“How was I able to kill you?” She twisted the blade, taking pleasure in the way he screamed. The sword warmed in her hands, as if delighted by the taste of blood and magic. “This blade contains ancient magic. It consumes spells like the one carved into you. Even as it drains the spell, it’s draining your life force.”
His arms dropped to his sides, and yet he continued to stare at her in wonder. “You could’ve been my greatest creation.”
Raven wrenched the sword out of him, but he was too weak to scream, his moan of pain barely audible. “You know what they say about creation…leave it to the gods. They have a way of turning on their creators.”
Without hesitation, she brought down the sword, cleanly removing his head from his body. It rolled to a stop, his sightless eyes dulling.
In the distance Raven could hear fighting, the belch of guns, the roar of animals, but it was as if it was happening to someone else.
She dropped the sword, watching it vanish before hitting the ground.
Durant padded toward her in his tiger form, the huge beast moving graceful. He nudged his head under her hand to gain her attention, but she couldn’t make herself move, afraid that she would shatter. Impatient at being ignored, Durant roared loud enough to make her ears ring, and she jolted in alarm. He carefully gripped her hand in his mouth and tugged, forcing her to go with him.
Jackson’s big wolf was tightly packed with muscles and nearly twice his normal size. His fur was an amazing mix of tawny gold tinged with black instead of the normal black and white of his race. He was pacing back and forth around London’s prone form.
London remained human, and her heart clenched at the sight.
He should’ve changed.
The stupid, wonderful fool died because he wanted to protect her.
He thought he was indestructible.
Damn him for making her believe that he would always be there for her.
She knelt next to him, head bowed, unable to look at him—the proof that she destroyed everything she touched. Jackson and Durant came to a stop on either side of her, resting their bulk against her, as if trying to comfort her.
When a hand came to rest on her knee, she jolted so hard she fell backwards, unable to process what she saw.
London was struggling to sit.
Horror shot through her as she gawked at him, suddenly terrified that she’s brought him back from the grave by the sheer desire for him not to be dead.
As if he understood moving would freak her out, London remained still. “That hurt.” His voice was gruff, but he seemed more concerned about her than his own injuries.
“How?” She could barely get the word out past her tight throat. She listened carefully, her breath leaving her in a whoosh when she detected his faint heartbeat.
“When you killed him, the spell evaporated.” London crawled forward very slowly. “I hung on. I knew you wouldn’t let him live. I just had to wait for the spell to break.”
He stopped mere inches from her, still on his hands and knees.
Not sure she believed him, she lifted her shaking fingers to his face.
His breath caressed her fingers.
The dead don’t breathe.
She carefully brushed her fingers along his stubbled cheek…the warmth nearly burning her cold skin.
The darkness inside her eased back, allowing her to breathe until the horror of seeing him lying so still slammed into her again.
She threw herself into his arms, then smacked him upside the head. “Don’t you ever do anything like that again.”
She couldn’t seem to stop shaking. London gathered her in his arms, easily lifting her and settling her in his lap. Instead of being shaken by his near death, he was content to hold her in his arms, as if dying had been worth it for this small pleasure.
The door at the end of the hall opened. Durant and Jackson whirled to face the new threat. London bolted to his feet, thrusting her behind him, and she barely resisted the urge to smack him again. She peered around them and recognized the monstrous shape that emerged from the shadows.
“Taggert!”
Chapter Twenty-six
The big werewolf paused and turned toward her, then threw back his head and howled in victory. He loped toward them with a loose-limbed gait, glancing down at the dead bodies as if debating on whether to piss on them, when he stopped in front of her and carefully extended his arm toward her. Nestled inside his large, bloody paw was a walkie-talkie.
“Here.” London reached past her and picked it up, knowing she’d fry it in seconds, then gently pushed her toward Taggert.
Raven didn’t hesitate, monster form or not, and she threw herself into his arms. The big beast stilled, panic widening his eyes, as if afraid to move. Very slowly, his big paw came up to pat her awkwardly on her back.
“You scared me disappearing like that. How did you survive the fall? The ravine had to be a couple hundred feet deep.”
A mental image of him freefalling played in her head, and her breath caught, her stomach rising up in her throat when it felt like she was falling with him. He showed her how he shifted the second he went over the cliff, reaching out with his claws to slow his descent, then hid and waited for them to give up looking for him before beginning his slow climb back to the top.
The squawk of the walkie-talkie brought her back to the present, and the rat-a-tat-tat of a machine gun sounded closer. When she opened her mouth to ask a question, something hammered into the building and the whole structure swayed disturbingly.
“Jamie breached the building ten minutes ago, practically taking it without a fight with your commander’s help, but the building went into lockdown. There’s a force gathering outside determined to eradicate every trace of us. We have ten minutes to evacuate before they bring down the building.” London tucked the walkie-talkie in the back of his jeans.
Raven was floored. Rogues only took care of their own. That Jamie would risk everything for her and her pack took her by surprise. It was more than she ever expected, and she swallowed hard in pleasure of being considered one of his own, more grateful than she could express.
