“Yeah.” Shadow’s face was slicked with sweat, dirt and blood. Those same lips that had so softly driven me wild curled up in a sneer. “Got any better ideas?”
“He’s going to attract wild animals!”
Shadow raised his eyebrows. “Exactly.” He brought the shovel down to move the first bit of earth. “Any shifters that come here have one thing on their mind. Revenge. Or they want to take something that belongs to you. I’ll bury him just deep enough they’ll still be able to smell him. They’ll know the consequences of trying to bring you harm.”
“You’re scaring me.” My Shadow wanted peace and harmony between the packs and townspeople. The person who was tearing a hole in my yard was a bloodthirsty animal.
The shovel stopped. I couldn’t see the head of it anymore, just the pole. The moonlight caught in Shadow’s eyes, and for a moment, I could forget what I’d just seen him do. “I’m the only one you shouldn’t be afraid of, Trina.” He went back to work. “I’m not going to let anyone hurt you, especially for helping me.”
My blood ran cold. “We need to check the shelter.” Shadow could be concerned with my safety, but all I cared about was the animals.
He nodded but didn’t look up. “This won’t take long.”
If I’d had any questions about his otherness, they were gone watching him tonight. He’d easily dominated that man, and in no time he’d dug a considerable sized ditch. I couldn’t believe we were burying a dead man on my property.
Ryker’s guy had bashed the hell out of my truck. It was in rough shape to begin with, but he’d shattered the windshield. We couldn’t drive to the shelter. “I’m going to have to call Kiera.” Shit. “You don’t think Ryker would do anything to them, do you?”
Shadow looked up and sighed. “I wouldn’t put it past him.”
My heart pounded as I waited for someone to pick up the phone. I imagined them bound and in the same shape as my truck. “Trina.” Kiera sounded half asleep. “ Y’okay?”
“Are you?”
“Yeah. What’s going on? It’s almost one in the morning.”
“You need to come get us.” I heard Lyssie in the background and Kiera gasped. It was pretty hard not to freak out over a middle of the night phone call. “Someone wrecked my truck, and I’m panicking that they got to the shelter.”
“Did you call the police?” Kiera asked.
“Shadow took care of it.” There wasn’t any other way to describe watching him drag a dead man’s body across my yard and throwing it into a hole. The first layer of dirt already covered him.
“Oh.” Kiera knew exactly what I meant. “We’ll be right there.”
**
I thought I was going to pass out as Kiera drove us to the shelter. I’d made those animals a promise. Whatever shit had happened to them in the past, whoever didn’t want them, that was behind them now. They were safe with me and they were loved. If anything (else) happened to the place that had become a sanctuary for all of us, I‘d lose my mind. I couldn’t let everyone that trusted me get hurt. The first attack was just a warning. I had no doubt any subsequent attacks would deliver the intended message loud and clear.
And I needed the shelter. Before Shadow arrived, it was the only part of my life that gave me purpose. Without it, I’d spiral back into a drunken blackness.
“It’s the same kind of attack that happened at the shelter,” Kiera said after I recounted tonight’s story, smoothing over the way Shadow beat the perpetrator to a bloody pulp. Just days before the full moon, the front windows of Forever Home had been smashed, the lobby trashed. They didn’t take anything, the animals were spooked, but no one was hurt. But the other night, they’d had the wolves to protect them. Tonight they were on their own.
“It’s got Ryker’s mark all over it. The scent was the same both times.” Shadow’s jaw set in a hard line. I’d made him clean up before the girls came, but he didn’t get all the blood out of the silver streaks in his hair, or the God only knows what out from under his fingernails. He’d looked like something straight out of a horror movie. He pulled me in closer, I hadn’t been able to let go of him since I’d climbed into the backseat of Kiera’s car. “They won’t bother any of you again.”
Kiera and Lyssie exchanged concerned looks in the front seat, but didn’t ask questions.
