Devoured: Brides of the Kindred 11 (11 page)

“Your hands…” She held out her own hands
after making sure the towel was knotted firmly in place. “Let me see them.”

“They’re nothing.” He frowned and shook
his head. “Nothing I don’t deserve.”

“What is
that
supposed to mean?” Tess demanded. “What do you—”

“Hey, five minutes are up. What’s going
on?”

Di was suddenly there, striding around the
corner of the house with a frown fixed on her face. She stopped talking when
she saw Tess standing in the grassy backyard. Next her eyes flicked to the
metal mesh cage lying on the ground like a discarded beetle shell. Her eyes
widened and she looked at Garron in awe.

“Wow, big boy—did you do that?”

“He sure did,” Tess said. “But now we need
to get out of here before Pierce comes back and finds us. He’s working a
homicide but you can never tell how long that will take.”

“We should go,” Garron said. “Is there
anything you want to take from here before we leave?”

Tess took a long look at the white house
where she had spent most of her married life—the place where she had once
thought her husband loved her and then learned differently. The house which
Pierce had made her prison—the house he would doubtless have made her coffin if
Garron hadn’t come to free her.

For a moment tears stung her eyes but she
sniffed and blinked them away fiercely.
I
won’t mourn for the past. I have to think about the future now —about what in
the world I’m going to do. I’m running out of places to hide.

“Tess?” Garron rumbled softly and she
looked up at him, realizing this was the first time he had spoken her name. “Is
there anything you need from this place? Anything you want?” he asked.

Tess wiped her eyes and shook her head.

“No, nothing. Let’s go.”

Chapter
Twelve

She
touched me and the need to change receded. She calmed my dr’gin with nothing
more than her sweet scent and the softness of her hands. How did she do that?
Why does she affect me so?

Garron stared down at his black boots,
which were up on the seat since there was no room to put them anywhere else in
the back of Di’s tiny vehicle. Tess had wanted him to ride up front because of
his long legs but he had absolutely refused. Her back was wounded and he wasn’t
going to increase her pain by making her ride cramped up in the back. Still, it
was a good thing he wasn’t claustrophobic. His knees were practically touching
his nose in this miniscule human conveyance which stunk of fossil fuels. How
did they stand traveling around in these noisy, cramped, smelly vehicles
anyway?

But his discomfort couldn’t hold his
attention for long. He kept replaying the scene outside her domicile over and
over again. The way she had literally fallen into his arms, the feel of her
soft, lush curves pressed against him, the rounded fullness of her lovely
breasts gilded silver by the moonlight…Gods, she was beautiful—so gorgeous she
made him
ache
. Literally. He shifted
around, trying to part his thighs more to make room for his throbbing shaft. He
wished it would go down but there was little chance of that—not when he could
smell her sweet, fresh scent even despite the car’s oil and smoke stench.

You
shouldn’t be feelings this way for her,
whispered the voice of his guilt.
Remember your vow. Remember Nella…

I
haven’t forgotten her,
he argued uneasily.
I will be true to her memory but I cannot
help the way Tess’s scent affects me…

Then more than her scent reached him.
Tess’s low, sweet voice came to his ears and he realized she and Di were having
an argument.

“Look, just take me by my place so I can
grab a few things and I’ll get out of your hair,” Tess was saying to her
friend.

“Get out of my hair? I don’t think so!
You’re staying with me.”

“What, so I can put you in danger too?
We’ve had this conversation before, Di—I’m not going to stay at your house.
It’s the first place Pierce will look the minute he finds me gone. He already
suspects that you’re the one who helped me hide on the Mother Ship.”

“We need to get you into a shelter.”

“No.” Tess shook her head vehemently. “They
need those spots for women with kids and besides, Pierce is a detective. I know
the locations are hidden but something tells me he’d find a way to get to me.
If I stay in one place, even if it’s supposed to be ‘safe’ I’m just a sitting
duck.” She sighed. “I guess I’ll just have to go on the road.”

“And how are you going to finance this
magical mystery tour?” Di asked flatly. “With your savings from the extravagant
salary they pay you at Happy Rest? Don’t forget, I used to be the administrator
there. I know how crappy the money is.”

“It’s not so bad—you got us a raise,
remember?” Tess said. “Besides, I’ve got a little—enough to keep me going for
awhile if I’m careful.”

“There is no need for you to go anywhere,”
Garron said, breaking into the conversation. “Except back up to the Mother Ship
with me.”

