by E. V. Winter
“Rex is safe in a house in Hale County. It belongs to someone called India Glass, she owns an animal shelter on Oakley Street. If you go there, you can make them all safe. Blaine is planning a terrible assault tomorrow, there will be many deaths if you don’t get there first. You have 24 hours boys to get this message to Maddox, Xander or Rafe. I can’t let Blaine do this. I’m fighting for us all. For all the packs.”
He sat down on the wet ground, suddenly feeling his balls shrink in a puddle of slush beneath him. He watched the omega wolves grow quiet and then back away from him. Kyle recognized this as a mark of respect. They stood and ran away. He jumped up and cupped his balls in his hand. “Jesus, I may never have kids after this,” he whispered before lying back down and taking himself back to his core, back to his wolf.
He transformed and walked in the opposite direction, back to his side of the road and to Quarry Hills. He could smell Juan’s scent so started sniffing for prey. It didn’t take him long to catch a rabbit. He killed it with one bite and carried it in his mouth, following Juan’s scent until they met. Juan came over and brushed his snout next to Kyle’s.
Kyle dropped the rabbit, and they both tore it apart, between them, each of them chewing through meat, guts and bones, snorting and smiling at one another. Kyle loved his pack. He could smell the two newer betas out in the woods too. They all got together in search of bigger prey, all four of them trusting one another.
This was what being a shifter was all about, the animal instinct, the possibility of magic in another form, being one with the earth. Kyle understood his place in this world, and he was uncomfortable with his place in Blaine’s world. He took a chance with the Brunholme Pack, and they listened. They did not attack, they withdrew, and they respected what he tried to do.
He knew what might happen if Blaine found out, but he was prepared for that. He did not want to taste royal blood again. He might hate their pack but he revered their leader, he understood the hierarchy and his heart lay with the brotherhood of the wolf.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Rex came down to the kitchen smelling fresh, of soap and shampoo. His teeth were clean, and it was all India could do not to throw herself into his arms.
He was very attractive. Maybe the most attractive man she’d ever met. She had no sexual experience, just a few indelicate fumbles in college, which led nowhere. She dedicated her whole life to study, then afterwards, dedicated it to caring for animals. She snapped out the one relationship which looked like getting off the ground out when the wolf bit her.
Her research on wolves told her Rex was no virgin. She wondered about whether he had chosen a mate yet. They mated for life. She wished she’d been a she-wolf in his pack.
As a human, she had little chance of catching his attention once he saw her face. She touched her scar again under the mask and wondered if it might ever heal.
“The food is basic I’m afraid. It’s a TV dinner,” she said, placing it in front of him. She made bread in the bread maker earlier and sliced it. He took a piece and bit into it. “Fresh bread, huh? Tastes good.”
“I can’t take credit, it came out of a machine.” She pointed at it on the counter.
“I can’t cook to save my life.”
“Really?”
“I have a cook and I had a cook in college too. I can just about open a bag of chips.”
Eve joined them to get another beer.
“They here yet?” India asked.
She shook her head, removing the cap from her bottle.
“Who?” Rex asked.
“We have some reinforcements coming.” Eve said. She took a swig from her beer and stole a slice of bread.
“I’m so sorry about all this.” Rex said. “I wish I didn’t feel so damn useless.”
“Don’t worry.” India said. “Once the stitches dissolve, you can go.”
“I want to help.”
She shook her head and Eve joined her.
“We have guns. They’ll come here in either of their forms and guns will be the death of either of them.” Eve said.
“Not death.” India said. “I can’t shoot anything to death Eve, you know that.”
Eve sighed. “If something is coming straight for your throat, you better go for their heart with your gun.”
“I can’t kill an animal.”
She looked at Rex’s blue eyes and he looked at her and curved up the corner of his mouth. She knew he killed animals all the time and probably thought she was being a wuss but she was a vet. Her job was to protect and save animals.
“Anyhoo, I’m going back to the bedroom to look out for my friends. I can let them over the fence when they get here, right?”
India nodded. “I’ll get the animals in after dinner.”
She went out into the yard with Rex behind her to chase the chickens back into their pen. Rex stood on the porch watching her. The pigs took more work, so he joined her in his bare feet, which were soon covered in mud. They laughed together and shooed the pigs into the sty. He washed his feet at the faucet near the porch.
“Wait here, I’ll get you a towel.” India said, going inside. Rex looked out over the yard. He tuned in his vision to the fence at the back but could see no shapes and he sniffed the air again. He could smell no wolves. At first, he felt secure, but he also felt a little sad. It was a long time since he scented Maddox, Xander and Rafe and he missed them. He wondered what was taking them so long to find him.
