Sentinels: Wolf Hunt

by Doranna Durgin

  An elusive scent played hide-and-seek on the gusty breeze; Nick whirled.

  There she was.

  Waiting for him.

  Everything that first glimpse had promised—rangy athletic grace even in stillness, only a few feet away and tucked up against the back side of the agility scorekeeper’s tent. Her features came as no surprise at all, they so suited the rest of her—short, mussed hair a glossy black, wide-set eyes a deep whiskey gold and tipped up at the corners over the world’s most amazing cheekbones, and a wide, serious mouth that wouldn’t have to say a word if she only ever let those eyes speak for her.

  Only a foot away now, and an unexpectedly swift step brought her closer. She found his gaze, direct and unflinching. “You’re following me.”

  “You meant me to.” He said it without thinking, while his mind caught on her voice—lower than he’d expected, smoothly musical, the edges of the words softened by the slightest of unfamiliar burrs, the faintest softening of consonants.

  “Did I?” She cocked her head slightly as she examined his words, his demeanor—everything about him.

  “You don’t belong here,” he said, but he kept accusation from his voice. For now. “Were you looking for me?” And on second thought, more warily, “You didn’t come here about the missing dogs.”

  At that she smiled again. Slowly. She shook her head. “No,” she said. “Not about the missing dogs.” She glanced over to the agility rings, where an overwrought Border Collie flung itself around its own made-up course as the judge signaled fault after fault and the handler laughed helplessly. “They are but infants.”

  It startled him, as much as he hid it. So a wolf would think, indeed—for compared to a wolf pack’s complex social structure and interaction, the domesticated dog led a simplified and limited life. He thought of his own rowdy, cheerful pack of little hounds. “They have their charm.”

  But her response had been too honest, too true. She’s not involved—but she’s not one of mine…

  Before he could take that train of thought any further, she said, “You knew me,” and she said it with some satisfaction.

  He found himself smiling—all wolf. “How,” he said, “could I not?” And then, narrow-eyed, “Is that why you’re here? To see if I would know you? To see if I would follow you?”

  “To see if you could,” she said.

  She’s not involved, she’s not one of mine…

  “There’s protocol,” he said, the reality of it pressing in. Too many things happening, here in Southwest. “You need to check in with brevis if you’re—”

  “Run with me,” she said, turning her head to a sudden gust of wind, glossy black hair buffeted, eyes flashing gold in the sun. Wild invitation from a wild child grown.

  He stopped short. In those eyes—in the lift of her head and the lines of strong, straight shoulders, in rangy legs promising long, ground-eating strides—he suddenly remembered something of what he was.

  “Run with me,” she said again, looking out over the remaining fields of the fairgrounds to the thick tangle of irrigated wooded borders between the tended green land and the natural desert grit and caliche and sand, filled with thorns and things that bit and stung and knew how to survive their harsh land.

  Nick looked out at that land, and he looked at the woman flinging wild in his face, and without even realizing it, he grinned again, dark and just as feral as she. All wolf.

  She hadn’t expected him to respond to her—not personally, not in any way. She’d expected to fail.

  She hadn’t expected to respond to him.

  She’d seen pictures—flat and uninteresting, without scent or texture. They hadn’t told her what she truly needed to know. They hadn’t revealed the deeper truth of him.

  They hadn’t told her he was alpha.

  Not alpha as reckoned in the world of cities and people, as among the Sentinels or the Atrum Core. Meaningless, those appellations. But alpha in the truest sense of the word.

  So now she’d found him, and now she’d drawn him in, and now she knew she would not fail.

  But now, she wanted to.

  Not an option.

  This open area in which they spoke held little shelter for changing—nothing more than ugly plastic portable bathrooms tucked beside the scorekeeper’s tent. Jet wrinkled her nose at them and targeted the informal parking lot beyond—full of oversized vans, small RVs, and big SUVs.

  A moment earlier, he’d been amused. But she’d left him with his civilized human thoughts too long, and now he held out a beckoning hand. A commanding hand, as if he had every right to demand her response.

  She supposed he did, when it came to that. But she tipped her head just so, and she dropped her jaw in light wolfish amusement…and she backed away. Just a step, then two…hesitating in invitation.

  “Later,” he said, his voice grown hard in a way that didn’t quite match the yearning in his pale green eyes. Humans might have trouble reading the truth of those eyes, but she had no such hindrance. He held firm nonetheless. “You’ve got questions to answer.”

  “After. If we run,” she told him, jogging a few easy strides away from the hustle-bustle barkbarkbark before hesitating again—knowing just the pattern of tease and entice, though he’d likely not recognize it until too late. For all his wolf, he was far too human to see the subtleness of what she could wield.

  “No,” he said, though his glance at the spit of woods as it reached through this field showed him to be just a tad more perceptive than she’d thought. A little faster.

  And so she moved again, body fluid and beguiling, expression clear. Romp with me.

  He shook his head. “I’m not bargaining. I want you out of the field until you’re formally cleared.”

  She couldn’t help a laugh. “That is for no man to say. I am my own person.” Not strictly true at the moment…but true for so much of her life that it clung to her, curled up inside her and aching to be set free again.

