Wild Reunion

by Liza Street

  The man holding her shoved her into the back seat of a sedan and climbed in after her. The other man got into the front and started the car.

  “It’s not the Jaynes woman,” the man in the back seat said.

  “That’s not our problem. She couldn’t be taken. We got someone else instead. Let them worry about it.”

  Eleanor tried to sit up to see where they were going, but the man yanked her down by her wrists. “Stay put,” he growled.

  She blinked back tears. Summer was hurt, Will was hurt, and Hayley was alone. Somehow, Eleanor had to come up with a way out of this.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  A sharp sting crossed Will’s cheek, and he struggled to open his eyes.

  Smack. It hit him again. He squinted in the dim light. Scents of piss and garbage filled his nostrils. And—smack—his sister’s fury and fear.

  “Wake up, you useless dick-weevil,” she said.

  He opened his eyes and caught her hand in mid-air, before it could make contact with his cheek again.

  “It happened, didn’t it?” he said, sitting up.

  “Yeah.”

  She didn’t need to ask what he was talking about—she knew he was referring to the “bad feeling” he’d had. The one she’d wanted to ignore.

  No time to say he’d told her so. He braced his arms on the ground and levered himself up, wincing at the cold ache in his left leg. “Where’s Jackson and Marius?”

  “On their way.” She cocked her head. “I think I hear Jackson’s car.”

  He didn’t try listening. His ears were good, but Hayley’s were great. Looking around, he saw Summer leaning against the wall to his other side. She held her head in her hands, but she was on her feet.

  “Where the fuck is Eleanor?” Will asked.

  Hayley’s eyes were wide with fear and pain. “She’s—they got her, Will.”

  “What the fuck?” He jumped forward and stalked to Summer’s car, which was blocking the front of the alley. “Why didn’t you protect her?”

  “I tried. She was”—Hayley gave a hiccupping sob before getting it together and finishing—”she wanted me to stay with Summer.”

  Will couldn’t contain the growls coming from his chest and throat. He was going to fucking tear apart every person who had touched his mate. “Where’d they take her?”

  “East,” Hayley said. “I heard them go east.”

  “Back toward Dark Pines,” Will said.

  Hayley nodded. “I think they want to go farther than that. They were from the Spokane Pride, Will.”

  “Fuckers.” He groaned, touching the back of his head. They’d knocked him out cold. If he’d been human, the blow likely would’ve killed him.

  “She felt your injury,” Hayley said. “I didn’t realize it until I found you here. The two of you are in tune with each other—you’re real mates.”

  He shrugged. That wasn’t news, and it didn’t matter right now. All that mattered was finding her.

  “Let’s move Summer’s car,” he said. As he and Hayley pushed it away from the alley and rolled it to a parking spot on the street, he added, “We’ll have to report the damage later.” He turned to Summer. “We’ll all chip in to get you a new car, okay?”

  Summer shook her head. “I’m not worried about the car. I just want to get Eleanor back.”

  Will agreed. Jackson and Marius pulled up in Jackson’s Land Rover, and Will, Hayley, and Summer piled in. Jackson climbed out of the driver’s seat to sit in the back with Summer, so Will drove.

  “They headed east, Hayley said.” Will clenched the wheel. “They’ve got Ellie with them. Why the hell would they take her?”

  Nobody had an answer. He wanted to growl, rage, punch somebody, shred skin. He wanted to get out of the car and run, although that made no sense. But the lion inside him felt that he was sitting still and not taking care of the problem. The lion inside him wanted to physically move, not just squeeze steering wheels and push pedals.

  Will sped out of Tacoma, east toward Huntwood. As they raced along the highway, he said to Hayley, “Did you see their car?”

  “Gold SUV,” she said. “I didn’t catch the make and model.”

  She sounded genuinely sorry, and Will’s heart softened.

  He said, “It’s okay. You know I’m not mad at you, right?”

  “Yeah.” Hayley sniffed. “I just—I wanted to go to her, but there was the car and Summer was on the ground and—”

  Marius reached behind him to take Hayley’s hand.

