by McKenna Dean
“No!” The word ripped its way out of my throat. Ryker couldn’t be dead. Not like this. Not because of me.
The wolf howled. The leopard roared. The bear snapped his teeth in fury as several bullets found their mark and he went down mid-charge at his assailant.
Knight swept his hand into the back of the shooter’s knee, causing it to buckle, but the gunman maintained his footing. He pistol-whipped Knight as punishment, forcing him down on his hands and knees in the dirt.
Lips pulled back in a sneer, the gunman raised his weapon and pointed it straight at me. The owl swooped by his head, just as Knight leapt up and plowed into me, knocking me down and covering me with his body. Knight’s enthusiastic tackle not only took my breath away but also caused me to drop both the keys to his car and the ray gun. I looked up into his eyes for a startled moment, certain someone else was about to die trying to save my life.
Branches cracked like rifle shots, wrenching our attention to the woods behind us as something heavy crashed through the underbrush, powering in our direction with the speed and force of a locomotive. An undulating cry clawed its way out of the forest, and the gunman jerked his weapon around to face the oncoming attack. He fired before the unseen creature even made an appearance, sending two shots in rapid succession toward the beast hurtling through the undergrowth. On the third shot, his gun clicked uselessly, and he tossed it aside with a curse.
From out of the woods burst a dinosaur the size of a large calf. Snow-white teeth gnashed in the bright moonlight as it paused beside the road, glancing from where I lay clutched in Knight’s arms back to where the gunman braced himself at the open car door. Lips curling as it uttered a guttural roar, the velociraptor launched itself toward the car. The shooter dove inside with a shriek, slamming the door shut as he started the engine. Smoke boiled out of the block as the car moved off with a scream of tortured rubber. The dinosaur loped behind it on two legs like—well, like a dog chasing a car.
“Come back, you imbeciles!” Arturo shouted as his men fled in all directions, chased by the rest of the Redclaw team. “It’s another fake. An illusion! I will prove it to you.”
Knight pulled me to my feet as Arturo stalked toward us. “You’ve created your last illusion, Dr. Knight. You’re more trouble than you’re worth.” Moonlight glinted off the barrel of his gun.
“Oh, hell.” Knight cut his glance sideways at me, his voice somewhat pained. “I thought he’d be out of bullets by now.”
For the last words he’d ever say to me, they were most appropriate.
The thudding of galloping feet made us look down the road, where the velociraptor approached with terrifying speed.
I said a distinctly unladylike word. More than one. Knight echoed me.
Arturo glanced over his shoulder as death charged straight for him. He gave a loud snort. “I am not fooled by your apparitions.”
“I hate to tell you, old man,” Knight said, neatly mingling apprehension with subtle regret, “but that’s not one of mine.”
“You lie!” Arturo snarled. “You’re good, I grant you. But this is nothing but a trick, I tell you. A manipulation of the mind. A—”
He went down with a scream in a welter of blood as the velociraptor tore into him. I closed my eyes and clung to Knight as Arturo died, praying we wouldn’t be next.
“Don’t move.” Sensing Knight was about to bolt, dragging me with him, I opened one eye. “He goes after anything that runs.”
Knight’s arms closed around me like bands of steel. I would discover bruises later. The dinosaur, snout still bloody, came over to us, snuffling along the ground. Though I couldn’t stop trembling, I squelched a squeal when he rooted around the bottom of my ragged dress and nosed my bare legs. When he stood on his hind legs and placed his massive paws on my chest, I staggered under his weight and held my breath as he nuzzled up against me and slurped his tongue along my ear. I had to hold my breath. He stank like rotten meat.
“Delilah,” I mumbled, my lips stiff with fear.
The dinosaur shook himself and seemed to collapse inward, rolling up into a little ball only to bounce back on his feet as the small terrier. He leapt up on me again, leaving behind little bloody paw prints as he licked my hand. He looked so darned adorable; I couldn’t believe just moments before he’d been a killing machine.
