ROMANCE: SHIFTER: Shifter to the Max Collection (Dragon, Bear, Wolf and Panther Shifter Romances) (Paranormal Fantasy Romance Collection)

by C. J. Ayers

  A part of her wanted to push open the car door and run as far and as fast as her legs would carry her. But, as quickly as that thought entered her mind it vanished. Where would she go? Anyway, she had to know the truth, regardless of the cost. She could never go back to living in a world she knew to be a lie. Killian was right. She couldn’t go back, even if she wanted to.

  Karyn's mind drifted to thoughts of the man beside her, the man she knew to be a creature of the night. She had seen death in him, the ferocious killer lurking underneath his professional façade. She saw greatness in him, too. Somehow, she sensed that he would not let any harm come to her.

  As Jack pulled the Audi into the long drive leading up to the Kansas City branch of Department 99, Killian slowly and gently shook Karyn awake. “We're here,” he whispered to her.

  Karyn feigned a yawn, sat up, and looked around. She had expected some colossal expensive-looking building populated by people running around in suits and ties. What she saw looked like nothing more than a small metal box in the middle of an expansive garden.

  Killian saw the confused look on Karyn's face and smiled. “I know it doesn't look like much from here, but the rest of the facility is underground. This is just the security room and elevator to the lower levels. It's actually quite impressive once you see it all. There are ten levels total.”

  “What level are we going to?” Karyn asked. Killian and Jack shared a look. Jack shook his head no, but Killian answered anyway.

  “The first part of realignment starts on the first level. If you're successful, you move down to the second level.”

  Karyn grabbed Killian by the arm and waited until he was looking her in the eye. “How bad is this going to be?” She asked. Her voice trembled a little.

  Killian knew it was against regulation to give her any information about the department, or about realignment, but staring into those deep blue eyes put him at east. He didn’t want to lie to her. Killian placed his hand on Jack's shoulder. “Why don't you go on in. We’ll catch up with you.”

  Jack looked between Killian and Karyn and then whispered to his friend. “You'd better know what you're doing.” Killian waited until Jack entered the building. He then cupped both of Karyn's hands in his own. He felt like ice.

  “I don't know exactly what your realignment will look like, or what kinds of things they will do to you. Each time it’s different. I do know that no one comes out the same way that they went in.”

  Karyn suddenly felt more afraid than when she had faced the werewolf. At least then she’d had something physical to fight, but how could you fight the unknown? She was already so exhausted, mentally and physically, from her excitement earlier in the day.

  At the very least, Karyn hoped that Department 99 would let her rest before the examinations began.

  “What if I just walk away?” What if I refuse to go through realignment?” Karyn asked. He could tell she was genuinely afraid. How did he manage to get himself into these situations? He should have just given Karyn over to the realignment guys back at the hospital. Why had he insisted on going with her? Why did he seem to have such a weak spot for her?

  “I wouldn't advise that,” he said sincerely. Immediately, Karyn understood. To refuse realignment would mean certain death.

  As they entered the small metal structure, Karyn noticed two security guards at the front door. “They look human,” she said, surprised.

  Killian laughed. “Looks are often deceiving around here, but yes, they are human. These guys are here because of their abilities. Maxwell here can pull and focus energy, changing it into anything he wishes. If he wanted to, he could blow this whole facility to kingdom come.” Maxwell nodded his head with a shy smile, and suddenly pulled a ball of fire out of thin air and bounced it from hand to hand, casually.

  Karyn was in awe. “What can you do?” she asked the other guard.

  Killian laughed again. “That's Ted. He can bring your worst fears to life… literally.” Killian leaned over and whispered into Karyn's ear. “He’s a scary dude…and I'm a vampire.”

  Karyn took two small steps back. “Nice to meet you both,” she said as she walked toward the elevator. Karyn didn’t even breathe until she was on the elevator with the doors safely closed behind her. As the elevator began its descent, Karyn suddenly felt like the small metal rectangle was taking her to her doom. Suddenly, she couldn't breathe, and the palms of her hands begin to sweat profusely. She reached over and pushed the emergency stop button on the elevator, bringing it to a heavy abrupt halt.

