by Kali Argent
Still fighting not to choke on her own blood, Thea tackled her opponent to the ground, rolling with her through the broken glass until she managed to pin her with a knee to her throat. Sweating with exertion, she leaned all of her weight on her right leg, applying pressure to the female’s windpipe until she stopped moving. After counting to ten, she slumped to the side, sprawled out on the floor on her back as she struggled to catch her breath.
The bleeding had slowed, and her nose burned as her body worked to heal itself. Every part of her ached, but she had to keep moving. Following a short but intense pep talk, she struggled to stand, wincing when the glass littering the tiles cut into the soles of her feet.
“Thea?”
She’d never seen a happier sight in her life. “I’m okay, Rhys.” Limping past the body of the felled vampire, she stumbled into his arms. “Really, I’m okay.”
She didn’t look okay, and Rhys’ heart had almost stopped when he’d entered the room. Blood covered her face, drying in thick streaks down her throat, coating her collar, and soaking into the neckline of her T-shirt. The scratch on her face was superficial, and it had already begun to heal, but he winced at how close it had been to her eye.
“The others?”
“Waiting for us by the restrooms.”
“They made it.” She leaned against him heavily and sighed. “That’s good. That’s really good. Deidra?”
“She lost a lot of blood, but she’s healing.”
Hooking his arm around her midsection, he supported most of her weight as they crossed the room. Calmed by her warmth and the steady thrum of her pulse, he cleared his mind of everything except keeping them alive until sunrise.
The restaurant doors had been chained closed and boarded over, the same as the other exits in the museum. No one had been surprised. Furthermore, the elevators were disabled, and the stairwells had also been blocked. They needed to get off the second level, but to do that, they’d have to circle back to the main staircase that led down into the lobby.
“I don’t think we have a choice,” Thea said when he’d finished briefing her on what had happened during her absence. “If we’re going back down, though, I think we need to try to get into that gallery of weapons.”
“Agreed.” They’d already lost two, and the night had barely started. If they didn’t find weapons soon, Rhys didn’t want to think about how many would be dead come morning.
Strangled, terrified screams cut through the silence, followed by hard pounding against a flat surface and the distinct sound of claws scraping over wood. He and Thea both tensed as they looked at each other.
“Hurry,” she gasped, pulling away from him and sprinting for the doorway that led across an empty auditorium of sorts.
Rhys followed half a step behind her, his eyes trained on the blue glow of the emergency lights in the hallway on the other side of the dark room. Thea never slowed, bursting into the corridor with enough speed to throw her against the far wall. She bounced off, shook her head, and took off running again, right toward a pack of four snarling Ravagers.
Five broken and bleeding bodies sprawled across the carpeted floor—two vampires, the shifter who had refused his help to Thea, and two human males—their eyes wide, mouths open, and their flesh covered in deep gouges. Zerrik and Duncan fought back two of the Ravagers, leaving the remaining two to pound and shove at the swinging door of the women’s restroom. Each time they threw themselves against the painted wood, it opened a few inches more before meeting resistance, and Rhys knew the occupants wouldn’t be able to hold the beasts off for much longer.
With a savage battle cry, Thea flung herself at the Ravagers, grabbing one by his long hair and using her momentum to twist his head around on his neck. He hadn’t even hit the floor yet before she was on her feet and leaping at his brethren.
Rhys hurried toward her, but a chuffing grunt from behind pulled him to a stop several feet from the fray. Muscles tense, heart racing, he turned toward the sound and groaned when he came face-to-face with a six-hundred-pound, pissed off tiger. Crimson stained the white patches around its mouth and between its toes, the blood still wet from its recent kill. Upon seeing Rhys, it arched its back, hissing and spitting as its ears pulled flat against its massive head, and its black lips curled over its teeth.
Extending his claws, Rhys drew his shoulders back and stared the cat in the eyes, letting loose a growl that vibrated from deep in his diaphragm. The tiger hissed at him again, reaching out to swat at the air between them, but after a bit of defensive posturing, it retreated from the hallway, slinking back into the auditorium.
