My baby. She had to catch up with Valentine. My baby’s been taken.
The traffic was starting to thin. She wound down the window, slowing down for a moment. She thought she could hear the racket of gunfire — there! — and she floored the car again. The sounds overlaid each other through the open window, the car’s engine, the chatter of the rifles, and the thumping of the helicopter as it blasted over the night sky. She couldn’t see it anymore, but its pitch was changing. Danny didn’t know much about helicopters except what she saw in movies, but she knew her city. A helicopter flying low and dark over the city streets was unheard of.
As unheard of as someone snatching her little girl. Or of—
Blood.
—she swallowed. Danny had ducked through the open door of Mandy’s apartment after Val had—
He loves me.
—jumped down the elevator shaft, the doors sliding closed behind him. Mandy had been on the floor, blood staining her shirt, pooling underneath her. Danny had fumbled for her phone, making the emergency call. Mandy had whispered something she couldn’t understand before slipping into unconsciousness. The guilt had sung inside her head, loud as the sound from the bottom of the hotel, and then she’d run. Run out the door of the apartment, and back down the stairs, taking them three at a time. She’d been able to follow Val’s path — where Adalia was taken — by the stopped cars peppering the road. Danny was glad of her little car then; beat up as it was, its size let her move through intersections a larger car would have been snared in. She’d climbed the footpath, hand on the horn to warn pedestrians, as she’d tried to catch up, but she’d lost them.
The helicopter was all she had left.
It was as Danny was leaning forward, trying to catch another glimpse of the helicopter through the buildings around her, that she hit the man. The crump as he hit the front of her car jerked her back to the here and now as he tumbled up and onto the windshield. The hit hadn’t been that hard — she’d just turned a corner — but it left a dent in the hood of the car. She slammed on the brakes, the man rolling off and landing on the street.
Danny grabbed for the door handle, yanking it and stumbling as she got out. “My God! I’m so sorry! Are you all right?” She stepped towards the man, who was scrambling to his feet. Why had he been on the road anyway? She was sure she hadn’t skipped a red—
“Lady!” He grabbed her arm with both hands. “Run!” Then he was gone, stumbling back down the street the way she’d come.
She stared after him a few moments. He must be confused from the impact, dazed. Danny looked after him, then back the way he’d come. The way she was driving. She saw the smoke rising, and heard the sound of the helicopter fading as it pulled further away.
Where were all the other people?
Danny saw another man running for her. He was dressed in black. “What’s happening?”
The man ignored the question, grabbing her and roughly shoving her away from the car. Then he jumped in the open driver’s door, slamming it closed, and floored her car.
“Hey!” She waved her arms, but the man in her car ignored her, swerving the car in a U to go back the way she’d come. Come to think of it, he was dressed a lot like those soldiers from the hospital—
That was when she saw it. My God.
The creature loped up to the turning car, smoke pouring from the tires as the man inside tried to make her car go faster. The thing kept pace with the car, loping alongside as it gained speed down the street, then reached out one clawed arm and punched through the passenger window. It gripped onto the metal frame of the door and pulled, slowing the car. The wheels still spun, more and more smoke rising, as the creature hauled the car to a stop. The man inside was shouting, screaming something, as the creature lifted the car and tossed it into the wall of a building.
Her car landed on its roof, the man inside fumbling for the door. He stopped as he saw it coming towards the car, pacing—
Stalking.
—closer with slow measured steps. Danny watched, mouth open in a silent scream, as the creature tore the door off her car and snatched the man from inside. He was babbling now as the creature held him up in front of its face, turning him this way and that. Then it roared, grabbed the man with it’s other arms, and—
She looked away, but couldn’t stop hearing the sounds. The scream that stopped, the gristly tearing sound, the wet spatters.
The silence.
