Sage’s cheeks flushed, and she turned to face the window. She almost didn’t recognize the image reflected back at her. That woman looked sturdy and ready to face any challenge thrown her way. Not long ago, she hadn’t been able to see any light at the end of the tunnel. One man had grabbed her by the scruff and shaken her awake with a handful of words.
I’ll stand with you.
While he wasn’t physically at her side that moment, she still felt his presence. He’d shown her she wasn’t as lost or hopeless as she’d thought. He’d pushed her past just breathing and moving. She wanted to do more than simply exist with him around; she wanted to live.
“He’s important to me, too.”
“We’ll drive through the night and see where that gets us,” Alton said, then added, “He’s a tough one.”
Hailey leaned forward and squeezed her arm. “They all are. Besides,” she said, “no one said we can’t help from a distance.”
Sage twisted in her seat, and Hailey grinned. Her phone screen lit up, bathing her face in an eerie glow as she clicked away a reply. “They’re fighting for us,” she said, glancing up, “I’m sure as hell not leaving them alone if I can help it.”
A shadow moved ahead, stepping right into their path.
Sage whined and dug her nails into her thighs the moment the headlights caught Jasper’s scarred face.
He was here. Not with the fighters on the ranch. Not a million miles away while everyone overreacted. Jasper Crowley, her tormentor, was right there in front of them.
“Hold on,” Alton growled.
He barreled forward, then spun the wheel at the last second to avoid hitting the man.
Sage twisted in her seat to see Jasper simply turn around and clasp his hands behind his back. She let off a sigh of relief and resisted the urge to raise a middle finger in farewell. They were going to make it. They were going to be safe.
Something hard slammed into the side of the SUV, crunching the metal and sending them into a spin.
Tires screeched as Alton tried to regain control.
Another slam on the other side rocked the vehicle to its side. Time seemed to slow as gravity took over, grabbing the lopsided SUV and tipping it over completely.
Sage threw her arm over her face as the windshield cracked, but didn’t break. The rest of the SUV wasn’t so lucky. Metal groaned and screamed against the asphalt as the SUV skidded to a stop.
She panted hard in the seconds after they stopped moving. Pure adrenaline pumped through her veins. Her fingers moved. Toes, too. She hung awkwardly in her seatbelt, but she was alive and breathing and mostly unharmed.
Alton turned wild eyes to her. “Sage?” he cupped her cheek and forced her to look at him. “You okay?”
She nodded, but he’d already twisted in his seat. “Hailey?”
The woman let off a groan and pressed a shaky hand to her head. Her eyes flew open and she glanced down at her stomach. “The twins,” she whimpered. “He better not have hurt the twins.”
Sage opened her mouth, but her words of comfort turned to a scream as her door was ripped away and a hand wrapped around her arm. Claws flashed across her vision and for a long, dreadful second, she thought they’d find a home in her flesh. Relief sagged her shoulders when they simply sliced through the seatbelt.
That same relief died when she caught sight of the one hauling her out of the SUV.
Jasper.
Fuck.
Fresh panic sliced through her and soured the back of her tongue. The horizon seesawed back and forth as she inhaled his scent and felt his eyes drag down her frame. Her skin crawled to feel his hands on her after so many months of freedom.
“Well, this is a better surprise than I expected,” he chuckled darkly, sweeping hateful eyes over her. Not turning away, he called over his shoulder. “Who else is in there?”
“Let go of me!” Hailey hissed as she was pulled from the overturned SUV.
Jasper jerked his chin to someone behind her, and Sage felt a hand land on her shoulder. She twisted around enough to see her father glaring down at her. “On your knees,” he ordered, shoving her forward before she could react.
Her stomach turned as Hailey was marched next to her. She recognized too many faces of those with Jasper. Ira, his second. Her father, of course. Garrett, the former occupant of her den and the one who’d handed Hailey over to Jasper in her close encounter. Others, too, who made up Jasper’s inner circle or served as his personal enforcers.
They hadn’t gotten away. They’d landed right in the center of the storm.
Jasper turned curious eyes on Alton the moment he was pulled from the wreck and placed on his knees. “And you are?”
“None of your fucking business,” Alton sneered.
Garrett decked him right in the face.
“No!” Sage tried to surge to her feet, but her father’s hand on her shoulder kept her on the ground. “Leave them alone,” she whimpered. “I’ll come with you willingly. No questions, no fighting, I will accept your mark and become your mate. Just leave them alone. Leave them all alone.”
Jasper’s lips hitched up in a cruel smile. “What makes you think you have a choice?”
Chapter 26
Sage breathed a sigh of relief as soon as the SUV door closed behind her, then immediately felt stupid. Just because a hunk of glass and metal stood between her and the monster on the other side didn’t mean she was safe. Far from it, in fact. She’d had that and much more distance not even ten minutes before, and look how that turned out.
She bit her cheeks to keep herself from spiraling. She wasn’t dead yet. She could still find a way out of Jasper’s grasp.
She’d had that before, too. In the early days when he’d put a collar around her neck. Bars on the windows, lock and guards at the door, he’d broken down her hope of escape.
