by Debra Dunbar
What was I going to do? It was less than a twelve hours since we’d fallen into this world and it seemed the humans had already given up. Not that I had much cause for optimism. Solo I might survive, but every Alpha instinct screamed for me to protect these humans. Actually, my chances for survival weren’t especially good even solo.
Renee had a big purse, and so did Crystal, although the girl’s was tiny compared to the giant bag the other carried. The teen upended it, dumping cash, and ID and a pass key.
“I dropped Sarah’s purse on the way here,” she said, her voice wavering. “I think she just had the same as me, though. I can’t believe I dropped it.”
“It’s okay sweetie. It’s okay,” Renee comforted her.
“We’ve got some change and a stick of gum,” the two boys announced.
“I’ve got a pocket knife,” Ray chimed in, his voice strained. “Someone’s going to have to get it out of my pocket, though.”
Doc reached into the man’s pants pocket, looking somewhat embarrassed as she pulled out what actually was a small multi-tool, and added it to the pile.
Renee winced and slid the bag off her shoulder, opened it and placed the contents on the ground next to the rest. Hand sanitizer. Aspirin, and a wallet with cash and cards. Chapstick, a notepad and three pens, and six granola bars. Best of all, she had a small bottle of water. Including Doc’s remaining one, that left us with two — enough to get through tomorrow if we conserved them and stayed out of the sun.
“We need to conserve the water,” Doc commented. “Ray and Renee, can you take aspirin dry?”
They nodded, and Doc handed them each two pills from the little bottle. “That only leaves six plus what’s in my first aid kit.” She walked over to her huge backpack and brought it back, carefully lining the contents up next to Renee’s stash.
In addition to the first-aid kit and bandana, she had sunscreen, a head lamp, a multi-tool, five protein bars, matches in a waterproof box, climbing equipment, and a leg. At least I thought it was a leg. The foot part was about half the size of a normal foot with a toe that came to a sharp point and an articulated ankle connected to a spring and something that looked like a bungie cord up to a knee with a similar system. Everyone stared at the device.
“What’s that?” Jason asked, picking up the leg.
“That’s a climbing leg. It’s a prototype. The one for below-the-knee amputees is in production, but one for above-the-knee amputees is a bit trickier to design. I’m beta-testing it for the designer.”
“You’re an amputee?” I felt like an idiot asking the question. Of course she was, otherwise why would she be testing a prosthetic leg? But she hadn’t said one word about her disability the whole hike to the cave. She’d walked miles through the sand with an artificial leg. The thought made me feel a whole lot less like the bad-ass of the group.
“Yes. The one I’m wearing now has a computer-controlled knee, and I’ve probably only got five days or so before the battery runs down.” Her brow furrowed. “The climbing leg isn’t meant for walking, especially long distances, but I don’t know how stable this one is going to be once the battery dies on the knee. If we’re here for a long time, you might need to carry me, Muscles.”
Was she joking? I wasn’t sure until I saw the corner of her mouth twitch. “Just call me Atlas. Pile everyone on my shoulders; I can take it.”
Actually I probably could carry three of them if I could figure out how to efficiently balance their weight and keep them from falling.
She gave me a sideways smile and gestured to the pile. “Let’s each take half a granola bar and a sip of water. It’s getting cold and we only have the one emergency blanket, so we’ll need to huddle together and share, being careful of Ray’s arm and Renee’s ankle.”
I put Renee in charge of dividing the food, then picked up a protein bar and nodded for Doc to follow me to the entrance of the cave. It was cold outside, the temperature having dropped at least fifty degrees since we first fell into this world. Stars blinked above, and two moons lit the desert before us with an eerie blue-gray glow. I sat, then scooted close to Doc once she lowered herself to the ground, offering her the protein bar.
She broke it in half and handed me a section.
“Ray’s not going to make it, is he?” I asked.
“Depends on how long we’re here and how serious his heart condition is. The long walk, the heat, the lack of food and water — it could be a problem. I just don’t know when it will be a problem.”
