by L. E. Horn
Well, not bottom, exactly. Water, deep and cold as ice. Dillon had his body wrapped around me, his claws embedded in my back. I drove my head up under his jaws as hard as I could, snapping his mouth shut on his tongue. His grip loosened in a swirl of blood, and I twisted in the water, punching my legs into his gut and pushing myself away, toward the rippling moonlight.
I broke the surface with a gasp, able to kick, but my arms windmilled, unable to either paddle or stroke to keep me above water. Just as Chris had warned me, the top-heavy wulfan physique threatened to drag me under. Dillon surfaced near me—snarling and snapping—too far gone into madness to fear drowning.
Holding my breath, I let the water take me, diving low to pass beneath his thrashing form and kicking hard to come up behind him. I wrapped my arms and legs around his body, using my claws as anchors, and sank my teeth into the massive muscles along the side of his neck.
From my angle of attack, I couldn’t reach the throat. The blood vessels I chewed toward were buried deep in the tissues. We’d drown before I found them, but the tremendous strength in Dillon’s legs kept bringing us to the surface, even as my weight pulled him under. Whenever we surged upward, my nostrils flared to suck in air. My jaws had to keep working, choking on blood, burrowing through tissue to find the artery beneath.
Dillon’s long limbs reached around to tear at me, the claws ripping great furrows in my flesh. I released an arm to protect my face, grabbing the top of his head. Blood flowed from cuts and blinded me. But I hung on as Dillon’s snarls and howls turned to screams, and finally, pitched higher, to squeals.
He was weakening, but so was I. My arms and legs shook, and my jaws spasmed, even as one canine finally found the goal. The pulse of warm blood arcing across my face made me peel my lips back from my fangs in a death grimace. The warmth was welcome, but the coppery, metallic taste filled my mouth and flowed into my nose, making me snort it clear to breathe. I flexed my jaws, braced my arms, and tore upward, ripping the artery wide open. Dillon unleashed a final, unearthly shriek and his legs gave a mighty kick. Numbness spread through me as we sank fast into the darkness.
Cracking impacts, like bullets through glass. The water erupted with foam, and it felt like a million knives speared into my shoulders, making me gasp in pain. Dillon slipped from my grasp, and I flailed for him. No . . . must finish him . . . can’t let go. Something clubbed me hard on the side of the head and everything went black.
13
Someone swore with a fluidity that impressed me. Several times I thought I caught my name as part of the tirade, but my brain kept fading in and out, and there were gaps I couldn’t quite fill.
“Chris,” an unfamiliar voice chided. The voice stopped its rant. My head pounded, but once the swearing ceased, I became aware that a lot of other things hurt worse than my head.
“He’s coming out of it. You didn’t have to hit him so hard.” I decided I liked the voice for another reason. It had a soft, slight burr that added depth to the feminine overtones. Whoever she was, she had a lovely way of speaking. It drew me like a fly to honey.
“Yes, I damn well did. He wouldn’t let go of that bastard.”
Hands stroked my forehead, skin roughened across the fingertips.
“Determined. Stubborn too. Sounds like someone else I know.”
“Respect your elders, girl.” Chris, definitely.
“Watch your tone with my daughter.” A strange rumble, not as deep as Chris’s, but with a similar burr to the female’s.
Curious, I opened my eyes. The moon silhouetted a form, my nose brought me a scent that started my heart pounding—wulfan, and female. The strength of my physical reaction surprised me, and I struggled to make out her features. She moved, and I saw high cheekbones, a square but feminine jaw, and a mouth with corners that told secrets. But her eyes—the color of moonlight— pierced straight through to my soul.
I felt as though I’d been hit by lightning. Startled and a little alarmed, I ripped my gaze away. Which was when I realized she was naked, and my brain ceased all ability to function.
Her gaze widened as she noticed my attention roam, and she cuffed me on a shoulder. “Eyes up, soldier,” she said in a no-nonsense tone. “Only fathers and gay men get to see anything else.”
“That smacks of discrimination.” Chris pointed out from somewhere behind her. “And what about Garrett?”
