by L. A. Banks
The fact that his touch now felt like a hot stone massage and his warm, hard body had been heaven on earth was freaking her out. It was as though the higher the moon rose, the less control she’d had. She wondered if her brain had fried in her skull or just gave up and melted, then ran out of her ear—because none of this made any kind of sense. Worse yet, the whole encounter made her realize just how intensely she’d needed all of what Hunter provided to function as a balanced unit. Everyone, even he, had declared her his mate—and she hadn’t decided. That was like getting married, in wolf culture, and the prospect of such permanence completey freaked her out.
To be someone’s mate was a commitment. It said that he needed her; she needed him. All of her life she’d been a loner of sorts, and now there was this very big thing happening so fast that there was almost no time to even think about it. Nature and duty were one, citing the way of the wolf. Family, the pack, the clan fused with that duty. It was a duality, the way of the wolf . . . the way of natural order among this species. Maybe humans didn’t have that same issue, but Shadows sure did. And in a world dominated by humans, this was a brand-new problem.
Sasha let her palms slowly trace the hard bricks in Hunter’s abdomen and then let her fingertips gently glide against the dark mahogany skin that was stretched tightly over muscle and bone. Never before in her life had she needed someone else to function. The concept was anathema. It went against everything she’d been taught and trained to deal with. Yes, you went in as a team, you didn’t leave your own . . . but if they died during the mission, there was no room for emotion until the mission was complete. And given the nature of most of her missions, she was a solo act. But now, damn . . .
“What’s wrong, baby?” Hunter murmured without opening his eyes. He nuzzled her hair and pulled the comforter tighter around them both.
“Nothing,” she said in a near whisper. “And everything,” she added after a pause.
“I could tell by your breathing . . . then your body got tight.” He kissed her temple. “What’s the everything?”
She let her breath out hard and kissed the center of his chest long and slow, thinking. “How can I go back to the base with this weakness that will happen once a quarter? It’s accepted in Shadow culture as just a norm, but in our culture . . . the human culture I was raised in, work in . . .”
“You talk as if you’re not one of us,” he said in a low, sleepy rumble, his tone holding no judgment.
“That’s not what I meant,” she said, tracing the stone ridges of his chest with her fingertips and speaking against his neck. “I’m just getting used to being a Shadow—just found out that I was . . . it’s a little more than I bargained for and it’s taking a while for me to switch up the lingo.”
She could feel him smile as his face moved against her temple.
“I’ll teach you,” he murmured in a warm rush of air and pulled her closer, beginning to wake up.
“No, no, be serious,” she said, squirming in his hold. “I’m trying to process what just happened here.”
“I am serious,” he said in a low chuckle that rumbled through his body. “I’ll help you process every . . . delicious . . . data point.”
“Hunter, listen to me. I never had good intel about who or what I was going in, and didn’t know my body would react like this. . . . Imagine, after all the years you’ve been alive, suddenly finding out you had some undetonated explosive in your system like this, that only started ticking once you got around your own species.” She shook her head. “Absolutely mind-blowing, and I don’t know how to integrate this with what used to be my former, more orderly life.”
Amazingly his grip loosened and the playfulness went out of his tone.
“I do know what it’s like to have a time bomb in your system, Sasha,” he said quietly, no longer seeking her mouth but seeking her gaze. “I just hope I haven’t passed that to you.”
“We’re going to beat this thing, find a way to be sure it’s totally gone or made dormant, something.”
He touched her face. “Do you realize that this is the first time you’ve ever really incorporated the word we into thinking about the future us?”
They stared at each other between blue-white panels of moonlight that came through the window. She touched his face, tracing the high ridge of his Native American cheekbones, marveling at the fusion of cultures that also gave him a strong African nose and lush Haitian mouth and coloring.
“I was always a lone soldier and never knew how to do ‘we,’ Hunter. Not sure that I know how to now . . . but you make me want to. It’s not the weakness caused by the heat. It’s you.”