I didn’t even wait for the car to come to a full stop before I got out and ran to the door. The plywood was still over the windows from the last attack. The dogs barked as I fumbled with the lock, my hands shaking so hard I dropped the key in the dirt. Shadow and the girls had joined me, and he guided me through the door. My legs wouldn’t work.
Lyssie turned on the lights and the girls checked the crates. “Everything seems okay.”
“Thank God.” I practically collapsed with relief. Two of my cockatiels were having a fit. I went over to give them belly rubs to calm them down. It calmed me down, too. I loved the birds. They were smart and funny and they’d been totally underestimated by their last owners. No one realized how long those little guys stuck around. “Nothing was weird around your apartment, was it?” I asked. Ryker’s people had already got me and the shelter, if they’d been paying attention, they’d go for them next.
“We didn’t notice anything.” Kiera had a kitten burrowed in her hoodie. All the animals knew something was up. “But it’s not like we did a full sweep of the house, either. We were freaking out about you.”
Shadow and I looked at each other. Already we didn’t need words to communicate. The girls couldn’t be alone. Yeah, I know, they were strong, capable women who’d dealt with a lot of shit in their lives. But we were dealing with lunatics who’d captured and tortured two werewolf packs. Possibly more than that. Our backup needed backup.
“I’ll call my brothers,” Shadow said. “We need to be on our toes until we beat this bastard.”
Chapter Nine
Shadow
“If we don’t have a presence in the forest, Major’s going to run roughshod over everything you try to fix.” Baron ran his hand over his hair. I’d made him and Dallas come down to the shelter in the early hours of the morning. “I’ve been watching his place. He’s got people coming and going at all hours. The other packs. They’ve always liked what you have to say, Shadow. You’re going to have to cover a lot of ground if you don’t get back there and make yourself known. You’re still dead to them.”
“I’ll deal with him. He’s either working with me or against me. That goes for all of you.” If my brother wasn’t willing to take on Ryker with me, then I had my answer. “You two need to take turns staying with the girls. One of you with them and the other in Sawtooth until we get our point across.”
“Convenient you get to stay with Trina every night,” Dallas muttered. I raised an eyebrow; I wasn’t used to either of my brothers questioning me.
“She’s in the most danger.” I could still smell that fucker’s blood on my skin. “They’ve come for her and her shelter. Do you have a better idea?”
“He’s just fucking grumpy you disturbed his beauty sleep.” Baron pushed Dallas’ arm, who glared at him. I didn’t like this. I had a lot more people to rein in than Major and Ryker. I needed my brothers to fall back into line before I did anything.
“I want you to stop at nothing to make sure those girls are safe.” My jaw set in a hard line, arms folded across my chest as my glare slid between my brothers. “Whatever it takes until we get things in line.”
Baron narrowed his eyebrows in confusion, and then his mouth dropped open. “You want us to cozy up to them so they’ll work with us.” He chuckled. “Clever way to get them to do whatever you want. They’re not stupid, Shadow.”
“Whatever it takes.” I didn’t waver. I wasn’t underestimating Kiera or Lyssie, but I did have an ulterior motive. They were both great woman that would make strong mates for my brothers. I knew what I wanted my pack to look like, and they’d play an important role. But we couldn’t lose them to an omnipresent threat of atta
ck.
“Major said—“
I cut Dallas off. “I don’t give a fuck what Major said.” I couldn’t believe he’d even pull that shit with me. Major had walked away from Trina and the shelter the second he had the chance. He didn’t have anyone’s best interest in mind but his own.
“You should probably know what he’s doing since you’re never in the forest.” Baron sighed. “He’s proposing that we take mates. Whether they’re promised to someone else or not. Strong wolves take what they want, according to him. It starts at home.”
It starts at home. Mine was burned down. “Decide who’s staying here and who’s going back tonight. I’ll deal with this in the morning.”
Trina and I fell into a fitful sleep on the couch, but at least she didn’t cry tonight. My eyes opened with every whine of the animals, which with the full house at Forever Home was more often than not. Soon the girls were back, Dallas trailing behind him. I went with him back to the forest.