Crisis adverted, he hurried to help his mate, reaching the ongoing battle just as the Ravager caught Thea by the throat and sent her sailing into the wall across the corridor. Rage burned through him, consumed him, his instincts calling out for the monster’s death. Charging the beast, Rhys slammed into him with enough force to send them crashing into the women’s restroom amongst the screams and shouts of those hiding there.
“Go!” Grappling with the Ravager, he rolled them to the side to clear the doorway. “Cade, get them out of here!”
His distraction cost him when his opponent jabbed a fist into his throat, toppling him to his hands and knees as he struggled for breath. He had no time to recover before the Ravager twisted its gnarled fingers in his hair, dragging him up from the floor and throwing him into the row of sinks. His back smashed against the wall-sized mirror, and broken pieces of glass rained down on the vanity and clattered into the sinks.
“Hey, asshole!” Thea called, rushing into the room with Cade on her heels.
The Ravager swung toward her, but grew confused when Cade circled behind him with similar taunts. They kept up a deluge of insults while ducking and dodging the male’s flailing attacks, giving Rhys enough time to find the largest, most jagged piece of the broken mirror.
Tucking his feet under him, he pushed off from the countertop, sailing through the air to crash into the Ravager once again. They went down hard, and pain lanced through Rhys’ knee when it slammed into the linoleum, but he ignored the throb as he wrestled the male against the wall and embedded the shard of glass into his neck, severing his jugular.
Then everything became eerily still.
“Let me see that.” Stepping over the Ravager, Thea crouched beside him on the floor and took his hand, examining the long cut across his palm. Ripping the other sleeve of her T-shirt off, she wound the fabric around his hand and tied it securely before leaning in to brush their lips together. “It’ll heal.”
After that, the hours seemed to stretch into days as they moved from room to room, level to level, sometimes passing unhindered, and other times having to fight their way into the next part of the museum. They made it to the weapons gallery on the main floor, but found the exhibit barricaded by a massive floor-to-ceiling iron grate with a shining silver padlock. At every turn they found themselves blocked, unable to escape, unable to reach any kind of weapon.
Not one of them emerged from the night unscathed, but miraculously, no one else died. Though, there had been a few close calls—like Cade happening upon a pack of African wild dogs. The guy had narrowly avoided evisceration by scaling one of the large display cases and defending his mountain until help had arrived.
Beaten, bleeding, and exhausted, they’d huddled together behind the welcome desk, watching as the sun rose through the arched windows set near the high ceiling. Rhys had lived through six previous Gallows, watched the sun rise on six different occasions, but none had been more beautiful than this one.
“We did it.” Leaning her head on his shoulder, Thea smiled tiredly up at the windows. “We survived.” Her face fell, and she scuffed her toe around the floor. “Well, most of us.”
It was the biggest group to ever survive the Gallows, thanks in large part to his fearless and tenacious mate. “You did everything you could, angel. It was more than anyone had any right to ask of you.”
“So, we’re still alive
. What happ—” Her facial muscles froze, her body tensed, and her eyes rolled back in her head as the collar around her neck crackled with electrical currents.
One by one, his comrades fell, their bodies twitching and jerking from the voltage. Then fire erupted in Rhys’ head, his muscles straining so tightly he feared they’d snap his spine. A buzzing started in his ears, saliva pooled in his mouth and ran from the corner of his lips, and his skin crawled until finally, everything went blissfully blank.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Thea expected to wake up back in the primate enclosure.
Instead, she drifted into consciousness on a soft, overstuffed sofa, covered in a chocolate-brown fleece blanket next to a crackling fire. Her head rested in Rhys’ lap, his fingers combing idly through her hair as he spoke with the others in the room. Warm and comfortable for the first time in days, she didn’t want to move, but curiosity got the better of her.
“Why are we back in the cabin?”
“Hello, angel. How are you feeling?”