“He’s castrated.”
“I wondered.”
Castrated? Is she serious? I inhaled to speak and regretted it. Pain lanced through my damaged ribs, which set off a cacophony of complaints from all over my body. I closed my eyes and moaned.
“Serves you damn well right.” Chris’s words were angry, but his voice was filled with a curious mixture of self-recrimination and concern. “You were supposed to help Peter, not go pelting off after Dillon. Now we’ll have to carry your sorry ass outta here.”
“Chloe . . .” I managed. My worry for her seemed muted. Why?
“Josh has her.” The other voice, the male one, sounded grim. Father? My memory supplied a name. Matt. The girl must be Sam, his daughter. Chris had brought the enforcer brigade.
“Dillon?” I took small breaths to speak.
“Dead.” Definite pride in Chris’s reply. “You did good, kid. That bastard was too far gone to save, likely has been for some time. Chloe should have known better. Peter almost died because of it.”
I agreed and had even thought as much myself. But she’d paid a high price for her blindness. “She didn’t deserve what she got,” I whispered. The faces and voices blurred, and fog moved in around the edges. Something wouldn’t let me go under, niggling at the back of my mind like an annoying worm. It involved Peter. But I stitched him up. “Peter?” I mumbled.
“You’re lying there in pieces worrying about everyone but yourself.” Chris sounded exasperated. “Doc Hayek is with Peter.”
Not Peter, then. But I remembered the smell of Peter’s blood. By the dead sheep. And on Chloe. I blinked and my vision blurred, but I fought through the fog. Peter was naked. He’d started as a wulf. What made him go into the house for the gun?
I pictured Dillon loping toward the house, the sheep in his jaws. Peter wouldn’t have taken Dillon on in wulf form, because he’d done it before and lost. So he’d changed to human and confronted Dillon for killing the animal. The claw marks on Peter’s back—not a kill strike, but more of a “piss off” move. Dillon hadn’t taken the criticism well. But he’d given Peter enough time to go for the gun—was he too busy eating the sheep? Likely. And too arrogant to consider Peter a risk. That fit.
Too much thinking. My brain throbbed along with everything else. But it refused to let me go. Dillon was too far gone to save, so Peter got his gun, intending to finish him once and for all. Then Dillon hit him with the bat and tried to rip out his throat.
No, that makes no sense. I pictured Peter emerging onto the deck, naked, but for the gun. Aiming it at Dillon, snacking on the sheep. But the angles were all wrong. How did Dillon get to the bat? And besides, the bat strike had come from behind. And Peter would never have turned his back on someone he didn’t trust. Those he did trust made a damned short list.
The scene continued to play in my head—Peter getting slugged with the bat from behind, dropping to his knees. And a small, brown hand reaching around to slash his throat.
Chloe. Her irrational devotion to Dillon. And her claws—red, not with Dillon’s blood but Peter’s.
Wulfan mate for life. Two sets of mates. Dillon and Chloe. And Chris and Josh.
Oh my God . . . Josh.
I struggled up, shoving aside the lithe female form that exclaimed and moved to push me back.
“No!” Half shout, half roar. “It’s Chloe! She tried to kill Peter.”
Suddenly I had the full attention of all three enforcers.
“It’s Chloe . . .”
“Chloe?” Chris gasped. “My God. Josh.” And he vanished, his shadow rippling in the moonlight as h
e became the wulf. Matt shot me a look and raced on Chris’s heels.
I rose to follow and the world swayed around me. Arms grabbed my shoulders, and Sam hovered into view. Still human. Still naked.
“Liam? Dammit. You’re bleeding everywhere.” She stared into my eyes, and hers widened at what she found there. “I don’t suppose you’ll lie back down?”
For an answer, I growled, my teeth bursting forth. My body was spent, but my mind drove me on, and the wulf answered my call. At least in part, giving me fangs and claws and the strength to stagger on human legs along the trail.
A slim, but strong arm wrapped around my waist. Her scent washed over me, warm and fragrant with her sweat, and something within responded, but I struggled to stay focused.
