Tonight was the night. It was ominous. He didn’t know if he felt the pack and their expectations, or if it was something else. But tonight was definitely the night.
Jenna was on his mind. She’d been hurt last night, Bruce could feel it. She’d stormed away, angry and rejected, and her emotions had tugged at him to run after her, but he’d stood his ground. Dwayne’s words kept playing in his mind and he didn’t know who to believe. Dwayne was never wrong. Sometimes vague, but never wrong. And even though Jenna was the other half of him, he didn’t know if he could trust her.
She’d disliked Tara from the start and she’d mentioned before how she wasn’t a good leader. What if Dwayne had been right in what he’d seen and Jenna was really going to take the opportunity and kill Tara?
A part of him told him that it was ridiculous. It wasn’t who Jenna was. Bruce had known her for five years and he didn’t think her capable of doing something like that. But then again, why would Dwayne have seen it if it wasn’t true?
He took a deep breath and started walking into the trees. He forced himself into a bear before nightfall. It was uncomfortable, like wearing jeans to bed, but he had to hunt now if he wanted strength to get through the war. There was no telling when the Assassins would attack and the moment the sun was down it could start. Bruce wanted to be able to keep control of his animal, and fight for his life and for the pack’s.
He didn’t get as many animals as he wanted, but when night fell he shifted back to human form and made his way through the trees. There was enough power in his blood to do something, at least.
The others all arrived at the same time. There was tension in the air. Every single one of them was nervous in the least. Rosa was downright scared – it showed in the way she clutched Stephen’s hand. Lori was ready for a fight, she always was, and tonight she could put her bloodlust to good use. What worried Bruce was that Tara looked nervous. If she didn’t have a handle of things, they were in trouble.
“They’re on their way,” Dwayne said, cocking his head as if he was listening. I would say another two hours. Maybe less. They stayed on the plateau. They didn’t want to meet the Assassins. An unexpected attack would have been better but they needed the power circle to be at an advantage, and they wanted to keep it away from the village.
Bruce wanted it that way to save them. Tara wanted it to keep their war hidden. They had different motivations but it came to the same thing.
It ended up being less than two hours. The night suddenly became very dark, like the moon had disappeared, and suddenly they first of the Assassins moved through the trees. They were like shadows in the night, thin and tall, but they moved like killers. They all had weapons but there were no guns. They fought fair – if being outnumbered five to one could be called fair. There were so many of them Bruce stopped counting when they attacked him.
The others were already fighting, and Bruce was suddenly facing two. They had long knives, with thin blades that were slightly curved. These blades were custom made. They weren’t commercially available anywhere. They could reach the heart and they were so sharp they slid through bone like it was flesh. They were damn dangerous.
Bruce came face to face with Darren, the Assassin that had been with Jenna, and his hatred overrode everything else. He lunged for the Assassin and tackled him to the ground.
“Not so tough now that you don’t have a team to hold me down and beat me up, eh?” Bruce said. He straddled Darren, knees on either side of his chest pushing down the hand with the knife, and he was slugging him through the face.
Blood blossomed from Darren’s nose but his eyes stayed mocking and he had that smirk all the time, even though there was blood on his teeth and his one eye started swelling shut.
The other Assassin jumped Bruce and Bruce had stop his punching Darren to avoid the other knife that was too close to his chest. The Assassin made a strange growling sound in his ear, and Bruce imagined it was the human equivalent of what he did. Just to show the difference he growled, and even though he was still in human form the growl was genuine.
Bruce felt the fear. The Assassin on his back was terrified, and that was a downfall that he couldn’t afford. The fear was like food to shifters, and Bruce felt his animal shake itself loose. He struggled to hold his control, and a moment later the bare was crawling out of his skin.
The Assassins both backed up. Darren scrambled away and the other guy was off his back. They were new Assassins, Bruce realized. The change was quick and by the time another, more experienced Assassin attacked Bruce was a bear. He stood on his hind legs and roared into the night.
Two more came running now that Bruce was bigger and stronger, and there were four people with knives all around him now, standing in crouched fighting stances, knives poised and ready to take him out.