  “You,” he said, and those light green eyes darkened as he lowered his head slightly, “are in Brevis Southwest. Without permission or notification.” Not a good sign, that challenging look, or the set of his shoulders. If he wanted to take her, he could.

  Then never let him get close enough. She slipped farther away, a few light-hearted steps toward the beckoning woods. “After,” she repeated. She closed her eyes, flung her head back, let flared nostrils scoop in the scents of this man-made wild spot that had outpaced any attempts to keep it tamed. A hundred yards away, the scattered cars defined the edge of the parking area, more sparse than the clustered vehicles around the entrance to the performance grounds they’d just left. The noises and odors of that place had grown more distant, and the woods, the desert beyond…they called all the more loudly.

  And besides, she was close enough now.

  This human form could run, too.

  Run she did, straight for the woods, all smooth easy speed and loping strength, taking advantage of his momentary surprise to gain ground. And once there, she didn’t hesitate. She spun to face him even as she toed off her shoes; she tugged impatiently at the buttons of the vest. So confining, these clothes! She skimmed free, rolling them into a quick, practiced ball and standing to face him, wearing only Gausto’s necklaces on this lean, naked human form, skin tightening against the shadowed breeze.

  He stopped short at the sight of her, eyes gone dark, jaw gone hard. He took a step toward her—

  She smiled, showing teeth, and crouched into a tight ball of flesh, reaching within to free the wolf. It swelled from inside her, a rising wave of relief and power, swirling blues and grays that expanded to obscure her from the world and the world from her. But that veil quickly shrank back, showing her the world now through her wolf’s eyes. And still she showed her teeth, a laughing curl of lip—a challenge. Come run with me if you dare.

  He took it as such—but he took off none of his clothes. All the specially made Sentinel clothes with their warded pockets and natural material
s—useless to one whose changes had been instilled by the Core, triggered over and over and over until she learned to do it herself, then trained with powerful aversives to remain human while they taught her more.

  His gaze latched on to her even as the glorious flicker of blue lightning gathered—her first sight of a Sentinel’s natural change, flashing and strobing until he finally closed his eyes and lifted his head just so—and then the light obscured his form, twining and crawling around him until she had to look away—if only for an instant, and then she drank in the sight of him, well-pleased.

  They stood together for an instant—close enough for him to have snagged her, had he truly wanted to. Black, rangy wolf-bitch with long legs and a gleam in her eye. Hoarfrost gray wolf, a big male with substance and power and size. Two wolves in the midst of humanity—strangers, but, as wolves were wont, confident in their quick assessment of one another, their equally quick camaraderie. Nick Carter as wolf relaxed more easily than as human, relying on an instinct that told him she was only just what she was. Wolf-bitch, comely and strong and wanting a good run.

  In unexpected choreographed unison, they each gave a good shake—an ear-flapping, tail-popping shake, dismissing the residual energy of the change. After that, his tongue lolled out, ever so briefly. And then he seemed to remember why he’d followed her this far, and his ears canted back and his muzzle tightened over his teeth.

  Time to run, oh, yes. At first full-bore, slipping through the trees like darkness and shadow, irreverence on the run from authority. But soon enough it became obvious to her…he could have caught her at any time. Caught her and shoulder-checked her off her feet; caught her and grabbed her up by the scruff. Instead he merely flanked her, waiting…giving her, ultimately, the chance she’d asked for before he demanded his answers—and she finally broke free of their subtle sparring and blew out of the woods and into the desert.

  She’d been waiting here for days, lurking at the edges of the fairgrounds at night and coming in during the day to hunt for him as she’d been told. So she already knew the trail, and already knew the best paths in the desert—the way to the nearest wash, the cholla thicket where the jackrabbits thought they could hide, the barrel cactus damaged by an illegal off-roader, now a temporary source of juicy pulp and water.

  She led him there, and they trotted along the wash, bumping shoulders. She made a quick, flirty dive at his foreleg; he snarled horribly and pretended to go down; they tooth-fenced there under the bland midday winter sun, the wind gusting at their fur, a cactus wren shrilling a warning above them just in case their fierce mock growls had gone unheard by any potential prey within reach.

  She ended it by leaping to her feet and loping back toward the woods, pushing speed and surprised that he could keep up with her, too used to the larger males who couldn’t match her lithe movement. But they reached the woods together, found the shade and the cool dirt together, pressed themselves down behind the cover of leaves to watch the distant fuss and bother of humanity.

  A nudge of her long muzzle and refined nose brought his head down; she commenced to cleaning his face—his eyes, his strong cheeks, his ears. The only submission an alpha would give, to a wolf-bitch of his choosing.

  Of his choosing. That’s what this was. That was what it had turned into, beyond her intent and surely beyond his, but inescapable and irrevocable. And so he gave her such trust, this man who had tried to stay so distant and yet had let the wolf in her beguile the wolf in him, half-closing his eyes to tilt his head into her caresses.