“All right then. I ought to clout you up the side of the head, but there’s been enough of that tonight.” She tucked her shoulder under mine and pulled my arm over her back. “Onward, soldier. Charge, as it were.”
* * *
The trip back to where I’d left Chloe seemed much longer than the voyage out. Of course, I’d been running from a homicidal maniac wulf at the time. Not running from. Leading away.
Right. Whatever I had to tell myself.
Now my sacrifice was pointless. If I’d only paused to work it out at the house, I wouldn’t have gone after Chloe and Dillon. But I remembered the bite wounds and smells on Chloe and realized that Dillon had proved a beast that even she couldn’t tame. But will she turn on Josh or admit what she’s done?
I figured the odds on her coming clean were long. If I was right, she and Dillon were mates. What happens when one mate dies? I thought of Peter and the pain he must have felt when he lost his. Hobbling, half jogging with Sam holding me up, my stomach twisted, knowing no matter how hard I pushed, it might be too late.
Cursing the impulsive act that landed Josh in this mess, my bruised brain raced through scenarios. But every one led to Josh ending up in the same place and time. Sometimes Fate is a bitch.
But if anything happens to Josh, I’ll never forgive myself.
The air whistled in my chest, each breath sending waves of agony through me. As we moved, Sam took an increasing amount of my weight. Although she kept up a running dialog of commentary, interlaced with the occasional profanity, she never suggested we quit. She would have to knock me out to stop me, and she seemed reluctant to go there. Such a little thing, tucked under my arm, but strong as a—well, a wulf, I guess.
A form materialized on the trail before us. It startled me as Matt rose to human from wulf. I’d fallen into a daze as we’d staggered along.
“Josh?” Sam’s voice was laced with tension. Sticking with me at my snail’s pace must have driven her nuts.
“Bleeding, but okay,” Matt rumbled, his voice filled with relief and still hoarse from the transition. I sagged against Sam. The news that Josh wasn’t lying dead in a puddle of blood took the last of my adrenaline and with it, my strength.
Sam handed me over to her father, and I saw how my blood had spread over her torso. Her naked torso.
“Hey, what did I say about eyes?” she snapped at me. I wrenched my gaze off her and the world tilted.
“Look out, he’s going to . . .”
14
Of all our senses, the sense of smell has been proven to link the strongest to our memories. Now that the wulf had enhanced mine, I appreciated the richness offered to me. The scent that pulled me from the darkness—fresh, exciting, yet familiar—made the small hairs on my neck and arms rise. Definitely worth the pain wrought by my return to awareness.Definitely worth the pain wrought by my return to awareness.
I inhaled and winced in agony.
“I wouldn’t take deep breaths for the next while,” a voice told me.
A slight form perched beside me on the bed. My bed, in my room. The form may have been small, but even dressed in a tee shirt and jeans she possessed curves that spoke to me. A smile pulled at my lips. Sam was a sight for sore eyes—and a very sore body.
“Hey, soldier,” she said, and smiled. “I’m Sam, if you don’t remember.”
I mentioned before that I’m a sucker for a good smile. Sam’s blew the lid off anything I’d ever seen. Full lips, white teeth, the way the expression danced in her gray eyes—gray didn’t do them justice, they were the color of a summer storm. My heart flipped over at what I read in those eyes.
“Do you speak?” she asked.
“Hey, Sam,” I croaked. “I’m Liam.” She reached for the pitcher of water by the bed and poured me a glass. I admired the way the sun streamed through the window to catch gold highlights in her rich red hair.
She laughed. “Quite the introduction, almost getting yourself killed.” She held the glass for me as I drank. I looked at my arms, covered in bandages, and remembered Dillon raking them with his claws. With the awakening of my brain came memories. “Peter?”
Some of the light died in her eyes. “He’s alive, but still unconscious. Doc Hayek said you saved his life, but now it’s up to the wulf to heal him.”
“His skull is fractured.” I didn’t say it as a question.
“Yes. The doc doesn’t know if there will be damage, either from the fracture or the loss of blood.”
