Page 21 of What I Should Have Felt (Anchors and Eagles #4)

COLETTE

S hiny metal flickered beneath the moonlight as the remaining two men who didn’t hold either of my parents raised their own knives and spun in a slow circle. My dad thrashed against the chokehold, but his captor wasn’t as distracted as he’d thought.

“Don’t,” his captor warned, and a sliver of blood seeped from the fresh cut upon my father’s throat.

But my mind was focused on something else. Did the Rougarou even know how to use a gun? The man was just shot. A creature of the night, one cursed by the moon, wouldn’t use a gun, would it?

Behind the line of attackers loomed a shadow. I squinted at the darkness as this thing moved with a fluidity that seemed otherworldly. Smooth and haunting, powerful and in control, the creature stalked forward with death by its side.

Not a leaf crunched beneath its footsteps as it emerged from the tree line .

It raised its chin, and that same mask flashed in the silver light of the full moon. A shiver stole down my spine, replacing the fear with something else entirely. A trace of adrenaline? Maybe. Excitement? Possibly. Whatever it was pushed a smirk upon my face.

Two men lunged at the creature, brandishing their knives. It didn’t even flinch as the first one dove in with a wild slice. The blade hissed through the air. The creature leaned out of the way and countered with a punch against the assailant’s ribcage.

With a grunt, he doubled over. The second man latched a hand around the Rougarou’s right wrist, stopping the second jab. Fabric twisted in the man’s grip, and the creature’s arm slipped through the sleeve.

“Colette!” my mom shouted, and I briefly glanced away from the fight. The two men dropped their knives from my parents’ throats and darted toward the single creature. Mom and Dad raced toward me, freed by a thing of legends.

“Let’s go!” my dad instructed as my eyes latched back on the fight.

Azelie raced out from behind me. My mom threw an arm around her shoulders as they ran to the left.

But I lingered. For just a moment. The Rougarou twisted the sleeve of its jacket around the throat of the man who had ripped it off in the first place.

My heart stopped. Shock jolted through me like a bolt of lightning, stilling every sound of the fight. Nothing moved. Nobody moved. Everything froze as if I’d hit the pause button on the remote in the middle of a movie.

This was no creature. This was no Rougarou.

I knew those tattoos. I knew that arm .

I knew him .

“Ford?” I whispered.

Time resumed, and he tightened the noose around his attacker’s neck.

Another man drove my knife into his trap. He grunted and stumbled forward. Tightening the sleeve even more, I heard a small pop, and the man he’d choked crumpled.

“Colette!” my mom shouted.

Ford’s eyes flew my way as another man landed a blow to his side. As if concrete had hardened around my feet, I was unable to move. In a rather beautiful movement, he unwrapped the noose from around the one guy’s neck and caught the wrist of the man diving in for a second punch.

He twisted, throwing the assailant into another brute. With his free hand, he ripped the knife from his trap and stabbed the blade into the eyeball of the man he’d caught in his jacket.

The squelch roared my body back to life. But instead of sprinting toward my family, I raced toward the fight where the final two men remained.

Nobody stabbed Ford but me.

Especially with my own knife.

Ford unwound the jacket from the screaming man’s wrist and shoved his arm back into the sleeve. He ripped the blade out of the eye and plunged it into the side of the neck of his incoming attacker.

I tore across the gravel road just as Ford’s eyes met mine.

Red? From this distance, I wasn’t sure what color they were, but I swore they were red when he passed me in the hall and broke down the door to save Azelie .

Ford shook his head, removing the bloodied blade and jabbing it again in quick succession. Blood pulsed across his jacket with every beat of the man’s heart. Ford had hit his target. That man would bleed out in a couple of seconds.

He dropped the body and pointed at my family as the final man raced at him.

I slowed. I should listen.

As if peeling Velcro apart, I turned to face my family. That is where I should be going. I should be racing over to them and disappearing into the woods. That was where the Rougarou wanted me. I mean Ford. I mean…

I shook my head.

My family. My daughter.

Right.

Spinning on my heel, I sprinted toward the people who were waiting for me. My mother had her hands clamped over Azelie’s eyes, the sheer fright plastered on her face visible from here. They would all need therapy. Even Azelie.

My lungs burned, and the taste of iron tingled on my tongue as I finally caught up with them.

I would need therapy.

If that was really Ford…

The world blurred as we ran in a group toward the cabin hidden in the forest. The one place that O’Connor didn’t know about. One place he couldn’t send his cronies to. How many would he even have left to send after Ford had finished with them ?

