by Tami Lund
“Besides, you need to conserve your strength,” Olivia added. “We’ve half the night before we can regenerate.”
Dane nodded again and released the magic, causing the sword to disappear. Then he grabbed Cecilia’s arm in a death grip.
* * * *
They were within five feet of the car when they were attacked. With only one warning snarl, half a dozen wolves stepped out of the shadows and began slowly advancing toward them. A small group of humans who were also heading toward their car took one look at the wolves and turned and rushed back into the hotel.
Tanner froze and instantly began calculating his next move. “Go ahead and produce that sword now, Dane,” he said quietly as he surveyed the group of wolves that now almost completely surrounded them. They could still make a dash for the hotel, but then they’d be trapped inside, surrounded by humans who were blithely unaware of the magical world. He would not be responsible for human deaths. They needed to get to the car, and get out of this town.
He recognized most of the shifters, even in their animal forms. Finn, the shifter who’d let them leave the manor home, was one of them. Tanner hoped that boded well for he and his small group of Lightbearers, but he wasn’t about to count on it.
Especially not when Quentin himself stepped out of the shadows, in human form, and dressed, as ever, in head-to-toe black.
“Well damn,” he said smoothly as he surveyed Tanner and the Lightbearers. “They just keep multiplying. I admit, I am duly impressed, my son. One for each of us and one to spare.”
Tanner did not respond. He was too busy wondering how good Dane was with that sword. Seven shifters against one plus a questionable Lightbearer warrior and two fairly helpless females did not make for very good odds. To make matters worse, he assumed that the Lightbearers would run out of steam sooner rather than later, given the fact that it was the middle of the night.
“So this is where they have been hiding, is it? Smart,” Quentin said with a nod. “It is easy to hide in Vegas. Although, not anymore.” His grin was pure evil. “Do you think there is a limit on how much magic I can inherit? Or can I just keep killing and killing them, as I see fit?”
“You cannot possibly believe that ridiculous old tale,” Dane sputtered. “How preposterous. If we die, our magic dies with us. You are a fool if you believe otherwise.”
Tanner mentally slapped his forehead. Quentin narrowed his eyes and studied the male Lightbearer.
“Kill this one first,” he said. “Let’s see if his words are true.”
Dane shoved Cecilia into a small space between two parked cars and then charged at the nearest shifter, sword swinging. Tanner was impressed that he managed to catch the shifter with his sword, who howled in pain and retreated.
Unfortunately, the move kicked everyone else into motion. Tanner shoved Olivia toward Cecilia, so that he could join the melee and try to keep Dane from dying.
* * * *
While Dane and Tanner fought off the shifters, Cecilia and Olivia huddled between two cars and hoped no one figured out where they were hiding.
“As soon as we get back to the coterie, I am demanding my father train us to defend ourselves,” Olivia said hotly to her cousin.
Cecilia snorted. “Good luck with that one. The only Lightbearers more stuck in the past are my own parents. Considering they are related, that has never boded well for either of us.”
“We should be helping,” Olivia said, as she watched Tanner get slashed across the side of his snout by another shifter. He had taken the form of a tiger, sleek and huge and—she hoped—more powerful than the rest. It was breathtaking to behold, watching him battle three shifters at once. Dane had managed to slay or injure two, and turned to help Tanner. Surprisingly, the odds looked to be slanting in their favor.
But then one of the shifters leapt away from the fray. “Where’d he go?” Olivia said out loud. Quentin was still there, across the way, watching very intently as his son battled the other shifters. Apparently, he was not concerned that Olivia and Cecilia might try to escape without Tanner. That other shifter who just disappeared worried Olivia, though. She darted her head every which way, scanning her surroundings.
“Looking for me?”
She whipped her head around and let out a small scream. Tanner noticed, lost his concentration, and was rewarded with another slash in the face.
The shifter who stood over her and Cecilia was huge, but then she was quickly coming to the realization that they all were. He had dark hair, dark eyes, and a scary look on his face. Clearly, he’d been taking direction from Quentin.
