Saved by the Lion

by Selina Woods

  “Wait here,” I said.

  “Someone should guard your back, boss,” Freddy said, standing up when I did.

  “All right,” I told him. “You others come along, too, but hang back.”

  I made my way among the staff and diners, observing the enforcers vanish into the office. Pushing my hand down in a flattening gesture to Freddy, I ordered him to silence and crept to the half-opened door. Without revealing my presence, I listened for a moment.

  “Get her in here, old man,” one of the enforcers ordered.

  “No,” Hyde answered. “Iliana is now under Griffin’s personal protection.”

  “Sure, she is. You want to die right here and now? Get the girl in here, or we’ll kill you, then her. But only after we’ve had our way with her luscious body.”

  I pushed the door open and stood in the doorway. Hyde glanced past the enforcers to me, then back at them. “You gents might want to have a look behind you,” he said, his tone conversational.

  I might not have known all of my enforcers by sight, but they certainly knew me. The pair turned and took in my imposing size, my scowl, and my clear menace. As one, their sneers changed to opened mouthed gapes of fear, panic rising in their widened eyes. They were wolf shifters and no match for a lion of my size and strength.

  “You heard him,” I growled softly. “The girl, Iliana, is under my personal protection. This is my only warning, and it’s up to you two to spread the word. No enforcer is to come here to harass her, touch her, or even look at her crosswise. Am I clear?”

  “Y-yeah, boss,” one said quickly. “We won’t bother her again.”

  “You will tell any enforcer you meet,” I continued, “and from this day on, any who disobeys me will die. Now get out of here.”

  The pair edged their way around me, grimaces of fear meant to be smiles plastered across their faces. I turned to watch them rush from the restaurant, shoving people out of their way as they went. “It’ll take time for the word to get around,” I told Hyde, swinging back toward him.

  He chuckled. “Actually, I doubt it’ll take long at all. You scared those two properly enough.”

  “Even so,” I replied thoughtfully, “if you don’t mind, I’ll come back and hang out for a few days.”

  Hyde’s smile faded, and he stared at me. “You’re asking my permission?”

  “Well, yeah.” I grinned sheepishly. “I’ll pay for what we eat.”

  He crossed his arms over his chest and leaned against a stack of filing cabinets. “Might I ask why you are being so, excuse me, nice?”

  I shrugged, feeling a tad helpless under his scrutiny. “Maybe I need to be kind once in a while,” I admitted. “Save what’s left of my soul.”

  While my answer clearly confused him, it also seemed to satisfy him. “Then I’ll be happy to have you hang around, Griffin. And you’re young. You have time to save your soul.”

  “Maybe.” I smiled crookedly. “Unless I get killed by someone stronger and meaner than I am before then.”

  I left him then, and, with Freddy at my back, returned to the other guards who stood watching the diners. “Let’s go,” I told them. “We’re headed back to the penthouse.”

  Going back to my cage did little for me. I could not stop thinking about Iliana and the way she blushed when I winked at her. Even as I sat down with Brand to go over reports, she preyed upon my mind. Half-listening to him drone on, I knew I needed to see her again. Yet, if I did, then I was no better than the enforcers whom I ordered to stay away from her.

  “Are you listening, Griffin?” Brand asked.

  “Er, yeah.” I rubbed my hands over my face. “Just distracted. I need you to order the enforcers to leave the girl at the Devil’s Headmaster alone.”

  “Is that the place on Market?” he asked.

  “Yeah. She’s under my protection now.”

  Brand nodded. “Yes, I’ll inform them. Under the pain of death, I presume.”

  “Yep. I’ll personally rip the throat out of anyone who gives her, or her father, any problems.”

  He eyed me with speculation. “Might I ask why you’re taking such an interest in them, sir?”

  While I’d never give him the same answer as I did Hyde, I scowled slightly at him. “He pays on time,” I snapped. “There is no reason citizens who pay should be hassled. You know damn well I demand peace and order under my watch. Killing the folks who pay effectively stops the cash flow, does it not?”

