Page 69 of Fighting for Her Heart

“We can’t leave Nora behind.” Squaring his shoulders, Axe glares at me. “She is Ember’smother. My mother-in-law. I will not leave here without her.”

Fuck.

I draw a deep breath. Axe is right. If we don’t wait for Nora—rescue her, if it comes to that—Ember will never forgive us.

Chapter Twenty-One

Ember

I squeeze shut my eyes,trying to listen for Zuben’s heart beat, his breathing, any movement at all.

I try holding onto Mom’s amulet, wondering if I can use magic to help my vampiric powers somehow, but that doesn’t help at all, and I almost want to laugh at myself for thinking it might.

Over the past few days, we’ve played our sexy game of hide and seek and fuck every night, and my ability to find Zuben when he’s at a distance has improved, but it’s still far from perfect. Probably because I’m super distracted with worry.

It’s been three entire days—seventy-two hours and counting—since Mom left with Ryker and Axe, and we haven’t heard a word. Zuben and I have talked about it ad nauseam, but we both agree that it’s too dangerous for either of us to go searching for them, even though not doing so is killing me.

The second day they were gone, Zuben’s reassurances were solid, but even his nerves are showing now.

Thinking about how Zuben’s anxiety about the others is affecting him, I draw a long breath to help me focus, and soon the sound of his heartbeat thumps into my head. Heading toward the sound, I rush through the trees. But then the sound starts to grow fainter again.

Stopping, I turn around.

From wherever he’s hiding, not only can I hear Zuben’s elevated heartbeat, I can also hear the rush of his blood and smell his delicious and distinctive scent, tinged with slightly more adrenaline than normal. He can’t hide his nerves from me no matter how hard he tries.

Doubling back, I enter the small clearing that holds the well we emerged from when we escaped that dungeon. Living in the cave seems like a lifetime ago now, even though it’s less than a month since our escape.

The trees in the forest are bare, but I don’t feel the need for a winter coat. My vampiric body’s ability to regulate temperature is so different than when it was human. Actual dates long ago lost meaning to me, but I realize that, not only must have we missed Thanksgiving, Christmas must be coming up soon. After so many Christmases alone, I can’t bear the thought of facing another if we’re not all together.

Today. Surely Ryker, Axe and Mom will come back today.

I walk past the well. The vibrations and sounds I’m sensing from Zuben change. I stop. I know where he is.

Leaping up, I land on the edge of the well.

Below me, Zuben is clinging to a rock near the top, grinning.

“That took you an exceptionally and inexcusably long time,” he says, trying to sound like he’s scolding me. “Perhaps you have not earned your reward.”

“Finding it hard to hold on?” Dropping to sit on the edge of the well, I tap one of his hands with my shoe.

“Not at all.”

Before I can take a full breath, Zuben leaps out of the well, picking me up on his way past, and we land several yards across the forest. Pressing me back against the trunk of a large beech tree, he kisses me passionately.

My leg lifts to wrap around him, pulling his body in tighter, and I moan into his lips as I reap my reward for completing this round of hide and seek.

He hardens against me as my body slides against his, craving more friction. I’m too short to feel the pressure of his hardness directly on my sex, and consider jumping up to put both legs around him, but he backs away.

“It soon will be dawn,” he says tightly. “We must get you inside.”

“Insidesounds good to me.” I grin. “But let’s check the road one more time first.”

Nodding, he takes my hand and we quickly move to the edge of the property and then check the length of the road several times, finally stopping at the end of the laneway.

On the very slim chance that Ryker or Axe came back without Nora, they wouldn’t be able to find their way on to the property without her. I hate thinking that Mom might not return with them, but not as much as I hate the idea that the men might be stuck out on the road, unable to get to me.

Zuben believes these checks of the road are unnecessary—that it’s highly unlikely that the three of them won’t return as a group—but he does these checks with me at night, and on his own during daylight hours.