by Cecilia Lane
Even the tracks up the dirt road were old. Hudson said four days, most likely. Mara didn’t know if it was a guess or some of his commando mercenary training.
He’d made one last attempt to leave her behind that morning—after filling her with food and coffee, and deliberately leaving her hungry for something else—and when that failed, made certain she understood the rules. He was in charge, and she needed to listen. She almost wanted to poke at him and see exactly what he’d do if she failed to obey.
She’d been forced to see how subpar her skills were compared to his own. He made no noise while they stalked up to the hunter camp. She wasn’t loud, but he was a ghost. She didn’t want to admit that she hadn’t heard him returning until he was right next to her.
Four days put the camp clearing out around the same time Kerry and others from the previous camp were shipped elsewhere. Ronnie regularly moved her fighters between camps for fresh matches, but the timing didn’t feel right. Something cooked in the background, and Mara didn’t like the possibilities.
Silence stretched between her and Hudson. “We can do this faster if we each take one.”
“Because that worked well for you last time,” he growled, not even slightly under his breath.
She narrowed her eyes. “Did you see or hear anyone?”
“No.”
“So we’re in the wrong place. We need to find the right one. There could be something we can use in there.”
“You still haven’t made a case for splitting up.” He held up his hand before she could continue arguing. “We’ll go together. You’ll need to check them both, anyway. You know what to look for more than I do. There’s no sense in splitting up.”
“You’re not going to make me stay back until you give the all clear?”
Hudson passed a hand down his face. “As much as I want to bundle you back to Bearden, I can recognize the stubborn set of your jaw. You’re going to get into trouble, one way or another. I’d rather it be with me.”
Hudson’s darkening eyes made her stomach twist and turn. It was the hint of respect mingling with the hunger that made Mara smooth her expression and stare straight ahead.
Respect wasn’t something she wanted, but it pleased her nonetheless. Her lioness was overjoyed. She was happier than a house cat that stumbled upon a stash of catnip. The beast stretched and kneaded her claws and rolled from side to side with an embarrassing amount of pleasure.
They were feeling each other out. Oh, they had a year’s worth of chitchat to fall back on. That was nothing compared to finding the true core of a person under stressful circumstances. Attempted murder and child kidnapping? Right there at the top of the list.
First Christmas with the in-laws and meeting the clan probably held spots three and four. Not that either of those would happen for her.
Mara shook off the stray thoughts as she followed Hudson out from their hiding spot and toward the closest barn. He plastered himself against one edge, just as she’d done the day before, and looked much more practiced in the motion. The man was a soldier and a fighter and didn’t fall apart when life tried to kick his legs out from under him. She was glad he was at her side, even if she was the reason he’d been drawn into the entire mess.
Kicking back her lioness, Mara walled the beast off in her mind. Brushing against Hudson and pressed against the wall of a hunter camp was not the time to get all gooey over a man. She placed her entire focus on the world around her and ground herself in the moment instead of inside her head.
Flies buzzed inside the barn and the scent of death shoved at her instincts to run. Nothing good would be inside, that stench screamed.
No good would come from not knowing, either.
Mara ducked under Hudson’s arm as soon as he swung open a door. Cage doors hung open. As big and new as the barns looked, she expected the insides to have been upgraded. No buzz of electricity ran through the bars. The walkway on the second level held no armed guards ready to fire silver and tranquilizers into disobedient shifters. Not one camera wired up the corners for constant surveillance.
Nothing moved, either. A rumpled shape rested near one of the cages. The origin on the flies and stench, she thought.
“Sure seems like they left in a hurry,” Mara said quietly.
Alarming, that. Ronnie was careful. She bought off local police so they’d turn around and check off the appropriate boxes on their paperwork. She worked with the scum of the earth, but she made them play by her rules.
Hudson grunted. “Maybe they’re closing down every place you’ve been after those two fuckers didn’t kill you.”
