by Chloe Cole
He’d thought his battle with the eagle shifter in Montana had prepared him, but nothing could prepare him for the inhuman strength some of their would-be assassins possessed.
He yanked the Bowie knife from the heart of the wolf shifter and stumbled back. His night vision goggles lay, useless, at his feet, having been torn off in the tussle. Lucky for him the clouds had passed and the moon lit the ridge in its preternatural glow.
"Dan! Are you all right?"
Mina's trembling voice rang over his shoulder and he wheeled around to face her. His gaze raked over her bloodied body with alarm.
"Are you hurt?" he demanded, the animal before him forgotten.
She shook her head and her lean throat worked as she stared at him. "Got a little tore up, but it’s healing already. I- I thought you were done for," she admitted softly, jerking her chin at the wolf by his feet.
"Yeah, well, I got some surprises in me,” he said with a grim smile. “The others?"
"So far, so good. Taya is holding her own, and Etienne...well, last I saw from the sky, he'd set fire to half an acre of trees and at least three shifters."
A long look passed between them, so many words unspoken, but the crackling in the forest around them cut any further discussion short.
There were more. So many more.
“Mina, take to the sky. We need you!” Taya’s voice calling from afar was loud enough for even him to hear and he resisted the urge to grab Mina and drag her behind him. Not only was he likely incapable of dragging her anywhere she didn't want to go, she would also kill him for trying to protect her. This was no damsel in distress. She was tough, strong, and deadly.
And it was exactly that respect and admiration that forced him to let her go when she stepped back, preparing to take flight again.
"Go get 'em, killer," he murmured. He let his gaze linger on her face--that determined chin, those laser-focused eyes, that pouty, gorgeous mouth--for one last, long moment, committing it to memory, just in case.
“Maybe I should just stay with you and--”
“Don’t even think about it. Worrying about you will only hold me back,” he said. Partly true, but the fact was, she was safer away from him. He was an anvil around her neck, and he knew it. She would stay if he gave her the choice. Better to take it out of her hands.
“Taya needs you. I think this area is secure anyway. I’ll come your way as soon as I do a quick sweep.”
Taya called her name again and Mina stepped back, lips trembling into a smile. "See you soon. And…be careful."
One second she was standing there in front of him, the next, she was gone. A specter in the night. He jerked his head, frantically searching, until he caught her out of the corner of his eye, soaring through the air like a falcon. It took his breath away.
And so will that son of a bitch coming in at your three o'clock if you don't get your head in the game.
He said one last, mental prayer for Mina's safety and then dropped down into fighting stance, readying himself for battle.
"Human?"
The massive man, clearly a shifter, came lumbering toward him, looking almost gleeful at the realization that Dan was a mere mortal, so it was a point of pride now. He knew he probably wouldn't make it through this night. There were too many of them coming too fast, and he didn't have the healing powers the rest of his team did.
But he was sure as shit going to do his damnedest to get through this bastard.
One at a time.
He stayed perfectly still as the other man closed the distance between them, the shifter's stride more confident with every step. Those massive hands gripped two throwing knives, and he was almost swaggering by the time they were only a couple yards apart.
"We don't accept surrender, you know," the giant ginger muttered, disgust clear in his mocking tone.
Which made the next moment all the more satisfying. Dan sprang forward, using the muscles in his thighs to get maximum lift as he propelled his entire bodyweight at his attacker. The other guy was massive, even in human form, but the element of surprise combined with Dan's own burly size sent his opponent stumbling backward. Dan got a second lucky break when the shifter stumbled on a stone behind him and toppled heavily to the ground.
The air rushed from his lungs in a whoosh--getting the wind knocked out of you was apparently just as real for shifters as it was for humans--and Dan capitalized on the opening, sending a flurry of blows to the other man's kidneys and stomach.
He couldn't lie. As worried as he was about Mina and as dire as their situation was, it felt fucking good. Unleashing some of the rage he'd pent up since the day he'd found that poor kid on that hotel bed felt like a revelation.
His dark pleasure was short-lived, though, because a second later, Goliath caught his wind, and he reached out a ham-like fist and pounded Dan in side of the head with it.
For a second, stars swam before his eyes and his ear rung. He shook his head to clear it, but knew what had happened as a hot trail of blood trickled down the side of his face.
Busted eardrum.
Son of a-
"Dan, look out!"
Taya's voice from above penetrated the humming in his head and he jerked upright just as Goliath's second hand, knife in fist, came up to slash at the place where Dan's neck had been.
Dan chopped the other man's wrist hard, and that hand reflexively opened, sending the knife skittering a few feet away into the underbrush.
