He turned toward the two males who stood behind him, their van parked lengthwise across the quiet street in case Bo had tried to back his truck up to get away. But he hadn’t even known they were there. He’d been so involved with her…
He couldn’t worry about that now. About how unobservant he’d been. How stupid. Not if he wanted to get her back.
Reaching behind him, he caught hold of the probes attached to his back and ripped them off.
“Jesus Christ,” the younger full-human sputtered, stumbling back, the taser falling from his hand. The older one was going for his sidearm. With no time to fight these two, Bo grabbed hold of his truck’s back door and ripped it off at the hinges.
The older male had his gun raised and pulled the trigger. The bullet slammed into Bo’s shoulder, but all it really managed to do was piss him off even more.
Roaring, his mane growing as the rage coursed through him potent and uncontrollable, he threw the door. It hit the one holding the gun, part of his head taken off in the process. The younger one screamed and ran, not even trying to get back into his van and drive away. He just ran, never once looking back.
With Blayne his only thought, Bo turned and shot off after the other van. Unable to see the taillights anymore, he took a chance and cut through the park that this road swerved around, praying he got there fast enough. Praying they hadn’t made it to the expressway. He hadn’t bothered with his truck because it limited what he could do. And he was fast enough to keep up with most cars or vans.
As he powered around trees and over benches, Bo caught sight of fast-moving headlights farther ahead. He snarled, his speed increasing as he thought about Blayne alone in that van.
They had her. They had Blayne.
Those who had taken her were chatting comfortably. They’d done this before. So much so, they were busy discussing basketball tickets and plans they had for next weekend. And while they chatted, whatever medication they’d given Blayne to knock her out was pouring out of her pores like sweat. She felt cold, her thick sweater doing little to keep her warm, the liquid soaking into the material. Her teeth began to chatter, but she clenched her jaw tight and held on.
Someone leaned in close. A full-human. They were all full-human.
“Jesus. She’s sweating like a pig.”
“In this cold?” a female asked.
“Chain her up,” a gruff voice from the front of the van ordered.
“But, sir—”
“Do it.”
The male sighed, and Blayne felt hands grip her wrists, the cold touch of metal against her skin. She took in a breath, steeling herself for what she had to do next. And that’s when the van bucked.
“Jesus Christ!”
“What the hell—”
Blayne heard a roar from overhead and she almost smiled.
Bo.
He’d come for her.
“We should have killed him,” the female voice whispered to someone else “He’s on the roof,” someone else said, his words nearly muted from the sound of metal being torn apart by claws.
“Kill him,” the gruff voice ordered. “Kill him now.”
Blayne opened her eyes and took a quick look around. It was a young male who sat beside her, his attention focused on the van ceiling. She looked him over once and saw the blade he had strapped to his leg. Military issue.
“And lock her up!” the gruff voice snapped. The young male pulled his gaze away from the ceiling and back to Blayne.
She smiled at him. He blinked, startled, and quickly tried to grab her wrists. She yanked them away and slapped him across the face. His head jerked to the side, and Blayne reached down and grabbed hold of his blade.
As she slid it free from its holster, she kept in mind what her father had always told her. “Do something, Blayne. Even if it’s wrong, do something.”
And that’s just what she did.
Bo swiped his claws against the roof again, tearing at it to get inside.
He could hear screaming now and, roaring in rage, sure they were hurting Blayne, killing Blayne, he shoved metal aside to get inside to her. To save her. But the shock of what he saw when he looked inside that van caught him off guard; that split second of confusion costing him dearly because the vehicle swerved wildly again, spinning in a circle and tossing him off.
Bo’s body flipped through the air until he hit the ground hard, his right forearm shattering from the impact while his body continued to flip again, his ribs banging against unfortunately placed rocks. He rolled a few feet more, finally slowing to a stop that left him in excruciating pain and unable to breathe very well.