Bruce swung his paw through the air and smacked one of the Assassins hard enough for him to fly through the air. The guy hit a tree and crumpled to the ground. There was no time to check if he was conscious. The other three closed in and Bruce spun around, trying to fend off the knives.
He heard the whoosh of the blade, the crunch of the foot in the snow as the Assassin stepped in, and Bruce wasn’t fast enough to avoid the blade. It sliced into the skin on his back and deep into his skin before he managed to twist free. The cut burned immediately and Bruce limped for two strides before regaining his footing.
He stormed the one that had cut him and grabbed his head with both hands. He yanked, and he heard a crack before the body went limp. When Bruce dropped the body he turned. The other Assassin looked at his buddy’s body, limp on the floor, and his face when ashen.
Bruce roared again and the Assassin froze but then he crouched into the stance again. Bruce knew that he could go on all night. He felt the power from their circle, flowing into him as he attacked. Tara was lending and borrowing power to them as it was needed, and she was fighting herself, strong and deadly.
Six of them were dead and the odds had thinned out. There were only eight left now, and six of them.
Suddenly a sharp pain shot into Bruce like he’d been stabbed. But the Assassin he’d been fighting was limp on the floor and there were no others close to him. It felt like Bruce’s lungs had been ripped out. He couldn’t breathe, his blood was so thick his heart struggled to pump it through his body and it felt like a limb had been ripped off.
Bruce crumpled to the ground. His ears were ringing, but through the sound he heard was an awful wail, like someone was dying. When he turned his head he saw a bundle of fur on the ground, matted with blood. Rosa kneeled next to it and she was the one producing the terrible sound, even though she wasn’t injured.
It didn’t take long to put two and two together. Tara was in leopard form and on the back of an Assassin that had a knife covered in thick red blood. He was close to Stephen’s body. The werewolf was dead.
What Bruce had been feeling, the sensation of him being killed himself, had been the loss of a pack member. He felt it as Stephen’s last breath left his body. It was like Bruce’s own breath had run out. Rosa collapsed next to Stephen. She was sobbing, heartbroken. Cleveland fell out of the sky like a dead bird. Lori, also a bear, groaned and then sat down so hard the earth shook, and Bruce felt his own bear retreated, his human returning. The pain was immeasurable.
The last time he’d felt something like this was when bears that were close to him had been killed. But they hadn’t bonded the way his pack had, and losing them had been emotionally painful, but he hadn’t felt it physically.
Bruce wasn’t just in agony, he was paralyzed. The Assassins could do anything now.
Bruce’s bear pulled away completely and his human returned. When he turned his head he saw that the same was happening to all of them, until they were just humans, lying on the ground in twisted shapes. An Assassins jumped Tara. He didn’t have a knife but he wrapped his hands around her neck and started squeezing. She made small whimpering sounds that turned into choking sounds.
And
none of them were able to stop the Assassin from killing their alpha.
Bruce fought the sorrow that paralyzed them all and managed to drag himself toward Tara. It was slow, and he knew without a doubt that he wasn’t going to make it on time. He was going to lose his alpha, and even though he’d wanted that position of power for so long, he couldn’t stand the idea now. Bruce looked around, searching for Dwayne.
He spotted the man between the trees, leaning on as if it was the only thing stopping him from falling over, too.
The Assassin that was on top of Tara was strong. He was the leader, as far as Bruce knew. It was fitting that the one leader killed the other. And it was damn unfair.
From the corner of his eye Bruce saw movement. The blade of a knife gleamed in the moonlight as it lifted. Jenna appeared from the trees, both hands wrapped around the hilt of a knife she must have taken off a dead Assassin. She lifted it high above her head and ran toward Tara.
Bruce reached out his hand.
“No!” he shouted. He couldn’t stand losing another pack member. He couldn’t stand his wife being the reason why his pack had fallen apart. He couldn’t watch Jenna kill Tara.
And at the same time, he couldn’t look away. It was like a car accident – you didn’t want to see it, and the same time you couldn’t stop yourself from watching.
