Bree skirted Charlie’s body, raced down the hall to her dad’s office, and flicked on the light. There were papers scattered everywhere, books dumped in front of the bookcase, chairs on their sides, a paperweight jammed into the computer monitor. Her dad’s diplomas lay on the floor, frames broken and glass shattered. And the computer was gone.
She bolted out of the office, turned right to avoid looking at Charlie again, and entered the first office she found. She booted up the computer and paced until it was ready.
Bree slid the flash drive into the USB port and skimmed through the file folders, searching for something, anything, that would help her. She was just a girl. She couldn’t save Liam and Conor—if Conor was still alive—on her own. The only way to keep her dad’s research away from those super soldiers was to become as fast and as strong as they were, so she could fight them off. But what if she became as savage and uncontrollable as they were? Her dad hadn’t had a chance to test the serum. What if, instead of saving Liam, she killed him? What if she didn’t even care? Or worse yet, what if she enjoyed it? Bree shuddered at the thought.
But what choice did she have? Using the serum was risky, but it was a risk she had to take.
Bree had to become a lycanthrope.
The first folder Bree checked contained a document with her dad’s ideas about the lycanthrope DNA project, a daily diary about how things had progressed and his reactions to them. She made a mental note to go back and read them if she ever got out of this mess alive. Other documents had ideas for future projects using the lycanthrope DNA. Some were detailed; others were just a few lines. Ideas so outrageous, Bree couldn’t believe her dad had thought of them. She shook her head in disbelief.
In the next document she found what she needed—a detailed list identifying the various DNA/virus combinations her dad had created. Without the list, it was impossible to know that the five combinations varied from one another. The most recent version, dated a day ago, was labeled WWGNTX55678. That was the version she would use. Now to locate the accelerator.
It took Bree only a minute to find the information on the accelerator; her dad had labeled the document “speed.” But his notes were only a bunch of formulas and coded information—nothing that told her how much of the accelerator she should use. Bree covered her face with her hands, fingertips digging into her closed eyelids. What should she do?
If only her dad were here to tell her.
After stowing the flash drive in her pocket, Bree returned to the lab and tapped the combination into the keypad that secured the storage unit, kept her fingers crossed, and hoped it worked. The lock clicked, and Bree sighed with relief. She turned the handle but stopped with the door halfway open as she realized this was really happening. A moment more and there’d be no turning back.
The second row contained what Bree wanted. With shaking hands, she removed the preloaded syringe containing the virus and the lycanthrope DNA and set it down carefully on the counter. On the bottom shelf she found the accelerator.
Now if only she knew what to do with it.
Bree stared at the bottle and tried to figure out how to proceed. If she used too much accelerator she would change too fast and wouldn’t be able to control it; if she used too little she wouldn’t change in time to save Liam. Maybe if she had asked her dad more about the accelerator and how it worked in combination with the lycanthrope DNA when he had mentioned it, she’d know what to do. Bree’s chest tightened.
“Just do it,” she said to herself.
Bree unscrewed the top of the bottle. Using the pipette she had grabbed from the instrument tray, she suctioned a few drops and added them to the DNA/virus combo. Was it too much? Too little? She had no idea. She added another dozen drops just to be sure. And then another dozen.
Nervousness and desperation had given way in Bree to a new found strength—a strength that made her ache to kick some lycanthrope soldier butt.
Without hesitation, Bree dropped her pants, aimed for the muscle—and jammed the needle into her thigh.
Chapter Sixty-Five
Whatever Bree had imagined would happen, it wasn’t this.
She felt the same as before.
She looked at her hands. No change.
Her legs. Nothing.
Not a single change, except for a slight ache in her thigh where she had stabbed it with the needle. Why wasn’t it working? Should she have added more accelerator? Or was her dad wrong about the new formula? Bree kicked the table in frustration and her toes hurt. Great. Just great. Now what?
If she couldn’t transform, she needed to create a diversion to distract the soldiers so Liam could escape. But what? All she had was the car, but that wouldn’t do her much good. Bree squeezed her bottom lip, twisted and pulled, tried to think of something.
For some reason her mind lit at the thought of the movie Gone in Sixty Seconds. All the cars and action. Liam loved that movie. But why was she thinking about it? She ran the scenes through her mind and finally settled on the right one. She pictured it in detail until she had the steps down cold, remembering what Liam had told her about the scene and how they did it wrong. All she needed was some lighter fluid and a lighter—which she could buy on the way to the warehouse—but she’d have to go a little out of the way to avoid the 7-Eleven where she’d lifted the pen.
It was her only chance to save Liam.
Chapter Sixty-Six
The streets became more deserted the closer Bree drove to the warehouse. Rows of single family homes gave way to townhouses and then a park followed by a handful of stores. Beyond the stores was a wasteland: deserted lots, rundown buildings with smashed out windows, waterlogged boxes, paint cans, tires, and rusted-out heaps of metal.
At the corner, she turned right and pulled into an alley next to a dumpster. Her headlights lit up the deserted space, but it did little to alleviate Bree’s anxiety. What if her plan didn’t work? Those men didn’t care about anyone. All they wanted was the flash drive with her dad’s research; she had no doubt that if they had to kill her and Liam to get it, they would.