  Will hadn’t seen Hayley lose it like this since that night their parents had died. It tore him up to hear her crying, and he nodded at Marius, grateful that Hayley’s mate was here and comforting her.

  “We’re going to find her,” Will said. “You did the right thing by fighting for Summer. I don’t know what these guys are after, but we’re not going to give it to them, okay? We’ll get Ellie back.”

  “How did they even find us?” Hayley asked.

  Summer gasped. “It’s our fault. Going to that show. Remember how the Fiddles tweeted about going? Jackson, if we hadn’t gone…”

  “No time to feel bad about it,” Will said, using his most decisive voice. “We need to think about what we’re gonna do when we catch up with Ellie.”

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  With every sharp left turn of the car, Eleanor slammed into the guy sitting in the back with her. Her eyes were covered, and being unable to see on the curvy road made her feel queasy. Nobody had hurt her yet. If they tried, she had a feeling it would be very easy to throw up on them.

  “She’s not even a fucking lion,” the guy in the backseat said.

  “I told you, it’s not our fucking problem,” the other one responded. “Lockman told us to get a Dark Pines girl, so we’ve got a Dark Pines girl. They were all hanging out together and she smells like one of the lions, so it’s good enough for me. As long as we get paid.”

  “How close to the drop-off point?” the first guy asked.

  Eleanor listened intently. Lion? Will had told her he could transform into a mountain lion. What were the chances that they were all delusional—Will, Hayley, and these guys, too?

  “We’ll be there any minute,” the driver said.

  It felt too hot in the car. The heater must’ve been going full-blast. The guy next to her smelled like onion rings and Eleanor just wanted to pretend none of this was happening. But it was happening. The car went around another turn and she slid across the seat. She tried to get purchase with her feet on the floorboards, but it was no use. She careened into the second guy again. He shoved her back, cursing under his breath. Eleanor was too afraid to respond.

  The guy in the front seat started cursing, and the guy in the back said, “What? What is it?”

  “We got company.”

  “Is it Lockman?”

  “I don’t think he’d be riding our ass and threatening to run us off the road.”

  Maybe it was Will. Eleanor took a deep breath, held it, then let it out. She’d known he would come for her.

  “I’m calling Lockman,” the guy in the back said.

  A moment later, she heard a loud voice over the speaker phone. “Do you have her?”

  “We got her, Alec, but there’s a problem. The Dark Pines are chasing us.”

  “What the fuck? I told you to do it in a way they wouldn’t follow.”

  “We did. The others were nearby, I guess.”

  “Is it Hayley you got, at least?”

  Before the guy could answer, their car spun. She hadn’t felt a bump or anything—had it skidded on black ice? Her heart beat erratically. Were they free-falling? If they were on a bridge, she could be plunging down into freezing water. Terror gripped her, and her heart felt like it was climbing up her throat.

  Wheels skidded, screaming on pavement. No free-fall, then. Eleanor raised her bound hands and ripped off her blindfold. She couldn’t stand being unaware of what was happening. Outside her window was swirling blackn
ess, and then two bright headlights.

  “Grab the girl and get out!” the driver shouted.

  Eleanor pulled her legs up on the seat and kicked the guy next to her. She caught him in the chin. He swore, then lunged for her.

  Before his hands made contact, his door was wrenched open and someone yanked him from the car. Eleanor caught the quickest glimpse of a giant bear that could only be a grizzly before her door opened and she started to fall out of the car. She screamed.

  Strong arms caught her and she looked up, blinking, into Will’s face.

  “I gotcha.” His face darkened when he noticed her bound wrists and ankles.

  He pulled a pocket knife from his coat and cut her ties while a bear roared somewhere on the other side of the car. The…grizzly. Behind him, a mountain lion prowled back and forth.

  “Will, when you said those things about shapeshifters…”

  “That’s Jackson behind me,” he said. “Hayley’s in the trees, looking for more bad guys.”

