Since I’d managed to catch her off guard, I was determined to throttle her until the chair fell apart. I felt the rage taking over me. The beast I fought so hard to deny had once again emerged. Alfred’s vaccine may have prevented me from taking on the form of the beast, but it had not prevented me from becoming one. Every time I looked in the mirror, I saw the form that my beast took. And I never let myself forget it.
My eyes burned and I felt a rush surge through my muscles. Though my form had not changed, I knew my strength had. I was always stronger since my attack, but during fits of rage my strength took on superhuman proportions. Now we were on a level playing field.
My voice filled the hallway with a fierce battle cry as I slammed the chair into Mallory’s body. Over and over again I pummeled her until I felt the wood begin to crack beneath my hands. Blood oozed from the corner of her mouth and still I pulverized her with the heavy chair. A strangled yelp escaped her muzzle and I bashed her head into the tile floor. The skin peeled back from around her eye socket and some of her teeth hit the floor. The chair splintered to the point that I was holding what amounted to a club and still I beat her into the ground. I think I might have stood there all night if Bade hadn’t stopped me.
On a downward swing I suddenly realized my club was stuck above my head. I looked back and saw Bade’s large furry hand holding what was left of the chair.
“I think you got her,” he said.
In all honesty, Mallory looked dead. All that crap in the movies about werewolves turning back to their human form when they die is bullshit. A transformation requires life energy. And guess what you don’t have when you’re dead? That’s right, life energy. Whatever form you die in, you stay in. Some werewolves may change back before they die in an effort to spare their family the horror of knowing what they were. That’s the best way I could explain how that rumor got started.
Bade tossed the remains of the chair onto the floor.
“Let’s find your friend.”
It seemed strange to hear a still discernible human voice coming from a wolf’s face. In all the years I’d seen and killed werewolves, I’d never actually spoken to one in half wolf form before. It was a scary, but strangely entertaining experience.
We left Mallory’s body lying in the hall beside Jenna’s head and Shawn’s penis. Bade followed me to the lab, but Richard wasn’t there. Bade began to sniff the air.
“Stop it, that’s creepy,” I said.
“I smell something strange,” he said.
“Stranger than the werewolf carcass, the severed head, and the penis lying in the hall?”
His laugh was a strange and unearthly rumble.
“I smell …” He sniffed again. “A reptile of some sort.”
“Reptile?” I thought for a minute. “Mallory studies snakes. She has several in her lab.”
“Where’s that?”
“Just around the corner.”
We entered Mallory’s laboratory and I watched as Bade sniffed around the glass tanks where her snakes resided.
“That’s not it,” he growled and sniffed the air again. “Something bigger.” He paused. “Something poisonous.”
“Well, I can’t imagine what it could—”
“Lilith!”
I froze.
“It came from this direction.” Bade pushed past me, ducking in order to fit through the doorway.
We moved cautiously around the next corner and into the lab that belonged to the head of the science department, Dr. Bill Williams. There I found Richard, chained to the wall and bleeding from the head. I moved quickly toward him and checked the pulse along his throat.
“He’s still breathing.”
“Someone must have knocked him out when he called for help,” Bade suggested.
Seeing Richard like that took all the fight out of me. I just wanted to take him home and take care of him. I positioned myself underneath his arm and asked Bade, “Can you give me a hand with these?” I motioned to the chains that held Richard’s wrists above his head.
Bade stepped in front of me and grabbed the chains. It was at this inopportune moment that I noticed Bade was naked. I’d heard his clothes ripping from his body as he changed, but it hadn’t registered. I’d also seen him mostly from the back. And let’s face it, if you’ve seen one werewolf’s ass, you’ve seen them all.
Real werewolves also vary from the movie variety in the fact that they still have genitalia. Somehow in the movies they always manage to lose all male or female characteristics when they transform. However, the wolf who stood before me that night was clearly male, and I’d clearly taken notice.
“It doesn’t bite,” Bade teased in his deep werewolf voice.
I couldn’t help but smile as I responded, “You sure about that?”
He leaned in and looked at me closely with his hand still on the chains.
“What do you think ... honestly?”
Since he’d asked, I decided to give Bade my honest appraisal.
“I think it’s scary.”
He laughed, and again it was a bizarre sound coming from a werewolf.
“And what exactly is it that you are frightened of?” he asked.
“Are you serious? You could knock someone out with that thing.”
He snatched the chains free from the wall and Richard’s weight fell on me. Bade reached out and took Richard from me carefully so as not to scratch him.
“Don’t worry. I’ve never used it to hurt anyone.”
“Maybe,” I teased. “But if you hit me with it, I think that would still count as assault with a deadly weapon.”
Bade laughed again as I turned to look around the room. There was nothing overly remarkable about Dr. Williams’ lab except the chains that had been on the back wall. Indeed, there was nothing remarkable about the man himself, and I wondered how it was that Richard had ended up in Bill’s lab.