Danny looked back, then froze. The creature was standing in front of her, its head tipped to one side as it looked down on her. It ducked its head forward and sniffed, big chuffing sounds as it tasted the air around her with its nose. It panted, then paced a circle around her as she stood still. She could see the blood streaming down it, tears and holes in its neck and chest. A small whine escaped it. It stood between her and the smoke rising up ahead. She had to go that way, around the thing, to get to Adalia. To get to Valentine. She needed to find them both.
“Please don’t kill me.” It watched her again, its head tipped sideways again like a curious dog. “I … I need to go that way. My little girl. I need to find my baby.”
Oh God. What if Adalia was caught up in this, if this thing had—
It chuffed again at her, one clawed hand raking slowly against the tarmac, cutting grooves in the ground. She watched, fascinated, as the claws cut deep into the ground, little chunks of torn pavement bunching and clustering as little furrows were formed. The swipe was sideways, four lines — one for each claw — running perpendicular between her and the creature. It leaned back, staring at her again.
“I…” She looked down at the lines. “I don’t know what that means. Please. I need to go that way.”
It didn’t do anything except look at her, breathing deep and low. Danny started to step sideways slow and careful; she walked to the left, trying to go around the thing. It watched her move, its head turning to follow her. As she made to step forward across the lines cutting through the ground it — quick as a fox — stepped sideways in front of her again. A low growl escaped it, lips pulled back from long white teeth.
“I can’t stay here!” A sob escaped her. “If you’re going to kill me, just do it! But you can’t stop me getting to—”
Those I love.
“—my daughter!”
It looked from side to side, another whine escaping it. Then it leaned towards her, another growl escaping it.
I don’t want to die. She reached into her pocket for her phone, holding it up in front of her. “Look, I’ll show you.” She swiped through her photos, pulling up one of Adalia. She’d taken it just a few weeks ago. She held the phone’s tiny screen towards the thing. It looked at the phone, then at Danny.
The gunfire shocked her so much she dropped the phone, the screen going dark as it hit the ground. The creature was on her — God oh God oh God oh — before she could flinch. Danny squeezed her eyes shut, waiting for the pain. It grabbed her up, and she could smell the thing’s closeness, an animal musk as it held her against its chest. She could hear the gunfire, and the thing roaring, so close and so loud that she was screaming, screaming with it and waiting to die—
The gunfire stopped, and she heard a click. The gun was empty.
It dropped her to the ground, and she landed awkwardly, her tail bone hitting the ground first. The pain of it made her feel sick, and she couldn’t get up. Danny watched as the creature loped towards the soldier dressed in black, pushing another magazine into his weapon. The helicopter screamed into view from behind a building, the noise loud and sudden, rotors beating the air. It was turning in the air, tipping to bring its side to bear on the thing. The creature snatched the man in front of it off the ground, then hurled him at the helicopter. The turret that was about to fire on it sprayed bullets that cut and chipped a line up a building as the pilot wrenched the helicopter sideways. He wasn’t fast enough, and the soldier’s body hit the side of the helicopter, crumpling a side panel. A man fell from the open side, screaming as he fell
to the street.
The creature bounded back towards her and grabbed a car from the side of the street. Its claws punched through the windshield and rear glass as it lifted it by the roof. Holding it over its head, it walked back over to her, holding the car above her. She tried to move, but she still couldn’t use her legs properly. Looking up, saw the engine bay of the car above her.
The sound that hit her ears then was like a chainsaw, impossibly loud. Faster than she could imagine, holes appeared in the car above her, bullets from the helicopter’s gun tearing into the car. Pieces of the vehicle were shearing off. The creature roared its defiance as it held the car above her. It fell to one knee, then shook its massive head. With a mighty shrug of its shoulders it flipped the car through the air at the helicopter. The pilot pulled the helicopter out of the way this time. The creature looked at her, then bounded off to the side of the street, ducking into an alley between buildings. Bullets tracked its progress across the ground, then chipped brickwork from the sides of the building where it crouched. It stepped out briefly, tearing a mailbox from the concrete ground and throwing that at the helicopter before ducking back between the buildings. The helicopter’s main light lit up, and it banked so the pilot could see down the alley. The engine note of the helicopter changed, and the rotors chapped at the air as it gained height. Tipping forward, it tracked above the alley after the thing.
