The Shepard's Agony

by Mandy Rosko

  “No!” he hissed, yanking her away. “No!”

  Gwen struggled, forcing herself not to scream at him since it would give them away. “Let go of me! Let go!” she hissed back.

  “Stop it! Stop,” Shepard said in her ear. She was too strong for him to hold her back for very long. If she’d kept that up for much longer, he would’ve had no choice but to let her go. “If you go out there they’ll kill you. Then, they’ll kill your friends and I won’t be able to stop them.”

  Gwen immediately went lax in his grip when his words sank horrifically deep. That was right, when the shooting started she’d forgotten. If she went out there, he wouldn’t be able to help her or her friends, just as she wouldn’t be able to help him. They would both be pitted against each other and someone would surely die.

  “What are we going to do?” she asked in a small voice. John had come looking for her and Di had tagged along. If anything happened to either of them, it would be her fault. And, if one of David’s brothers were hurt … what would he think of her? It seemed that neither of them had any choice but to stay out of it.

  “We’ll wait until they leave, then sneak off. It’s all we’ve got to work with so it’s what we’ll do,” he said, loosening his grip on her arms but not releasing her. For a few small seconds, he held her close. She allowed herself the small comfort and leaned her back against his chest.

  Gwen wondered why she couldn’t bring herself to hate him. She wanted to, everything would be so much easier if she did. He betrayed her in the worst possible way, used her and left her, then attacked her family and kidnapped her. But, what he was doing now, protecting her, it spoke against everything he did in the past. If she were heartless enough, she would have struggled harder, escaped to John and told him that David was actually a Shepard and then collect the reward money on his head.

  Gwen mentally played out that scenario, shivering at the thought. She then reached her hands up to hold his arms closer around her.

  She could never do that.

  Groaning with the thought, Gwen turned and wrapped her arms around his neck.

  Shepard was having thoughts similar to Gwen’s. He wished that he wasn’t a hunter and that she wasn’t a werewolf. Everything would have been so much simpler if they’d been born into normal families. But, no, they had to be different. Worse still, they had to be different from each other.

  Never mind what his father would do if he found out that his youngest son had fallen in love with one of the creatures he’d sworn to wipe from the face of the Earth.

  “I think they’re gone,” he said finally, wanting very much to continue holding her, but knowing he needed to check to be sure they’d left.

  “I can still hear them,” she whispered.

  “Can you tell where they are with your hearing?”

  “Not too far from here. John keeps trying to circle back. He can smell me in here with you.”

  Gwen was amazed he’d been able to track her at all if she’d been in a truck. David must have carelessly left the windows down in his haste to escape with her. Nothing that would leave a very fresh scent with the traffic on the highway, no matter how few cars there were at such an hour, but it would explain why it had taken him so long to find her.

  “Then, we need to leave now. They might see us, but we can’t stay here,” he said.

  Gwen nodded. He was right, she had to go. She couldn’t stay to help her packmates kill his brothers and he couldn’t stay to do the same. She didn’t care if John or Dianna saw her, she was technically a hostage, but what if the Shepards saw David? What reason would he have to run away from them?

  She asked him this question while he opened the door and poked his head out to be sure all was clear.

  “Then, I’ll have a lot of explaining to do,” he said, grabbing her by the wrist, he pulled her outside and toward the truck. The night air was cool on her face and smelled wonderful and fresh compared to the dusty motel room Gwen was glad to finally be leaving.

  They both ran to the driver’s side of the truck.

  Shepard raised a brow at her. “I’m driving,” he said.

  “This is my dad’s truck, you wouldn’t get ten miles without it breaking down on you. I’ll drive.”

  “But …”

  She could tell he was struggling with the idea of letting her drive and fought the urge to stamp her foot or maybe even punch him. They didn’t have the time for his problems with letting women drive.

  “Go already,” she snapped.

  “Fine,” Shepard muttered, running around to the passenger side and jumping in.

  As long as she kept the truck running, he was fine with having her drive. He didn’t want to have to pull over into the next motel again anyway.

  Gwen climbed in the truck, suddenly halting with the key halfway in the ignition, her mouth parted.

  “What is it?” David asked as Gwen jerked out of her daze and started the truck.

  “It’s nothing.”

  ***

  Hunched low to the ground in the bushes, John growled an angry rumble deep in his chest when Gwen climbed into the driver’s seat with the human who’d taken her. He didn’t know what she was doing, but he had no doubt she was being forced to do it.

  Gwen! he called to her mentally, watching her stall her actions for a second before she started the truck and drove off, ignoring his call.

  It was easy enough to figure out that the man with her was a hunter. What his intentions were with Gwen was still unknown, as was what he was blackmailing her with to make her comply with him.

  Another gunshot sounded and he yowled when his ear exploded.

  Shot, he was shot. John dashed toward the nearest cover he could find to inspect the damage. He brought a paw up to rub against his ear, suppressing a whine with the horrible sting. His ear was gone.

  ***

  Gwen’s skin crawled when she heard the shot. Something bad happened, but she couldn’t go back and find out.

  Shepard reached a hand out to touch her shoulder, keeping the other on his gun in case he would need it to defend himself, from her. Luckily, she kept her eyes on the road and welcomed the comforting touch.