Just as Dan pulled back to deliver three knuckles to Goliath's throat, a roar seemed to rumble from the very earth beneath them as the other man lurched upward, using both hands to shove Dan hard enough to send him flying half a dozen feet backward onto his ass.
He'd always considered himself quick for a big man, but he wasn't shifter-quick, and he'd only made it to his knees when Goliath reached him, massive fists flying. Dan's teeth rattled as one cross, straight to the chin sent him reeling. He felt like he was under water, every motion slow and laborious in spite of the hot burst of adrenaline coursing through him.
Was this what it felt like to be weak? Was this the curse of smaller men to live with every day, knowing they didn't have a chance in hell of protecting themselves or the people they cared for, no matter how much they willed it?
Another swing, another bone-crunching punch to the ribs that sent a searing pain through his body suddenly jerked him out of his lethargy, bringing him back to reality with a bang.
Just as Goliath pulled back, prepping to deliver another crushing blow, likely the last, if his murderous expression was any indicator, Dan gathered up every ounce of his strength and jerked his body left. The move unseated the other man and gave Dan a moment of freedom. Exactly long enough to grab the grapefruit-sized rock just a few feet away and bring it careening down on the back of Goliath's thick skull.
His shot was clean, his aim true, and he felt the bone cave in beneath the makeshift weapon.
His opponent jerked and twitched for a moment, then stilled before crumpling into a heap, face first.
Dan rolled to his feet with a grunt and dropped the stone, scanning the ground around him for the throwing knives. There wasn't a second to waste and he clearly needed to step up his weapon game if he was going to get past any more shifters. Hand to hand combat was going to be an uphill battle.
"You okay?" a low, male voice called from behind him.
He peered over his shoulder to find Etienne just a few yards away, a respect lighting his eerie green eyes that hadn't been there before. He was naked and covered in soot, but that aside, he looked no worse for wear.
"Yeah, I'm good. Have you seen the girls?"
Dan scanned the area for a sign of either Mina or Taya, but saw nothing except a half dozen bodies strewn on the ground.
Etienne nodded. "Mina was in a brawl with a lion shifter on the cliff below us. I heard a roar and caught a peek of him right as he went off the side. No way he survived the fall. Not sure where she went after that. And Taya is all right." Etienne shrugged, his expres
sion just short of stunned disbelief. "I don't want to speak too soon, man, but I think we might have done it. I did a sweep of the ridge and the coast looks clear. I think we might have actually won this round."
Dan opted to focus on all the words up until the last two. Because the thought of this possibly being the first battle of many made his insides clench. He was already losing his mind not being able to stay by Mina's side for the fight. He wasn't sure how much more he could take.
"Good job out there," Etienne muttered.
"Hey, guys," a low, female voice called from a distance, and Taya's winged form appeared from the tree line above.
His pulse battered his throat as he searched behind her for Mina.
"Where is she? Where's Mina?"
"I'm here. I'm fine," Mina called, as she soared into view.
Seeing her there, wings extended, like a fucking bird goddess sent from heaven in all her glory made his blood sing. He wondered if he would ever get used to the way she made him feel.
She drifted downward until she hit the ground in a graceful crouch, and then straightened.
"Everybody in one piece?" she asked, glancing from him to Etienne and Taya and then back again, her perceptive gaze assessing him from head to toe.
The pain in his ribs and ear that had been relegated to background noise in the midst of all the adrenaline-soaked action now came back with a vengeance, but he nodded anyway.
"Fucking A."
The others murmured their agreement, but he barely noticed. His gaze was locked on Mina and he couldn't tear it away. For whatever reason, he'd been given a second chance. One more day to spend with her, and that was worth a thousand cracked ribs.
"Excellent work, team," she murmured, her voice thick with emotion. "I'm so proud of us all. Now let's go inside and-oh!"
He cocked his head at her sudden exclamation and stared, trying to comprehend what he was seeing.
There Mina stood, brows drawn together in confusion as she lifted both hands to her chest, where the back-end of an arrow protruded, still quivering.
Horror slid through him, thick and oily, as a spot of blood bloomed on her white shirt, spreading so rapidly it hardly seemed real.
"Get the fuck down!" Etienne growled, shoving Taya to the rocky cliff floor even as he launched himself into the air, exploding into his dragon form.
Dan rushed to Mina's side just as her legs gave out. He caught her in his arms and scooped her up, his body on autopilot as he tried to process what had happened.
An unseen assassin armed with arrows and crack-shot aim had just shot his woman in the heart.
And he'd stood there, helpless as a child, and watched.
"Mina? Mina, baby, stay with me," he urged, willing himself to fall into that safe place in his mind as he ran toward the bunker. The one that had hundreds of hours of training. The one that knew that getting his sister-in-arms to safety was his primary concern, above all else.
