He curled his fingers tightly around the apple and stilled the purr of the beast.
Addy isn’t for me.
He repeated it four more times before he found the whetstone. He grabbed the stone and, with vicious strokes, started sharpening the knife she’d given him.
Just one more thing to lay at
Their
feet. He whipped the knife down the stone. A life with no future.
12
ISAIAH WAS HALFWAY THROUGH SHARPENING THE KNIFE when he heard the approach of hoofbeats. He stood, deciphering the information. Two horses, more than likely Cole and Reese. Cole because he needed control. Reese because he was a peacemaker and his protectiveness toward his cousin took a different form than Cole’s. Dane struck Isaiah as a man who preferred to stay back and control from behind the scenes, hence his not coming along on this ride. Which was just as well. Two Camerons were enough with which to deal.
The Cameron brothers had the reputation of being a fighting team that was as lethal as it was impressive. Isaiah had had a taste earlier when he’d taken down Cole. It hadn’t been as easy as it should have been, seeing as Isaiah was a Reaper and Cole a human. However, the man had the reflexes of a cat, and if Addy hadn’t lunged forward at the moment she had and distracted Cole, he might have succeeded in getting free and the other brothers would have gotten off a shot.
Isaiah set the whetstone on the rail of the porch and stood. The front door slammed. Addy no doubt going out to meet her cousins. He would have preferred that she wait for him. Cousins or not, she should’ve waited for him regardless of who showed up. He was her bodyguard, but she was hell-bent on independence from her cousins and him. His beast snarled at the latter. Isaiah frowned. The beast’s possessiveness was getting out of hand.
Walking to the side of the house, Isaiah listened to the rumble of their voices, picking up the intonations while waiting on the words. All three speakers sounded tense. His beast rumbled its displeasure at Addy’s distress. Isaiah shot back a growl of his own. He could handle his woman’s problems. He didn’t need any help from
it
.
Son of a bitch, when had she become his woman? Isaiah strode along the side of the building, the turmoil inside matching the turmoil he was walking up on.
“I know what he is. I know who he is, and I still want him here,” Addy said in a tight voice.
“It’s not decent.” That was Cole.
“Neither are your Saturday trips to Dolly’s place but I don’t lecture you on them.”
“How the hell—” Cole cut off his words. “You know that’s different.”
Addy huffed, the way she did when she was confident of winning her point. “I know you’d like to think it is.”
“No decent woman lives with a man not her kin.”
That helpful tidbit was inserted by Reese. Addy had a response for that to. Isaiah was beginning to believe she always had a response. “You know what’s not decent? Me not being safe in my own home. What’s not decent is raiders breaking into
my
kitchen, disturbing
my
tea. What’s not decent is those men kidnapping
me
because of . . .” Her voice trailed off.
Isaiah was surprised Addy drew the line there, as mad as she had to be at Cole’s interference.
“Go ahead and say it,” Cole said, his tone tight. “It was because of me you were kidnapped.”
Addy’s response was too quick to be anything other that emotional.
“We don’t know that, Cole.”
Isaiah shook his head. It was a foolish response and would cost her her edge. Guilt was too powerful a weapon to throw away. She’d been right to hire him. She was too soft to be hard.
He cleared the building and, squinting against the setting sun, took in the scene with a glance. Cole and Reese sat on their horses in front of the small building, leaning on their elbows against their saddle horns, looking nonchalant, but everything from the set of their shoulders to the narrowing of their eyes said they were itching for a fight.
Isaiah cracked his knuckles. He wouldn’t mind giving it to them. They should have protected Addy better, done what was right rather than what she wanted. As he intended to do.
All three turned as he approached. It was an easy four-foot leap up from the ground, over the front porch rail, to where Addy stood. Easy for a Reaper. It would be harder for a human, but he wasn’t aiming to look human for the Camerons. He wanted them to know exactly what he was. A threat.
Cole’s eyebrows rose. Addy gasped. Reese nodded.
“That’s what I figured.”
Isaiah took a position a little in front of Addy.
“Just what did you figure?” he challenged.
“Nothing I wasn’t supposed to, I’m sure.”
“I won’t have it, Addy,” Cole cut in.
Addy put her hands on her hips and took a step forward, neatly sidestepping Isaiah. “What won’t you have, Cole?”
With a jerk of his chin, Cole indicated Isaiah. “You staying here with the likes of him.”
“It’s going to grate then, when I tell you that you don’t have any say in what I do.”
“I’m your cousin, your oldest living male relative.”
“But you’re not my father and not my brother, and even if you were, I’m not a girl. I get to make my own decisions.”
Cole’s hands fisted on the saddle but he didn’t take his gaze from Isaiah. “Not if I have you declared incompetent.”
Addy gasped. He wasn’t sure what Cole’s threat meant, but it put the fear of God into Addy, and that was enough for him. Isaiah tucked his fingers around her upper arm and pulled her behind him. She trembled beneath his touch. He sighed. If she would just let him do what she’d hired him to do, she wouldn’t be so shaken.
“Next time, stay where I put you.”
She shook her head, tears in her eyes. His beast roared in his head. His gums ached and the skin on his fingers burned. He slid his hand up her shoulder until he could tip her face to his, remembering the feel of her skin beneath his touch, remembering how she trembled then. How it had pleased him. How it had pleased them both.
“What is he threatening you with?”
She shook her head again.
“He’s calling her crazy,” Reese supplied.
Declared incompetent. That had an official sound to it.
