Wolfen

by Alianne Donnelly

  Bryce shook his head and almost toppled over. “Clothes,” he growled.

  Helena chuckled. “This usually works better without them.”

  He spun to face her, but she was faster, keeping at his back. Her breath huffed against his spine, then her tongue lapped at him, hands snaking around his waist to his stomach.

  Bryce grabbed her arms to pry her off, but she struck the backs of his knees and sent him to the ground. With a quick twist worthy of a pro wrestler, Helena brought his arm behind his back, then came around to straddle his lap and press herself against his chest.

  He reached for her throat.

  She grabbed his cock.

  Bryce flashed his fangs, and she laughed. “Oh yeah, let’s play rough. Been a long time since I had someone match me…”

  Bryce squeezed.

  So did she, smiling recklessly.

  He wasn’t getting out of this without inflicting damage. Out of options, Bryce released her throat to circle her waist, squeezing her closer. Triumph and lust transformed her face as she let go of his arm to clutch his neck. She licked at his lower lip when he pushed to his feet.

  Then he unceremoniously dropped her ass to the ground.

  The effects of whatever they’d dosed him with were fading. Bryce was now steady, though his head pounded like a drum. But at least he could walk without stumbling, and he moved away from Helena before she could latch onto him again.

  He retrieved his clothes from the foot of the bed and dressed quickly, shoving his boots on without bothering to lace them.

  Helena gaped. “You’re serious? You’re just going to walk away from this?” She turned full circle in front of him, displaying her physique without a trace of shame.

  Bryce shouldered past her to the door.

  She danced around him, flattened herself against it before he could get it open. “I could make it so good for you,” she said. “Ask anyone, they’ll tell you.”

  Exactly why he wanted nothing to do with her—he knew everyone around here knew; he could smell them all over her.

  “Move,” he said, staring her down.

  Helena’s posture straightened in challenge, and she stared right back, used to humans bowing before her. But Bryce wasn’t human. The longer she stood in his way, the more it pissed him off, and his scalp itched as his hackles rose. Helena noticed, glancing up warily, but she still didn’t back down.

  Voices outside split his attention, made his ear twitch. People arguing, on the verge of a brawl. Men, women, armed guards…and Sinna among them. Her voice carried the loudest to his ears; he’d recognize her anywhere.

  She was alive.

  “Move,” he repeated. This time, his voice was barely human.

  Helena swallowed hard, gaze wavering just a little, but she raised her chin before she tucked tail and stepped aside.

  Bryce snatched open the door and stalked out into the bright light of day.

  And there was Sinna with David. Alive and well, trying to get past a row of armed guards who stood in her way, no doubt under Helena’s orders. She spotted him, and relief made her shoulders sag. How long had she been out there, trying to get to him?

  Then her gaze shifted to his right, and she frowned.

  Bryce sighed as Helena sauntered out of the shack, utterly unabashed by her nakedness, rubbing it in Sinna’s face. “Let her through, boys,” she purred, and the guards stepped away.

  All four met halfway, Helena keeping pace by Bryce’s side as if she had every right to be there, and Sinna blushing scarlet next to David, refusing to meet Bryce’s gaze.

  “Hellraiser,” David greeted.

  “Professor,” Helena returned.

  “Chilly day today.”

  “Good for the constitution.”

  Bryce ignored them both. “Are you okay?” he asked Sinna.

  When he reached for her, she shied away from his touch. “Fine,” she said. “You?”

  “Irritated beyond reason.”

  “Told you we should have gone one more round.” Helena winked at Sinna. “Men. They never know what’s good for them.”

  Sinna glared, but quickly looked away.

  “You know,” David said, “people might like you more if you weren’t so…”

  “So what?” Helena said.

  Bryce took Sinna’s hand and pulled her aside. “Talk to me,” he said. “What happened?”

  She shrugged. “Nothing. You passed out, and they took you away in case you flipped out again. I’ve been looking for you for two days.” She glanced sideways at Helena. “Didn’t realize you were busy.”

