by Helen Scott
“Just teaching the little bitch a lesson. Maybe you two can help me?” Jax asked over his shoulder.
The men glanced at each other, shifting nervously as they tried to figure out what the best response was.
“We’ll do whatever you want, alpha,” the other one said.
“I know,” he replied without looking at them. His gaze was pinned on me and what I was sure was a slowly purpling face. If I didn’t get some oxygen soon, I was going to pass out, and that was the last thing I wanted with Jax and his goons around. I didn’t trust any of them. My stomach tightened into a knot of fear when he looked over at the two of them and simply said, “Hold her there.” I wasn’t sure what was coming next, but I was sure that I didn’t want to know, whatever it was. I just needed to figure out a way to get out and fast.
28
Nina
The two bruisers came over and took me from Jax like I was a rag doll, while he backed away and began to pull his shirt off. Fortunately, the exchange gave me a moment to breathe, which was more of a relief than I wanted to admit. I knew Jax didn’t want to kill me, but that didn’t mean he wouldn’t take me right up to the edge of death and force me to stare it in the face. He’d already made that perfectly clear with his words and now with his actions.
A snarl ripped through the air, and my stomach dropped as I tried to find the source of it. I could barely see past the brutes in front of me though. When a second snarl sounded and it was even closer, one of them turned, and I saw a massive silver wolf behind him. Its gray eyes glanced over me, making sure I was okay.
Roman was there, which meant that Micah and Tate had to be somewhere as well, unless Tate hadn’t healed enough to join them. I couldn’t think about that right now though.
Not when Jax was lunging for Roman.
The two bodyguards dropped me, and I crumpled to the ground, focusing on sucking in as much air as I could while I had the opportunity. Just the feeling of my chest expanding felt like pins stabbing me all over my skin, like somehow, it had all constricted in that short period of time and was now objecting to being forced to expand again. I forced myself to try and breathe evenly, not just follow my instincts and gulp air down, but it was a challenge, especially while watching the guys fight.
Micah had appeared in wolf form, which meant that the two guards had shifted so they could fight better. It also meant that it was just me and Jax in our human forms. He was watching me curiously, probably wondering why I didn’t shift to fight with my mates. He’d seen my wolf before when I was little, but I hadn’t shifted much, if at all, after my parents’ murder, so it had been a while.
My younger mate was rolling around on the floor with his opponent, the two of them snapping and snarling at each other, looking so vicious and set on tearing each other’s throats out that I was genuinely concerned for Micah’s life. I knew it was always a possibility that Jax’s wolves would kill one of my mates, but seeing it front and center like that made my heart almost freeze in my chest. I knew I had to trust Micah though. He would fight smarter not harder.
Roman leapt up and tried to gain the upper hand—or paw as it were—on the wolf he was fighting, but the two of them just ended up colliding as they both stood on their hind legs. For a moment, I was terrified that Jax and his wolves would have that crazy ability to just shift back and forth like the wolves in Shadow Forest, but nothing like that happened.
I tried to push to my feet, but I stumbled and fell back down. When I tried again, it was only to come face to face with Jax. He stood less than a foot from me, seething with rage. Spittle flew from his mouth as he breathed heavily through his clenched teeth.
“I will ruin you, Antonia. You will regret the day you turned me down, regret hiding behind your human friends and now your mates,” he said a moment later.
“No. I won’t. But I’ll make sure you regret ever raising a hand to me or my mates. No, that’s not enough. I’ll make you regret even thinking about hurting us. You will become nothing but a shadow of a stain in our past as we go on and live happily without you. I left this pack years ago, turning it to dust in my mind, and now I’ll leave you in the dust as well.” I struck out with my foot, kicking him in the knee.