She watched him briefly close his eyes and take in a deep breath through his nose. She’d stopped breathing, never having left her emotions so wide open and exposed before.
“Your heat is not considered a female weakness, like human males so foolishly view the human female menses,” he said quietly, as he allowed the pad of his thumb to trace her bottom lip. He shook his head no, his eyes never leaving hers. “Nor is it a curse or any other ridiculous term. To think such is antithetical to our culture. That is what I cannot begin to process. What you’ve just experienced we consider a time when you step into the full ripeness of your female energy. If anything, the weakness that is inspired is within our gender . . . when a male Shadow is rendered completely and totally devastated.”
He took her mouth slowly and deeply and then pulled away so he could stare into her eyes. “Sasha, don’t you understand yet . . . that when you have finally chosen me as your mate, and have opened your heart to be vulnerable to me at your strongest time of passion, that is when you’ll completely consume me? And as I wait for you to decide, what else am I now but yours?”
As he kissed her again, it was his turn to freak out. He’d gone into this union a freestanding warrior and come out of it her soldier. As her satiny heat blanketed him, her body welding to his, he knew that there was nothing he wouldn’t do for her, short of death. Yes, even that—he’d take a silver bullet, risk clan retaliation if he had to eliminate infected pack members, regardless of the politics. He’d protect her from her own military, if they ever turned on her, and would protect her heart from any abuse this wicked world might try to foist upon her.
She scorched his mind as her moist heat soaked into his skin and bones like a warm rain. Keeping her heart safe meant that her family was his family, because they were embedded in her spirit. Woods, Fisher, Doc, all she had to do was tell him the names of those to protect and he’d bring the way of the wolf to shadow them. On her command he’d become like a dark, unseen angel of the night for them, for her, anything she asked.
Her heat was his weakness, didn’t she know . . . but it was also more than that, so much more. It was the agony in her eyes as she’d held a weapon on him and didn’t take the shot. It was the way she had a prayer burning in her irises that she wouldn’t have to pull the trigger. It was the way she’d fought side by side with him, then against him, as well as the respect she gave his grandfather . . . along with the unspoken protection she’d lent to an elderly man without stealing his dignity. It was so many things about her that fused in a single baritone moan as she joined their bodies.
It was impossible to process any of it. There was just simply no sorting it out right now.
Try as he might, he couldn’t break free. The chains and leather straps didn’t allow for even the slightest movement. A muzzle had been placed over his mouth; bright, glaring lights chased away all shadows, thus any place safe to slip into and disappear.
Something was stinging or pinching the soft flesh in the crease of his arm; his head pounded from the blow he’d received. Crow Shadow glanced at his arms, panic making him thrash against his restraints anew.
Thick, plastic tubes filled with a crimson substance that he knew to be his own blood leaked life out of his body. Growls filled his throat, but with his mouth sealed shut there was no way to voice his complaint. Spewing curses was futile, he need
ed answers! Since when did Vampires begin drinking Shadow Wolf blood? He didn’t understand; his eyes followed the very nonchalant entities that monitored his progress. Would they suck him dry and leave him a pale husk, or keep him alive to torture in some sick game?
Weak from significant blood loss and a concussion, for now all he could do was watch them fill small test tubes with what leaked from his veins. At least they hadn’t put their foul mouths on him and bitten him.
A second-floor window opened before Woods had taken two steps away from the rental car. Fisher cocked his weapon, but a familiar female voice called out a split-second response.
“Drop it.”
“Clarissa?” Woods yelled as Fisher pulled back.
“You’re gonna have to do better than that,” a familiar male voice shouted.
“Yo, Winters, hit us with holy water, garlic, whatever as long as it’s not silver bullets, dude.”
“Where’s Fisher?” Bradley called out. “You know the protocol on a nighttime sanctuary request.”