  Two days…? “I was drugged.”

  “I’m sure.” She blinked at him and widened her eyes. “Oh, don’t worry. I’m not upset. It’s a good plan. I mean, if we can get her to come with us of her own free will, then all the better, right? Yeah. So, you know. Good job. Taking one for the team.”

  She was jealous.

  The realization left Bryce gaping like an idiot. Sinna was jealous. His nostrils flared to take in more of her scent—that sweet, delicate fragrance of heat and strength—and savored the purity of it. He wanted to roll around in that scent, wear it on his skin. It did something to his brain, made him think of a million things to say, but short circuited his ability to put them into words, and the longer she stood there, watching him, waiting for some sort of response, the worse it got.

  Sarge’s entrance on horseback broke the strained silence. “Matron wants to see you both,” he said, and turned his mount around. “You too, Helena. Put some clothes on first.”

  The girl flipped him off.

  Sinna sighed with disappointment. “I guess we should go,” she said, and followed after Sarge.

  Could he have misread her?

  She glanced back with an unhappy scowl. Not at him, but at Helena.

  Dumbstruck, Bryce almost tripped over his own feet.

  Sinna was jealous.

  Over him.

  He never thought he’d be one of those guys, but damn, it felt good. And, predator that he was, he wanted to chase her down and make her say it out loud, just to hear her say the words. Because he was certain nothing would ever sound as sweet as that female’s voice in his ear, saying she wanted him all for herself.

  Like that would ever happen. Sinna wasn’t the kind who had to settle for a guy like him; she only had to smile, and men would fall all over themselves to fulfill her every wish. Her wanting anything to do with Bryce was as likely as the sky raining down chocolate chip cookies.

  Bryce shook himself off, got back to the real world, and trailed after Sinna.

  Matron’s house was indistinguishable from the others in Hopetown. A well cared for little cottage with painted shutters and a sturdy door that stood open in welcome. Inside, she had a separate room for sleeping, but the doorway didn’t close.

  Matron herself was seated at the table with Bryce’s collection of knives neatly laid out in front of her. A pit bull slept over her feet, guarding their three supply packs.

  When they entered, she waved for them to sit. “You must be starving.” She nudged the dog off of her and retrieved a cauldron from the hearth. She did it so easily, turning her back without any fear. She ladled hearty portions of stew into three bowls and set them onto the table. “I ain’t much of a cook, but I can’t imagine you’re any pickier about what you eat than my daughter is.”

  Neither Sinna nor Bryce made any move to taste it.

  Matron smiled and ate a spoonful from each bowl to prove it was safe. “I thought we should talk. My southern sensibilities dictate that such things are best done over a good meal. Wouldn’t you agree?”

  Helena barged in, dressed, and looking very unhappy. “Mother,” she greeted.

  Matron motioned to the cauldron. “Help yourself. We were just getting started.”

  “Ooh! Food.”

  While Helena served herself, Matron regarded Bryce with a curious eye. “What’s your name?” she asked.

  “Bryce,” he answ
ered.

  Matron raised an eyebrow. “That’s not the name you were given.”

  “It’s the one I chose for myself.”

  After a moment, she nodded. “It’s a good name. And it tells me nothing about you that I don’t already know.”

  Helena dropped into a seat next to her mother and started shoveling food into her mouth as if she hadn’t eaten in a month.

  “Forgive my daughter. She’s very much a free spirit, and curbing her is something I’ve given up on long ago. Manners ain’t her strongest suit, I’m afraid.”

  Sinna tentatively picked up her spoon.

  Bryce took up his own and tasted the concoction first, just in case. Not great, but not bad, either. He gave a nod to let Sinna know it was safe. “You wanted to talk,” he said to Matron.

  “Yes,” she said. “I’m sure you can imagine we don’t get many visitors these days. Your cache of supplies is quite impressive, I must say. But what I want more than any of that, is information.”

