Unleashed (Dark Moon Shifters #1)

by Bella Jacobs

  Creedence sucks in a breath through his teeth. “Oh, no, Slim. I meant six. Season six is an abomination, and I prefer to pretend it never existed.”

  I narrow my eyes into slits. “No. Musical episode. Brilliant.”

  “What are you’re talking about?” Kite asks, clearly bewildered. “Is this a television show?”

  I blink up at Kite, horrified, as Creedence gasps in disbelief.

  “Only the best television show ever, hippy boy,” Creedence says, rising from his chair and punching Kite lightly on his arm. “I’m telling you, you missed out on some incredible storytelling out there in the pristine wilderness drawing in the dirt with sticks or whatever it is you bears do for fun.”

  “And yet somehow, I’ve survived,” Kite says dryly, slugging Creedence back, making the other man dance to the side with a good-natured laugh.

  Creedence is slimmer than Kite, but just as tall, and moves with a grace that makes me wonder if he’s a dancer or an athlete—someone who makes a living with his body. From what I remember, they definitely seem to get along better than Kite and Dust, though that encounter became very fraught, very fast.

  “How long have I been out?” I gently push up into a seated position, testing the limits of my post-gunshot-wound body. Thankfully, aside from a flash of pain as my pectoral muscles engage, I’m not feeling nearly as bad as I would have expected.

  “Two days.” Kite reaches out to help as I toss the covers from my legs, revealing my new duds—a loose-fitting pair of dark jeans and a baggy T-shirt with a bunny wearing a pink bow on the front that would be more at home on an eight-year-old.

  I frown down at the clothes, but Creedence answers my question before I can say a word—“Sorry about those. I didn’t have much time at the Goodwill and I wasn’t sure what size you were. I can grab you something better next time I’m in town.”

  “No, it’s fine,” I say. “It’s nice to have something clean to wear.” Brushing my hair over my shoulder, I realize that it’s clean, too, and that my skin feels fresh beneath my new clothes.

  Someone must have bathed me, I realize, but I’m too shy to ask who did the honors. I’m alive and seem to be healing well, and I decide to be grateful for that and conserve my energy for more important questions.

  “It’s time to tell me what’s going on, Kite,” I say, pinning him with a firm gaze. “Everything. Now.”

  He nods. “I’ll go get Dust.”

  “No, I’ll go to him.” I swing my legs over the edge of the bed. “I need to get some fresh air.” I also need to get away from that dream, to feel the sun on my face and remember that nightmare monsters, no matter how terrifying, can’t hurt me.

  “I’ll grab the shoes I bought you,” Creedence says, shaking his head as he glances down at my sock-clad feet. “Those are going to be too big, too.”

  “I don’t care,” I say. “Shoes of any kind are appreciated.”

  Creedence grunts. “Low maintenance is a good thing, but don’t be a doormat, kid.”

  “I won’t.” I hold his gaze and then Kite’s, hoping they can see how deeply I mean business. “Just choosing my battles. And I’m not a kid.”

  Kite nods. “No you’re not. I’ll go tell Dust we’re meeting out on the deck.”

  Chapter 13

  Wren

  Outside, we settle into chairs around a wrought iron table on a deck overlooking a field filled with purple spring flowers and a forest beyond so bright green it looks like it’s been freshly painted.

  It’s beautiful, this place. A lovely retreat from reality.

  Looking out across the rolling pastoral splendor, the insanity of the past two days seems like a bad dream.

  But bad dreams don’t leave you with a bullet wound in your chest and so many unanswered questions your head feels like it’s been infested by a swarm of killer bees. I’m overflowing with curiosity, but I’m also sore from my trip down the stairs, so I keep things brief, “Tell me everything. I’ll hold up a hand if I need you to stop and clarify.” I sit tall in my chair, not wanting to show weakness or give Dust any reason to insist I should return to bed and save this discussion for a later date.

  He studies me for a long beat, as if debating doing just that, but before he can speak, Creedence cuts in, “Just tell her, Captain. She’s got a right to know, and spreading it out isn’t going to make it easier. Shit or get off the pot already.”

