A shot rang through the tension. Tree bark exploded near the tiger shifter’s head. He jumped with a shout and ducked behind a tree. Then another shot blasted through the group, hitting a tree near one of the lions.
“Katherine, stop!”
“It’s not me.” She shoved her pistol into a holster behind her back. “Come on!” The three young wolves were nearly to them, still struggling to hobble along.
“Shift,” he said, stepping toward them, using the alpha magick he now possessed to push their obedience. The wolves shifted immediately. Their skin was mottled with black and blue. Cuts and bruises covered their swollen faces. Knox bent grabbing the two most injured and slung them over his shoulders. He grunted from the weight, but as long as he kept moving. He could manage them both.
He didn’t like that Katherine was reaching for the third one. He didn’t want anyone to touch her, much less another male. But he also wasn’t okay with leaving even one of his tribe behind to be executed by these cats.
By some miracle he and Katherine got Callum and the other two wounded men to her truck. The shots had stopped, but none of them had come close. Whoever had been shooting had only targeted the Tribe.
“Who was shooting, Katherine?”
“I don’t know.” She slid into the driver’s seat and yanked the truck into reverse. Gravel spit from beneath the tires and peppered the bottom of the truck like buckshot. She ground her teeth and pushed down the sensory memory. “Maybe Harrison? I wouldn’t put it past him to follow me around.” She eyed the rearview mirror. “Yep. Especially since that’s his truck following along behind us.”
Knox turned and peered out the back window.
A lone siren blared in the distance. “What’s that noise?”
“Someone called the sheriff. I’m sure they heard the shots. He’ll be coming from the center of town. He won’t see us. Hopefully no one else saw my truck.”
Minutes dragged for what seemed like hours. She pulled into her driveway and Knox didn’t wait for the truck to stop before he was climbing out. He unlatched her tailgate and pulled the guys out of the bed one at a time.
“Shift back. We can’t stay here.” The three bruised guys bowed their heads and melted into their beast forms.
Katherine came storming around from her side of the truck. “What are you doing?”
He stepped closer, grabbing her upper arms. “I can’t stay here, Katherine. It’s not safe for them and it’s not safe for you. I thought I could protect you. I failed. If not for Harrison…I—”
“Wait. What? You said you had a responsibility to me. You said we would do this together,” she said, her tone breaking his heart in half. “You lied.”
“Katherine. I just have to find a place to keep them safe. I will come back eventually, I promise. It’s not safe for you to go with me. You’re human.”
“They’ll find you if you go into the wild. They’ll kill you and I’ll never see you again. I won’t even know if you’re dead cause they’ll fucking eat you. Everyone leaves me. You’re no different.”
Knox dropped his hands to his sides. “We don’t eat—”
“Just leave. How dare you make me think you cared about me.” Her voice rose louder and louder. “Get away from me. I should’ve known better.”
“Shuarra.”
“No.” Her voice held darkness and finality. That single word ended his. “You don’t get to call me that. Not anymore.”
“Katherine, sweetheart, back away from him, okay.”
Knox looked up meeting Harrison’s gaze over Katherine’s shoulder. His fangs descended. Knox knew his beast was showing in his eyes. But this human was going to take his mate away. His wolf wasn’t handling his choice to try to hide his packmates over staying with his mate, but now this human was urging Katherine away from him. Not giving him a chance to explain. He wasn’t going to leave her permanently.
Ever.
He just needed to get his pack to a safe place. He couldn’t let her come with him. He’d never be able to fight if she was in danger.
Katherine took a step backward. Tears burned streaks down her blotchy red cheeks. Her pain was evident. Pain he’d caused. Pain he hadn’t meant to cause.
She was right. He was going back on what he said, but he couldn’t just let Callum and the others die. They were barely out of their teenage years. They deserved a chance to live too. He couldn’t just abandon them to be slaughtered.
“I will be back, Katherine. I promise.”