Knight released me with an exaggerated whoosh of air, and bent over, hands on his knees. I staggered back from him a step, surveying the surrounding battlefield. What was left of Arturo’s team had been decimated. Bodies—or the remains of them—lay scattered about like broken toy soldiers.
I couldn’t bring myself to look at Ryker, who lay where he’d fallen, dying to protect me.
Instead, I hurried over to the moaning bear shifter, who had collapsed on his side. I knelt beside him, placing a hand on his shoulder. When I hit a wet patch of fur, I pulled my hand back to stare at it, the coating of blood looking almost black by the light of the moon. The terrier, coming up beneath my arm to sniff at the bear, sat down and whined.
“Is he—?”
I looked up at Knight. “No, but he needs help. Fast.”
I put out my hand without thinking, and Knight hauled me to my feet. “We need to find your car keys. Then we can take him to.... No. We’ll never get him in the car. I’ll stay here. You go to the nearest phone and call for a doctor. No. A vet. No.” Panic gripped my throat with icy fingers and squeezed them shut. I couldn’t think. I couldn’t breathe. I sucked air in, but it felt like nothing was getting into my lungs.
“Hey.” Knight pulled me into his arms, the familiar scents of pipe tobacco and Old Spice wrapping around me like a comforting blanket. “Hey. It’s going to be okay.”
“No, it’s not!” I pounded his shoulder. “I don’t know what to do. I always know what to do.”
He cupped my face in his hands and tipped up my chin to brush away my tears with his thumb. “That’s one of the things I like best about you. You still know what to do. Just break it down into smaller steps.”
“I killed my boss.”
“No, you didn’t.” Knight’s voice soothed, even as one hand dropped to the back of my neck and he tucked me into his shoulder. “You got Ryker—er, that is to say—Ryker died shielding you. A completely different proposition.”
“You started to say I got Ryker killed.” I sniffed but found myself steadied by the very Knight-ness of his attempt to comfort me.
“An unfortunate turn of phrase. Now, think. What do we need to do first?”
I appreciated the “we” there. “Find your keys. I dropped them when you tackled me. Get help. One of us should stay here. Me, since the other Redclaw agents will return soon.” Against my will, my eyes began to fill with tears. What would my coworkers say when they found out about Ryker?
A growl caught our attention. The terrier stood with all hackles raised, one paw lifted as it stared intently into the mulch. There, the ray gun crept toward me. I snatched it up before the little dog attacked it. He leapt at my hands as I pulled it out of reach. “No. Bad dog! The ray gun is our friend.”
The dog sat on his haunches and tilted his head from one side to the other in response.
“I must take a closer look at that weapon at some point. Clever little thing, coming back to you. Notice I’m not asking any questions about the dog just now. I take it you control the change by voice command? I have a feeling I know how you got away from the wolves in the hold. Now we just need to find the car keys. Or we could look at Margo’s bag of tricks and see what else is in there. Who knows, perhaps there’s some type of radio communicator?” I didn’t need moonlight to know Knight had one eyebrow lifted. I heard the devilish imp in his voice.
“You’re bloody brilliant.”
“If I do say so myself.”
Knight’s crooked grin heartened me in a way I couldn’t explain. I could do this. With his help.
The terrier pawed at my leg, his little claws catching me by surprise. With a yelp, I loo
ked down at him.
He glanced over his shoulder and yipped several times.
I followed his line of sight and saw what had caught his attention. Digging my fingers into Knight’s arm, I turned him to face Ryker’s body. “Do you see what I see?”
There was no need for him to answer. No sooner had I spoken than the little curl of smoke rising from Ryker’s prone form puffed into a bright flame. Flickers of orange licked along the edges of his body, outlining the black skin suit as it did so, the margins of the flames burning an intense blue. It reminded me of the mysterious package sent by Rian Stirling, programed to self-destruct. Without thinking, I stepped forward as though to put it out.
Knight held me fast, preventing me from getting closer, and a moment later, we both retreated, shielding our eyes from the white-hot flare. The wavering heat forced us back even further. As muscle and bone collapsed and turned into charred remains as fine as powder, the suit folded in on itself. Hot as the fire had been, it soon burned itself out. A slight breeze ruffled the pile of ash, carrying it away in a tumbling, spinning swirl of silky soot.