Fisher begrudgingly nodded and came out of hiding from behind the car. He opened both arms, weapon dangling from one finger, and walked up the front steps. Both he and Woods cringed as a bucket of water doused them from the second-floor window.
“All clear!” Clarissa yelled after thirty seconds.
The front door opened after a brief pause. Winters peeked out with a toothy grin.
“Sorry, guys. This was the best decontamination process we could rig up outside of the lab.”
Lion Shadow looked around the gathering of pack alphas and the hair began to prickle on the back of his neck, although he wasn’t sure why. Several of the other Shadows had the same reaction, he noticed, and he began to study their entourages with great care. The hunting party had agreed to stay close, to stay in communication, but several members were missing. All betas. Too many at the same time to not be noticed. Something was definitely wrong.
“Hey, Doc,” the MP said as Xavier Holland stopped at the main guard checkpoint. “I see they have you running back and forth tonight,” he added, making pleasant small talk.
“Yes, Joe, I have been running around like a chicken with my head cut off,” Doc said calmly, trying to force his voice to remain upbeat. He smiled a tense smile. “But at my age I’m starting to forget where I’m supposed to be when. Just for the record, what time was it when I pulled in earlier—I know there was something else I was supposed to do, but for the life of me . . .”
“No problem, Doc,” the younger man said, his eyes holding a combination of amusement and empathy. “It was around twenty-one-hundred hours, sir. I hope that helps?”
“Ah, perfect,” Doc said with a forced chuckle. “Thank you, son.”
He kept driving and immediately called the lab security phones in a panic. As soon as the line picked up he began reciting the Twenty-third Psalm. The MP on the line recited The Lord’s Prayer, and only then did Doc slump back against his seat in relief.
“There was an attempted breach,” he told the guard. “Around twenty-one-hundred an entity body-doubling as me tried to get into the lab. It may still be on the premises. Take all precautions.”
Francois shook his head. “Ah, they have learned. We got past the entrance guards easily enough, but once in the tunnels we could go no farther. They’d created a holy water mist system with UV lights leading to the labs that would eviscerate one of us—not to mention, the garlic oil they’d sprayed in there was wicked enough to gag Dracula himself!”
Etienne sighed and waved his hand. “Such a nuisance, but this is perhaps what I so love about the humans. They are adaptable and keep the challenge generous.”
“But it would have been so much more potent with antitoxin added to it.” Francois fingered a plastic bag of Crow Shadow’s blood and released an annoyed sigh. “I would have so enjoyed seeing the expression on that arrogant bastard’s face. I am not finished with Dexter, to be sure.”
“Nor I.” A sly smile creased the corners of Etienne’s mouth. “But patience, patience . . . there is still more than enough time to redress the slight. Everything in this world is about auspicious timing, n’est-ce pas?”
Nausea made Clarissa hold on to the edge of a desk. “We’ve got to get out of here,” she said, staving off the dry heaves.
“What, are you nuts?” Fisher said, glancing around at Woods, Winters, and Bradley. “It’s the dead of night. Trudeau said to stay put.”
“If we don’t move quickly, they’ll find us here. Werewolves. They’re on the move from a cemetery less than a mile from here—you accidentally led them. For some reason they’re seeing you. I don’t know why.”
Woods and Fisher looked at each other.
“I thought only Shadow Wolves could pick up familiars?” Woods said, his horrified gaze ripping to each face in the room. “Clarissa, before we risk going out in the night without cover in Vampire and Werewolf country, make real sure you’re picking up Werewolf and not Shadow Wolf, all right?”
Clarissa’s eyes held the same question that Bradley’s and Winters’s eyes held. “What the hell is a Shadow Wolf?”
Fisher slapped his forehead and began walking in a tight circle.
“You said familiars, like a witch’s confidant?” Bradley rushed over to an open table and extracted rune stones from his pocket, then quickly flung them down.
“Oh, just screw me!” Woods said, his voice escalating with his panic. “No! Didn’t Trudeau give you intel yet about the nature of this mission, and the rest of it?”
