“It took me a while to break the lock earlier, but eventually I got it and switched it for a spell of my own,” Daria explained as they slipped around the side of the house before dashing for the cover of the trees.
Imogen and India were waiting for them in the trees too and she hugged them both, not missing the pistol in Imogen's right hand. A wolf could survive being shot but it would certainly slow them down.
“I’m glad you’re okay, both of you,” India said softly. “Connor has been going out of his mind, Summer.”
“Wait here until we give you all-clear and you can come back inside. The pack will be all over the house by now and will try and take them all at once before any of them try to escape.” Kandis hissed before running back toward the house.
“Why do they call you Summer?” her aunt looked puzzled.
“I needed a new name when I escaped from Danvers clutches before and Summer was a nickname Lukas had for me when I was just a kid. It’s grown on me over the years.” she smiled.
“It will take a little getting used to, I still think of you as Serena. You are so like your mother, it takes my breath away. We have so much to catch up on but it will have to wait until we are all safely out of here.”
Her aunt’s gaze was intense and a little unnerving and Summer shivered but not with the cold. She took Raven's arm as they watched and waited on their cue from the cover of the trees.
CHAPTER TEN
Connor
Getting inside the house had been fairly easy, almost too easy, but he wasn’t going to look a gift horse in the mouth. His main goal was to get Summer to safety and then to deal with that slimeball Danvers once and for all. The others had filled him in on everything that had happened to date and he agreed that there was no redemption for him. It must be awful for Liam, Finn and Lexi, despite everything, he was still their brother.
His own brother, Cillian used to be a spoilt brat who had tried to kidnap India on his father’s behalf to bring Garrett to heel, but he could never imagine wanting him dead. Besides, he was an amateur compared to Rob Danvers and he was trying desperately to make up for the things he had done and Connor believed it was genuine.
Daria had broken the spell on the back door which she recognized as her daughter’s work and replaced it with one of her own, which should slow down any escapees at least for a little while until they could round up the guards and get into place to take down their boss.
So far everything had gone like clockwork and they had caught five guards, three in bed sleeping and two guarding the corridor where Danvers, Summer and Raven’s rooms were. Jay would interrogate them before a decision was made on their future.
That made Connor nervous, it was all just a little too easy getting inside. Maybe it was just his naturally suspicious nature but he would tread carefully.
He knew that Summer would be safe in the woods by now as the house was silent and no alarms had gone off. He forced himself to calm down and clear the fury from his mind before they confronted the bastard that had taken his mate.
He leaned down toward the hooded figure lying prone on the floor and gave him instructions before moving silently down the corridor toward the room at the other end.
Seann gestured to the door to the left and Liam nodded.
He leaned in and took a deep breath, catching the familiar scent and smiled. There was no mistaking the scent, this was his brother’s room.
Seann motioned for Liam and Finn to take the left of the door while he and Lukas took the right side. They wanted to capture Danvers as smoothly and quickly as possible.
Connor brought their captive forward and took the hood off the young wolf he had caught trying to escape when they had first entered the house. He couldn’t be more than twenty years old but he had been armed and he had to assume that he would have used his weapon on Summer if she had tried to escape.
The kid looked terrified but Connor couldn’t worry about that right now.
“If you don’t do exactly as I say, I am going to snap your neck like a twig, do you understand?” he whispered before walking him the rest of the way to Danvers’ door.
Garrett appeared at the top of the stairs and gave a thumbs up. With Jay’s help and their security teams, they had captured everyone else, the rest of the house was clear.
Connor pulled down the kid’s gag and untied his hands. He grabbed the hair at the back of his neck and bunched it tightly in his hands, pushing him forward. The kid raised a hand and knocked three times.
“Mr. Danvers, sir. We have a problem.” He spoke loudly and clearly and Connor gave him kudos for hiding his nerves. The kid had balls.
There was no reply and Connor was suddenly tense.
“Mr. Danvers, I really need to speak to you, sir.” He tried again.
“He’s gone!” Connor roared.
He stepped back and charged at the door. He brought up his right foot and kicked with the full weight of his body behind it and the frame shattered as the door swung open to reveal the empty unmade bed. He had been here very recently, his scent was strong and Connor ran to the bathroom but he was already gone.
“In here,” Lukas yelled.
“Garrett, alert the others and have both teams protect Summer and Raven. Get them into a vehicle as quickly as possible and the hell out of here.” Seann barked as he followed Lukas into the walk-in closet and saw the hidden doorway and the narrow staircase leading down to the first floor.
Garrett ran into the hallway to call Jay as Seann and Lukas barreled down the metal stairway, hoping Danvers wasn’t too far in front of them.
Connor knew it had all been too easy and he should have listened to his gut, it had never let him down before. He turned around and saw the CCTV images on the opposite wall. Live feed from a dozen different cameras mounted around the property and inside the house. Security team one had disabled the system, or so they thought. Danvers always seemed to be one step ahead of them and this was no different. He had been aware of their every move and knew just when to get out.
