Hunting Haven

Haven

“Wait. What?” My heart felt like it fell to my toes at Gabe’s words. No. I must have misheard him. There was no way that six women had lost their lives because of me. Because some sick fuck was obsessed with me.

I started to have hot flashes as my stomach flipped. My rising anxiety and guilt caused my world to spin. “I think I’m gonna puke.” I barely got the words out before Dane shoved a small trash can onto my lap.

If I wasn’t having a meltdown of epic proportions, I probably would’ve been mortified at that moment. Instead, I heaved shamelessly as my mind spun. Six. Six lives had ended, but I was okay. All because I had protectors that kept me from the vampire’s clutches.

“If you turn me over to him, he’ll stop killing the women, right?” I began to suggest, my head still buried in the trash as I tried to calm my stomach.

“I’m not giving you to him,” Gabe snapped.

“But it could save lives!” I argued as I sat up from the trash, wiping at my mouth angrily.

“No, it wouldn’t!” It was the first time he’d ever raised his voice at me. Before I could argue or snap at him for yelling at me, he powered on. “Do you know what would happen? He’d changed you into a fucking bloodsucker. You’d be a vicious beast that I’d have to put down and if I couldn’t end you? The pair of you will end way more than six fucking lives, Haven.”

“How can you be so callous? Those women didn’t need to die,” I snapped.

“And you don’t need to be turned into a murderous creature!” He rubbed his face aggressively, his anger apparent. “I will find this vamp, and I will put him in the ground. I’m not turning you over to him. I can’t lose another person to the fucking vamps.” He shoved a hand into his hair, yanking it in frustration. “I can’t kill another person who matters to me.”

My arguments died at his passionate response. Still clutching the garbage can with one arm, I reached out and grabbed his hand, squeezing it gently. “Who was it?”

Dane stood, mumbling something unintelligible, and left the room. Gabe looked up, but not before I saw the tears in his eyes. The muscle in his jaw twitched as he clenched it and shook his head.

I waited a moment to make sure my stomach was done revolting, before I set the trash down and stood. He turned his face away from me immediately, as if he were ashamed that he was crying.

I wrapped my arms around his waist and stepped closer, pressing my cheek to his chest. Instead of asking again, I just held on. He hugged me tight against him. After a few moments of silence, I spoke again. “There is nothing wrong with crying.”

“Hunters don’t cry,” he quipped, his voice thick with emotion.

“Well, it’s a good thing you retired. Let it out, babe. You’ll feel better.”

He slouched, resting his cheek on the top of my head as he shook from silent tears. We stayed like that for a while. His sniffles were the only sound that broke the hush that had settled over the house.

“My kid sister,” he said quietly. His voice cracked, the sound so pain-filled. He paused to clear his throat before continuing. “Rebecca was eighteen, and David, my brother, was fifteen. Hunters start doing missions at 18, but I wouldn’t let her. I was high ranking enough to have that sort of pull. I raised them after my parents died in the field. I was twenty, freshly divorced, and stuck raising a six and nine-year-old. It was… challenging, but I did my best. Maybe I was a little overprotective.”

I smiled sadly at the last sentence. A little overprotective didn’t begin to cover what Gabriel Macias was, but that was one of the reasons I cared so much for him.

He paused to clear his throat once more. Raking a hand through his hair so roughly that I was afraid he’d rip it out, he continued. “Six years ago, I went on a mission for a week. I didn’t bother to get a sitter. I figured she was technically an adult and David wasn’t too far off. But Becca decided that she was sick of not being able to be an active duty hunter. She tagged along on a mission she had no business being on.”

His hug grew tighter as he pressed on. It was almost as if he didn’t want to tell me, but he couldn’t stop telling the story if he tried. “They were clearing out a vampire hive, a literal hell-hole where those fucking leeches live together and feast on mass amounts of humans. Let’s put it this way, seeing piles of dead bodies is normal and honestly? Those are the lucky ones. Hives are worse than you can possibly imagine. Anyway, the hunters sent on the mission were all killed but Rebecca…”

He took another moment to pull himself together before letting me go. He collapsed onto the kitchen chair as if he couldn’t keep himself upright anymore. Pulling me into his lap, he curled around me and continued.

“A vampire wanted to keep her, decided to change her instead of killing her. When I got back into town, the hunters told me. I insisted we launch a rescue mission to get her back. There were rumors, whispers really, about a cure. I was important enough, and raised a big enough stink, for the Hunter’s Association to agree to let me try to return her humanity.”

His grip on my waist grew almost painful. “We infiltrated the nest again. This time it was all high-ranking hunters, no juniors. I honestly couldn’t tell you how many leeches I killed that night, but I always kept an eye out for Becca. When I spotted her, she was fighting with my ex-wife. I tried my best to get to them, but Julie… she shoved a stake into my sister’s heart before I had a chance to cross the room. It was pure chaos. I fought my way over to them, hoping my eyes had played tricks on me. ‘Orders are orders’. That’s what Julie said to me when I got to them. My little sister had been turned into a monster and then murdered, and she preached about orders.”

“Wait, but I thought you said that you were supposed to capture her and try to heal her?” I asked more than stated. I hated to pester him for information, but I wanted to understand.

“So did I. That’s what I’d been told. Turns out that the director told the rest of the hunters on the op something else. They were never going to let me take Rebecca out of there. I thought I was going to save her. Instead, I led the charge that ended her into the hive.”