“No, but the stones say Clarissa is right.” Bradley looked up from his quick divination and began grabbing artillery.
“Hey, guys, I don’t know about stones or visions, but radar is picking up something large, moving fast—many things, actually. Now would be a good time for somebody to pull that MLRS out and load that puppy up!” Winters backed away from the table and began to assist Woods and Fisher.
“Gimme coordinates, Bradley—tell me where to point it, Rissa,” Woods said as he and Fisher rolled the unit that was pitched on a dolly toward the window.
Fisher whipped out a digital compass as Clarissa barked directional information, and positioned the multiple launch rocket system to target the center of the fast moving mass.
“Are you guys insane?” Bradley yelled, his eyes wild. “You can’t fire that in a residential area!”
“Yo, yo, yo—not to mention it’ll take off half the roof,” Winters added, terror making his voice raw.
“It’s gonna hit the graveyard,” Woods said, not missing a beat. “May God rest in peace whatever’s in there.”
“Take off half the roof or let what’s coming take off half your face—quick decision, folks,” Fisher said.
One second went by and Woods made the decision. “I thought so,” he said, and then set off silver rounds that exploded out of the northwestern section of the roof and sounded like bazooka tracers.
Clarissa, Winters, and Bradley hit the floor, covering their heads from falling cinders. Fisher grabbed a fire extinguisher and foamed anything with an ember glow.
“Good! Now we’ve got a hole,” Fisher said, nodding toward Woods. “Your call, Lieutenant.”
“Winters, what’s up on radar? In about ten seconds you should be able to see nothing moving.”
Winters scrambled up on his feet and checked the radar systems. But before he could speak, it sounded like the Fourth of July outside.
“Oh, shit!” Bradley yelled and was up on his feet. “Now local authorities will be—”
“No they won’t,” Woods said, picking up an M-16 and checking to be sure the magazine had silver shells. “Not if you guys get up on the roof and tack down a tarp over the hole. Then this building will look like any other dilapidated, half-repaired, work-in-progress structure in the ward. The locals will take days to go house-to-house to figure out the exact trajectory of that artillery.” He turned to Clarissa. “You all stay armed, me and Fisher have gotta draw whatever made it out
of the graveyard away from you.”
“Roger that,” Fisher said, adding grenades to his arsenal.
“You guys don’t have to do that,” Winters said, glancing from his screen to the two soldiers. “A big section of the mass stopped moving . . . then it looks like small splinters of it broke off and are going deeper into the neighborhoods away from us . . . heading for the Lake Pontchartrain swamplands, and some of them are headed southwest toward the Terrebonne bayou area.”
Woods nodded but he and Fisher didn’t lay down their arms. “Get a tarp up on that roof to camouflage the artillery hole while me and Fisher walk point, just to be on the safe side.”
Sasha opened her eyes at the same time Hunter did. They both got up quickly, the haze of sleep instantly vanishing as they rushed into the shower, and were in and out in three minutes. Dressed, armed, they met Silver Hawk on the path to the truck.
“I did not want to intrude, but I sense there’s been an incident,” the older man said, looking at them without blinking.
Sasha and Hunter nodded.
“We know,” Hunter said. “Yeah . . . we know.”
Chapter 14
“We never really got to say how glad we were that you guys made it home okay,” Clarissa said once Woods and Fisher had slipped back into the building.
“Then and now, dude,” Winters said, giving Woods and Fisher a fist pound.
Bradley nodded. “We went to your memorial services on the base. Seeing you show up here freaked everybody out. . . . We didn’t know what to think. But we appreciate everything you did.”
Woods dragged his fingers through his disheveled hair. “Can’t say we blame you.” His eyes held a level of fatigue that went beyond battle weary. “You can train all your life, drill a situation a thousand times, but until you see it up close and personal, it’s all brand spanking new. None of this fits into what I’d call normal.”