He watched as Jay was trying to coerce Summer and Raven into a truck and turned and ran downstairs to help with the search. There were so many people that wanted Danvers dead, but he was going to push to the front of the line and make sure he took his last breath tonight.
The staircase ended in the cellar and among Seann and Lukas’s scent he could detect Danvers too. Where would he have gone after he came down here? Jay had the roads blocked so he wasn't leaving by car and team two were patrolling the trees looking for wolves. He had to be here on the property somewhere and that meant Summer needed to be elsewhere.
Everyone had gathered in the tree line and he was angry that the truck was still there and Summer’s face was a stubborn mask, she was refusing to get inside.
She saw him coming and ran to him despite Jay’s protests and Connor swung her up in his arms and buried his face in her neck, drinking in her intoxicating scent. He didn’t want to let her go but he needed to get her out of here for her own safety.
“Summer, you need to leave, darlin’. Danvers has slipped through the net again and you are his prime target.” Connor held her away from him.
“I’m not going anywhere, Connor. I am staying right here.”
No! You’re not. Get in the damn truck with Raven and get out of here, Summer.”
“Absolutely not!” she pushed away from him and crossed her arms over her chest.
“Do as you are told Summer, please.” Lukas joined in, but she stubbornly refused to budge and Seann scowled at Imogen as she grinned at the feisty witch.
“Summer, go now!” Seann commanded and Connor felt the breath forced out of his body by the weight of the alpha’s command.
“I’m not a wolf, that won’t work on me,” she snapped and Connor knew she was probably the first person apart from his mate to openly defy him. Seann wouldn’t like that at all.
“I knew there was something about you I liked, Summer,” Imogen said as she took her by the hand
and pulled her to her side. “We are wasting time, let's split up and find him before he gets too far out of our reach.”
“Garrett’s team will take the outbuildings, I’ll take the woods with Liam, Connor and Finn. Jay’s group will search the house from top to bottom and Kandis can take the women and patrol the roads on the property by vehicle. Non-negotiable, if I have to I will put you in the truck by force, take it or leave it.” Seann was fierce but Connor could see a grudging admiration for his petite mate in the huge alpha’s eyes.
“Let’s go! Kandis yelled and jumped into the bed of the truck with Imogen and India as Daria took the wheel. Summer got in the backseat and Raven sat upfront with her mother.
The truck swung around and headed down the long driveway. It was the best place to start in case Danvers had just decided to run and hide this time. India’s tracking skills were second to none, Imogen was the fastest wolf in the pack and Kandis was the most capable of bringing a full-grown wolf down. They were a formidable team.
Connor watched the truck drive away and stripped off his clothes, leaving them in a pile as he stretched out his limbs and shifted to join the others in the manhunt.
It was good to run freely and he bounded after his packmates, the adrenaline coursing through his body and the wind caressing his fur. He couldn’t imagine not being a wolf, not feeling this euphoria as he ran wild and free, always at one with the elements and mother nature.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Summer
She concentrated really hard on her surroundings as Daria drove slowly around the Danvers country estate. But nothing stirred, not even a squirrel. He was out here, she could sense it in every fiber of her being, but her skills were so rusty she wasn’t sure she would fully trust them.
“Where are you Danvers?” she whispered.
“Let’s start circling back toward the house,” Daria said.
“We are going to shift and have a look around to see if India can pick up his scent,” Kandis called from the back and Daria pulled over to let them strip off.
Summer felt a small pang of jealousy as she watched the three of them shift and run off into the woods together. Imogen’s stark white wolf stood out against the pale blonde and red of the other two. They followed slowly in the truck, watching for the slightest movement in the trees.
She had been a little envious of Lukas and their father’s shifting ability over the years and sometimes wondered if she had made the right choice when she refused her father’s offer to turn her when she was eighteen. She had the genes which gave her a much higher chance of a successful transition, but she was afraid of losing the abilities she had inherited from her mother if she was to turn wolf.
Her refusal to practice anything but the most basic witchcraft these last couple of years seemed to have diminished her abilities anyway so it had been for nothing. Maybe as a wolf shifter she wouldn’t have been on Danvers’ radar and could have lived her life in relative peace.
But then she might never have met Connor and even just the thought of a life without him in it left her with a gaping hole in her chest and an ache deep in her gut. He had been right about her, she was an all or nothing kind of girl.
She watched the three wolves dart in and out of the trees at the side of the road and her heart missed a beat when India’s red wolf lifted her head and howled. Kandis and Imogen were beside her in moments and they appeared to be dragging something from the trees out onto the grass clearing.
Daria pulled over to see what the wolves had found.
“Danvers” Summer gasped and yanked open the truck door and sprinted in their direction.
She heard her aunt and cousin calling for her but she wasn’t about to let her friends get hurt protecting her while she sat around doing nothing. They didn’t know Danvers as she did, he was capable of absolutely anything and no one else was going to die, not while she had a single breath left in her body.