As I was looking around I heard a terrified whimper and knew that Richard was awake. Bade was holding him like a groom about to carry a bride across the threshold and Richard looked horrified. It was evident that Bade attempted to smile, but it came across more as a baring of teeth and Richard screamed.
“It’s all right,” I said, walking toward them.
It seemed Richard had just noticed I was in the room.
“That reaction never ceases to entertain me,” Bade rumbled.
“Is he a friend of yours?” Richard asked, staring wide eyed at Bade once again.
I knew that the enemy of my enemy was supposed to be my friend. But, Marco was no longer my enemy and Bade was not my friend. However, he wasn’t there to hurt me either. Thankfully he answered the question, because I couldn’t think of how to explain things.
“Tonight I am.”
Richard still looked pale, but his eyes didn’t pop out so much after Bade’s response.
“Can you stand on your own?” Bade asked.
“Let me try,” Richard said, obviously eager to get away from Bade.
Richard staggered a bit at first and Bade took a step forward for support. As Bade gripped his shoulders to steady him, Richard looked down. By the astonished choking sound he made, I knew exactly what Richard was looking at even before he said, “And now I know why you hang out with him.”
Bade laughed as I said, “Shut up, Richard. That goes for you too.” I pointed at Bade. “What happened here tonight?”
Richard looked scared again as he said, “We should get out of here.”
“Why? What else is here?”
Just then Mallory staggered through the door and I almost screamed along with Richard. She looked horrible. I’d beaten her much worse than I thought. Several teeth were missing from her battered muzzle, and one eye hung out of its socket. There were places on her shoulders and across the side of her face where the bone showed through the skin.
Out of the corner of my eye I saw Bade take a step in front of Richard. Mallory sprung for me and my strike was a blur. It looked like I’d backhanded h
er. But, in one fluid movement I had released the blade on my right forearm and cut her throat.
She fell to the floor choking and gagging. I moved closer to finish the job and Richard cried out, “NO!”
“What? You don’t want me to finish her?”
“No.” He stepped from behind Bade as he said, “I want her to suffer.”
“Richard …”
“Let the bitch choke to death,” he insisted. He walked over and spat in Mallory’s mangled face. The sadistic gleam in his eyes was frightening. I hadn’t known Richard Stacey was capable of such hatred. But, if subjected to enough bullshit, I guess we all are.
I stood there staring in shock at a side of Richard I’d never seen before. Deep down, we’re all capable of violence if we get pushed far enough. But, I never thought of Richard as being the type for revenge. It sickened me to think what he must have been subjected to in order to provoke such a reaction out of one of the kindest men I knew. It hurt to see him like that. I knew what it felt like to realize the world wasn’t always a nice place. That people didn’t always do the right thing. Something told me this was Richard’s first taste of what true evil was capable of and it scared him.
“She tried to kill me tonight,” he explained while Mallory strangled on her own blood at our feet. “But he stopped her.”
“Who?”
“Bill.”
“Dr. Williams? Where is he?”
“Don’t look for him” Richard pleaded. “With any luck he’s gone.”
“Richard what—?”
“I’ll explain later. Take me home.”
Mallory jerked violently, and then stopped moving for good.
“Is there another exit?” Bade asked.
“Yes. Why?”
“Did you know the guard?” he asked Richard.
“Yeah, I did.”
“There are some things downstairs you might want to avoid.”
“Shit.” Richard sighed. “They killed Shawn?”
Bade and I didn’t answer, and I guess that was answer enough.
“There’s another side exit at this end of the hall.” Richard pointed behind him.
*****
On our way down the stairs Bade froze suddenly, causing me to crash into him, and Richard who’d been right on my heels nearly fell.
“What?” I asked.
“You hear that?”
I did hear something and it was growing louder. There was a fight outside and it sounded nasty. Bade moved to the small window on the door and looked out into the parking lot.
“It’s Kane,” he said. “And some wolf I don’t recognize, not in the rain anyway.”
“Bade, why did you come to see David tonight?” I asked.
“I should tell you some other things first,” he began.
“Why?”
“It’ll all make more sense that way.”
“We may not have much time before he comes back,” Richard insisted.
“You want to run out on that?” As Bade asked this a loud howl and some tearing noises reached our ears and Richard shook his head.
“I’ll be brief,” Bade said. “There are things you need to know while I can still talk, before the beast overtakes me.”
“I don’t even want to know what that means,” Richard grumbled.
“The situation you’re in is my fault, and I’m sorry. I never meant for things to turn out like this.”
“What things?”
“Julie wasn’t always so hateful,” he continued, “once upon a time she was a relatively nice person.”
I hadn’t expected for the subject to turn to Marco’s ex-girlfriend. Just the mention of her name caused me to sneer involuntarily as if a foul stench had reached my nose. I couldn’t seem to help it. I’m a pretty laid back person and normally willing to give people the benefit of the doubt. But, I’d instantly hated Julie, even before I knew who she was.
“What happened?”
“Even at such a distance for so many years, Marco could no longer hide what he felt for you.”