It all happened as if it was slow motion. Jenna brought the blade down, and it sliced through the air with a sound. The knife came down in a straight line, and it landed at the back of the Assassin’s neck. His head slipped off his neck as if it had never been attacked, and blood sprayed all over Tara on the ground. There was a spray of blood on Jenna’s clothes.
Her face was contorted in an animalistic snarl, and only after a couple of seconds did she drop the knife.
The headless body slumped slowly to the side, hands slipping away from Tara’s neck. She sputtered and breathed in sloppily, coughing through the blood. She rolled to the side.
The other Assassins ran. They’d all watched Jenna kill their leader, and they were outnumbered and terrified. They would be back, but not soon.
It was like the sacrifice, the blood spilled, got everyone back in motion again. The shifters weren’t paralyzed. Bruce still hurt, like he was bleeding out, and maybe he was in some places. But his heart was crushed.
Rosa didn’t move. She lay next to Stephen’s body, sobbing. Dwayne came out of the trees and put his hand on her shoulder. She didn’t acknowledge him, but he stayed there with her.
When Bruce reached Jenna she’d fallen to her knees, her hands trembling and she was on the verge of hyperventilating. Her breathing too fast and too shallow, and she stared in horror at the man she’d just killed. Tara had pushed him off her and gotten up. She looked terrible with the blood all over her, matting her hair into little strings and those white animal eyes shining through it all. But she was still alive. Jenna hadn’t killed her.
When Bruce looked at Dwayne he was staring at Tara too. They made eye contact and Dwayne shrugged.
“Hey, it’s okay,” Bruce said to Jenna and put his arm around her shoulders.
“I killed him,” Jenna said. Her voice was just a puff of air. Bruce nodded.
“You saved us all by doing it.”
Jenna nodded, but this was going to haunt her for a long time. Bruce’s first kill had haunted him too, and he was an animal. How much worse was it for a human to take a life, and so brutally, too? But they would be there to help her through it. He would be there, and after the bloodshed and the sacrifice, Jenna had bought the pack’s loyalty.
Tara walked to Rosa where she was a motionless heap on the ground. She kneeled next to her and Bruce felt Tara borrow Rosa some power. It was going to be painful for Rosa for a long time. Losing your mate was the worst thing that could happen to a shifter. But she wouldn’t die if the pack carried her through, and after what they’d been through together, they weren’t just going to let her wither away.
After a couple of minutes, Rosa sat up. Her cheeks were wet with tears, her eyes swollen and she looked smaller and more vulnerable than ever. But she got up and joined the other shifters in a circle.
“Tonight we have won against the shifters,” Tara said. The blood was starting to dry and she was a terrible brown color. She looked toward Jenna.
“Thanks to the human.” She held out her hand and Jenna stepped closer, into the circle. “We are all safe for now. Jenna has saved us from the Assassins and proven loyalty similar to that of a shifter.” She turned to Jenna.
“I am forever in your debt, and the Family accepts you as our own. We acknowledge your place as Bruce’s mate, and as a pack member, and we will protect you and yours as such with all that we are.”
“We will,” everyone around the circle said, including Bruce even though his voice cracked at the end. Tara’s eyes flashed white, but Jenna didn’t cower away. Everyone closed their eyes and tilted their heads to the moon. When Bruce opened his eyes again Jenna was looking at him.
There was no guarantee that the war wouldn’t come back. The Assassins would always hunt them. But Jenna was one of them now, and Bruce could hold onto her for as long as he lived, without feeling guilty about being torn between his Family and his humans.
Murray had stayed true to his word and kept the humans in the night of the full moon. No one had been harmed or even suspected anything.
Bruce and Jenna moved back to town where they were welcomed with open arms. They’d been missed, and they were accepted back into the community like they hadn’t been gone at all. Jenna got her job at the salon back and Bruce worked at the lumberyard again.