“She’s not crazy.”
Cole snorted. “From the outside looking in, she is. If all her rituals weren’t enough, her behavior from before would seal the deal.”
“I can’t believe you’re doing this,” Addy snapped.
Cole shrugged. “I could say the same thing about you.”
Isaiah had the gist of it now. Cole was threatening to call Addy crazy so he could have control over her, which only went to prove that nobody could be trusted.
Except her,
the beast whispered.
Shut up.
“You want I should kill him now?” he asked Addy while keeping his gaze locked with Cole’s.
Addy didn’t answer right away. Cole’s saddle creaked as he shifted his weight.
“Are you going along with this?” she asked Reese.
He shook his head. “No—”
“Shut up, Reese.”
Reese continued as if Cole hadn’t interrupted. “But I can’t agree with you taking up with a man who’d kill your cousins over a minor disagreement.”
“Cole’s threatening to lock me up.”
“He’s frustrated.”
“So am I.”
This time it was Reese’s saddle that creaked, another betrayal of the emotion that swirled around in an incomprehensible influence. Isaiah let it flow. The emotion didn’t concern him. The men and their overprotectiveness did.
Reese tipped his hat back and motioned to Isaiah. “But you don’t have to go to extremes.”
To Isaiah’s surprise, Addy put her hand on his arm. Support? A strange warmth went thought him. Pleasure.
“You said you wanted me to have someone who would do anything for me, put me first. You always said I deserved that.”
What am I to you? A means to an end.
The warmth shattered, the void filled by a bitter self-mockery. At some point he’d learn.
“You do,” Cole countered, “but I also want a man who knows how to love you and this one is a stone-cold killer.”
Addy’s fingers stroked up and down his upper arm in tiny touches. Isaiah steeled himself against his response. She was just nervous.
“And you know this how?”
It wasn’t his imagination that she stepped in front of him. He covered her hand with his and removed it from his arm.
She cut him a glance and blushed. Cole glared. Reese frowned.
“Just a shot in the dark.”
“Do you want them dead?” he asked again.
A floorboard creaked as Addy shifted her weight, but still she didn’t answer. She might not want them dead, but the beast did. Cole was a threat. To her. To them.
Isaiah shook his head to clear it of images flashing dark then light, hazy then clear. Images of sharp instruments approaching, then being drawn away. And pain. Always pain where he loved. The images shattered in a moment of clarity in which all he could see was Addy putting her slender body between him and a threat.
Shit
. He couldn’t love her. Everything he tried to love died—the dog, the odd woman.
“Should I want you dead, Cole?” Addy asked in a very civil tone of voice.
“Hell, no.”
“Then what should I want?” she asked softly. Too softly.
“You should want what every woman wants. To be protected and loved by a man strong enough to hold you.”
Isaiah almost jumped when she turned and her blue eyes met his, seeing far more than he wanted, asking for something the beast wanted to give, but couldn’t. She reached out, palm up. Asking again.
He couldn’t. The beast snarled. He shook his head. Cole swore. The confidence in Addy’s eyes faded and her hand dropped to her side, but she held her ground. The woman was damn stubborn. Isaiah almost felt sorry for her cousins. They had no concept of how deep the Cameron blood ran in Addy’s veins. She could outstubborn the lot of them.
“I am protected,” Addy continued. “Just not by a man of your choosing.”
“His loyalty is questionable.”
“His loyalty is to me.”
Cole snorted. “That isn’t reassuring to me.”
Her braid rustled against the cotton of her dress as she shook her head. “Then you’ll have to adjust.”
“No.”
“You can’t stand the thought of anyone else having control over me. You never could.”
“I know where I found you.”
“So do I, but that’s the past, Cole, and it wasn’t your fault. Just like if anything happens to me here, it’s not your fault.”
“The hell it’s not! They took you because of me.”
Addy’s scent changed with her emotions, grew more acrid. She was afraid. Fear Isaiah knew how to handle. Catching her hand, he pulled her to his side.
“They won’t again.”
Cole’s gaze locked on his hand. Just to irk him, Isaiah slid his hand up to Addy’s shoulder. Cole reached for his gun. Isaiah smiled and pulled her closer. The gesture started out as provocation, but it ended as something more when Addy leaned into his side. She felt good there. Right.
“You have no say in this,” Cole countered.
“Addy gave me that right yesterday and as you’re upsetting her—”
“Like hell she gave you anything.”
Addy pushed at Isaiah’s side. It was surprisingly easy to keep her there. “Everything about her is my business and you won’t upset her anymore.”
“The hell I won’t.”
Cole might be used to that glare of his intimidating humans, but Isaiah was a Reaper. “You won’t.”
“You’re serious about being her protector?” Reese asked, interrupting the argument.
Isaiah didn’t look away from Cole. The man needed to understand where his control ended and Isaiah’s began. “Dead serious.”
“Good. Then you won’t mind a little help.”
“I don’t need help.”
“Everyone needs help.”
“What the hell are you up to, Reese?” Cole asked.
That was what Isaiah wanted to know.
Reese motioned to the surprisingly complacent Addy. “That’s our cousin, whether you like it or not, Cole, and we’re not going to just hand her care over to a stranger.”
“Uh-huh.”
“I trust him,” Addy interjected.
Cole’s “I don’t” was succinct and to the point.
Isaiah smiled at the Camerons. “Learn.”
Reese smiled right back. “Likely I will, as I’ll be staying to help out.”