“Like I got backed over by a bus.” Not a single part of her didn’t hurt—another good reason not to move.
“I think that’s pretty much the consensus.” Sitting across from her in a rounded armchair, Zerrik templed his fingers under his chin and winked. “Good to see you awake.”
“Why? How long as I out?”
“About nine hours.” Flopping down on the end of the sofa near Thea’s feet, Kamara leaned her head back on the cushions and groaned. “We thought you were dead.”
“Aye, that we did.” Looking much healthier than the last time Thea had seen her, Deidra leaned against the stone hearth, her face tilted toward the fire. “We were just arguing about who would get your blanket.”
Rhys growled at the females, but Thea burrowed deeper into her blanket and grinned. She didn’t mind their teasing. It felt…normal, and after the night they’d had, normal felt pretty damn good. Still, no one had answered her original question.
“Why are we here?”
“I honestly don’t know.” Rhys caressed her cheek with his thumb. “A group this big has never survived the Gallows. There are enforcers outside on the porch, but we’re alone in here.” Grinning, he skimmed his fingertips down the curve of her throat. “No collars, either.”
“What?” She sat up quickly, but dropped her head and groaned when the room started to spin. “What the hell is wrong with me?”
She’d been the last one to wake up during the Gallows, and she hadn’t exactly been coherent at first. While the others carried on conversations around her, she’d dozed for most of the day. Granted, she’d exhausted a lot of energy the night before, but she hadn’t slept more than five hours at a time since the night her parents had died. Throbbing headaches, muscle fatigue, dizziness—if she didn’t know better, she’d swear she was coming down with the flu.
Strong fingers travelled the length of her spine and up to her neck, massaging the tense muscles at her nape. “When’s the last time you ate?”
“Uh…” It probably wasn’t a good sign that she had to think about it. “I guess the night before we arrived in St. Louis. So, seventy-two hours, give or take.”
To his credit, Rhys kept his disapproving growl to a respectable volume. “You need to eat.” Standing, he offered his hand, not budging until she took it and stood from the couch. “Come on, angel. Let’s get you cleaned up and fed.”
Only then did she realize that Rhys—as well as everyone else in the room—were showered, fresh-faced, and dressed in new, clean clothes. She, however, still wore her ripped T-shirt and stiff pants. Dirt, sweat, and blood coated her skin, her hair, and caked under her fingernails. The scratches and scrapes she’d sustained had healed, and her nose didn’t feel swollen or off-center, but the rest of her body ached like the ten shades of hell.
“Maybe a shower first.” She reeked of things she’d rather not think about, the smell so pungent she could barely stand to be in the same room with herself. How her friends had managed for nine hours was anyone’s guess. “Yeah, definitely shower first.”
Rhys’ eyes narrowed, and his Adam’s apple bobbed when he swallowed, but he only said, “Go shower.”
“Clothes?” She tugged at his clean, black T-shirt. “Any chance I could get in on this action?”
He placed a kiss on her forehead, then turned her by the shoulders before giving her a gentle nudge toward the hallway. “I’ll see what I can do.”
That bathroom didn’t have a mirror, which was probably for the best. It also didn’t have a sink, a vanity, or any cabinets. A white, porcelain toilet occupied an alcove in the far corner of the rectangular room, no door or even a curtain to separate it from the showers. Sighing, Thea peeled off her stained and tattered clothes and left them in the doorway. As soon as she had the chance, she’d burn them.
Icy water stuttered from the center shower head, raining over her and splashing off the ugly tiles before circling down the mesh drain. She shivered, and her lips trembled, but she welcomed the sting of cold. Eventually, the spray heated, its warmth seeping into her skin, her muscles, easing some of her soreness and washing away days’ worth of filth.
The water sloshed from her body and hair in streams of red, brown, and gray, swirling around her feet in a puddle of sludge that turned her stomach. In that moment, she realized it didn’t matter how long she showered, or how hot the water ran, she’d never really be able to wash away all the blood.
