by Nancy Holder
“I’ll kill him anyway,” he said. “None of this should be happening. He led us to this. They know he’s weak and they’re trying to take us over. They’ve been trying ever since I was a kid. That’s why we need to be strong.”
His heart was picking up speed, beating preternaturally fast. She found herself responding, excited by his ferocity, and she took a fearful step away.
“Kat, Kat,” he said, reaching for her. “When this is over . . . if I make it . . .”
“You will make it,” she said.
He took a deep breath. “If something happens, I know Lucy will take care of Jesse. Be sure to tell him how much I love him.”
Then he took her hand and walked her back to the group. Arial raised her brows at the sight of the two of them and she nudged Regan. Regan’s answering smile was poisonous.
Then Justin tightened his grip around Katelyn’s fingers so hard that he rubbed the bones together. Katelyn looked up at his face, then followed his line of sight.
Dom Gaudin and Cordelia moved from the trees. Dom was carrying a white flag, and his arm was wrapped around Cordelia’s waist. She was thin, and her red hair had grown a few inches.
“Cordelia!” Katelyn cried, and heads whipped in her direction.
She began to run to Cordelia, but Justin jerked her to a standstill. Arial and Regan flashed her looks of disgust, and Cordelia held out a hand to her.
“Kat!”
Dom murmured something to Cordelia; she lowered her arm and raised her chin. Her expression was strained and miserable, but her head was held high. A bit of the old Cordelia was still alive, then. Katelyn was relieved to see it.
Mr. Fenner gave Katelyn a long look and strode toward the couple. “Justin!” he barked. Justin moved to stand beside him. Cordelia didn’t hug — or even acknowledge — her father.
Mr. Fenner, Justin, Dom, and Cordelia disappeared back into the trees. The sky darkened into twilight, everything leeching to gray, then to dark gray. Moonrise would come soon. Katelyn remembered nights at the beach when she and Kimi would wait for the green flash on the water’s horizon, holding their breath, squinting, giggling. But this was anything but a game.
“I don’t like this,” Regan said. “It’s another trick.”
“They had a white flag,” Doug pointed out.
“When have they ever acted honorably?” Regan said. “And as for her . . .”
Katelyn’s dislike and suspicion of Regan flared. Regan was an ambitious backstabber. Katelyn doubted she had ever put the pack before her own wishes and desires. Her father just had never realized it.
“Get ready,” Arial said.
Moments later Justin re-emerged. He glanced over his shoulder and then began striding toward Katelyn. The air reeked with the smell of silver. Justin gagged and clapped his hand over his mouth. In the same moment, the sky exploded with flares going off and fire bombs hurtling through the air toward them and exploding all around. Katelyn screamed and fell to the ground, her hands over her ears. The Gaudins were striking first.
Thoughts and words flew out of her head as she cowered against the earth. She didn’t know anything that was happening around her; everything was chaos. Bodies and people and blood —
— and smoke.
Fire!
Justin was crouched over her, his arms around her waist, dragging her somewhere. The silver stench was overpowering. The smoke, paralyzing. She couldn’t remember how to move her body. She just screamed and screamed and screamed.
“They’re trying to drive us toward the water,” Justin said.
He fell backwards and Katelyn landed on top of him. Then a flash of fur hurtled itself at the two of them. Still screaming, without thinking, Katelyn’s hand found the gun in her holster and fired off a shot. The wolf howled and plummeted to the ground less than six inches from her feet. Frantically she kicked at it as Justin threw his arms around her, then rolled her sideways and got on top of her.
Trees were going up like roman candles; werewolves were transforming all around Justin and her. She didn’t recognize anyone, didn’t know who was on her side and who was an enemy. She only had four silver bullets left and she cursed herself for not sneaking more out of the garage.
Luc Gaudin rushed at her, changing as he ran. His clothing burst off his body and he raced toward her on two legs that were rapidly changing into the legs of a wolf. His jaw stretched, his eyes looked mean.
Justin yanked the gun from her hands and aimed it at Luc’s half-transformed head. It exploded. Katelyn screamed uncontrollably.