  “Speaking of that,” Brand continued as though that was the answer he expected, “the packs have been roaming the streets again. They killed a few people the other night.”

  I growled low in my throat, my temper rising. Being the city’s ruler also meant protecting it as well as collecting taxes. Packs of shifters, usually lions and wolves, took drugs that made them high and crazier than normal, then preyed upon people. They tended to rape and kill, males as well as females, and no one was safe from them. Not even my enforcers. I killed as many as I could find, yet still more seemed to ooze from the woodwork.

  “Do we know where they’re hiding?”

  “Not yet.”

  “Make it a priority to find them,” I ordered him. “Then, I’ll lead a team in and wipe them out.”

  “Very good, sir.”

  “Those maggots make it difficult on everyone,” I said, relaxing and releasing my pent-up fury. “Send a bunch of enforcers who are just standing around being paid to do nothing. Let them earn their keep.”

  “You got it. Anything else?”

  “Yeah, we need to find the source of the stalkers’ drugs,” I said, speculating. “If we can cut them off from wherever they’re getting them, going without might do our work for us and kill them. They need their fixes on a regular basis.”

  Brand actually laughed. “What a sight that would be. The packs turning on one another and slaughtering their own. I like it.”

  “With luck, it’ll happen that way,” I said, “if we don’t have luck, they might unleash their craziness on anything that moves.”

  “They have to be getting their drugs from somewhere in town, right? Someone is making it for them and getting paid to do it.”

  Standing, I paced to the balcony and leaned against the rail, wondering why I never thought of cutting the packs off from their supplies before. The wind, cold for early spring, cut into me, but I ignored it. Brand followed me to the door but didn’t step outside with me.

  Turning, I folded my arms across my chest and rested my ass against the rail. “Is it possible that their addiction runs so deep that being without it might kill them?”

  Pursing his lips, Brand thought about it. “Not likely, sir. Drive them out of their minds, yes; force them from hiding, absolutely. It will make it both easier and harder to kill them.”

  “If they’ve gone insane, you mean?”

  “Yeah. Still, if you’re determined to kill them, it might be worth it.”

  I recalled Iliana’s beautiful face, and it was with her in mind that I lied to Brand. “It’s worth it,” I said, gazing out over the run down and blasted city, “because if the people aren’t terrified to be out after dark, they can work harder and make us all richer.”

  That may have been the truth, but not the entire reason I wanted the vicious packs gone. What I didn’t say was that folks like Iliana would be safer, and why I wanted them safer was a question I dared not ask myself. It wasn’t so very long ago I couldn’t have given a rat’s ass about the safety of the people who worked twice as hard as they should just so they could pay my taxes.

  “Good point,” Brand answered. “I wonder if we catch a renegade, maybe we can torture him into telling us where they get their drugs.”

  I had done plenty of killing since I reached adulthood at the ripe age of twelve and became an enforcer, yet the idea of torturing someone, even a renegade, bugged me. Of course, I couldn’t tell him that. “All we have to do is refuse him his dope,” I suggested. “Promise him his fix, and he’ll sing like a s
parrow.”

  “Then I’ll get the enforcers on the task of finding a hideout,” Brand replied. “Catch one and kill the others.”

  “I’ll be going out later,” I told him, staring out over the city again. “Inform me about it tomorrow.”

  “You got it.”

  Brand left me alone to brood. Iliana once again filled my thoughts, and I knew I had to see her again. I liked to think my intentions were a great deal more honorable than the enforcers who craved to sate their lust with her beautiful body, but where did I draw the line?

  Chapter Three

  I liked to roam the streets on four legs, usually at night but sometimes during the day, as I wasn’t as likely to be recognized. It helped me to see what was really going on in my town, as I could watch from a rooftop or under an old wreck and observe without being seen. Running on four legs also gave me the feeling of freedom I had lost a very long time ago.

  An hour after Brand left, I locked the elevator and took the stairwell down. It was a long walk down the many flights of stairs, but I was young and in excellent shape. The door to the stairs was guarded only at night, and as I slipped out into the alley an hour before darkness fell, there was no one to see me shift into my lion.

