"We could, but then people might come looking for them, and we really can't have that. It would just be easier to call the human authorities and have these idiots thrown in jail."
I snorted with disgust. "I should have killed them when I came into the house."
Would have made my life easier.
"I need to talk to Ajag."
I frowned, confused. "So, talk to him."
Ze'ev was standing right there, not ten feet away.
"I'd like to, but your claws are out and you have Ajag wrapped up like a burrito. I'm worried I might get my throat ripped out if I get too close."
Oh.
"Well, don't get too close then."
I concentrated on retracting my claws before lifting my hand and pulling back the edge of the blanket so I could see Ajag's face. His eyes were closed, but I knew he was awake. The grip he had on my shirt had just tightened.
"Hey, you okay to talk to Ze'ev?"
Ajag's eyelids fluttered open. He stared up at me for the longest moment before asking, "Will you stay with me?"
"I won't move from your side." My smile was strained, but there. That was something at least. "Promise."
"Okay."
I helped Ajag sit up, but kept my arms wrapped around him. Besides the fact that he didn't seem to mind, I doubted there was a force on earth that could have made me let him go right now.
Ze'ev didn't come closer except to sit on the end of the bed. His gaze was very earnest as he stared at Ajag. "Lu has the three men that attacked you tied up and under guard out in the other room. They won't hurt you ever again, Ajag, but I need to know what happened. What did they do?"
"Sy and I were leaving," Ajag began, "but the front door crashed in before we reached it and those three guys came in. I told Sy to run and hide and started throwing things at them."
My jaw clenched when Ajag started talking, but I wasn't sure if it was from the knowledge he had been trying to leave with Sy or from what had happened to him.
I had known he planned to run at the first opportunity, but actually hearing that he was leaving made me want to chain the man down so he couldn't step foot outside this house.
Didn't he understand how dangerous it was out in the world and how much safer he was here on the ranch? It was a great place for Sy to grow up, too, especially since he was surrounded by other wolves, strong wolves.
"One of them, that man you had pinned to the floor, dragged me in here and started...started..."
"I get it," Ze'ev said. "Did they say anything?"
Ajag's brow furrowed as if he was trying to remember. "They kept calling me Jackson. I think they thought I was him."
Ze'ev stiffened. "They thought you were Jackson?"
Ajag nodded.
"You two don't even look alike."
This was true. Ajag was much sexier. Well, in my opinion at least. His soulful cobalt blue eyes and that stunning sunlight blond hair?
Simply gorgeous.
"I think they were only supposed to rough me...I mean rough Jackson up. When they broke in, they started laughing and breaking things. One of them grabbed me and started to hit me, but that other guy, the one that dragged me in here, he said not to hit me too hard because he had plans for me."
The furrow on Ajag's face deepened, pulling his eyebrows down over his eyes and leaving them in the shadows. "He said something about what he had planned to do to me would stop me once and for all and it would get them a bonus." Ajag glanced up at Ze'ev. "Do you know what he was talking about?"
