Trusting Love Ch. 04

"Neither one of them is answering, mom or Cam." She turned to him with worried eyes. "Do you think something could have happened to them? Cam's cell is out of service and its one of those that would get reception in the middle of the amazon and mom always answers hers but now it's just going to voicemail."

"There is no reason to believe that."

"Then why are they not answering? If it was one of them it would be understandable but for both of them? I have never been unable to get a hold of either one of them. They always answer even if it is to tell me they are currently busy so something must be wrong. I just got killed by someone I spend three years of my life with so who's to say he didn't go after my mom and sister. And if I'm suddenly other than human who's to say he too isn't human. He obviously has been drugging me to make me forget and I always heal so fast." She knew she was rumbling probably not making much sense but the thought that Ray had gotten to her family was chilling.

"Hey, hey it's alright." He took her into his arms. "We will find your mother and sister and you will see they are fine."

"What if they are not, what if he just had a relationship with me just to get close to my family? He could be some heredital enemy and I lived with him, slept with him and even thought of marrying him." He held her tighter and she clutched his shoulders convulsively. "How will I ever trust my own judgment? How can I believe in someone, anyone when the man I thought I loved is some monster who abused me and I can't remember? I always had these irrational fears I could not explain but they make sense if he abused me and took my memories of it. I can't trust what I feel for you, I don't even know what I feel for you and you're talking about imprisoning me."

"I didn't mean that Tara."

"You said it!" she pulled away from him. "How can you say something like that and not mean it? You wouldn't even listen!"

"I'm sorry." He reached out to clasp her arms and she didn't pull back.

"I don't make a habit of waking up with different men, Ray was the only one and I just thought he had climbed into bed with me even though we had broken up. I just thought I was fantasizing about waking up with you since I've fantasized about doing a lot of things with you and then you went psycho on me. How can I trust you?"

"Because I would cut my hand off before I ever hurt you."

She looked into his eyes unsure if he was serious and saw that he was. "How am I supposed to take that?"

"Just as I said. I would rather die than hurt you Tara."

No, that made no sense. Men, people really always chose themselves before others no matter how much they claimed to love someone. A parent would die for their child that was understandable but for someone to die for a lover was something that happened in Hollywood and novels. She felt overwhelmed, too much had happened, was happening and she felt unequal to it. What she needed was to forget all about it, to relax.

"That's not what I need Trev."

"Tell me what you need."

Tara straightened then smiled. "Ben and Jerry."

Trev frowned in confusion clearly not following the change in conversation. "What?"

"If I'm going to be your prisoner for the unforeseeable future I'm going to need lots of Ben and jerry, everything but the..., karamel sutra and especially phish food."

"You are not a prisoner, we just can't take the chance he'll come back for you."

That remained to be seen, she was too tired to argue and frankly scared to go to her own house. For the moment being Trev's captive didn't sound so bad, it should but maybe her brain had been deprived of oxygen for one moment too long when she had checked out. She knew he would not force her to stay no matter what he said, she hoped, right now she didn't want to be alone in her house. Not until she had come to terms with what had happened, remembered what had happened.

"My Ice cream?"

Trev held out his hand to her and she took it feeling like a teen girl going on her first date with her first crush. She might be out of her depth but he was currently her anchor and she really needed him, really needed normal. And eating ice cream across from him was normal, something they had done a hundred times before.

*

Lycans! Ray hated those howling dogs in human skin. As far as he was concerned they were the scum of immortals. If the immortal council had been competent eight centuries back the filthy animal would have been no more. Now one of the oldest immortal laws was in place and the Lycans were near untouchable. Killing them off would take more of an effort than it should have.

In ancient times when the impartial guardian race had interacted more with the immortals they had set rules upon the ether that was the source of immortality. One of which was that an attempt to annihilate one of the races should only happen once. If that attempt failed the race could never again be the subject of annihilation. The vampires had been wiped out, then the elementals and the phoenix. But the Lycans had survived, through some fluke that had allowed only the male children below the age of eighteen to survive leaving the council to machinations that had probabilities to fail. He could not stand that, even though the chances were minute, the probabilities existed.

Three years back his mother, a seer of their people, had led her to Tara. Sweet, innocent Tara brimming with untapped passion, so much passion. For a blood incubus innocence was an aphrodisiac, something they craved above all else. She had been a virgin and the power he had harvested when he had taken her virginity had been immeasurable. Normally that would never have been equaled on any successive couplings but something about Tara had remained innocent. Even when he had brutalized her to get the runehyer, power that came from destroying trust or innocence, she had retained her innocence. Sure he had poisoned her with the memory depriving agent his people secreted but even that eventually could not stay the destruction of the human soul.

After three years Tara still had a measure of her innocence and Ray found he had become addicted to her power, there was something different about it, something unique. Then the council had found out she was Trevyn's mate and he had been ordered to kill her. His secretion had ensured she would not choose to bond with the Lycan prince and Ray had enjoyed the man's frustration having heard from the council that Trevyn had been warned not to force the mating. Once an Ubus got their claws into someone it was hard for that person to get free.

Ray had come back to Tara's house hoping the bond he had established with his serum would mean Tara would come back to the home she had made for them, come back to him. She always had in the past but now he watched as Trevyn's dogs collected Tara's things. Anger boiled in his blood, she was his, Tara and whatever sweet power she had were his. He had found her first, it did not matter that some filthy canine thought she was his he would get her back. And when that happened damn the council and that bitch of a master the blood Ubus followed.

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