Pursuing My Rejected Luna by Cara Anderson novel Chapter 208

Chapter 208

Taxon

As expected, the route through the house is not clean either. Two more of Savin’s people loom between us and the exit. Nicolai handles one. I handle the other. Skye, behind us, does something useful to a third man who appears from a side door that we weren’t expecting-she gets an elbow into his throat with the precision of someone who has been waiting for an opportunity and takes it the moment it presents itself.

Nicolai and I both look at her with a mix of awe and bewilderment

“My father’s pack,” she shrugs. “He insisted. And this asshole is one of the men who dragged me here.”

“Good,” I nod like a bobblehead doll. “That’s… good.

“Remind me to thank Marco,” Nicolai adds, pulling Skye behind him, protecting her from any future unseen threats.

We keep moving. The service road exit is an exterior door on the property’s northwestern face-maintenance access, not on Savin’s standard security map because it was added when the property was retrofitted twelve years ago and whoever drew up the intelligence didn’t go back far enough in the records.

Thankfully, I went back far enough.

The door opens onto a gravel track. At the end of the track, two SUVs are waiting and Noah, leaning against the nearer one with his arms crossed and the smug expression of a man who knows, beyond an absolute shadow of a doubt, that he’s saving our asses.

“Surprise,” I throw up jazz hands, trying to add an ounce of levity into the tension that hasn’t quite uncoiled.

Noah looks at me. Looks at Nicolai. Looks at Skye. “You’re insane,” he shakes his head. “Both of you.”

“Just drive,” Nicolai rolls his eyes.

Noah drives while the three of us occupy the back seat. Skye sits sandwiched between us, squirming in a way that broadcasts her heat is rising from a light sprinkle to a raging monsoon.

Her scent in the enclosed vehicle is- I can tell the moment Noah registers it, his muscles going rigid and his knuckles white where he grips the steering wheel.

“Oh fuck!” He grits out. “Please tell me you’re not gonna do things in the back of my car that will require all new upholstery.”

I’m managing my wolf with sheer force of will and a fair bit of prayer. But I can already feel my control slipping. From Nicolai’s expression, he’s doing the same. Succeeding only marginally better than I am. At least he was, until the tiniest whimper escapes Skye’s lips.

“Shh, Moonbeam. We’ve got you.” He coos, pulling her into his lap. Then to Noah, “We’ll do what needs to be done. Our mate will not suffer.”

Noah grumbles something under his breath but doesn’t argue. I pull out my phone to call Dr. Chernov, desperate to be doing something, anything. He answers on the second ring-I called him before the operation, wanted him on standby, just in case.

“She’s out,” I announce the moment he answers. “We’re-“look at Noah who answers my unasked question.” Forty minutes from the estate.”

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“Any obvious injuries?” Chernov asks.

Nook at Skye, allowing myself to really take her in for the first time. What I see makes me want to turn around for the sole purpose of torturing and killing every fucker her dared lay a hand on her. But the look on Nicolaï’s face tells me that is already the plan.

“Her face.” I rasp, pausing to regain my composure before I continue. She has a cut on her cheekbone, not deep. And she’s holding her arms like they hurt. They were tied tightly behind her back when Nicolai found her.”

Then I look at her wrists. I look for long enough to see what I need to see and then I look back at her face instead because looking at her wrists is doing something to my ability to think straight.

“Wrists,” I tell Chernov. “There’s some bruising and deep gashes, probably from the ropes. She’s moving well, though. Nothing life threatening.”

“I can walk and everything,” Skye says dryly. Her voice is steady. But I can tell it takes some effort.

“I’ll be at the estate when you arrive,” Chernov assures me.

I hang up the phone and look down to find her hands are in mine-I did that without deciding to, just: her hands are there and mine found them, needing the warmth of the bond flaring at the contact. I swallow hard, letting myself feel everything I’ve kept locked down now that she’s here and safe.

“I’m okay,” she whispers, leaning over Nicolai to press a soft, reassuring kiss to my lips.

“I know.” I reply but it comes out broken.

“You’re not going to tell me I don’t have to say that?” She raises one eyebrow in question.

“No. You don’t have to say it. But only because I know it’s true.” I hold her gaze. “You’re okay. You’re the strongest person I know.”

She looks at me for a moment. Then she leans her head against my shoulder. Her other hand reaches across- finds Nicolai’s. I watch him take it. The way his hands close around hers-careful with her wrists without making a production of it.

The vehicle is quiet but the flush of Skye’s skin is getting darker and I don’t miss the tiny rock of her hips over Nicolai’s obvious erection. His other hand is tight on her hip but I can’t tell if he’s holding her still or helping her move over him. And Noah is driving with the focused silence of someone who knows when to not say anything, which is one of his better qualities.

“Take me home,” Skye moans.

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“Home,” Nicolai agrees.

Dr. Chernov is waiting when we pull through the gates. He examines her in the driveway-quickly, efficiently, the practiced assessment of someone who doesn’t waste motion. She lets him. Cooperates without making a fuss about it.

“Wrists will bruise significantly,” he says. “I’ll order some antibiotics to prevent infection of the open wounds. I trust you’ll dress them as soon as you’re inside.” He looks at us both pointedly, the expression of a man who knows better than to suggest entering the home of two Alphas whose mate is in heat. “The cut on her face is superficial-won’t scar with proper care. She’s-” He pauses. Assessing something he’s not saying directly. The heat, which is present enough in the open air of the driveway that all three of us know what he’s not saying.

“Given the trauma,” Chernov says carefully, “I can manage the heat medically. Sedation would allow her body to-

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My Alpha rumbles his displeasure at the thought of not caring for our mate during her heat but I bite my tongue before the sound can escape. He’s right, she’s been through an ordeal and this is her choice.

But Skye shakes her head before he even finishes the sentence. “No!” She insists. “No sedation.”

She looks at Nicolai then at me.

“I want to ask you both something,” her voice is small, timid. “Before we go inside.”

We wait, both of us nodding for her to continue.

“Jaxon.” Her hand finds mine. “I want you to mark me.”

I go completely still. Because I couldn’t possibly have heard her right. The thing I withheld from her through three years of marriage and she still finds me worthy of now? That can’t possibly be true, can it?

Not that I’m uncertain. I don’t think I;ve ever wanted anything more. It;s just hard to believe it’s real. She’s asking in a driveway, battered and in heat, but still with complete clarity.

She looks at Nicolai. “And I want you to mark me again. Both of you, at the same time. If you’re okay with that.”

He’s silent for so long, I start to worry he’s not okay with it at all. Not that I can blame him. He’d be well within his rights to ban me from Skye’s heat altogether. But when he finally speaks, it’s not to object.

“You’re sure,” Nicolai checks. And, of course, I should have known his only concern is for her.

“I’ve been sure for weeks,” she states confidently, sending a flurry of warmth through my chest that settles a little further south. “I just needed to get home first.”

I look at him. He looks at me. The question in his expression is not will you or should we-it’s something older than that. Something that travels between two men who have fought about this woman and worked beside each other and carried her out of an enemy’s basement together. Something that looks, possibly, like respect.

He looks back at Skye. “Then let’s go inside,” he says.

She nods and he lifts her into his arms. I keep her hand in mine, not letting go. Never letting go again.

We go inside.

Cara Anderson Author

Thank you for reading!

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