“What?” Tess twisted in her seat to look
at him though it clearly hurt her back to do so. “I don’t think so—I’ve been
banned from there. Banned for
life.
Besides,
why would I go with you?”

“Why wouldn’t you?” Garron said, frowning.
It hadn’t occurred to him that she would want to go off on her own. The whole
time she’d been talking to Di about going “on the road” he just assumed he
would be with her. He had put her in danger—it was his responsibility to
protect her. Nothing else made any sense.

“Well, because, I…Oh, look, here’s my
place, Di—pull in.”

The little blue car pulled into a parking
area filled with other vehicles and Tess started to get out. Then she put a
hand to her forehead.

“Crap—my keys!”

“Got your spare right here, hon.” Di was
already handing her a small, flat piece of metal. “Want me to come in with you?
It’s not likely but if Pierce has already gotten home and found you gone, he
could be somewhere around.”

“In that case,
I’m
going in with her,” Garron growled.

“Well, I
would
protest but I think big boy here is probably more protection
than I would be,” Di said. “Tess?”

“Um…” For some reason Tess was shifting
uncomfortably in her seat. “I don’t know…”

“Come on, Tess, we don’t have a lot of
time here,” Di pointed out. “The minute Pierce gets home and finds you gone,
he’s going to pull out all the stops to find you. This is the first place he’s
going to come looking—even before my house.”

Tess bit her lip. “All right,” she said at
last to Garron. “Come on.”

He unfolded himself from the back seat and
followed her slow progress to a large building which seemed to have multiple
dwellings in it—a little like the housing in the Unmated Males area of the
Mother Ship.

Tess clutched her towel tight to her
breasts and kept glancing around nervously as they climbed the steps to a
second story dwelling.

“Sorry I’m so jumpy,” she muttered as they
finally came to a stop in front of a door marked 113B. “I’m just not used to
coming home in the middle of the night wearing only a towel. Plus this thing
with Pierce…”

“Your concern is understandable,” he
murmured, hoping to sooth her. “But please know this—I won’t let him hurt you
again.” He felt a low growl rising in his throat at the thought.
“Ever.”

Tess looked at him a long time, the key
apparently forgotten in her hand.

“You really mean that, don’t you?”

“I wouldn’t have said it otherwise.”
Garron assured her. He wanted to cup her cheek, to touch her in some way, to
give reassurance. But though he had held her to him twice in the short time
they’d known each other, such contact was forbidden among his people and he
found the taboo difficult to overcome when there weren’t extenuating
circumstances.
Besides, you shouldn’t
want
to touch her at all,
whispered
the guilty voice in his head.
Remember
Nella!

Garron contented himself with looking into
her lovely dark eyes.

“Why are you here?” she said at last,
searching his face.

“To protect you.” He couldn’t help himself
any longer…he reached out and brushed her flushed cheek lightly with just the
tips of his fingers. Gods, her skin was soft! “I swear that if he comes near
you again I’ll kill him,” he said. It wasn’t a threat…just a statement of fact.
He didn’t know why he felt so strongly about this little, curvy Earth girl but
he did. And if that bastard who had hit and brutalized her came to find her,
Garron was going to rip him to shreds. Literally.

Tess’s cheeks got red and she looked away.
“Um…we should probably go inside before some of my neighbors start wondering
what’s going on.”

“Agreed.” He nodded. “Lead the way.”

She put the flat metal key in the lock and
turned until the mechanism made a small, sharp clicking sound. Then she pushed
the door open.

The smell of dried blood and some kind of
animal fur hit Garron in the face, making him wince. When Tess pressed a wall
plate which brought harsh, overhead lights flickering to life, he saw the
source of the stench.

There was a small table in the middle of
the front room which appeared to be some kind of food prep area. The table had
wilted flowers and glass shards strewn across it. They were lying in a pool of
congealed, mostly dried blood which covered the table and had dripped onto the
floor.

There were papers too, strewn in careless
heaps. Looking more closely, Garron saw they were covered in small, dense
script. Many of them were brown around the edges, having soaked up the blood.

Scattered around the messy scene were a
few tawny tufts of animal fur. From the scent, Garron could tell that the blood
and fur were from the same animal…and judging from the size of the puddle on
the table which had spilled out onto the floor, he doubted it was still alive.

“Oh God…” Tess’s soft voice was hoarse.
“I’m so sorry I didn’t warn you. I…I forgot how bad it was in here. I guess I
kind of blocked it out.”