Bree tapped the steering wheel rapidly with her thumb and went over her plan one last time. She took a good look in the rear view mirror and checked both side mirrors. Satisfied she was alone, she climbed from the car.
From the trunk, she grabbed the hoodie she had taken from the house and another hoodie she had left in the car a while ago. She pulled the strings out of the sweatshirts, tied the strings together, and gave the knot a tug; it held. She reached for the pen she had stolen from the 7-11, but it was missing; she must have dropped it somewhere. Thankfully, she now had a better plan in mind than relying on a pen to protect her. And there was a first aid kit in the trunk.
The scissors from the kit cut easily through the sweatshirt material; and once Bree had a decent-sized piece, she tied the strings tightly around it. She set the string-wrapped piece next to the lighter fluid on the floor in front of the passenger seat, closed the door, and fingered the lighter in her pocket. A quick look around assured her she was still alone.
This was it. It had to work.
Chapter Sixty-Seven
The road was deserted except for a pickup approaching from the opposite direction, music pounding through open windows. Bree stopped at the light and then proceeded until she located the warehouse, one among a cluster of four. From the distance, she could see no movement, but someone was definitely there. Those horrible men were either waiting inside or out back. Either way, she wouldn’t have a lot of time.
Bree pulled over to calm her nerves. If one thing went wrong, if the lighter didn’t light, if Liam didn’t understand what she said, if they saw the string, if she was too close to the car, or if it just didn’t work, that would be it. No second chances for her or Liam. She swallowed hard and prayed that if she failed and the men killed them that they would make it quick.
She checked the time. It was now or never.
Bree yanked the car into
drive, pulled back out onto the street, and turned left onto an unpaved road that seemed to lead to the back of the warehouses. The road snaked around several bends and past a cluster of buildings before reaching the warehouse; a single bulb lit the back doorway. Stairs connected the loading dock to the road and, slightly off to the right, dozens of wooden pallets were stacked into huge piles.
Bree considered staying in the car to scope out the situation, but there wasn’t any time. The soldiers must have heard the car by now. If her instincts were right, the soldiers were waiting inside the warehouse instead of watching her from concealed positions outside the building. But she could be wrong. Either way, she had to move and move fast.
After parking behind the pallets, Bree popped the gas tank and exited the car, careful not to make any loud noises or she would lose her advantage. She patted her pocket—the lighter was still there—and then scooted around to the other side of the car and unscrewed the gas cap as quickly as possible.
Bree threw open the passenger door. It rocked on its hinges, and she thrust her hip against the door before it slammed shut. The inside handle jabbed her hip, and she winced at the pain, and at her stupidity. She had to do this right, and she had to do it fast, but she couldn’t make any mistakes…and that would have been a biggie. She took a deep breath and refocused.
Bree grabbed the string-wrapped rag from the car floor and doused it with lighter fluid. The smell was so strong she gagged; and although she tried not to breathe in the fumes, it was impossible to avoid them. Bree squirted the remaining lighter fluid through the open car windows and across the seats and then snatched the second bottle and doused the outside of the car. After tossing the empty bottles onto the back seat, she poked the rag inside the gas tank filler neck, leaving just a bit sticking out.
Bree scanned the area. Still nothing. Her stomach churned. She had the right place—the Yang’s sign was right over the dock. Bree moved toward the front of the car, as far as the hoodie string would reach. The lighter fluid seared her nose and throat.
“I’m here,” she yelled as loud as she could.
Chapter Sixty-Eight
Yang’s Warehouse, Hilwater, Virginia
Bree stood with the car between her and the warehouse and waited for someone to respond. But she saw nothing. She heard nothing.
If the lycanthrope soldiers expected her to go inside they could forget it.
“It’s Bree Sunderland,” she called. “I brought what you wanted.” Her heart pounded and her mouth was as dry as sand. They could drop her from a distance with a single gunshot if they wanted, and there was nothing she could do to prevent it.
The warehouse door opened and out stepped Taft, who had transformed back into human form. “Where’s the research?”
“What? No gun this time?”
“I don’t need a weapon to deal with you. You’ve seen what we’re capable of.”
He was right, but that wasn’t going to stop her. “How do I know you’re not going to kill us as soon as you get the flash drive?”
“You don’t. But if I wanted to kill you I would have done it already. You can’t possibly believe I’d just sit here and wait for you to arrive. I’ve got an armed lookout manning the road in case you were stupid enough to bring the cops with you. He radioed ahead and told me you were alone. And I have plenty of guns inside. So hand over the research. Now.”
“If I don’t see Liam you’re not getting anything.”
Taft stepped inside and led Liam out the door a moment later; Liam’s hands were bound behind his back.
“Bree!”
“Just give us the research,” Taft said, “and we can all get out of here.”
Bree knew that was never going to happen. She held the lighter next to the end of the string, readying her finger over the wheel. “You know,” she said. “You kinda look like that guy Sphinx in the movie Gone in Sixty Seconds.”
“I don’t give a rat’s ass,” Taft said. “Either give me the information or I’m gonna take it from you.”