  “You should know, they were saying something about a drop-off point,” Eleanor said. “They wanted to take me to someone named Lockman.”

  Swiftly, Will picked her up and carried her to Jackson’s SUV. “Did you catch that, Jackson?” he said. “Lockman could be around.”

  The lion growled and continued pacing.

  “Listen, Ellie,” he said, helping her into the car, “I gotta help fight. If we don’t take care of it now, we’ll be fighting with this other pride forever. Can you stay in the car with Summer?”

  Eleanor turned to smile at Summer, who was sitting in the back. Then she faced Will again, and nodded. “Are you…gonna be like Jackson now?”

  “Yeah.” He shot a glance behind him, on the other side of the narrow road, away from the roars of the grizzly and where he’d said Hayley was waiting. “I think they’re here.”

  “What?” Eleanor looked past him. She counted three sets of yellow-green, shining eyes.

  Will continued, “You don’t have to watch. It might even be better if you just climb into the back with Summer, okay?”

  “Okay.”

  Will closed the door, and Eleanor sighed heavily. She turned to face Summer. “You okay?”

  Summer nodded. “My jaw hurts and I have a headache, but nothing’s broken. I just feel so helpless, though. We’re the only two humans out here, and we have to sit in the car.”

  Eleanor nodded absently and reached her hand back to Summer, who squeezed it.

  Humans. Shifters. She couldn’t believe her eyes or her ears. Would Dr. Bridges think she was hallucinating? Likely.

  Fuck Dr. Bridges. He, or they, didn’t know her body or her mind—she did. And what she was watching in front of her—Will shucking off his clothes right outside the car, and then crouching to the ground, surrounded by a shimmering light that made it hard for her to see—this was real. And her feelings for Will were real, too. Love, admiration, trust.

  The shimmering light faded, and just outside the car stood a mountain lion, impossibly large. He blinked once at her, slowly, then turned. He and the other lion, Jackson, ran to the trees at the opposite side of the road. Were real cougars that big? She’d never been this close to one, so she couldn’t be sure.

  “Majestic, aren’t they?” Summer whispered.

  Eleanor jumped. In her awe of seeing Will transform, she’d forgotten Summer was there.

  “Yeah, they are,” she agreed.

  Something moved in her peripheral vision, coming from the opposite direction, and she jumped again.

  “What did you see?” Summer asked from the back seat.

  “Something else. Another mountain lion.” She looked at the glimmering eyes on the opposite side of the road from Will and her friends. “I think…I think there are more bad guys than Will thought.”

  “Climb back here with me.” Summer’s voice was urgent.

  Eleanor couldn’t take her eyes from the wintry, dangerous scene outside the windshield. She felt alongside the steering wheel until her hand touched keys in the ignition. Joona Carpence in the ILC graphic novels wouldn’t hunker down in the back of a spaceship while her man fought. Joona would kick ass.

  “Actually,” Eleanor said, “I think you should come up here. And buckle up.”

  “Oh yes,” Summer said, sounding nervous, but delighted. “Let’s actually do something. Ooh, Jackson and Will are gonna be so pissed.”

  “Why should they get to be the heroes?” Eleanor grumbled.

  Summer made an oof sound as she clambered into the front seat. She buckled in and said, “Where the hell is my industrial hole-puncher when I need it?”

  Eleanor started the car. She could just imagine the look of surprise on Will’s face when he heard it, but that wasn’t her concern right now. Right now, there were several sets of glimmering eyes on the other side of the road, ready to charge at the people she loved.

  A mountain lion darted from the opposite side of the road and crossed to Will’s side.

  “Okay, let’s get them,” Eleanor said.

  Summer whooped as the next large cat started across the road and Eleanor slammed down on the gas pedal. The car lurched forward, and the mountain lion was forced to dodge.

  She didn’t know what she was doing, but she had a feeling that anything interrupting the plan of the bad guys had to be good. In the SUV’s wake, three other lions had charged across the road. Eleanor made a U-turn and charged down the road again. This time, she clipped one. The lion went flying and slumped on the shoulder.

