Stone Predator, Kennedy Harkins [if you give a mouse a cookie read aloud txt] 📗

had the whole day to do whatever the hell I wanted. The possibilities were endless. Well except for anything that involved leaving the house. I couldn’t forget the reason I’d taken off in the first place. Ace. Who was surprisingly still asleep, with his arms clinging me to his side.
I sighed, his grip was rock solid. The only way I was getting away was if he let me, and until he woke up, he wasn’t in a position to do that.
Two options; lie here patiently, for what could be hours, and wait for him to wake up, or have a little fun. Smiling to myself I moved my face closer to his ear.
“Wake up!” I screeched.
Not even a flinch! Hmm, I guess it was time to change tactics.
Rolling over, I straddled his hips. I had to lean down to his face, because his arms would only allow so much movement. He was like a raccoon with something shinny; he just wouldn’t let go.
“EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE,” I mimicked a buzzer at a basket ball game. His eyes flew open, and his brow shot toward the ceiling when he took in our current predicament. My face flushed when I realized I was sitting on him. How had that seemed like a good idea?
He folded his arms behind his head and grinned up at me. “Can I help you with something?”
I glared and ground my teeth together, which only made his smile widen. “Don’t flatter yourself, Sleeping Beauty. This is not what it looks like.”
He faked an innocent tone, “What does it look like?” Turning my red face away, I got up stiffly. He really could be a such a jerk! A cocky, furry, jerk!
“So, where are you keeping the prisoner?” I asked nonchalantly. His face froze into an angry mask. I figured that might be his reaction. Oh, well, I could certainly find it on my own. How big could that place be anyway?
I snapped out of my mental debate when Ace tried to sit up. He cringed against the sudden pain and I rushed over to place my hands on his bare chest. Carefully I pushed him back to his original position.
“You’ve had better ideas,” I scolded him.
“What do you expect me to do? Just lie here while you go in search for a werewolf that was stalking you?” He growled.
I sighed heavily, “What if I promise not to look for him?” It was the last thing I wanted to do, but if it was the only thing that was going to keep him grounded...Damn, I really hate waiting.
He eyed me warily, “And I’m just suppose to believe you?”
“Hey, this is a good deal, and besides, you’re not really in a position to stop me.” I pointed out hesitantly. This could go one of two ways...
His face scrunched up in obvious agony, he brought himself to a sitting position, and unlike last time, he stayed there. Ace smiled at me tightly. “Impressive, but still-” I was cut off by him suddenly lurching to his feet, it wasn’t pretty. He swayed a little and I instantly snaked my arms around his waist; taking as much of his weight as I could, but as we had found out with Michael, that wasn’t much.
“Would you just lay back down?” I huffed angrily.
“No.”
“I could let go,” I warned, “and drop you on your ass.”
“Go right ahead.”
“Let’s just try and get you to your bedroom, okay?”
“Oh, it’s my bedroom now?” He chuckled as I helped haul him to the stairs.
“Shut up and climb,” I grunted.
Fifteen minutes later we were stumbling down the hallway leading to Ace’s room. I was tired, he was tired. Not to mention the fact that I could no longer identify his sweat from mine. This whole ‘nurse’ idea had sounded better in theory. If I get out of this alive, I thought to myself, it’ll be nothing but the gym and strength workouts.
When we reached the bed, we both collapsed onto it. Well, Ace did, I collapsed onto Ace. We were both too exhausted to read anything into it.
Or at least that’s what I thought until Ace’s hands found my face. I rested my forehead against his, and stared into his eyes, drinking up the affection I found there. My fingers traced over the hard panels of his chest. He closed his eyes, and his mouth opened slightly at my touch.
He looked so much younger, and fragile, like my caress could break him.
“Ace-” Whatever I had been about to say was cut off by a sharp knock on the wall next to his wide open door. I whipped my head around to see the figure standing there. Much to my surprise, Ace didn’t even flinch, which highly suggested that he’d known he was there all the time. I furrowed my brow in frustration. Human senses, what are you gonna do?
“Hello, Yhan,” Ace muttered with out opening his eyes.
“He’s awake,” Yhan stated, all the while eying me with an indecipherable expression. He was clearly of Asian decent, and possibly a little Spanish, with a large frame only dwarfed by Ace’s. Unlike most of the werewolves I had met to that point, he wasn’t abnormally tall. He had a few inches on me, but with his muscles it gave him the appearance of being stocky. I’d put his age in the early thirties.
Ace sighed heavily, my body moving along with him. “You sure have great timing, Manchester,” he chuckled sarcastically.
“I’m sorry if I interrupted something.” In all my twenty-six years, I had never heard someone as not sorry as that compact werewolf. My mind processed that carefully, apparently not everyone in the pack was as accepting as Alex. I decided to talk to Ace about it later. One adoring fan at time, that’s what I always say.
“Are you planning on. . .questioning him yourself?” Yhan asked, his voice full of hidden meaning. It wasn’t wasted on me.
“Not in your condition your not.” I remarked coldly, leaving no room for argument.  
His fingers traced my cheek, leaving behind a trail of heat. His eyes were determined, with an underlining of kindness. “He threatened you.” He said it like it explained everything, and maybe it did. For him.
“So? Doctors get threats all the time, it’s in the job description. You just can’t save everyone. And it never fails that the people you can’t save have mentally unstable relatives...” Under the stubbornness in my tone was a deep sadness that I couldn’t keep out. All the faces of patients that I had lost flashing their way through my vision. I could tell you each of their names, their hobbies, what they did for a living, who their favorite teacher was.
I could even tell you how I killed them.