  I lift my eyebrows and blink, indicating my wholehearted agreement with his statement. Creedence is still a stranger, but so far, I like him.

  A lot. His no-bullshit attitude is refreshing.

  “I’ll start,” Kite offers, leaning forward to brace his arms on the table, framing the gently-sweating beer bottle between them. “The people who ran us off the road and the piece of shit who shot you are part of the Kin Born alliance. They’re born shifters and they think that’s the only kind that should exist.” He holds up a large hand, ticking off one finger for each of the items on his list as he continues, “So other kinds—shifters made by mate-bite, shifters who become kin after being exposed to shifter blood, and the handful who are created in labs by doctors—the Kin Born want those people to die and us to die for standing up for them. I have a reputation for helping what they call ‘artificials’ escape. One of the Kin Born must have followed me the other night, assumed you were an artificial shifter, and decided to take us all out.” His chin drops to his chest with a sigh. “I’m sorry. I tried to be so careful, but obviously things didn’t end well. You were shot, Sierra is still missing…”

  “That’s not your fault.” I want to reassure him that I don’t blame him for my injury, but I’m not sure what to make of half of what he just said. It sounds like something from a twisted fairy tale.

  “It is, though. At least partly,” Kite says. “I was sent in undercover, posing as a shelter worker, so I could determine the easiest way to get you out. I should have come up with something safe and seamless faster. I was told I had until August to finalize the details and get the moving pieces in place, but then Dust found out your parents had gotten you an appointment with Dr. Death, and we had no choice but to move fast.”

  I frown, and Dust jumps in to offer, “Dr. Highborn’s procedure, the one you were scheduled for… It doesn’t cure any virus; it permanently alters a shifter’s DNA, making it impossible for them to take their kin form. It also ends in death for about seventy percent of his patients, though he doesn’t own up to that when sharing his statistics.” Dust’s jaw clenches. “A lot of his victims are shifter street kids his people lure in with promises of free food and board in exchange for participating in a drug trial. They’re never processed into the clinic through official channels, so we can only estimate how many are lost on the operating table. But from our research and tracking the kids who have gone missing in the past few years, we’re guessing it’s close to a ninety percent fatality rate.”

  My eyes fly wide.

  “Highborn tests his procedures on the homeless kids,” Kite says softly. “He uses them to find out what’s safest for his Church of Humanity patients and then only the movement deaths are recorded.”

  “And only patients referred through a Church of Humanity physician are serviced at the clinic,” Dust says, crossing his arms over his chest. “Every other patient with Devour virus who applies for treatment is turned down. We hacked into their database and verified it for ourselves. Dr. Highborn isn’t a member of the movement—he actually has a history of clashing with C of H charities in the past—so why make his ‘cure’ available only to their members?”

  “Ooh, ooh, I know this one.” Creedence bounces lightly in his chair as he lifts his arm in the air like an overeager student. “It’s because he’s full of shit and also a human supremacist motherfucker.”

  Dust inclines his head and offers a dry, “Tell him what he’s won, Johnny.”

  I shake my head gently, brows pinching tight.

  “I know it’s difficult to hear,” Dust says. “I’ve b
een in your shoes. When I found out my adopted parents had been making me sick…” His gaze shifts over my shoulder, a shadow falling behind his eyes, as if for a moment he’s back in his little boy’s body, helpless and sick and praying for a reason to believe that someday he would get well. “Belinda and George weren’t nearly as good to me as Hank and Abby were to you and your sister, but I still didn’t want to believe it. They were my parents. They took care of me, said they loved me…”

  Dust’s lips curve in a bitter smile. “But that’s part of what makes this so insidious, Wren. Love and the willingness to brutally torture another living being because he or she isn’t something you think God approves of—both can exist in the same person. Most of the time these people feel they have no choice. The more a Church of Humanity parent loves the child they’re trying to save from the beast mark, the more passionately they’ll set about poisoning them.”

  “They literally think the devil made us and sent us to earth to serve him.” Kite glares at his beer as he spins the bottle on the tabletop. “And that every time we shift we’re sucked further under Satan’s control until we become pure darkness, pure evil.”