“The pack master would like a word with you two,” he said, and he reached for them. Cecilia kicked him in the shin and he cursed as he grabbed his leg and began hopping around on the other foot. Olivia followed Cecilia’s lead and kicked him in the other shin. He collapsed to his knees, snarling and grabbing for them. The two women scrambled out of reach.
Cecilia was suddenly grabbed from behind and disappeared behind the car at Olivia’s back. “No!” Olivia shouted as she turned and chased after her cousin. The dark haired shifter caught her leg and she kicked out, hard, the heel of her sandal making contact with his face. He shouted in pain and released her leg and Olivia followed the path her cousin had just taken.
When she reached the other side of the car, Cecilia was in the arms of another shifter. He had coppery hair and pale, pale blue eyes and when Olivia looked into his face, he lifted his finger to his lips and motioned with his head toward the fight that continued out in the parking garage.
He pressed Cecilia against the cement wall and motioned for Olivia to sit next to her. “I’m going to shift this car into neutral and push it toward the fighting,” he whispered. “It should distract them enough for you to run away. Be ready.”
Without waiting for an acknowledgement of his words, he turned away and slowly opened the door of the car, which was backed into the parking space, and slipped inside. Olivia caught a glimpse of darkness staining the side of his shirt. He must have been one of the shifters Dane managed to injure with his sword.
After a few seconds, he slipped out of the car again and stepped back to where Olivia and Cecilia were still pressed against the wall, both clearly unsure what to do next. “Here we go,” he warned, and then he leveraged himself against the wall and used his legs to push the car forward.
Just as he promised, the group of shifters scattered every which way. “Go,” he commanded, and then he shifted into the form of a wolf and loped off.
Olivia grabbed Cecilia’s hand and ran the other way. She made it three steps before someone snagged her around the waist and bodily flipped her around. “This way,” he commanded, and she knew it was Tanner, because her body recognized his touch and reacted in a way that was wholly inappropriate for the situation. He gave her a swift, odd look before shoving her in front of him and pointing at the maroon sedan in which they’d arrived.
A moment later, the four of them were inside the sedan and Tanner was driving it out of the parking garage, not even bothering to slow for the shifters who had regrouped and were trying to get in the way of the moving vehicle. The car careened out of the parking structure and out onto the busy street, and still he did not slow down, for other vehicles or pedestrians. Several heart-stopping moments later, they were off the main drag and coasting toward the nearest interstate, and Olivia finally felt it was safe enough to breathe again. At least, until Tanner spoke again.
“Okay, how do we get to the coterie?”
Chapter 8
“Freddy’s dead.”
Tanner gripped the phone, gritting his teeth against the flood of emotion he felt at that one statement. Pain for the loss of his friend. A loss that was his fault. Regret and sympathy for the man’s mate, who was left alone with a pup and another due to be whelped any day. Anger, because he knew without Lisa telling him that Quentin did this to her family.
“I have your mother.”
“What?” The flood of sadne
ss and anger washed away as quickly as it hit. “What do you mean, you have my mother?”
“I mean, she’s in the passenger seat, next to me. Sofia’s in the back. They’re both sleeping. I’m in my SUV, driving. Tell me where to go, Tanner.”
“You can’t leave the pack, Lisa.”
“He killed Freddy. I can’t stay there.”
“Where else will you go? When he realizes you’re gone, he’ll come after you.”
“I’m going with you. Wherever you’re going. I don’t care. But I can’t stay there. I can’t be ruled by a monster who would kill my mate just because of his insane obsession over something that isn’t even real.”
Tanner could hear the tears in her voice, even though he knew damn well Lisa was fighting them. She was tough. She hated to cry, even when the situation warranted it. In truth, he wasn’t really surprised at the fact that she’d chosen to leave the pack. He was, however, surprised she’d made the decision to take his mother with her.
“Why did you take my mother?”
“She asked me to. She’s dying, and I guess she figures she has nothing to lose. She’d rather die with her son than that bastard of a mate.”