  My bodyguards didn’t like me to give them the slip, but I could hardly feel the rush of freedom if I had a half dozen lions and wolves following me. Trotting to the mouth of the alley, my paws silent on the gravel, I peeked around the corner. None of my minders were in sight as I broke into a lope from one alley to the next. I ran through streets cluttered with the rubble from bombed buildings where a few souls might live without heat and light, past rusted hulks of old cars and trucks, overturned buses.

  As many shifters often traveled on four legs, I was paid no more heed than I might if I were on two. Few lions had black manes that ran under the belly as I had, yet there were others. While I was glanced at with caution as I trotted and loped openly, none panicked as I headed toward Market Street. My enforcers lounged on street corners watching the people, and I decided that they needed to earn their pay every day. Not just when taxes were due.

  The sun started sinking, and the temperature dropped as I trotted down the sidewalks of the downtown area. Out of fear of the night stalkers, the renegade packs, few people wanted to be out past dark. Even my enforcers vanished into their homes, and fewer and fewer cars drove down the rapidly emptying streets. With more caution, I slowed my pace, and frequently sniffed the early evening breeze for potential trouble.

  The Devil’s Headmaster, like many homes and business, showed no lights. The doors were safely locked, and I wondered if Hyde and Iliana actually lived there, perhaps in an apartment in the very far back. I wandered down the alley behind the Headmaster, listening and hearing only rodents rustling through the dead leaves and trash. I sensed nothing, and saw nothing, and decided that perhaps I had wasted the trip to see her.

  They must have locked up and gone home; maybe they live in another part of town. While I doubted that was the case, as most business people lived in or very near their businesses in order to protect them. Still, there was a residential neighborhood not far away, and maybe Hyde had taken his daughter to a house there. I pressed my ear to the rear door of the restaurant and heard nothing from inside.

  As I planned to spend time eating at the place the following day, I decided that might be as good a time as any to see Iliana again. That way, I wouldn’t seem quite like a stalker, and more like a protector. Padding silently down the alley again, I headed toward the street and stopped dead.

  Was that a scream?

  Breaking into a gallop, I ran to the front of the restaurant, listening with everything I had. I saw nothing that hadn’t been there before. Whipping my head around, I tried to see everywhere at once, listening hard, trying to find the source of the noise. I couldn’t be certain it came from inside the Headmaster, or somewhere else. Come on, scream again. Let me know where you are.

  The girl obeyed my silent command, and her cry came again. This time, I knew it originated inside the restaurant. I ran back around to the rear, racing down the alley, hoping there weren’t bars on the windows. I knew there was no way I could take down the steel doors, either the front or the back, and found no windows that didn’t have iron over them.

  Gritting my teeth in rage, I ran around to the front again, searching for a way in. Even the front windows had bars, something I paid little attention to as most windows anywhere I went had them. Iliana must be in there with someone who wasn’t playing nice. Where was Hyde?

  At last I found a grate that must lead to the cellar of the restaurant. My lion couldn’t fit in there, but I hoped my man could. Yanking the grate off, I wriggled in feet first and dropped lightly into a cellar. It was obviously a storage room, for shelf upon shelf was filled with food and supplies. My lion was stronger and faster, and I switched forms mid-run and dashed up the stairs.

  The door at the top was bolted, and it took about four strikes of my heavy body to break the lock and shatter the jamb. Now I clearly heard deep growls and roars of fear and rage, the sounds of bodies striking the walls and floors. They came from the direction of the main dining room, and I galloped toward it. Passing the office and the cold stoves in the cooking area, I burst in without slowing.

  Iliana, in her small lion form, had leaped atop the table of a booth, her back to the wall, her fangs bared as she faced her attacker. A male lion, snarling in fury, tried to get past her slashing paws to grab a hold of her, and no doubt force her to the floor and rape her. But as he was unable to get behind her, they were both at a stalemate. She couldn’t escape, nor could he seize her without his face getting slashed to ribbons.

