🐺💣🔪 #MY_BLACK_KNIGHT 🔪💣🐺
🎴Happen 44 (L)
As Produced By Sheriff Squinty
Theme: Off To The City
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“I didn’t know how to bring something like that up. You alre-ady had so much to deal with when you’d learned everything about me. I was waiting until a better time when you weren’t overloaded.” Gabriel looked away, clenching his jaw. “It was selfish not to tell you, now that I look back on it. p@rt of me was worried what you’d think of me. You alre-ady had enough reason to hate me.” His head swiveled back towards me. “I would have told you though. I promise.” He spoke gravely, sincerity oozing from his words.
I sighed. My Wolf was alre-ady begging me to forgive him. Honestly, I knew I had forgiven him for slee-ping with Eva. He hadn’t known about me at the time. It was disgusting, but I could accept it; it wasn’t in my nature to be unforgiving. I was just angry about how he’d handled it.
“And Will?” I pressed.
“I can’t help it, Skylar. I know I have no right. But I’m an Alpha male, dominant and possessive. The thought of another male tou-ching you makes me want to rip their head off.” My Wolf was basking in his possessiveness. I found it both irritating and flattering.
“You knew I was jealous of Eva. I told you about Will, I just wish you’d told me about her. I might have reacted differently if I had been told differently. The thought of you two….and what if she’d gotten pregnant?” I realized I was rambling now but all of my insecurities were rushing to the surface.
“Wolves that aren’t Mates have a much lower chance of reproducing, you know that. Her genes were not designed for me like yours are. Besides, it wasn’t like I didn’t use protec-tion. A child was the last thing I nee-ded with my bloodline.”
I felt yet another blus-h coming on as Gabriel spoke of my genes being made for his. It was true. Wolves had a very low chance of getting pregnant by someone who wasn’t their Mate. It was all orche-strated by Fate; Fate determined the best wolf to reproduce with.
“You’re right. I should have told you differently. If I could go back and change it, I would.”
I nodded, unsure what to say now. Once again, my Wolf was begging me to voice my forgiveness aloud. For the second time, I was struck by her depth of emotion for Gabriel. He was completely perfect to her. She wanted him unconditionally.
Honestly, she was in love with him. There would never be anyb©dy else for her.
This thought practically made me tremble. Love. It was an equally exhilarating and frightening concept. I stared up at Gabriel, feeling my nerve endings come alive as I realized he had taken a couple steps closer and was now a mere few feet from me. He was gazing at me intently, observing every inch of my face as if he desperately wanted to know what I was thinking.
“What else did she say to you?” Gabriel asked quietly. I instantly knew he was referring to Eva and I looked away. Her words had been humiliating, and I didn’t want to repeat them. “I could tell you were arguing before I arrived. Tell me what she said.”
I sighed, feeling the heat of embarras-sment un-der my skin, h0tter even than the traces of the fever that remained. It was going to be horrible to say the words again aloud.
“She just told me her opinion. She has a right to-”
“Skylar,” he growled impatiently and I sighed again.
“She told me that I’m weak, and insecure, and not worthy of an Alpha, and also not pretty.” My words were mumbled almost incoherently.
Gabriel growled, low in his throat. “None of that is true. She was speaking cruelly to you out of selfishness and you shouldn’t have listened.”
As was customary, I felt insecurity rushing to the surface. Eva had definitely been right about that p@rt. “Some of it is true, Gabriel. I’m sure she’s not the only one from your pack that thinks you deserve someone stronger as a Mate-”
“I don’t care what they think. You’re a lot stronger than you think, and you are mine.”
There was actually pride in his voice and I felt my heart flutter as my Wolf purred. “Lucky you,” I muttered, torn between feeling embarras-sed and completely elated at the way he spoke about me. I knew I was acting a bit immature and attem-pted to push my insecurities aside. I had been doing so well a couple of nights ago; if only I had access to the alcohol-induced br@very now!
Gabriel made a noise of frustration and stepped forward. I felt his strong hand gr-ab my chin and tilt my head up as he glared down at me. The breath left my lungs in a rush as I realized just how close we were, our faces less than a foot ap@rt. I could see every perfect detail of his features and the way his eyes were burning, whether with anger or de-sire, I didn’t know. My b©dy was heating up as every inch of me craved him.
“Do not talk about yourself like that,” He said firmly, although his voice was dee-per than usual and I thought I detected a husky edge to his tone. I was still sitting on the large boulder while he stood immediately next to me, staring down at my face ensnared in his hand.