“I’m so sorry, Gabe.” My murmured apologies weren’t much, but I had nothing more to offer. What a horrible fucking experience. To be betrayed by the people you’d been raised to fight with, to have a woman you were once married to murder your little sister because of a directive? Honestly, it made me want to punch his ex in the face. She was despicable. Had she warned Gabe about the command that had been issued to the rest of them, he might have been able to save Rebecca.

“I can’t lose you, too. Not to a vampire, not to the hunters. Please don’t fight me on this. I’ll do my best to keep you safe.”

I nodded and kissed his cheek, very conscious of the fact that I desperately needed to brush my teeth but still wanting to comfort him.

“Can I ask… what happened to your brother?”

He sighed. “He’s alive. Still a hunter. He blames me for Rebecca. When I left the association, he didn’t take it well. He wanted me to stay, to fight my way to the top and destroy the organization from the inside out. I understand his desire for revenge, but I couldn’t do it. Couldn’t pretend to obey them for a moment longer. It took four senior hunters to hold me down when we got back to the headquarters because I tried to kill Director Gibbons. My acting skills aren’t Oscar-worthy. There was no way I could hide the fact that I wanted to murder him. David petitioned to stay with the hunters as a ward of the association since he was still a minor. Said I’d lost my mind and that he didn’t feel safe under my guardianship. They took him in and offered me re-education.”

“Re-education?”

“Magical brainwashing, basically. I could stay with the hunters if I let them fuck with my mind, but I didn’t want to stay. I didn’t even want revenge. It won’t bring Becca back. It won’t fix my relationship with David. I just wanted to get the fuck away from the hunters and never turn back.”

“And then you had to go back to hunting because of me,” I lowered my eyes to the ground in shame. I’d made him go back to a lifestyle that he hated.

“I made my own decisions. Dane and the panthers could have watched you, but I didn’t want that. I needed to keep you safe myself. I’m sorry I failed.”

“I don’t think you failed. I’m still human after all.”

“Yeah, but you’re also still in danger and now you know all about a world you have no business being a part of.”

“I’m happy as long as I’m a part of your world, Gabe.”

He smiled softly. “My, my. That was sweet, romantic even… who are you pod person and what did you do with Haven?”

“Hey Gabe,” Dane said as he popped his head back into the kitchen. “If you still want to go to Haven’s to get some of her stuff, we should get going. We only have a few hours before sunset.”

Gabe nodded, patting the small of my back in the universal get up sign. I climbed off his lap and frowned at him. “We’re going back to my house?”

“We’re not staying. I figured you’d want some of your stuff, so you felt more comfortable here. Dane is going with us for added protection.”

“Be careful, Macias. You keep doing cute shit like that and I might not let you go,” I joked.

“I’m counting on it.” He said it so quietly that I wasn’t even positive that I’d heard him properly. Still, a smile spread across my face as we made our way outside.

As Gabe drove to my house, he asked Dane to fill us in on what had happened to him the night before.

The panther cleared his throat obnoxiously, puffing his chest obnoxiously. “It was a dark and stormy night,” he began.

“No, it wasn’t,” I laughed.

“You’re just like Macias. Buzz kills.”

“Hey. Take that back! I am not that straight-laced and gentlemanly.”

Dane snorted. “True. You don’t have manners. You didn’t even look away when I was naked.”

“Dude, focus,” Gabe snapped as he merged onto the highway.

“Fine,” he whined. “For the record, the story I wanted to tell was way more entertaining.”

“Noted,” I said, stifling a laugh when I saw the expression on Gabe’s face. He looked like he was seconds away from pulling over and throttling Dane.

“I was on watch, hiding in the shadows and being all stealthy in my panther form, when I saw a vampire standing at the end of the block. He was too far away to smell, but it looked like the description of the one stalking Haven, so I chased him when he ran. When I got closer, I realized it was a different bloodsucker.”

He leaned forward into the front seat, sticking his head in between Gabe and I as he pressed on. “Anyway, as much as I wanted to kill it, I realized that it smelled similar to the vamp that broke into the car. If I had to guess, I’d say it was the vampire’s progeny. I turned to leave and rush back to the house, when the asshole jumped on me and bit the back of my neck. When I shook him loose, he ripped into my side. I bit his head off—literally—and then ran back to the house. I lost a shitload of blood from the wound in my side, which is why I was basically getting my ass whooped when you showed up. I was dizzy as a mother. Glad you showed up when you did or I would have been vampire lunchmeat.”

“More like a vampire smoothie,” I quipped.

He grinned as I turned to kiss his cheek playfully, but still sincere. “My hero. Thanks for helping keep me safe, Dane.”

“Anytime, my lady.”

Gabe reached back and shoved the panther back to his seat. “Put your seatbelt on.”

“You’re just mad that your girl gave me a kiss. I told you she would prefer me, but, alas, I cannot return your feelings, Haven dear. Angel would castrate me.”

My eyebrows shot up as I thought of the muscled giant that showed us to our room. “He’s your boyfriend?”

“My mate, actually.” Gabe’s grip on the steering wheel tightened as he clenched his jaw. “Is that a problem?” Dane asked. His voice held an edge that I was desperate to wipe away even as I glared at Gabe.

“Nope. He’s hot. Go on with your bad self, baby,” I grinned. Dane flashed a small smile as he watched Gabe warily as he waited for him to speak.

“Yeah, I got a problem,” Gabe snapped. Dane’s smile dropped. He sat there, mouth ajar, in shock. I sucked in a breath, ready to rip the hunter a new one when he continued. “You hit on Haven at Callahan’s and you were mated the whole time? You threatened to try to sleep with her if I didn’t make a move. You’re such an asshole.”