No. No. It wouldn’t be like that again. She’d come too far to be forced back into captivity.
Sage glanced out the window to where Jasper conferred with the others, then slashed a look to Hailey at her side. “Did you get the message off?” she whispered.
Hailey turned her head slightly, eyebrows raising with her unspoken question.
“Before we crashed. Did you get the message off?”
“I don’t know.” Hailey shook her head slightly. “I’m not sure.”
Someone pounded on the window. “Quiet in there!”
Well, there went that hope.
Or any of somehow slipping out the other door and making a run for the trees.
The front door whipped open and Jasper slid into the passenger’s seat. Roland wedged himself behind the wheel and turned the key in the ignition.
“Where are you taking us?” Sage demanded.
Jasper whipped his head around. The murderous look in his narrowed eyes made her want to shrink back, but she somehow managed to keep her spine straight.
“Hm,” he grunted, then sneered. “I suppose it doesn’t matter now. I’m taking you back to your pride.”
Roland shook his head and chuckled.
Sage exchanged a worried look with Hailey, then Alton. Fear slithered over her previous determination to not let Jasper break her. No good could come from his plans, whatever they were.
* * *
There was something wrong.
Rhys pushed the thought to the back of his head as he tore into another lion trying to rip out his throat. But as he whipped around to find only a handful of lions pacing just out of swiping range, the idea returned.
Seven prides, the fucker claimed. Unless they were all as small as the Crowley pride, the numbers didn’t add up. Even then, he expected more than what they faced. But with the distraction in town, the Ashfords not answering, Dash and Colette momentarily off the board… They didn’t exactly need the consortium’s full force to bring them down.
With a roar, he threw himself at his targets, slicing his claws through the air. He twisted in their very center, snapping his jaws and missing by the bares
t inch when the fucker jerked away. He didn’t let that stop him. If anything it just pissed him off more.
The fuckers wanted to end him and destroy his chance of reuniting with his mate? Not if he had any say.
Another lion fell, but yet another took his place. Rhys snarled, the sound sawing in and out of him, then swept right back into the fight. He didn’t care how many he had to put down or how long it took. Each one put him closer to seeing Sage again.
Then more appeared. Many more. Wherever the reserves had been hiding, and for whatever reason, they decided that moment was the moment to turn the tide against them.
The Crowleys were forced back. Step after step, one bite or claw at a time, they lost all room to move.
Pure dread shot through his veins as the fighting around him died down to nothing. He snarled and lunged for the closest lions, but the beasts simply turned against him and boxed him in with the others.
Over their heads, he spotted a group walking for them on two feet instead of four.
At his side, Trent snarled when he recognized who led the new arrivals.
No!
Rhys’s heart froze when he saw the woman Jasper dragged behind him.
“Shift. Now,” Jasper ordered over the last rumblings of the battle. “Or your mates lose their heads.”
* * *
Sage struggled to yank herself away from Jasper, but he had an iron grip on her arm. “Don’t,” she whispered to the pride. “Don’t stop fighting.”
She watched in horror as they did just that.
Kyla was the first to falter, with Lindley a close second. Trent and Rhys were the last, but they, too, stumbled to stops as the procession made its way to the very middle of the action.
This was pure Jasper. He couldn’t just take the win. He had to break every last ounce of a person’s will before he snatched his victory. He’d done the same with her, letting her fight back just enough to feel like she had control before slamming her back into reality and marking her as helpless with his claws.
“I said shift!” he roared.
The order was met with howls and roars of resistance that silenced the moment she and Hailey were pushed to the ground in front of him.
Trent rushed forward, throwing a testy swipe at Jasper’s honor guard, then backed off with a savage growl. His shape shimmered and cracked apart, until he held himself up by fists planted in the ground.
“I’ll fucking kill you if you hurt her,” he swore.
“Fight you for it,” Rhys challenged his alpha, throwing all the weighty rage of his glare toward Jasper.
“Now, now,” Lindley ground out. “No need to argue. Look around at how many of these fuckers showed up to get themselves gutted. There’s enough to go around.”
“Quiet,” Roland snapped, throwing a hard punch into her brother’s cheek. The blow did absolutely nothing to make the loathing in Lindley’s eyes disappear.
Jasper clucked his tongue. “Leave them their words, Roland,” he called out. “They’re harmless. The last thrashing struggle of a beaten enemy.”
Her father stared Lindley down for a second longer before stepping back to his place at Jasper’s side.
Jasper huffed a small laugh, then let off a sigh of satisfaction. “I’ve imagined this day for years. Ever since that whore seduced my brother into allowing worms and other vermin into our pride.” Trent struggled against the hands holding him back, but Jasper only acknowledged him with a sly glint in his eyes. “Ever since the enclaves inexplicably decided the same. Locked in that tiny cell by those mistakenly under the impression they were better than me, I knew I had to do everything in my power to rid the world of those who thought themselves worthy of our blood.”
He paused, sweeping a withering glance over the pride he had kneeling in the dirt, then raised a triumphant look over his consortium. “Today marks the return of the true Crowley line to all its former glory.”