“Time to go.” Raven turned and headed in the direction where the mercs had dragged Laura. She wasn’t sure she cared what happened to the woman, but she had a feeling that wherever they found Laura, they would find others who needed to be rescued. When Taggert matched her stride, she asked the question that had been preying on her mind. “Rylan?”
“Alive.” The word was garbled coming out of his misshapen muzzle, his teeth and tongue forming the word awkwardly, but it was enough to bring tears to her eyes.
“Jackson, can you track where they took Laura?” The wolf cast an annoyed glance at her over his shoulder, not in the least bit challenged. They followed silently, noting that if anyone had been on this floor earlier, they disappeared when she took out the electronics.
They located the stairwell, and she frowned. “How many levels?”
Taggert held up four fingers, giving her a confused look.
“There are at least that many levels belowground.” If the building came down, those levels would be buried, but possibly still functional, meaning the experiments would still continue, and this would have all been for nothing.
They began to climb up. Jackson’s movements should’ve been awkward, but he was too graceful and aware of his body for that. He flowed up the stairs as smoothly and easily as he moved over the forest floor.
The power was intact on the floor above, the locks on the door still engaged. Apparently she must have blown out the lights on their floor alone and not the whole building.
When Taggert reached out to swipe at the keypad, she held up his hand. “Let’s try my way.”
Raven reached out to the pad and placed her palm over the sensor. It beeped red—access denied. But instead of lifting her hand away, she fed the machine just enough current to blow the circuit, and a little puff of smoke rose from the seams along with the smell of charred wires.
She lifted her hand and backed away. At her nod, Taggert grabbed the door, twisting the handle until the metal locking system inside crunched. But when he went to pull it open, her gut cramped viciously and she slammed her hand against the metal and knocked it shut.
Milliseconds later, the ping of bullets riddled the door.
Jamie’s voice crackled over the walkie. “We’re not going to be able to hold the floor for much longer. Whatever you’re doing, you need to do it fast.”
As if to emphasize his point, the building swayed alarmingly under the impact of some powerful artillery.
Only when the building stopped moving did Raven try to edge in front of Taggert, but he refused to budge. “Let me.”
He studied her for a bit, then reluctantly released his hold. Not surprisingly, he didn’t go far, his big form looming behind her, the heat of him a reassuring presence at her back. “Safe.”
“I won’t take any risks, I promise.” Not when she had so much to lose.
Raven opened the door a crack and raised her voice. “We only want to help the people on this floor. The building is going to collapse. We need to evacuate. If you put your weapons on the floor, we will give you free passage.”
She expected another barrage of bullets. Instead she heard the clatter of guns hitting the floor.
“Agreed,” a man spoke from the other side of the door.
Taggert tried to nudge her aside, but she stubbornly refused to budge. “If they see you first, they’re going to panic.” She looked behind her and beckoned to London. “We’ll go first.”
London slipped an arm around her waist, then picked her up. Not expecting the move, she grabbed his arm, completely amazed when he turned and calmly set her aside as if she was a piece of furniture to be moved out of his way. His hold was light, his easy strength making her shiver. When he set her down, he was so careful she barely felt the ground beneath her feet.
She wanted to warn him against doing anything stupid, scold him for taking his job as protector too seriously, but he didn’t give her a chance, opening the door before she could voice her complaint.
The floor was wide open, a wall of locked cupboards lining the back wall. The left side showed two rows of hospital beds, but only half of them occupied. Eight women lay as if asleep, their hands eerily crossed across their stomachs, the thin blanket clearly outlining their prone bodies.
Each one was hooked up to a small device monitoring their vitals, plus a feeding tube and an IV. In the last bed was Laura. She wasn’t moving.
Nausea churned in Raven’s gut at what that meant…Laura had already been added to the breeding program.
And every one of the patients wore a necklace. Even from a distance, she could sense the magic in them and recognized the energy signatures immediately. They were the same necklaces Frankenstein forced the witches imprisoned at the asylum to create.
They contained pure magic.
Her mind raced as understanding slammed into her—he was using the magic to keep his pet projects alive long enough for them to come to full term. He was experimenting, hoping that the children would be born without the blood disease that was killing their parents.
She turned away, bile burning in her throat, needing to focus on something else to maintain her sanity. When she turned right, she came face-to-face with a large laboratory set apart by a thin wall of glass used to keep the rest of the room sterile.
Inside were a half a dozen guards and what appeared to be a handful of nurses. Raven nodded to them. “There are only five of us. More are on the main level. If you don’t attack, you’re free to head down without interference.”
While she spoke Jackson, Durant, and Taggert joined her.
“How can we trust you?” A big man spoke, the same one as before. He was a shifter, newly turned, but old military. His gaze flickered toward the shifters as they wandered over to the beds, but his gaze quickly returned to her, as if sensing she was the bigger threat.
“The commander is downstairs waiting for you. He’s been collecting his men. Go to him.” Raven nudged London’s arm, then gestured to the walkie. London dutifully lifted the small device and pressed the button. “Tell the commander that we’re sending a dozen of his men down. To those who are listening, they’re friendlies.”
There was a small silence, a bit of static, when the commander’s gruff voice came over the air. “We got you. Send them down. I would advise you to hurry.”