“What happened here?” Garron asked
quietly.

“I…my…” She took a deep breath and tried
again. “When I left Pierce and moved in here, I got myself a dog. Not a huge
one—just a mixed breed mutt from the pound. I’ve never been a dog person but
the woman at the shelter, she told me Gus—sorry, that was his name—she said he
was a good guard dog. That he would alert me if anything was wrong.”

“And did he?”

“He never got a chance. Pierce did this
while I was gone to work.” She put a hand to her eyes. “I knew something was
wrong when I came home. Gus always barked while I was putting my key in the
lock—he was always waiting for me. So happy to see me. That day there was
nothing…silence.”

She was quiet for a moment herself, with her
hand still over her eyes as though she was trying not to see it all again.

Garron’s heart burned in sympathy for her
pain. He wanted to tell her she didn’t have to say any more if she didn’t want
to. But after a moment, she took a deep, trembling breath and went on.

“When I came in Gus was…was dead in the
middle of the table. See the broken vase?” She gestured to the shards scattered
around. “Pierce used one of those to…to stab him and…and cut his throat.” She
blinked rapidly and Garron could tell she was trying not to cry. “That way if I
tried to press charges, he could say the dog attacked him and he had to use the
closest thing to hand to defend himself. ‘See, your Honor? No premeditation
here. I was just coming over to drop off some paperwork and that vicious
mutt…’” Her voice died for a moment and she had to breathe deeply before
continuing. “That’s what he would say. But I know Pierce planned it—he wanted
to send me a message.”

“Which was?” Garron asked.

“That he owns me. That I’ll never really
get away.” She reached out and picked up a crumpled paper covered in dried
blood. “These are the divorce papers I sent him to sign. I’ve been trying to
get away from him for
months
using
legal means. I was trying to be civil—trying to make it an amicable break. I
wanted to keep living here—get into the nursing program at HCC and finish my RN
degree. But when I saw this…when I saw what he’d done to Gus…” She shook her
head. “I knew he was coming for me and if he got me back, I’d never be free
again.”

“Tess…” Garron began but then didn’t know
how to go on.

She sighed. “So I took Gus to Di’s house
and buried him in her backyard but I didn’t dare to come back here to clean up.
I knew he’d be watching. That was when I moved up to the Mother Ship. I
just…didn’t have anyplace else to go.”

Garron’s whole being ached with pain and
shame. “And I sent you right back down here,” he said in a low voice. “Back to
be beaten and terrorized.”

“You didn’t know,” she said gently,
putting a hand on his arm. “I don’t blame you—
really
.”

“It doesn’t matter.” He pulled away from
her light touch—though he longed to receive it, he didn’t deserve her comfort.
“I blame myself.”

Tess took a deep breath. “Well right now
we’re both going to be to blame if we keep standing here until Pierce shows up.
I need to grab some clothes and get out.”

“I’ll wait and keep watch. Unless you need
some help?”

“No—I think I can manage.” Stepping
carefully around the glass and pooled blood, she left the food prep area and
made her way to the back of the dwelling.

Garron squeezed his eyes shut and massaged
his temples, trying not to smell the stench of dried animal blood and fur.
Gods, to think that bastard had killed her one companion! The only creature she
had to care for and love. What kind of heartless son-of-a-bitch
was
her ex mate?

One
who will stop at nothing to get to her,
whispered a little voice in the back of his mind.
Which means you must be twice as vigilant in
protecting her.

Garron vowed to himself that he would be.
He would keep his vow to remember Nella and be true to her memory but this
situation was his responsibility. He wouldn’t leave Tess’s side until he knew
she was safe. Until Pierce was incarcerated forever, unable to hurt her…or
dead.

He opened his eyes and looked around at
the messy food prep area. Clearly this scene disturbed Tess greatly—and with
good reason. He didn’t know if he had time to do much, but maybe he could clean
it up a little. Now where did she keep her cleaning tools…?

* * * * *

When Tess finished packing her large
duffel bag, she realized it was too heavy to lift.

Need
to leave some of this behind. You’re going on the road—got to travel light.
She opened it again and dumped half the clothes and all
the non-essential knick-knacks except for the small music box her mother had
given her for her twelfth birthday. That was special—she had to have it. She
took a few travel sized bottles of shampoo and conditioner and her e-reader
which had all her favorite books and pictures on it. The rest she left.