Free Once Broken (Dove Creek Chronicles) by H. Henry Page A

Casey on the back porch.
    “Yeah,” he answered. He was silent for a moment, his back to me. He shook his head. “No. I killed that girl, Remi. I didn’t mean to, but . . .”
    Closing the space between us, I laid a hand on his arm and looked up at him. “You had no choice. From the looks of you, she was hell bent on killing you.”
    “She was,” he conceded. “I was tryin’ to just hold her off, but she kept comin’.”
    “You don’t have any problem clobbering female vampires. Why did she give you trouble?” I asked.
    “It’s not the same. There’s no tellin’ what those demons are, man or woman, no matter what they look like. I couldn’t help but think that she was just a girl, she was so young,” he said. “Afterward, I lost it. I was hurt, but I could’ve hung on. I just couldn’t hold it together . . . Aric could’ve gotten killed.”
    “But he didn’t. That’s why we’re a team, to back each other up,” I said. I wondered if it was me who needed to be preaching this particular sermon, but I continued anyway because he needed to hear it. “Joss and I were both right here, ready to help. It worked out fine.”
    “I hate this feelin’. Like the whole world is out for our blood.”
    “Don’t worry, Case. We’ll get ‘em.”
    “How do you know?”
    I gave his arm a light squeeze. “Faith. That’s what we’re all about, isn’t it?”
    Finally looking down to meet my eyes, his guilty scowl eased. He covered my hand with his and my skin tingled under the heat of his calloused palm. “Thanks for patchin’ me up, darlin’.”
    “You’re welcome. But from now on, don’t be such a gentleman. We need you alive.”
    By the time I got back inside, Aric was in dry clothes and all set to go back out on watch. I offered to take his place since he’d already been busy that night, but he turned me down since he was geared up and I was not. He and Jocelyn assured me that they didn’t expect anything to happen in the couple of hours that were left before daybreak.
    I wandered out to the barn to see what Gabriel was up to. As I opened the smaller door that was set into the wall just to the side of the huge double door, I found him at a work bench with his back turned to me. He didn’t appear to have heard my entrance, so I shut the door with a click that was good and loud. I didn’t want to go sneaking up on a man with a weapon in his hand.
    Gabe looked around at the noise and spotted me. “Hey, Remi. Wasn’t expecting to see you. What are you doing here?”
    “I could ask you the same thing. No work tomorrow?”
    “It’s Saturday,” he said.
    Had I really lost track of what day it was? I wandered closer to where Gabe had been working before I interrupted him. “Oh, right. Well, I was just here to check on things.” I was going to tell him about how Casey and Aric had gotten into a pickle, but he spoke first.
    “C’mere. I have something to show you.” He patted the workbench next to him.
    A few quick steps, and I was sliding into the open seat. Gabriel was always tinkering around the armory, designing new weapons and coming up with modifications for old ones. As a professional engineer, he was distinctively suited to the task. It was usually Aric who did the actual building, though, so I was curious to see what he had been up to.
    In Gabe’s lap, I saw my bow. It was good as new . . . But better. My eyes went wide with delight. “I thought it was lost last night.”
    “I saw it as we were getting ready come back here. You were already in your car, so I hung onto it to see if I could repair it.” He explained as he handed me my prized weapon.
    “You did better than that,” I said, taken aback. I looked it over; he had done more than just fix it. There was a pair of silver spikes protruding from the front of the frame, one on top and one on bottom. I carefully put the tip of my finger on one, testing the sharpness.
    “I checked the balance. Those are carbon with silver plate .