by Tigris Eden
If the look of shock was anything to go by, she would say Hedrick had no clue Draven was a werewolf. Or, maybe he did know, and realized how stupid he was for signing up for death detail. The expression “bugged out eyes” applied to Hedrick in all ways. He was trying to scramble back in his seat, but there wasn’t anywhere to go. The silent scream on his lips had her cracking a smile. Dumbass, you’re as good as dead. How could he not know? Actually, with the exception of Bells, the entire team was fighting in their human forms. Strange that Hedrick hadn’t known, usually Marcus was a lot smarter when gathering intel on people he intended to hurt, maim, or kill. This was a first. Marcus must not have factored in all the variables in this particular order he’d given to Hedrick, or maybe he had.
With quick hands, Jesminda held the chest of a now furry Draven. She’d been so caught up in her thoughts she hadn’t seen him change, she hadn’t realized she’d moved to stand in front of him. The dark fur on his chest felt silky smooth to the touch, less thick. He stared down at her with glowing golden green eyes. She stared right back. Hedrick knew the location of their daughter. She needed it. Draven stilled at her touch, which gave her cause for some comfort. At least he wouldn’t attack outright. She needed to know what Marcus had up his sleeve. She knew him. He wasn’t sloppy. He calculated every move he made. He did his homework like a good little thug. What was the catch, leaving Hedrick here in the place of Faith? Was Marcus hoping Draven would attack him? If that was the case something was wrong with Hedrick.
There was a noise at the front of the plane and Jes looked past Draven to see Royce, who’d come up the stairs. Royce rushed towards them but Draven turned and snarled. The wolf barely had the room to move he was so huge. Royce held his hands out in front and stopped short.
“Not trying to hurt you or your lady, man.” Royce looked over at Hedrick who was still sitting in the chair, motionless. “He’s drugged. Marcus wants you to attack. Don’t do it, man. The fucker is bait.”
“How,” Jesminda bit out through gritted teeth.
Royce stood there for a moment eyeing Hedrick. He was breathing at a rapid pace. There was a foul odor in the cabin. Did he piss himself? Gross. But she couldn’t be focused on that, she had to focus on the wolf that was growling. She could feel the rumble to the soles of her feet.
“How,” Jesminda screamed. Panic clawed its way down her back. The wolf wasn’t moving, but for how long?
“He’s been injected with silver nitrate, not a high enough dose to kill him outright, but enough that it’s contaminated his blood. If Draven were to strike, it would take a miracle to cure him. Damn, you didn’t tell us that Marcus knew about the Unit, Jesminda. That would have been information we would have wanted to know firsthand.” Royce’s frustration wasn’t making her feel any better.
“Like I knew. I was just thinking that things seemed unorganized for him. Like he hadn’t realized you guys were more than human. Now… He obviously knows about your team. My plan was just to get away without being caught, protect my daughter, and start over again.” She blew out a breath. “Not this shit I am going through now, running from zombies, my daughter being taken, and having an overgrown behemoth of a man trying to tell me I’m his mate. I want off this fucking coaster of pyschotron!” she yelled. The wolf still hadn’t moved, but he was ready.
Royce looked over at Hedrick and grinned.
“Dude, fucking pissed your pants? That’s classic.” What the hell was the mind reader doing now?
“What are you doing?”
“I gotta post this shit on the board…. Hold up.”
Royce snapped a pic with his camera phone and began typing on the screen. Was he fucking for real? Her daughter was missing, Hedrick was there with a gun, she was holding back a big-ass werewolf; a werewolf that offered no arguments, and Royce was posting pics online. Unbelievable.
Draven licked her arm. Warmth and the rasp of his tongue smoothed down her limb. Gross! She smacked Draven’s head away with her hand and stepped back, turning to pin Hedrick with a glare. Fucking photo time was over!
“Start talking, Hedrick, or I’m going to let Royce have at you, and he’s not a werewolf.” Hedrick sneered at her as if she couldn’t make him talk. Draven’s wolf stayed close to her back, growling and making licking noises with his chops.
“It would be my supreme honor, my lady to make him talk; shall I make him drink my blood?” Royce asked with a raise of his brow. That was wrong on so many levels, and something she did not have time to stick around and see. They could be running out of time.
She suppressed a shiver; she remembered Royce’s blood, the taste of the warm nectar coating her throat like a lover’s caress. What would it do to Hedrick? “Is it going to have the same effect on him as it did on me?”
Royce faked being hurt. “Hell to the no! It will have the opposite since he’s a male. He will writhe, but not in ecstasy or bliss over my sexual prowess. No, he’ll writhe in agony, and it will make him talk.”
Royce looked at her and winked. He was enjoying this way too much for her taste. She needed to find out where Marcus was taking Faith, and that was all there was to it.
“Royce, be serious… please.” Jes took a step towards Hedrick.
“You heard him, you want to writhe in agony, or just tell us where my daughter is being taken?”
Hedrick’s face twisted into a slimy grin.
“Why, miss, I don’t know where they’re going to take the little one. I do know Marcus plans on letting Enri have her. You know how Enri is, doesn’t care what age a wee little one is. He will take her just the same.”