She shook her head. “Don’t.” She moved to stand next to Harrison and laid her head on the older man’s chest. Each sob that shook her body tore open a fresh wound in his heart.
It took everything inside Knox to keep his beast from taking over and launching himself fangs and claws bared. He wanted to rip his throat out, but Harrison was important to Katherine. She’d called him a father. He was just protecting his little girl from the big bad wolf.
“Keep her safe.” He met Harrison’s fierce gaze again. The older man gave a slight nod and lowered the business end of his rifle.
Knox turned away from Katherine before he lost all composure. He allowed his wolf to come forward and take control. A moment later he was on four paws. The breeze was blowing through his fur. The scent of the surrounding forests was bright and crisp.
He swung his head back once more to look at Katherine. She was walking toward her house. Her back was turned. Knox waiting, hoping and wishing she would turn around, just for a moment. This wasn’t how he wanted this to go down.
The wolves were supposed to stay in hiding. He was supposed to have had two whole days with Katherine. He was supposed to show her how much she meant to him.
Instead he was leaving and breaking her.
She entered her house and closed the door behind her. Not one look. Nothing.
A whine slipped from his throat.
Harrison was still standing there. Still staring him down. “You need to go far from here. If those bloody cats come around Katherine, I’ll hunt every last one of you down and it will be like you never existed. You have my word. You broke her heart. Don’t you dare come back thinking you’ll get to do it again. She’s been through too much. She deserves better than whatever your brand of crazy is.”
Knox curled his lip up and growled low in the back of his throat. He would be back. He couldn’t just leave her. It wasn’t physically possible. She just didn’t realize it yet. And neither did Harrison.
She was his Shuarra. No matter what. Even if she never spoke to him again. He would protect her and watch over her until he breathed his last.
“Go’on. Get,” Harrison said, his tone harsh and broken on the same breath.
10
Katherine
Katherine crawled the length of her bed and buried her face in the pillows where she’d slept with Knox all night. They still smelled like him. A mix between pine and wet dog. It was oddly comforting and heartbreaking at the same time.
One sob after another tore from her throat. Her lungs burned. Her face was wet. Tears poured as if there would never be an end.
“Katherine.” The bed dipped a little on the side. “That boy is stupid.”
“Harrison, he said we’d do this together. He promised.”
“But you were in danger. I shot at those other guys, Kat. If I hadn’t followed your dumb asses, no telling what would’ve happened. I saw them. They were like him, but different.”
“I’m not helpless.”
“But he was, sweet thing. I saw his face through my scope. When those other two guys started advancing on you. Had you surrounded. He knew he’d lost and the thought that you were going to get hurt was stripping away his soul. Any man worth his salt would’ve done the exact same thing.”
“Now you’re on his side?”
“Hell no, I’m just saying. I sympathize.”
“He lied. Broke promises. I don’t want anything to do with him.”
Harrison sighed, but Katherine kept her face b
uried in the pillows. She couldn’t face her father. Knox. Anyone. Everything hurt so much. The pain reminded her of that night her dad betrayed and left her.
“I’ll be back later to check on you. Get some rest, okay.” He stood and the mattress moved again. A light pressure touched her head. His hand was stroking her hair. Then lips pressed softly to the crown of her head. “I love you, baby girl. You’re going to get through this too. Just know that boy loves you more than anything. And I wouldn’t say that lightly.”
“He barely knows me. How would you know that?”
“It’s a guy thing. We can see it.” His boots clunked on her floor toward her bedroom door. “I’ll lock up on my way out. Stay in today, sweetheart. I’ve got to go make some deliveries today, otherwise I’d stay with you all day.”
“I’ll be fine. Thanks Harrison.”
“Anything for you, Kat.”
Katherine listened to his footsteps fade. Then the house shuddered when he opened and closed the front door. Then his truck roared to life and disappeared into the distance.
She was alone.
For real.
Knox was gone.