“The sheer audacity to survive. How dare I,” she said dryly.
A dull thumping sound stopped her in her tracks. She cocked her head. There it was again. “You hear that?”
“Heartbeat. Faint.” Hudson swung his head from side to side, trying to catch the sound.
Mara trailed closer to the cages. The thumping sound grew louder as she walked past one, then another. Empty, all of them, except for overturned buckets and scraps of clothes.
Halfway down the row and right next to the dead man, she stopped. The man’s neck looked broken. On closer inspection, he had handcuffs and a cattle prod attached to his belt. She couldn’t find any sympathy for the dead hunter.
The faint heartbeat came from inside the closed cage. Mara glanced from dead hunter to sealed door. Good on whoever was inside if they were the one to snap the asshole’s neck.
“In here.”
The sound of her voice triggered something in the cage. A shaky hand reached out and grabbed hold of the bars. A man in filthy rags lifted his head. His mouth moved, but no sound came out on the first try. He managed to speak on the third attempt. “Help me.”
“Fucking monsters,” Hudson growled next to her. Disgust overrode every other bit of his scent. His eyes flashed when he spun toward the end of the barn. “Wait here. I’ll look for keys.”
Mara nodded. Her lioness watched the shifter in the cage carefully. He crawled forward and unsteady limbs, but something still hinted at danger. She inhaled, lips parted slightly, but nothing strange or wrong hung in his scent.
His movement revealed another shape in the far corner of the cage. No extra heartbeat forced Mara’s eyes to the ground. Fuck. Too late.
“Who you got in there with you?”
“Some dead man, like the one out there with you. He wasn’t moving when they tossed him in here.”
For someone who couldn’t speak moments ago, he found his voice easily. Sheer will to live, perhaps? Adrenaline? That made human mothers able to lift vehicles. He didn’t smell like a lie. Mara wanted to believe the pacing of her inner cat was over her jangled nerves and nothing more.
“And this one?” She toed the body.
“They turned off the power when they moved the others. He wasn’t quick enough.” A feral, toothy grin graced his lips before he quashed it. His eyes darted to the lock. The shaking of his limbs had all but vanished. “You going to let me out, or what?”
“Still need those keys, don’t I?”
He cocked his head. “That one should have some. He was supposed to get me out.”
A creak above them drew both of their eyes upward. Hudson stepped onto the second level and called down. “Found a control panel. There’s a whole office back here that looks like a tornado passed through. I’ll hit the override and get the door open.”
Hudson disappeared back through the door. Mara let her gaze fall and found the other shifter boring a hole through her. Gold eyes flashed in the low light and he raised his lips in a snarl.
“Hudson, don’t!”
Too late, the bolt slid apart and the seemingly weak shifter rushed the cage with surprising speed.
Mara slammed herself against the door to stop him from pushing through. Her shoes skidded on the loose dirt floor with every inch she lost.
“Bitch. Traitor. I’ve seen you before. Seen you licking the boots of hunters. You leading the big m
an into a trap like all the rest, you fucking hunter whore?”
Each word cut her as sharply as a knife. They were her own thoughts flung back at her in the most hurtful phrasing. No matter how much she pushed back on them and the cage door, he made his way out.
Stomping steps from above were the warning of Hudson coming to her rescue. He threw himself over the railing and crashed to the ground just a moment too late.
The caged shifter smashed her fingers and twisted out of the opening. His hand wrapped around her throat and he rode her to the ground.
Her head bounced with the smack. She kicked and shoved at the shifter. A part of her wanted to let him finish it and end her. She deserved it after all she’d done. Traitor.
Hudson hauled the shifter off her, but that didn’t stop the fight. He turned and snapped half-formed jaws in Hudson’s face and slashed at him with sharp claws. The men danced, muscles snapped and bones breaking, trying to gain the upper hand while shifting just enough to keep on fighting. Neither let their animals take full control. That second between shapes and awareness could be their last.