My brows loosened upon my face as it hit me.

Ford was back. I was safe. He was protecting me.

I could finally relax. I was no longer alone.

Everything I once felt for him came rushing back in.

The guilt left. The frustration and rage over him leaving me left.

What I should have felt all along came trickling in like a gentle bubbling brook.

An ill-timed smile crept upon my lips. He’d known I’d be pissed if he tried to take care of me.

At least at first, when he returned. That was why he was pretending to be the Rougarou.

That witty, intelligent man still found a way to take care of me even when I was too hard-headed to see I needed it.

And it all suddenly made sense. The fights that just…somehow disappeared and ended overnight while growing up. That was him. It had to have been.

All this time… He’d never stopped.

What an asshole I’d been.

I paused and braced against a tree trunk as my family continued to jog ahead of me. The world was quiet. My head was quiet. For the first time in years, since Liam passed, I felt a surge of overwhelming…gentleness. I could be tender again. I could be the woman Ford had always made me feel like.

I could—No, we could start over. Starting something new, having these feelings of desire for Ford was okay. Liam would want me to be happy. I deserved to be happy.

My family slowed their pace to a walk, and Azelie glanced over her shoulder.

I gave her a reassuring smile. My secret was still a hurdle to jump.

Admitting to Ford that I was wrong, that I was sorry, was something I would need to do.

All I could do right now was hope that he’d forgive me and give us a chance.

There was always the possibility that he wouldn’t want me once he found out I’d kept Azelie from him. There was always a possibility that he would lose all feelings for me. And there was, of course, still the issue of my parents. And O’Connor.

I groaned to myself and pursed my lips. Why? Had he and I not been through enough already?

He was worth it. Plus, there was something about him wearing that mask… Fighting those bad dudes… My stomach swirled warm as images of him bathed in shadows and moonlight danced through my mind.

Wait. No. He’d killed somebody. Several somebodies.

Somebodies who came after me and my family.

Somebodies who came after Azelie. A somebody who tried to…

All right, yes. I was allowed to find his controlled, protective rage fucking attractive.

Because while I knew I could fight, not having to was a nice change.

Because I finally wasn’t the one who had to carry all of that burden. I pulled my bottom lip into my mouth and grinned as I realized I was going to keep another secret to myself. The fact that I knew he was pretending to be the Rougarou.

Time to entice him into something that had me weak at my knees. Giddy. Excited. And yes, aroused. Those were the top three things I was feeling right now.

Oh, fuck. I needed to see someone about this.

And then it hit me. Hold on. Since when did Ford know how to fight like that? That wasn’t just backyard, teenage fights where you grabbed hair and looked like fucking idiots. No, that was…controlled. Calculated. Purposeful and deliberate.

“Damn it,” I muttered to myself and exhaled.

“What was that?” my mom shouted.

I shot off the tree. Shit, I’d totally forgotten about them. “Uh, nothing!” I replied and jogged the distance between us.

“Well,” my dad said once I’d joined them. The silhouette of the cabin sat in the distance behind my parents as Azelie pushed off my mom and wrapped her arms around my waist. “Where are we going to stay?”

My mom closed her eyes. “We can’t go back home. They—They—” Her voice broke as a tear slid down her cheek, and my dad pulled her into his body.

We couldn’t stay at the cabin. There was no place to sleep. Nothing but a kitchen and living room. I chewed on the inside of my cheek as a fleeting thought danced through my mind that I just knew they would hate.

Azelie tapped my arm, and I glanced down at her. Her eyes darted to my parents, who were consoling each other. She looked back at me and raised her brows. “What about Ford?” she whispered.

“What?” I hissed through my teeth.

She pulled her shoulders up to her ears. “I’m just saying. You trusted him to come pick me up, and you have to admit, he’s pretty intimidating looking. His family is going through the same thing we are, and if they haven’t been hit yet, they’re next. Unless…”

“Unless we’re all there. That’s a lot of numbers,” I finished for her.

She nodded .

“You’re way too smart for your age,” I added and studied her a bit longer.

She’d had the same thought I had, and it was the most logical conclusion. Even if she had no idea that it was Ford who had already protected us as the Rougarou. Even if my parents hated the idea that this would also provide protection to the Thibodeauxs, it was the best idea.

“Mom, Dad, I know where we should go,” I bluntly stated and dug my phone out of my pocket.

“Where?” they asked simultaneously.

I simply glanced up at them as I tapped the contact icon for Ford’s number. They were not going to like this at all.