Wild Wolf Claiming

by Rhyannon Byrd

  “Thanks,” he grunted, feeling the heat of Skye’s gaze burning against the side of his face. If she’d listened in on his conversations earlier, then she knew he’d only been using Lindy as bait. But it still felt wrong to be caught out with another woman. Especially when everything between them was so screwed-up.

  “Elliot, talk to me, please,” she whispered, when he turned and started walking her over to his Jeep.

  “Can’t,” he scraped out, the quiet word nearly carried away by the freezing wind. “Right now I just need to get you out of here.”

  “Before we leave, there’s something I need to tell you.”

  “This isn’t the time,” he started to say, when one of the mercs shouted a gruff warning. Instantly on alert, Elliot shoved Skye behind him as he did a quick visual sweep of the area, his heart damn near jamming into his throat when he realized they were suddenly surrounded.

  With a quick look over his shoulder, he saw the mercs, as well as Lindy, taking up protective positions around Skye. For that right there, they’d earned his eternal gratitude. Not that he didn’t already feel that way about this group. They’d proven themselves so many times it wasn’t even funny.

  But as grateful as he was, he still had a sick feeling in his stomach. Behind him, Skye had her hands fisted in his Henley, and she sounded completely terrified as she kept muttering “Come on, hurry!” over and over again.

  There must have been nearly thirty wargs closing in on them from all sides of the parking lot, along with several men whose scent definitely marked them as pureblooded Lycans. The wolves were no doubt part of some “bad guys for hire” scheme, which was something he and the other Runners saw too much of these days. Just as he was getting ready to quietly ask Lev if he had any brilliant ideas, one of the Lycans stepped forward and lifted his arm, signaling the others to halt. Elliot narrowed his eyes on the dark-haired, good-looking bastard, thinking he seemed vaguely familiar, though he couldn’t for the life of him place where he knew the Lycan from.

  Then a creepy smile tugged up a corner of the guy’s wide mouth, and he said, “You don’t look like you remember me, but I definitely know you, Elliot.” Shoulders shaking with a gritty laugh, he added, “Oh, yeah. I’ve seen you at your finest.”

  Confusion creased his brow, while a nauseating wave of panic started to coil its way through his insides.

  “Funny as hell that you’re a Runner now,” the Lycan drawled, and it was clear from the silence in the group that he had everyone’s attention. “I’ve heard they call you and your partner the Wild Wolves or some shit like that. Laughed my ass off at that one.” Lifting his brows, he said, “I mean, isn’t the other guy a turned human? But you... Yeah, you I’ve seen get pretty wild.”

  “Who the fuck are you?” he demanded in a harsh shout.

  “Nine years ago. A cave where Simmons and his groupies got up to no good.” The asshole slid him a knowing smirk. “Ring any bells?”

  Behind him, he thought he heard Lev curse under his breath, but his pulse was roaring in his ears too loudly to be sure. He sucked in a sharp breath and blinked, hoping he might wake up and this would all turn out to be just another twisted, horrific dream. But then the asshole started talking again, and he knew the nightmare was only just beginning.

  “My name’s Lopez,” the Lycan said, keeping his dark eyes locked on Elliot. “But that’s not something you would have ever known. I’m just someone who happened to be in the right place, at the right time. And I gotta admit, you put on quite a show that night.” Whistling low, he pulled a pack of cigarettes from his pocket, took one out and lit it with a silver lighter, before saying, “Talk about a massacre.”

  Skye gasped, and Elliot felt every single ounce of blood drain from his face, unable to believe this was happening. “Shut the fuck up!” he roared, while inside he was dying, wondering why he hadn’t explained everything to her when he’d had the chance. Because no matter what, this wasn’t how he wanted her to learn. From some goddamn psychotic son of a bitch.

  “Tell us the story,” one of the wargs called out, leering like a jackass. “It sounds like a good one.”

  “And don’t leave out any of the juicy details!”

  “Yeah, come on, Lopez. Let’s hear it!”

