by Dani Harper
And it had been totally reliant on a quality that only Geneva Rayne Ross possessed. Without her, it simply could not be employed. Ever. Meredith had first sent out most of the pack to recapture the little brat—or to recover the body. Meanwhile, she secretly went to one of her underground spell rooms and wept with frustration and disappointment until she had no tears left and no more things to break. Finally she found her equilibrium.
So Geneva had escaped. So what? Let her try to manage a first Change all by her little lonesome. She’ll die, and I won’t have to kill her. Perfect.
And if the bitch didn’t die? Geneva couldn’t hide forever, and once she was found, she would learn to do what she was told, at least long enough to serve Meredith’s ends. And after that? If you can’t be a good example, then you’ll just have to be a terrible warning.
“Make yourselves useful and take that away.” She waved her fingers airily at the corpse. The three men hastened to comply, giving the patterns on the floor a wide berth. Two seized the dead man and headed for the door. Meredith smirked and pointed an exquisitely manicured fingernail at the odd man out.
“You. Stay here.”
Never having had a passenger on the bike before, Travis had to admit there was something very appealing about having a woman pressed up against his back. And as he opened up the throttle on the highway, he felt Neva lay her head against him. Although he was certain it was just to shield herself from the wind, he still felt an unexpected surge of protectiveness toward her. But his wolf didn’t have to be so damn smug about it.
That lupine smugness disappeared as the highway signs flew past them, and Neva began to sag. Her grip on his jacket loosened alarmingly, and for the last eighty miles, he drove one-handed in favor of holding her good arm tightly to him, willing her to stay upright.
While he would never have chosen cheap accommodations—his human side liked things clean and comfortable—he would have preferred something smaller and more out of the way. However, any port in a storm, and the Rocking Horse Casino was right on the highway and boasted an enormous hotel. He coasted into a quiet side lot with no small amount of relief. And in the heartbeat between bringing the bike to a stop and leaping off it, Travis used every ounce of his Changeling speed to catch Neva before she tumbled to the pavement.
Now what? Dressed like she was, she might attract attention if he took her along to the front desk with him. And her exhausted state might be interpreted as something else—drunk off her feet, at the very least. Worse, someone could easily suspect she was a victim of a date-rape drug and call in the cops. No, Officer, everything’s fine, she’s just going to turn into a wolf soon. Yeah, right.
There were no windows on this side of the building, and the one and only car parked here looked like it belonged to staff. He laid Neva carefully on a curved garden bench sheltered by tall, yellow rhododendrons, and tucked the heavy coat around her. “Stay here,” he said, although it was unlikely she could hear him.
When he returned with the key card for a room, she hadn’t moved a hair and was, in fact, snoring heartily. His mouth quirked when he picked her up and the snores failed to subside. Exhausted, he thought, and was glad he’d decided to stop to let her sleep for a while. She was going to need all her strength for later, when the moon was high.
Travis chose the side entrance to the stairs, where he was unlikely to encounter very many people. Humans preferred elevators as a general rule. He’d reached the third floor before Neva stirred.
“Put me down,” she muttered without opening her eyes.
“In a minute.” He found the room. Balancing Neva in his arms, he fumbled with the key card and cursed loudly as the lock rejected it twice. An old woman with enormous glasses poked her head out of a suite down the hall. He forced a smile for her benefit. “Newlyweds,” he said and was relieved when the woman giggled knowingly, shook her finger at him, and withdrew. On the third swipe of the card, the door opened and he carried Neva inside.
“I don’t feel good,” was all she said as he stripped the leather duster off her and tucked her in one of the queen-size beds.
She looked colorless, even against the white sheets—until she opened her eyes. He could clearly see the green fire in their golden-brown depths, and he knew she didn’t have much time. It was only about an hour till the full moon rose, and once it reached its highest point in the sky, Neva would shift form for the very first time and fully become what Travis had always been, or she would die trying. He shoved that thought away at once.