  Shepard didn’t say anything, allowing her to drive in peace, both wondering what their next move would be until an idea came to Gwen. She jumped with enthusiasm and shared it with him.

  “We’re going to a vampire’s house?”

  She didn’t expect David to understand. Vampires and werewolves were natural born enemies. Like oil and water, the two didn’t mix. But, Evey was different. She wasn’t born a vampire, she was turned, and she wasn’t raised with the prejudices that the others were, not to mention she lived in the area. She could help them by sending a message to Bill and her father. For a fair price.

  “Where does she live?” David asked.

  Gwen told him. Though she’d never been there herself, the house was conveniently close to their usual Moon Night spot, only a twenty minute drive. Evey had given her the address the last time they’d seen each other, which, once Gwen stopped to think about it, was nearly a year ago now. Would she even still live there?

  “How did you and a vampire ever end up being friends?” he asked.

  Gwen was glad he was talking, anything to take her mind off what she was driving away from.

  “We met a few years back when the pack was having trouble with a coven of witches. Werewolf fur and skin are supposed to be very potent ingredients for potions and spells …” Why was she explaining that to him, she didn’t know. Of course he knew about it.

  Shepard swallowed and nodded, but didn’t say anything for fear of upsetting her. Selling werewolf fur was the reason his family stayed in the hunting business all those years.

  “Well, anyway, Evey was having some of the same trouble. She had a warlock on her trail who wanted to pull out her fangs with a pair of pliers.”

  Shepard flinched in sympathy. Feeling his teeth with his tongue, he was grateful they were there. He understoo
d the problem immediately. Vampire fangs were even more precious on the black market than werewolf fur, mainly because most vampires had a habit of being filthy rich and capable of avoiding such things either through their own strength or the power of those they’d manipulate around them. Most of the time, werewolf pelts were actually sold to the vampires, the bastards.

  Jacob’s teeth were all he had since he could no longer hypnotize people after Garrett put those needles in his eyes. A rare enough talent already, and Jacob could never do it again.

  “We worked together. And, since Evey was a witch before she was turned, she had some inside information to help us … uh, solve the problem. We’ve kept in touch since then.”

  So they killed all the witches, Shepard thought before picking up on what she’d said.

  “Wait, you said she was a witch before she was turned?” He didn’t understand. How did that work? Even as a vampire it didn’t explain why she would go against her own kind.

  Gwen shook her head, knowing where his thoughts had run off to. “She was a Wiccan witch, not the other kind. She’s alright.”

  “Like it matters,” Shepard muttered. He’d worked with enough witches to know that he didn’t like them. The last witch he’d seen had been an old blind woman with a cackling laugh and a crooked nose; classic look for a witch. The woman had poisoned Jimmy just to see how long it would take for her new potion to kill him.

  He wasn’t the kind to hit a woman, not an old, blind woman either, but he did what he had to do to get her to hand over the antidote. Jimmy spent a month sick in bed after that.

  Some witches weren’t born into the practice, they had to learn it and they were never as strong as those with natural talent. In Shepard’s eyes, anyone who wanted to learn it was not to be trusted and he wasn’t about to stop to get to know anyone to find out if their talent was natural. It was all bad news.

  “Witches might be human, but they’re still dark creatures,” he said.

  Gwen’s eye twitched. She could feel bitter emotions coming from him and she didn’t like them. “Dark creatures?”

  “Completely dangerous, you shouldn’t trust any of them—”

  The tires screeched and Shepard briefly saw white when his forehead smashed into the dashboard.

  He hadn't been wearing his seatbelt and the first thing he did after grabbing the spot on his forehead that was flaring with pain was curse.

  “Ah! Fuck! What the—?”

  The next thing he knew, he was in the air, thrown out of the truck.

  Damn. He let his guard down and forgot about her strength.

  Opening his eyes, Shepard looked up and saw Gwen’s angry face leaning over the seat and glaring down at him.

  “I happen to be one of those dark creatures you think can’t be trusted!”

  Shepard tensed as he realized his latest mistake.

  “I didn’t mean—!”

  “You can stay out here and walk, you asshole!” Gwen slammed the door and locked it before Shepard could grab for the handle. She then sped off, kicking up rocks and dirt at him as she escaped.

  Shepard could only stand there and watch her go, kicking himself for being a fool.

  What had he been thinking? Shooting off at the mouth like that when he knew how she’d react. What did he expect her to do? Join in and agree with him? Of course not.

  Shepard sighed when the tail lights of the old truck went out of sight. He could never be with Gwen, but if he wanted his last memories of her to be good ones then he had to accept that she was different. Not human, but not bad.

  Shepard frowned and sat down on the pavement, crossing his legs to think.

  He loved her and, despite everything, he still wanted to be with her. If she really was the wonderful person he thought she was, then didn’t that mean he had to give the same chance he was giving her to the other Weres? He didn’t think it was right to kill them, but that didn’t mean it was easy trying to erase years of conditioning by his father and brothers. However, if he wanted her forgiveness, he would have to.

  It was probably best that she threw him out.