Death was an inevitable part of the world they now lived in, but that didn’t make it any easier to take a life. When faced with her own mortality, she’d always fight to win, and in the moment, she wouldn’t hesitate. Now that the battle was over and the adrenaline had ebbed, she hated herself for the things she’d done in the night.
Thea remembered the vampire she’d fought, the female with empty eyes and a vacant smile. She hadn’t asked for what had been done to her. She hadn’t asked to be starved and tortured to the point of insanity. Before the pack had taken her, she’d been someone’s sister, someone’s daughter. Thinking of Rhys, Thea’s heart bled, and a single tear seeped from the corner of her eye. The vampire could have been someone’s mother.
The same could be said for the Ravagers. She’d fought without mercy to protect her friends, and she’d do it again. That didn’t make it right, though. For the first time since all the madness had started, she actually felt sorry for the werewolves, and even more so for the Ravagers. Pity and tears wouldn’t stop them from trying to kill her, though, and as much as it hurt, she had to remember that.
Muffled footsteps shuffled near the open doorway, and Rhys’ dark scent permeated the steamy air. Thea didn’t turn.
“I brought you a towel and some clean clothes.”
“Thank you.” Still, she didn’t turn. “Just leave them by the door. I’ll be out in a minute.”
She waited, trying to stem the emotional tide threatening to overwhelm her, and listened for his receding footsteps, but he didn’t move. Thea could feel the weight of his stare on her back, and though he’d said nothing else, she could sense his own waring emotions in the stillness.
The rustle of fabric, measured breath, slow, even footfalls, and the steady pumping of his heart—she heard it all, but she didn’t know what it meant until strong arms surrounded her waist, pulling her back against a wall of warm, solid muscle.
“Is this okay?” His breath fanned over her back as he skimmed his nose across the top of her shoulder. “I just want to hold you, angel.”
She not only welcomed his closeness, she needed it. Until that moment, she hadn’t even realized how much. Clinging to his arms, she relied on his strength to anchor her, to calm the raging and destructive thoughts whirling in her head. His presence soothed her, and his touch eased the constriction in her chest. It seemed impossible that she’d only known him for a few days, because it felt like they’d lived a lifetime since then.
“Yes,” she breathed, sinking into his embrace. “Please, stay.”
> Neither of them spoke, content to hold each other beneath the warm spray. Minutes passed, the tension eased, and after a while, Rhys reached for the generic shampoo on the wire rack that hung from the shower head. Emptying a generous amount into his palm, he warmed it between his hands, then massaged it through her hair into a rich lather. Once he’d cleansed and rinsed her long locks, he moved on to the rest of her body, caressing her arms, shoulders, and back, kneading the tight knots as he washed away the dirt and blood.
Dropping her head, Thea closed her eyes and groaned. The male had magic hands, and he used them to relax every muscle in her body. Quietness surrounded them, interrupted by only the pitter of water and their uneven breaths. Pressing a hand to the tiled wall to steady herself when she began to sway, Thea trembled when a new kind of ache throbbed between her thighs.
His hands slid over her hips and up her sides, the suds on her body creating a sensual glide. He drew big circles over her belly from sternum to navel, then down the tops of her thighs, ignoring the one place she wanted his hand the most. His touch turned lighter, almost teasing, and when his knuckles brushed against the swell of her breasts, he paused.
“Is this okay?” he repeated, his voice deep and filled with gravel.
Thea couldn’t draw enough oxygen into her lungs to answer verbally, so she only nodded. She hissed, sucking in air between her teeth when he cupped her swollen breasts and squeezed. Blanketing her back, his rigid length nestled at the small of her back, he traced the vein on the side of her neck with his lips while his fingers pinched and tugged at her sensitive nipples.
“You like this.” His voice was tight, strained, but also held a note of satisfaction as he twisted the hard nubs. “I’ll remember that.” One hand continued to torture her in the most sinful ways while he drew a line down her middle with the other, pausing at the top of her cleft. “And here? Is this okay?”