texas.

Trust me,” he said, taking a right onto what appeared to be the town’s main road and hit a red light.

“Why not?”

“Because she isn’t going there.”

“How do you know?” Logan demanded, further insulting Kale.

“I know she’s not on the plane. Think about it, Logan.

By now the Sentinels know we’re after her, they have her and I bet one of your men tipped them off about me taking the

contract.”

“My men would never-“

“They would and they did,” Kale said, cutting him off as he waited for the damn light to turn green. “I already received a tip-

off about that an hour ago. My point is only one ticket was sold, in her name, bought with credit card.”

“You’re right,” Logan sighed. “Any idea where they really went?”

“No, but I’m hoping to find out. For some reason there are over ten Sentinel homes in this area. I’m a little curious about that,

but that will have to wait. It might take me a couple of days, but I’ll find out which home she was in,” he said, taking his foot

off the brake when the light turned green only to slam back down on it as a couple of kids on skateboards jumped out in front of

him.

“This can’t wait a couple of days, Kale. I need to find her as soon as possible.”

“I’ll do my best, but-“

“Tell me where you are. I can help,” Logan said, sounding desperate, which shouldn’t be a surprise since most of his clients

were pretty desperate if they had to call him, but this was different. This was Logan.

“Are you going to tell me what you need her for?”

“No.”

“Then I can’t help you. I’ll get back to you as soon as I have more information,” Kale said, ending the call just as Logan started

to make promises they both knew Kale would never allow him to keep.

“Why the hell did I take this job?” he wondered as he caught a scent he hadn’t smelled in centuries. One that caused a growl to

break free as he searched for the source and when he found it he had to struggle for the first time in centuries not to shift as he

watched the little boy with short black hair and a ready smile cross the street in front of him as he held onto an elderly

woman’s hand.

When the little boy waved to him and thanked him for letting him cross it took everything Kale had not to jump out of the car

and rip the little boy’s throat out.

Chapter 23

“What did you just call me?”

“What part did you have a problem with? Being called a human or a whore?” Chris asked, knowing he was being an asshole,

but he really didn’t give a flying fuck at the moment.

He saw the punch coming a mile away and easily caught it before it made contact with his jaw. “You’re weak,” he said with

open disgust as he shoved her hand away.

“And you’re a hypocrite,” she snapped, stunning him.

“How exactly am I a hypocrite?” he demanded.

“That kiss,” she practically hissed.

“What about it?” he said, wishing that he could stop thinking about it, but he couldn’t. The longer he stayed near her the more

he wanted to take her into his arms and do it again and that disgusted him. He didn’t want a weak woman, never mind a woman

like his mother.

“I’ve been kissed before,” she announced, making his hands clench into fists, “and I know the difference between a man who’s

never kissed a woman before and one that’s been around the block a time or two and I know I wasn’t the first woman you’ve

kissed.”

“So?” he asked, frowning.

“So?” she asked with an incredulous snort. “Where exactly do you get off kissing other women if you’re married?”

He glared at her as he answered. “I didn’t know about you when I kissed anyone and I haven’t touched another woman since I

found out about you.”

“And exactly how many women were there before you found out about me?”

“What does that have to do with anything?” he asked, leaning back from her as she gave him that same damn look that Jill used

when she thought she was right about something. It was actually kind of creepy.

“I don’t know, Mr. Double Standards, what do you think it has to do with?” she asked in a mocking tone that he didn’t

appreciate one damn bit.

“You want to know how many woman I’ve been with?”

he asked, getting back in her face.

“Yes,” she said, trying to sound firm, but failing miserably. It pleased him that she didn’t want to hear about any of the women

in his past anymore than he wanted to hear about the men.

“I lost count, but there were plenty.”

“And did you do more than kiss them?” she demanded, getting right in his face.

When he hesitated, she pounced. “So it’s okay for you to have sex with other women, but I can’t have sex with another man?”

she asked on a snort of disgust.

“I didn’t have sex with any of them!”

“Why not?”

“For the same reason you shouldn’t have let some other guy fuck you, Sentinels can’t get sexually excited for anyone but their

mates. You knew you didn’t want them, but you still fucked them.”

She glared up at him as her bottom lip quivered. “I slept with them because it was my choice, Chris, My choice,” she stressed.

“I don’t give a damn if you think you own me or what this little mark,” she said, gesturing to her navel, “means, but let me tell

you what it doesn’t mean,” she said, shoving him away from her and he let her.