  I doubted Iliana could have held him off all night, or until her father arrived, whichever came first. Not bothering to roar and announce my attack, I charged forward and hit the enforcer with fangs and bared claws, and all of my tremendous weight behind it. Catching him by complete surprise, I pinned him to the floor and tried to chew my way through his thick mane to his spine.

  He squalled like a stricken cub, twisting half around to slash his fangs at my shoulder. Trying to get me off his back, he thrashed and rolled, and succeeded in getting partway onto his back. That meant he could use all four sets of razor claws against me as well as his deadly fangs. They ripped at my vulnerable belly, his teeth slashing at my face.

  I let go of him, and leaped backward, hoping he would get to his paws. If he did, I’d have the advantage of superior size, and had a better chance of killing him. He did, and rather than attack me as I hoped he would, he tried to run. Where he thought he could go with bars on the windows and the steel doors locked and barred, I had no idea.

  “Cowardly bastard,” I snarled as he leaped away from me.

  “I’m sorry, Griffin,” he yelped, tucking his rear end and spinning to the side away from me. “Please don’t kill me.”

  “You were warned to stay away from her,” I snapped, stalking him among the tables and chairs as he tried to hide among them.

  “I know, I’m sorry,” he pleaded, skipping from table to table, “it’ll never happen again.”

  “No,” I growled. “It won’t.”

  I think I might have chased him around all night without setting a single claw to his hide if it weren’t for Iliana. From out of nowhere, she leaped silently on the enforcer’s back, riding him as an old-time cowboy rode a bucking horse. He emitted a wild scream of blind panic as her claws sank deep into his skin and fur. Her weight wasn’t enough to bring him down, as he was easily twice her size. Yet her attack served to force him into the open in an effort to get her off him.

  I charged forward, my fangs bared, and hoped she’d have enough sense to get out of my way. More agile than a house cat, Iliana leaped from him and onto the top of the counter an instant before I hit the enforcer broadside. I threw him off his feet, pinned him between the floor and the counter. I sank my fangs into his throat just behind his jaws.

  I cut off his
scream of anguish and panic before it reached his tongue, crushing his bones, tendons, and his ability to draw breath. I tasted his blood in my mouth as he struggled, thrashing, his claws sinking into my back and shoulders. I ignored the pain he created, forcing my jaws closed, suffocating him slowly, waiting through the long minutes for him to die.

  At long last, I listened to his racing heart ebb and finally stop, and he went limp. His paws fell away from me. Releasing my hold, I dropped his corpse to the floor and stared down as his eyes slowly glazed over. Stepping away from it, scenting piss as his bladder let go at the moment he died, I wrinkled my nose and glanced up at Iliana.

  Crouched atop the counter, she stared at me in fear and horror. Her lips pulled back from her fangs, she growled low in her throat, no doubt suspecting I planned to take the enforcer’s place and rape her. With the aftermath of the battle over, my adrenaline rush evaporated, and I hurt all over from the cuts the enforcer managed to deliver.

  “I’m not in the mood to soothe your worries, Iliana,” I said, cranky that she still feared me after I saved her life. “Stay up there if it makes you feel better. Where’s the bathroom?”

  Her lips slid down over her fangs, but she didn’t stand up from her defensive crouch. “Next to the office.”

  I felt her eyes watching me as I prowled past the counter toward the office and went into the bathroom, turning on the light. Switching forms, I leaned my hands against the sink and used the mirror to inspect the various cuts on my shoulders. I hated mirrors, and as it didn’t do me a bit of good anyway, I smashed the damn thing with my fist. Glass shattered in all directions, crashing into the sink in splinters, with much of it falling to the floor.

  More exhausted than I should be, I sat on the toilet lid and reached around to my back. My fingers came away with bright blood, and I wondered if the healer I knew would answer her door at this late hour. By the feel of the cuts, I’d need plenty of sewing to put me back together. My pain and frustration fueled my anger, and I knew I’d lose my temper altogether if I didn’t find a way to calm myself.