With wary caution, I bent over to touch the suit lying in place of Ryker’s body, almost like a chalk outline at a murder scene. It was already cool.
“They’ll want to know what happened. Mr. J and Miss Climpson, that is. I should take this back to the office.” I lifted the suit up from the ashes intending to stuff it within the duffle.
“Well, that would be dashed awkward, seeing as it’s my only article of clothing.”
Knight maintains he did not scream, but I was there. We both yelped. And then I whipped around toward the voice, ray gun at the ready.
“Stand down, Bishop. I’ve already been shot once tonight.” Ryker stepped out of the shadows, looking like Thorvaldsen’s statue of Jason and the Golden Fleece in the moonlight.
“You’re alive!” I squeaked, before averting my eyes. I held out the suit, fixing my relieved gaze on Knight all the while.
Ryker’s fingers brushed mine as he accepted the suit, and I flinched at the lava-like heat radiating from them.
“Sorry.” The whisper of cloth suggested he was getting dressed as he spoke. “There’s always some residual warmth after a Phoenix resurrection.”
“Warmth” was a rather benign word for the process, but as a Phoenix-shifter, no doubt he didn’t even notice such things.
“Of course.” Knight slapped his forehead. “Phoenix. Fire. Ashes. Rebirth.” Knight paused, and when he continued, I could hear the frown in his voice. “You took a bullet for Bishop. Several, in fact. Does that mean you’re immortal?”
“In a manner of speaking. What’s our situation, Bishop?”
Ryker’s cool dismissal of his death and rebirth brought me crashing back to reality. I pointed to where the bear lay. “Sir. The attacking force appears to be dead or routed, but I’ll catch you up later. One of your agents is down.”
Ryker crossed to the bear’s side in three swift strides and knelt to assess him. “Hang in there, Russo. Help’s on the way.”
“Russo? That’s Russo?” I couldn’t believe it. I mean, I knew my coworkers were shifters, but somehow, I’d pictured Russo as a coyote or a raccoon. I had a hard time seeing the lean young man in the rain coat as the massive bear lying at our feet.
Rooting around in the duffle bag, Knight let out a triumphant shout and raised one of the green lanterns that had been in the cave. When he flipped a switch, the lantern bathed the entire clearing in a bluish light. Holding the lantern aloft, he brought it over so Ryker could see the extent of Russo’s injuries.
They looked terrible. Blood soaked the brown fur and had pooled around him where bullets had gone in at the shoulder and sides. Russo lay on his side, head and neck outstretched, as he groaned in pain.
“Sir, Knight and I can go for help. Or, if you prefer, we can—”
“Not necessary.” His tone was brisk, but not unkind. From a zippered pocket, he withdrew a watch and fastened it to his wrist. Seeing my interest, he said, “We haven’t yet mastered the ability for me to wear it when I’m flying.”
“That looks like Dick Tracy’s two-way wrist watch radio.” Knight leaned in with the lantern for a better look.
“It wouldn’t be the first artifact to end up in a comic strip. Science fiction and superheroes can pave the way for the release of such technology to the general public.”
Knight sat back on his heels, mouth open in admiration for a second before he grinned. “That’s brilliant. Get a generation of kids thinking how cool and advanced the technology is, and then ten or fifteen years later, introduce the artifact, and voilà!” He snapped his fingers. “The population is already primed to accept it as normal.”
“Something like that.” Ryker pressed a button, activating the tiny screen. Mr. J appeared as though he were on a microscopic television, looking his usual frazzled self.
Ryker explained the situation, and Mr. J assured him he would relay the message to the teams already on the way, making them aware of the medical emergency. When he’d finished his call with Mr. J, Ryker withdrew a small vial from the same pocket and shook some tiny white pills into his hand. Handling the massive jaws with care, Ryker placed the pills under Russo’s tongue and lowered his head to the ground once more.
“Pain meds. Dissolves under the tongue. Formulated especially for shifters by our labs. And now we wait.” Ryker rested his hand on Russo’s shoulder. “It won’t be long now.”