But now, when night fell and Bruce walked into the forest to join his Family up in the mountains, Jenna went with him. When the monsters went out to hunt she stayed behind with Dwayne and he taught her how to tap into her sense of power and magic that she already felt. One day she was going to start getting visions, Dwayne said to Bruce once. He’d had a vision about it.
Bruce was just happy that he didn’t have to be so torn anymore. He’d come to the small human town to run away from his past. He’d joined the humans because he hadn’t been able to live in complete isolation, and he’d met a woman that had stolen his heart. It had been five years with a hell of a lot of ups and downs, but they were together now.
The pack accepted his wife, left his people alone, and the Assassins gave Williamsburg a wide berth for now. Things were going well. The shifters protected Jenna as if she were one of them. In a way, she was more one of them than one of the villagers.
Bruce was in the forest after his hunt one morning just before sunrise. He’d hunted most of the night and he was waiting for the power to subside, stop humming in his veins, before he headed home to Jenna. She was waiting for him.
Dwayne found him between the trees and leaned against a trunk like he had all the time in the world. Bruce knew by now that he had something on his mind.
“Things are better now,” the psychic said after a while. “I was wrong about Jenna.”
Bruce shook his head. “Not wrong, like you said. Just vague.” Dwayne nodded. The picture he’d given Bruce had been accurate, the Assassin just hadn’t been in it. Neither of them had spoken about it since the war.
“You’re bringing this up for a reason,” Bruce said. Dwayne nodded.
“I’m never wrong,” he said.
“I know,” Bruce answered.
“You’re going to be a father,” Dwayne said and looked at Bruce with eyes that were empty pits of black. Bruce got that shiver down his spine that accompanied that look. He frowned.
“Jenna hasn’t told me anything,” he countered.
Dwayne shrugged. “She doesn’t know yet.”
He walked into the trees and disappeared as the sun broke over the horizon and set the world on fire.
Chapter 1
Time is relative. Three months without Jenna, when everything had gone haywire in their relationship, had felt like years. And six years had flown by
in the blink of an eye.
When Dwayne had told Bruce that Jenna was pregnant, he’d believed him. Dwayne had been right about everything he’d seen in his visions of the future since Bruce had met him when he’d come to Williamsburg first.
Everything except one. There had been that incident where Dwayne had seen Jenna with a blade and Tara, the alpha, on the ground during a war. Instead of killing Tara, like Dwayne had thought, Jenna had saved her.
And that was where everything had changed.
Jenna had been adopted by the pack even though she was just a human. She was officially Bruce’s mate and they treated and respected her as such. And when the baby had come along during the following fall it just hadn’t been that much of a surprise.
Bruce stepped out of the trees in the inky black of night. It wasn’t going to hold – it was already heading toward dawn and the darkness had an unstable quality to it just because the sun broke over the horizon. Bruce took a deep breath, the cold morning air burning his lungs on the way in.
It was in the middle of summer, but mornings in the Syracuse Mountains were always cold. Even on the hottest days, the highest peaks were still snow capped and ominous in the distance.
Bruce felt the surge of power rushing through his veins. He’d the night hunting as a bear to keep his energy up. There was a time when things started going wrong when there weren’t enough animals to feed the small pack of shifters that lived in the mountains above Williamsburg, and their existence was threatened by the Assassins. But since Jenna had saved Tara, the pack had healed itself.
Even after they lost Stephen. And with that, it had seemed like the land had healed itself, too. The animals had come pack as if they knew that pack needed to be fed. The trees seemed greener than ever, the mountainside was lush, and even the village had good crops and healthy livestock.
Life was good.
Bruce followed the dim trail that led down the mountain, curling around boulders and trees until it led him to the back of the village. His cabin was the last one of the row of cabins where the town’s folk lived. A little out of the way, but not too far removed from Williamsburg and its people. Bruce and Jenna lived in the cabin just far enough removed from Bruce to be able to shift into a bear without being noticed, and Jenna had come to love the peace and quiet.
BAD BOY ROMANCE: DIESEL: Contemporary Bad Boy Biker MC Romance (Box Set) (New Adult Sports Romance Short Stories Boxset) Page 102