I contemplated that information. “He’s too stubborn to die.”
“Yeah, he is.”
“Josh?”
“Chloe attacked him. He defended himself. Chloe is dead.”
I closed my eyes, remembering her thick, rich brown hair and inviting smile. Yet the pain I felt wasn’t so much for her, but for the woman I’d thought she’d been. That woman didn’t exist.
“I’m sorry,” she said. The words were well meant, but not necessary.
“She tried to kill Peter.” For me, it was as simple as that. “How’s Josh?” I thought of the gentle man, the caregiver, having to put down Chloe.
“Not good.” Sam’s expression showed regret. “He’s not an enforcer. Not that taking someone down is ever easy, but we deal. Josh is having a hard time with it.”
My body made a bid for attention, enhancing awareness of my nakedness beneath the sheets. “I—uh, need to get to the bathroom.”
“I want to check your wounds.” Something in her voice made me look closer at her.
“Bathroom first. Perusal after.” I lifted the sheet and glanced down, grimacing at the bandages covering what I supposed were stitches. “Wow.”
“Most are waterproof if you want a shower.”
Suddenly, the urge to wash became as urgent as the need to empty my bladder. Although my skin had been scrubbed clean around the wounds, dried blood still clung to it for the stretches in between. The sheets were a horror; I’d never get the stains out.
It seemed Sam was a mind reader. “I’ll change your sheets while you take a shower. Can you get up?” She stood and moved beside me, a hand out to assist if I needed it.
My gaze drifted, remembering the last time I saw her.
“Hey. That eyes-up rule holds for when I’m dressed too.” She raised an eyebrow at me. “Just ask Garrett what happens when you break the rules.”
“Castration?” I guessed.
She laughed. “So you were awake.”
Not quite sure if she was joking about my becoming a eunuch, I sat up with care. My protesting ribs wiped the thought from my mind, them and a million other injuries to my body, including my head, which ached. I swung my legs over the side of the bed, clutched the sheet to my hips, and stared at her.
“Nothing I haven’t seen before, soldier. And recently, at that.”
Heat flooded my face, and she laughed.
“I can manage on my own,” I declared. “I’d appreciate it if you’d turn around.”
“Wulfleng.” Eyes dancing, she grinned and complied. I eased myself out of bed and wobbled across the floor to the bathroom. At the door, I turned and caught her staring at my butt.
“Hey!” I protested.
She arched one russet eyebrow and yanked off the
bottom sheet.
I took care of the immediate concern before turning to face myself in the mirror. I didn’t recognize the person staring back at me. What I had first considered to be dried blood turned out to be bruises, and they were everywhere. The side of my head was shaved, and a large bandage covered what I determined, with careful poking, to be a deep claw mark, now stitched. My eyes were bloodshot, the surrounding skin puffy and swollen. I had bandages all over, concentrated on my arms, shoulders, and legs. My thighs had actual gouges, and I could feel the dents through the white gauze.
There was more of me bandaged than not. I could smell the rankness of Dillon in my hair and on my body, and I remembered his blood running warm across my face. I shuddered, then winced as the movement hurt my ribs. And everything else.
I got into the shower. Someone had placed a stool in it, so I could sit—well, perch, as I discovered the wound on my butt—while scrubbing. Sam’s done this before. I wondered about the daughter of an enforcer who had become one herself.
By the time I emerged, a towel around my waist, my energy was running on empty. Sam waited outside the bathroom, lending me an arm back to the bed.
“Stay like that,” she said when I sat on the edge. “I’ll check your bandages.”
First she examined the ones along my torso, a painful process but not without its perks as it brought her close enough that I could sense her body heat. She seemed unaffected by my proximity. I couldn’t say the same.
“You know, when Chris told me about you, I pictured you—differently.” Crap, did I just say that?
“And how did you picture me?”
I hesitated. “I think I’ll stop my foot, as it’s on its way to my mouth.”
Sam smiled. “I like you, Liam. You’re smart.”
I regarded her uncertainly. Is that a smile or is she baring her teeth?