The Maverick Pride Tales - Chapter 83: Chapter 83

“They wanted you,” Michael said, his voice an earthy growled that sent shivers of awareness rolling through Kylie.
“Yes,” she confessed, and closed her eyes on the wave of nausea that followed.
“My mother was jealous and angry at being humiliated in front of her circle. She told them they could all have their turn with me if I survived. Then, she attacked.”
“Your mother attacked you?”
His voice was low, almost a whisper, but she could feel the tightly leashed fury he was holding onto inside his softly spoken words. Kylie merely nodded before continuing to tell her sad little tale.
“She broke my arm, and my jaw, mangled my hand, dislocated my shoulder. Hell, I think she almost killed me. Somehow, I got the upper hand. I knocked the wind out of her. While her Queen’s Guard tended her, I ran. Crawled out of the pit and made it to my car. I put it in gear, but before I peeled out of there, I heard her roar, ordering my death. I never drove so fast. But I got out of there and I have never looked back.”
The silence in Hunter’s office was deafening. Kylie knew the laws of Shifters were complicated, sometimes brutal, and terrible. If her old Pride wanted her back, something had to have happened. She closed her eyes, waiting for the ax to fall.
“I want to thank you, Kylie, for sharing that with us,” Uncle Uzzi said, while the others in the room did their best to calm their agitated beasts.
She knew enough of the Maverick Pride to understand this story would horrify them. Their world was so much different than hers. So much prettier, safer, and kinder than where she’d been raised.
“Do you know what happened to your mother after you left?”
“No, but I assume she is after me again.”
“Actually, I am not sorry to inform you that your mother had been killed by those same rogues she took into her Pride shortly after your escape,” Uncle Uzzi stated to the sound of reverberating growls across the room.
Kylie could hardly believe it.
Her mother was dead.
“Then who is after me?”
“This might be hard to hear,” Hunter said, stepping forward. “You see, Kylie, most of the Pride fled after your mother’s death. The remaining streak brought in more rogues and scoundrels, outcasts of other Prides. Under the Sharp Claw Pride title, they have remained part of the Shifter Council. Now, these males have been fighting each other for control ever since. They have gone through several leaders in the last few years alone.”
“This is true,” confirmed Uncle Uzzi.
“You see, dear, I was contacted by someone from the inner circle of the new Sharp Claw Pride’s Neta just the other day. A Tiger Shifter by the name of Waylon Pitt, Jacob’s younger brother. He has control now, well, for the time being. He called me to find you, Kylie.”
“Waylon?” she asked, shuddering as a fresh memory came rushing back to her.
The bearded man had been older than her by at least twenty years. He’d given off a bad vibe, or so she had thought the first time she’d laid eyes on him. He was not like his older brother, the man her mother had first chosen to mate. Waylon was nasty and cruel, always leering whenever her mother had made her sit with them during meals and runs.
The worst was the way he smelled, like a mixture of the most offensive body odor, sickly sweat, and urine. Being a Shifter, she had no idea how he could stand to be near himself. She had no respect for the foul male, and no desire to be hunted by him either.
“How close is he to finding me?”
“He gave me the name of a town where he thought you were staying. Said I should look for you at Maverick Point, and that he wanted to employ my service since he believes you are his mate.”
“No! I mean, what did you tell him?”
“I told him to give me a week, and that I would get back to him.”
“I have to go. I have to get my things,” Kylie mumbled, trying not to panic.
Waylon thinks I am his mate. No! He just wants to use me.
“No, you can’t leave!” Michael barked.
“What? What do you have to say about it?”
Kylie narrowed her eyes and turned, facing the man she’d been doing everything in her power to avoid for months, and all for this very reason.
Michael Turner might be good to look at, but he didn’t know what those men were like. No honorable Shifter could ever imagine.
They were scum. Low lives who wanted to use her, break her for their own amusement. To hold her like a prize to rule over the Pride her own mother had run into the ground.
