Page 22 of Blood & Bond (The Bouchers #2)

Ambrose

“ A bsolutely fucking not,” Lucy shouted at her brother.

I grimaced and wondered if I should intervene. Charlie should’ve known better than to tell her in the middle of breakfast, but from the look on his face, he’d been counting on Lucy not wanting to make a scene.

Considering she’d risen to her feet so fast that her chair had crashed over backward, I thought he’d misjudged things a bit.

“I’ll be perfectly safe,” Charlie practically hissed at her, rising as he widened his eyes in the universal shut-the-hell-up look.

“Bullshit. These guys are frigging commandos, Charles! What the hell do they need you for?”

I tried to hide my wince as Charlie’s cheeks pinkened.

“I’m just going shopping with Erik,” Charlie said, standing up.

The stubborn, angry looks on their faces were incredibly similar.

“Oh, you’re just going to take a little grocery store trip,” Lucy mocked. “Right. After we just snuck back to the United States like a couple of spies, and now you’re just going to go flitting around in public?—”

Her words trailed to a stop, and I tensed as she realized exactly what Charlie’s role in the plan was.

“Fuck that,” she snapped, glaring around the table. “What the hell is wrong with all of you? Do you think Zeke would be okay with this?”

My father stiffened.

“Do not ,” Charlie ordered, his fists clenching on the tabletop.

“He made me promise him I’d get you back to his family, so you’d be safe ,” Lucy shouted. “What a frigging joke!”

“It’s not your decision! You have no idea what Zeke would want.”

“You’re a frigging idiot,” Lucy snapped, pointing at her brother. “He wouldn’t want this.”

“I think I would know better than you,” Charlie shot back.

Lucy started laughing, and the sound had me immediately pushing to my feet. The sound was raspy and broken and just shy of hysterical.

“Would you?” she asked, her voice flat. “Would you know better than me, Charlie? Because I’m pretty sure that you’ve been checked out since the day Zeke left.

I was the one who made you get out of bed.

I was the one who spoon-fed you when you refused to eat.

I was the one who had to carry you into the shower when you weren’t even capable of bathing yourself .

I practically carried you on my goddamn back from Europe, you ungrateful shit. ”

Charlie’s teeth were gritted so tight as he sneered at Lucy that I was worried for a moment that he was about to launch himself across the table.

“That’s enough,” my dad announced, his voice low.

“Oh, fuck you,” Lucy snarled, not even bothering to look at him.

“Baby,” I murmured, carefully laying my hand on her back. Things were about to devolve even more than they already had. All three of my brothers were staring at my mate, waiting to see what she would do, and my mother was silently crying.

“You’re not doing this,” Lucy announced firmly. “They can fuck off with their little rescue mission.”

“His mate is missing, Luce,” Charlie said, pointing to the end of the table where Finau was staring blankly at the plate in front of him.

“Then he can find her.”

“He needs help. He?—”

“He can fuck off too,” she said, her voice suddenly quiet. “They can all go straight to hell.”

“Lucy,” I said quietly.

“Don’t frigging touch me,” she hissed, sidestepping my hand. She looked at her brother. “Do not leave this house, or I swear to god, Charlie,”—she looked around the table—“I’ll burn the place down before I follow you.”

“Lucy,” he called as she stormed out of the kitchen.

“I’ll talk to her,” I said as he dropped back into his chair.

My father stopped me at the base of the stairs.

“Go careful, Ulf,” he warned.

“Thanks for the tip,” I replied, moving past him.

By the time I reached my rooms, Lucy had already grabbed her bag and was on her way back out.

“Get out of my way,” she ordered.

Instead, I stepped inside, closing and locking the door behind me.

“I’m not messing around,” she snapped. “I’m leaving.”

“Where are you going to go?” I asked, leaning back against the door.

“Who the hell cares? I brought my brother here so he’d be safe, not so you creeps could use him like some kind of bait.”

“Aren’t you forgetting something?”

“Don’t think so,” she replied mockingly.

“How far do you think you’d get before the heat got unbearable?”

Lucy froze.

“I’d guess a couple of miles,” I continued. “Maybe less.”

“Then I guess Charlie would have to take care of me for once,” she hissed.

“Charlie’s not going with you.”

“Yes, he will.”

“If you think that using him to lure them out was our first or even fiftieth choice, you haven’t been paying attention,” I replied. “He came to us and wouldn’t take no for an answer.”

“And you all thought, yeah, sure, we’ll use the weak, broken guy in our big plan ? What the hell is wrong with you?”