  “What do you want to know?” Bryce asked.

  “Where did y’all come from?”

  “North,” he replied shortly.

  “Are there more of you up there?”

  “Some.”

  “Why did you travel all this way south?”

  “Seemed like the thing to do at the time.”

  “Did it now?”

  Bryce nodded.

  “I see. It wouldn’t happen to have anything to do with my daughter, would it?”

  Bryce silently held her gaze.

  She chuckled. “Darlin’, there ain’t much that gets past me. Like I said, we don’t get many visitors, but we do get some. Those coming from the north, especially, seem to have one thing in common: my ex-husband.”

  Helena snapped her heels together. “Heil, Vater!”

  “Now, you’re the first Wolfen he’s sent my way, and I’m quite curious to know exactly how he managed that.” She glanced from Bryce to Sinna and back. “But I see you ain’t keen on telling me, so let’s try something else. What did he tell you?”

  Neither of them spoke.

  Matron sighed. “Fair enough. Let me tell you what he told the others, because it was a very fine tale, I must say. He told them our family had gotten separated during an evacuation. That my daughter was the key to eradicating the converts once and for all, and our ultimate survival hinged on her returning to the bosom of his good graces. Now, we all know that’s a load of convert scat, don’t we?”

  Her lilting voice was calm and relaxed, as if she’d had this conversation a dozen times before and it had ceased to make an impression on her.

  She could afford to bide her time.

  She didn’t have a brother locked away with her crazy ex.

  “Now, let me tell you the real story,” Matron said. “Once upon a time, there was a young girl from Georgia who fell in love with the smartest man she’d ever met. They got married and moved across the big blue ocean to a beautiful little town in Ukraine so he could be close to his work. Now things weren’t always rosy between them, but they were young and in love, and nothin’ else mattered. And when the girl became pregnant, everything seemed to be falling into place.

  “The child was born with a disfigurement that broke both of their hearts. They swore to do everything they could to fix it, but then the world imploded and they no longer could. They moved back to the States, all set and ready to play like the old homesteaders of the past, staking out their claim and building it up from nothing.”

  A sad, dreamy expression clouded her gaze for a moment. “It was a brave, harsh new world,” she said, “full of dangers and treachery. They had quite a time of setting up their little nest, let me tell you, between building a settlement, raising walls, fighting off monsters… And then the young wife conceived again, and the smartest man in the world became obsessed with his wife’s pregnancy. He checked her temperature three times a day, prescribed what she could and couldn’t eat, dosed her with all sorts of vitamin supplements, and monitored every move she made.

  “She became suspicious, and one day decided to look through his notes. What she discovered was that her beloved husband, the light of her life, had implanted her with something that could’ve turned into the very thing she thought he was protecting her from!

  “She confronted him, of course, and he assured her all was safe and well. But the closer she got to giving birth, the more he focused on the baby, and less on her, or his other child. And the moment the newborn’s first scream split the desert air, Klaus abandoned his family completely. He had what he’d always wanted: a perfect progeny, a little angel of a daughter, the best of the best. Nothing else mattered anymore; not his wife, or the infection she suffered after birth, not even his firstborn and the pain she bore every day. Not the months of agony his wife went through, locked away in the attic like a lunatic—like she didn’t exist!”

  Matron looked Bryce straight in the eye, spoke only to him. “People push us as far as they can,” she said, “as far as we let them. But when our backs hit the wall and there ain’t nowhere else for us to turn, well then we don’t got another choice, do we? We got to bite.”

  Her stare demanded he agree with her.

  Bryce didn’t say a word.

  Matron straightened and smoothed her features into a nostalgic smile. “I had one ally in all of this: my firstborn. My damaged little girl. She came to let me out, my sweet little angel. I knew when Klaus found out, he’d kill us both; I knew I had to leave, but God didn’t put me on this Earth to be nobody’s punching bag. Klaus took away from me the only thing I’d lived for: his love. So I took it right back from him, and ran like hell.”