I didn’t miss this time. The hit was dead center and forceful enough that I heard a crack. Jax grunted in pain and fell to the ground, putting most of his weight on his good leg. I went to kick him in the face, but he saw it coming. He grabbed my ankle and yanked, pulling me off balance and forcing me to fall. Instead of letting myself fall backward again, since my body was still sore from him pushing me against the tree or whatever it was, I fell to my side, landing hard on my arm.
Pain lanced through me like a knife, shooting through my nerve endings and making me want to cry out. I couldn’t though, since Jax was on top of me, squishing all the air out of me, leaving me unable to make a sound.
He almost seemed to hover over me with all of his weight on his good leg and the opposite arm. His gaze was all wolf in that moment, and I’d never felt more like prey. This wasn’t the fun sexy kind of prey either. This was being the center of his focus, while all around him was chaos and destruction. I knew, I just knew, that if he caught me, if he kept me, then all that chaos and destruction would rain down on me until there was nothing left of the real me. I would be only what he created through violence and fear.
It was this notion that had me struggling underneath him, trying to get free, even when it seemed impossible with him pinning me down. His hips and stomach were practically cement blocks on my waist. Trying to move under his weight was next to impossible, and as I glanced to my mates for help, I saw that they were too busy with their own fights.
Roman and Micah were fighting to keep the others away from me and Jax, trusting that I could take care of myself, and I didn’t want to let them down, but I didn’t know how to get him off me either. I needed to be smart. He’d be expecting an attack, so I had to do the opposite.
Jax grabbed my face and forced me to look at him. “You’ll always be mine, Antonia, do you understand?” His shift was starting to distort his face and his voice, so it came out both growly and whiney.
“I’ll never belong to anyone, Jax. I’m my own person, not a fucking car or something that you can buy or steal. When are you going to understand that?” I demanded.
“You need to come with me. Stay with me. It’s the best way forward, it’s the only way this world works,” he hissed at me, a note of pleading to his voice as he tried to pin me down even further.
I didn’t want to do what I was about to do, but it was the only thing I could think of that stood a chance at surprising him. I relaxed completely against him, forcing my arms and legs to go slack, my face to smooth out as I rested my head against the ground. Everything in me was screaming at me to fight, but I knew that he wanted me badly enough that he wouldn’t think twice about accepting my surrender.
As soon as I relaxed enough that he was confused, I wrapped my legs around his hips, rolling my own against him, before twisting and pushing him over until I was straddling him. He grinned up at me as I stared down at him, keeping my expression relaxed.
“If you wanted to be on top, all you had to do was say so. I mean, it won’t be an all the time thing of course, but for birthdays and special occasions, I don’t mind letting you take control in the bedroom every once in a while.” He smiled up at me seductively, his lips curling in such a way that I knew he thought he’d won.
I pushed myself up into a sitting position, surprised that he let me, and rolled my hips once more for good measure. He was hard under me, his cock pressing against me, but it didn’t light a fire in me, not like one of my mates did. He didn’t seem to notice or care though, his eyes fixed on where I was pressed against him.
Now was my chance, I rocked back and forth, hooking my feet inside his thighs while balancing myself on him with my hands resting on his chest for a moment, then I popped up into a standing position. Without hesitating, I pulled my foot
back and let it fly, kicking him as hard as I could in the balls.
Jax’s howl of pain was enough to get the others to pause and look over at us. He cupped himself and tried to rock back and forth, as though he needed to escape the pain. He couldn’t though.
I leaned down and grabbed him by the jaw, jerking his face until he was looking at me with fury in his gaze. His moods were more tempestuous than a storm on the ocean deciding whether or not to become a hurricane. Once his gaze was fixed on me though, I knew I was in trouble if I didn’t get out of there.
“I am not yours. You will never have me. Everything you do pushes me further out of your reach. Understand that, asshole.” With the hand that wasn’t holding his face, I hauled back and slapped him across the cheek.
Would a punch have been better?
Probably.