“I have plenty to say,” he growled.
“No, you don’t. And I need to go,” she said, and made to move around him, but he blocked her path.
“Where will you go that’s safer than here?” Michael demanded.
“Don’t you get it?” she yelled, crying now where she’d not shed a tear for so long. Angrily, she wiped at her face.
“I can’t bring them here. You don’t understand what they are. Besides, this is my problem, it has nothing to do with you,” she said.
Kylie’s eyes held his for the first time in—well, ever—and she swore sparks of electricity sizzled between them.
Her stomach clenched and beads of sweat began to form on her brow.
Oh fuck. Oh no. Not now.
Mating fever. She had heard of it, and she could not be sure, but something was hitting her and hitting her hard. Her nipples tightened painfully, her sex clenching on air.
Fuck. She could just ignore it. She had to.
Her she-Tiger growled and hissed, the beast at odds with her human half. It felt strange to fight with her inner animal. After all, she was the only one who’d ever been there for her for years.
Mate, the she-Cat insisted.
No.
She would not acknowledge her beast’s mournful roar. She couldn’t afford to think about that. Kylie was not meant for happily-ever-afters. The best she could do was survive.
“Kylie—”
“It’s not your concern, Michael,” she growled, refusing to let her body rule her mind.
She ignored the next wave of cramping. If she went into heat maybe some other male could⁠—
No.
She already knew she could never take another to bed.
Dammit.
Why now? She wanted to scream, but she had no time for self-indulgences like that.
Waylon knew where she was. He and his men had hunted her all the way north to Maverick Point. And when they found her, well, the bastard would drag her back to South Carolina like a prize. Once there, they would fight over her like a juicy steak.
One thing she knew for sure, Kylie was never going back there. She would die first.
“Is that what you think? It’s none of my business?”
“That’s right,” she returned.
This time Michael was the one who scoffed. She couldn’t blame him. She’d treated him badly, and she knew it. But he was young, educated, good-looking. He could find someone else. Someone who could give him things she couldn’t.
Like peace.
Kylie refused to bring blood and violence to his door, to any of their doors. This Pride had given her sanctuary, but now it was time to go.
“Children!” Uncle Uzzi clapped his hands to get their attention.
“Now, Kylie, there is a better way to stop the Sharp Claw from holding any claim on you. You see, Waylon is not only saying you are his mate. He is appealing to the Council saying you were stolen from them when you were underage⁠—”
“What?! He is crazy! Besides, what better way could there be? I have to leave. Period.”
“Shh, it is not your turn to talk, dear,” Uncle Uzzi grunted, shaking his finger and blue sparks of magic sizzled in the air.
Kylie looked at Michael then, and they both turned to face the only Witch in the room. Uncle Uzzi was formidable, she would give him that. Seeing the older Witch wearing a wickedly satisfied smirk had chills running up Kylie’s arms.
Uncle Uzzi glanced once at the Neta as if waiting for approval before he continued to address the room.
“Well, it seems my talents can come into play here after all. As you all know, I have helped some members of your Pride find their mates⁠—"
“What are you saying?” Kylie interrupted.
“First, if you think I am going to let you—the woman who many of my female clients’ are raving about as their new favorite lingerie designer—walk away without a trace, you are mistaken, my dear,” Uzzi began, ignoring the groans and closed eyes of the men in the room.
Even big boys couldn’t handle talking about a woman’s underwear, Kylie thought and snorted.
Pussies.
“As I was saying,” Uncle Uzzi commanded the attention of the room. “Those rogues only want you because you remain free, unmarked and unmated.”
“I know,” Kylie said. “They only want to mate me to better control the Pride,” she said, revolted at the very idea.
“Yes,” nodded Uncle Uzzi.
She had the feeling that Uncle Uzzi’s unblinking sapphire-blue stare saw way more than anyone could’ve guessed. Way more than she wanted the older Witch to see. Kylie swallowed and waited for her to continue.
