True Alpha

by Ranae Rose

The key fit the lock, and it popped open with a minute click. He tore the collar from her neck and tossed it aside, revealing the ring of purple bruises that circled her neck. Something inside him wavered and snapped at the sight. What had they done to her? He wouldn’t know until she woke, until she was in condition to speak. Night was still hours away; he had to keep her alive until then.

  “Jack?”

  Ronnie stood in the doorway, gripping his rifle, his dark eyes silently asking the obvious question – was she alive? His t-shirt was damp with sweat – he must’ve run all the way across the valley and up the hill in his human form.

  “She’s been shot,” Jack said. “Her shoulder. Wound needs taken care of.”

  Ronnie nodded. “I saw that several of the others were hit, but I came here in case there was trouble with the baby.”

  “There’s not that I know of.” Another thing he had to be grateful for in the midst of this disaster.

  “What about you – your face is covered in blood, and so is your arm.”

  “Broken nose, and I got hit in the forearm. I’m fine.” His injuries were nothing compared to some of the others’. His stomach shrunk into a hard ball at the thought of Daniel lying still on the ground. Daniel – his packmate, his family – one of the only two flesh-and-blood relatives he had. “We have to get them all off this mountain.”

  “I’ve gotta give basic treatment to everyone’s wounds first – I’ve got some first aid supplies in my pockets. Can you handle her here for a little while? I need to treat Daniel and Michael first.”

  Jack nodded. “I’ll take care of her while you treat the most critical injuries.” She wasn’t bleeding as much now that he’d applied pressure to her wound. “Daniel and Michael – let me know as soon as you can if they’re alive.”

  “I will.” Ronnie pulled his shirt over his head and began tearing it into ragged strips. He walked away, his makeshift bandages in hand.

  Jack slipped an arm around Mandy’s shoulders and lifted her into his lap, cradling her as he kept his palm pressed tightly over her wound. Something slick and warm met his bicep – blood. There was an exit wound. At least that meant the bullet wasn’t lodged inside her. He let the exit wound rest against his bicep as he held her, counting down the seconds as Ronnie treated the others, binding up their wounds and hopefully sealing enough blood inside to keep them alive until night fell and the moon shone.

  A breeze rushed by, carrying the scent of blood on the wind. Will’s deep voice boomed as he called out to Ronnie and helped to administer basic medical care. A distressed female voice had to belong to Kimberly – she must’ve heard the gunfire die down and climbed the hill. The battle was over; now all they had to do was keep the badly wounded alive and somehow get them off the mountain and back to the cabin without losing them.

  Night couldn’t come fast enough.

  ****

  A sense of déjà vu assailed Mandy as she rested her head on Jack’s shoulder, sitting stiffly on the front porch steps, trying not to move for the sake of her bandages. Ronnie had already had to change them once after she’d moved too quickly and they’d become soaked with blood.

  “You sure you don’t wanna lie down?” Jack asked, his unhurt arm wrapped snugly around her waist.

  “I’m sure.” No way did she want to move – her knee was a throbbing mess of agony, bruised, bloodied and surely broken. Since she needed to be outdoors in order to soak up the moonlight, she’d asked Jack and Ronnie to lift her out of bed and carry her out onto the porch, where she could sit with her leg extended, determined not to move her knee until it had bathed in moonlight for long enough to heal.

  Jack nodded and continued to hold her, saying nothing.

  She leaned against him silently – what was there left to say? She’d told him all about her abduction and period of captivity when she’d regained consciousness, thrilled and relieved to wake up in her own bed. And he’d told her about the rescue – the desperate search, the sacrifices – everything. Now, they had little choice but to wait on pins and needles together.

  She rested her head against his shoulder, cringing inwardly as she remembered the moment when she’d first laid eyes on his face. His nose was purple and swollen, and despite the fact that he’d scrubbed the blood away, the injury looked brutal. It had been crooked at first; Ronnie had set it for him so it wouldn’t heal that way. Mandy had nearly passed out when she’d heard the crunch of cartilage and Jack’s curse. He’d said that letting Ronnie straighten his nose had been worse than the original injury and his gunshot wound combined.