I bit myl-ip, unable to speak in that moment. de-sire was pooling in my belly and I was pretty sure I was trembling as my Wolf urged me to close the distance between us.
Gabriel made a growling sound de-ep in his throat and I realized his burning eyes were fixated on my mouth as I bit myl-ip. Slowly, I let my eyes trail down to hisl-ips. In that moment I wanted him to k!ssme, in fact my entire b©dy was practically begging for it. I wanted to know how it felt to have his mouth on mine. Gabriel was still staring at me intently, and I could’ve sworn his grip on my chin ti-ght£ñed.
We were only inches ap@rt. His scent completely enveloped me and my lvst was increasing by the second. For a brief moment, I saw something flash throu-gh his expression and I thought he was going to k!ssme.
Then, all vestiges of emotion vanished and he abruptly dropped my chin and pu-ll-ed away. I stared after him, feeling completely bereft as he walked away. A lump rising in my throat, I looked down. I did not attempt to mask the hurt that was washing over me in waves. How could he do that to me? How could he just pu-ll away like that so easily? It had to be me. I had to not be very appealing to him. I knew it wasn’t normal for Mates to resist each other, yet Gabriel had done it on multi-ple occasions.
I felt a rush of bitterness rise to the surface and I couldn’t help but say something. “Eva must have been right about the attrac-tiveness thing, huh? I mean, it takes no effort for you to push me away while you welcomed her with open arms.” I knew my words weren’t fair but I was hurting and I couldn’t help but lash out. I almost felt like I had been rejected in some way.
Gabriel spun around, and to my surprise he looked furious. What right did he have to be furious?
“Are you kidding me, Skylar?” He snapped angrily. I blinked at him, unable to comprehend why he had gotten so angry so quic-kly. “You honestly think I’m not attra-cted to you, that I don’t want you?” His voice was nearly a snarl. “Have you ever st©pped to consider that I just have a s-en-se of self-preservation? Every time I t©uçh you, my Wolf just gets more attached to you! Yet, you haven’t even given me a fv¢king answer! You could decide to reject me tomorrow!”
I sat there, the reasoning behind his words dawning on me.
“Why would I do that to myself? Why would I do something that I KNOW will just make me want you more when you can decide tomorrow that you don’t want me? Worse, it’ll make your decision even ha-rder, when you alre-ady have enough to think about and you said you wanted to make up your mind without my influence!”
I was completely speechless, and then I felt a bur-st of shame. Gabriel was right. I was being incredibly selfish. I was expecting him to treat me like he was my Mate when I technically hadn’t even accepted him yet. He was just following my lead, and I was getting angry at him for it.
“I…..you’re right. I’m sorry. It’s just…” I vainly tried to find words so he would un-derstand where I was coming from. “My Wolf goes crazy when you’re so close. I’m not as strong as you and I can’t resist you easily. I guess it just seemed like I was nothing if you could push me away with so little effort.”
Gabriel ran a hand throu-gh his hair, closing his eyes momentarily as he got a grip on himself.
“re-sisting you is one of the ha-rd est things I’ve ever done,” he said throu-gh gritted teeth. “But until you make up your mind, I have to deal with it.”
Feeling ashamed still, I stared at the ground. I let a moment pas-s in silence so Gabriel could calm down a bit. He was right, and I was disgusted with myself for not thinking of how he must be feeling.
When I looked up and opened my mouth to apologize yet again, what I saw took me completely by surprise.
Gabriel had a glazed expression in his eyes as if he was mentally talking to someone, but the item clutched in his hand was not what I expected to see: Raziel’s large, snow-white feather. When had he gotten it? More importantly: was he communicating with Raziel throu-gh the feather?
My question was soon answered as Gabriel’s eyes re-focused on me, all anger drained from their depths.
“Raziel just contacted me. He said he found out something very important concerning the Ritual. We are meeting him in the closest town.”
“When?”
“Tomorrow.”
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Hall Of Supernatural Stories
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I awoke the next morning feeling a strange mixture of hope and apprehension. I wanted to think that Raziel had good news for us, or that he found some secret weakness of Cain’s, but knowing our luck we would learn something horrible today.