Tanner pinched the bridge of his nose and wondered how the hell his life had spiraled so far out of control. One minute, he was playing halfway decent pool with a human and thinking about picking up a hot redhead for the night, the next, he was in a car with three Lightbearers, running from his father and his former pack. In a matter of days, his life had disappeared and been replaced by ... insanity.
“Where are you?” he asked on a sigh. Lisa told him and he tossed the phone at Olivia, who sat in the passenger seat watching him. “Pull up the GPS,” he told her, and then he gave her the coordinates Lisa told him.
Olivia held the phone as if it were a piece of moldy cheese. “I have no idea what you are talking about,” she said primly, and Tanner wanted to bang his head on the steering wheel.
Damn it, he’d forgotten that she didn’t even know what the hell a cell phone was, let alone how to work the GPS on a smart phone.
He wasn’t at all surprised when she lifted her chin and gave him a defiant look. Even as frustrated and pissed off as he was, he still wanted to kiss her when she looked at him like that. He wanted to do all sorts of other things, too. Things that weren’t exactly appropriate to think about at the moment. Or at any moment, with a Lightbearer.
Cecilia reached across the back of the seat and plucked the phone from Olivia’s hand. “I know how to use them,” she announced, so Tanner gave her the coordinates, and then told her to punch in their current coordinates as well. When she handed the phone back to him, he saw that she’d indicated an exact halfway point where they could meet with Lisa, so he put the phone to his ear and instructed Lisa where to go.
After he disconnected the call, Olivia asked him what happened.
“Quentin got to Freddy,” he said flatly. He squeezed his hands on the steering wheel and willed himself not to react to the words. “He’s dead. Apparently, Lisa packed up Sofia and my mother and left the pack. We’re going to hook up with her in about four hours.”
“Your mother?”
He stared out the windshield. “Yes. She’s ill, practically on her deathbed. Can’t even walk. The fates only know how Lisa managed to get her down two flights of stairs. I’m surprised she hasn’t started whelping, with all the stress she’s suffered the last couple of days.”
Olivia was silent for a few moments, and then she said, “That was considerate of her.”
Tanner did not respond.
“I’m sorry about your friend,” she said quietly. He glanced at her and saw it in her face. She was sincerely sorry. She practically looked as if she were about to cry. On his behalf.
“Thanks,” he replied.
“It isn’t your fault, you know.”
He didn’t reply.
“Freddy was a grown man. He knew what he was doing. He believed in you. That doesn’t make you responsible, though.”
“Yeah, actually, it does. It comes with being a pack master. You’re responsible for everyone in your damn pack.”
“You aren’t the pack master,” she reminded him. “And since Quentin is the one who killed him—at least, I assume that is the case?”
Tanner nodded sharply.
“Then this is Quentin’s fault. He’s the pack master. He is responsible for his pack. And he let his pack down. This is not your fault,” she repeated, and she reached across the console and placed her hand on his bicep. He felt the now-familiar rush of magic and wanted to touch her back. A lot. In a lot of different places.
Instead, he kept his hands on the steering wheel and continued to drive. But he didn’t mind in the least when she left her hand right where it was.
* * * *
They met Lisa at a hotel in the mountains of Colorado. The hotel was far enough off the interstate that Tanner declared it was reasonably safe to check in and rest for a few hours, although Olivia and Dane warded the room once everyone was inside, just in case.
Lisa was a mess. She was so distraught that the fact that Tanner arrived in the company of three Lightbearers instead of one did not even draw a reaction from her.
Her face was tracked with tears and there were deep, dark shadows under her eyes. Sofia clung to her stuffed tiger and refused to take her thumb out of her mouth. Tanner’s mother, Ariana, was the only one who held a remote semblance of cheerfulness, which Olivia found surprising, considering the woman truly did look as if she were on the brink of death.
“Lights above, what happened to this poor woman?” Dane demanded when he first glimpsed Ariana’s frail form, lying on a sofa in the hotel suite they’d rented for the night.