  “Which is offensive.” Creedence winks as he takes a pull on his IPA. “I like to take full responsibility for my bad behavior.”

  All of the men have beers, but I didn’t ask to join them. I’ve never tried alcohol—my meds had enough unpredictable side effects without adding that into the mix—and I figure two days into recovering from a gunshot wound isn’t the time to start experimenting with new things.

  Though, considering all I’ve been through, I actually don’t feel that bad. In fact, I would swear I feel stronger now than I did thirty minutes ago when I woke up.

  “I’m feeling better.” I motion in the general direction of my chest, not sure what to say in response to everything they’ve just told me. “You did a good job patching me up.”

  Dust’s expression brightens. “Good. I guided the bullet out, and we got several bags of fluid into you the first six hours after. But if you were human you’d still be down for the count.”

  “We heal faster than regular folk,” Creedence offers.

  “And if you could shift, you would heal even faster.” Kite smiles. “But don’t worry about that now. It can take a month or more to get the drugs out of your system enough to make a shift possible. When the time is right and you’re ready, it’ll come naturally.”

  With a soft huff, I lift a hand.

  “Or it won’t,” Creedence says with a contrary grin. “Some people never come all the way back from the meds. Sometimes the poison just got in too deep.”

  I lift both hands now, fingers spread wide in the universal sign for “slow the heck down.”

  “Not for Wren.” Kite frowns at the other man. “She’s going to be fine. She’s got a kin form moving inside her. I can feel it.”

  I wave my hands in the air, but Creedence is already saying, “Yeah, well I have a few feelings of my own, Pooh-bie, and I think it might not be as simple as all that.”

  “Stop!” I smack my hands onto the table hard enough to make Kite jump and Creedence shift back in his chair, studying me out of the corners of his golden eyes. “I don’t believe in this. At least, not most of it.”

  “In what? That your parents were drugging you?” Dust cocks his head inquisitively. “Then how do you explain the rapid improvement in your health? Stopping the meds alleviated your symptoms. That’s just cause and effect, Wren. No faith or suspension of disbelief required.”

  “No, I mean shifters,” I say, though I’m not sure about the other stuff, either, at least not that my parents knew the drugs were responsible for my sickness and not the other way around. Hank and Abby are trusting people, hardworking, but uneducated, and they’ve never been far outside the Seattle city limits. Someone else—the elders or some crazy person like this doctor who treats humans like lab rats—could have tricked them into hurting me.

  But the shifter thing…

  Seriously, how gullible do they think I am? And what are they hoping to accomplish by convincing me they’re supernatural creatures? I mean, from what I’ve seen of Creedence so far, he seems like the type who might go along with a gag for fun, but Kite is a serious person and Dust seems to have gotten downright stuffy by the ripe old age of twenty-six.

  “Well, that’s easy enough to sort out.” Creedence tips his beer back, draining the last of the golden liquid before plunking it down on the table on its side. “Ready for a game of spin the bottle, gentlemen? I spin, winner gets a shift and a kiss?”

  Chapter 14

  Wren

  Creedence glances my way, arching a suggestive brow. “Assuming that’s acceptable to the lady? I assure you I excel at all boudoir activities, the captain’s a stuffy Brit, but he keeps his mouth clean, and Pooh-bie here is a sweet kid. You could do worse.”

  Kite’s scowl is the most menacing expression I’ve ever seen on his face. “Call me Pooh-bie one more fucking time, and I will end you, cat.”

  “Pooh-bie?” I blush as Kite looks my way. I guess he hasn’t told anyone about our kiss, which makes me strangely happy. I like that it’s still between us, our secret. It makes me think it might have meant as much to Kite as it did to me.

  “Short for Pooh Bear.” Kite runs a hand over the top of his silky hair as he rolls his eyes. “Because my kin form is a bear. Aren’t they creative?”

  I smile, but it fades quickly.

  A bear…

  Like the bear in my dream, the one who held me close and made me feel so safe, even when surrounded by evil things slinking through the darkness.