  But everyone was still alive; Ronnie, Will, Jack, Violet and Clarissa had managed to carry the injured down the mountain and back to the cabin – an arduous journey that would’ve been impossible without Ronnie and Will’s combined muscle. The unhurt Half Moon members had had to take turns carrying the injured, a difficult task that had required them to trek through the wilderness in their human forms, their bodies exposed to the branches, thorns and other little threats that the forest boasted. Jack had carried Mandy despite his wounds. Everyone was covered in scratches and at least a little bruised.

  “Hand me that roll of bandages, will you?” Clarissa’s voice drifted from inside the cabin. “Thanks.” She emerged onto the porch a moment later and nimbly leapt over the railing, dressed in an outfit of Mandy’s as she hurried to one of her patients.

  Daniel and Michael had been placed on stacks of blankets in the grass around the side of the cabin. The evening air was cool, but they were both in such poor condition that no one wanted them to miss a single ray of moonlight. Ronnie and Clarissa took constant care of them, doing everything they could to keep them from bleeding out as they waited for the sun to set. Clarissa took orders from Ronnie and assisted him however she could while he handled anything complicated.

  Both Daniel and Michael’s wounds could easily have been fatal, though by an immense stroke of luck, none of their major organs had been hit. Daniel had taken a bullet to the chest and Michael had been hit in the chest and the shoulder.

  Ronnie hadn’t attempted to remove the bullets from either of their chests yet, fearing that if he did, he’d drain them of what blood they had left. He was waiting for the moon to emerge; its light would aid his surgeries by causing their bodies to heal, even as Ronnie worked. With luck, they’d both survive, just like Mandy had months ago when she and Jack had fallen prey to another shifter hunter.

  She’d been shot in the chest too, but it had occurred outdoors at night, and the moon had immediately begun healing her. She hadn’t had to suffer through hours of being carried through the daytime wilderness, losing blood the entire way.

  “Bring me a bowl of ice water and some washcloths,” Ronnie said, his voice a low rumble. “We can’t let his fever get any higher.”

  Mandy glanced to where Ronnie was kneeling beside Daniel, frowning as he secured a fresh bandage around his abdomen. Like Michael, Daniel was still in his wolf form – since neither of them had regained consciousness, they couldn’t be persuaded to shift back, though their hairy coats made it more difficult for Ronnie to treat their wounds.

  “I’ll be right back,” Clarissa said, hurrying into the cabin and glancing over her shoulder at Daniel as she went.

  April reclined on the lawn too, though she was conscious. Ronnie had dug the bullet out of her hip and cleaned and bandaged her wound; now she waited for the moonlight, like everyone else.

  Mandy’s heart ached for Clarissa, who’d been tirelessly helping to treat not just her own mate, but all of the wounded. Mandy could imagine the agony of seeing her mate in such a condition – Clarissa must feel as if her life were hanging by a thread, just like Daniel’s.

  And then there was Mandy’s mother. Mandy’s chest tightened at the sight of her mother’s strawberry-blond head bowed in misery as she knelt in the grass beside Michael. What must she be feeling, watching the long-lost father of her child linger on death’s doorstep in the form of a huge wolf? Less than twenty-four hou
rs ago, she’d known nothing of the shifter world and had seen neither hide nor hair of him for thirty years.

  Mandy’s stomach churned with guilt – maybe she should’ve told her mother what she really was. Plainly, she could handle it, though she was clearly in agony. Being bombarded with so much new, improbable information at once and during such tense times had to be taking almost as big of a toll on her as Michael’s injury – the one he’d incurred in an attempt to save Mandy.

  Conflicting emotions clashed inside her as she eyed the big, brown wolf stretched out on a pile of blankets. Jack had told her what had happened, how Michael had disobeyed his orders and raced to the heart of the conflict, saving Jack from one hunter and then leaping in front of the barrel of a gun, purposely taking bullets that would have otherwise hit Clarissa and Violet. If not for him, Jack would be dead, and he’d saved two of Mandy’s other packmates, too. How could Mandy ever feel anything but grateful to the man who’d saved her mate? For that, she could forgive just about anything.