“What are you doing, Shadow?” he asked as he drove. “Why are you getting these women involved in pack politics? You’re putting them in danger by keeping them involved.”
“How old are you, Dal?” He’d never questioned me like this before.
He curled his lip in confusion. “Thirty. What does that matter?”
“It would be nice to settle down, somewhere other than Mom’s house, or with your brothers like a never ending frat party, wouldn’t it? To know you’re going to crawl into a warm bed and have a mate waiting there to make love to you before you fall asleep? Did you like seeing Lyssie this morning with her hair a mess as she made her coffee?”
“They’re human.” Dallas shook his head. “They’re not strong enough for us. Protecting someone means to keep them out of danger, not putting them in line for a direct hit.”
Trina might’ve struggled to keep her head above water sometimes, but if I had to choose a woman to take into battle, I’d take her any day over a bought and paid for wolf woman. “Give them a chance. They might impress you.”
Major wasn’t surprised to see us pull into his driveway. He smirked as I approached him. “For someone who wants to be alpha, you come looking for me a lot, Shadow.”
His brothers came out of the house behind him. “Do you need me to take care of a problem, Major?” Shea circled me, shirtless. His human skin was an encyclopedia of bad decisions, marred by battle scars, dark tattoos, and healing wounds.
This sonofabitch was just begging for me to annihilate him for what he did to my little brother. I hoped he could still smell the blood on me from last night. I wouldn’t hesitate to do the same to him, first chance I got. I’d do it now, but I needed his brother. He jerked his chin toward the forest. “The first thing you need to learn, Shadow, is to build alliances.” Shea looked over his shoulder. “How many of your pack would come running for you?”
My pack currently consisted of my brothers and they’d been fighting me tooth and nail all day. “The shelter is off limits, Major.” I ignored Shea. He’d piss me off more. “Do what you want to me, but keep Trina and the rest of the girls out of it.”
Major squinted in confusion. Good. Now I could narrow the attack down to where it came from. “What are you talking about? That attack happened weeks ago.”
“There was another one last night at Trina’s house.” Even Shea stopped in his tracks. He hadn’t been in the shelter for the first attack, but he’d been held captive for six months’ worth of Ryker’s shit to know what I was talking about first hand. “I took care of it.”
“Fuck.” Major ran his hand through his long brown hair and paced. “That’s crossing the line.”
“What do you know?” It was pretty obvious it was something.
“Come inside.” Major motioned for me to follow him into the house. I sat down at the small table in the kitchen. This place didn’t look like it was full of bachelors. It wasn’t exactly feminine, either, but it was clean, well-stocked, and bore the mark of a woman’s touch. Interesting. Major couldn’t afford a mate, but he wasn’t above taking what he thought was his. Once I sat down, he continued. I’d swear he checked to see who was listening. “Ryker thinks we’re responsible for the busted ring.”
“How?” He was as crazy as he was dangerous.
“You know Ryker, the reasoning never makes any sense, but you hanging around that girl is giving him more reason to think we were in on the fix. Now all the livestock is gone, too, putting me out of business. My plan, before you so rudely fucked everything up, was to bleed him dry so slowly he wouldn’t have noticed. I was going to barter with local packs, get more animals. Now I have nothing.”
“My house burned down.” I reminded him. “My business is gone too.”
“Right, so we’re all back to square one. And we all want to be on top.”
“Are you working with him, or are you working with me?” I needed to keep this simple.
“I’m working for me.” Major didn’t break eye contact. “But I won’t let anything happen to the shelter. Shadow, if you know what’s good for any of you, you’ll stay away from there. And from Trina.”
I wasn’t sure if it was a threat or a warning. One thing was for damn sure—I wasn’t going to turn my back on the woman who saved my life when she needed me most.
Chapter Ten
Trina
I could get used to having a roommate.
“If you want to stay at the shelter, we’re going to make this fun,” Shadow teased me as we walked hand in hand into Wal-Mart. “The couch might’ve worked when it was just you, but it’s not big enough for all the things I want to do to you.”