  “I don't think I can do this.” Karyn started to breathe and talk rapidly. “How could I have existed in this world all my life without seeing the truth all of this time? How could I have been so wrong about everything?”

  Without knowing why, Killian suddenly found his arms wrapped around her. The thought of her in pain was more than he could bear.

  “I promise you, you're going to make it. Trust me and trust yourself.” Karyn immediately nodded, taking two deep breaths. Killian was right, she had been through tough times before and had always found a way to survive and thrive. She could do this.

  Just as the elevator doors were opening, a voice came over the intercom. “Be advised, rogue shifter level one. Repeat, rogue shifter level one, full facility containment.” Killian swore as he immediately pushed Karyn down to the ground. The elevator doors closed slowly behind them.

  “One of these days those guys are going to tell us what shape these damn things are taking when they ask us to go capture them!” Killian said was a low growl. “Rogue shifter? Could they be any less specific?” He added.

  Killian quickly pulled Karyn over to the nearest desk and pushed her underneath. “Don’t move. Not for anyone, not even me, until those sirens go off.”

  Karyn started to climb out from under the desk almost immediately, completely ignoring Killian's orders. Suddenly the air was filled with flames and a roar of something that sounded like a tornado filled the room. Karyn stared in awe as a giant dragon flew around, like an enormous injured bird, crashing into walls and destroying everything in sight. She quickly went back under the desk.

  Everything seemed to be in total chaos. People superimposed over top of creatures ran amok. Somewhere from the other side of the room, a woman was throwing some kind of green hazy flame at the dragon, while cussing at him, and calling him a lizard. Thunder and lightning erupted inside the building. The whole day felt like nothing but a living nightmare. When was the insanity going to stop?

  Karyn peeked out from beneath the desk and scanned the massive first floor of Department 99. Karyn had no idea how to tell the difference between friend or foe, so she quickly looked for the one person she knew to be on her side. She spotted Killian and realized that he was heading straight towards the dragon.

  “Hey flameboy!” She heard him yell. “Why don’t you try lighting me on fire?” The dragon immediately locked its gaze onto Killian, belching a monstrous inferno directly at him. Karyn jumped out from under the desk screaming Kilian’s name even though she knew it was too late. The flames had already surrounded him. Karyn stopped dead in her tracks as the dragon turned its mighty stare onto her. This was it. This would be the end.

  Out of the raging flames, Killian leapt high into the air. With the dragon’s attention riveted on Karyn, Killian grabbed one of the scaly spikes and stabbed the serum deep into the dragon's throat. Karyn was surprised when, just like before, the creature became human. Only this time, it became a female. As irrational as it seemed Karyn suddenly found herself feeling jealous.

  Department 99 was a hub of activity as the woman / dragon was quickly hurried away in cuffs. Killian bounded over with a smile on his face. “That's always so much fun,” Killian laughed.

  Karyn half-heartedly punched him in the shoulder. “You scared the crap out of me! I thought you were dead.”

  Killian’s smile faded. “I am dead, remember.” Karyn swallowed, suddenly feeling embarrassed.

  In the midst
of all the commotion and confusion, neither Karyn or Killian saw the armed men until they were already upon them. Before Karyn could even protest, she had been handcuffed, blindfolded, and drugged. She was asleep before she even knew what had hit her.

  Killian had never liked the realignment guys. Ever since his own experience, he had held a grudge. He remembered the tall one as the one who had tried to break him. Realignment was a joke. It was conditioning pure and simple. And torture. He stared at the tall one. Without blinking, I can punch the guy straight in his mouth laying him out flat. Killian could feel his killer instinct ready to burst from the seams. He wanted their blood, all of their blood. Before he even realized it had happened, he looked down and saw the other two men at his feet. He felt something grab him from behind and it took several seconds to recognize the voice of the man holding him. It was Jack.