Bade paused and my heart seemed to have moved to my throat. I had no idea that Marco cared so much, or made what he felt so well known. I remembered him saying to me on the balcony, “I’ve got nothing to hide.” I guess he didn’t.
“He and Julie were friends, but she loved him. Marco on the other hand, saw some trace of you in her and that’s why he got involved.”
“What did he see of me in her? No offense Bade, but I hated that woman on sight. Do you see her in me?” I asked.
He looked me up and down appraisingly before answering, “Not really. But she was reasonably attractive and she had red hair.”
He reached out with one clawed hand and stroked my hair tenderly. To my surprise, I didn’t recoil from his touch, or try to stop him. I wanted his honest opinion on something that had bothered me ever since I’d first seen Julie. The fact that I was looking to Bade for honesty says exactly how desperate I was to have someone anyone tell me that I was nothing like this poor dead woman that I despised.
“She could never compare to this captive fire you have here,” he said softly, still stroking my hair. “Or to the fire I see in your eyes. If she was a substitute, and I believe she was, she was a poor one.”
I pulled back slightly. The way Bade touched my hair felt more intimate than it should and it was hardly the time or the place for intimacy. Bade glanced out the window as he spoke, “It got to the point that everyone knew how he felt. The humiliation was too much for Julie. Her hatred for you consumed her.”
“What made Marco finally break things off? I’m assuming that was his decision?”
“Yes.” Bade looked questioningly at me before he continued. “She poisoned your cat.”
Tears I hadn’t known I could still shed welled up in my eyes. It had been a year since my cat died. But, he’d been my companion and I would still prefer his company to most people I knew.
“That bitch killed Conan?” My voice deepened as I spoke, and the burning behind my eyes let me know they were amber. “I’m glad I killed her,” I snarled. “If I’d known, she would have suffered more.”
“I thought you’d feel that way. But believe me when I say the way you took her down could not have been more humiliating.”
I had to agree with Bade to a certain extent. I’d nearly beaten Julie to death a few months ago before breaking her neck in front of thirty or so members of the wolf pack.
“Get to the point,” I prompted.
“That’s when Marco threw her out. He said she’d lost her mind, and he was right. He didn’t put her out of the pack, just out of his private life. When I left, she followed. She couldn’t handle being demoted.”
“I thought she still served as alpha female to the pack?”
“She did, but not his mate.”
I looked confused and Bade added, “He was not kind to her after what she’d done. He waited until the gathering to announce publicly what he thought of her, and it wasn’t pretty.”
“What did he do?” I couldn’t resist asking.
“He let it be known that he was no longer in any way associated with her. He told the pack what she’d done to you and how that proved her to be mentally unstable. Then he announced that she would serve as alpha female only until such time as he found a replacement.”
“Damn, I was hoping for a flogging,” I said sarcastically.
“That’s harsh,” Richard said from behind me and Bade agreed.
“I thought this was going to be brief.”
“I’m summing it up as best I can,” he insisted.
“Bade, I wanted to know, it’s just that we don’t have much time.”
“Well, I would have chosen a better opportunity, but you and I aren’t exactly on speaking terms.”
“True. Go on.”
“I didn’t mean for you to be treated so roughly when you and the cop were kidnapped. That was her cousin with the baseball bat.” Bade did not maintain eye contact while he admit
ted this.
“It’s a shame she didn’t live to see him get his face smashed in,” I snarled.
“I knew you could take Julie, that’s why I set it all up.”
“Set what up?”
“You know what I plan to do.” It wasn’t a question.
I growled at him and surprised even myself with that reaction. It was a warning. I did know what he planned to do, and I would not tolerate discussion of harming Marco in my presence. With a pang of guilt I remembered telling Marco I was not his to protect, yet I was willing to take on a full grown alpha male in his defense. What I’d told him was true, but it had hurt me to say it.
“Let me finish,” he pressed. “My idea was that if you killed Julie then you could be Marco’s queen. And once I’d taken care of Marco ... you could be mine.”
“Son of a bitch. This is all your fault.”
“I didn’t know all the women in the pack would go crazy,” he insisted.
“What did you think they would do, cheer?”
“Actually, I thought they all fancied me.”
“A conceited werewolf?” Richard asked.
In spite of the situation I laughed at Bade’s reaction. Surely he wasn’t that clueless. But then a more sinister thought crossed my mind.
“What about my blood? Why did you want my blood?”
“Dr. Williams was one of a handful of scientists David Kane introduced me to. I imagine that’s why he called me here tonight.”
“That monster was working for you?!” Richard exclaimed.
“Not any more.”
“What were they working on?” I asked.
“A drug that would suppress the transformation. It would allow someone to keep the heightened senses, prowess, and strength of the wolf, without taking on the beast.”
“So, that’s why you wanted my blood, because I don’t transform.”
“Exactly.”
Bade reached for me, and once again I allowed him to touch me. “I’m sorry that I struck you. But you did draw first blood,” he said softly. Bade was referring to the last time we’d met. He backhanded me after I bit off his silver nipple piercing along with his nipple.
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