by Michelle Fox
Talon cranked up the radio, drumming his fingers on the steering wheel as he raced back home. He would crash for the night and then go find her in the morning. There was a nice café in her hometown where they could have breakfast. Maybe they could talk.
Or maybe she would wipe the floor with him.
Either way, he aimed to find out.
Chapter Fourteen
~Gretchen~
Gretchen sang along with the radio, bouncing in her seat in time with the bass. It had been a hell of a night, one she was thrilled to say was over. Axel Sharpe had been dealt with. Her father would heal and she could get back to cooking. But first, she was going to snuggle up in her bed and sleep for at least twelve hours followed by eating everything in sight at Moon Struck Café, the local gathering place for her pack. Not only were the pancakes fluffy, but the bacon was thick and always crisp. Her stomach growled just from thinking about it.
Maybe she should stop and get a snack. It had been a while since she’d eaten and she’d certainly had her share of exercise for the night. She slowed as she neared a gas station, debating if she should pull in or not. Her stomach made a loud rumbling noise and decided the issue for her. She turned into the driveway and parked by the door.
The gas station’s convenience store was small, but at least they had chips and cookies. She filled her arms with crinkly bags and then snagged two bottles of a sports drink, figuring she should probably replace some electrolytes.
Ripping open a bag of chips, she shoved them in her mouth as she walked out of the store. The night was calm with a cloudy, dark sky that carried the faint scent of rain. Gretchen crumpled an empty bag and started another, her stomach grumbling for more. Back in her car, she chugged a power drink, draining the bottle with one long swallow. Somewhat sated, she eased her car back toward the road. From here on out, it would be all country. She looked forward to the darkness. Her shifter eyes had trouble dealing with too much light at night.
The radio blasted dance music as she gunned her way through the winding back roads that would lead her home. There was only one light, a red blinker and she dutifully slowed to a stop.
She never saw the truck that came barreling up on her. All she knew was something big and heavy hit her car, first snapping her head back into the headrest followed by ramming her face into the steering wheel. Pain blossomed across her face, webbed and sharp as broken glass, and her mind spun. Blinking, she tried to clear her vision, tried to understand what had happened, but instead her stomach hit eject on all the food she’d just eaten.
Fumbling with the handle on her door, she opened it just in time. Vomit burned up her throat and hit the pavement with a wet splat. Gagging, she fought to control the next wave of nausea, but failed.
Someone released her seat belt and pulled her out of the car with rough hands. Something wrapped around her wrists. It burned, which confused her. It feels like silver, but why would anyone tie me up? Her vision remained clouded, refusing to allow her the chance to figure anything out.
With rough jerks, whoever it was dragged her away from her car. She stumbled, almost falling, and yelped as the bands around her hands tightened. The burning was like being seared with a brand. She almost expected to smell burnt flesh, but all her nose registered was blood and fear. Her wolf whimpered and fought to jump through and protect her, but something blocked her ability to shift. That meant it had to be silver binding her, but why and who?
“What’s going on?” she asked, terror filling her as she managed to make out someone pulling down the tailgate on their truck. “What are you doing?”
“Shut up,” said a masculine voice. The man yanked her forward and shoved her against the tailgate. The metal edge bit into the backs of her thighs hard enough to bruise and for Gretchen to cry out. The man smacked her across the face.
“I said shut it.” He shoved her back until she collapsed onto the tailgate. Then he lifted her legs, which caused her body to fall backwards with a thud, and wound something around her ankles, binding them together. Then he tilted the tail gate up until she slid into the truck bed. Slamming it shut, he left her there; alone, half blind and burning.
The last thing she heard him say before he drove off was, “Hot damn. I did it. I got her.”
***
Gretchen spent the bumpy ride trying to unwrap the chain around her hands, but to her dismay, she discovered there was a padlock holding it in place. In the post-accident haze she’d missed that small, but important detail. With the way silver sapped her strength, she wouldn’t be able to rip the chain off, and the padlock meant she didn’t have a shot at unraveling it.