The tension between Gabriel and I was very fragile at the moment. After Raziel had contacted him, Gabriel and I returned to the main pack village before we p@rted ways, my Mate claiming he had some Alpha business to take care of. I wasn’t sure if he just wanted an excuse to get away from me or not. After all, Gabriel had opened up to me, which was something he was not accustomed to. Neither one of us really knew how to act now. Truthfully, I knew the pressure was on me. Gabriel had la-id out all of the possible consequences of our Mating and it was up to me to make the decision; he was just giving me space until I chose which path I wanted to follow.
Well, I knew which path I wanted to follow. My Wolf ached for our Mate and despite my complicated feelings, I knew a lot of my de-sire for Gabriel could not be blamed solely on my Wolf. I was trying to think things throu-gh logically like I always had. I possessed the same s-en-se of self-preservation Gabriel had referenced the night before. In this case, though, I was tem-pted to just throw all logic out of the way as my window of opportunity was closing. The Stone of Jacob, which Gabriel either carried with him or kept securely hidden in my house, was waning. Who knew how much longer it would last?
My thoughts a muddled, confused mess, I quic-kly got dressed and brushed my teeth, throwing my rebellious curls up into a ponytail. We were returning to the same town in which I had first come into contact with the vampires. Not exactly plea-sant memories, but at least Gabriel would be with me this time and it was the middle of the day. I was a bit confused as to why Raziel would risk coming to us, but I was sure he’d explain his reasoning upon his arrival.
I said a quic-k good-bye to my parents on my way out, tossing some feeble excuse over my shoulder as I closed the door behind me. I felt guilty lying to them but they couldn’t know anything about the Angel or the Ritual. They were in enough danger as it was, so I knew lying to them was the best thing to do in this scenario. Hopefully my father wouldn’t grill me about it later. For now, he was just glad I was getting out of the house, since my fever was nearly gone. I wondered when he would bring the whole ‘Affinity’ issue up. So much had been going on that I hadn’t had time to dwell on the changes my b©dy was going throu-gh.
Gabriel was waiting near my front porch, looking slightly impatient as he stood there, tall and imposing as usual. He had on a ti-ght-fitting white t-shi-t that only accentuated his broad torso and made me look away before I blatantly ogled him. I had embarras-sed myself enough recently.
“Sorry, woke up a bit late,” I mumbled, not wanting to explain how I had spent many minutes daydreaming about him this morning.
“Let’s go,” was his curt reply, and I inwardly sighed. Typical Gabriel. He had opened up and shown me a different side of him, and now he felt expo-sed and vulnerable so he was shutting down.
*
As Produced By Sheriff Squinty
*
‘I can practically become a psychologist if I keep up the an-alysis,’ I thought to myself dryly as we meandered towards the forest. We were running in Wolf form today since the city was such a short distance away. As we entered the fringe of greenery and prepared to Shift (away from each other’s line of sight, of course), I faintly wondered where Will and Eva had gotten to. Had Will had any luck persuading the she-wolf to accept him when she was so enamored with MY Mate? The thought of her aggravated me so I pushed it aside. It felt like I had so many issues in my life at the moment, and I could only hope I would be able to manage them all at once.
Perhaps this was what it was like to be Luna.
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Unsurprisingly, there was scarce conversation between Gabriel and I on our way into town. My Mate could directly mind-link to me now if he wanted to, but he seemed set on avoiding it. After hearing his reasoning the previous night I supposed I couldn’t blame him.
“Where are we meeting him?” I finally asked after we’d Shifted back to human form and gotten dressed. We were just inside the shelter of the trees, after which the ground sloped down to meet the outSk-irts of the city.
“Some local coffee shop in the middle of town.”
I almost wanted to laugh at the absurdity. “We’re meeting an Angel in a coffee shop?”
“It’s more inconspicuous to blend in, and it’ll be loud enough that we aren’t overheard.”
I shrugged. It still felt strange. “Why did he want to meet in town, anyways?”
“I’m not sure.”
That worried me. Surely Raziel had a reason for wanting to meet amidst the mas-s of humans as opposed to a more secluded location.
“So, you can use the feather to talk to him?”
We were ma-king our way down the slope towards the buildings on the edge of the city. Gabriel glanced at me out of the corner of his eye, likely exasperated by all of my questions.
“Yes.”
“Do you have it with you now?”
“I had no way to carry it in wolf form.”
“When exactly did you get it?”
“I had Eli bring it to me when I met up with him two days ago. I s-en-sed that Raziel was trying to contact me.” Gabriel must have seen my perplexed look because he elaborated further. “He used to be able to mind-link me without the feather, but his Angelic power has waned, so now when he’s contacting me I ba-rely s-en-se his pres£nce in my mind. I actually have to be tou-ching the feather to directly talk to him.”