I grimaced. “Water and food are going to be a problem for all of us sooner rather than later. Can you find out more about his heart? Is there anything you can do for him?”
“Probably not.” Her voice was emotionless. I got the feeling that she’d developed a kind of numbness to steel herself against the inevitability of death. She’d probably seen more than her share in the hospital. “I’m not an ER doc, I’m a trauma surgeon. I get the accident victims, the falls, the burns. The other doctors get the heart attacks, pneumonia, and strokes. I can find out what he was taking, get his medical history, but there’s not much I can do. Heck, even if I was a cardiac specialist, there wouldn’t be much I could do. I don’t have anything besides aspirin, and we’re having to force the guy to walk around in the heat.”
“Should we press on or wait here?” I asked, thinking out loud and grateful for someone to bounce ideas off. “I hate to torture Ray by hauling him through these mountains, but we don’t have enough food or water to last more than another day here. If we wait we might not be strong enough to make it to somewhere with more resources. Maybe you can stay with the others while I go off and try to bring water, and possibly food, back here.”
“With what, four plastic bottles? If we climb up and get a good look around in the morning and see there’s water nearby, that will work. Given that there’s a desert out our front door, I think we’ll need to be on the move.”
I bit into the protein bar and thought. “Let’s see what’s on the other side of this mountain range tomorrow, then think through our options.
Doc nodded then sighed. “Do you have any idea where we are? Do you know if there’s even potable water or anything edible a few days’ hike from here, if at all?”
I hated to admit this. “No. I have no idea what this place is or what to expect. Plus, I haven’t been able to smell water, although I’m hoping in the morning I’ll be able to catch a scent. If not, then we’d be heading out on instinct.”
She smoothed back an errant lock of hair and tucked it behind one ear. “Every bit of my training says to stay put, to remain as close to our entry point as possible in order to facilitate rescue. Given the uncertainty of our finding food and water, plus Ray’s condition, I’m voting to stay put. We could build a fire to signal our extraction team and indicate our location.”
I eyed her curiously. “Are you ex-military?”
“Army, but that was a long time ago right after I graduated high school.” She smiled. “I was a medic. When I got out I went straight into college and med school. Eight years of school in total, a five-year residency, and a two-year critical care fellowship.”
“That’s a whole lot of schooling.”
“Yeah.” She sounded sad, and I knew she was probably thinking what a waste it all had been if she was going to die out here.
“The problem is that I don’t have faith that there will be an extraction team. We only have enough food and water to hold us another day. Even if someone is coming, I doubt a rescue team can get to us by then.” I swallowed hard, not wanting to say the fear that had been lurking in the back of my mind ever since I’d hit the sand. “Remember when you asked if we’d fallen through an interdimensional rift? Well, we have. If it’s still open, I know someone who will definitely come after us, but if it’s closed, we might be screwed.”
Silence greeted my words.
“There might be someone who can open the rift and come for us,” I added, “but it’s a long shot. They might not be
able to do it. They might not be able to find the right location. And they might not want to do it.” Stupid angels. Half the time it seemed they didn’t care one bit about humans, let alone werewolves.
“You’re serious? About this rift thing?” She let out her breath in a whoosh. “Normally I’d think you were crazy, but I went from a shop just off the port in Juneau, Alaska to a desert unlike any I’ve ever seen. And two moons? I’m either having some sort of coma dream, or I’m dead in hell, or you’re right. I’m not sure which of the three is worse.”
“I’m right. Rifts have been opening up for a few weeks now, but never in a populated area like this one did. They’re being closed as quickly as possible, but I don’t think anyone knows how to prevent them happening.”
She sniffed. “Nice of you guys to alert the tourists. I mean, I might have gone to Colorado instead had I know there was a risk I’d be sucked through an interdimensional rift while waiting for the tour bus. Or at the very least demanded a hazardous-location discount on my trip.”