India leaned down at his feet and dried them. “Here, I can do that,” he said, taking the towel from her. She pulled it back, and he pulled it again, her body falling into his. Her face against his chest. He looked down at her and stroked her hair. She let him do it, her body willing her to stand up and get away from him, and her heart pleading with her mind to help her do the right thing. He reached down and pulled down the mask. He kissed her softly and withdrew, his eyes on hers, his hand stroking the scar on her face. She pulled away but he kissed her again, longer this time, their mouths came together, open and soft, and she yearned for more. Her heart and mind battled one another, her heart hammered in her chest, her mind shouted at her to stop, the heart won, it wanted more, and it took more from him as he wrapped his arms around her. They separated, and he smiled at her. She pulled the mask back over her face. He turned down his mouth.
“No more kisses for me?” he asked.
She stood up. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have done that. It’s unprofessional…”
“Can you just be yourself tonight? Not India the vet or India, this wolf’s superhero?”
She took the towel and smiled before going back inside. He sat back and took a deep breath. “I want her,” he whispered to himself. She was the one. She was the person he waited so long to meet, his other half, his better half, his queen.
He sniffed the air again. The scent overwhelmed him. It was his pack. He smelled Rafe first. Rafe was fast, always the sprightliest on his feet in the woods. Then Xander, who was just behind, and Maddox, their back marker, their eyes and ears in every direction. He ran to the fence with the strongest sense of them there. They were close. Eve stood up at the window and watched him sniffing the air like some demented soul. She opened the window. “Is it my friends?”
He looked across at her. She looked like a saint, the light behind her at the window. He smiled at her, the wonderful, quirky, gun-toting sister of the woman he loved.
“No, it’s mine.”
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
India stood on the deck and watched the strange goings on at the fence. Three naked men climbed over it, they transformed before her eyes into humans, from their lupine form. They didn’t hug Rex. They bowed first, then they nuzzled their noses into his neck, one at a time. It was quick but clear he was someone special to them. They followed him to the house. India looked away, but they cupped their privates when they saw her there. Eve was standing at the bedroom window.
Xander waved up at her with one free hand and shouted “Sorry.”
/> “It’s fine. I bat for the other team,” she said, swigging her third beer, and hoping they had not eaten her friends. She walked down the stairs to join the others.
There were some hugs then. India and Eve grabbed blankets, and they wrapped themselves in them.
“Sorry about the nakedness ladies, it’s an occupational hazard.” Maddox said. “Jeez, we’re here at last.”
“What took you so long?”
“We found India saving you on CCTV but it took us a little longer to track her down.” Xander said, drying his body on the blankets. “We don’t have the right connections.”
“Something weird happened yesterday.” Rafe said. “Kyle came out and transformed in Brunholme Woods in front of our omega pack.”
“Kyle Gracie?”
Maddox nodded as India passed around coffees to everyone. “He came to tell us where you were and warn us that tomorrow the Quarry Hills pack will attack.”
“Here?” Eve asked.
“Yes. Kyle doesn’t like Blaine’s actions, and he wants to warn us. We’re here at last, no time to waste. We have to figure out a plan to take them down here.”
“How will they come?” India asked.
“Could be in one of two ways.” Rex said, stroking the base of her back as she stood next to him, She smiled at his little joke, still tingling from his touch.
“So we need to be armed and ready?” Eve said.
“Pretty much.” Xander said. “Have you any guns?”
“Yes and I’ve got reinforcements on the way, three friends all bringing guns.”
“We’ll take the guns off you if that’s okay and we’ll try to make you and…”
“I am India,” she said. “She is Eve, my sister.”
“We’ll make you safe. You need not get involved at all.”
“Unless I want to?” Eve asked.
“This is pack warfare.” Rex said. “You need not be here at all. You could drive somewhere safe and be somewhere else.”
“During curfew? We kept you safe this long Red, and we can do it for longer.”
“Red?” Maddox asked him. Rex grinned. He liked it that Eve called him Red again, but he wanted to hear India say it too. She demurred and sat down beside him at the table.
“There are six of them and they might come with omegas too, so we need to prepare for a dirty fight. It’s their M.O. lately.” Maddox said.
“And we can’t be prepared for them until we see what they have in mind.” Rafe added. “I can stake out the woods tonight and find some game trails, maybe some wolf tracks.”
“They’ve been here before.” Rex said.
“Yeah, we could smell ‘em.” Rafe said. “They’ll come in over flat ground again if they can though. That way, they will conserve their energy for the fight.”
“They came here transformed.” India said. “At my door pretending to be yard cleaning experts, two guys.”
“When they came as wolves, the other night, I shot one of them when they spooked us at the fence.” Eve said.
“So they’re down a man, maybe? You get him good?”
“Yes I think so.” Eve said, because she knew she was an excellent shot and she heard him yelp loud enough.
“So India, Eve. Has he been an obedient patient?” Maddox asked.
India nodded. “He’s still not well enough to fight with you. He’s too weak.”
She saw Rex flinch, the truth hurt now he was among his pack. She remembered then, he was their leader, their king. “But in a week, he’ll be back, good as new, if not better,” she added.
“He can hold a gun though.” Xander said. “I know he can hunt.”
Rex turned his head to look into India’s face. She saw his pleading eyes. He wanted to be part of this.