  He felt Skye start to shake behind him, the pain in his chest from how hard his heart was beating nearly bringing him to his knees. Or maybe it was just the organ breaking, shattering into pieces. He supposed it’d been inevitable—given his work—that he would one day encounter someone who had been there that night. But, Christ, he’d never imagined it would be like this.

  “The Lycan here, he was just a teenager, raging with his hormones, and this rogue wolf named Simmons found him a pretty little thing to pop his cherry,” Lopez started, and Elliot made a sound that was raw and dark and deadly, but there was nothing he could say to shut the asshole up. And he couldn’t attack him. Not when it would mean leaving his life-mate. And the mercs and Lindy were in the same position, each one standing with their back to Skye, ready to protect her when the time came.

  Lopez took a long drag on his smoke, then slowly exhaled. “So there’s a huge group of us in this cave, and Simmons has a red-faced Elliot take this stacked little blonde into the back, where there’s this curtain hanging to give them privacy. He even had a bed set up for them and everything.”

  “You’re a sick shit,” Lev muttered, growling at Lopez.

  But the bastard just smiled. “So there we are, listening to them get all worked up. And then Elliot finally gets to the good stuff, only to find out that the girl was a virgin, too. And there’s blood. Too much of it for the young Lycan to handle.”

  “Oh, God,” Skye whispered in a broken voice, tightening her grip on his shirt. “No...no...no.”

  “So we hear the girl scream bloody murder, and Simmons is wearing the biggest fucking smile as he rips the curtain down, allowing us all to see what’s happening. He’d planned the whole thing, setting this little bastard up, and damn, it was a hell of a show.” Grinning at Elliot through a cloud of smoke, he laughed as he said, “You fed on that girl like she was a juicy steak being offered to a starving dog.”

  More details followed, the words like a buzzing, lacerating pain in Elliot’s head. The Lycan told them everything, even revealing parts that Elliot hadn’t been able to fully recall until that moment. But it was all coming back to him now, the cold sweat on his face and the bile rising up the back of his throat warning him that he was about to be ill.

  Skye... Oh, God, Skye. She knew everything now. Well, almost everything. And it was breaking his goddamn heart.

  Tossing his cigarette butt on the ground, Lopez jerked his chin at Elliot, his grin widening as he said, “I think I’ll enjoy doing the same to that pretty little morsel hiding behind you.”

  Over my dead body, Elliot thought, releasing his fangs with a deadly hiss of sound. But before he could issue his warning to the bastard, one of the wargs that he recognized from the safe house growled, “Not tonight, Lopez. That’s not what we’re paying you for and you know it.”

  The Lycan looked toward the long-haired warg and laughed. “Raze, you paid me and my men to back your pathetic ass up, because you’re terrified of failing your boss man again. But don’t delude yourself into thinking you call the shots here.”

  “Fuck you!” the warg snarled, getting right in Lopez’s face. As the two continued to argue, the rest of the wargs and Lycans began to shift into their preternatural forms. The wolves only shifted the top halves of their bodies, while the wargs took on a change unlike anything Elliot had ever seen.

  Earlier that morning, Lev had told the Runners that the wargs were “soldiers” that had been created to serve things that came from hell itself, and watching them now, he could believe it. Though they still had their basic human shapes and faces, their limbs bulged with thick muscle, and their jaws were elongated, ears pointed at the tips, with an eerie crimson hue to their skin. And just like the ones he’d fo
ught at the safe house, they had claw-tipped hands and lethal fangs.

  Glancing over his shoulder, he saw that the mercs had taken off their shirts and were already shifting their upper halves as well, while Lindy remained in her human form, but held a wicked-looking blade in each of her hands.

  After the things Lopez had just revealed, shifting was the last thing he wanted to do in front of Skye. But he didn’t have any other choice. Looking forward again without even making eye contact with her, Elliot ripped his Henley off, and allowed his own change to wash over him. Though his fur had been more golden in color when he’d been younger, it had darkened over the years, and it rippled over him now as his torso expanded, transforming into the deadly shape of his beast, while his head became wolf-shaped, complete with a fang-filled snout.