I grinned. I couldn’t help it. She was so matter-of-fact, so dry in her humor. There was an instant sort of camaraderie between us, a respect, an odd kind of partnership built on the stress of our situation. And if I were completely honest with myself, an attraction. Doc was striking rather than conventionally beautiful. She was lean and strong, fresh-faced with a slim nose, a wide mouth, and those beautiful eyes. She was smart, capable, calm in an emergency. And all of that together attracted me far more than a dolled-up bleach blonde. I reached out a hand and tucked that darned stubborn lock behind her ear, noting how soft the fine hair was, like strands of silk against the rough callouses on my fingers. “You doing okay?”
She laughed but this time it was short and bitter. “Interdimensional rift. Falling roughly six feet into gritty metallic sand. Trying to help traumatized and injured people while tromping across a hot desert with limited water. Facing the prospect of shivering all night in a cave, lying on a stone floor. Slowly starving to death, or dying of thirst or exposure, or being eaten by a dinosaur. Yeah, just peachy. Every muscle in my body aches, and I think I’ve got sand in places there shouldn’t be sand.”
She reached down and zipped open her left pants leg, then pushed something. There was a whoosh sound and before I knew it, I found myself holding a leg while she peeled off a silicone sleeve and massaged a stump that ended just above where her knee would have been. “Man, this hurts. If we’re up in the mountains tomorrow, I might switch to the other and save the battery on this one.”
I admired the complex piece of equipment. “This is pretty sweet.”
“It better be. It costs one hundred grand for that thing.”
I nearly dropped it. “You’re joking.”
She grimaced, still rubbing her leg. “I wish I wasn’t. I love it though. I can walk on rough terrain, down stairs foot over foot, and with a quick adjustment, I can stand for hours in surgery without fatigue. It’s waterproof, sand proof, shock proof. It was worth every penny, although when I’m chilling at home I tend to leave it off and just use crutches.”
It really was a marvel of technology, with complex joints and electronics in both the knee and ankle. A far cry over what I’d ever expected a prosthetic leg to be. “And you have the beta-test one. Any others?”
“The climbing one is a design test, so it’s with me on loan. I’ve got a jogging leg that’s got a carbon fiber blade, too. I drive a ten-year-old piece of junk, live in a crappy, basement-level efficiency. Every dime I make goes to student loans from med school and this expensive leg.”
I chuckled. “And trips to Alaska. Didn’t the government pay for your college?”
“G.I. Bill only goes so far. And I do splurge on the rare vacation. Priorities, my friend. Priorities.”
Didn’t I know it.
“So what do you do?” She turned her face up, looking at me with those sleepy, bedroom eyes. “Professional body builder? Calendar pin-up model? Grizzly wrestler? Have you got military experience yourself?”
I’m the Alpha of a werewolf pack didn’t seem like a wise announcement, although I was pretty sure I’d need to reveal that to these people soon enough. “No military. I’m a manager of sorts. I organize and lead hunting trips. That sort of thing.”
She nodded, then we both sat there in awkward silence, looking up at the moons.
“What’s your name?” I realized I’d never asked her, instead assigning her nicknames of Doc and Bedroom-eyes.
“Kennedy. Kennedy Duke.”
I grinned. “Doctor Duke? Seriously? That sounds like a character on a kid’s show.”
“Don’t I know it. My mom’s last name is Cruz. I’ve been tempted to go with Spanish tradition and be Kennedy Duke Cruz, but my dad would be crushed.”
“I thought so. I was guessing Spanish or Italian.”
“Italian? Them’s fighting words. Andalusian. My dad was in a college exchange program and met my Mom in Barcelona. How about you?”
I grimaced. “My mom died when I was twenty in a hunting accident. I lost my father five years ago.” It was the same fishing accident which had taken our pack leader. Which meant I’d taken on the Alpha role at the same time I was mourning the death of my father.
She narrowed her eyes, as if she were trying to do the math.