Bo stared up at the trees over his head. Everything was silent now, and he knew that the van had crashed while he’d flipped across the park ground. To be honest, he wanted to stay right where he was. He wanted to lie here and try to find a way to breathe without that unfortunate whistling sound. He wanted to die here staring up at the trees and hoping that heaven really was an ice-covered pond where all the best hockey players met daily for a new game.
He knew he couldn’t, though. Not because he was determined to live—although he’d definitely like to do that—but because he had to get to Blayne. If there was anything he could do for her, he would.
Bo made his body get up, but it was a new experience in torturous pain. An experience he hoped to never go through again. Forcing himself to see past everything that swimmed before him, Bo stumbled his way over to the van, his shattered right arm tucked tight against his body.
He felt panic sweep through him when he saw that the van had wrapped around a tree, the front and side windows blown out, bodies lying everywhere.
“Blayne?” His voice sounded garbled, and he knew that blood poured out of him. He ignored that and searched among the blood-covered and dressed-in-black bodies, hunting for Blayne.
Panting and trying not to pass out, Bo sniffed the air. His eyesight may be average but his sense of smell…
His gaze snapped over to a tree about twenty feet away. He walked/limped over to it, and as he got closer he saw her.
The wolfdog was covered in blood and, even scarier, she was wrapped around her own tree. He crouched beside her and touched her shoulder. Like a broken rag doll, she rolled over, and he could tell from the way her body moved that her bones were broken… possibly all of them.
“Oh, God. Blayne.” He touched her cheek with the back of his left hand. She still breathed but barely. “Blayne. I’m so sorry.”
His legs gave out from under him and he fell back on his ass. He sat there, panting, wishing he could change the entire night. Wishing he could tell Blayne how he really felt before he lost her like he’d lost nearly everyone else that had mattered to him. He wished he could—
Jesus Christ on a cross, you idiot!
Bo glanced around, everything growing hazier by the second. Yet he knew his uncle’s voice. He could hear it, like he’d been hearing it since he was ten years old.
Don’t sit there being pathetic. Do something, boy. Even if it’s wrong—do something!
His uncle was right. Bo had to do something. Anything.
He looked over at Blayne. She still had on the watch he’d given her, his having been ripped off when he tore through the van roof. The outside had been badly damaged, but Bo still held out hope for the inside. And at a cost of nearly fifty grand, the damn thing better survive a monumental crash.
Reaching over, more blood pouring from his mouth in the process—at least nothing hurts anymore—Bo grabbed Blayne’s watch and pushed the tiny button on the side, releasing the face plate. And thankfully, unlike the outside of the watch, the inside remained in perfect working order. Using the tip of his pinky finger, Bo pulled out the now active antenna and pressed the button built inside.
Letting out a relieved sigh he’d done that much, Bo dropped. The last thing he consciously remembered before everything ended was putting his arm around Blayne and wishing that everything could have been different for them.
CHAPTER 15
Grigori Novikov woke up snarling.
“It’s not my phone,” a female voice snapped in the darkness.
Moving away from the warm body he’d been wrapped around, Grigori reached down to his jeans lying on the floor and dug the phone out of his front pocket.
“Yeah?”
“Grigori?”
Grigori had a hard time hearing the voice on the other end. There was a lot of background noise. Sounded like choppers. “Yeah.”
“It’s your cousin. Yuri.”
“Yeah?” Because God knew he had a lot of cousins.
“From Brooklyn. We got a retrieval call.”
“Yeah?”
“It’s Bold.”
Wide awake, Grigori sat up. “Are you sure?”
“We’re sure. He’s in bad shape.”
“Bring him here.”
“There’s a hospital in the city—”
“That’s not prepped for a hybrid bear. Bring him here. We be waiting for him.”
“Okay. We’re moving. One other thing.”
“What?”
“There’s a female.”
“Full-human?”
“No. But if she’s not dead, she will be.”
But he knew his nephew. If she was with Bold, they at least had to try. “Bring her.”