Muttering a swear word, she forced herself to relax. She needed to conserve what strength she had in case an opportunity to escape presented itself. Laying back on the hard truck bed, she tried to figure out who had attacked her. She didn’t recognize the man’s scent, but he also didn’t smell like shifter. Or vampire. He lacked the subtle rottenness that clung to vampires’ skin. She had caught the odor of sweat and dirt, but other than that, her captor wasn’t anyone she knew.
He could be human. She considered the possibility and then shrugged it off. Humans weren’t fast enough or strong enough to catch a shifter. Any stories she’d heard of people hunting shifters involved coordinated groups of humans, not one single man. A wizard or witch would be more likely, but then she hadn’t sensed the spark of magic they carried in their scents.
The other possibility was she’d been so stunned by the car accident that her senses had failed her. I did take quite a hit to the head. She frowned, not liking the idea, but couldn’t rule it out.
After what seemed like forever, the truck came to a stop and the sound of the driver exiting the vehicle came to her ears. The tailgate clunked and groaned as it opened. The man reached inside, and grabbing her ankles, pulled her out of the truck.
Feeling desperate, Gretchen shot up like a viper and head-butted the man. Her vision still hadn’t completely cleared though. The muddled mix of blacked out spots and what was actually before her, meant her aim was off. She hit the guy, but not square on. Her attempt to fight back ended in a glancing blow to one side of his face with most of the force directed toward the empty air over the man’s shoulder.
He retaliated instantly, giving her a sharp slap across the cheek. Not one to back down, Gretchen flailed, trying to gather herself enough for another strike, but he got to her first. There was a buzzing sound, and then, suddenly, her body became a pulsing repository of pain. She couldn’t think, couldn’t breathe, the pain filled her up until there was nothing else.
When it ended, she found herself on the ground, gravel digging into her spine and her captor laughing at her. At least she could see a little better now. The edges remained dark, but the center of her vision had cleared. She gasped when she realized she’d been taken by someone she knew.
“Jeb,” she said, her voice hoarse. The heavy-set human wore the same camo pants along with heavy work boots and a T-shirt that read ‘Bigfoot saw me, but nobody believes him.’
He gave a little salute. “The one and only. Glad you remember me.”
How could she forget? “What are you doing?”
He held up the black rectangle in his hand and electric blue arced at its end. “Well, see, I know werewolves are real. Your little stunt at my reveal party didn’t deter me. In fact, it convinced me I was right. Ever hear the phrase, the lady doth protest too much? You guys went to an awful lot of trouble to discredit me. Why do that unless I had something you didn’t want anyone else to see?”
“How did you find me?”
He pointed up to the sky. “I had cameras all around my yard. I’m big on security. I got all of your faces on video. A little face recognition software and voila I knew your names and where you lived courtesy of the DMV. I was headed your way, wanting to scope out your house, when I spotted you at the gas station. I’ve been following you since then.” He squatted down by her. “So tell me, is your whole town full of
shifters or do you hide among humans?”
“Werewolves aren’t real. You’re crazy,” she managed to say, although she had to admit she didn’t sound all that convincing.
“No, I’m not. I’m a trained investigator.” He tapped his eye. “I see everything. I work all the angles and I never assume. I work off proof and evidence, something you and your friends took away from me.”
“So now what?” she asked, her voice dull.
“Well, I have one problem. I know the names of your friends, but I don’t have all of their addresses. The DMV’s system locked me out before I could download everything. So you’re going to tell me where I can find them.”
“I don’t know where they live,” she said. “We only meet up when we’re furries. I don’t see anyone outside of that.”
“Bullshit. I saw you getting hot and heavy with your boyfriend at my house. What was his name?” He rubbed his chin for a second, then shook his head. “It doesn’t matter. Although maybe I’ll get you guys some name tags just to keep everyone straight.” He went to the truck and rummaged through it. “Actually, I have some right here that I bought for my party and forgot to use.”