  “Calm down, man. This ain’t going to help her none.” The thought of Karyn and the sound of Jacks voice slowly began to bring him back to his senses. Killian was mortified to realize his fangs were out. If Jack hadn’t been there, if he hadn’t acted quickly, he would have killed those men.

  The first man Killian had hit stood up and brushed himself off. “You have no idea how bad you just made this for her,” he said, and then he turned and walked away dragging Karyn unconscious form.

  Karyn woke up and tried to shake the fog from her head. She seemed to be laying on a cold, hard slab of a floor, and she had no idea how she got in there. For a moment, she didn't remember anything. Then suddenly, it all came crashing back. She stood up in a rush and immediately got dizzy and had to drop back down to the floor. She sat cross-legged with her head in her hands, trying to study her breathing and slow down rapid heartbeat. Having a panic attack certainly wouldn’t improve her situation.

  As the effects of whatever drug they had given her began to wear off, she started to take note of where she was. It appeared as though she was in a single room, although there were no windows and no doors. There had to be a door. How else could she have gotten inside?

  Karyn stood back up much more slowly this time, and put both of her hands against the cold steel wall. She began to walk the perimeter of the container slowly, her hand scanning the walls for any imperfections that would indicate a door. She made one full circle and then another, and then another. Finally coming to the conclusion that there was no way out, she laughed dryly to herself. Just her luck. Of all the people in Kansas City, this would have to happen to her.

  Karyn had been sitting in a corner for what seem to have been several hours. There was nothing else in the room except for her. It also seemed that whoever had placed her here had taken all of her belongings as well. She shuddered to think of whoever had changed her clothes and placed her in this very nondescript grey tightfitting jumpsuit. Well, she thought to herself, at least she wasn't in a hospital gown.

  During the last several hours, Karyn had had a lot of time to think. She questioned her own sanity, wondering if the things that she had seen throughout the day could possibly be real. Since she knew nothing of her biological family, it crossed her mind that maybe schizophrenia ran in her genes or some other psychological illness that she was unaware of. Perhaps everything she had seen was real and they were going to kill her because she had seen it. Killian had told her she was a shadow walker. Since she had no idea of what that really was, she couldn't determine whether it was a good thing or a bad. What if she was really like those monsters she had seen today, capable of so much destruction so much slaughter? Of all the things that she wondered about herself, the most curious thing was that her mind continuously went back to Killian. She kept expecting to see him walk in and rescue her, yet again. She hoped he had not gotten himself into some kind of trouble. The way he continually walked himself into danger scared her. If he was human, she would say it was almost suicidal. but he wasn't human. He couldn't be killed, at least not in conventional manner. She began to wonder what could kill him. Since the only information she had on vampires came from movies, she doubted their authenticity. Killian did not seem to have the qualities of any vampire she had seen before. After all, he had walked out in the middle of the day at the hospital, a hospital with crosses along most of the walls, and she had seen him walk through flames and come out unscathed. Maybe he was completely indestructible? She liked him, that was for sure. She had never felt so close to someone so fast before, it was terrifying in its own way. From her years of growing up, being moved from home to home, and from people to people, the first thing she had learned is that you don’t get attached. She had not only accepted that way of life, but had in fact embraced it. Staying distant and unattached made her stronger in ways, helped her to focus on only the things that mattered to her, kept her flexible. But, Killian had found a way to instantly sneak under her defenses and touch a part of her she had denied even existed. Now, her thoughts constantly found themselves latched onto him. His grey eyes that seemed to go on forever, the way his black hair fell down in whips, the way his muscles bulged under his black shirt just enough to know that he was stronger than his sleek form would normally allow. These were the things that attracted him to her, but they were not the things that made her heart jump. It was his character and mannerisms that made her feel like she was falling in love with someone she barely knew. And, yet, she did know him, or at least she felt like she had known him for a very long time. Karyn wasn’t sure if it was her new shadow walker abilities or something entirely different, but when she looked into him for the first time at the hospital she saw way more than what she said. It felt as if she had seen the entire span of his life laid out in front of her in images, thoughts, and feelings. Even though it had all happened in just under a second. In all the things that Karyn had ever seen about vampires, they had to be bitten to be turned from a human, but Killian hadn’t been bitten. He had been born. Killian was the son of vampires in a line of vampires extending back farther than she could see with a history much richer than anything she had witnessed in this place. Karyn also saw that Killian did not come from this world. He came from a world where vampires ruled everything, and humans were nothing more than breeding stock. In her vision of Killian, she had seen the pods of people being grown in cities similar to the ones here on earth. There, humans were born and raised and lived normal lives, thousands upon thousands of them. Then, they were sent out into the world oblivious to the death that awaited them. Stalked, hunted, and bled dry by the vampires who were never at a loss for food. Only, Killian had been breaking the mandate of protection against the breeding cities and had been going inside to kill causing chaos and questions. Karyn had seen an image of Killian stalking a young boy his fangs extended in anticipation of the kill, and then he was being pulled. Something had yanked Killian not just away from the boy, but completely out of the world. There was blackness and hunger and loneliness that seemed to go on forever, and then he was here in her world. After that, the images were very confusing as if Killian went crazy for a while with images of the real and the unreal overlapping amongst dreams and desires. For the first time in his existence Killian had been faced with fear, and it had almost destroyed him.