  Whoever had helped him before, up at the safe house, clearly wasn’t making an appearance tonight, and he couldn’t help but wonder if that was because the mercs were there. Then he didn’t have time to think about anything but keeping these bastards away from Skye, because they came at them hard and fast, their solid black eyes gleaming with violence.

  And, yeah, he could see it now. Could understand what the mercs had been trying to explain to him and the others at the meeting that morning. The wargs...they weren’t of this world. If you knew what you were looking for, you could see the shadow cloaking them. The evil that had followed them straight out of hell.

  He’d been able to handle them in smaller numbers, but like this, they were damn near rabid, and he knew their viciousness came from a pack mentality. As ruthlessly as he and the others were fighting, there were simply too many of the assholes.

  “Get her out of here!” he shouted over his shoulder, as soon as he’d downed another one. “All of you. I’ve got this!”

  “What?” Skye screamed from just behind him. “Are you trying to get yourself killed?”

  With James moving in to cover him, Elliot turned to face her for the first time in his partial wolf form. Unable to make himself look her directly in the eye, he flicked his tongue across his lips, then forced his words through the beast’s muzzled snout. “It’ll be okay. I’ll be right behind you.”

  “You’re lying!” she shrieked in a voice that was thick with tears. “You always lick your lips before you lie. It’s your goddamn tell! Even when you look like this!”

  He blinked, surprised by that revelation, since he’d never realized it before. But, shit, she was right.

  “Just get her back,” he snarled at Lev, who was moving to her side. “Now!”

  “Wait, damn you!” she screamed. “Help is coming!”

  “Help?” he grunted, wondering what the hell she was talking about. Please God, he thought, don’t let her have called the police. Because if she had, they were screwed.

  Swiping at the tears on her face, she said, “I found everyone’s numbers written down in your desk. So I called him when we first got here.”

  “You called who?” he demanded, his brow furrowing as he stared down at her.

  “Mason!”

  Shit! That’s why his phone had started going crazy earlier. And he couldn’t even be pissed about it, because they needed the help.

  Behind him, he could tell there was a definite shift in the battle, and Elliot knew his fellow Runners had just joined the fight. With a sharp look at Skye, he growled, “You stay the hell down.”

  “I’ve got her covered!” Lindy shouted, moving in close to his life-mate, the blades in her hands dripping with blood, while her dark eyes burned with determination. “I won’t let these bastards anywhere near her.”

  Satisfied that Skye was in good hands, he turned and took in the welcome sight of his friends. Yeah, they were a badass-looking bunch, and he knew they would fight for him like they were fighting to protect their own families. Despite the fact that his intentions were good, he’d been wrong not to tell them what he had planned, and he definitely had a serious apology to make. But not right now.

  Right now, shit was about to get real.

  “Any of you warg assholes actually end up surviving this night,” Mason called out in a deep, rough-edged voice, “and, let’s face it, you’d have to run like a coward for that to happen. But if you do, be sure to let Chiswick know that every Bloodrunner in the Silvercrest pack will stand with Elliot Connors and go to battle for him. So if Chiswick wants war, he’ll have war. We protect what’s ours, and we’re gonna be coming after him.”

  Before Elliot could so much as get a word out, he found himself facing off against one of the Lycans working with Lopez, and he quickly got him on the ground, then went in for the kill. All around him, the enemy was being taken down with lethal, brutal efficiency, and he could only imagine what Skye must be thinking of the carnage.

  From somewhere off to his left, he heard one of the mercs shout that Raze was making a run for it, and James instantly retook his human shape so that he could go after him. Driven by the sole purpose of protecting his female, Elliot kept fighting alongside the others, until nearly all the remaining wargs and hired Lycans had been dealt with.

  Using his forearm to wipe the blood and sweat from his eyes, he took a quick look over his shoulder just to assure himself that Skye was still okay. Lindy hadn’t left her side, and as he turned his attention back to the battle, he saw that Lopez was the only adversary left...and Kyle and Jeremy had the asshole cornered.

  “Get away from him,” he bit out, stalking closer. “This bastard is mine.”

