Alpha Unleashed

by Aileen Erin

  The woman coughed from the back of the room. It sounded wet, like she was bleeding. Hurt.

  We needed to end this, and soon. But if we got some information before we killed this thing, even better. “I bet your mistress is too scared to face us. She ran all the way here, but we’ll find her.”

  It laughed again as it levitated off the ground. It hadn’t even turned to listen to me. Instead, it stared straight at Raphael “I remember you,” it said. “Your soul was tasty. Kept a few bits of it for myself.”

  Raphael roared and swung the bat, aiming for the demon’s head. Light flashed as it connected and the demon flew across the room, slamming into a pew. Wood splintered around it.

  I strode to it, holding a vial ready. No more beating around the bush for this girl. Not if it was going to torment my cousin. “If your master is so powerful, then where is she?”

  “Not telling.”

  I threw the vial. It screeched in pain as its skin melted, steam rising as the potion bubbled. The smell it gave off—like burning plastic—reeked.

  “Where is she?”

  “Not—”

  I threw another vial. Then another. Claudia and Shane started lobbing potions, too. Its skin made a sickening crackling noise as the potions hit, but it was still breathing. Still alive.

  The demon gave off an ear-splitting cry as it flew in the air.

  I dodged, throwing myself on the ground.

  Shane yelled, and my blood went cold.

  We needed to end this now.

  I kipped up, and threw three more vials before reaching in my bag. Claudia met my gaze, her hand raised with her own vials. “Cosette!”

  Claudia and I threw our vials in unison.

  “My pleasure.” Cosette hooked arms with Van and he launched her into the air. She flew, sword raised and glittering. The blade came down, decapitating it in one glowing strike.

  The earth cracked open with a roar and flash, sucking the demon back to hell.

  Eerie silence echoed through the church for all of five seconds.

  Then a gun cocked.

  “SFPD. Drop your weapons. Now.” No less than ten cops swarmed into the sanctuary, guns out. Some of them wore Kevlar vests, others had shotguns instead of handguns, but all of them looked like they weren’t fucking around.

  Wolf-Dastien nudged me with his head, and I closed my eyes. This was so not happening.

  “On the ground. All of you. Any wolf that makes a move toward us gets a silver bullet right through the eye.”

  A gunshot, we could heal. But I wasn’t so sure about silver bullets, let alone a silver bullet to the head. I lifted my arms in the air and got to my knees.

  “Everyone. On the ground.”

  I spared a glance for the others.

  Shit. Me and my cousins were the only ones cooperating. A bead of sweat rolled down the nearest cop’s cheek. All of them reeked of the sickly sweet scent of fear. One wrong move and they’d all snap.

  Help me out, Dastien. We have to cooperate. “You guys have to get down,” I said just loud enough for the Weres to hear.

  “No,” Donovan growled the word. He must have just shifted back. I peeked at him, off to my right. Even standing there, naked as the day God made him, he looked fierce. Waves of alpha energy rolled off him, and my throat tightened.

  This could go bad. Very quickly.

  “Yes. You will.”

  “They have a gun pointed at my mate. I’ll not be surrendering.” The other wolves growled.

  “You should listen to your friend. Down on your knees,” one shotgun carrying cop said as he took one step forward.

  “You all will shift back and be nice to these police officers.” I raised my voice loud enough for everyone to hear. “We have to make a choice. We could force our way out of here, but is that the right thing to do?”

  “Maybe Donovan has a point,” Shane said. “If we don’t leave, we’ll be tied up with the police, just like Luciana wanted.”

  Dastien’s anger rolled through our bond. Even my own mate thought I was being dumb, but I couldn’t give in. A mistake here could destroy the trust between humans and werewolves forever.

  I swallowed down my nerves. “I’ll call the FBI, and they’ll help clear this up. We need to show the humans we can work with them or they’ll see us as nothing more than animals. If we don’t go with them now, peacefully, we’ll ruin any chance of them trusting us. Monsters like Luciana will come and go, but the rest of our lives with the humans—we can’t throw that away.”

