“Alex’s punishment is not your responsibility,” she told Tattoo Kid. “Fighting is your second demerit. Killing is an instant wash out—no chances left to go for a third.”
Either my cousin couldn’t count, or she was lying. In wolf form, the latter possibility made no sense to me.
I cocked my head, whined out a question.
Then two big burly thugs pressed in through the door.
Chapter 6
Bad timing had turned into worse timing. Tattoo Kid would never manage to back down from the aggression pouring off the newcomers’ skin.
My cousin, of course, seemed intent upon giving him the breathing space to at least try.
“Gentlemen, a moment please.” Becca slipped past us so fast she might as well have been lupine. Her hands pressed against over-muscled chests. Her feminine humanity was the only factor preventing the executioners from ripping her to shreds.
And I took advantage of the eddying emotional currents to follow her lead as well as I could. Wrenching myself back into my two-legger skin, the undertow drew Tattoo Kid up right alongside me. His human teeth scratched Alex’s neck as I dragged the two apart with human fingers. Tattoo Kid’s whine emerged from furless lips even though the emotion he expressed was entirely wolf.
“Not your problem,” I assured Tattoo Kid as Alex took advantage of the moment to try to rise off the linoleum. My foot struck the latter’s throat. Alex subsided with a gurgle of pain.
Becca was talking, but I wasn’t listening. Instead, my entire attention was focused on the boring of eyes between my shoulder blades. Alex’s father’s henchmen were hungry for blood—mine, Tattoo Kid’s, Alex’s, it didn’t matter. Inside my skin, my wolf bristled. Beside me, Tattoo Kid growled low and quiet deep in his throat.
“Let them step up and take him. He’s not yours. He’s mine.”
I wasn’t lying. Every kid who entered Death Camp territory became my temporary pack mate. It was my trick for managing the unmanageable. Usually, I relinquished that connection before washouts were executed. This time, for Tattoo Kid’s sake, I instead held tight to the tether twining between myself and Alex as the henchmen stomped past us and yanked the teenager to his feet.
“Past the end of the driveway,” I told them as they dragged a whimpering washout back in the direction from which they’d come. No need for the campers to hear this execution. Only after their vehicle doors slammed shut did I reach down to pull Tattoo Kid to his feet.
“What’s your name?”
I wasn’t making conversation—my wolf was too dominant inside my body to succumb to such human irrelevancies. Instead, I was giving Tattoo Kid a moment to pull himself together before I released the rest of the campers from the order that held them frozen with spoons in their hands and oatmeal in their mouths.
Unfortunately, Tattoo Kid didn’t play along. “Call me whatever you want to.” He shrugged, turning away in a gesture that was insolent enough to earn another demerit.
But I didn’t give him one and he knew I wouldn’t. This was the trouble with making exceptions. Laxness on my part opened the door to bad behavior of this sort.
Becca sighed, a soft sound of disappointment. We both knew we were going to lose a second camper today...and with no father in the wings, I’d have to perform this execution.
Only, Tattoo Kid wasn’t giving me the body-language equivalent of the middle finger. Instead, he swiveled back to face me with that ratty old duffel swinging from one finger.
He dropped it at my feet like a well-trained dog returning a thrown tennis ball. “I don’t intend to be a charity case,” he said, voice gritty.
I held out my hands palm-up in question. It was hard to hold onto the plot line here in the cafeteria when I could feel Alex’s fear ratchet up from worry to terror in the distance. He and his pack mates had reached the killing ground. Through the washout’s nose, I smelled blood, feces, and urine. Even after eleven months, the kill site stunk.
“Twenty grand is still the price of admission, right?” Tattoo Kid wasn’t letting the matter drop. Instead, he upended the duffel, releasing a cascade of twenty-dollar bills that fluttered down to form a pile completely covering my bare feet.
I blinked. “Did you rob a bank?”
“No.”
He didn’t elaborate, but the oversight wasn’t due to surliness. Pain ripped through me as my connection to Alex tightened. And, from the expression on Tattoo Kid’s face, the same agony had slammed into his belly as well.