Jes lashed out in a fit of rage, she didn’t see anything but a haze of anger so thick she saw blood as she zeroed in on Hedrick. Her hand shot forth and clipped him in the jaw. His head snapped back, and through the haze, she could hear Royce cheering her on in the background. She launched herself in the air, intending to punch him repeatedly in the face, but Royce snagged her around the waist before she could get any air time. She wanted to scream, and wail, and beat the ever-loving shit out this abomination of a man.
“Let me have the fucker! I will show him pain!” she screamed. Somewhere in the back of her mind, she knew she needed to remain calm, but the thought of her daughter with Enri, that malicious bastard, sent her into a fit of utter rage. With swift movements, Royce was in front of Hedrick. He had the other man off his feet and up against the wall by his neck. He stood there as the other man struggled for breath, not saying a word. He tilted his head to the side as if listening.
Royce looked over his shoulder at her. What she saw froze her in a moment of fear. An animal so dark and feral, she took a step back into the wolf’s personal space. Royce wasn’t a man at all. He was something else, something else entirely. The bones in his face were more pronounced; more savage. Eyes that once smiled, stared at her with a cold calculating gleam. Royce was not someone you wanted on the opposing team.
“Your daughter is on her way to a cottage where Marcus is holding her. He intends to bleed her out for her half-breed blood.” There was a distinctive snap and then Hedrick was falling on the floor in a slump.
The others were still out fighting off the horde of Death Walkers as Jesminda took off after Royce and Draven’s wolf. She didn’t know where they were going, and her fucking ankle was still tweaked. But as long as Royce knew the location of the house, they’d get to Faith in time, before Marcus drained her. She hoped.
“Jes, stay here with Draven, he’s not going to change form until we’re able to track down Marcus. Once we get Faith back, I’ll instruct Bells to take her to Draven’s mother’s house where she’ll be safe.”
Everything would have to be okay. She needed it to be. They just had to get Faith back, no matter what. Jes didn’t want to stay with the wolf, she wanted to be out there with them searching for Faith. In the end she got her way, Draven had taken off in the direction of the vehicle. He didn’t wait for instructions, he just fled. Dietrich and the others killed
the remaining Death Walkers and Royce looked pissed.
“Well, now you get to come along.”
He pointed at the others and told them to follow.
18
Draven was primal in his beast form. He saw everything in shades of red, orange, purple, blue, and yellow. His lack of human vision didn’t downgrade his ability. No, instead, it heightened his sense of sight. The thermal light did what it was meant to do, and that was track heat signatures. Add a touch of werewolf and what did you get? A wolf who could not only track thermal light from those trying to escape him, but could also track past signatures that were left behind. They would be faint, but he would still be able to detect them.
The wolf did that now as he ran in the direction of the metal contraption with wheels. In the darkest corner of his mind, his human half called it an SUV. Fuck an SUV, it was a metal contraption that held his pup. Whoever dared to drive it with her trapped inside would pay the consequences. He didn’t care about the humans that were trailing behind him. They were following in their own metal contraption. Didn’t matter if some were more than mere mortals, as far as the wolf was concerned, he was the top of the food chain and everything and everyone else was beneath him. He was from House Canidae. His kind was of the original strand. They came straight from Lycaon, the bastard King of Arcadia himself, who’d attempted to feed Zeus the human flesh of his son to test the God’s power. What a fuck-up that had been.
He should thank him for the curse. It had evolved over the years. Draven wasn’t a shifter but a true Lycaon. His race was feared above all other shifters and most immortals. There was nothing but the Gods themselves that could cause serious damage to him, and as they had been silent for over a millennium.
There was a concentrated patch of red straight ahead. It meant they’d stopped there for a moment, why, he didn’t care. His job was to see his young found and extracted from the mortals who dared to take her. Who would even think to drain Faith? She was of his blood, his line, she wasn’t a half-breed as his human half suspected. She was a full-blooded Canidae. His genes trumped her mother’s mortal ones.
Fate had a funny way of picking your mate, but it was of no concern to him now. He used to feel humans were the roaches of the earth, overpopulating the world, littering the lands with its filth. His grandfather had once spoken of a time when the earth was not so dirty, not so clouded by modern things. Draven’s people had ached for such a time to return. Knew once the land had its share of abuse, it would cleanse itself of its dirty inhabitants. Now he’d fallen for the very thing he his people disliked. A Human. He’d strayed from his people’s law by taking up in the mortal world. For a time, he was shunned because of it. His father would see his ways were not erroneous, but calculated. He’d integrated himself into modern society for a purpose. Did he mean to make friends along the way? No, but that couldn’t be helped, friends were allies, and allies were needed to fight this current foe that now plagued the team.
His legs carried him farther and faster as the trail became lit with dark reds and bright oranges. He was getting close. They were going down this concrete path in the metal contraption, and it seemed they’d pulled off the road. Did they know he was coming for them? He hoped not because he had plans. Plans that involved ripping into their chests and devouring their hearts while they were still beating. The thought alone had him salivating in anticipation for what was to come. He liked his meat raw.