There was the rustle of a plastic bag followed by the sound of packaging being opened. A second later, Jeb slapped something on her chest. Gretchen peered down and found a Hello My Name Is sticker with her name scrawled across it.
“Are you serious?”
Jeb shrugged. “Well, there are a lot of you.”
“What are you going to do?”
“Lots of things, but mostly I’m going to crown myself king of cryptozoologists.” He beamed at her. “I’ll be set for life and an established expert after this. I’m hoping for a TV show, personally. And probably a nice book deal. At least six figures.”
“You’re delusional.”
“On the contrary, she-wolf, you’ll find I’m everything but.” He pulled a gun from the small of his back and pointed it at her. “Now, say hello to phase one of my plan.”
Gretchen struggled to get up and run away, but couldn’t move fast enough. The gun roared and she howled as a bullet tunneled into her thigh, splitting her flesh open as it went. “What the fuck was that for,” she shouted, giving volume to the pain screaming through her body.
“I have my reasons.” He held up his phone and talked into it. “According to legend, shape shifters heal pretty fast. Tonight, thanks to an unfortunate accident, we’re going to test that theory out. This is exclusive never before seen video of a wounded shifter in the wild.”
“It wasn’t an accident, you asshole,” Gretchen hissed at Jeb.
He held up a finger. “Shush or I’ll gag you. Besides, I can edit out everything you say or even dub it to say whatever I want. So go along, or pay the price.”
She growled at him, at a loss for words. If I ever get my hands free, I will wrap them around his neck and squeeze until his brain oozes out his ears like a popped zit.
Jeb lowered his phone over her leg, filming the bullet wound. “Already we can see that the bleeding has stopped, which is crazy because this wound is less than five minutes old. One thing that remains to be seen is whether or not the bullet will work its way out or be trapped by the rapid healing. We’ll just have to watch and wait.”
With that, he fell silent, holding his phone steady. Gretchen tried to roll away from him, but he put a foot on her other thigh and pinned her down. “I have tent stakes in my truck, I bet I could put them through your shoulders and into the ground to keep you from wiggling too much,” he said his tone conversational.
She went still and resigned herself to glaring at him. He ignored her, focusing on her leg.
“The wound has now sealed up. There’s a scab, but I expect that will disappear.” He bent over and poked at her leg, pulling something off her. “And here’s the bullet. I guess her body pushed it out.” He held it in front of the camera for a second before focusing the lens back on her leg.
Gretchen fought not to react as Jeb treated her like a lab specimen. She had always counted the ability to heal from almost any wound as a major bonus of being a shifter. She hadn’t thought it would ever be used against her as a ‘tell’ that she was more than human.
“Ah, yep. I was right. The scab is gone. Just a thin pink line now. If we wait long enough that should resolve as well.” He hit a button on his phone and then shoved it back into his pocket. “Let’s do that one more time, shall we? Only this time with more blood.”
He rummaged in his truck for a moment and returned with a big knife housed in a leather sheath in one hand and a small metal bucket in the other. Tucking the knife through his belt, he bent down and hoisted Gretchen upright. Leaning her against a tree, he unwound the silver chains around her ankles, using the now free length to bind her to the tree itself. He skipped the padlock and just wove the end of the strand into the layers, pinning her in place. Pulling the knife from its sheath he cut through her jeans, teasing the fabric open to reveal the soft flesh of her thigh.
“What the fuck?” She tried to kick at him but he dodged her strikes without much effort. “Leave me alone, you perv.”
“Scream if you have to. No one will hear you out here.” He raised the knife, preparing to strike.
She glared at him, refusing to flinch as the blade’s cold edge came closer to her leg. “You have no idea who you’re messing with. They’ll kill you for this.”
“Ah, we’ll see about that.” The knife stopped moving and he tapped his head with a finger. “So far, the man is smarter than the beast. You underestimated me from the beginning and I don’t think that has changed. I know exactly what I’m up against and I’ve made arrangements.”
Gretchen shook her head. “It doesn’t matter. They won’t stop until you’re dead. If I were you, I would run while I could.”