  I cleared my throat. “Officers. The wolves are going to shift now, and they’ll need the clothes from our car. I’m sure you’re already searching it, so if you’d please bring the bags here for them, we’ll happily go with you. We have two injured humans. One badly hurt. I don’t know if she’s still alive. And Shane? You okay?”

  “Hurts.” His voice was strained. He just had to hold on. A few minutes more.

  None of the cops moved.

  “Please. We’re going to need an ambulance.”

  “We already called one.”

  I let go of a little bit of tension. I was going to have to get the EMTs to use holy water on them, but maybe… “We haven’t done anything wrong here. This is the work of Luciana Alvarez. It’s exactly the same as what happened in Cedar Ridge, Texas. If you get us the clothes, we can sort this all out.”

  “She needs to drop her weapon.”

  I looked at Cosette. She bit her lip as she eyed the door. “Would you rather I just made this all go away?”

  Tempting. Really tempting. But I shook my head. “We tried that last time and look where it got us. We have to cooperate.”

  “Fine. But I’m not kneeling in demon ashes.” Her sword winked out and she brushed her hands on her jeans.

  “What the fuck was that?” A cop yelled.

  Ugh. Way to diffuse the situation. I waved my hands, drawing the cops’ attention back to me. “Please don’t be afraid. The wolves are going to shift now.”

  One by one, the guys took their human forms until only Meredith was left. She huddled against Donovan’s legs and I didn’t blame her. “Now, we need our clothes. Please.”

  A cop disappeared and came back a minute later with one of the Cazadores’ duffels of clothes. He tossed it toward us.

  The guys held their hands out and slowly reached for clothes. Everyone was moving very slowly. Carefully. Making sure there were no mistakes. It was necessary, but we didn’t have this much time. Adrian and Shane—not to mention the woman—needed help now.

  My arms ached, but I wasn’t about to lower them.

  “What about that one?” One of the cops motioned at Meredith with his guns.

  Donovan growled.

  “Calm down,” I whispered. “That’s my friend Meredith. She’s a minor and would like some privacy to change.”

  She approached bag, grabbing the sweats in her mouth, and then slowly walked behind a pew. A few moments later, she stood, fully clothed.

  “Thank you,” she said.

  This isn’t going to go well, cherie.

  Yeah, but we’re screwed either way. At least now we can be seen as cooperative.

  “Everyone outside. Move it. Now.”

  Ordering wolves around was bad. Ordering an alpha was pretty damned stupid. And ordering Alphas like Donovan and Lucas while pointing guns at them and their mates…

  Their power rose, brushing against my hair.

  Help me. I called to Dastien. We can’t hurt the cops.

  “Move!” The cop yelled, shoving a gun in Claudia’s face.

  Lucas’ power rose, and Dastien finally started to realize what I’d known all along. Take what you need.

  “We’re going with the cops.” I put everything Dastien and I had behind the words—commanding them to start moving. Lucas and Donovan turned their power toward me. I had to grit my teeth against the massive force of alpha energy, but I wasn’t backing down. “We have to do this or we’ll just prove we’re the monsters
they fear.”

  Meredith’s lips were pressed tight as she stared down her mate. From the look on her face, she was giving him a solid dressing-down.

  “She’s right. Let’s go,” Meredith said. She raised her hands as she moved slowly toward the cops with me.

  The cops moved quickly, cuffing Meredith and me before moving on to the rest. I kept my eyes on the Weres. If anyone was going to act out, I had to stop it. We couldn’t afford to open a rift between the supernaturals and humans. Not if we had any chance at peacefully coexisting.

  I expected the most trouble from Van, but he’d disappeared without ever being seen by the cops. That was probably for the better. As it was, Cosette had done some Jedi mind trick on them, holding her wrists together so they seemed to think she was already cuffed.

  I knew we could get out of this, but that was what worried me. All it took was one slip—one lost temper—and humans would get hurt. Then we’d have to run. And if we ran now, we’d be running for the rest of our lives. Anger burned inside me.