Death in all forms was music to his ears. His breathing didn’t labor as he dug deep into the pavement. His effort at finding the spot where the contraption had stopped for the evening ended with a progressive result. There was a slight curve to the beaten path, and if an untrained eye weren’t searching for it, they would have continued forward, but not the wolf. He could see the heat signatures as they trailed off and down to what looked like a small cottage. There was smoke piping out of the brick structure. It sounded almost too quiet, though he saw shapes moving in the window. A snap of twig sounded in the brush behind him, and the wolf turned, pouncing on the intruder with a fierce growl.
“Fuck, man! Get your big ass paw off my throat. It’s us, fool.” Royce choked out.
The wolf was reluctant to let the man up. His interest was on the occupants of the house, not the group behind him.
Calmly, the wolf released the other male called Royce. There was no need to change back to his pitiful human form. The beast and man were both on board with that plan. This wasn’t the time for waiting, or for someone to come up with what humans called a plan. This was much more than that; this was a personal attack on him and his skills to protect what was his. One of the most sacred laws of his kind was to protect their own. Draven’s wolf didn’t feel he’d done that law any fucking justice. But now he had his chance to redeem himself. Redemption was coming, and it was in the form of his massive jaws and canines as they struck his opponents. He was going to kill the humans. Fuck them up beyond all recognition and piss on their insides.
The wolf let out a fierce growl and bounded out of the woods, heading straight towards the cottage. He knew the others, led by Royce, were following closely behind. He had to give them credit. They had fierce determination, and it wasn’t often he ran into a male with sure, steady courage. Royce wasn’t a shifter, he was something more, and Draven’s wolf had to give deference to that, as well. The wolf knew a lot of things, more than he sometimes let on. But the male had saved his mate. He would respect him. Royce’s plans aligned with his to save his pup.
The branches were silent under his paws as he raced towards the cottage. It was like the forest knew to be silent beneath his feet. The others behind him weren’t so lucky. Their feet made too much noise, and the wolf in him couldn’t take their ignorance any longer. With a quick jerk of his body, he was facing the followers, growling a warning for them to stop.
“He doesn’t want us to go any farther; he says we’re too noisy,” Royce said so the pathetic excuse for immortals and his mate would understand why he was so angry. His pup was there, waiting for him. He could smell her fear, but underneath that fear was her determination. His pup knew she would be rescued. It was a strong sting in his nose that brought him comfort.
“Fuck him,” said the tall, dark male the wolf vaguely remembered as Dietrich. If the two-legged mammal didn’t shut his jaws, he had no problem helping him do it. Draven took a step closer to the man and got up in his face with his snout. He sniffed him out, and what came back was pure hatred. So, the other man didn’t like him. Too fucking bad, his human side responded. He didn’t give two shits about him either.
“Fucking try it wolf! I’d be more than happy to take on the responsibility of stepfather and husband to Miss Sexy over there.” His head nodded in the direction of his mate, who sniffed disdainfully at the air. If he could smile right now, he would. Instead, he turned from the other male and growled one more warning before he took off into the dark.
As he made his way to the structure, the lights on the cottage suddenly went dark. There was no way they could smell him or sense him, but the lights had gone out. If they wanted to play hide and seek, then he would flush them out. The wolf sent up a fierce howl. The trees swayed at his baying, the air growing chilly. He shifted into his half-were, half-human form and crept along the edge of the drive, sliding in and out of shadows. He could hear the beating of two hearts, where was the third human? Something snuck up behind him with a predator’s grace. He wasted no time as he spun around, thrusting his clawed hand into the warm flesh. His hand came through the other side and the air felt chilled from the warmth of the blood that dripped from his hand. The face of his attacker was one he did not expect to see. One he knew, one he was very familiar with.
# # #
Jesminda gasped when the dark figure crept up behind Draven as he’d snuck around the side of the house. Bells had to grip her arm and hold her back. She knew her actions weren’t thought out, but what did Draven expect her to do? Her baby was in that house. Faith could be hurt, or wor
se. Royce and Dietrich approached the house from the side as Draven laid the body to the ground.
“I’m going to slide through the front door,” Bells whispered in her ear as she silently walked past. What the fuck was she going to do? Stand there? Not contribute? Sure, she was human, but that was her baby in there. She watched as Bells snuck up to the house quietly, her steps quick as she glided her way towards the door. Watching her friend in action made her nervous and twitchy, envious. She wanted to be the one to rescue her baby. Was she even still sleeping? Royce had put her under, but now she had been away for some time.
Jes crouched lower as the lights from the house flickered back on. She ducked into the brush and watched as Bells and the rest of them blended into the darkness. Bells made it to the front door but leapt at the last minute onto the roof and watched. A tall, dark figure took a step onto the porch. He looked left, then right before he called out the name Oliver. It couldn’t be their Oliver. He wouldn’t be mixed up in this. His daughter had been taken. She couldn’t see who the man on the porch was because he was hidden by the shadows. It wasn’t Marcus, that much she knew. The front door cracked wider and light spilled onto the porch, illuminating the figure. The hairs on the back of her neck and arms rose in alarm. This man wasn’t human, he was immortal.