Mara didn’t have that problem. Hudson distracted and she let her lioness take control. The beast burst out of her body in the time the men shuffled two steps and dodged three blows. One swipe of her claws raked down the feral shifter’s back and he spun on the new threat.
The lioness roared in the face of madness and feral rage, and he still didn’t stop.
Bleeding and swinging from one target to another, she silently urged him to give up. But his inner beast had hold of him and killed any remaining bit of humanity. He was beyond pain or thought or any other drive but to maim and kill everything around him. She’d seen it before, and witnessed hunters deal with those problems with a quick bullet to the brain once the animal became too unruly to fight.
He lost the fight when he switched targets once again and jumped for her. She rose up on her hind paws to avoid contact. He lunged for her again, again, driving her backward. She didn’t want to kill him, couldn’t find it in herself to land the final blow. Hudson was, for a second time, forced to kill for her.
The big man, more bear than human, let the final inch of his inner animal snap through him with a shudder. He landed on four, huge paws and grabbed the shifter off Mara with massive jaws. She roared with pain as the claws digging into her sides were ripped from her flesh.
Then there was the deep silence between heavy pants.
Hudson shifted first and shook out the last bit of energy from the change. He knelt in front of her and blocked her view of the feral shifter.
She could barely feel the hands that stroked over her face and ears and down her neck. The animal part of her wanted to lean into his touch, but the human side still had too much control. Shock and guilt and hatred for herself kept the beast still.
“Shift, kitty. You need to shift to heal,” Hudson murmured.
So she did. Her lioness kicked up her back paws and left her alone. The animal wanted nothing to do with her when she denied all her instincts.
She crouched on her hands and knees. Her hair hung in wild waves around her face and down her back. She wanted to draw the strands forward and hide in them forever.
Instead, she looked around Hudson. In death, the man found peace. The rigid lines of a face twisted with hatred had relaxed.
“He looks like one of mine. It’s not him, but he looks the same. He could be the same, for all I know. Someone put him here. Maybe John ended up like this.”
John Millios had been a tutor from Boise. He’d been bitten in his early twenties by a rogue mountain lion and had little knowledge of his other half. He’d been easy to take with promises of helping him understand his beast.
Mara squeezed her eyes closed and fought back the fat, hot tears that leaked from her eyes. Hudson might have fooled himself into thinking she could be good, but she knew deep down what she was. Monster.
She’d been a victim, but she created even more. The dead shifter that lashed out at her and hunters alike was another victim. He’d been forced past his breaking point.
Blood pounded in her ears and drowned out all other noise. Her heart beat so hard and painfully in her chest. Hudson knelt in front of her, but she didn’t see him. Not really. Not with all the faces running through her mind. The seven lives she ruined. All the ones Matthew fought to keep on breathing, only to be killed anyway. Every last shifter that passed through Ronnie’s fingers. Too many hurt, beaten, or dead. All so some sick fucks could gamble on deadly fights.
And she helped them.
Monster.
Chapter 12
Hudson pressed his lips together. Mara wasn’t seeing or hearing him. Fuck. He’d seen that distant look on the battlefield before.
He shook her shoulders once more. No response.
He hated himself for what he was about to do. He knelt next to her, wrapped an arm around her shoulders, and pinched the soft skin of her hand. Hard.
Better than slapping sense back into her.
Mara blinked. Still dazed, still freaking the fuck out, but she was back from the edge.
Hudson leaned in closer. His bear rolled through him, desperate to make her right again.
Desperate to touch her.
The sadness that filled her scent and face destroyed him. He thought she’d found her bottom, but he’d been wrong. Mara carried the weight of all her actions and wouldn’t let any be unloaded by the good she’d done or pushed to the people that forced her into terrible situations.
Now he added to her burden. If he’d heard her shout and acted before flipping that damn switch, the feral shifter wouldn’t have been freed. He’d been caught up in wanting to save another life and that forced her into a fight she wasn’t ready for.