Bree turned her attention to Liam, locked her eyes on his, and hoped that once he saw the fire he’d get the reference to the movie and know what was about to happen. She flicked the lighter and moved the string into the flame. The heat was brutal on her skin, but she held onto the string until she was certain it had caught on fire and wasn’t in danger of extinguishing. “Fine,” she said. “I’ll put it down over there.” She pointed to a spot about eight feet away to give the string time to burn without Taft seeing it and to get herself away from the car. “How do I know you’ll let Liam go?”
“You got something we want,” the other soldier said, revealing his position behind a tree adjacent to the building. “And we got something of yours. It’s a simple trade.”
Sure. Like they’d even let her or Liam live. She forced herself to keep from looking to see how far the string had burned.
She didn’t dare.
She had to wait it out, hit them with surprise, and make a run for it. “So how are we going to do this? And where’s Conor?” She shifted her attention back to Liam.
Liam’s chin dropped to his chest, and he shook his head. “He didn’t make it.”
The sorrow Bree heard in Liam’s voice matched her own. And it was all too raw.
Taft said something, but Bree didn’t hear his words. Her focus was now trained on the flames shooting out of the gas tank and across the side of the car. There wasn’t a gigantic boom rocking the night like in the movie, and the car didn’t explode, but soon the car was engulfed in raging, hot flames. Bree could feel the heat despite her distance. The flames became hotter and bigger, and a horrific scream came from near the car. Someone was on fire; it was definitely a man, a really large man. He must have been sneaking up on her. He dropped to the ground and rolled to extinguish the flames.
“Run!” Bree yelled.
Without hesitation, Liam back-kicked Taft in the groin; Taft fell to his knees, and Liam raced down the steps. Bree turned and bolted.
They ran for their lives with Bree in the lead.
They jumped broken wooden pallets, dodged boxes and dumpsters, and darted between buildings to try to shake the man chasing them. As they zigzagged through a lot of tractor trailers, bullets pinged against the metal. There was not a soul around to help them, only a few motion sensitive lights and the moonlight to illuminate the way.
They pressed past a crumbling two-story structure with blown-out windows—broken bricks and glass and furniture littered the ground—and stopped short twenty feet later in front of a massive stream.
Bree turned her head left. Right. “It’s too big to jump and it looks like it goes on forever in both directions. Let’s hit the woods. We’ll have a better chance of losing them.”
“Okay,” Liam said.
Bree spun around and raced into the woods. She pushed through bushes, dodged trees, and jumped over fallen branches. Limbs scratched at her face, her arms, her legs, but she kept running.
A minute later and without warning, they hit the edge of a steep embankment. Bree dug her toes into the earth but couldn’t stop her momentum. She flew into the air, arms and legs flailing. The ground came up on her quickly, and somehow Bree tucked into a ball right before she smacked into it. She tumbled for what seemed like forever, hitting rocks and branches that felt harder than concrete. Her left elbow took a hit, not once but twice. Bree gritted her teeth to keep from crying out each time it touched something and hoped like hell she’d reach bottom soon.
“I’m right behind you, Bree,” Liam called. “See if you can use your feet to stop.”
Maybe that made sense to him, but if she did that she’d sprain or break an ankle. “I can’t,” she yelled back.
A half dozen more tumbles and Bree reached the bottom of the hill. Out of breath and dizzy, she uncurled, fingered her elbow, and then bent it back and forth. It hurt, but it wasn’t broken.
Dirt and small rocks rained down next to
Bree, and a moment later Liam skidded to a stop by her side. “That was pretty hairy. Are you okay?”
Bree didn’t answer. Liam turned and followed her gaze.
Taft and the other guy had transformed back into lycanthropes. Huge, muscular beasts.
And they weren’t alone.
Behind them were four more just like them. Bared teeth. Eyes staring hard at Bree and Liam.
Chapter Sixty-Nine
Bree’s legs almost buckled beneath her. Where did they all come from? They must have been at the warehouse. Now what? It wouldn’t take more than a few leaps for the lycanthropes to reach the bottom and to overrun and overpower them. If they caught her and Liam they’d tear them apart. Rip them to shreds.
Like they did to her dad.
“Run,” Bree said to Liam with desperation in her voice.
They took off and headed into a denser area of the woods, but the trees were larger and the canopy blocked most of the moonlight, making it more difficult to see. Bree wondered if that was good or bad. It definitely made it harder for her to dodge the trees, and Liam still had his hands tied behind his back. But the lycanthrope soldiers…it might not even matter to them. Wolves hunted in the dark and could probably see no matter what. “Which way?” she said as she slowed to glance over her shoulder, trying to get a fix on the lycanthrope soldiers through the trees.
“I don’t know,” Liam said. “Straight I guess.”
Out of the corner of her eye, Bree caught a flash of movement on the right, but when she whipped her head around to get a better look it was gone. “This way.” She pointed to a clearing on the left. It looked like there were trees on the other side. Maybe they’d get lucky and evade the lycanthropes long enough to come out of the woods to a crowded highway or town where the lycanthrope soldiers wouldn’t dare follow them.
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