“The true Crowley line?” Hailey didn’t let a flicker of fear enter her eyes as she scoffed. She knelt in the dirt, bruises from the accident darkening her face, and glared absolute murder at Jasper. “I’m carrying the true line. You’re just an unfortunate blip in history. A mistake. The shameful relative no one will ever mention again.”
Jasper sneered. “I’ll rip that cub from your body before the night is over.”
Her smile sent chills up Sage’s arms. “You can try.”
In that moment, when the world seemed ready to burn and crumble around them, everything changed.
She felt it in the air first. A quickening to the breeze, a pebble rolling in the dirt.
Then the ground seemed to vibrate underfoot.
Roars and howls erupted in the night as some unseen force slammed into the backs of those on the very outer edges of the fucked up gathering.
Backup had arrived.
Almost as one, the Crowley pride—her Crowley pride—jumped to their feet. They threw punches, jammed knees into stomachs and groins, anything they could do to throw off their immediate captors and add confusion to the next line.
Rhys was the first to shift. The massive white lion surged out of him and locked his jaws around the arm of Jasper’s second. The beady-eyed man howled with pain as he was shaken from side to side like a ragdoll.
Dash and Colette were the first through the line. Then there were Ashfords spread out on either side of them. She recognized others from Bearden, too, like the Strathorn firefighters and some of the police force. Above, a huge dragon beat his wings and sent jets of flame against the lions on the ground.
Sage bolted to her feet right along with them. She twisted around to find Hailey. The woman still crouched in the dirt, eyes wide. She stuck out her hand, hoping to haul her up. They needed to run. Somewhere. Anywhere. Staying on two legs in the middle of the madness was a sure way to find themselves on the wrong end of fangs.
“Not so fast,” Jasper hissed in her ear. He twisted her arm behind her back. Pain shot straight into the shoulder, the pressure threatening to pop it out of joint.
Fur brushed against her mind. Against her fingers. Over her skin.
Sage sucked in a breath and grinned.
There was no split second between shapes. No feeling her bones break apart. Not even a single second of hesitation. Her people needed her, and Broken help anyone who tried to keep them apart.
Sage threw her head back and roared as her lioness ripped out of her.
She hit the ground running, all four paws digging into the dirt to launch her faster into the next step after the asshole trying to escape. His own shift shimmered his frame, then sent him darting around clusters of fighting.
Sage kept on his heels. She barreled past Lindley standing over the body of their father. She dodged Trent viciously shaking Garrett not far from where Hailey crouched, her hands wrapped around the thick end of a branch.
Twisting and turning, Sage dodged the claws reaching for her, sending her own flashing against fangs that got too close. She couldn’t let him get away. Not this time. He’d been beaten and had his legs taken out from under him before, and he’d still rebuilt his numbers. She was done living under the threat of his return.
She jumped, clearing the back of one male, and landed right on Jasper. Her claws sank into his flesh as she tore into him with her fangs.
He’d made her so small and scared. He’d kept her trapped even when the physical bonds were removed.
No more. No fucking more.
Pain and destruction were the only languages he knew how to speak, and he’d left her fluent in both.
Then Lilah was there on his other side. Her lip lifted to bare her fangs. The noise of her snarl dragged at his attention, and Jasper retreated just enough to keep them both in his line of sight.
Lilah struck first, avoiding his teeth and going for his back end. Sage moved as soon as the lion’s attention spun to his other attacker. She slid in, raked her claws along his front, then ducked away again before he could nail her with a returning blow.
>
They worked back and forth, each taking their turn to crowd closer and exact some bloody revenge. She slashed at him for every time he held her down and dragged his claws across her skin. She bit him to pay back all the days she spent locked in a bedroom, dreading his return. Raw fury powered her forward again and again, until his hide was streaked with red.
Lilah threw herself over his back. The sudden weight stumbled him, which was the opening Sage needed to slam her shoulder against his side. Jasper lost the last bit of balance and went down.
Sage scrambled out of the way of flashing fangs, latched her jaws around his throat, and yanked her head back.
Jasper Crowley, propagator of war, hater of humans, her supposed mate, and the man cruel enough to scar her for life, stilled, and a great weight lifted from her shoulders.
“Get in the cave!”
Sage whipped her head around to see Trent sprinting through the chaos. Above him, the sky glowed red with flames.
He ducked long enough to grab Hailey’s hand and jerked her to her feet. Eyes wide with fear, she didn’t try to yank her arm away or ask any questions. She simply ran.
Sage turned the moment they reached her.
The others, too, ran as fast as their legs could carry them.
The dragon in the sky sucked down an audible breath, then unleashed a blaze of fire over the land.
Heat blasted against Sage’s back and urged her faster. Faster!
She barreled into a warm body, then skidded to a stop in the cool darkness.
Panted breaths were the only sounds for a long moment. Sage swept a look over the others, counting, then counting again. Rhys. Rhys wasn’t there. He wasn’t with them. He was still—
Fire blasted from the dragon again. Sage tried to tear away her eyes as the path turned straight for their hiding place, but one figure tumbled inside before the flames scorched the ground at the mouth of the cave.
Savage Exile: Lion Hearts Book Five Page 18