  Kite’s eyes light up, almost as if he’s read my mind. “No need to spin the bottle. I’ll do it.”

  “You’ll do no such thing,” Dust says, his voice cool and brisk, “You’ve been injured, and you’ve already shifted too often in the past few days. You need to rest and conserve your energy in case we need it for something more pressing than a parlor trick.”

  “You’re just saying that because you want the kiss, Captain,” Creedence teases, guiding the bottle back and forth, like the arm of a metronome. “But you underestimate how good I am at getting a bottle to stop where I want it to. I’ve had more than my share of experience with this game.” Creedence’s mischievous gaze cuts my way. “Completely unsupervised childhood. Got into all sorts of trouble. Upside, I’m really good at trouble.”

  I bite my lip, fighting a smile, not wanting to encourage him or this strange rivalry he seems to be trying to stir up. But the man has an infectious grin and an air about him that makes even his more outrageous comments seem harmless. I have a feeling he could say just about anything and get away with it, as long he flashed that “I-can’t-help-being-bad-baby smile” after.

  “I’m sure you have incredible bottle-twirling skill.” Dust’s lids slide to half mast. “But I prefer to use logic, not games of chance, to make decisions. I can’t risk shifting out in the open—my kin form is large enough to show up on radar if our enemies are watching—and the farmhouse interior isn’t of sufficient size to accommodate me. With Kite needing to continue to heal, it makes the most sense for you to shift, Creedence.”

  “Sweet. I could use a run, anyway. Been cooped up too long.” He stands, gripping the bottom of his light-brown tee and tugging it up and over his head, revealing the most incredible body I’ve ever seen. Golden skin covers lean, powerful muscles and abs an underwear model would kill for, with crisp, curly golden hair that dusts his chest, making it clear Creedence is a man, not a boy. The sight of him—so powerful and sensual and clearly completely at ease in his body—makes me blush even before he reaches for the top button on his jeans and pops it open.

  I jerk my head to the left, averting my gaze so fast it sends a flash of pain through my chest.

  Creedence chuckles, and Dust snaps, “You could have undressed inside.”

  “I’m just trying to keep everything above board and out in the open,” Creedence sa
ys, amusement thick in his voice. Clearly, he’s finding this all a lot more entertaining than the rest of us. “Transparency, Captain. That’s the key to building trust.”

  “Interesting advice from a con man,” Kite says. “Wouldn’t think you would know much about trust.”

  “Con men know more about trust than anyone. Before you break it, you have to make it.” Creedence pauses, and I hear more rustling, making my face flame hotter as I realize there is likely a completely nude man standing a few feet behind me. “You want to turn around, Slim?” he asks. “See the entire show from start to finish?”

  “Um, I…” I swallow, wondering if it’s possible to burst a blood vessel from embarrassment. “I—”

  “Cover up, Creedence,” Dust says, clearly sensing my distress. “She’s never been out of the human world. She’s not used to strangers stripping down to the altogether five minutes after she’s met them.”

  “We’ve known each other nearly an hour now,” Creedence says, mock hurt in his tone. “I thought we were ready to take the next step.”

  “Sorry, I’m old fashioned,” I say, fighting to pull myself together. “I need at least two hours to acclimate to full nudity.”

  Creedence laughs, and even Dust’s scowl backs away from his face. He glances my way, his lips curving in silent approval. But he always did appreciate spunk, and I can’t keep blushing and averting my eyes forever.

  I asked for this. I should at least be woman enough to give Creedence my full attention as he does…whatever he’s planning to do.

  Fifty percent of me is still sure this is some kind of prank or maybe a case of group psychosis, in which all three of these men have convinced themselves that they possess the power to transform into animals.

  But the other half…

  Memories of that dream bear and waking up to find Kite wearing a leaf apron because his clothes “didn’t survive the shift” keep squirming through my head. Why would he engage in such elaborate mind games while we were in mortal danger? And if that bear was real, then shifters are the only explanation. An actual purely-animal bear would have zero interest in snuggling a half-drowned woman he’d pulled from the river.