  The last image she had seen of him, he had been staring at his own reflection in the mirror, something she herself had done on numerous occasion. This wasn’t the kind of looking that people did when they were checking their makeup or hair line, this was the type of looking where you were trying to find yourself, discover who you were and who you were going to become. Karyn had always believed that mirrors were the gateways to a person’s soul, when there was no one to hide behind and no place to run. How can you hide from your own reflection, or deny what you see when you look at your own reflection? Karyn knew that this was the type of soul searching that Killian did when he looked into the mirror just the same as she did and she connected with him because of it. It took courage to truly look at yourself in that way.

  Yes, Karyn had seen the killer in Killian when she had looked at him the first time, bu
t she had also seen the man who looked himself in the eyes and chose not to live as one. This, more than anything, was the reason that even though she was alone in a cold room where she may never come out again, Karyn’s mind remained locked on Killian, her vampire in shining armor.

  As Karyn sat in the corner of the small room thinking about Killian she began to hear a high pitched droning noise. At first she thought it was because she was exhausted and hungry, after all, as far as she knew, she hadn’t eaten in almost a day, if it was even the same day. She really had no way to know.

  Just as she had convinced herself that she was hearing things, the floor in front of her began to open up. Karyn laughed out loud, she had checked every wall in the room for a door but never thought to look on the floor. It made sense. Killian had told her that each floor went deeper underground, so of course the doors would be on the floor. Karyn immediately dismissed the idea of trying to escape. Regardless of the purpose behind why she was in this room, the reality was that she was here. Somehow she doubted that they were simply going to give her a way out and then just let her walk away. So, instead she waited calmly and patiently in the corner watching as a small table and a chair was pushed up through the opening in the floor. Karyn wanted nothing more than to rush over to the table and see what was on it, sit on a chair instead of the cold hard steel floor, but she forced herself to wait. She felt for some reason as though everything she did was being watched and tested. She was already angry with herself for not having thought to look on the floor for a door. She wanted them to know that she could care less what they sent into her little cell.

  Karyn’s time in orphanages, foster care homes, and sometimes even the streets had taught her not only how to survive, but also how to be patient, and how to adapt. She knew that there would be food of some kind on that table as well as at least some water. If they had wanted her dead, they could have done so a long time ago. She also knew that there would be some kind of condition that she would have to meet. One of her foster mothers used to make her eat her food off of the floor like a dog. Karyn would do so because she knew that she had to eat, but she never let it break her. She always knew that those people were less than her because of their actions and she would not allow them to make her less than who she was. She would do whatever she needed to do right now to survive and to find her way to the truth, but she would not be broken.