Without Regret (Pyte/Sentinel 2)

“Did you seriously just tell me that I’m pregnant only to turn around and tell me that I’m not keeping it?” Izzy demanded, thankfully using her anger to haul ass through the water ahead of him.

Sucking in a pained breath, he pulled his Sentinel phone out of his bag and scanned his thumbprint. As the phone slid open he kept his thumb firmly pressed to the screen and pressed 1-1-2-5, the SOS code that would hopefully get his little mate the protection that she needed.

When he didn’t answer, because he couldn’t, she continued. “Because I’ll let you know right now, buddy, that’s not your choice! I never expected this and I sure as hell never planned on it, but I’m telling you right now that I am keeping this baby and it’s going to take more than just you to take away from me,” she practically yelled, which was okay at the moment since it meant that she couldn’t hear him struggling to breathe.

With a shaky hand he placed the phone back in the bag, sealed it and placed it in his pocket before he did something stupid like drop it. He wrapped an arm around his chest to help lessen the pain, but it didn’t help. Holy f**k, this hurt. Every breath felt like someone was taking a hot poker and ramming the tip into his lungs.

“I don’t want children, Munchkin,” he somehow managed to bite out. He’d never allowed himself to want any children of his own. He was more than fine with his brothers and sister and future nieces and nephews, but he would never have one of his own. He just couldn’t take the chance that he’d hurt his child, he just couldn’t.

“Good for you, buddy. You don’t want this baby then that’s fine,” she said, sounding close to tears and if he wasn’t in so much f**king pain or struggling just to keep putting one foot in front of the other while he slowly trailed behind her he’d grab her and pull her into his arms and explain everything, but he couldn’t.

“Slow……down,” he said, coughing.

Of course she didn’t. For such a small woman she moved damn quick when pissed, he mused as he slipped and stumbled, landing on his knees on small jagged rocks as the current threatened to shove him backwards. Gasping, he fought against it as he slowly got back to his feet. His little mate of course was a good thirty yards ahead of him now.

He stumbled backwards, in too much pain to put up much of a fight. “Munchkin,” he gasped, cringing as pain shot through his chest.

“What?!” she demanded as she turned around to glare at him.

“I-“

“That’s right, buddy,” she said, taking that as her cue to storm towards him. “You have a lot of nerve,” she said, angrily wiping the tears off her face. “You people kidnap me, screw around with my life, scare the living hell out of me, threaten to drop me off on an island and leave me there and when something good, something that I thought would never happen for me, happens and you think you’re going to keep bossing me around,”

she said, stomping over to him as he looked around praying that help would arrive for his Munchkin. “Well, you have another thing coming, buddy, because I am through with you bossing me around,” she snapped, prompting her fists on her h*ps as she glared up at him.

“It’s,” he gasped for breath, “for your own good.”

“For my own good?” she nearly screeched.

“Have to be,” he sucked in a breath, “quiet,” he said, hoping like hell that no one could hear them. He gestured for her to turn around and keep walking, but she of course ignored him and continued to glare up at him.

“You don’t want to be my mate. You don’t want the baby. Well, guess what? I don’t want you,” she said around a loud sob as she shoved him and damn if that didn’t f**king hurt. It didn’t hurt that her hand slammed into his broken ribs.

His vision dimmed as the pain shot through his lung and Izzy’s cries for help registered in his mind.

“Run, Munchkin,” he managed to say as his world flickered black.

Chapter 36

“Chris? Chris!” she cried as Chris’ eyes closed and his body dropped into the ice cold water before she could grab him.

She hadn’t meant to hurt him. Oh god, had she killed him? Her heart lurched in her chest at the thought of Chris being dead. No, he couldn’t be dead. He couldn’t be. She was mad at him that was all. She’d been angry that he didn’t want the baby and that he was still planning on sending her off after she thought they were getting closer.

Not that she expected him to beg for her to stay with him or anything. She wasn’t an idiot. Okay, she might have wondered what it would be like to fall asleep in his arms every night and wake up in his arms every morning, one or two dozen times over the last ten hours since he turned into sweet, funny Chris, the Chris that she was afraid she just might be falling in love with.

The way he could make her feel on top of that too strong connection she felt with him had her falling hard for him and she was helpless to stop it. She knew he hadn’t wanted anything permanent, but she was hoping that he might have felt the same way about her. Something to let her know that she wasn’t in this all alone and that maybe for once someone truly cared about her.

But he didn’t. Clearly nothing had changed between them. He still planned on shipping her off and now felt like he had to take the one thing she’d never thought she’d have and would never give up. Not without a fight.

If he didn’t want them then that was fine with her, or at least she would make it fine later. Right now she needed to make sure that he was okay so that she could yell at him for scaring the hell out of her.

“Chris!” she cried as she half-ran-half-stumbled after him as the current threatened to knock her on her butt.

He went beneath the water as it dragged him back the way they came.

“Chris!” she screamed, feeling so damn helpless as he was dragged head first towards a large rock sticking out of the water. Praying she didn’t miss him, she dove for him. She landed to the side of him, missing her mark, but she made up for it by shoving him away and from the rock.

As she reached out and grabbed his ankle, praying he hadn’t swallowed too much water, she slammed her shoulder into the rock, but somehow managed to hold onto Chris through the mind numbing pain.

She pressed her back against the rock, ignoring the way the sharp edges dug into her skin and pulled Chris towards her. Once he was close enough she grabbed him by the waist of his pants and dragged him until she could pull him out of the water and into her arms.