“But sir—Russo needs help right away. Shouldn’t we—?”
Ryker shook his head. “Shifters are tougher than they look. We have accelerated healing rates when in shifter form and are resistant to most human diseases, too. Help is on the way. All of our teams have at least one agent trained in emergency shifter medicine.” From another pocket, he pulled out a folded pad that he pressed against the worst of Russo’s wounds to stem the loss of blood.
“But as tough as shifters are, you can still die. All except for you.” There was an underlying note to Knight’s statement that made it of an accusation rather than born of curiosity.
Ryker shot him a cool look I would not like to have received myself. “As you’ve seen for yourself, I can die. I just come back.”
“How old are you? Are there any—”
“It’s not something I care to discuss. In the meantime, perhaps you’d like to catch me up now.” Steel reverberated in his voice, and a suggestion of patience wearing thin. Before I could speak, the terrier thrust his nose into Ryker’s hand and licked his palm. “Who’s this little guy?”
Knight opened his mouth only to snap it shut, his eyebrows crawling into his hairline as he shot me a look of horror.
Tugging the dog gently back beside me by his collar, I cleared my throat and began. “Part of the story, sir. I took advantage of the fact I had a social engagement in the area to follow a potential lead on the missing artifacts.”
“We.” Irritation brought out the English in Knight. “We followed the lead. It was my idea. Don’t take all the blame for this, Bishop.”
Ignoring him, I continued. “Once here, we ran into Rian Stirling, who confirmed our belief the artifacts were in the area and intimated there would be an auction to the highest bidder.”
“Oh, really.” Ryker’s voice went dark and silky. I wondered if he knew how much he sounded like his half-brother just then, and had to hide a shiver. Was his threatening tone because of the illicit sale, the presence of his sibling, or the fact I’d spoken with Stirling? And if Ryker could come back from the dead, was his half-brother immortal too? “Go on.”
“Before we could contact Redclaw and inform them of our discovery, we recognized Dr. Knight’s wife among the guests, calling herself by another name.”
Ryker glanced up at Knight. What he saw in Knight’s face, I had no idea. To me it looked as though a portcullis had clanged shut. But Ryker’s expression softened, and I heard sympathy in his voice when he spoke. “Margo Knight was here? Alive?”
I cleared my throat. “And is dead again. For real this time. But I’m telling my story out of order.”
Still crouched beside Russo, Ryker rolled his hand to indicate I should continue.
I shot a look at Knight, who had his hands in his pockets and was looking off in the direction where Margo’s body lay. “It seemed probable the woman who’d called herself—”
“Oh, for heaven’s sake,” Knight snapped, facing us once more. “Just say Margo. You sound like the protagonist from a Rider Haggard novel. Next thing you know, you’ll be referring to her as She Who Must Be Obeyed.”
“Very well.” I swallowed any annoyance. It had been an evening of difficult revelations for Knight. I wasn’t going to quibble with him. “Margo had seduced an old friend of mine. They were using an old smuggler’s hideout on the property to store the stolen artifacts, as well as what appears to be valuables taken from neighboring estates.” I indicated the dog. “He was there, along with artwork and jewelry. In my zeal to confirm the presence of the artifacts—”
“Great Scott.” Knight pulled on his hair until it stood out over his ears in angry tufts. “This isn’t a court of law, Bishop. We got captured. The man Margo tried to double-cross showed up and killed her. Then Redclaw arrived and there was a bloodbath. End of story.”
“You forgot the wolves,” I pointed out.
“Right you are. Yes, there was a rival gang here, too. I don’t know where they’ve gone.” Knight looked around as though they might be lingering, and I cocked my eyebrows at the terrier, though in the dim light, I doubt Knight saw my gesture.
“I see.” The moon had ducked behind the clouds, or I’m sure I would have witnessed a smile twitch across Ryker’s lips. “Perhaps you could fill me in on what happened after I was shot?”
“Oh.” Knight shifted uncomfortably and glanced at the dog. “I’m not sure as I can say. There was so much going on.”
