Their Shifter Academy 2: Unclaimed

by May Dawson

  Jensen McCauley had a side that was absolutely terrifying.

  But he listened to me. I could rein him in.

  No matter how much we fought, I was sure I’d never be on that side of his anger. What happened between the two of us was something…different.

  And strangely enough, scary, unstoppable Jensen kind of turned me on.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Tyson

  Penn slammed the door as we got out of the car in the parking lot of Heat, the strip club the pack owned.

  “Who’s in a bad mood going to a strip cub, Penn?” I asked.

  We had a quiet ride over. He was pissed about something, and even though it might have had nothing to do with me, I was still pissed at him. We hadn’t finished our talk about what the hell was going on with him and Maddie.

  I thought he’d fallen for her already. With her easy smile that crinkled the corners of her eyes, her strength and quick wit, she was easy to love.

  But maybe he’d just been manipulating her to win a pack princess and make his daddy happy.

  Penn ignored me as he stalked toward the low-slung building. I followed him out of the sunshine and into the perpetual darkness.

  “Hey, Penn. Hi, Tyson.” Women in various shades of undress materialized around us as they melted away from whoever they’d been talking to. Only the woman undulating on the stage remained.

  The bartender caught my hand with hers. “Can I get you something, Tyson?” Her voice came out husky.

  “No, thanks.” I squeezed her hand and retreated as fast as I could without being rude, then stuck my hands in my pockets.

  Penn made a point to ask each girl how they were doing. He remembered everyone’s name and asked specific questions about their families, and as he hugged them goodbye, he reminded them they could always call if someone hassled them. Seeing his genuine concern about each girl made some of my anger ebb.

  I knew Penn. He wouldn’t prey on Maddie like some of the guys at the academy would.

  When we made it past the girls to the back and stepped into the dimly lit hallway, we were greeted by Clint and Derrick. The two of them were bigger than we were, a combination of muscle and fat, and they seemed to form a wall between us and the manager’s office behind them.

  “Good to see you again, Penn,” Clint said. “Your dad’s got you working as soon as you get home, huh? Things haven’t changed much.”

  “I know,” Penn said. “Just doing my job.”

  “What’s he got you looking for?”

  The way Clint said it made me tense. Penn seemed as at ease as ever, but then, I’d seen Penn at ease two seconds before he shattered a bottle open over someone’s head.

  “I’m not looking for anything,” Penn said, his voice quiet. “I’m just checking in.”

  The two of them moved aside. I stood in the doorway as they disappeared back into the club, crossing my arms over my chest and leaning against the frame as I kept a watchful eye out. They’d left cigarettes smoking in the ashtray in the middle of the desk.

  Penn took a seat behind the desk, pulled out the books and began to flip through the records. It didn’t take long before he rubbed his shoulder absently and blew out a sigh of exasperation.

  “Let me guess,” I said. “Their handwriting sucks?”

  “Invoices don’t match up with what’s entered here, but then, maybe they’re just idiots,” Penn muttered.

  He continued to look back and forth across the pages, frowning as he turned them. I stayed quiet so he could focus, until I couldn’t take it anymore.

  “So you didn’t seem too interested in the girls out there,” I said, leaning against the side of the desk, my arms crossed. Was that because he genuinely felt attached to Maddie? I’d never seen him pull away that quickly from their admiring glances and wandering hands before.

  Penn stilled, then said slowly, “Well, no. I guess not. You didn’t seem too interested in them, either.”

  I shrugged. “Is it because you have a girlfriend?”

  “We aren’t in the second grade. I haven’t asked her to be my girlfriend.” Penn pulled open one of the desk drawers, then another. “I need a working pen.”

  “I thought you were going to claim her.” My voice came out casual, dangerously so.

  Penn looked up at me. “How come you aren’t interested in any girls, Ty? Not the ones here. Not my sister.”

  “You know I care about Mel.”