“You got it. I’m sending my son. We’ve got clean up here.”
The call disconnected, Grigori turned and dropped his feet to the floor.
“What is it?”
“It’s Bold,” he replied to the concerned voice. “He needs us.”
Gwen pushed up against Lock’s side until he took the hint and put his arm around her. She laughed again at the conversation between the two males. If anyone had told her a year ago she’d be engaged to a geeky bear with a honey fetish, she would have slapped some sense into them. But she was starting to realize that life was always about a little confusion. The more confusion, the more interesting.
“Maybe I should call Blayne,” Ric suggested after they’d finished their dessert and he was poured another cup of coffee.
“Why?” Gwen asked, although she already knew the answer.
“I don’t know if I trust him.” Something Gwen had already figured out, based on the reaction of both males when she told them how the hybrid had trapped Blayne into a dinner date. She thought it was funny and cute. The guys? Not so much.
“He’s an asshole,” Lock muttered in between sips of his coffee.
Considering Lock usually had nothing bad to say about anyone, made it all the funnier when he did.
“I don’t know if I’d go that far, but I don’t trust him with our Blayne.”
This was the problem with Blayne. She became friends with all these guys, turned them into the big brothers she never had, and ended up dateless but well protected from any other male who may have an interest. And who had to fix the problem? Who else? Gwen.
“She’ll be fine,” Gwen assured both idiots. “Trust me, Blayne knows how to take care of herself.”
“Yeah, nothing like a mighty slap fight to throw off a hardened scumbag.”
“Slap fights are for her friends. If she was in real trouble, I have no doubts Blayne could handle it.” She looked at Ric. “So feel free to call off your pit bull.”
Ric choked on his coffee. “What?”
“You know, Ric. Your pit bull—Dee-Ann? You hired her to protect Blayne, yeah? Well, if I’m right, Blayne will soon have her very own hockey star to watch out for her, so you can put your bitch back on her chain.”
“I’m not clear what you—”
“You did hire her, didn’t you? To watch out for Blayne? Because of all the hybrid attacks? I mean,” she added, “I hope you hired her. Otherwise it’s just goddamn creepy that she’s been hanging around.”
Ric blinked. “Yes. Right. Of course. I hired her. To protect Blayne. Exactly.”
Lock placed his mug down on the table. “You’re lying.”
He said it so quietly Gwen knew he wasn’t teasing. And she watched Ric’s expression go from charmingly muddled to predatory cold in two seconds.
“You are,” Lock went on. “Because no one in their right mind would hire Dee-Ann Smith to follow someone as a precaution. So you tell me right now”—and that’s when the grizzly boar exploded—”why the fuck are you following Blayne!”
The full-humans in the diner jumped a little at Lock’s outburst, but Ric’s head only dipped a little, bright eyes focusing on the grizzly.
Gwen tapped the table. “Outside. Both of you. Now.”
She reached for her backpack to get her wallet, but Ric dropped a small wad of cash on the table to cover the bill and the tip.
Once outside, she pulled the straps of her pack over her shoulders and focused on Ric. “All right, start talking.”
“Perhaps we can—”
“Don’t hand me that shit, Ric,” Lock cut in. “This is Dee-Ann we’re talking about. And I know her well enough to know that I’d prefer almost anyone else on the planet to be following Blayne around of her own volition. So what’s the deal?”
“I can’t discuss it.”
“Why the fuck not?” Gwen snapped. “What are you hiding?”
Lock stepped in close to Ric, the two best friends staring each other down. One an angry grizzly, the other a wolf not ready to back down.
Gwen held her breath and balled her hands into fists until her nails dug into her palm.
After a long minute of mutual staring, Lock stepped back. “Oh, my God. You stupid son of a bitch.”
“What?” Gwen demanded.
“You did it, didn’t you?” Lock kept going, ignoring Gwen. “You joined the Group.”
Gwen shook her head. “What’s the Group?”