Everyone was gone. And she was in her bed without the man who had quickly become a vital piece of her heart. And now her heart felt like it’d been carved with a butcher’s blade. There were slices falling away as she questioned every word Knox had said. All the things he told her about fated mates and soul matches were crap.
Except Harrison thought he really did love her. It was the only thing that had kept her from just giving up completely and letting everything she felt for Knox wither and die. The sooner her feelings died and were forgotten, the sooner it would stop hurting. Right?
She closed her eyes and let the emotional exhaustion pull her under.
Thunk. Thunk. Thunk. “Katherine?” Thunk. Thunk. Thunk. “I know you’re in there, girl. I see your truck.”
Katherine opened one eye.
Thunk. Thunk. Thunk. The walls of her bedroom vibrated and the photos across from her bed shook in their frames.
“Katherine Manitok.”
Katherine sat up straight in bed. Tara. She slipped off the bed and ran to the front door, hesitating for just a moment before unbolting it and swinging it wide. Not only was Tara on the porch. Owen stood there in all of his nearly seven-foot-tall-intimidating-make-a-linebacker-jealous form.
“What are you doing here?”
“Checking up on my best friend.” Tara shoved her way into the house and wrapped Katherine in a hug. “What’s going on? Please tell me.”
“It’s over. The guy I told you about meeting at the community center. He’s gone.”
Owen stepped over the threshold and closed the door softly behind him, much more gentle than Katherine would’ve expected from a giant like him.
“But he was here? In your house?” Tara grabbed her arms and stared hard. “He didn’t hurt you?”
“Not that way. My heart took a bit of a beating though.” Katherine pulled away from her friend and headed to the kitchen. She could use a drink. A stiff one.
“What happened?” Tara asked, and sniffed the air carefully.
“Why do you keep sniffing the air, Tara? You are not being subtle. Both of you, get out of my house.”
“Knox is dangerous. He was there, Katherine. On the mountain. He helped them hold me there. I almost died.” Her friend’s voice was breaking, and Katherine’s heart felt the pain and fear like it was her own. She hated that her friend went through such an experience. That she almost died. That she would probably never be the same again because of it.
Still. Knox wasn’t who they said he was. “He’s not dangerous.”
“Do you know what Knox is? What he really is?”
“You mean that he’s a werewolf. And that Owen’s a werebear. And that there are tigers and lions and dragons and shit living on the west side of the river. Yep.”
Tara’s eyes widened. Her mouth gaped like a fish on a line. “You can’t tell anyone, Katherine,” she said, finally able to make words.
“Who would I tell? Who would believe me?” Katherine’s tone cut sharper than the knife tucked into her boot.
Owen growled from behind Tara. “She can’t. Col will—”
Katherine turned toward Owen and crossed her arms over her chest. She was done. Done with all their bullshit vendettas and stupidity and alpha male ignorance. “Col will what, bear-man? Come light me on fire? Is he going to start killing the villagers too, not just the wolves? Maybe all the wolves didn’t have a choice in the matter? Hmmmm? Did he ever consider that? Did he stop even once and consider that their alpha was forcing their hand. That they didn’t want to take Tara. That some of them just wanted peace with your damned dragon. That’s all Knox wanted.” Katherine could hear her voice like she was outside her body. She was screaming. Yelling at her friend’s giant of a boyfriend who could turn into a bear probably the size of a school bus.
But she didn’t care. She wasn’t afraid of them anymore and she had nothing left to lose. She’d already lost Knox.
She pointed at the closed front door. “Get out of my house. Both of you.”
“No. You don’t know everything no matter what Knox told you.” Tara folded her arms over her chest, mirroring Katherine, and settled into a I’m-not-moving-whether-you-like-it-or-not stance. “Raish bit me, Katherine. It changed me. That’s why I keep sniffing shit. Cause I can smell everything.”
Katherine’s heart stumbled in her chest and then shuddered to a stop like her truck did sometimes. Just long enough for her brain to catch up with what her ears had heard. “Changed you how? Into what?” This time her voice was quiet, barely more than a whisper.