  Kyle lifted his claw-tipped hands. “All yours, Connors,” the merc drawled in his slow Southern accent, while he and the Runner stepped aside.

  As Elliot approached, Lopez stared back at him through cold, hate-filled eyes, and he knew this last fight was going to be anything but easy. But it would sure as hell be satisfying. Giving the jackass a sharp, deadly smile, Elliot charged as Lopez sprang forward, and they crashed together with a meaty, visceral sound, each of them snapping with their jaws.

  His side stung as the Lycan’s claws grazed him, and Elliot twisted with a powerful roundhouse, cracking his booted heel into the asshole’s chest. Then he struck him again, even harder, and Lopez fell. Fueled by the anger burning through his veins, he came down over the bastard and straddled him, pinning him to the ground with one claw-tipped hand pressed hard against his throat.

  “You think you know what you’re dealing with?” Lopez wheezed, eyes bulging with rage as he tried to free his arms—but Elliot had them trapped against his sides. “You don’t know shit, Runner. Before this is over, everyone you know and love is gonna burn and die.”

  “You first,” he scraped out with another sharp smile. “And you’re just gonna bleed.”

  He’d never enjoyed the feeling of his fangs and claws tearing through flesh as much as he did in that moment, the taste of the bastard’s blood feeding that feral, destroyed part of him that was still howling in outrage over everything it’d undoubtedly lost, now that Skye knew the truth about him. The beautiful life that had almost been his. The way she’d looked at him, like he was her goddamn hero. The way she’d kissed and touched him, as if he were already something she...loved.

  “Elliot, man, he’s dead,” Lev muttered at his side, the merc’s deep voice somehow reaching down into the blood-soaked chaos of his thoughts and bringing him back. “You’re done. It’s over.”

  He hung there over the body, feeling like he’d been on one of those carnival rides that just went round and round, until you didn’t even know which way was up when you stumbled off, nauseous and disoriented.

  And then he suddenly remembered where he was, and he felt Skye’s penetrating stare before he even lifted his head...and locked his glowing gaze with her dark, shadowed one.

  Hello, sweetheart. Meet your monster, he thought, knowing damn well that she must be horrified by what she’d seen. What she was looking at right then.

  All those seconds and minutes and hours he’d done his best to be good for her. Sweet. Tender. Loving. He’d just ki
lled them as brutally as Lopez’s earlier recounting of the night Elliot had taken his first life.

  Pushing himself sluggishly to his feet, he realized the other Runners had all retaken their human shapes and were talking to him, and he struggled to focus on what they were saying as he did the same. Since the sight of her pale face and tortured eyes was destroying him, he forced himself to look away from Skye, and narrowed his gaze on the guys around him instead.

  “We’d already figured out something was up,” Cian was muttering, as he used the T-shirt he’d shoved in his back pocket to wipe the blood from his chest. “Your girl just saved us the time searching.”

  Mason gave him a hard look. “You owe us an explanation, Elliot.”

  He exhaled a harsh breath, and stabbed his bloody fingers back through his hair. “We’ll talk later. Right now, just get her back.”

  “Wait. What did he say?” he heard Skye ask in a broken voice, from where she stood beside Lindy.

  He turned his head and looked back over at her. His chest lifted with another ragged breath, and though he tried to force out some kind of explanation, he couldn’t. So he ended up just shaking his head.

  Tears poured down her face like a stream. “Elliot, please. Talk to me. Don’t do this!”

  Turning away from her again, he looked at Mason. “Make sure she’s locked down in my cabin. I don’t want her setting foot outside of the Alley until this nightmare is over.” Shifting his attention to Lev, he asked, “You think he’ll send more?”

  “He’ll think twice about sending any of his men down here again,” the merc replied, rubbing his jaw. “At least not until he’s had a chance to regroup, and that’ll take time. But it means he’ll probably go after Max and Vivian even harder now. A guy like Chiswick—he won’t like losing.”

  “Shit,” Brody and a few of the others cursed, their rough voices overlapping.

  “I know he’s your partner,” Lev added, “and I know he’s asked for time, but enough’s enough, Elliot. The guys and I, we should go after him.”