  Helena gave an artificial smile. “She’s talking about me.”

  “That’s right,” Matron agreed, stroking Helena’s pale blonde hair with pride. “Klaus’ final achievement, the last Wolfen embryo to survive the den’s downfall, implanted into a human host and born without any flaws or weaknesses. The absolute perfect specimen. He’d poured every last resource into her, because he knew he’d never make another. Not like that. That’s why he wants her back. Not because he loves her. Not because she can save the world. Because she’s his property.”

  Finished with her tale, she sat back like she expected them to rally to her side. As if Bryce gave a shit about some moron human and her marital problems. He was more than ready to tell her off, but bit his tongue instead. Diplomacy, he reminded himself. We come in peace, until we don’t.

  Sinna had no problem speaking her mind, though. “What happened to your other daughter?” she asked.

  Matron’s face went blank. “Pardon?”

  “Your damaged little angel,” Sinna clarified. “You took Helena, so where’s your other daughter now?”

  Flustered, Matron waved her hand dismissively. “Well, I couldn’t take her with me, obviously. This world is a harsh place for people like her. The best thing I could do was to leave her behind.”

  “With her father, who didn’t care about anything except Helena? Who would have killed you both if he found out she let you out?”

  Matron’s lips compressed into a tight line. “It was the best place for her. She was safe there.”

  “For how long?” Bryce asked.

  Matron fidgeted. She didn’t have an answer, and it was obvious it had never occurred to her anyone would ever ask. She disgusted him.

  “So what do you want from us?” Sinna asked, more hostile than Bryce had ever heard her before.

  Helena picked her teeth with a claw. “It’s not what she wants. It’s what I want.”

  “And what’s that?”

  Helena smiled—a predator’s grin, soulless as a viper. “To settle old debts.”

  47: Sinna

  Here comes the train…

  ~

  Sinna paced the length of the cottage, twirling an arrow in her hand. It was a nice cottage with a window that overlooked the lake, a solid roof, and two beds set out. All of their belongings had been neatly s
tacked in one corner—supplies, guns, everything. Sarge really was as good as his word.

  They had the place to themselves, but Sinna’s skin tingled with the suspicion they were being watched, which made her restless and jumpy. From the moment she’d left that church rectory in San Francisco, all she’d wanted was to get to a safe place with sturdy walls and plenty of defenses. Since then, every time she found herself in a place exactly like that, all she wanted was to get the hell out.

  Bryce stood in the doorway, back against one side, feet propped against the other, cool as a cucumber while he watched her wear a hole in the floor.

  “I don’t like this,” she said.

  He didn’t say anything.

  “She wants to go with us. Alone. How does that make any sense?”

  Not a half-hour ago, Helena had laid out her daring plan: Sinna and Bryce were to lead her back to Haven so she could kill Klaus. All on her own. No backup from her people here, or from Sinna and Bryce—and she wanted to leave tomorrow!

  The worst thing? She’d looked Bryce dead in the eye the whole time she’d talked about it. As if Sinna and Matron weren’t even there.

  “And did you hear the way she talked? Ugh!” Helena hadn’t talked; she’d purred. All low and sweet, like she was whispering secrets into her lover’s ear. Sinna would have that to look forward to—three days driving around in a beat-up mule with Bryce and a bombshell blonde who couldn’t keep her clothes on. And all because Helena felt she needed to spend more time with her own kind. “We’re not gonna do it, right? I mean, we can’t. She’s a loose cannon. She’ll slit our throats in our sleep or something. We can’t trust her.”

  Silence.

  Sinna stopped pacing and turned to Bryce. “Am I right?”

  He shrugged. “This was your idea.”

  “Well, it seemed like a good idea at the time!”

  “Still is,” he said.

  Sinna gaped.

  “She’ll come willingly, she can fight, she’s good backup. And if she screws up, we can use the distraction to get Aiden and haul ass to Montana.”