Alex didn’t die easy. He struggled—I could feel it. He whined and begged and was torn to shreds with a complete lack of dignity.
And Tattoo Kid rode that wave right alongside me. He’d bonded with that asswipe Alex just like I had. He felt the moment when men Alex had once trusted ended his life.
Tattoo Kid coughed once, then shoulders that had bowed down in protest straightened. My own body mirrored his reaction, minus the cough.
Our conversation continued, the hiccup finished but not forgotten. For the sake of the campers, I held my voice steady. “You don’t owe me anything.”
“I’m paying for the chance of a pack.” His tone matched mine beat for beat. “This has nothing to do with you.”
The room exhaled even though I hadn’t released my long-ago order. Instead, Tattoo Kid did the job for me with pure intent.
And, for the first time all day, I smiled. A new alpha was being born.
Chapter 7
Looking back on it, the next three weeks merged into a movie-montage scene, complete with upbeat soundtrack and occasional laugh lines.
There was the day I took the campers hunting box turtles to be radiotracked by scientists...in wolf form, of course. Matthew—a scrawny bloodling scared of his own strength—refused to pick up the shelled reptiles until Tattoo Kid led the way with such gentle wisdom that he cemented Matthew’s loyalty for good.
There was the teenager—nicknamed Nose—who was the epitome of awkwardness in human form but whose sense of smell beat everyone else’s in the pack during our first group run. He wouldn’t be their leader, but everyone wanted him to survive Death Camp. Even our resident bully—Gregory—resisted the urge to kick Nose’s ass.
The rest of the campers had their own stories and characteristics...some of which were lost forever as the timbre of the montage darkened. After the first week, Becca and I stopped locking campers into their cabins at dusk and three kids died within the next twenty-four hours. The first two were disemboweled in their sleep. The killer was executed at dawn.
During the third week, a promising shifter perished due to bee-sting allergies—that one was unexpected. More predictable was the camper—Sneaker Boy—who broke three rules in quick succession and had to be put down by his father’s enforcers.
By the end of week three, there were only eight campers remaining. Tattoo Kid, timid Matthew, Nose, Gregory the bully, his henchmen Liam and Elijah, and two shifters I couldn’t quite get a handle on—Oliver and Aiden. We gathered in the gazebo after breakfast, the lines around Becca’s mouth tightening as I informed the survivors about what would happen during their final week of camp.
“Now’s your chance to get a head start over every other dumbass kid who went through this program,” I started. The rustling and whispering stilled as they realized my words would affect the rest of their lives...long or short. “One of you is the clear alpha. Unanimously choose him here and now and I’ll return a quarter of your tuition fee. That’s enough to buy an acreage and create a sweet territory. Everybody wins.”
A snort from the crowd was Becca’s cue to take on her role as good cop. “You kids don’t know what you’re missing out on.” She was so earnest, ignoring the eye rolls and yawns from Gregory’s side of the gazebo. “Three summers ago, the pack took us up on our offer. They bought a plot out west where land is cheap, and our paperwork gave them a year of leeway before they had to defend their territory from other packs. Now most of them have mates. They’re thriving. Plus, I took off to t
he beach for a week of vacation.” She placed a hand over her heart. “True bliss.”
Aiden chuckled at her theatrics, but the two alpha contenders had been paying more attention to the details. Gregory rose to his feet, straightening until he was one inch taller than everyone else in the vicinity. “I nominate...myself.”
And so much for that. No beach vacation this session. Instead, we could expect at least one more death.
I wasn’t the only shifter disappointed. Matthew—sweet kid, but dumb as a rock—opened his mouth to reject Gregory’s leadership. And Tattoo Kid spoke over him, painting the target on his own back instead.
“No.”
“Look,” Gregory started. “I’m the obvious choice. I have family connections. Money.”
“Arrogance? Not a selling point.” Tattoo Kid met Gregory’s stare for one split second, then dismissed him with a chin jerk at me.