“Kat, stop!” Justin bellowed, handing back the gun and furiously wiping his hand on his pants.
Fire rose around her, caging her, and she whirled in a panicked circle. A gray wolf flashed past, and Katelyn’s mind registered that it was Regan. Regan leaped through a hole in the wall of fire, and then the hole closed up.
Heat blazed around her. Through the whoosh of the firestorm she heard shouting, gunfire. She was going to die like her father and her mother. The wind shifted and smoke poured over her, choking her, and Katelyn stumbled forward and ran into something that gave way. She grabbed it, felt it. A vine. Desperately, she gave it a tug. It held.
She jumped and began to hoist herself up the way circus people and gymnasts did: looping the vine around her ankle, propelling herself upward. Coughing, feeling her skin blistered, she kept going. Surrounded by smoke, heat, noise, her eyes closed, she kept on climbing. Then the vine jerked hard and as she caught her breath, she inhaled smoke and began to cough uncontrollably. As she convulsed, the vine jerked again, and she was sure it was going to give way. She thought she was going to say, “Help,” but what came out was “Trick.”
She tried to scramble up, but was coughing too hard and suddenly her hands slipped and skin tore from her palms. The vine was still wrapped around her ankle so she used it for leverage, pushing up as hard as she could, waving her hand above her head, trying to feel for a more solid section of vine. Leaves brushed against her fingertips and she stretched as hard as she could, finally wrapping her hand around a thick branch, scooting along it onto a weighty limb. She let go of the vine with her other hand and hung for a moment while she fought for control of her body. Then by sheer force of will, she did a slow chin-up, then leaned forward, just like in her dream. The wind blew against her face, wafting away the smoke. And she looked down.
It was her dream.
Her nightmare.
Werewolves were burning. Racing in and out of a ring of fire, they were crazed, biting at each other, bleeding, smoking. And in the center, rising from his knees, Justin raised his hands over his head. His shirt had been torn off and he was covered with blood and soot. His hair was slicked back. To his right, past the wall of flame, the bayou was alive with animals fleeing the fire. The smell of silver coated her skin like oil. Someone had dumped silver into the water, just as Luc had said.
Justin threw back his head and saw her. He reached up his hands but she was at least twenty feet above him, and she couldn’t go back down the vine. It had caught on fire and flames were traveling like a dynamite fuse toward her perch.
There was a splash like a cannonball in the water. She craned to see, and her vision telescoped. It was Doug, Regan’s husband. Somehow he had fallen into the bayou brimming with toxic silver.
Before she could talk herself out of it, Katelyn swung to the next tree, scrabbling for handholds. As soon as she was sure she was poised above the bayou, she sprang off. She executed a simple swan dive, moving too fast to see where Doug was, then shot into the water. Something bumped against her beneath the surface and she reached out a hand. She touched something slimy and jerked her hands against her chest, kicking hard.
She broke the surface and looked around. The world was glowing. Doug’s head was in the water; he was lying face down. His body shimmered with red light and she grabbed him around the neck and tried to flip him over as best she could, but he lay so still. She started swimming to shore, grateful that she
was still in shape. There was no fire on that side of the bayou, but the trees danced with the reflections of the inferno behind her. Who could survive that?
Then her feet kicked against sticky, mucky silt and she stepped into what felt like quicksand. Something made her turn around to see a large shape undulating through the water. Alligator? It was coming at them. She felt for her gun. She didn’t have it. She had lost it.
“Doug, Doug!” she tried to shout, but she was too hoarse. She tried to drag him but he was too heavy for her. She reached into the water and tried to bend his legs at the knees to get them onto the mud bank. She had no clue if that would do any good.
It was still coming.
Silver is poison, she thought as she bent over Doug. She put her ear to his mouth and felt at his neck for a pulse.
No pulse. She immediately began compressions.
The snout of the alligator appeared from the water, black and glistening against the firelight.
“No, no, no,” Katelyn rasped, freezing. Doug stirred faintly. She shouted, “Alligator!” as she ran around to his head and grabbed him under the arms. “Doug!”