Adalia.
Danny clambered to her feet. She still felt unsteady from the pain in her coccyx. A quick glance told her that her car was a lost cause. She stared back down the street, towards the rising smoke. She needed to get down there. It didn’t look far; she could walk it.
“Come on, Danny.” She looked down on the ground, saw her dropped phone—
What the hell?
The ground around where she’d been sitting was torn, pitted, a hundred little craters from bullets marking the ground. There was a small patch of unmarked ground where she’d been sitting. Where the creature was, there were wet marks on the tarmac. She reached down and touched a spot with one hand; her hand came away red. Danny pocketed her phone and limped towards where the car had landed. It was shredded, holes through every part except the hood she’d been staring up at. The engine inside had stopped the rounds, protecting her from being riddled with bullets. The creature had wanted to stop her going back up the street, but then it had run off—
It held the engine above me.
She looked between the torn car and the alley, then back at the lines scored onto the ground.
It was leading the danger away.
Danny limped towards the smoke, taking the sidewalk. She passed bodies where they’d landed, saw a baby’s pram out the corner of one eye — don’t look don’t look don’t look — and made her way out to a clearing of sorts. A van was on the side of the road, the back torn off it. Flames licked out of the van’s engine bay and dirty smoke rose to the sky above her. Street lights cast their orange glow across the scene. From far away she could hear sirens and the chatter of guns. Bodies were scattered around, dead soldiers torn and tossed aside. The occasional colorful splash of non-military clothing told the tale of a fallen civilian.
Valentine. Where was he?
She pulled out her phone. It still worked despite the crack in the phone’s glass, and she pulled up Valentine’s details. She dialed the number, and waited for it to be connected. The ringing surprised her; she could hear her phone’s speakers ringing at the same time as the sound of a phone ringing nearby. She cut off the connection and the other phone stopped ringing.
Danny stared at the phone in her hand for a long time. She looked around her at the bodies. Then she redialed Valentine’s number.
The other phone started ringing again. She walked slowly around a car and saw a pile on the ground. Scraps of bloody tartan, with a — she poked through the pile — Ralph Lauren label. What used to be some jeans, ripped and torn. And a phone. Her photo was flashing up on the screen, the caller ID identifying her not as Danny Kendrick but as Drop everything and answer!
A sad smile tugged at the corner of her mouth.
She crouched down, leaning her back against the car. She felt so tired. She looked through the tattered clothes again, her eyes spotting a glint of metal. She reached for it, pulling up a tiny cylinder with a domed head. It was a bullet.
A silver bullet.
She leaned forward, scrabbling through the bits of cloth. She found a handful of silver bullets, scattered and fallen in amongst Valentine’s clothes.
No. Her hand covered her mouth. It couldn’t be. Danny had been with Valentine at the hospital as that creature had torn up the place. He couldn’t be that thing. Not unless—
Not unless what, Danielle? It was simple. It was impossible.
Not unless there were two. What had John said? Are they hunting werewolves or something?
They were trying to hunt Valentine. That thing in the street back there, it was Valentine, she was sure of it. It had tried to protect her, it had shielded her from being shot, before it — Valentine, she corrected herself — before Valentine had run off, drawing them away. He’d been so badly shot, the blood matting over his fur, covering the pavement beside her. It could only be Valentine. He was protecting her from them after he’d tried to get Adalia back.
She didn’t know who they were yet, but she was sure that they had — my baby — her daughter.
Danny scooped up Valentine’s phone, wallet, and after a moment’s thought, the silver bullets. She needed to get out of here. She could still hear the sirens, and sooner or later she’d be caught up answering police questions. She didn’t have the time for that, not with Adalia and Valentine out there. Danny needed help, but she couldn’t get stuck inside an interrogation room. If she could get back to Carlisle, she was sure she could explain all this — look, Carlisle, Valentine’s a werewolf and mysterious black-suited soldiers have taken my daughter, could you make some calls? — well. She could try.