Hudson squeezed her hands and brought his lips to her ear. “I know it’s hard. This is tough. Maybe even the worst you’ve experienced. And you know what? You’re going to get back on your feet. You’re going to rise up and fight. Because it’s not about you or me anymore. It’s about everyone else. You’ll take a moment to cry it out or punch some holes in a wall or let me hold you, but you will get up and carry on. I know this because you’re one strong, badass woman, Mara Malone. And I pity every asshole that crosses you from this moment on.”
She shook her head. “There’s no use. There are too many of them and they scurry to hide whenever light is shined on them. They have all the power.” She gestured behind him. “At some point, we all break.”
Not if he could help it. “You did this for what? A year and a half?”
A muscle in her jaw ticked and she nodded.
“And your brother kept his wits with him for as long before that, didn’t he?” Low, to mention the man, but he grabbed for anything to keep her with him. If he had to piss her off, so be it.
Mara’s eyes flashed and she nodded again.
“So the others could still be out there. They could still be themselves. Jasmine was fine, wasn’t she? And so were the others I found—”
“And this man went feral.”
“So you’re ready to give up? Not even try? Let all of them and Kerry rot away while you feel sorry for yourself?” He growled and let some of his frustration bristle in the noise. “I never thought you were a coward until this moment.”
She hissed. Her limbs tensed under her and her eyes flashed that beautiful amber gold of her inner beast. Fury whipped around her. “I am not a coward.”
“Then stop blubbering like one and get back on your feet.” Hudson winced internally at the words. Dammit, he hated talking to her like a soldier. She deserved a nice life. One free of any fighting or problems of any kind. “You did what you had to do to survive. You’re going to keep doing that. We’re going to find Kerry and make these fuckers bleed.”
She shut her eyes again and sucked down her next breath of air. When she opened them, the cool blue of her eyes replaced the amber of her lioness. Determination covered over her anger.
“We need to check
upstairs. Office, you said? Maybe there’s something up there that will let us know where they went. Maybe it’ll be correct this time.”
Atta girl. He itched to pull her against his chest and make her forget the last terrible years of her life. “I’m going to get our clothes. You should step outside. You don’t need to stay in here.”
She lifted her chin and focused her gaze on the second level. “I’ll be up there.”
He didn’t want to leave her. He wanted to bundle her up and take her home to Bearden.
Hudson forced himself to stand and walked out of the barn. His best friend in the Strathorn clan once told him that sometimes words weren’t needed and actions mattered more. He needed Mara to see she was the strong, capable woman he knew her to be. Giving her that moment to collect herself and get back at their goals said he trusted she could do anything.
Even so, he hustled to the spot they’d hidden clothes in case a quick shift was needed and he hurried back, throwing his own jeans and shirt on as he went.
Mara was gone when he entered the barn again. His heart stopped beating. His bear released a deafening roar and clawed at his chest.
Hudson scanned the space. The stench of death and blood overwhelmed everything else, but the only altered detail he could see was the eyes of the feral shifter had been closed by someone. Mara.
A scrape from upstairs restarted his heart and Hudson jogged down the breezeway. She was exactly where she said she’d be.
In the doorway of the office, Hudson stopped. Mara rifled through the papers scattered across a desk.
He knew he shouldn’t gawk, but damn. His gorgeous mate was right there and without a stitch covering her. Her limbs were strong and her hips flared into thick thighs he wanted to get between.
Her hair shifted with her turn, long enough to cover the side of her breast she exposed. All the blood in his body rushed straight to his dick.
Fucking hell. Not now.
His bear disagreed with a rumbled in his chest. They fought. Now was exactly the time to fuck. Both their bodies were running on a high and she needed the reminder of who, exactly, would make her feel good. The beast sent unfair images of her mouth falling open as she shattered around his fingers and the heated look in her eyes when he finished on her stomach.