“I’m not a coward,” he said. With that, he raised the knife and slammed it into her thigh.
Gretchen grunted at the impact, but otherwise remained calm. The bullet had hurt more. The new wound was just a tiny scratch in comparison, but then he twisted the blade inside her and her vision blurred.
“Oh God,” she moaned.
“I didn’t know monsters believed in God,” Jeb said, his tone conversational. “Amazing.”
“Fuck you.”
He jerked the knife up with a sharp tug. “Ah, there it is. The artery. I need some of your blood for phase two.” The bucket handle clanged as he picked it up and pressed it against her wound. Blood dripped into the container with a metallic pinging sound. When it slowed, Jeb encouraged it with more twisting of the knife, reopening the wound and preventing it from healing.
Cold creeped into Gretchen’s bones along with weakness. Her body could heal almost any wound, but not until the damage stopped. “I-I-I’m losing too much blood,” she said, teeth chattering.
“Almost done. Just a little more.” He pulled the knife half way out and then thrust it back inside, scraping bone in the process.
Gretchen yelped, her back arching with pain before collapsing to shudder against the tree trunk.
“That wasn’t so bad, was it? You heal too fast for anything to hurt for long.”
“Yeah? Let’s try it on you and see what happens.” She forced her eyes open and locked gazes with Jeb.
He just smirked at her. “You’re feisty, I’ll give you that, but let’s remember who’s in charge here.” Testing the chain wrapped around her to make sure it was tight, he said, “Be a good girl and stay, she-wolf. I’ll be back with some of your friends soon enough.”
Looking at the bucket he’d used to catch her blood, she asked, “What are you going to do?”
“Oh this?” He lifted up the bucket. “We’re going to see how well shifters can track. They’ll find your empty car sooner or later. I’m going to give them a trail to follow. One full of hidden cameras. It’s going to be monstacular.”
He then climbed into his truck and sped off, kicking up a cloud of dust as he went. Gretchen fought and fo
ught against the silver chains, but they were the one substance on earth immune to her shifter strength. She couldn’t use brute force to get out of this one and so she raised her head to the sky and howled a warning to the world. She could only hope someone was close enough to hear it.
Chapter Fifteen
~Talon~
Morning found Talon slumped over his desk, snoring so loud he woke himself up. Clapping a hand to his forehead in an effort to make being conscious hurt less, he blinked at his office, trying to remember why his head felt as heavy as a wrecking ball. Catching sight of the empty beer bottles neatly lined up on the end of his desk was his first clue. He’d drunk too much.
Groaning, he pulled out his phone and checked the time. Seven a.m. Well, at least he hadn’t overslept.
“Morning, sheriff,” Keira poked her head into his office. “I brought you some coffee and donuts.”
She set a bag that smelled like sugar near his elbow followed by a big to-go cup of brew that smelled more like hazelnut than coffee. Good. He liked it better that way.
“Thanks,” Talon mumbled. He didn’t want to open his mouth too much because he was fairly certain his morning breath could peel paint. Beer always soured his gut.
“You okay?” She looked at him with narrowed eyes.
“Yeah. Axel Sharpe had to be bound,” he said as he opened the bag and crammed the first donut into his mouth, whole.
Her green eyes widened at the news. “Xander probably liked that.” She’d only met the vampire once, but same as Talon, felt no love for the guy.
“And he’s made sure Axel liked it, too.” Talon gulped his coffee. He knew it had been the right thing to bind the stray, but that didn’t make him feel any better.
“A small mercy,” Keira murmured. Then, after a moment’s silence she asked, “Anything on deck today? The guys were wondering.”’
Talon shook his head. “You guys are free for today. Tomorrow there will be work,” he said, remembering the bookie ledger from Axel’s fight club. They would need to go through it and figure out how many shifters Axel had drugged and scammed. The Pack Council would want to know. “I’ve got to run up to Huntsville and talk to Gretchen’s alpha. I want to get his statement on what happened.”