  “Yeah, I know.” His tone was skeptical.

  Penn always saw through me. I cared about Mel, but I didn’t want to mate with her.

  “Are you dating Northsea or not?” I asked.

  “Northsea,” he repeated. A knowing smile darted across his face, as if he could tell I was trying to create some distance between her and me.

  Irritation prickled across my skin. Was I really that fucking transparent? Maybe Penn and I knew each other too well.

  “Yeah, I’m dating her,” he said, some of his arrogance deflating as he leaned back in his chair. “I like her a lot. Okay?”

  Some of my irritation ebbed at his confession. At least he was transparent too, with me, if not with anyone else. “Yeah, it’s okay. It’s better than the idea you’re claiming her to make your father happy.”

  He looked at me hard, his jaw tight, before he said, “That would be pretty fucked up.”

  “Yeah, it would be.” I stared back at him.

  He didn’t like being questioned? Well, maybe since he was the rising alpha, no one else would question him to his face. But I was always going to be the person who challenged him when he was an asshole.

  Penn needed that. Penn needed me.

  “You heard my dad and me,” Penn said. There was no question in his voice. “I get that. But really, you thought I could do something like that? Try to win her over to make my dad happy?”

  “I don’t know,” I said. “I’ve been away from the pack for two years.”

  I’d been away from the pack. But more importantly, I’d been away from the guy who was simultaneously a younger brother to me and the future alpha I was supposed to bow before.

  “I didn’t change that much,” Penn said.

  “All right. Good.”

  Penn still seemed tight-lipped and exasperated. He jerked another drawer open, searching for a pen. His face shifted.

  Penn swiveled in his chair, using both hands as he lifted out a brick of Fae dust, the sparkling green enchanted drug that had caused a whole lot of trouble in the shifter community.

  He set it carefully on the desktop. His gaze flickered to me, and without needing to discuss it, I moved to swing the door closed.

  Just as Derrick and Clint headed down the hall toward us.

  I nodded and flashed them a smile like nothing was awry as I swung the door closed.

  Penn scrubbed his face over his hand. “Those fucking idiots.”

  “We’ve got company,” I said, flipping the lock before moving to the side of the door. “Also, that looks like a wee bit more than personal use.”

  “This stuff’s been killing wolves,” Penn muttered. “My father shut it all down.”

  Great idea, in theory. I’d heard he intended to do just that, but I doubted if he’d really meant it. The man loved money.

  But I couldn’t stand the pack running drugs. My mother hadn’t lived a happy life, and once she discovered the magic-tinged drugs that worked far more effectively on shifters than any human drug, she was done. I found her dead in our trailer the year after Penn’s father killed mine.

  “Obviously, some people didn’t get the memo.” Penn’s face was troubled.

  A heavy knock sounded on the door. “Something I can help you with, Penn?”

  We were in a windowless room in the back of the strip club, and the two goons were probably armed. We were carrying too, but that didn’t make a shoot-out any more appealing.

  Penn slipped the brick back into the drawer and eased it shut silently. Wiping his hand on his jeans, he nod
ded at me to open the door.

  “Hey,” I said as I pulled it open.

  The two of them crowded into the room. It was a tight squeeze if this turned into a fight.

  “What’s going on?” Clint asked, studying Penn.

  “Your record keeping sucks,” Penn said, smacking his hand on top of the book. “I’m going to take these with me.”

  “No, you aren’t.” Clint said.

  Penn leaned back in his chair. His lean muscles were taut with tension, prepared to strike, no matter how relaxed his pose. The room simmered with violence.

  I hadn’t seen Anton, who was one of the alpha’s closest friends, much over the past few years, and I liked it that way. He usually ran stuff at Heat.

  But when Anton stepped in, looking around with a genial grin on his face, at least it seemed to defuse some of the tension in the air. “Hey, guys. How’s it going?”

  “Good,” Clint said. Whatever he was about to say next, he broke off as Penn and Anton greeted each other.