“Your brother isn’t weak or broken,” I bit out.

“You have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“What part of mates rarely survive the death of their other half didn’t you understand?

” I asked, taking a step toward her. “The fact that Charlie is still functioning? The fact that he’s making an effort to get to know our family?

The fact that he wants to do something for someone else…

someone he doesn’t even know? Your brother is the strongest person I’ve ever met. ”

“He’s still not being used as bait,” she screamed at me.

“He needs this,” I argued, my voice rising as well. “He needs to feel useful. He needs to feel like he’s doing something to stop the people who killed his mate! Why can’t you understand this?”

Lucy’s face was red with anger. She was practically vibrating with rage.

“If you let this happen, we are done ,” she spat out. Almost immediately, her back curved, and her arms clutched her stomach. “I will never complete the bond. I’d rather let us both burn alive.”

My head snapped back like she’d slapped me.

My ears rang.

The inferno in my chest roared.

I reached for the door handle behind me with shaking hands, barely able to flip the lock. I spun and threw it open, hurrying out of the room as I started to dry heave. Keeping one hand on the banister, I moved down the stairs as quickly as I could.

I needed to put as much space between us as I could manage. Every molecule of my body felt like it was screaming as I lurched through the living area toward the front door. I’d barely gotten it open when I heard chairs scraping back from the table.

“Follow him,” my dad ordered someone.

Then I was outside and half walking and half running toward the woods.

Gods, the pain was excruciating. Ripping off my shirt, I used it to mop off my face and the back of my neck. Just as I hit the tree line, I stumbled and landed on my knees. Even the breath in my lungs felt like it was burning. I couldn’t get enough air.

Every single instinct urged me to go back to the house.

“Ulf,” Beau called as he jogged up behind me. “Fuck.”

“Give me a minute,” I ordered, my own voice sounding unfamiliar.

Digging my fingers into the dirt, I dragged scorching air into my lungs and gagged.

“I’ll assume the conversation didn’t improve after you’d left,” he said awkwardly as he sat down a few feet away.

“You could say that,” I ground out, closing my eyes.

I’d never lost control so badly before. The moment she’d said she would never accept the bond, something inside me had snapped. I had to get away from her before I did something unforgivable.

“I understand why she’s angry,” Beau mused. “I’m not sure that using Charlie is a good idea.”

“Would you rather use Reese?” I snapped as the muscles in my back rippled and fire raced down my spine. I needed to go back in the house. Who knew what Lucy was doing in there?

I just couldn’t trust myself yet.

“Reese was never an option,” Beau replied flatly.

“What?”

“I said Reese was never an option.”

“Never an option for what?” I mumbled in confusion. Gods, why was he talking to me?

My heart felt like it was going to beat out of my chest.

She couldn’t leave me. I didn’t even think it would be physically possible.

But if she tried, would I be able to let her?

I wasn’t sure of that either. The logical side of my brain kept reminding me that mating bonds were sacred and only taken willingly, but thousands of years of instincts urged me to go back inside and start the blood exchange.

I wasn’t sure how long we stayed outside.

It felt like hours, but it could’ve been minutes.

When Beau realized that I wasn’t able to hold a conversation, he stopped talking and just sat with me in silence as I tried not to come out of my skin.

It wasn’t until Chance came jogging toward us that I had the strength to rise to my feet again.

“You need to get back inside,” he called. “Right now.”

“What’s wrong?” I grunted, the muscles in my back and arms so tight that my entire upper body felt like it was encased in cement.

“Lucy—”

He didn’t say anything else before I was hurrying toward the front door. If she was trying to leave, I had to stop her.

When I got back inside, the house was in chaos. Alice was ordering people around, Danny was talking over Chance as they tried to explain something to our dad, and Charlie was yelling.

“What’s wrong with her?” he said frantically. “Luce? What the hell is wrong?”

I found her on the stairs. As Charlie reached for her, she reared backward like she couldn’t bear for him to touch her.

“Baby,” I called, my voice raw.

“Ambrose,” she breathed.

When she turned her head, my legs turned to water.

Her eyes were so swollen that she could barely see out of them, and her face was wet with a mixture of tears and sweat.

She was curled up tightly on the bottom step, her heels to her ass and her arms tucked against her chest. Her bag was in a heap at the bottom of the stairs.

“It hurts,” she groaned, her teeth chattering as she rocked back and forth.

“Move,” Alice ordered Charlie, pulling him out of the way.

“Stop. She’s my sister,” he argued.