“Where the hell is your sire?” he burst out. “He should be helping you with this.”
Neva snorted. “My sire? You make it sound like I’m a pedigreed dog. If you mean the monster that bit me, I’m several states away from her.” She blinked. “At least I hope so. Where exactly are we?”
Travis was too busy digesting the previous sentence to answer her question. “Are you saying the gift was forced on you?”
“What gift?”
“Well, the wolf, of course.”
She stared at him for several seconds. “A gift…What kind of a goddamn gift is this?” Neva struggled to sit up, fury in every feature. “Here, I’ll make you into a creature from hell, and then you can show your thanks by murdering innocent people. Oh, and you can start with your family. You won’t be needing them anymore.”
Travis held up both hands. “Whoa there, you’ve been watching way too many bad movies. Changelings aren’t like that at all.”
“Werewolves are exactly like that. Don’t try to snow me.”
“I’m not a werewolf and neither are you,” he said. “That Hollywood stuff is bunk. It pisses me off that they always show the gift as a curse. Some poor schmuck turns into a ravening animal when the moon’s full, and can’t remember what he did when he wakes up the next day…” Two and two belatedly made four in his head. “Is that what the cliff jumping was all about? You’re not depressed. You think you’re going to be some kind of monster, so you’ve decided to do away with yourself.”
“You don’t get it.”
“I get it just fine. I get that you’re still thinking about it, too, and that’s why you were so gung ho about leaving the damn hospital.”
She said nothing, just glared at him, and he knew he was right on the money. He glared back and pointed a finger at her to underscore his words. “Don’t you try anything. I mean it. You give me the slightest reason to think you’re going to do something stupid and I’ll damn well tie you up.”
“Oh yeah? Until when, exactly? You can’t keep me leashed forever.”
“Until you have a chance to experience what being a Changeling really means.”
She rolled her eyes at that. “Going through screaming hell while an animal takes over my body? Oh, goody. And then afterward, maybe I can go practice my new skills by tearing the throats out of some homeless people.”
“Jesus, it’s not like that. A first Change can be pretty rough on you physically, of course. But this crazy notion about being a natural-born killer is just plain wrong.” Guilt immediately punched him in the gut. He couldn’t lie to her. “What I mean is, you’ll have the power and the strength to kill humans, but you’ll learn control, so you won’t. You’ll still be you, and frankly, you don’t look like the homicidal type to me.” Unless looks could kill…
“You’re so full of shit. Or else you just don’t get it. Once Meredith gets hold of someone, they’re not themselves anymore. And her werewolves kill for her.”
“That can’t be—”
“I saw them. I watched them murder people. And I couldn’t do a thing about it.”
She’d pass any lie-detector test, he decided. She believed she was telling the truth, but he couldn’t begin to fathom where she had gotten the strange ideas. Changelings had strict laws, and no wolf was permitted to run around killing people. Usually…He tried another approach. “Look, I don’t know anything about Meredith’s pack dynamics. What I do know is that once you learn to have control, you can have
a great life.”
Her face changed suddenly. “I had a great life,” she said quietly, her anger displaced by enormous sadness. “At least, I had one planned.” A tear caught on her lashes, and she rubbed it roughly away with the heel of her good hand.
Travis’s heart clenched unexpectedly, and he lowered himself into a chair. “You still do,” he said gruffly. “Nothing’s different. You’re not going to wake up tomorrow and be a different person. You’ll just have a—I don’t know how the hell to say it. It’s like you’ll have an extra dimension to you. You’ll be more.”
“What I’ll be is useful. To Meredith.” She sniffed and wiped her nose fiercely on her sleeve. “I can’t Change, don’t you get that? You’ve got to let me go.”
“Christ.” He rubbed his palm over his face. “I’m getting tired of this argument. Last time: you are going to turn into a wolf, and you need to lie low till it’s over. Case closed. So no, you’re not going anywhere unless it’s with me.” He rose and pulled a large jackknife from his back pocket. “We need to take those casts off.”
