She urges me toward the stairs, and I look over the banister but don’t see him. Clutching the pants to hold them up, I slink down the steps.
The TV is still on, and the soft murmurs of voices fill the living room. I stick my head around the corner to see if he is in the huge room, but he isn’t there.
I let out a breath of relief and turn around to leave, but jump when I find him standing directly behind me. I nearly have a heart attack. He moves so silently, like a ninja. I didn’t hear him at all.
“I sent someone to get you some clothes. Come, tea is ready,” he prompts, turning away and walking off.
“See, he could have killed you before you even noticed, and yet, he didn’t. Maybe he isn’t that bad.” Sierra mocks me and my inability to trust everyone who crosses our path.
“That’s what mom and dad thought when they let those three men in our camp. Look how that turned out. They are dead, and I am alone,” I tell her.
I’m almost sure Sierra is set on sabotaging every move I want to make, because she doesn’t agree with my words, and instead follows the smell of what he is cooking.
As I step into the kitchen, he bends over and gets something out of the oven. “There are drinks in the fridge if you’re thirsty,” Andrei lets me know, but keeps his back to me.
It irritates me that he knows I am no threat to him or anyone else for that matter. I would never turn my back to anyone. No one can be trusted.
“You can sit down,” he instructs, turning around to face me. His eyes dart down to where I am clutching his pants, trying to keep them up. “Sit please, talk, anything instead of staring at me like I am about to kill you,” he sighs, pointing to the dining table.
I scurry over to it and sit down in the chair facing him.
“How old are you?” He asks as he busies himself, grabbing some plates down from the cupboards. I remain silent and bite my bottom lip. “It’s your age, I can’t hurt you by asking questions.” His voice is a mere whisper, but I still hear him.
“Twenty-three, I think,” I reply slowly, and he nods.
“I’m twenty-eight,” he tells me in the most casual tone I’ve heard him use so far. “You had a mate?” he asks.
Barely, I think to myself. That was over as quickly as I met him. Since this isn’t something I want to discuss with a complete stranger, I say nothing and, instead, look around the kitchen.
“How long were you with those people?” Andrei catches me off guard with another question as soon as the silence becomes uncomfortable.
“Too long,” I whisper, looking out the windows. I tried them already, they have no opening and are made of perspex. I have checked all the windows I could find on the top floor, but I will try my luck downstairs too, once Andrei falls asleep.
“Why don’t you have windows?” I ask him, and his eyes dart to them. “So, people can’t get in or out?” I mutter.
“My last mate was killed because people got in the house, so I built this place. It is safer,” Andrei explains and walks over to me.
I jump up from the chair, falling and hitting the ground behind me.
“Uh,” He clears his throat, his head turning upwards. “Your pants,” he adds, and I look down before scrambling to get them up my legs. I move to grab the fallen chair.
“I won’t hurt you. Here, eat,” he says, sliding a plate to me.
Andrei places down a plate for himself too before he walks to the fridge and opens it. He grabs something, turns around and hands me a bottle of water. He waves it at me, and I take it quickly, watching as he sits down before doing the same.
Sage
He uses a fork to cut up his food, while he gives me a knife to use.
I wonder if he did it so I wouldn’t be worried, or was he genuinely unconcerned about my ability to injure him with it?
I pick up the knife, and he stares at my hand for a second, but quickly looks down at his plate again, using his fork to cut his own food. I cut a piece off and pop it in my mouth.
“Kat said you had a mate,” he muses without any context.
It isn’t a question, more a statement. I nod, chewing slowly, keeping my gaze focused on him, just in case.
“I had a mate. Her name was Angie. She was killed during a pack war,” he adds. I tilt my head as his eyes flicker to his beast. His hand clenches tightly around the fork for a second, before his grip loosens.
“Is that why there are no women here? I can’t smell she-wolves,” I point out, and he looks up, shocked that I actually answered him.
“Yes, our warriors were away helping Kat’s pack. We didn’t think the other pack would attack mine. They were all killed, including the elderly and the children. Unfortunately, we didn’t get back in time,” Andrei whispers the last part.
He feels guilty about what happened to his pack, and I can’t blame him. I feel guilty for the death of my own mate. Not only that, but I never got to know him, we never had a chance to come up with our happily ever after, but I was guilty because he died trying to save me.
“Your mate? He never marked you,” he points his finger at my neck. Andrei’s eyes don’t leave the bare skin that is supposed to bear the mark of my mate. However, as I look at him, I spot the faint outline of his mark scarring his own neck.
“He didn’t get a chance. They killed him when they realized,” I admit, shrugging as if the fact doesn’t bother me. As if the memory doesn’t haunt me every minute of the night and every moment of my waking hours.
“How long ago?” He asks.
“A couple months, a pack east of here. They stumbled across him, but he was nearly dead.”
“What do you mean? Near Kat’s pack?” He perks up, as if I just said something outrageous.
“Yeah, the same scent, so I assume he must have been one of her pack members. We were camping just outside the pack borders. They couldn’t find food and set up there. We could hear wolves fighting and then it died down. They went searching to see if they could find anything left. They thought it might have been a bear or something to eat. Instead, they brought him back, he was barely breathing and was torn to pieces.” I stare at the wall, recalling the memory.
“So that’s how he died? He was dead before he could mark you?” Andrei asks, and I shake my head.
“No, I recognized him instantly. My wolf kept talking to his wolf. She tried so hard to keep his wolf calm and alert. His wolf said his Alpha attacked him. When they fell asleep, I licked him, trying to heal him, and he eventually woke up. The rogues wanted to use him as ransom, but when he realized I was his mate he tried to break the chain. They woke and killed him.”
“I can’t picture Ezra attacking his own pack members. He isn’t like that, ” Andrei says.
Maybe that Alpha guy is his friend, and Andrei feels it’s his responsibility to defend his friend’s honor? After all, Andrei is an Alpha too, and those tend to be close. At least, I think so.