“Yes, he can hold a gun,” she said, a brief smile on her face. She wanted to keep him safe, but the pack came first, she understood that.
He smiled, his hand going to her back again, a gentle stroke which set her on fire.
“Well, I need to find footprints.” Rafe said, and rose from his chair, dropping the blanket at his feet and leaving them, naked for all to see. India could only admire his muscular frame. She was glad he had his back to her though.
He climbed the fence and went into the trees. Eve was trying to see him transform again, but it was too dark now.
“And we’ll stay outside if it’s all right. There’s strength in numbers. When your friends get here, we’ll talk again, maybe discuss where our best options lie.” Maddox said. “How many guns do you have?”
“We have two revolvers and a rifle, all cleaned. We’ve got plenty of ammunition for all of them.”
“Great.”
“I’m sorry we don’t have any clothes to give you, we maybe got some overalls which might fit.” India said. She was as tall as Rex but Maddox and Xander were both taller.
Xander smiled. “Whatever you got is fine. We’ll manage. We have clothes out in the woods, but they’re at Brunholme for when we get back.”
Xander and Maddox lingered near the porch. Eve returned to the bedroom to wait for her friends. India took Rex to the office to show him his alternative place to sleep. He pulled her down onto the bed. It was rickety and creaked when he did it, which made them both laugh. He took off her mask again and kissed her. The warmth they generated almost stifled her but she could not let go. When he kissed her again, deep, hot and wet, she wanted more. Heart and head collided again, and she pressed her hand to his chest and touched him away.
“Don’t worry,” he said. “I will be a good boy. This rickety bed is no place for this kind of thing.”
“How can we do this? You’re not like me, we’re not the same.”
He sat up, holding her hands in his scarred hands. “It’s okay to be different and be together.”
She rose from the bed. “You’re a wolf.”
“And a man.”
She stroked his chest. “Yes, you’re a man, I know, but I can only be a woman. I can only be with you for half of your life and the other half I’d spend worrying myself sick about you.”
“I’m safe. We’re a respected pack, we do good in the community. Trickery and evil by another pack almost destroyed me. Reining them in needs to be our first course of action. for what they did. One of their own has given us their plans.” He touched the dressing on his wound. “The one who did this to me.”
“And you trust his word? A man who tried to rip out your throat?”
“We have to trust his word. He doesn’t like the way his pack is going. There’s a tradition, a lupine brotherhood, there are rules.”
She rested her head against his shoulder and he wrapped his arms around her.
“Please give me a chance,”
She felt the tear roll down her cheek, over her scar and onto his shirt. Her little animal rescue center was about to turn into a battle ground and she was terrified. Moving closer to him might mean moving closer to danger, and she needed to protect herself and her animals.
She lifted her head. “I need time to think.”
He nodded, moving stray hairs away from her face.
Eve knocked on the door. “My friends have arrived. You want to go find Maddox?”
Rex rose from the bed, leaving India to dry her tears. She never felt so confused in her life about anything. This animal rescue was her rescue too. It was her place for normal life and routine, for tasks and plans. She became a savior for others when she’d almost given up on herself. It was what saved her from disappearing into her own personal black hole.
“We’ll talk later, okay?” He said. “You want to leave for safety, now might be the best time.”
She shook her head. “This is my home. These are my animals and you…” she couldn’t finish what she wanted to say, that he might change her life forever, that she felt something so profound when she was with him, that nothing else mattered. That thought scared her to her bones. He went to her, resting his knees on the floor and held her face in his h
ands. He kissed her lips, her eyes, and her scar again and again. “Whatever happens, I am yours.”
Then he left. Gone back to the pack, and to the fight, and the hunt, and a world she could barely understand.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Even Blaine got ready for the fight. Macho was still in too much pain to leave the house, so Blaine, dressed all in black and carrying a holster, stood waiting for the others on the deck outside. Kyle never felt so reluctant to do anything. He did not like the shape this was taking. Blaine’s meetings were with drug lords, underground arms dealers and others like them. What did he really know about any of those things except they were a way to make money? Kyle felt an unease, a tightness in his stomach he could not shake.
“Kyle come on, we’ve got work to do.”
He nodded, his gun in the back of his jeans. He loved the hunt but not in human form. In this form it took on a unique color. Their perspectives changed, the stakeholders were not equals, and they were an unknown quantity. They were going to the home of two women to terrorize them into handing Rex over, and for what? For territory, but not for wolf supremacy, but human greed.
“Kyle, come on.”
They left, walking through the woods towards the interstate. The untended Hale County woodlands took energy to navigate. They were boggy with overgrown forests and no clearings. It was an arduous walk from start to finish. They left a trail the last time but rain may have flooded some of it. Blaine walked in front, the others all lagging, out of breath. Kyle knew Blaine wanted it over with. He shared little of the plan, apart from it would be all guns blazing. They’d kill her animals first, this would get her out of the house to protect what remained and they’d take her prisoner. She would be their bargaining chip in Rex being handed over.
Juan caught up with Kyle. “Jesus, he’s a man in a hurry.”