Quinn Security

by Dee Bridgnorth

  “If you’re in fear of your life, you should be.”

  “Thanks,” he said dryly.

  “My guess,” Eddie went on, “is that if Lucy is still alive by the time he wages the attack, he’ll personally handle her first.”

  “Hitting Kaleb’s cabin first,” Rick supplied, mulling the strategy over out loud.

  “It’s a guess, Rick,” he pointed out. “Dante never stated one way or the other. But I’ve gotten to know him. I don’t see how he’ll succeed if he plays it any other way.”

  “Damn, look at this land,” Rick marveled, taking a moment to stare out across the darkened field. “I can’t believe anyone would want to build a casino here with hotels and malls and all that nonsense.”

  “Dante is determined to destroy it all,” Eddie said. “Destroy all that this land represents…”

  “What does it represent?” he asked, but before Eddie could answer, he stated, “Dante has been hiding here. The land has protected and served him.”

  “It’s been a battleground for centuries and no one in the Fist has been the wiser.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Long ago,” Eddie began as the trail of matted grass turned into the forest and disappeared. “This way,” he mentioned and they turned north into the thick, wooded trees. “Long ago,” he started again, “the Halseys made a tradition of coming back to this land to hunt Dante. They never killed him, of course, but they slaughtered countless wolves in their effort.”

  “There’s no hunting ‘round these parts,” Rick balked, feeling both annoyed and disrespected that anyone would dare come to Devil’s Fist to hunt.

  “It’s their land,” Eddie reminded him. “And it’s vast. Who would stop them?”

  “I would.”

  “But you didn’t because you never knew.”

  “I realize that,” he complained.

  Eddie lifted his hand in the air and both men quieted, focusing intently on the sounds of the still forest all around them.

  It was faint and Rick would’ve never heard it unless he had engaged his heightened werewolf hearing, but he was able to pick up on the sounds of a crackling fire.

  “This way,” Eddie whispered.

  “You’ll have to shoot him from a distance,” Rick whispered to remind him. “He can’t see us coming or else we won’t have a chance in hell.”

  “You think I don’t know that?”

  “I don’t want to die tonight, Eddie.”

  “You think I do? Quiet!”

  They took the rest of the trail in silence and soon came to a cave that was carved into the side of a small mountain. Whether they were still on the old Halsey land or had crossed into the territory of Yellowstone, Rick had no way of knowing. All he knew was that somewhere inside the cave Dante had retired in front of a crackling fire.

  “We’ll have to draw him out,” said Rick, assessing the entrance of the cave from ten yards away as the men tucked themselves behind the wide trunk of a mighty oak tree. “You take the west side and I’ll take the east,” he suggested. “I’ll toss some rocks in front of the cave, make a little noise, and the second Dante comes you, you shoot him with the arrow from behind.”

  “Got it.”

  “It’s got to strike through his heart,” Rick reminded him.

  “I can do that, Sheriff, so long as you make enough noise to draw him clear on out.”

  “I will,” he promised.

  He gave Eddie a nod and the men stepped slowly and soundlessly, heading off in their respective directions.

  The light was low, the moonlight shining down from overhead barely penetrating the thick canopy of treetops overhead, but Rick engaged his werewolf sight and was able to make out Eddie’s muted silhouette across the way.

  When it seemed Eddie was in position, Rick having arrived at the east side of the cave not fifteen yards off from its entrance, he collected a number of fist-sized rocks.

  Before throwing a single one, he eyed the first chant he had printed out. He had spent the bulk of the afternoon attempting to memorize all three, but frankly none of them had stuck in his brain. He sent up a murmuring prayer to the Lord that he was starting with the right chant. All three of them could work, he hoped, or maybe just one. Of course, if all three were required and they needed to be spoken in a specific order, he would be screwed. He just didn’t know what to expect. All he knew was that he couldn’t sit around waiting while Troy Quinn bided his sweet time. He also couldn’t take another day of Dante breathing down his neck to kill Lucy Cooper. This would all end tonight. It had to.