“I’m forty-five,” I confessed. “Been in Alaska since birth, five generations of us. I’ve got no idea what our ethnic ancestry is.” I did, but this wasn’t the time to tell her we were descended from Nephilim, our angelic blood diluted to the point where healing, strength, speed, and the ability to shift into a wolf form was all that was left of our heavenly powers.
Her eyebrows shot up. “Forty-five? No way. You don’t look a day over thirty. I thought I was older than you. Doesn’t Alaska weather a person, or is that just a stereotype?”
“Moisturizer, sunscreen, exercise, and good genetics.” Mostly genetics, but I occasionally remembered to slap on some moisturizer.
“Ah, healthy living. No doubt you eat your vegetables and do yoga every morning.”
I snorted. “I hate vegetables. Meat. Fruit. Nuts. And more meat. And I wouldn’t know a yogi if he knocked on my door.”
She chuckled and we fell silent again.
“So what’s your name? I can’t keep calling you Muscles. Well, I can and probably will, but it might be nice to know the given name of someone I’ve fallen through an interdimensional rift with.”
“Brent Phillips.”
She nodded. “Well, Brent Phillips, aka Muscles, I’m dead on my one foot. Can you give me a shoulder so I can hop off to sleep on the cold stone floor?”
I looked down at the top of her head, at the silky, shiny dark hair that had nearly all escaped from the elastic. I was still holding her leg, feeling the warmth of her next to me. Suddenly I was reluctant to join the others, to take her back. What would happen if we stayed out here? If I kept her warm?
This wasn’t the time. As much as I wanted to lose myself in passion, to see the look in her sexy eyes as I made love to her, there were injured and scared people in that cave. So I got to my feet and held out my hand, pulling her up and helping her balance on the one leg. Then, unable to resist, I tucked her prosthetic under my shoulder and scooped her up in my other arm. She gasped, throwing her arms around my neck and pressing herself against me. Her rear was resting on my forearm, completely supported by the muscles in my arm and shoulder. Not that this was any amazing feat of strength. The woman had to have weighed no more than a hundred ten pounds soaking wet.
I felt her breath, her breasts against my shoulder, her mouth brushing right above my ear. “I think I will call you Muscles.”
Breathless, husky. I grew hard just hearing that seductive note in her voice. Maybe later. If we all survived the next few days, then maybe I’d do more than just imagine taking this bossy doctor to bed. Maybe.
Chapter 26
Raphael
“Glad to see that Alaska survived your visit,” Micha
drawled. “And your timing couldn’t be better. Things are unstable in Aaru and I foresee some battles in the next few days. We’ll need you.”
“The situation in Alaska isn’t stable. There are more rifts to close, plus one opened in Juneau, exploding a store and taking seven humans plus the local Alpha. If others similar to that one occur, the whole area is at risk.”
Micha waved his hand. “Perhaps I’ll send Zatiael. He can handle things for the next few years, and let us know if the gateway is in danger.”
I’d promised Ahia, and I intended to keep that promise. “It’s not just the rifts and the hydra and the drop bears, and the boobie-birds, it’s that exploding one. It’s a serious danger, Micha.”
“Boobie-birds?” The angel shook his head. “Like the seabird? Genus Sula? Blue-Footed Boobies?”
“No. Half-plucked birds with serpent tails and pendulous breasts.”
Micha’s mouth dropped open. “Birds with breasts? Well, no matter. You can investigate all this later, after we stabilize Aaru.”
“No, now. I need to go back and see if I can reopen the rift, create a stable gateway and try to rescue the humans and the Alpha that are on the other side.”
“Let me get this straight, you want to go back to Alaska and expend an enormous amount of energy constructing a gateway so you can rescue seven humans and one werewolf.” Micha shook his head. “It took four of us to build the gateways to Hel. It’s not worth the effort, my brother. It nearly drains me empty to haul that dragon back and forth.”
The Iblis had roped him into that one, making a deal with the dragon who had taken up residence in the British Museum. But beyond that I got the meaning behind his words. This task would be a challenge for Micha, the most powerful of us by a mile. It would be impossible for me.