Lock gave a very short, brutal laugh. “They’re like the National Guard. The Unit handles problems outside the States while the Group likes to handle problems inside.”
“What does that have to do with Blayne?”
“Answer her,” Lock snapped when Ric didn’t respond.
Ric folded his arms over his chest, no longer looking like the sweet, unappreciated wolf she always thought of him and replied, “Blayne’s name was sold. For the pit fights.”
“Sold?” Gwen tried desperately to understand all this secret agent bullshit. “You mean so she could be taken?”
“Right. Dee-Ann’s been watching her to protect her.”
“That’s a lie,” Lock growled. “I know Dee-Ann. She’s nobody’s babysitter. You’ve been using Blayne as bait, haven’t you?” She knew what Lock said was true when Ric didn’t bother denying it. But Lock snapped, not surprising since a lot of his time in the Marines was spent playing the bait for the rich fuckers who hunted their kind.
Lock’s grizzly hump began to expand as he grabbed Ric by his leather jacket and lifted the wolf from the ground. “Haven’t you?” he roared, and the wolf snarled, lips pulling back to reveal two-inch-long fangs.
“Stop it!” Gwen yelled, slamming her body into Lock’s. “Stop it right now!” When the two didn’t move, she said, “Put him down!”
Lock did, dropping the wolf. Ric landed without a stumble, and Gwen stepped between the two, facing Ric. “Did you tell any of this to Blayne?” she asked him.
“No. It was decided that it was best if we didn’t.”
Gwen briefly closed her eyes. “No, Ric. That was not best. Not with a wolfdog. And not with Blayne Thorpe.”
“We’ve got her protected.”
“Dee-Ann’s with her Pack tonight,” Lock said.
“We have someone else covering her tonight.”
Lock sniffed. “Trainees.”
“You put trainees on Blayne?” This was getting worse, and Gwen quickly dug into her jeans to retrieve her cell phone.
“She’ll be fine. It’s not like they’re fresh out of high school, Gwen.”
“You guys don’t understand,” she said. “You think you know Blayne…” Gwen again sho
ok her head and speed-dialed Blayne’s cell. She did it two more times, knowing her friend’s phone always ended up at the bottom of her bag. But after the third time of not answering, Gwen knew it was time to worry.
“Well?” Lock asked.
“She’s not answering.”
“That doesn’t mean”
“You don’t know Blayne!” she yelled in Ric’s face. She paced away from the men. “You don’t know her at all.”
Christ, they were in so much trouble. Somehow, someway, they’d lost that damn wolfdog. Dee-Ann, also referred to around the Group office as “That Bitch” was going to have their collective asses for this. It would be especially hard to explain away considering Bo Novikov’s truck was the size of a small tank and really hard to miss. But they got caught in New York traffic. It wasn’t their fault!
“Turn here,” she told Tommy. He did, and after less than a mile, he pulled to a stop.
“Fuck.”
Gemma got out of the car. She pulled her weapon from the holster and quickly advanced to a damaged van and a full-human missing part of his head.
“This one got off a shot,” Tommy told her.
She nodded and walked over to Novikov’s black truck. The driver’s side window was broken, both doors open. She heard House of Pain’s “Jump Around” and knew someone had it as a ringtone. As she stood beside the passenger’s side, she could tell it came from the backpack. Blayne Thorpe’s backpack, which still had her wallet and credit cards. Nope. Not a robbery.
“I’ll call Dee—” she began, but stopped when she saw the look Tommy gave her. Or, should she say, that Tommy gave whatever was behind her.
Gemma sniffed the air and unleashing her fangs, the She-leopard spun around, her claws out. The grizzly caught her by the head and lifted her off the ground. She hissed and snarled, slashing at him with her claws. She heard Tommy roar and then she was flying, right over the truck and right into her tiger partner. They hit the ground hard, rolling on impact. She got up first, and that’s when she saw the black bear and the polar lumbering toward them.
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