  There was no way the cops would’ve known to come to a random church in the desert. The demon was just to keep us busy. Luciana must’ve called the cops as soon as we crossed the wards. If we went with them quietly, no one would be able to stop her.

  So either way, Luciana won.

  I took in the scene. All the dead bodies. Their skin gray and shriveled. I didn’t need to see their eyes to know what they looked like. Shane lay on the ground. Blood seeped through the leg of Adrian’s pants. We were a mess.

  And now Luciana had more than enough power to do what she wanted. She’d wiped out two covens and gotten us out of her way. If they threw us in jail for the night there’d be more than enough time for Luciana—mistress—or whatever the hell she was now to open her portal.

  Sirens rose in the distance as the ambulance approached. First we had to make sure Shane and Adrian were okay. Then we’d deal with Luciana.

  Hopefully for the last time.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  The scent of stale, cheap coffee wafted through the station. The process of getting booked took forever. Like multiple hours. Especially since only a couple of us had any form of ID.

  Good thing Van hadn’t stuck around. Who knew what the officers would’ve made of him?

  Cosette was bad enough on her own. The cops had been giving her a hell of a time, which I didn’t really blame them for, given the whole pulling swords out of thin air thing. Then she’d charmed one of the police dogs somehow. Now she sat in the corner with a German shepherd curled up at her feet, and it growled at anyone who came close, including its handler.

  Knowing Cosette, it could’ve been worse. I was just glad she was making a show of cooperating instead of trying to magic this away like she so obviously wanted to. It was way too late to undo the situation.

  Our big problem was that the cops wanted answers. None of us had anything to say that they were willing to believe. It left us at a stalemate, but at some point they were either going to have to trust we were the good guys or decide we were the monsters.

  The cop who seemed to be in charge—Wilson—had left us in a room with one officer—Yeats. She was a heavy-set lady with hair in an unflattering pixie cut. She watched us as we sat quietly in our chairs like good little citizens.

  The room’s white walls and gray-speckled linoleum floor were clean enough, but the smells of blood, sweat, and vomit were ingrained underneath the scent of cleaning products. A table took up space in the middle of the room, but none of us were using it.

  A blinking red light flashed on the camera in the corner. Someone, somewhere was watching us. I wondered what they were thinking. Which side would the coin were we going to land on? Friends? Or not?

  As we sat in silence, waiting for what felt like forever for something to happen—one way or the other—the only sound in the room came from the large clock on the wall as the hands ticked. It was driving me mad, constantly reminding me that time was slipping away.

  At least Adrian and Shane weren’t dealing with any of this. They were at the hospital. Under guard, but still, they weren’t getting interrogated. Shane hadn’t looked good. I’d heard Adrian convincing the EMT to treat him with holy water before we were hauled off, but I was still worried. Adrian seemed much better off than Shane, and I didn’t think it was just our speedy healing time. Maybe the reason Dastien and I hadn’t been affected by our demon-inflicted wounds like Raphael had been because we were Weres. What if witches were easier to possess?

  I had a feeling Shane was going to need more healing than just holy water. Something more like what Claudia did to Raphael. Only we were stuck at the police station, and we hadn’t heard a word about them in hours.

  Cosette sighed as she scratched her police dog behind its ears. “Anyone else ready to walk out of here? Because I am. At any moment.”

  “No.” It was the first time Donovan had spoken since we’d gotten to the station. “I wasn’t thinking straight. The sight of a gun pointed at Meredith set me off—”

  “Same here,” Lucas said. “Don’t beat yourself up about it.”

  “Aye. But it was short sighted. Teresa here was the only one who kept her head, apart from the witches. If we’d done what we’d wanted, the humans never would’ve trusted us. We’d be hunted. Our children would be hunted.” He stared at the wall in front of us. “No. This was the only way.”

  “I kept my head,” Cosette muttered before turning to me. “If we’re not breaking out, can I at least summon my Kindle? This is dead boring.”