While the others whispered to each other, the big man didn’t hesitate. He unlocked the door and boldly stepped out. When no one made a move toward him, his shoulders relaxed. “What can I do?”
For the first time, Raven smiled. “Grab as many of the bedridden girls as you can and get out of the building.”
The big man reached behind him and yanked one of the nurses out of the room, shoving her toward the beds. “Unhook them, and be quick about it. No one leaves until we can bring all of them with us.”
The man narrowed his eyes on the soldiers under his command until they rushed toward the waiting hospital beds to help.
The man seemed so honorable, Raven couldn’t understand why he would help someone like Frankenstein. “Why?”
The man flinched, shame darkening his eyes. “They said it was our only hope for survival. They said the women were already infected. We have paperwork saying they volunteered.”
“And you believed that? Did you read the paperwork that you signed when you took the serum?” When he shook his head and glanced away, his shoulders slumped in defeat, she sighed.
“We were desperate. It was either sign or die, so we signed.”
“And these girls? You knew what they were doing to them was wrong.” She found it hard to believe that a clearly honorable him would allow this to happen.
“They were our only hope for the future.”
Defeat bowed his shoulders, but Raven didn’t know if it was because he’d been confronted with the knowledge of his wrongdoings or because she’d stopped them before a cure was found. She didn’t care to know more.
Turning toward her team, she stopped short and sighed. “Any chance you can turn back human?”
Jackson was first. It happened fast. His fur receded, flowing back into him like water. His back arched, a grunt escaping as his muscles pulled tight and twisted. There was no sound of muscles popping, no bones snapping or fur rippling, no blood as the flesh reformed. His transformation was unique. A light simply formed around him, only to recede as his body settled back into itself.
“Holy shit,” one of the nurses whispered, staring avidly, and Raven stepped possessively in front of Jackson as he rose to his feet…completely nude. He was solid muscle. Power wrapped around him, barely leashed. It crested over her, rough and untamed and delicious to touch. His yellow eyes faded, splintered with brown as the human in him returned.
And he only had eyes for her.
One of the nurses grabbed a set of scrubs and handed them over, and Raven forced a smile, biting back a growl at the way a blush illuminated the nurse’s face. She’d clearly enjoyed the show.
Durant’s change was slower. He wisely moved to the side of the room, remaining hidden behind one of the beds. It wasn’t vanity on his part, more like trying to spare her from having to kill the women for ogling them.
Taggert’s change wasn’t as dramatic, his form shrinking down, the hair receding, muscles and bones popping. It sounded horribly painful.
Knowing they didn’t have much time, she passed out more of the scrubs, watching while the nurses unhooked the patients one at a time. It didn’t take long for the women to wake, groggy and confused.
“What the fuck?!” Laura woke up swinging, nearly falling out of the bed, barely catching herself before she crashed to the floor. No one bothered to help her, meaning she must have been her usual charming self around them, too.
“Wakey-wakey!” Raven sang sarcastically as she approached. “Your soldier friends are about to take down the building, so I
suggest you hurry if you want to get out alive.”
The soldiers didn’t wait, herding the rest of the girls toward the door, picking up the few of them who couldn’t walk.
Laura stood on shaky legs and gave a tired, breathless laugh. “Good. Maybe that’s for the best.”
“And Tuck and George? Do they deserve to die?”
Laura stiffened, refusing to look at her, and Raven’s patience snapped. “You asked for this—”
“I didn’t ask to be made into a monster!” Laura whirled, shouting out her frustration and rage.
“Oh, honey, you were a monster long before you were turned.” Raven shook her head. “I offered you help. Instead you betrayed your friends, kidnapped us, blew us up, shot us through with shrapnel, threw one of us off a cliff, stabbed one of my men through the heart, bound us in chains, and brought us to this lab to be dissected and ultimately killed.”
“I was trying to save them!” Laura stormed toward her on unsteady legs. “They’re good men. I was promised a cure, a way to free them. I was the reason they were injured, the reason they were turned.”
She turned her shattered eyes to Raven, then lifted her chin. “I would do it again in a heartbeat if I thought I could cure them.”
“Even if it meant starting a war?” Raven whispered. “Because if we die, there will be no stopping it. Millions will die…not because of the blood in your veins, but because you’re a coward.”
“We’ve got to go. Now!” Durant was helping one of the remaining girls toward the door, Jackson and Taggert close behind, each carrying their own patient.
Raven walked toward him, but hesitated by the cabinets when a crackle of static lifted the hair on her arms. She quickly broke the lock, then stepped back to stare in shock. Inside were hundreds of pieces of jewelry, the key to keeping the tainted soldiers alive sitting right under their noses. Raven turned and searched the room until she spotted a trash can. She quickly dumped out the garbage and began scooping the jewels out of the cabinet.
The magic nipped at her fingers, eager to come out and play.
“Raven, we have to go. Now!” London grabbed her arm, halting her frantic movements, drawing her toward the door, and she scrambled to keep up with him. When he tried to take the garbage can from her, she yanked the container back. “We need them.”
Electric series- Raven Investigations BoxSet Page 86