“What the hell?” Neva lurched backward until her back was flat against the headboard, clutching the blankets to her with one hand. “You’re not touching these!”
“If we don’t take the casts off now, it’s just going to make it harder for you when you turn. Think about it—a wolf’s leg doesn’t bend the same way a human’s does. Besides, I doubt that you still need them.”
“Right, like I had them put on as a fashion statement.”
“You walked three city blocks under your own steam, less than three days after a fall that would have been fatal to anyone else. You know full well your recovery’s been faster than normal,” Travis said. “I’ll bet the doctors in the ER were amazed at how clean the breaks were and how aligned the bones were. That’s why you have light fiberglass casts instead of heavy plaster, and I’ll bet money there’s no pins or screws either. In fact, by now your bones are probably knitted. You can thank the wolf for that.”
“I’m not thanking it for a damn thing.”
“Regardless, the Change will complete the healing.”
“I’m not making the Change.”
He rolled his eyes at that. “Whether you want it to or not, it’s happening.”
“I could kill somebody.”
“Unlikely. But I’ll make you a deal. If I promise to keep you from doing anything homicidal, will you promise to stay alive long enough to learn control?”
“I’m not promising anything.”
He shrugged and took a step toward her.
“You touch my casts and I’ll start screaming.”
“No, you won’t, because you don’t want to attract attention.”
“Yes, I do, and I’ll attract a lot of attention if you come near me.”
“You’re a real pain in the ass, you know that? Have it your way, then, see how that works out for you.” It was actually the tightness in her face that had stopped him—it was obvious that she was in pain. He folded the knife away and headed for the door. “Get some rest. I’ll get us some chow and see what I can do about finding you some meds.” He didn’t bother mentioning that pharmaceuticals didn’t work on Changelings and that she was probably too far gone for them to be of any use to her.
The heavy door clunked shut behind him, and Neva blew out a breath. Her bruised and battered body was throbbing in a dozen places, and she wanted nothing more than to sleep for a week—but she didn’t have the luxury of time. There was no telling how long Travis would be gone, and she didn’t plan to be here when he got back.
She eased out of bed, her body shrieking silently in protest. Everything hurt, but she still wished she had some regular clothes she could at least try to get into. Travis hadn’t brought in any luggage. He didn’t appear to own much except whatever was in the saddlebags of his motorcycle, so she couldn’t steal anything of his—well, except for the too-big coat. She slid on the stupid fabric slippers, then tried to adjust the pajamas and bathrobe that had twisted around her. It was frustrating with only one hand to work with, and for a moment she wondered if Travis had been right about not needing the casts anymore…She put it out of her mind at once. He was a werewolf, and he couldn’t possibly be right about anything.
Neva struggled into the heavy leather duster and cautiously opened the door. Signs pointed to the elevators, the lobby, the bar, and the restaurant. The powerful smells of food made her stomach clench as if she hadn’t eaten in days. She wasn’t going to succumb, though. She had a mission. She shuffled as quickly as she could down the hallway in the direction of the back exit.
The stairs were pure hell. The curtains had been drawn in the motel room, and somehow Neva had missed the fact that they were three floors up. Leaning heavily on the railing, she finally came up with a strange lurch-step-slide-and-repeat that got her to the ground floor in one piece but with much of her energy spent. She stepped outside and sank to the concrete step as dizziness and pain overwhelmed her. It was fairly quiet here at the back of the motel. A dog barked in the distance, and the traffic sounds were muffled. She took several deep breaths of the cool air until the dizziness faded and her vision cleared. The sky was awash with deepening pinks and purples, and she gazed at the twilight colors with pleasure—until she realized that the moon would be making its appearance on the opposite horizon at any moment. And although a skyline of buildings blocked it from her sight, she knew that her body would be able to sense its rise. That realization sparked enough adrenaline to get her back on her feet, pain or no pain.