  With that in mind, he tossed the first rock. It landed quietly right in front of the cave’s entrance.

  Too quietly.

  He aimed the second at the stone siding of the cave and it struck with a hard, cracking sound.

  He heard movement inside the cave. Wasting no time, he chucked the next rock as hard as he could at the side of the cave. His eyes widened and he stared, unblinking, as Dante’s shadow stretched out across the ground at the mouth of the cave.

  Rick threw the next rock and prayed under his breath, “Come on, come on!”

  He aimed the next rock at the forest floor a few yards beyond the entrance, hoping that Dante would see the rock strike down and come out to investigate.

  He did.

  Rick’s heart leapt up his throat as he wound his arm back, fisting the final rock, as Dante drew cautiously outside to see who was there.

  A little farther! Rick prayed as he wound up, having grabbed another rock from the ground, and chucked the fist-sized stone with all of his might.

  It struck the side of Dante’s head and he turned, facing towards Rick and opening the length of his back up to Eddie, who was lurking in the darkness far behind him.

  But Eddie didn’t release the arrow he had cocked against the taut bow.

  Dante locked his dark eyes on Rick and grinned wickedly.

  Then the dark lord began slowly stalking towards him.

  “Now!” Rick yelled. What in the hell was Eddie doing back there! He had the shot, why wasn’t he taking it? “Shoot him!”

  Dante didn’t even turn around to see who Rick was yelling at and it was then that Rick understood.

  When Eddie finally released the arrow, it zipped fast through the air, zinging past Dante and slicing through Rick’s shoulder.

  Eddie pulled another arrow from the basket slung over his shoulder, cocked it in the bow, and released his fingers.

  Thinking fast, Rick shifted into his wolf form, tearing out and barely dodging the second arrow.

  His shoulder was screaming with pain, the arrow still plunged deep into the muscle, but he sprinted as fast as he could, heading north into Yellowstone, as Eddie shot another arrow at him.

  Miles to the north was the little stone house where Sasha and Nikita lived.

  Rick was determined to get there.

  ***

  Having gotten Gretchen Halsey settled in the apartment above Libations bar where Rachel Clancy had once lived—Dean and Elizabeth had first taken her mother to the motel out on the plains, but her reaction to the cramped, dingy motel room had been worse than Elizabeth’s had been—Dean pulled his pickup truck into the driveway in front of Conor’s cabin, turned the headlights off, and removed the key from the ignition, as Elizabeth unfastened her seatbelt.

  Conor’s truck wasn’t parked in the driveway and neither was Rachel’s vehicle, which gave Dean a brief moment of relief. The last thing he wanted was for Rachel to influence Elizabeth any further than she already had, but the fact of the matter was that sooner or later Conor and Rachel would return and there would be no way for Dean and Elizabeth to avoid them if they were in the living room on the pull-out couch.

  Dean had a lot on his mind as he climbed out of his truck and keyed in to the cabin, Elizabeth trailing after him.

  “I think she liked you,” she commented as they came to the couch.

  He screwed his face up, shocked. “You think your mot
her liked me? I think she was offended to have to breathe the same air as me.”

  “That’s just how she is,” Elizabeth mentioned as she began taking the couch cushions off and stacking them on the nearby armchair. “I can’t believe my father spent so many years hunting your kind.”

  “I don’t know what he was hunting,” Dean said as he grabbed a stack of bedsheets and blankets from the linen closet. “But my grandmother might. It must have been back when I was a boy that my father, Xavier, warned all of our pack not to go out onto the old Halsey land. Maybe that was why.”

  As they worked together to make the bed, she wondered, “Maybe that’s why you and I are meant to be together?”

  “Because your family was hunting mine for centuries?”

  “Would that be so crazy?” she argued. “Maybe the universe wanted to put an end to a senseless feud.”

  He had to admit he liked the sound of that. Of course, he would rather put an end to the senseless feud that had reared its ugly head between Elizabeth and himself.