  I’d never trusted Anton—I thought he was slimy as hell—but at least the simmering violence in the room eased. He let us take the books, and walked the two of us back out to our car.

  “I’m glad you’re back,” Anton told Penn at the car. “Your father needs you.”

  “I’m just here for the weekend,” Penn said.

  “For now,” Anton reminded him.

  Penn’s jaw tightened, but he nodded.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Maddie

  “So if we’d gone back to Tegan’s house to meet him like the text said, we’d be dead,” I said, my hands tightening on the steering wheel.

  “I have the feeling we’re on to something.” Jensen twisted to look behind us, searching for a tail. “Otherwise, people wouldn’t be dying.”

  “Way to look on the bright side.”

  “If it’s the Kierney pack, they’ll be waiting for us. We can’t just waltz in there.” He leaned back, his face thoughtful. “Who do we know from the Kierney pack?”

  “You can’t just waltz in there,” I said. “But maybe I can. People know I’m a pack princess. And they won’t expect me to be on your side. Everyone knows I don’t like you.”

  He snorted. “They’re misinformed.”

  “They might not know I was at Reefer’s. That ‘cop’ seemed surprised to see me with you—”

  “Despite what he said, we should assume Tegan told them everything,” he interrupted. “You’re not going into that kind of danger, Maddie.”

  “What do you care? It’s one way to get girls out of your precious academy.”

  He checked behind us again, then turned his gaze on me, his brows twisting together.

  “Are we really going to argue about that? Now?” he demanded.

  “I’m not arguing with you. It’s a fact. That’s been your mission.”

  His face clouded. “Yes, yes it has.”

  He said it in a way that made me wonder, as usual, what the hell was going on in his head. But I didn’t get a chance to press him before he added, “I think we’ve got a tail.”

  We’d put quite a few miles between us and that motel in a hurry. But it hadn’t been enough.

  I swore. “You think he planted a tracker on our car? I knew we should’ve taken the cop car.”

  There had been a genuine-looking police car parked outside our hotel, complete with crackling radio. I’d stared at it as we were hustling toward the Rover. The police car made me wonder just what kind of enemies we were up against.

  Were there shifters in the police department itself that would be coming after us?

  “You do love attracting attention, don’t you?” he muttered.

  I certainly didn’t care for it at the academy, where I was either ogled or bullied. I wasn’t sure which one I hated more. “I don’t seem to have much choice.”

  We sped down a long, empty country road. Every dip and crest in the road bounced the car up and down, and taking corners at this speed made my heart flutter in my chest.

  “Mm.” The sound was tight and non-committal. He glanced in the mirror again, and his eyes widened.

  As I dared to glance away from the road in the rearview mirror, a truck popped up behind us. It accelerated toward us rapidly.

  “Tinted windows.” Jensen twisted in his seat, his hand braced behind my seat, as he observed the car. “Maybe bulletproof glass? Only one way to know for sure.”

  I pressed down on the accelerator, trying to see if we could lose them, as Jensen pulled his gun out.

  “What if it’s not someone coming after us? What if it’s someone innocent?” I demanded.

  “Driving like that?” he asked skeptically.

  I glanced in the rearview mirror again. We flew at ninety-five miles per hour, but they kept pace with us.

  “You don’t know how aggressive some soccer moms get on the road,” I said, but he had a point. “All right. Light it up.”

  He leaned out the window and fired off two quick shots. They bounced off the windshield, ricocheting into the fields.

  “Okay, forget the soccer mom theory,” I said.

  I eased off the gas as we took a corner. The world was moving in a fast blur around the car, and I concentrated on the road ahead of us.

  Spike stripes. Spike stripes blocked the road ahead. A dark car beyond them.

  “Get back in the car,” I snapped at Jensen. “Hold on.”

  He slid back into the car without hesitation, before he flashed me a dirty look as if he didn’t appreciate how bossy I was.