  Maybe that’s what made it so hard to trigger the amulet, the one Fabron Gausto had given her—the one that was meant to immobilize him, to fetter him. Maybe that’s why his widened eyes, pale and green, held such stunned betrayal as the power of the thing surged up and wrapped itself around him, catching him even as he bolted upward, a snarl on his lips. Maybe that’s why, as his body stiffened and trembled and then went limp, she thought she heard a cry of denial invade her own private thoughts.

  Or maybe that had just come from within, after all.

  Chapter 2

  “Bring him in, Jet.”

  Fabron Gausto had said those words with confidence. No doubt he’d fully expected Jet to obey.

  He had every reason to.

  Confused by the changes in her life, by the changes in her body, Jet had accepted the things done to her at Gausto’s hand…so that she might survive them, as so many had not done. And when he held the rest of her pack hostage to her good behavior and sent her out to take down the enemy—one, he’d said, who would see her coming and yet never truly see her at all—she’d had every intention of doing just that.

  But he’d been wrong. Nick Carter had truly seen her. He’d recognized the wild in her; he’d seen her nature.

  He’d seen her heart.

  And she’d seen his.

  The feelings were strange to her—they came differently than they had before Gausto had forever altered her. Sweet and hard and twisting, more complex…conflicting desires, conflicting needs. She didn’t know how to reconcile them…what to do with them.

  She knew only that she needed time to understand them.

  And so instead of bundling the stricken wolf into an unwieldy package on the back of her sleek, growly Triumph Tiger motorcycle, alone, she’d ridden the thirty-one miles north to Oro Valley much more quickly than she should—speeding and ducking and dodging through traffic, nipping at the heels of larger vehicles and sprinting on by, close enough to catch the hint of unease in the other drivers’ expressions.

  Also against directions, that aggressive riding—but if Gausto had expected anything else, it only proved that he’d learned less about her world than she had about his.

  This route, she’d practiced extensively, though she knew few others. She peeled off I10 and onto Route 77 without second thought, skimming west of the Santa Catalinas and through Oro Valley, up to the foothills of the Tortolinas. She left bike, helmet and leather biking jacket in the sprawling driveway of the desert estate, parked in the shadows of stately, groomed saguaro that looked no happier, leashed by civilization, than she. Past the unobtrusive guards with a lift of her lip they pretended not to see; past the entry landscaping cameras that showed of her approach.

  Gausto knew, then, that she came alone.

  He waited for her.

  Past the public entrance to the house, the big double front doors of rustic wood enclosed by decorative steel privacy screening, and around the side to the entrance. Unlike the front half of the house, this hallway was narrow and dim, unexposed to exterior light; it led to rooms with no windows and no escape.

  Jet had reason to know.

  It led, too, to the far workroom, a deep place of murky memories and illness and brethren trapped and dead.

  But today Jet went to none of those places. She went instead to the tiny vestibule of a room that was hers alone—flat off-white walls with token but classic southwest texture, a plain overhead fixture with a dim bulb, a tiny rectangular window near the ceiling. To her furniture, her cot, a small trunk of clothes and the chair where Gausto would be sitting.

  He was.

  Never taken unaware, that was Gausto.

  He sat with his legs crossed and his hands quiet in his lap, but Jet was not complacent of him. Not this man, with his precisely tailored suit, his silver flashing jewelry, black hair drawn back in a tight tail at his neck. And dark eyes—cold, flat eyes. He didn’t wear amulets as so many did here; Jet had heard enough to understand that somehow, he was protected. Fully, completely protected from any workings anyone might try on him.

  She was human enough to feel bitter envy at this fact, and wolf enough not to show it.

  “Jet,” he said, using her name with flat authority. Well he might; he’d given it to her.

  And she did as she’d learned; she showed him submission. The form was her own—down to one knee, hands quietly on the other, body twisted ever so slightly aside in token exposure, head tipped just as subtl
y to show her throat. Always a careful balance, there—she’d seen those flat eyes of his go alive at the sight of her tender flesh, and she thought that even in his fully human existence, he felt the flicker of impulse to go for her throat.

  Especially when he was angered.

  Slowly, she went down to one knee. Slowly, she gave him her vulnerability. Her very caution seemed to please him.

  “You failed,” Gausto said. “I’m surprised. Perhaps I didn’t explain the stakes carefully enough? Another demonstration—” He stopped as Jet stiffened, and smirked slightly in the satisfaction of it.

  She wanted to tear his throat out.

  And she could have done it, could have shifted and been on him before he so much as moved from the chair. His blood would have splashed across these walls, his mysterious ward of protection of no use against her teeth and speed.

  But she didn’t. Not with the scent wrapped around this house, ever reminding her…her pack, trapped beneath, some already dead at Gausto’s hand, the rest awaiting salvation only Jet could provide.

  It should have been enough. It would have been enough. But Gausto had also promised her something else again.

  Freedom.

  For Jet, freedom had turned complicated and elusive—much more complicated than the simple return of a pack to the distant mountains from which it had come. For among them, Jet was no longer fully wolf…nor completely human. She was Gausto’s prize tool, his thing. That he would even contemplate releasing her…

  He must want Nick Carter very much.

  But Jet, in spite of her own best efforts, was not as biddable as she was meant to be.