Marisa Chenery: Roan's Fall

At first glance, Saskia didn’t look as if she would be a match for him, but looks could be deceiving. With her long light blonde, almost white hair, flashing violet eyes and slim build, someone would think he could disarm her and have her at his mercy in a matter of seconds. That was so far off the mark it wasn’t even funny. Saskia hadn’t been chosen to be the leader of six large lone male werewolves for nothing. She could hold her own against any of them.

At Saskia’s nod, they circled each other with their swords raised. While most werewolves their age had given up the sword long ago and chose to fight in wolf form if the need ever arose, the seven of Roxie’s protectors still used the sword—their weapon of choice. Roan made the first strike, which Saskia easily blocked with her sword. Circling each other again, he waited for another opening then struck out at her. This time sparks flew when their blades met.

Saskia and Roan parried and thrust. The sound of their swords clashing filled the room. Neither one of them tried to hurt the other. This was for practice only. By the time Roan held up his hand to indicate that he’d had enough, both he and Saskia were sweating and out of breath.

“Feel better now?” Saskia asked while she panted for breath. He wiped the sweat out of his eyes before he answered. “A bit. At least I now should be able to sleep.”

“That bad, is it?”

“I’m sure it isn’t as bad as when you and Eli are away from each other for any length of time.” Once mated, werewolf couples couldn’t stand to be apart for very long. The longer apart the more anxious they became until they were together again, which usually ended up with the mated pair having sex.

“Just tell Ansley what you are, Roan. You’re not doing either one of you any good by holding off, especially you.”

He snorted. “Yeah, I’ll just blurt out that I’m a werewolf and that she’s my mate and we’ll live happily ever after. Ansley will think I need to be locked up with the rest of the crazies.”

“You could always go wolf in front of her. She wouldn’t be able to deny the truth then.”

“No, but she could very well run away screaming. Or drop dead in a faint. I don’t think she is as strong as you are, Saskia. She’s a bit on the timid, shy side.”

“I think you’re second guessing yourself too much, Roan. How long do you intend to drag this out? How long do you think you’ll be able to last before you break and claim her without telling her the truth?”

“To be honest, I haven’t a clue. Right now seeing how long I can keep myself in control is the least of my worries. After the way I left Ansley, I wouldn’t be surprised if she is more than a little pissed off with me.”

Saskia closed the distance between them and gave Roan a hug. “I’m sure she’ll forgive you. After all you two are meant to be together.”

Roan hugged her back. “I can only hope so.”

After a fitful sleep with his dreams filled with erotic images of Ansley in his bed, of her moaning his name as he took her over and over again, Roan headed over to Roxie and Beowulf’s house. It was his turn, along with his two brothers-in-arms Dirk and Kye, to watch over Roxie. Not that she allowed them to do much more than sit around using up space. Even though Roxie didn’t think she needed their protection, Roan knew Beowulf was more than grateful. Roxie might think they were overdoing it, but he knew it would only be a matter of time before someone made a move on her. The person who worried them most was Miles—Saskia’s brother by blood. At one time, he had been chosen to be the foretold one’s protectors, but that soon changed when Miles decided he wanted to have control over the foretold one rather than be a protector. Roan found his brothers with Roxie inside her second floor office. Even though Roxie didn’t need to work, since Beowulf had more than enough money and then some, she still continued to work at her web design business that she had started before she had met her mate. As a self-proclaimed internet junkie, Roxie had told him she loved her job too much to give it up.

Kye sat in one of the chairs near Roxie’s desk looking bored out of his mind. Dirk, on the other hand, stood behind Roxie’s chair completely absorbed in what Roxie worked on as she pointed to something on the monitor of her desktop computer. Roan shook his head. Dirk and Roxie would be up here for hours. Dirk, the only one of them that had completely embraced the technological age, now did all his investments through the internet. Once Roxie had found out he was computer savvy like she was, she had taken it upon herself to teach Dirk everything she knew about web design. Something Dirk had been interested in learning.

Knowing the other two were too absorbed in what they were doing to have heard him come into the room, Roan caught Kye’s eye. “If you need me, I’ll be outside in the back. I have to make a phone call.”

Kye covered a large yawn with his hand. “Sure, go ahead. Not as if much is happening here. I don’t know how those two can stare at that computer monitor for hours on end and not get a headache. My eyes would be crossing by now, especially if I had to look at that gibberish Roxie calls HTML code.”

Roan chuckled. “I guess it helps if you can understand what you’re looking at.”

“I guess.” Kye settled down lower in his chair. “I think I’ll catch some Zs until they have decided they’ve had enough.”

Having been in Kye’s place more than once, Roan couldn’t blame him. He slipped out of the room and headed to the kitchen. He stepped through the sliding glass door and pulled his cell phone out of his jean’s front pocket. He closed the door behind him. He searched through his contact list until he found Ansley’s work number, which he had programmed into his phone earlier.

Once someone picked up on the other end, Roan asked to speak to Ansley. Put on hold, he patiently waited for Ansley to pick up the phone. When she did, he said, “Hey, Ansley. It’s Roan.”

“Oh. What do you want?” Ansley asked in a clipped tone.

She was definitely not happy to hear from him. “I thought we could get together again tonight.”

Ansley didn’t reply right away. “Why? So you can run out on me again?”

“Ah, look, that had nothing to do with you. Okay?”

“Sure it didn’t. You couldn’t get away from me fast enough.”

“I had my reasons for doing what I did. Let me see you tonight and I’ll explain everything.”

“I don’t think so. Being humiliated by you once was more than enough. I have to go. I’m in the middle of cutting a client’s hair. Bye, Roan.” Ansley hung up before Roan could say anything else.

Knowing he couldn’t leave things the way they now stood, Roan hit redial and once again asked to speak to Ansley when the other end picked up. This time the girl who answered told him Ansley wouldn’t take any phone calls right now. After he hit the end button to hang up, Roan let out a low frustrated growl.

“Your soon-to-be-mate giving you a hard time?”

Roan looked up and realized he hadn’t been alone out here. Beowulf sat at the patio table with a newspaper in his hand. Roan went over to Beowulf and sat down in the chair next to his. “You could say that. I have no one to blame but myself, though.”

Beowulf folded the newspaper he had been reading in half and placed it on the patio table. “Having a mortal mate who knows nothing of our kind tends to make things a little more stressful.”

“You’re not kidding. By taking it slow, I now have Ansley not wanting to talk or see me. I know Roxie told me to explain everything to Ansley before I claimed her, but I don’t know if I can keep this up.”