The alligator’s head rose out of the water. Doug’s head flopped forward. He vomited down his front.
“Help!” Katelyn cried, tugging at him. “Justin!”
Doug gasped and tried to scoot up the bank. But he lolled helplessly, slack and barely able to move, as Katelyn kept hold of him. She could see the alligator’s eyes. There was no intelligence in them, only intent.
Her instinct for self-preservation told her there was nothing she could do for Doug. If she wanted to live, she had to abandon him. But her sense of decency forced her to stay. She growled, trying to stare down the alligator as her bones throbbed with pain. She could feel her body shifting.
Now, now, now, she thought. Change. Kill it.
But the sensation ebbed. The alligator was glowing; the bayou glistened with silver and scarlet and Katelyn began swearing at Doug, begging him to help her, losing her balance and falling hard into the muck.
The alligator darted forward.
Then it began to writhe. It jerked again. Its jaw opened, closed, then it fell awkwardly to one side. Someone was shooting at it.
It bolted hard, jaw snapping, almost catching Doug’s foot. Then, slowly, it began to slide back into the water. Doug was screaming in terror.
Katelyn looked from the animal to the fiery bank. She saw the silhouette of a man wearing a gas mask over long, shoulder-length hair. He was standing with a rifle against his shoulder pointed directly at her. An icy tremor rattled her bones. It was Dom Gaudin. Obviously he had known about the silver, and now he was going to fire at Doug and her.
Then he lowered the rifle and blew her a kiss.
She gave him a solemn wave. He watched her for a moment, then the smoke closed over him.
“So sick,” Doug said, gasping.
“Can you walk? We have to get out of here.”
“Go,” he ground out. “Go help.”
She was afraid that if she left him, Dom would shoot him after all. So she crouched closely beside him, acting as a human shield, wondering if Justin was still alive. Now that imminent danger had passed, she began to shake, and Doug patted her hand.
“It’s okay, Kat.”
His words were slurred. He was still out of it, so she wiped her eyes and pulled herself together. Flopping his arm over her shoulder, she tried to lift him up — but he was as limp as a ragdoll.
“Can you change?” she asked him.
“No.”
She could barely hear him.
“Okay, I’m going to get someone,” she said, though where in all the chaos, she had no clue. She wished she had a bottle of water, anything to dilute the effects of the silver in his system. On his skin, in his eyes. He had probably swallowed some, too.
“I’m coming back,” she said.
He didn’t respond. His eyes were glassy and his mouth was slack. He couldn’t be dead. She pulled off her jacket, wadded it up, and placed it beneath his head. Then she took off running, hoping that this side of the bayou would take her to where the Fenners were making their stand.
Katelyn raced through the smoke and gunfire, around burning weeping willows and cypress trees. If either pack had thought to keep this fight off the radar, that wasn’t happening. As she rounded a pine, she heard Justin shouting, and put on a burst of speed.
“Justin!” she yelled, nearly colliding with him as he came in sight.
He made as if to touch her, then jerked back. She knew he could smell the silver from the bog on her.
“Come on!” he said.
Fenners in human form flanked them; wolves bounded past toward a line of Fenner trucks and cars. They were doubled over in pain, gasping and vomiting. From the silver in the air, she guessed. They were retreating.
“Get in, get in!” Justin yelled.
Katelyn jumped into the bed of a truck. Lee Fenner lay sprawled beneath her on a tarp, and Arial was crouched beside him with one of his hands pressed between both of hers. She was crying, and Mr. Fenner’s face was ashen. He was muttering and Katelyn strained to hear.
“I stopped him then, but I couldn’t stop him now. So many dead. So many dead,” Mr. Fenner rasped.
She glanced around, wondering if any of the others knew what he was talking about. No one seemed to be paying attention.
“Where have you been?” Arial demanded, staring at her. “If you’d been there, if you’d shot Dominique Gaudin, Daddy would be all right.”
Katelyn tried to remember the last time she’d had the gun. Justin had shot Luc with it and she didn’t know what had happened to it after that.
“Doug,” Katelyn said to Justin as she set her down. “He’s on the other side of the bayou. He’s hurt.”