“These wolves are dangerous. I’m just trying to protect you. Raish bit me and it changed me to be like him. I’m a wolf now, Katherine. I have this…thing…this beast inside me.”
“So, you were smelling me in the store.” Her friend was one of them?
Tara nodded. “I didn’t know what you smelled like exactly, but I knew it was one of them.”
“So, you’re like Naomi?”
“How did you know about Naomi?”
“Knox said they knew she was a dragon, but he didn’t know she use to be human. It freaked him out a little. He would never hurt me.” Katherine said, her voice dropping in the last sentence. “Except to leave.”
“Katherine where did he go?”
“Away from your new friends and their teeth and claws. That’s what you came for, right? To kill him. To kill them all.” Katherine marched over to her front door and yanked it open. “Get out. Just get out of my house. I’m done. He’s not here. He left me.”
“Why do you care that he left?” Owen said, taking a slow step toward Katherine. Tara moved quickly to stand between them.
“He said I was his mate. I don’t know about all the fated match crap he was spouting, but I did care about him. A lot. And it’s your fault he’s gone. So get out.” She stepped away from the open door and waited.
“Katherine, I—He—They—” Tara kept starting and stopping. But like Katherine, Tara knew there was nothing left to say. Not right now. Not while everyone was angry and hurt and confused. Them being here was making everything worse.
“Tara, come. Your friend is safe for now. We need to go.” Owen pulled Tara gently toward the door, but a strange sound gurgled in Tara’s throat. Katherine watched as her best friend’s eyes lit up like Knox’s. Gold. Glowing. Her friend’s teeth changed. One moment normal bicuspids. Next moment oversized fangs. Holy shit.
“They will hurt you. Look what they did to me.”
Katherine took a step back from the door. She’d seen Knox change like this, but it was strange to see her best friend with fangs. She’d known Tara since they were toddlers.
“Life isn’t always fair. Now I have this inside me.” Tara held up her hands. Sharp black claws had grown from her fingernails.
“Tara, we talked about this before we came.” Owen put a
hand on Tara’s shoulder.
“She needed to see it. She needed to know what kind of monsters she’s associating with.”
“You are not a monster,” Owen said, his voice soft and gentle like a summer breeze.
“I kinda am,” Tara said, her voice sharper than it needed to be.
Owen’s eyebrows rose. His eyes darkened with hurt. “So, Ava’s Ryder is a monster now too? Am I a monster? Your friend has a valid point. We should go.” Owen slipped an arm around Tara and stared her in the eye.
“Shift back, Tara,” he said, his voice deep and rumbly and something that made even Katherine feel a little uncomfortable and want to shift—even though that was impossible. “I wanted to kill them all too, Tara. I considered them all monsters for taking you from me, but even I’ve had to question my supposed truth.”
Katherine raised her hand and pointed to the open door. “I need you to leave.”
“Katherine.” Tara’s voice pleaded for so many things. For a chance to explain. For sympathy over her situation. For Katherine to change her mind and side with them…which wasn’t going to happen.
“You wouldn’t listen to me even if I tried. You’ve already made up your mind and we are not on the same side. So just get out.”
Because even though Knox had abandoned her, she still cared about him. She still didn’t want him dead or his pack. And she was sorry for Tara. Sorry that she had to deal with this new scary thing inside her, but she wasn’t dead. She had survived. The Tribe had gotten her back and Knox had been a part of making sure that happened.
He could’ve run. Abandoned Tara to her fate. But he had stayed, and it had nearly cost him his life. He’d crawled down the mountainside bleeding and alone and barely conscious to her house.
More tears poured down her cheeks, burning worse than the memory of her father stabbing her. “Please just go.”
Owen picked up Tara and left. And that was it. No more arguing. No more questions. They were just gone. And now the silence closed in again. The loneliness and emptiness in her soul grew bigger and ached again.
Wolf At The Door: Soulmate Shifters World (Soulmate Shifters in Mystery, Alaska Book 5) Page 10