“She won’t tell me,” Tanner said with a narrow-eyed look at his mother.
Dane immediately dropped to his knees next to Ariana and placed his hands on either side of her face.
“What are you doing?” Ariana asked in alarm.
Olivia grabbed Dane by the arm and lifted him to his feet. “Not now,” she said quietly. “You’ve expended too much magic as it is, and dawn is only just breaking. We need you regenerated first.”
Dane glanced over his shoulder and then led Olivia to the other side of the room. “She’s dying,” he whispered. “We have to save her.”
“Will she die today?”
Dane hesitated and then shook his head.
“Then we wait until later. Seriously, Dane. Those shifters who attacked us aren’t going to give up. You cannot heal her until you pass out. Not now. Not if it isn’t necessary.”
Dane pursed his lips, but he finally nodded.
Tanner was in one of the two attached bedrooms with Lisa and Sofia, so Olivia decided to take charge of the rest of the group. While Dane headed to the bathroom to shower, she and Cecilia helped Ariana into a chair, so that they could pull out the bed within the sofa upon which she had been lying.
“Three of you,” Ariana said in a weak, hollow voice. “Does this mean my mate was right all along?”
Olivia shook her head. “We exist, but our magic cannot be inherited by killing us.”
“Fascinating,” Ariana murmured. Olivia turned away from her and contemplated the sleeping arrangements.
“Okay, three beds and six adults plus Sofia,” she said. “If Tanner stays in there with Lisa”—a thought that did not remotely sit well with her— “Then the three of us can share the bed in the other bedroom. It’s huge. Plenty big enough. And Dane can have this sofa sleeper.”
At that moment, Tanner stepped out of the other bedroom, closing the door softly behind him. Olivia breathed a sigh of relief and Tanner gave her another odd look.
“Or Dane and Tanner can both sleep out here on the sofa sleeper. Which makes sense anyway, for protective purposes.”
Tanner narrowed his eyes and glared at her. “I’m not sleeping with that Lightbearer.”
Olivia had the ridiculous urge to ask him if he was interested in s
leeping with another Lightbearer, but she was too afraid of the answer, and besides, she wasn’t supposed to be attracted to him.
“There aren’t any more beds,” she said instead.
“I’ll sleep on the floor. I’ll be fine.” His tone ended any further argument.
Olivia watched as Tanner lifted his mother as if she weighed nothing at all—in truth, she practically didn’t—and carried her into the bedroom next to where Lisa and her child slept. Cecilia followed him, and while they helped Ariana get settled, Olivia took advantage of the moment of privacy and slipped out onto the balcony. She’d barely been out there a few minutes when Tanner joined her.
“It isn’t safe out here,” he said by way of greeting.
Olivia waved her hand and magical sparks shimmered in its wake. “It’s fine. The ward extends beyond the balcony. No one can see us out here.”
“No one?” Tanner glanced around. As the sun had not yet pushed over the mountains, their surroundings were silent, save for the occasional sound of insects or far off wild animals, on the hunt. He evidentially determined they were safe enough, because he stepped up to the railing and leaned on his forearms.
“Is your mother settled?”
“Yes.”
“Are you glad to see her again?”
He appeared surprised by the question. “Yeah, I guess I am,” he said after a moment. “I haven’t seen her in ten years, well, before yesterday.” He turned his head and looked out at the mountains. “I was planning to go back for her, after I saw you, Cecilia, and Dane safely back to your coterie.”
“Now you don’t have to go back at all.”
“No, I suppose not.”
“And you have Lisa, too.”
He turned and looked at her, studying her features. “Are you jealous?” He sounded amused.
“Of course not,” Olivia said hotly. “What do I have to be jealous of? It isn’t like … like— ” she broke off, before she embarrassed herself further.
Tanner turned back to watching the mountains. He looked casual, comfortable. Olivia watched him, while he admired the scenery. He really was quite handsome, far more so than any other male in her life. She had never felt that spark, like she did with Tanner, when she touched another man.