  Then as he was jolted in his seat, bouncing back and forth so that his big shoulder swayed against mine, he yanked his seatbelt back across his chest.

  I whipped the wheel to the right, taking us off-road, trying to get around the spike strips.

  Trees flew past us, dangerously close, as the car jolted and bounced over the rough sloped terrain at the edge of the road.

  One of the tires still hit the spike strip. It popped with a sound like an explosion.

  Someone shot at us from the car, and then we passed them, bouncing back up onto the road. I barely had the car under control as I clung to the steering wheel.

  Barely. But that was enough. I’d gotten us through the roadblock. The wheel was making a whush-whush sound, but the car kept driving.

  “Nice job,” Jensen said.

  He didn’t even sound like a dick. He meant it. I hadn’t expected that from him. “Thanks.”

  The black car was on our bumper, and it slammed into us, jolting the Rover forward.

  Jensen twisted out the window again, firing at their tires now instead of their windshield.

  They darted forward, pulling up alongside us.

  I mashed the accelerator to the floor as I leaned over the steering wheel, trying to get as low as I could. The other car slid back into place behind us.

  The passenger in the car alongside us lowered their window, then stuck the barrel of a gun out.

  Jensen grabbed my shoulder and leaned across me to fire into their car. The noise of the gun sounded too loud in my ear, and I grimaced as my eardrum popped painfully, followed by a constant low hum that muted the sounds around me.

  I clung tight to the wheel to keep from flinching and hurtling us to our death in the trees.

  The guy who’d been about to shoot at me slumped back in his seat as blood seeped across his shirt.

  “Can you go any faster?” Jensen gritted.

  “The engine’s maxed out.” I was standing on the accelerator, and it wasn’t helping.

  We headed for a one-lane bridge. A mini-van drove slowly toward us from the other side.

  I slammed the heel of my hand against the horn as I honked frantically. We needed the right-of-way.

  Driver’s Ed never prepared me for this.

  The car came to an abrupt halt on the other side of the bridge, pulling off into the grass.

  I sighed in relief, watching the sides of the bridge as it came nearer and nearer,
hoping I could keep our car straight at these speeds—

  The car behind us slammed into our back bumper, hard enough to knock the Rover off balance.

  We hit the cement pillar at the end of the bridge. The car revolved 180 degrees, and I glimpsed the face of the driver of the car that had hit us through the tinted windshield.

  Right before the world went upside down.

  Our car rolled down the embankment. My stomach turned, and my vision went dark around the edges in panic. The world was moving too fast around us as the car flipped, over and over.

  We landed in the water with a splash.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Maddie

  We were upside-down, and I dangled from my seatbelt, panic burning in my chest as the car filled with water. I reached out for Jensen. “Are you okay?”

  My fingertips grazed his hard biceps, but he didn’t answer. I finally tore my eyes away from the water pouring in through his open window to his face. His body hung from the seatbelt, his eyes closed. A bloody gash stretched across his forehead.

  The damned air bags were in my way as I struggled to release my seatbelt.

  I landed hard against the water-flooded windshield. As I sat up in the rapidly-growing pool of water, I drew in a deep, ragged breath, trying to catch my breath for the swim.

  Outside, I heard ping, ping against the metal underbody of the car. Gunshots. They were waiting for us to swim out.

  What if we swam underwater instead?

  I was a good swimmer now—I’d come to it late, but I’d grown up as part of the Atlantic pack as well as in Blissford.

  I could swim down the river alone, under water, without drawing their attention.

  But I wasn’t sure I could do it carrying Jensen.

  The frigid water was up around my breasts now. I gritted my teeth, knowing that the spike of terror in my chest now was nothing compared to how I’d feel once the car was completely submerged. But I couldn’t get the door open until the car pressurized.

  His face looked innocent when he was knocked unconscious—no smirk across his nicely-shaped lips now—and his wild dark curls hung in a loose halo around his face.