  Clearly, she’d misjudged her father. Yes, the mess had been his fault in the first place, but he’d tried to fix it, and his actions had proven that he regretted endangering Mandy and the pack – enough so that he’d been willing to sacrifice his life in order to lessen the damage. What in the world would she say to him when he recovered? And if he didn’t … what could she possibly say to her mother? It was obvious that she loved him in spite of everything, and nothing would ever be able to heal the wound she’d be left with if she lost him a second time, especially after all this.

  Clarissa emerged from the cabin with a bowl and several washcloths. She set them on the porch railing while she hopped over it, then picked them up again and hurried to Ronnie, who was still kneeling by Daniel’s side.

  “Soak the cloths in the ice water, use them to wrap his legs and then drape one over his forehead,” Ronnie said. “I’ve gotta check on Michael.”

  Clarissa dipped a cloth into the water and wrung it lightly before pressing it over his brow. Then she took care of his legs, wrapping him from his paws to his knees with the wet cloths.

  Ronnie moved on to Michael, crouching beside Kimberly. They spoke quietly, their heads bowed as Ronnie checked the bandage he’d wrapped Michael’s upper torso in, covering the wound that the burrowing bullet had caused.

  Ronnie had torn up his shirt to use as bandages earlier that day; Jack’s clothing was all too small for him, so he continued to go shirtless, apparently impervious to the autumn chill. His broad shoulders and back were covered in a dozen different little scratches, carved by stray branches and thorns. After such a grueling twenty-four hours, it was amazing that he and the others were even still awake. But they were – they carried on, repairing the damage the shifter hunters had inflicted because there was simply no other choice.

  “The food’s ready.” Violet opened the screen door and stuck her head out, her gaze darting immediately toward Ronnie and lingering on his broad shoulders, though she looked just as tired and worried as everyone else. She’d volunteered to whip up extra-large batches of the quickest food she could find, as everyone had been too busy searching to eat during the day. The aromas drifting from beyond the screen door indicated that she’d chosen to cook breakfast for dinner – a fitting choice, since no one had eaten breakfast.

  “You stay here; I’ll get you a plate.” Jack rose slowly, giving Mandy time to adjust herself so she wouldn’t slump over without his firm body to lean against.

  “Thanks,” she said when he emerged a couple minutes later carrying two plates heaped high with pancakes and eggs, balancing them both on his unhurt arm.

  The plate he placed in her lap was warm, a welcome contrast to the coolness of the October evening. When he settled beside her again and wrapped his arm around her waist, she forgot about the chill entirely as his heat erased every last trace of coldness from her skin.

  “Better eat it while it’s hot,” he said. “Your body needs food so it can heal.”

  She’d heal up in the moonlight just fine, but he was right – she needed to eat, especially for the baby’s sake. Problem was, every time she thought back to what had happened in the shack, her mind zoomed back to that terrifying moment when her captor had raised his gun, preparing to bring it down on her belly, and she felt sick with remembered fear. That combined with the pain radiating from her knee and shoulder was a recipe for nausea.

  “I made your pancakes sickeningly-sweet, just how you like ‘em,” Jack coaxed.

  He had indeed doused her pancakes in so much syrup that they were practically swimming, and yeah, that was the way she liked them. She inhaled, allowing the sweet scent to work its way into her lungs and mind, inciting a craving.

  “If you don’t feel like breakfast, I could go inside and get a brownie from your secret stash,” Jack offered.

  “It’s not secret,” she said, cutting a bite of pancake with the side of her fork and spearing it. “It’s just where I keep them – food, in a cupboard – it’s not that weird.”

  “I’m just sayin’, you always hide the brownie container behind the cereal.”

  “That’s just so I don’t see the brownies and get tempted to eat one every time I open up the cupboard.”

  “Uh-huh.” He shoveled a huge bite of eggs into his mouth. He was half-smiling as he ate, but his eyes seemed a little darker than usual – a duller shade of gold. Regardless of his teasing, she knew he felt the pack’s tension, exhaustion and worry just as strongly as everyone else – even more so. He was the alpha, after all.

  After what he’d gone through, she could at least ease his worries a little by eating. She took a small bite of pancakes, letting the syrup spread slowly over her tongue, bathing her taste buds in sweetness.