I glanced down at my hands, feeling the sudden urge to tell Gabriel the truth. After all, he’d finally revealed everything to me, I might as well fess up.
“I alre-ady knew you had a feather. I went exploring one day and found the box in your closet.” I felt my cheeks reddening because of the confession and avoided his gaze. There was a chance Gabriel would be furious with me, I knew. He probably didn’t condone snooping about in his room.
I peeked at him in my peripheral vision. His expression had ha-rd ened, unsurprisingly.
“And you didn’t say anything because….?” He asked, clearly trying to mask his irritation.
“You were alre-ady pissed at me half of the time. I didn’t want to make it worse.”
Gabriel let a sigh, turning his head slightly to observe me. He was silent for a moment as he examined my expression. “Had you put the pieces together alre-ady when I took you to Raziel?” He seemed disconcerted by the thought and I quic-kly shook my head.
“Not at all. I never would’ve guessed….” I trailed off. Saying it aloud still felt unreal. My Mate had holy blood, and it was unnerving to think about. Eva didn’t know about his Angelic blood, I was pretty sure, but I knew it would have only reinf0rç£d her ideals about me being ‘unworthy’ for Gabriel. I hurriedly pushed thoughts of the redhead away, because despite my conversation with Gabriel the night before, I wasn’t quite ‘over’ the whole t©pic.
“What’s the locket for?” I couldn’t resist adding the question.
He tossed me a sharp glance, and for a second I thought he wouldn’t bother replying, but with a small sign Gabriel relented. “I’m not sure. Raziel brou-ght it to my after my mother…left. He think she stole it from Cain. I haven’t noticed any special properties other than the fact that it irritates my skin.” Judging by his tone of finality, Gabriel didn’t want to discuss any more issues relating to his mother.
Several minutes pas-sed in silence. We made our way along the edge of a shopping center, walking casually as if we hadn’t been beasts running throu-gh the trees just moments before. If anyone had seen us a few minutes ago, giant wolves with clothes tied to their ankles and shoes clutched in their mouths, I was sure nob©dy would’ve believed it. Humans were funny that way.
I wasn’t sure how Gabriel knew where we were going but I trotted along obe-diently as we cut throu-gh a few side streets before finding one of the main roads of the city.
“Are you scared of me, Skylar?”
Gabriel’s quiet question nearly st©pped me in my tracks. I turned to face him as we strode throu-gh a narrow alleyway, and I’m sure my surprise was clearly visible on my face.
“Um…” I responded, caught off guard.
“You said you were worried to tell me you went throu-gh my things, because I might have been angry with you,” he elaborated, although I’d figured that’s what set him on this train of thought.
I hadn’t considered it in a long time. On the night of the Meeting when we first met, I had truthfully been terrified. I had thought of him as the formidable enemy Alpha, so of course I’d had my reservations.
Now, Gabriel was still rou-gh around the edges, short-tempered, brusque, and intimid@t!ng. Yet, un-derneath all of that, I had seen true emotion. And despite all of our arguments he had never hurt me, physically at least. My Wolf and I knew Gabriel would never l@ya f!nger on us.
“Not exactly. Not the same way as before,” I finally answered slowly, aware that Gabriel had a pained expression on his face because I was taking so long to answer. He didn’t look satisfied by my answer, so I continued. “I used to think of you as an enemy Alpha. Not anymore.”
“What reason would you have to be scared now, then?”
I looked down, my cheeks starting to burn. The truth was, I was scared now because of my feelings, and I was scared of the possible consequences of Mating with him. I was nervous about how Gabriel would act if I decided to accept him as my Mate. There were many things to be worried about.
“I’m not really scared of you, just the situation, I guess.” It was true. Gabriel was intimid@t!ng-as a person but I really had toughened up when I got to know him. His brevity and cold mannerisms didn’t deter me quite like they used to. I was becoming accustomed to his difficult personality.
Gabriel made a noncommittal noise in his throat and, moments later, directed us to a coffee shop across the street. Once again, the absurdity of Raziel in a coffee shop struck me, before I realized that he had been on Earth a very long time and probably acted like a human all the time to blend in. I wasn’t human either, yet I had attended high school and gone clubbing. Humans outnumbered us on such a mas-sive scale that it was best just to act like one.
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#Tobecontinued….