  During the hours they’d spent with Gretchen at Libations, talking and discussing the secret society that Thomas Halsey had been involved with, Elizabeth had warmed to him. The wall of ice she’d thrown up in-between them had melted and at one point she’d even held his arm affectionately, which far from pleased Gretchen.

  He liked the terms she was speaking in. The fact that she’d even mentioned them being together, though she had referred to them in the hypothetical, still seemed promising. But if Dean had learned anything, it was that cornering her into making the decision to be with him would only result in another freeze out.

  With the bed made, she sat down and pulled her hiking boots off.

  “She’s all I have left,” Elizabeth commented.

  Dean was tempted to remind her that she had him and always would, but he held his tongue and sat down beside her, listening.

  “I know she’s difficult, but she’s never talked to me as deeply or for as long as she just did in the bar.” She looked at Dean. “I lost my father; I don’t want to lose my mother, too.”

  “You don’t have to.”

  “Being estranged from her would be the same thing, and I don’t see how I wouldn’t become estranged from her if I lived in Devil’s Fist.”

  “What are you saying, Elizabeth?”

  She sighed and admitted, “I don’t know. I’m just thinking out loud, I guess.”

  “What was your mother like before she met and married Thomas Halsey?” he asked, and Elizabeth immediately knew where he was going with this.

  “She wasn’t some small-town bumpkin, Dean. I don’t see why she would want to move here.”

  “You’re important to me,” he insisted, feeling the truth of his emotions rising up in his chest. He couldn’t believe what he was about to say, but it came out anyway despite the mixed feelings he instantly had about it. “I wouldn’t rule out moving to Los Angeles.”

  “Seriously?” she asked, and her voice contained more hope than he’d ever heard in her tone before.

  “I think I’ve been asking a lot of you. Too much. More than you’ve ever asked of me. I can’t say I would be comfortable in a big city, but I think it’s only right that I seriously consider the possibility if I want to be with you.”

  “Mother would love that!”

  He teased, “I think it’s more likely that she would try to hire me to tend to her rose bushes—”

  “She already has a gardener,” she assured him.

  “Ah, I was making a joke,” he smiled.

  “If you came back to L.A. with me, would you give me time to consider whether or not I’m ready to really be with you… fully?” she asked, referring to the elephant in the room.

  “I thought you wanted to rebuild the Devil’s Advocate building, stay in the Fist, lay your roots down here?”

  “I don’t know what I want, but I can’t see myself living so far away from my mom.”

  He sighed and told her, “I have one commitment here in the Fist and that’s to do as Troy orders me until Dante Alighieri is captured and killed.”

  Now it was Elizabeth’s turn to sigh. “I feel sorry for him.”

  Dean stared at her. If only she knew the harm and devastation that Dante had inflicted all summer, she wouldn’t feel that way.

  “Don’t you?” she asked.

  He told her frankly, “No.”

  “Even after all my mother told us about? You really don’t feel badly for him?”

  “I can’t say that I do.”

  “But he didn’t ask to be born. He didn’t ask to be some kind of mutant half breed, and I doubt that my ancestor knew Sasha was a werewolf when he slept with her.”

  “Are you blaming my grandmother?”

  “Maybe,” she allowed. “Dante came into this world as a werewolf but obviously Sasha didn’t raise him. She didn’t guide him through the trials and tribulations of being a wolf. Any crimes he committed were probably unintentional. Would you have been able to control yourself had your parents not guided you?”

  She had a point, but Dean was hesitant to agree.

  “And the next thing Dante knows, his father’s side of the family tree is hunting him year after year?” she reminded him. “God, how horrible. That must have broken his heart. He’s not evil, he was forced to become that way. And all he wants is to feel like he belongs to the town he was shunned by. No one has ever made him feel welcome here. What choice did he have? Of course, he has to attack the town and take it by force. There’s no other way if he wants to live here. Can’t you see that?”