  Spitfire. He grinned at the thought.

  If she hadn’t been born a werewolf, she would have been a wildcat. Still, somewhere inside himself, he really doubted she would leave him with so many dangers out searching for him. All he had to do was sit and wait for her return. Hearing a howl off in the distance, he checked that his gun was in its holder, the one that was loaded, and silently hoped she wouldn’t take her time getting back.

  He waited a few minutes and began wondering if he was wrong in assuming that she would come back for him. It was then that he spotted a van on the road.

  Shepard rose to his feet and stepped out of the way. Hiding his gun beneath his wife-beater shirt, he waved his arms in the hopes that the driver would give him a lift.

  It wasn’t slowing down. He also didn’t notice that it was a black truck and not a van until it passed right by him, the faces of his brothers in the windows.

  They were going after Gwen.

  “No, no, stop!” he roared, but they left him in their dust. He tried to think of a way he could warn Gwen, but she didn’t so much as have a cell phone on her and there was no way he could outrun two trucks to get to her first.

  A low growl behind him said he was no longer alone. Shepard spun and saw a large wolf, head bent and teeth bared, snarling at him before it lunged.

  ***

  Gwen’s foot held the gas pedal to the floor, trying to outrace her fury. It was turning out to be an even bigger speed demon than she was. She banged her hand on the steering wheel and pulled over to the side of the road. She continued to hit the wheel again until it dented, then clutched it and seethed.

  She needed to breathe, needed to calm down. She couldn’t leave him back there no matter how mad at him she was.

  He’s a hunter. He’ll be fine.

  She shook it away, it didn’t matter; to leave him would be the kind of behavior he was weary of in her. Dark, dangerous, and uncaring. Uncaring was the last thing she was where he was concerned, even if she didn’t want to admit it.

  Gwen put her chin on the dented wheel at the defeating thought. Love or no love, caring, whatever, she was afraid of him. Her pride didn’t want to admit to that either, it didn’t want to own up to being afraid of anything. As a hunter, his first priority should have been to kill her first and ask questions later. Hunters were the kind of people she grew up being warned against. Normal children were taught not to get into cars with strangers, she and the others were taught what the signs of hunters were. Children or not, they would kill them.

  Witches, she could handle. Vampires, she could handle. Zombies were the easiest to handle. Unlike hunters, witches and vampires weren’t always out to kill werewolves and each other. Some of them were even nice, like Evey, when she wasn’t in a mood. Hunters were single minded and hell bent on turning anything deemed not human into a trophy.

  But, David wasn’t like that. She didn’t even know he was a hunter until less than an hour ago. Plus, she still felt something for him. What was she going to do with all that?

  Gwen shook her head. No, hunter or not, she couldn’t leave him. John and Di would kill him if they found him, if they got away from the other Shepards that is.

  Gwen wiped her eyes, surprised to feel moisture there. Her hands were wet now, so she dried her face with the sleeve of her shirt and put the truck back into drive.

  It sputtered and whirred, moved a few feet when she tried to turn, and then died.

  She was shocked into stupidity.

  What? It couldn’t die on her, it never died on her! She tried again, but this time the truck moved a few inches and then went to truck heaven.

  Gwen put the truck back into park, threw the door open, stomped to the hood, and checked the engine.

  It wasn’t something she could fix on her own. She needed a jump start and the highway was dead.

  No wonder David pulled into a motel. So
much for being the only one who could keep the truck running.

  Sighing, Gwen pat the hood affectionately and began walking back in David’s direction. She stopped when headlights appeared far down the road, the tiny hairs on the back of her neck stood up.

  Danger, danger was coming.

  Get off the road! She screeched at herself before dashing into the woods. Her nerves were kicking in and, after years of having them come to the rescue, she trusted them.

  She ripped her clothes away and prepared to change, praying she hadn’t been seen. It was bad enough she left the truck back on the road. She should have hidden it!

  One second she was on two feet, the next she was running on four paws, ignoring the twigs of trees that whipped at her face and snout. She didn’t think David was with his brothers. That meant he was still on the road and she had to get to him.

  ***

  Shepard ducked and rolled when the wolf lunged. He reached for his gun, confused when it wasn’t there. What the …?

  Looking up, he was stunned to see it in the mouth of the wolf that had jumped at him.

  Great.

  He pulled a hunting knife out of his boot to compensate.

  “I don’t want to kill you,” he said, knowing it was probably a friend of Gwen’s.

  The wolf snorted as though it didn’t believe him.

  Fine then, come on. Shepard readied himself when something caught his eye.

  Shepard raised his head when a woman with fire red hair walked out from behind the trees, completely shameless in her nudity.

  His eyes widened. What was she doing here?

  A bark brought him back to the fight. Shepard looked up in time to see the wolf in mid jump, jaws open. He did another duck and roll, but it was one second too late.

  Shepard was on one knee, inspecting the scratch on his arm with wide eyes and praying it was from a twig on the ground.

  Realistically, he knew the Were had scratched him.

  “Wait! John!” Di called, rushing forward and standing in the middle of the two. “Don't kill him!”

  The wolf cocked its head before growling its disagreement, trying to circle around her.