“They see you as a prize, their prize, since they are claiming you belong to them. They believe they can use you to curry favor with the remaining members of the Sharp Claw Pride as their rightful heir. The stronger Tigers have already left. They wouldn’t follow a Pride with no clear leader. The remaining rogues want to use you to force the weaker ones to follow whichever of them gets their mark on you first.”
“I will never go back there,” she vowed.
“And they will never stop hunting you,” Uzzi countered.
“I’ll go⁠—”
“No, you can’t leave. We will protect you⁠—”
Michael spoke, stepping forward, and her heart squeezed at his words.
“And they will wage a war, claiming you do not have the right to hold her as she is their Pride mate. You must admit, no formal declaration of switching Prides was given,” Uncle Uzzi cited the old Shifter law to resounding growls and grunts from the Shifters in the room.
“Look, I appreciate all of you, and the Maverick Pride has been good to me. But I won’t bring bloodshed here. I am not worth it—” Kylie blurted.
“What? Of course, you are,” Michael said, and he sounded crushed.
“We are your Pride now, Kylie, and we are Shifters. Bloodshed is what we do,” Hunter said, smiling.
“Yes, Neta, but I can’t risk endangering Elissa and your cub or any of you. Not for me,” she argued, trying to make them see reason.
“I will leave⁠—”
“No,” Michael shook his head.
“Before you decide that,” Uncle Uzzi said with an edge in his voice and a glare at Michael. “I have another solution.”
“What’s that?” Kylie said, knowing the Witch meant well but it was hopeless.
Whatever they decided now, she would not endanger the Pride. No matter what. She could not allow those rogue bastards to come and start a war here.
Not for her.
She would have to leave in the dead of night to avoid detection. Her mind raced with ideas even as her heart thudded sorrowfully inside of her chest. There were precautions to take, things she’d have to do to avoid getting caught by Jess or Gretchen, or even Elissa.
“Do not think like that, Kylie. Stop it now,” commanded Uncle Uzzi, and she looked up surprised to see the older Witch frowning. “I said, I have a solution, Kylie McNaughton, and it does not involve you running.”
“Alright,” Kylie answered unsteadily. “I’ll hear it, before I make a decision.”
“Good. That’s all I ask.”
Uncle Uzzi smiled triumphantly and looked around the room before zeroing in on Kylie once more.
“What if you were already mated by the time they get here?”
Confusion furrowed her brow, and she cocked her head to the side. Her she-Tiger pressed against her skin. The great big animal wanted more information.
“What?” she asked as she tried to make sense of Uncle Uzzi’s words.
“Yes,” growled Michael in response, and he seemed to grow taller as he nodded his assent. But his assent to what exactly, she wondered.
“What are you saying yes to?” she said looking from Uncle Uzzi to him, then back again. “What is he saying yes to?”
The Witch’s grin grew wider, and judging from the predatorial look on Michael’s face, and the ethereal blue lights swirling around Uzzi’s head, she had the feeling he knew what he was agreeing to.
Oh hell no!
Kylie wanted to stomp and growl, but even doing so would not help her to reason with the man. So, she turned to Hunter.
“Neta, you have to stop him⁠—”
“Neta,” Michael said at the same time, cutting her off effectively. “I am officially announcing my intention to mark and claim Kylie McNaughton, as a true and eligible male from an honored family of the Maverick Pride, I will have her, and no other, as my mate from now until the end of time!”
Holy fucking shit, she gasped.
Michael Turner, Maverick Pride Healer, had invoked the Ancient Rite of Proclamation.
It was so fucking sexy that her whole body flushed in response, and her ferocious, and somewhat skittish she-Tiger, purred.
Loudly.
Purrrrrrrrr.
But Kylie could not just let that slide, so she turned to the big male who was practically vibrating with energy, and was, admittedly, more attractive than any other she had ever seen. Still, she slapped his face good and hard.
“You buttlickingcatnipsniffingfureatingasshat!”