  “I can see that you’re very compassionate, Elizabeth,” he complimented as he tucked her blonde hair behind her ear.

  “Don’t patronize me,” she scoffed, pulling away.

  “I’m not patronizing you, but I don’t see it the same way as you. You haven’t been here. You haven’t seen the bloody bodies, the innocent residents he’s killed. You haven’t seen all the people he’s turned against their will—”

  “And you can’t understand why he’s done that? Really, Dean?” she questioned, and the implication wasn’t lost on him.

  “I’m not trying to turn you against your will,” he argued.

  “Aren’t you, though? You certainly haven’t taken no for an answer,” she reminded him. “How are you any different than Dante?”

  “Whoa, you’re going too far.”

  “I don’t think so,” she maintained. “I’m not sure I’ve gone far enough.”

  “Elizabeth,” he warned.

  “I’m serious,” she insisted. “What have you and your brothers done to make peace with him?”

  “Don’t you get it? There is no making peace with Dante!”

  “How do you know that?” she challenged. “Have you tried?”

  “Have we tried?” he balked. “We didn’t have a chance to try. The second he got here, or I should say, the moment he emerged, he’s been attacking the town. He put a spell over Reece Gladstone. He lured her into the woods and captured her. That was his introduction. How can we make peace with that?”

  “If you were listening to my mother and if you were really paying attention to our conversation in the bar, you would agree that all Dante wants is to belong. But you and your brothers are preparing to go to war against him.”

  “Look, I don’t know how to put this anymore plainly for you,” he stated. “But the only place Dante Alighieri belongs is in hell.”

  “No,” she disagreed. “The only place he’s been living is in hell. He’s fighting to turn the Fist into heaven where he can live unharmed.”

  Dean sighed, realizing there would be no getting through to her.

  “Even your father wanted him dead,” he said in a last-ditch effort to get her to understand.

  “I’m not going to make the same mistake as my dad,” she asserted.

  “No one is asking you to. I want you as far away from this thing as I can manage. Honestly, Elizabeth, if you want to go back to Los An
geles with your mother, I promise I’ll join you there as soon as the war is over. We’re just days away. The full moon will be here in…” he trailed off, thinking about the exact date. “Four days.”

  “Maybe that would be for the best.”

  Finally, they agreed on something.

  “So tomorrow you’ll drive Gretchen back to L.A.?”

  “I might as well,” she agreed, though she seemed downtrodden.

  It was a compromise he could live with. If Elizabeth was safe in California, he wouldn’t feel anxiously compelled to turn her into a werewolf to ensure she wouldn’t be harmed by Dante or any of his damned. This was something he could live with.

  “Thank you,” he told her softly as he leaned in, testing how close to her he could come without Elizabeth pulling away or cooling off.

  She did neither so he brushed his lips across her warm cheek in a gentle kiss.

  She smiled and urged him back only to say, “Won’t your brother be home soon with Rachel?”

  “That’s a risk I’m willing to take,” he grinned. “I don’t want us to fight ever again,” he breathed against her cheek as he kissed her softly again.

  “You’re very stubborn,” she teased.

  “So are you,” he teased right back as he helped her face towards his.

  When he pressed his lips against hers, he felt an electric zing of energy flood through him.

  Could he really move to Los Angeles? He could easily understand why she didn’t want to live far away from her mother. He felt the same about his brothers. Their bond was intense and he couldn’t imagine leaving all four of them in favor of a big, loud city where appearances and status outweighed community. Could he really give up all that he had built in the Fist for Elizabeth?

  It wasn’t easy to swallow, but he feared he would have to. The fact of the matter, however, was that Elizabeth had become more valuable to him than the life he had carved out for himself in Devil’s Fist. Being with her meant the world to him. Not only did he love her, deeply, but it was becoming clear to him that having her in his life, fully and completely, would make him happier than continuing to live as he had been here in Wyoming. He was going to marry her. He was going to spend the rest of his life with her. Where they happened to live would have to be the least of his concerns.