She chanted a vanishing spell as she ran, her lips moving like lightning, over and over again until she saw the shimmer of light as one by one her friends seemed to vanish into thin air. It was of course just an illusion, designed to fool the senses, but Danvers wouldn’t be able to see them and that’s all that mattered for now.
The figure lying on the ground got up and Summer saw he had a gun in each hand before he even turned around.
A tranquilizer gun and a pistol.
He had lured them here and was going to try and capture them. She guessed he was hoping for her and Imogen, the two he had wanted most before and the two with the biggest grudge against him. He was always a step ahead and he would never give up taking what he wanted as long as he was alive.
“My beautiful Serena, I knew you couldn’t stay away from me for too long. It seems it’s our destiny to be together after all.”
“There is nowhere left for you to run, Danvers. You are surrounded and within minutes there will be a dozen more angry wolves here, all of whom want you dead.
“That was a neat little trick trying to hide your friends but I know if I randomly fire this tranquilizer gun there is a good chance I will hit something and I have it loaded with the maximum dose, even for a wolf. Two darts into the same wolf would most likely kill her, especially at close range.
“They are too far away for you to shoot, Danvers. I know from past experience it wouldn’t reach more than fifty feet. Besides, you run the risk of hitting Imogen and you want her even more than you want me.”
“Maybe, but this will slow them down, even if it doesn’t kill them.”
He lifted the hand with the pistol and waved it around.
She tried desperately to give her friends a clue to get back out of his range of fire and to hold their ground until the others got here. Surely he would back down when he was faced with the best the Donovan pack had to offer.
Danvers grinned at her and she saw the madness in his eyes. He was completely out of control and she felt the red-hot burning rage bubble up inside her. He obviously had a backup plan that Summer wasn’t privy to, but she was sick and tired of his games and his selfish destruction of everything in his path. She didn’t want to wait and see what heinous scheme he had up his sleeve.
He lifted his left hand in the air and pointed the pistol directly at Summer. The dart gun still held firmly in his right. A bullet wouldn’t always kill a wolf unless it hit them in the heart but she was no wolf. She was faster and stronger than the average human, but she bled like a human and she would die like a human if he pulled that trigger. She knew without a doubt that if he couldn’t have her then he would happily watch her die instead.
Burning hot fury invaded her mind as she took another step closer to him and then another. She hoped the others were getting far back from the reach of the dart gun while he was still concentrating on her.
“Shoot me if you must because I will never be your prisoner again.”
She was within twenty feet of him now and he hadn’t budged an inch. Summer knew he wasn’t going to.
“If that’s what you want, witch, then so be it. When you die, your spell will be broken and I will take Raven and the white wolf in your place and kill the others. They will atone for your sins against me and I will break them before I put them to work. I will enjoy every single minute,” he said as he smiled, already too far gone to be reasoned with.
He raised the gun a little higher and as he squeezed the trigger, Summer released all of the energy that had been building up inside her and directed it toward him.
“Connor, I love you,” she whispered sadly as she waited for the bullet that would surely end her life.
The blast of power from her hands rocked him on his feet and she saw the bullet in slow motion as it came toward her. It chinked against something mid-air and fell on the ground and she looked around confused that she was still standing upright and unharmed.
Daria and Raven were in the tree line and she recognized the hum of magic as they held the forcefield that had protected her, but she knew they
couldn’t hold it for long. It took a tremendous amount of energy and concentration to keep a protective shield in place, more than two witches could hold for any longer than a few minutes.
She charged him, surprising him with her speed as his second bullet met the same fate as the first. The momentum as she hit him rendered him flat on his back and knocked the pistol out of his hand. At the same time, the jolt disabled her shield and put her once again at the mercy of a madman with no protection between them.
He grabbed her and his large hand was around her neck, squeezing tightly before she had a chance to defend herself. She felt the muzzle of the tranquilizer gun against her stomach and used all of her strength to try and push him away before he could shoot, but he held her tightly against him. If he pulled the trigger it would be all over for her.
“We could have ruled the whole world together, witch.” Spittle was coming out of his mouth as he spoke and Summer could see into the pits of his eyes and the depth of his madness.
“I would rather be dead than in league with a psychopath like you Danvers,” Summer spat as she fought him with all her strength. She could sense the others descending on them but Danvers would kill her before he would let them take her away from him.
She closed her eyes to meet her fate and the life she should have had with Connor filled her mind. Her mate, the children they might have had, her brother and the pack that she had grown to love like family. It was all such a terrible waste and she was grieving for the pain she knew they would have to endure by her death.
Then suddenly she was lightweight and free. She could hear Danvers screaming but it didn’t make sense. Her aunt and cousin were on either side of her holding her arms and she could feel the waves of energy coming from them, keeping him at bay.
“Remember who you are Serena, you are more powerful than even your mother was, join us and unite our strength,” her aunt said softly.
Children of the Moon: Book Six Page 8