  Eleanor felt sick to her stomach. She hated the idea of hurting anyone. But these guys had kidnapped her and they were now attacking the people she loved.

  There was no time for feeling sick, only time for protecting Will.

  But now, all the lions were on one side of the road, and a battle was taking place.

  “I can’t drive down there,” Eleanor said. “Too much risk of hurting one of ours.”

  “Or hitting a tree,” Summer added with a nod. “Now we have to wait.”

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Will wanted to roar with frustration when he heard Eleanor starting up Jackson’s car. But when she started driving at the attacking Spokane lions, he couldn’t help but be impressed. His mate was smart.

  Especially because he hadn’t expected so many Spokanes to show up.

  Hayley and Marius fought side by side, Marius never leaving an opening for Hayley to be hit. Will could guess why; he’d smelled the difference in his sister in the car. She’d be having a little one soon.

  A baby was a good reason to end this conflict with the Spokanes once and for all.

  Large lion paws churned the snow banks at the side of the road. The sounds of snarling and hissing filled the air. The scent of blood, coppery and metallic, filled Will’s nose.

  Will rushed to Jackson’s side just in time to block an attack by a Spokane lion. He slashed at the attacker, drawing blood. Crimson on white snow.

  The air was filled with the sounds of fighting. Will struck blindly at their opponents, unable to stop and think, unable to reason. He had to protect Ellie, protect his territory and the growing families upon it.

  The fighting slowed. Will watched as one of the Spokane fighters disappeared into the trees, not even trying to be stealthy as he ran. Retreating.

  Retreating, before the battle had finished?

  This wasn’t a pride war, this was a skirmish. Will doubted that any of it had been sanctioned by the Spokane alpha.

  He felt the movement of air with his whiskers seconds before a large shape landed beside him. He spun, growling, his foreleg already raised.

  Sawdust, dried fruit. Dark, desperate eyes. The lion he faced was Alec Lockman.

  Alec spun to the side and turned to attack Will, but Will made himself taller and growled. Alec was desperate, though, and charged. He locked his arms around Will’s shoulders and dove for Will’s neck. Will twisted his head down. In one motion, he protected his own vulnerable neck and thrust hi
s jaws forward to lock onto Alec’s.

  Alec tried pulling out of the death embrace, but Will kept his hold. He slowly pushed down with his jaws and forelegs, forcing Alec to the ground. The scent of sawdust filled his senses and he wanted to let go, but he had a feeling taking Alec down would be the key to ending the battle.

  As Will lowered Alec to the ground, several of the other Spokane fighters fled across the road and back into the trees. Will’s suspicion had been correct. This wasn’t sanctioned by any alpha; Alec had put this skirmish together on his own.

  Once Alec was on his back, he shifted back to human. Will kept his jaws clamped on Alec’s neck, staring into Alec’s defeated expression.

  Jackson, Marius, and Hayley approached, still in their animal forms. As soon as Jackson got closer, Will shifted back into his human form. He stood above Alec. “What the hell are you thinking?”

  Alec looked away, regret filling his features. “My father—my alpha—disowned me because we couldn’t get Hayley into our pride, and we couldn’t take your territory. He left me for dead, do you get it?”

  Hayley shifted and stood, naked and smelling like anger, at Will’s side. Jackson and Marius kept guard in their animal forms.

  Hayley folded her arms in front of her chest and glared at Alec. “So, what, he disowned you, and now you think you can just take one of us and get back into his good graces?”

  Alec shook his head. “It would’ve worked.”

  “The fuck it would have,” Hayley spat.

  “Grow up, Alec,” Will said.

  “You win,” Alec said. “Hear the truth in my voice. I won’t come into or near your territory ever again. I won’t even stay in Washington, because I’m not welcome in my own territory.”

  Will nodded. He could hear that truth, and he believed. Even better, the heavy, dark foreboding in his gut melted away. His territory was safe now.