I closed my eyes and moaned, thinking how mind-blowing the other night was before we had to go kill the jackoff who came to attack us. The lady behind me ran her cart up the back of my heels. I yelped as I turned around, and she gave me a horrible look. “Sorry.” Not really, but whatever. I turned back to Shadow before she was done glaring at me. “I thought you worked pretty well with the couch.”
“I like to have options.” Shadow’s low tone vibrated against my soul and a whole lot of other parts of my body I shouldn’t be thinking about in the middle of a giant department store. “And eventually, we’re going to get sore.”
I liked the sound of that.
I shouldn’t have been in such a good mood today. We had two credible leads on adoptions come in today, but that wasn’t all that had cheered me up. I guess cheating death for the second time will do that to a girl. Maybe now that the shock had worn off and I realized what Shadow had done for me, making sure I was safe by any means necessary up to and including putting someone’s cold body in the ground, I was finally willing to let my guard down and admit to myself what my heart had known all along.
Not that I was making light of what Shadow did. But I also knew what could’ve happened if he wasn’t there. It was an alternative that turned my stomach inside out.
This wasn’t exactly a celebration, but we both needed something good to focus on. A little light at the end of a long, dark tunnel.
He showed me there was indeed life after death.
“You never finished with me, on the couch.” I bumped against him. We needed to get whatever it was he had in mind and get out of here, fast. I was minutes away from pushing Shadow into one of these little boats in the sporting goods section and picking up where we left off. The grin he gave me didn’t help my cause. “What are we getting?”
Shadow put a small barbecue, lanterns, and a blow-up mattress in the cart. “We’re going camping.” He steered the cart out of the aisle. “We need housewares and food and then we can get back to business.”
I practically ran to the aisle that had bedding like I was on one of those game shows that you had to fill your cart in an insanely small amount of time to win. “What do you want to get for food?”
“Hamburgers. Hot dogs. Stuff to go with them.” Shadow chewed on his lip. “S’mores.”
“I haven’t had those since I was a kid.” This
was a great idea. I missed cookouts. Being in Idaho, I didn’t get invited to family gatherings anymore, and I’d never gotten close enough to anyone in Granger Falls to encroach on their parties. “Wait a minute. Can you eat chocolate?”
Shadow laughed. “I’d have to take down the entire candy aisle before I got sick. It’s not great for us, but we’re bigger than other dogs so it doesn’t affect us as much.” A lady with a toddler swung her head around when Shadow referred to himself as a dog, but we quickly had the aisle to ourselves.
Reality set back in when we got back to the parking lot. “Stay here,” Shadow instructed before crossing over to my giant rescue truck. He inspected it thoroughly before waving me over. It was an easy target, I’d had it decorated with puppies and kitties and the shelter logo. But until my pickup was back in commission, we had to drive around in a giant rolling target or walk everywhere.
Sometimes going back to the shelter felt more like home than my house. I greeted all the animals then encouraged them to calm down, checking over cages and water dishes while Shadow began setting everything up. “What can I do to help?” I asked.
“Put the beer on ice and relax.” He was making quick work of the grill without even looking at the instructions. I was nervous about the beer. Since Shadow shifted, I hadn’t felt the urge to drown my sorrows, because I hadn’t had any. But I knew what went up must come down eventually.
“Oh come on.” I picked at the tape on the inflatable mattress box. “I might be a damsel in distress, but I’m not useless.”
“I never said you were.” Shadow took the box away from me before I opened it. “It’s been a long time since I’ve been able to do anything like this. It feels good.”
I nodded, sinking into the couch. I understood. Plus it gave me a chance to simply watch him in action. I already knew he was good with his hands. But we still knew so little about each other, so it was a treat to see how he put together our makeshift campground, the way he bit his lip when he was thinking, or talked to inanimate objects to get them to cooperate.
Rescue Me (Sawtooth Shifters, #2) Page 5