Laurann Dohner - Justice

“She doesn’t know who to trust after the males came after us.” He smiled. “She defied my orders to remain in the bathroom and saved my life. She is battleworthy, Tiger. You should have seen her.”

“I did. We arrived and found her planted protectively over you and holding two guns. I’m lucky to be here because she pointed them right at me. The fifth male was outside the back slider of your office. He must have realized when we arrived that he had one last opportunity to kill both of you. He launched himself through the glass. She turned both guns on him, didn’t miss once and he was dead before he ever touched either of you. She reacted before I could. We had to drug her, Justice. She was in shock and told Halfpint and Tiny that she thought we were going to suffer a civil war. She was ready to kill any of us who got near you, thinking we’d split loyalties. She’s very protective of you.”

Justice grinned and his arm tightened around her. “She’s a perfect mate.”

Tiger laughed. “I’d say so. Remind me to never piss you off. She’ll hurt me.”

“I’ll explain things to her when the drugs wear off.” Justice paused. “We need to weed out the new ones to make sure none of them want to come after Jessie or me. I won’t allow that to happen.”

“I thought of that already and ordered all of the new ones, including the females, to be detained for questioning. Our officers are talking to each of them to see if we have any more problems.” He paused. “We will deal with them if there are more of them who hate humans enough to turn on their own people. We can’t allow them to endanger any of us if they are unstable.”

“I know.” Justice sighed. “Did you ever think we’d be discussing this?”

“Never. It must be done though.”

“Yes.”

“The council is in the waiting room. They wanted to ask you to give permission for them to take over your duties while you are healing. They asked me to tell you that if you need to take some time to,” Tiger’s gaze drifted to Jessie, “calm your female, please take as many weeks away as you need.” A grin suddenly split his face. “Everyone is requesting you hide your weapons from her in the future.”

“She can keep them after she realizes this won’t happen again.” Justice suddenly laughed. It hurt and he groaned. “I would feel safer at night knowing she has access to a gun. She can protect me but I’ll hide them when I make her angry.”

Tiger laughed. “Should I tell everyone that is the reason why you won’t take her guns away? They might believe it and not know you are teasing.”

“No.” Justice laughed. “Just tell them I’ll think about it.” His smile suddenly died.

He glanced at Jessie and then Tiger. “Did she say anything about me?”

“She was worried and she cried when we thought you weren’t going to make it.”

“I meant about how I tore apart the first male who came at our bedroom? Was she horrified? Upset? Sickened? I never wanted her to see that side of me.”

“She never said a word but I saw the body. She walked through his blood and had to have known how you killed him. It was obvious. Didn’t you tell her we don’t use weapons against one another? That it is our way? Didn’t you tell her that we were sure it would result in death if our males ever fought when it comes to protecting a mate?”

“I never explained it clearly, in enough detail.”

“You are afraid she won’t be able to look at you again and not remember? I’m sure she’ll still love you.”

“I ‘m worried she will fear me.”

“You are her male, Justice. Her mate. You tore your bed apart at Reservation, over a female. She was the one, wasn’t she? She was there that night but had to leave suddenly for her job. I had to allow their helicopter to land to pick her up during your press conference with the reporters outside the gates. I should have put it together but I assumed the female was one of ours.”

“I should have told you but you know how you are when it comes to our males and humans. You’d have worried. She is all I’ve wanted since I first touched her and all I could think about.”

“She will get over it if it bothers her, Justice. She is not new to you. She knows you and still put herself in your bed. That is trust that you would never cause her harm. She killed to protect you and sat out there on the other side of the door pointing two guns at council members.” Tiger laughed. “She thought she was protecting you.”

Justice groaned. “She didn’t.”

“She certainly did. They were amused but they stayed more than ten feet back.

Well, except for Brawn. He walked closer. You know how he loves to push things.”

“What happened?”

“She pointed one of her guns at the front of his jeans and told him unless he wanted neutered he should step back. He backed up.”

Justice chuckled. “I wish I could have seen that.”

Tiger grinned. “I did and I’ll have many laughs over the memory. Speaking of Brawn, they realized you hadn’t chosen anyone to take Jessie’s place on the task team and they knew you had a meeting with Tim this morning. Brawn met with him instead and volunteered for the job. He left half an hour ago.”

Justice tensed. “The task force?”

A grin split Tiger’s face. “Won’t they be in for a treat?”

“You should have stopped him.”

Tiger laughed harder. “You are the one who agreed they could help you make decisions and take on some of your responsibilities.”

Justice relaxed and smiled. “I wish I could see him interact with humans. What a nightmare. He would have been my last choice. I was thinking Flame would have been perfect since he enjoys spending time with humans.”

“Yeah.” Tiger chuckled. “I agree but they got Brawn instead. Poor Tim.”

Jessie suddenly stirred next to Justice. He turned to her, ignoring Tiger. Jessie’s eyes flickered open and he smiled at her, cupping her face. “Hi, Jessie.”

Jessie smiled in return but memory returned as her eyes widened with alarm. She tried to jerk up in the bed but Justice held her down by tightening his hold on her. “It’s over. We’re safe. Calm down, honey.”

Jessie flashed her gaze around the room and found Tiger. She glared. “You had Ellie drug me.”

“I did. You wouldn’t listen so I thought you would listen to Justice.” He stood and walked out of the room.

Jessie was furious. “He had me drugged.”

Justice grinned. “He was probably afraid my mate was going to kill him. I’m proud of you but…” His smile disappeared. “I’m going to punish you for disobedience. You should have stayed inside the bathroom.”

“I saved your ass.”

“I know. Thank you. You still need to be punished and I decided the best way to teach you a lesson.”

She was pissed off. “You can’t be serious? I saved your life, Justice. Just because I’m a human doesn’t mean I had to hide inside the bathroom. You never would have asked one of your women to do that. You―” Justice kissed her. Jessie groaned against his mouth, happy to feel his lips on hers, thrilled that he felt well enough to do it. Her hands reached for his chest to assure his heart beat strongly. He pulled away and stared deeply into her eyes.

“Will you at least listen to what kind of punishment you are getting before you start yelling?”

“Fine. Tell me and I’ll tell you if you can or not.”

A growl sounded in the back of his throat while his eyes narrowed. “I’m sending you to Reservation. I decided the best way to teach you to listen to me is for you to spend at least two weeks out there.”

“You’re sending me away?” She was stunned and hurt. “But—”

“I wasn’t finished.” He smiled. “I’m going to personally give you lots of orders and you will learn to follow every one of them.” He pulled her closer. “I’m going to demand you take off your clothes and climb into bed with me. So, do you think this is fitting punishment?”