Regaining the floor, I drew the campers’ attention away from the drama of the truncated power struggle. “Well, bozos, you just lost your best bet at survival. So here are the new rules. Don’t leave Death Camp property or you’ll regret it. No guns. And consequences for bothering Becca increase from this moment forward—touch a hair on her head or make her shed a single tear and you’re out.”
Nose shivered. By this point, they all knew what “out” meant.
“Otherwise,” I continued. “The rules are no rules. No cash payout, but I’ll sign off on your pack if you unanimously choose an alpha by the end of the week. Questions?”
“So, can we, um, kill each other?” Matthew’s brow furrowed.
My lips quirked. He’d given me just the opening I was waiting for. “Each other? Yes. Or me. That’s a yes also.”
Ears pricked up even though none of the campers were currently lupine. Everyone was paying attention when I planted the bait.
“Death Camp is set up as a trust, not a personal possession,” I informed them. “If I die, this year’s campers inherit the land, the cash, everything. Major stepping stone to success, guys.”
I slid my gaze across the eight remaining shifters. Tattoo Kid met my eyes. Matthew was red-faced, as if he’d been the one who turned this into Luke Hunting Season. Most of the others looked befuddled, sick to their stomachs, or outright lost.
But Gregory smiled wide and toothy. Bait sniffed out and accepted.
At least part of the morning had been a success.
Chapter 8
“I wish you wouldn’t do that.”
Becca and I were back where we’d started. Sitting on the porch, killing time while campers made decisions they’d later regret.
I shrugged. “Better they go after me than each other. Gives Tattoo Kid a couple of days to find his feet.”
“You could just shorten No Rules Week.” Becca glowered at her toenails. She was drawing in the dust again, but I couldn’t tell what the picture was at the moment. “Spend more time on Wolf Week. Now that’s an idea worth expanding upon.”
“Wouldn’t work.” I shook my head...then reached out and snagged the arrow speeding toward me out of the woods.
Grab and twist, making sure the point ended up far from Becca so it wouldn’t scratch her accidentally. Becca yipped only a little. My fingers stung from the friction. Still, I didn’t show any sign of weakness as I called into the forest.
“Nice try, but you’ll have to do better than that.”
A growl of frustration followed by a rustle of feet on fallen leaves promised Elijah had retreated. Becca and I sat in silence for a moment longer—smart packs started with a decoy then planned a second strike while their prey was recovering its wits.
Gregory’s pack was, apparently, not that smart.
When the cicadas restarted their chorus, Becca returned to her point. “Why not?”
“Because they need to get aggression out of their systems in a safe setting. Then they need to realize the deadline is crazy close. Pressure. Terror. It’s what builds a cohesive pack.”
Becca sighed. “Sometimes you’re so wolf it drives me crazy.”
“Sometimes I’m glad you’re really not.”
I meant my words, but I was only half paying attention to our conversation. Because, belatedly, I’d deciphered the picture at my cousin’s feet.
The central blob was a house, I realized. Out front, a stick family stood together under a shade tree—mother, father, kid, dog.
Or was that a wolf?
The truth hit me like a blow to the head. Becca yearned for lupine togetherness. No wonder she’d never made any real connections in the mundane human world.
Selfishly, I’d let her come to Death Camp September after September. I’d used her as a crutch, explaining away her presence as a teaching tool for the campers. She was a physical embodiment of the most important rule of pack dynamics—the strong protected those without fangs or the ability to bite back.
So, yeah, my reasoning had made sense at the time. But Becca was putting her life on hold hoping she and I could become permanent pack mates. Meanwhile, I’d lost all faith in pack when my father killed my brother in retaliation for a half-assed, teenaged rebellion.
I couldn’t commit to another wolf clan. Not now. Not so soon.
Which meant it was high time to stop deluding myself. It was time to follow my own advice—be strong and protect Becca from her own misplaced instincts.
Without Death Camp, my cousin could find a human husband. Buy a house. Pop out a kid. Adopt a dog.