  “No summoning.” I was too wound up to get bored, but it was still taking too long. I had to do something to move the process along.

  “Can I have my phone call, please?” I asked Officer Yeats. “It’s my right. And we haven’t been charged with anything. I should get a call.”

  A wrinkle appeared between her eyebrows as she considered my question. “I’m not sure werewolves have rights.”

  It didn’t sound like she was trying to be rude, but instead was trying to reason out whether I should be able to make a call. That was the only reason I was able to maintain my cool. Thanks to Dad’s coaching over the years, I already knew how to argue my case.

  “I was born in Los Angeles eighteen years ago. My parents are human. I have a valid US birth certificate, and you saw my valid driver’s license when you booked me. By not allowing me my phone call, you’re violating my rights as a US citizen.”

  She sighed. “Fine.”

  Thank you, Dad, for making sure I know my rights. I smiled at her. “Is there any way you can get my wallet? There’s a business card inside. I just need the number.”

  She crossed her arms as she stared me down. Then she let out a huff and turned on her heel. When she came back, she had my sparkly silver wallet in her hand.

  Maybe wasn’t so bad after all. “Thank you.”

  She handed me a portable phone, and I started dialing. Seconds later, the phone was ringing. Answer. Please answer. If this was really my one call, I didn’t want to waste it on a voicemail. I wasn’t sure I’d get another call if no one picked up.

  “Special Agent Ramirez here.”

  A sigh of relief escaped me before I could stop it. “Hi. It’s Teresa McCaide.”

  “Teresa.” He drew out my name, his voice a degree—or ten—colder than our last meeting. “I’ve been expecting your call.”

  “Well, I’m calling.” I cleared my throat. “I’m at the fine police offices of Santa Fe.”

  “What a coincidence. I just got off a plane in in Santa Fe. I thought we discussed you calling me before the fact?”

  I winced at his annoyed tone. “We didn’t know what we’d find here. Now that we did find something, I’m calling.”

  “Next time, you call me first.”

  “I’m sorry. Next time, I promise I’ll call first.” Maybe. If I could.

  “Good thing I’ve already been appraised of the situation and why you’re being held or else I’d be real
ly annoyed.”

  I never thought I’d ever be in a position where the FBI would be pissed at me. Yet here I was. Special Agent Ramirez was definitely ticked off. “The thing is… I need to get out of here. Luciana is going to do something very bad, and if we’re not there to stop her, well, it’s going to be worse than what she did last time. Much, much worse. A little help would be very appreciated. If there’s anything you can do to speed this along?”

  Officer Yeats cleared her throat and tapped her watch.

  I nodded. Time was almost up.

  “You’re going to have to sit tight. I’ll see what I can do once I’m there, but they’re officially holding you for questioning. They could keep you there for up to twenty-four hours. Unless they get a judge to sign off for more time.”

  No. That wasn’t going to happen. Even twenty-four hours was way too freaking long. We needed to get out of here like yesterday.

  “But I’m sure I can do something about it once I get there, provided you fill me in on what’s going on.”

  “Absolutely.” I looked at the clock on the wall. “How far away are you?”

  “I’ll be there in less than an hour.”

  That put him here after midnight. Much too late.

  The line went dead before I could argue with him. I handed the phone back to Officer Yeats. “Thanks.”

  He seemed pissed, Dastien said through the bond.

  I know, right? It feels like no matter how hard I try, I’m messing it up. My knee bounced as I thought.

  Hey. You’re doing a good job.

  But even you disagreed with me about going with the cops, and—

  And I was wrong.

  I tried to take solace in that, but as I sat there, listening to seconds tick by on the clock, it was hard not to question my decisions.

  We had to get out of here. Soon.

  I was sitting with my eyes closed, waiting for the Special Agent Ramirez to make his appearance, when magic brushed along my skin. It felt dirtier than the cell and motel room put together. My chest tightened as I slowly sat up.

  “Claudia?”

  “I feel it, too,” she whispered.

  Luciana’s magic. It had a certain flavor of disgusting that I’d become familiar with.