  It was delicious. Her stomach rumbled in response to the taste and she began to eat with more enthusiasm. Behind her, the screen door opened and Violet and Noah emerged. Violet carried several plates with a grace only an experienced waitress could muster.

  Noah, on the other hand, was only able to carry two – he’d been shot in one shoulder, and though Ronnie had bandaged his wound expertly, that arm was no use to him until it healed. “I told you, you don’t have to help,” Violet said as they made their way by Jack and Mandy, descending the porch steps. “You should be resting.”

  “I’ve already started healing, and I’ll be fine in a few hours,” he insisted. “There’s no reason why I can’t give you a hand.”

  Violet tsked, and together, they took food to those who were on the lawn.

  “It’s just about sunset,” Jack said when he and Mandy had finished their plates. “Would you like to watch it with me?”

  “Do I have a choice?” she teased. Seated on the front porch, they could either watch the last of the day’s light fade from the sky, or they could close their eyes.

  “Nope. It’s gonna be quite a while before I leave your side.” He drew his arm a tiny bit tighter around her waist, his embrace just snug enough to make her feel close to him without hurting her shoulder.

  Jack kept her warm as the last of the day slipped away and dusk settled over the mountains like a blanket. The moon shone from above, gibbous and white, glowing against the darkened sky. Mandy rested her head on Jack’s shoulder and waited for the pain to fade. As soon as her wounds finished healing, she was going to wrap her arms so tightly around him that it would be impossible to tell where she ended and he began.

  Little by little, the pain ebbed.

  “Clarissa, hand me that knife.” Ronnie’s voice drifted across the yard, steady and determined. “And have the forceps ready. Violet, hold the flashlight steady.”

  Mandy didn’t watch as Ronnie operated on Daniel, making a cut that allowed him to reach the buried bullet with his forceps and ultimately succeeding in removing it from Daniel’s abdomen, from the sound of it. “Hold this tight against the wound – apply pressure like this. Don’t be afraid of hurting him, that doesn’t matter – if he loses much more blood, he’ll
be dead before the moonlight can patch him back up.”

  A pang of deep sympathy sliced through Mandy’s heart – poor Clarissa.

  “Violet, can you help me with this?” Ronnie asked.

  Mandy glanced over and saw that Ronnie had recruited Violet as his new assistant; Clarissa was still with Daniel, stanching his wound with steady pressure.

  “Feelin’ any better?” Jack asked, mercifully distracting her from the scene in the yard, where Ronnie was about to attempt to remove the bullet lodged in her father’s chest.

  “The pain is fading.” She closed her eyes and laid her head against his shoulder again.

  The conversation that drifted from nearby, mainly between Ronnie and Violet, dominated Mandy’s attention. When things got rough, with blood gushing from the wound while Ronnie couldn’t seem to get ahold of the bullet with the forceps, Mandy held her breath. When she grew lightheaded and realized what she was doing, she exhaled, hastily taking another breath.

  Jack tightened his hold on her; he didn’t have to be as gentle, now that her wounds were knitting.

  “Stanch the wound,” Ronnie said, his voice calm but commanding. “I can’t see anything – there’s too much blood.”

  God, what if her father didn’t make it – what if he really had given his life to save Jack, Violet and Clarissa and to give her and the baby a better chance at survival? She pressed a hand to her belly as her nerves buzzed with anxiety. He’d done a good thing, but she didn’t want it to be his first and only fatherly act. Not just for her mother’s sake, but for her own and the baby’s – he’d proven himself worthy of a second chance. Surely he wouldn’t want to leave after this, not now that his hunters were finally gone.

  “Got it,” Ronnie said, his calm tone slipping into a near-sigh. “Apply as much pressure as you can.”

  Mandy exhaled in relief, her muscles going limp as she leaned against Jack. It wasn’t over yet, but now all anyone could do was keep pressure on Michael and Daniel’s wounds and wait as the moon worked its magic. Tense minutes ticked by, and as Mandy’s injuries grew less and less painful, she began to feel a little better mentally, too. After all, every minute that Daniel and her father made it through was another step toward survival.