Heart pounding, she shuffled down a series of alleys until she found what she really needed—a car with a set of keys in it. It was a very old Toyota something or other with dented doors and ripped seats, but it would do for her last ride. At least it was unlikely that anyone would seriously miss it, and as she struggled to get into the little car, she wondered suddenly if anyone was going to miss her. To her dismay, her eyes teared up at once.
Shit. Don’t think. Focus on what you’re doing. Neva fumbled for the keys and prayed to any deity that might be listening that the vehicle would start. It coughed and complained, but the engine turned over. Suddenly a pair of headlights flashed in the rearview mirror, and bright light filled the car until Neva had to close her eyes. The downside of being in a small car became apparent anytime a pickup truck or other tall vehicle came up behind you at night. She waited for it to pass, which it did with painful slowness—and stopped directly in front of her. Her eyes flew open just as the door to the Toyota was ripped from its hinges and tossed to one side.
FIVE
Neva bared her teeth as Travis’s big hands reached for her. “I’m not going with you.”
“You are going with me, and you’re going quietly.” His voice was low, but there was no mistaking the underlying fury in it.
She opened her mouth to let loose a fire-engine shriek, but his iron grip covered it before she finished drawing the breath.
“You want to scream? Fine. But think it through, Neva. The moon. Is. Up.” He emphasized every syllable.
It was all too true. She could feel the lunar body pulling at her, tugging at some primeval instinct within in the same way that it drew the tides. Her gaze automatically shifted to the east. Blocked by tall buildings, she couldn’t see the moon—but she knew its exact position in the sky.
“You start yelling and humans will come,” he continued. “People who live here in this neighborhood, police, EMTs, you name it. And they’ll all get to see you turn into something they won’t understand. In less than a minute, it’ll be all over YouTube, Facebook, CNN, the works. Live coverage of your Change—and of anyone you injure trying to escape.” Travis released her and stepped back. “I’m your only hope, Neva. Quit fighting me.”
For a brief, flickering moment, she wondered if maybe revealing herself to the whole world would solve her problem. If she proved that werewolves existed, maybe she could reveal Meredith and her gang for the evil they were. It could wo
rk, it—
Her eyes rested on the swing set and scattered toys in the yard beside her. Not here, not now. Travis, damn him, was all too right about the human witnesses and the possibility of innocent people getting hurt in this crowded neighborhood.
Neva glared up at her would-be savior. “What exactly do you want from me?”
He shook his head. “Not a damn thing from you personally. Only that it’ll make my life a whole lot easier if the humans don’t know about Changelings. Once you’ve turned, and shown that you’re in control of yourself, I’ll be glad to get out of your life. Deal?”
He struck that Terminator pose again, holding out his enormous hand just as he had at the hospital. What choice did she really have? She held up her casted arm and wiggled her fingers. In a flash he had scooped her out of the car and carried her to the truck. “Borrowed,” he said in answer to her questioning look, and deposited her in the passenger seat none too gently.
When he slid behind the wheel, it was on the tip of her tongue to say something scathing about the oily stink of stale cigarette smoke and god only knew what else that coated every surface of the truck. But as she opened her mouth to speak, the powerful scent of fresh food slammed into her senses, overwhelming all else. A box with a large deluxe pizza dwarfed the dashboard, and bags of burgers and fries and pints of milk were stacked in the middle of the bench seat.
“Dig in,” said Travis, slamming his door twice to make it stay shut. “Shape-shifting throws your metabolism into high gear, and you’ve got to have fuel in your system.”
He was using his lecture voice again, but she wasn’t listening. The sound of four hundred and sixty horses under the old truck’s dented hood barely registered. She was starving. As if she hadn’t seen food in days, she found herself alternately eating from a folded slice of pizza in one hand and a box of fries in the other. “Omigod,” she said with her mouth crammed full. “This isn’t like me at all.”