Free Andromeda's Fall (Shadowcat Nation) by Abigail Owen Page B

murmured.
    Andie
nodded. “My mother was a very smart woman. She was killed during the second
wave of attacks the next day. She’d hidden me in a safe hole in the wall, but I
saw it all. A wolf ripped her throat clean out. I don’t think I’ve seen so much
blood, even since. I watched as he dropped her to the floor where she kicked
and twitched the last of life out of her.”
    Andie
stopped talking as that image filled her head. A wave of nausea buffeted her,
and she swallowed.
    “But
you got away?” A.J. said softly.
    Andie
pulled herself back to the present and nodded. “She’d hidden me in the wall
with the wolf skin. After they checked the bodies, the wolves left. Although to
this day I have no idea how they didn’t hear me. My heart was pounding so hard.”
    A.J.
reached over and rested his hand on hers. She hadn’t even realized it was
trembling until he held it.
    “I
waited, days it seemed like,” Andie continued, her eyes filled with the haunted
memories. “But in reality it was probably just overnight. When I came out of my
hiding place, I started gathering supplies like my Dad had showed me. And I saw
something move. A boy, a little older than I. He was unconscious, but he was
breathing. I found a sled and pushed us out of there.”
    “How
long till someone found you?”
    Andie
shook her head. “They didn’t. I managed to get us to a lodge of shifters about
a hundred miles away. Some people my Mom and I had visited previously.”
    Andie
saw the shock register in A.J.’s eyes. A six-year-old girl had hauled an
unconscious boy a hundred miles through Northern Canada in the snow and managed
to find a safe haven.
    “Jeez,”
he breathed.
    Andie
smiled, though it didn’t reach her eyes. “I told you I showed talent young, and
my Dad took advantage of that. The boy did wake up after the first day. And
he’s the reason I didn’t die, lost out in the wilderness. He helped get us back
to the shifters I was hoping to find. So I didn’t do it alone. But you asked me
why I check everything?”
    A.J.
tipped his head, waiting for the answer.
    “They
got inside the house on that second wave because someone had opened a window to
let out some of the smell, and it had disabled the alarm on the house. More
warning could have made the difference between my mother’s being dead or alive
today. Kyle Carstairs terrifies me. And I’m a damn good fighter now. But the
only thing that scares me more than Kyle is a pack of wolf shifters. Those pack
shifters may not hit the compounds as much anymore, but it still happens. And they
definitely still attack the cougars in the wild. Now I have Kyle Carstairs
hunting me too. So yeah, I check.”
    A.J.
reached out and pulled her into his arms. “You don’t have to worry about that
here. I will keep you safe from wolves or Carstairs or anything else that comes
for you.”
    Andie
let her head fall on his chest and closed her eyes. “I know.”
     

Chapter 12
     
    A
few days later, Jaxon was headed inside from a run through the obstacle course.
Andie was still out there working with his men, but he had a meeting with his
High Council in an hour and needed to prepare. He entered the guards’ room and
hit the showers before returning to the locker where he’d stored his clothes. He’d
just finished buttoning his shirt when the sound of his cell phone ringing caught
his attention. He fished it out of his bag and looked at the screen. An unknown
number flashed at him.
    “This
is Keller.”
    “This
is Sarai Bouchard,” said a soft female voice on the other end.
    Jaxon
jerked upright so fast he smacked his head on his open locker door with a loud
clang. The Seer calling him couldn’t be good. A couple of his patrolmen were in
the room and glanced up, giving him curious looks as he stood there rubbing his
head.
    “Give
me a moment to get to a private space,” he said.
    “Hurry,
I don’t have much of a window to talk.”
    Jaxon
grabbed his bag and hustled through the