Ace’s POV
Her gaze was faraway, the despair I saw there brought forth my own. She had demons, that much was clear. So did I.
I wanted nothing more than to grab her and bring her back to the present. Back to me, and away from the ghosts that haunted her stare. What she had said about doctors getting threatened all the time shook me. Who would dare bring harm to her? She belonged to me.
I thought back to that night, only a few days ago, that I had found her cold and unresponsive next to a statue. My entire being shied away from those memories, I had thought Vivica dead, her pulse so faint that even I couldn’t hear it until I pressed my ear to her chest.
I wasn’t human, I was very aware of that fact. But what I felt for her went beyond love. Love, such a simple word, but it holds so much meaning. Wolves don’t technically love, we mate, and we possess. The human part of me loved her, adored her with all of my heart. She was stubborn, clever, with a enormous heart of gold, and she was utterly mine.
It didn’t matter to the wolf or the man that she hadn’t completely accepted me yet. I could be patient when called upon. The wolf, however, was getting restless. He fought at me, trying to weaken my resolve, but I knew she had to come to me. Any other way and I would scare her away. That was unacceptable to both man and beast.

Vivica’s POV
His eyes darkened considerably, but Yhan spoke before he could. “He’s more than capable, we’d never risk his safety.” Did I imagine the emphasis on the “we”? I whipped my head in his direction. His mouth was set in a grim, serious line but his eyes held a hint of mockery.
I practically leaped off of Ace and met him predatory stare to stare. His nostrils flared slightly, giving away his vexation.
“Is there something you’d like to say, Yhan?” I said through clenched teeth. His posture stiffened ever more at my tone and prolonged eye exposure. He took a threatening step forward and opened his mouth to reply.
“Enough. Both of you, enough,” Ace’s tone was pure Alpha wolf and left no room for disobedience. I found myself bowing under it, before I snapped out of it. Turning towards him I straightened my shoulders in defiance.
“You may be his-” I jabbed my finger at Yhan- “keeper, but don’t even try that shit with me.”
Ace’s eyes flared at the changed but when he spoke his words were unbearably gentle. “This is my job, these are my people. Do you expect me to sit idly by?”
I glanced back and forth between Yhan and Ace. What was more important? To win the fight or the war? Sacrifice or unyielding justice? I know what I would have chosen a few month prior...
“I want to be there.”
His eyes froze over instantly. “I don’t want you anywhere near him,” he growled.
“Tough.”
“Perhaps, I could propose a compromise?” Yhan injected himself into the conversation, filled to the brim with know-at-all syndrome.
“Yhan Manchester, there is absolutely nothing I would like more than to hear you blabber,” I answered with fake enthusiasm and interest.
“Go on,” Ace ordered as if I hadn’t spoken. Annoying.
“Your human could sit in on the interrogation; close enough to ease her worries, but not too close for her to be in danger.” Arrogant ass, he made my ‘worries’ sound like female nonsense. I won’t even go near the whole ‘your human’ thing, it made me see red. If anything he was my werewolf, not the other damn way around.
Yhan continued to lay out the basics of his ‘proposal’ as I started to fade from the conversation. It couldn’t hold my focus, nothing could. Everything seemed fuzzy, like it was going through different layers of wax paper before getting to me. I was growing wary of this argument, which was really strange. I live to joust with words.
My vision was the next to go, blurring over and then disappearing altogether. I had the vague impression something was talking to me. . . calling my name. I was past hearing, past feeling, past. . .everything.
Then he was there in my head, so very vivid. His thoughts were mine, his anger was mine. I felt what he felt or more what he didn’t feel. My consciousness dissolved into his. In those moments Vivica Khan was gone, as if she never existed.

Unknown POV
I could sense her in my mind, trapped by my power and will. Just like the two women in front of me. The only difference was that they were with my in a corporeal way and Dr. Khan just...was.