The picture in the dust would be a pipe dream no longer. The fact I wouldn’t be part of it was beside the point.
I swallowed, then proceeded to fix my mistake. “We don’t need you here.”
“What?”
For a moment, it seemed as if she couldn’t understand what I was saying. So I elaborated.
“You’re a liability.”
“A liability?” Her voice—which had been nearly steady in the face of the steel-tipped arrow—rose to the pitch of a teakettle’s shriek.
A head popped out of the nearest cabin. I bared my teeth, growled, waited until the lookie-loo bolted back inside.
Playing on others’ emotions for their own future safety was what I did best. I’d just never used my skills against Becca before this point.
That had to be why my stomach ached as if I’d eaten day-old roadkill then returned to human form before the rancid meat had time to digest.
Ignoring the pain, I looked her dead in the eye. “A kitten would do your job better.”
“You plan to replace me with a kitten?”
Becca was on her feet now. The last time she’d been so angry, we’d both been five and I’d popped the head off her plastic doll and sunk it in the muddy lake bottom. She’d tried to claw my eyes out. I’d free dove for hours until I found the missing piece.
Now, grown up, I still quailed beneath her fury. Quailing involved blinking three times in quick succession before speaking. “So, are you leaving?”
“No, you infuriating man, I’m not leaving.” Any other woman would have slapped me. Instead, she called my bluff. “I’ll see this season out. Then we’ll talk.”
Chapter 9
For three days, Death Camp was a maelstrom of fury. Tattoo Kid made himself scarce while at the same time showing up anytime a weaker wolf found himself in danger. Gregory and his henchmen threw their full focus behind trying to kill me. Becca’s eyes joined in with the latter task while the rest of her body guarded my back.
“I’d really prefer you didn’t protect me,” I said through gritted teeth when Becca interposed herself between a stampeding werewolf and my waiting fingers. I’d planned to toss the kid over my shoulder into a hornet’s nest. Liam would have gotten the message in a dozen different stinging ways.
Now he’d just try again tonight. I sighed. I hadn’t planned on sleeping anyway.
“Pack mates protect each other,” Becca answered. Then, under her breath, “Even when one of them is a back-stabbing jerk.”
I shrugged, head
ing toward the center of camp where I’d be an easier target. If I could keep Gregory’s attention on me for another day or two, I had a feeling Tattoo Kid would win the fence-sitters over to his side. Five against three was bad odds among werewolves. The mismatch might be enough to make Gregory cave.
Unfortunately, time ran out quicker than I’d anticipated. And Gregory was more underhanded than any other camper I’d met during the last decade.
Or so I realized when I re-entered the cabin complex and scented vomit. I turned, nostrils flaring. The stench didn’t just emanate from one cabin but rather from several. All, in fact, except the dens of Gregory and his two henchmen.
“What is it?” This time, Becca stepped closer to me for her own comfort. As usual, she’d bonded with these campers. She was worried—not for herself—but for the safety of the kids.
Her shoulder nudged against my arm, and I wanted to pull her in close and reassure her the way a wolf would have done. Instead, I took a half step sideways, my hand falling to the taser belted at my hip.
“Lock yourself in the office and don’t come out until I tell you,” I ordered. “Don’t eat or drink anything.”
She snorted, a short huff of air out of delicate nostrils. “Whatever. You’re saying it’s poison?”
“I’m saying I need to buy an obedient kitten.”
“Yeah, because everyone knows it’s so easy herding cats.”
Becca reached the closest door before I could stop her. I hesitated, uncertain whether to stand behind her or walk before her. Was the greatest danger outside or in?
Outside. I turned as a flicker in my peripheral vision materialized into Gregory. No, not just Gregory. Gregory, Liam, and Elijah—all three assholes in a single location. What a coincidence.
“It’s time to decide,” the central asshole proclaimed loudly enough to be heard over the sound of retching. “My way or the die way.” He chuckled. “Get it? Die way?”
Thirteenth Werewolf and Other Stories Page 2