But a slap felt more degrading, like I didn’t even think he was worthy of any more of my punches. I wanted to run while I had the chance, and I knew that was probably what Roman wanted me to do as well. I couldn’t abandon him or Micah to Jax and his wolves though, so instead, I tried to kick Jax in the balls again. He was protecting them this time, and I knew I wouldn’t get so lucky again. Between his knee and his balls, I was hoping he’d stay down.
It was why I decided to launch myself at the wolf attacking Micah. I landed on its back and pulled it to the floor, exposing its weak underside as I did so. Micah didn’t hesitate and tore into the wolf’s belly with his teeth and claws, shredding it as he attacked. The warm rush of blood covered my body where it was connected with the wolf I was holding, and I knew in that moment, the man wouldn’t survive the injuries Micah had just inflicted.
The bad thing was, I didn’t care.
A roar came from my other side, and Jax was back on his feet, his skin rippling with the shift that wanted to break through. Somehow, I knew that if his wolf made an appearance, I’d die. As much as I thought Jax was rash and full of anger and hate, I was sure that his wolf was the same, only more so. His wolf wouldn’t have the desire to keep me alive. He’d just act on instinct, and his instinct right now was to attack me, consequences be damned.
Which was why I knew we had to get out of there.
If he shifted, then there was no hope, so our best chance was running, but the sounds of a new fight pricked my ears as well. When Micah was done, I pushed the wolf that was bleeding out off of me and stood, my blood-soaked scrubs sticking to my skin in places. I looked toward the flap and saw more wolves outside, but they were fighting amongst themselves.
It was only the flash of jade green eyes scanning over me that had my heart singing with hope.
29
Blake
I’d heard Jax roar like that a couple times before since I’d joined the pack, and nothing good ever came of it. In fact, some of the worst fights I’d ever witnessed followed thereafter.
I muscled my way into the room where we knew Nina was, and for a moment, I panicked. She was drenched in blood from the waist down, with an odd clear patch in the middle. When I glanced around, I saw the wolf bleeding out at her feet and surmised that the blood must have been his. If she’d lost that much blood, I was certain she wouldn’t be standing there, looking like an avenging angel who was about to smite me if I looked at her the wrong way.
A sound drew my attention back to Tate and the wolf he was fighting. I turned and helped him tackle his friend to the ground, smacking his head into a brick for good measure. Finally, I looked at Tate and nodded toward the room.
“Let’s go get our girl,” I said.
Tate nodded in return. The two of us stepped into the other side of the tent. The problem was the two other wolves that followed behind us. We’d been effectively corralled—Nina and all her mates together in one spot. It was perfect if Jax wanted to punish her by hurting us.
Nina’s eyes were wide as she took me in, the question written all over her face. I gave her a slight nod, letting her know I was okay, though I really didn’t want to get hurt again, not when my whole body still ached from fighting the infection and the wound itself. Shifter healing hadn’t meant much when it came down to that, since the infection had spread too rapidly for my healing to fix. As Jax had so kindly pointed out once I was conscious again after he’d taken me, my wolf was weak.
It was true—my abilities to heal were weak and they always had been, but my wolf form, the thing he saw once I’d shifted, was far from weak. He would’ve known that if he ever paid attention to anyone except himself, just like he would’ve known that most of the pack didn’t understand or like his obsession with Nina. There were people talking about trying to take her out, just to stop the madness. It was amazing what you heard when people thought you were unconscious.
The two wolves that were behind us charged us with battle cries, and all I had to do was duck and the guy went barreling over me like I was a cliff edge or something. Roman and Micah had rotated around to square off against Jax, a dumb move on their part if you asked me, but it meant that Nina was out of his reach, which was probably their reasoning. I understood it, really, I just also knew how batshit insane Jax could be, just like he could appear completely sane and charming. The man was more of a chameleon than wolf.
I looked over at him as the man who’d rolled over me struggled to get to his feet, and I saw Jax’s skin ripple, his face beginning to elongate slightly. If he shifted, we were fucked.