Danny looked around, spotting a car with its door hanging open. The front was knocked in a little, and she saw that it had collided with another car. They were sitting in the intersection, but their occupants — and the story behind the crash — were long gone. She hopped inside, finding the keys in the ignition, and started it up. The fan belt screeched at her as she gunned the car down the street, heading for home.
• • •
Danny sat hunched on her couch, the blanket pulled close around her. She gripped a mug of Scotch in her hands with the same white-knuckled intensity she’d held a steering wheel an hour ago, rocking back and forth a little.
“What?” John looked at her, then burst out laughing. The laughter faded as she didn’t join in. “Holy shit. You’re not joking.”
“I’m not joking. And I wasn’t talking to you.”
Carlisle cleared her throat. “Let me try. What?”
“Like I said. It’s too hard to explain any other way. Valentine’s a werewolf. There’s a bunch of soldiers out there. They’ve grabbed Adalia, and Valentine’s caught up in it somehow. Melissa, please. They’ve got my baby. We’ve got to go get her!” Danny sipped at the scotch, the fire of the drink hitting her. She needed Dutch courage right now, something to stop her hands shaking.
“I…” Carlisle sat down. “Yes.”
John did a double take with his head. “What? Look, Melissa, she’s been knocked about, maybe a hit on the head. She’s not making—”
“She’s making perfect sense. And call me Carlisle.” Carlisle reached for the bottle of Scotch, pouring herself a generous two fingers and slamming it back. “Vince showed me something. A surveillance tape of when you and Everard were…”
“You can say it.”
“Mugged.”
“Right. So what was on the tape?”
“Nothing I can explain. Not soldiers. But something.”
“Something? What the fuck is something?”
“Okay, it’s not something. It was definitely a werewolf. Huge. Fur. Claws.�
�
“You didn’t think to bring this up before?” John’s voice was rising and he got out of his chair, pacing the room. “Why?”
“I didn’t believe it myself. The tape was blurry.”
“How blurry did it have to be to not make out a fucking werewolf?”
“Look, I…” Carlisle refilled her Scotch. Danny watched her, sipping from her own again. “He saved your life.”
“What?”
“He killed the muggers.”
“Val? Val wouldn’t hurt a fly. He’s not wired that way.”
“It doesn’t matter.” Danny's voice was hoarse — my baby, they’ve got Adalia, my little girl. She looked at John. “We’re wasting time. Do you want me to say you were right?”
“Right?” John ran a hand through his hair. “About what?”
“At the hospital. You said they were hunting werewolves.”
“I was making a joke. I don’t want to be right. I want you to make sense.” He stuck a hand in his pocket for his phone. “I’m calling a taxi. Going to go down there, take a—”
The plink as the bullets hit the coffee table cut him off. Danny was dropping the silver bullets one after the other next to the bottle of Scotch. “I found these in his clothes.” She tossed his wallet on the table after them, then Valentine’s phone. “And his wallet. Phone. Just bloody clothes. They shot him with silver.”
John looked at the small pile underneath her on the couch. “But…” He looked lost, his voice small. “They shot Val?”
“Yeah.” And took my little girl.
“Christ.” John looked at her, then at Carlisle. “Melissa. We’ve got to find him.”
“It’s Carlisle. You believe us now?”
“No. But Val? He’s my friend. My best friend.” John swallowed. “I remember what the silver did to his hand. Aller … what was it?
“Allergic dermatitis.” Danny nodded. “I think it’s a bit worse than that.”
“Whatever. Allergic dermatitis. I don’t care if you crazy bitches think he’s a werewolf or not. But if he’s been shot? With these?” John shuffled a foot through the bullets on the ground. “We got to help him.”
The Night's Champion Collection: A supernatural werewolf thriller trilogy Page 23