“Where?” Justin asked.
“I’ll show you,” Katelyn said.
“No,” Arial insisted. “Stay here and protect the alpha. He’s more important than some bit-in human.”
So that’s how she feels about Doug. And me, Katelyn thought. She knew Arial’s priorities were misplaced. The pack wasn’t supposed to protect the alpha. The alpha was supposed to protect the pack. Someone else needed to stand up and lead. She glanced at Justin, whose face was drawn. His eyes were watering, and he was studying his uncle.
“Arial,” he said, “I’m taking over.”
“Oh, no, you’re not!” she cried, cradling her father’s head. “This is a Fenner pack. My father is our alpha. He just needs a few minutes.” She looked down anxiously at Mr. Fenner.
“I’m a Fenner,” Justin said.
“Don’t even start with me.” She bared her teeth.
“Arial! Justin! Where’s Doug?” Regan yelled hoarsely, coming up behind them. She looked at Katelyn. “Where have you been?”
“Doug’s hurt,” Katelyn told her. “Come with me.”
“We have to get Daddy out of here,” Arial insisted. “He’s hurt.”
“Someone needs to wait for us,” Regan said.
“We’ll get Doug and leave in my truck,” Justin said.
Katelyn scrambled out of the truck. She gestured to Justin and Regan to follow her as she began to retrace her steps. Behind her, the truck carrying Arial and Mr. Fenner roared to life and peeled out. She heard more departing vehicles and doubled her pace. Behind her, Justin and Regan struggled and coughed, their erratic heartbeats pounding in her ears; the silver was doing a job on them.
Through the smoke, she saw a handful of Gaudins in human form wearing gas masks. Their side of the bayou was practically empty. The Gaudins were leaving the scene of the massacre they had brought down on the Fenners.
Doug was lying where she had left him, his face turned the other way. She approached, detecting no heartbeat at all. Alarmed, she reached him first, fell to her knees beside him and peered at his face.
His skin was blackened as if he’d been burned. His bloodshot eyes were open, unseeing. She hesitated, then touched hi
s carotid artery with two fingertips. There was no pulse.
She felt someone standing over her and looked up. It was Justin, grim-faced, pasty, exhausted. He whirled around and caught Regan in his arms.
“He’s gone, Regan,” he said. “Don’t look.”
Regan threw back her head and screamed. The scream became a howl. The bayou echoed and more voices raised in unearthly crazed shrieking, howling, weeping. Regan rained fists on Justin’s chest, fighting to get free, but Justin held her. She coughed and choked.
“Kat, get up. We have to get out of here,” Justin said. “Now. The silver is killing us.”
“Let me see him. He’s not dead!” Regan cried. “Let me go, Justin!”
Katelyn got up. “Justin, we can’t leave him here,” she murmured. Where she’d seen Regan only as a cruel, devious bitch, now she was seeing her as a girl with the man she loved — unwilling to leave him, distraught with grief.
“Do you have the strength to carry him?” Justin asked her.
She didn’t.
“No!” Regan yelled. “I won’t leave him! I’m staying!”
“You’re not.” Justin kept hold of her. “They already have one hostage. Cordelia. We can’t let them have another daughter of the alpha, even though you won’t be as valuable now that he knows where Uncle Lee stands.”
“What are you talking about?” Katelyn asked.
Justin kept a tight hold on Regan. “Dom offered to stand down — stop this fight — if Lee forgave Cordelia.”
Katelyn was speechless. “And Lee didn’t?”
“He didn’t.” Justin turned to Regan again. “They might just kill you, Regan. But they sure won’t let you go if they capture you.”
“I don’t care,” Regan said, breaking his hold and flailing her arms, trying to kick him, as he attempted to recapture her. “Let me go to my husband, you cheating, lying bastard!”
Justin wrapped himself around Regan, but Katelyn could tell he was tiring. He said, “Regan, I’m sorry.” She kept struggling. “Kat, in my pocket,” he said. “Gun.”
Katelyn wasn’t sure she’d heard him right. He looked over at her with a cold, steely gaze. “I have a gun. Get it out.”