“We need to get out of here,” I called out. I glanced at Roman and then Jax, hoping Roman picked up on the fact that Jax’s wolf was my concern.
That was all I was able to do though, because the guy who’d run at me was back up, and this time, he was coming at me slowly, swinging massive hammers of fists that would definitely leave my head ringing if they connected. My main focus was staying out of his range, but I also wanted to make sure the others knew we needed to leave.
I backed up toward Tate and the guy he was fighting, or rather circling. When he saw me, he pressed his back up against mine, and I said as quietly as I could, “Berserker incoming.”
Tate’s head whipped around to look at Jax. We both knew the consequences of facing his wolf, since we’d seen it plenty of times when people had challenged him to be alpha. None of them had survived. There had barely even been enough of them left to bury. He was a true berserker. Once his wolf was out, there was no stopping it until it decided to stop.
Which was why we needed to run.
“Go! I’m following, but go if you can,” Nina called.
It drew the attention of the guy who had been focused on me until that point. He turned to her like Michael fucking Myers or something and began a slow, almost curious walk toward her. As she stood and watched, I knew if I didn’t intercede, Nina would be hurt, and I couldn’t allow that, not when I could stop it. She was independent, didn’t like people saving her all the time, but sometimes, we just needed to be saved. Our society, outside of the pack, put too much emphasis on being self-reliant and not enough on community. I grew up differently though, and I wasn’t about to let her get hurt just so she got to be independent.
What I didn’t expect was the viciousness with which she lashed out with some kind of karate or Muay Thai. Her foot whipped up and out, striking my opponent across the jaw hard and fast, snapping his head to the side and dropping him like a fly being swatted.
I stared at her for a moment, surprised by what I just saw. I knew she was a good fighter, since she’d beaten me when we first met, but a kick like that took some experience and know-how.
“Go!” She waved at me.
I shook my head. “Not unless you’re coming with us.”
“I need you to be safe before I can walk away, do you understand?” she asked, looking directly at me. I knew it was because I was the one that had been taken and the whole reason we were at the hospital in the first place, but I couldn’t leave.
“My wolf won’t let me,” I said in response.
I heard her mutter something about men and their wolves b
eing pigheaded as she turned to Jax once again. Roman and Micah had been keeping him away from her, teasing him almost with the possibility of a fight between them, but neither ever let him land a hit. It was only increasing his anger though.
When he heard the exchange between me and Nina, he said, “I’ll never stop hunting you. You’re mine, Nina. These idiots may not be willing to realize it yet, but I know you felt it when you were on top of me. There’s a connection between us.”
“Ten minutes, boss.” The guy who Tate had been fighting tossed his cell phone toward Jax while Tate was on the ground, struggling to see straight. There were too many players, too many people to protect, and I couldn’t watch all of them.
“That means more reinforcements are coming,” Tate groaned out from the floor.
“Then we need to leave. Now,” I said, hoping like hell that they would listen to me and not underestimate the danger we were all in.
“If you leave, you’ll never really understand what’s going on. You’ll always have questions that only I have the answers to,” Jax said, his voice distorted by his vocal cords being more canine than human in that moment.
“I’ll find answers. I’m not staying, Jax.” Nina’s voice said the right words, but her body was still standing there facing Jax. I didn’t understand why.
“Nina, if we don’t leave now, we will never get out of here,” I said. “Reinforcements means death for your mates.” The second part was a low blow, but it got her moving and broke whatever weird spell Jax had captured her in for a moment.
“I know why you’re imprinting on these second-rate mates. I know why you should choose me instead, and I know you have one more mate to imprint on. If you’ll leave, you’ll never get answers, never find peace. You’ll be hunted until you can’t run any more, like a fox against a team of hounds. The hounds always win. It’s just a matter of time and how much the fox has to suffer first. Leave now, and your suffering will be more than you can bear.” Jax’s voice was filled with a calm certainty.