There was no time for emotion. No room for feeling.
But, god, did it hurt. He wanted to howl at the injustice of it. Rage at the irony. And, more than anything else, he wanted to eviscerate the beast that hurt her.
He reached the entrance of the bunker just Mina's body went from tense to slack as she passed out in his arms.
"Wake up, love. Open those beautiful eyes for me, okay?" he demanded as he glanced down into her face. The color in her cheeks was draining at an alarming rate, and it scared the shit out of him.
This couldn't be real. She was a shifter, for god's sake. A fucking Valkyrie. She could survive this and more.
"Move," Taya demanded, shouldering past him to the mess hall. She rushed ahead of them and swept shattered glass off the table with the top towel. “Lay her down and gently strip her shirt away. I'll get some fresh towels not imbedded with glass so we can wipe away some of this blood and see what we're dealing with."
She must have sensed he was in need of a commander, and she was dead right. He snapped to it, all soldier, as he carried Mina to the table and laid her gently on it.
He dropped into a chair beside her and reached in his pocket for a penknife. As carefully as he could manage, he cut away her shirt until the wound was fully exposed.
"We need to pull the arrow out, Dan," Taya said softly, as she bent close to Mina.
"No, no," Dan snapped. "If we do that, it will be like uncorking a bottle. She'll bleed out in seconds. You're supposed to break it and leave it until--"
Until what? They flew a hundred miles to a human hospital where they would promptly figure out she was unlike anything they'd ever seen before and called the frigging National Guard the way he'd almost done when she'd first told him about shifters? Or worse, sent her to some lab for experimentation?
She'd rather be dead. That much he knew. But pulling the arrow out? It was a death sentence anyway.
"Shifters heal faster than humans. If the arrow stays in, she bleeds more slowly, but the tissue can't knit itself back together because the foreign body is blocking it. If we leave it in, eventually, it will kill her." Taya's tone was all cool and controlled, but her expression was sheer terror. "If we take it out, at least she has a chance."
He pushed himself to his feet, releasing Mina's cold hand as he did, and then turned to level Taya with a probing stare.
"How good of a chance?" he demanded.
Her devastated expression and accompanying headshake made his stomach roil.
"I don't know, Dan. But I know it's the only chance she has."
And that was that.
Without hesitation, he nodded and stepped back to make room for her to stand over Mina.
"Ready?" she asked, tipping her head back to eye him expectantly.
He laid a hand on each of Mina's shoulders, murmuring soft words of comfort. His heart pounded in his chest like a jackhammer as Taya closed her slim fingers around the shaft of the arrow.
"One..." she whispered, her voice trembling but her hands steady and sure. "Two. Three!"
She yanked straight up, and with all her might. Hard enough that Dan had to use his body weight to hold Mina in place. The sucking sound that came from Mina's chest as the arrow came free made the hair on the back of his neck stand straight up, but he refused to let fear and panic take over.
He released her shoulders and grabbed the plush white towel Taya brought in with her. "Putting pressure on it," he muttered, leaning down and pressing the cloth to the wound, hoping against hope that her blood didn't soak it moments later.
The next two minutes felt like a lifetime. The only sounds in the room were the ticking of his watch and he and Taya's shared erratic breathing as they waited.
He resisted the urge to lift his hand and check the wound a thousand times. Taking pressure off, for even an instant, could only hurt and looking wouldn't change a thing. Either her body's healing mechanism would kick in fast enough to save her or it wouldn't.
"I don't want to leave, but there's nothing else I can do for her right now," Taya said, her voice husky with unshed tears. "I need to go to Etienne. We don't know whether it was just the one assassin left, or whether there are more out there. If they get past him, you're both here and helpless. I promise I'll come back as soon as it's clear."
He didn't look up, keeping his gaze locked on Mina's still beating pulse as he nodded in understanding. Taya’s mate was still out there, at risk. He would’ve done the same. "Be careful."
She stood and strode away, her hurried footsteps a bleak reminder. Even if Mina made it through, this wasn’t over. In fact, the fight might have only just begun.
He squeezed Mina’s hand in his and thought back to other wounds he’d seen like this in battle. Bad idea. He had to stop making comparisons that would only drive him crazy. She was stronger than any soldier he’d ever fought with. Surely--
The screech that rent the air sent a cold knife of dread through him and he jerked his gaze to the sky right as a silhouette flickered past the moon. A second later, a rock the size of a
bowling ball careened through the shattered skylight, barreling straight for Mina’s head. Dan dove forward, covering her body with his own, grunting as the stone connected with the meat of his shoulder, cracking the heavy bone with a crunch.
The pain was blinding. But so was the rage.
So much rage.
They’d tried to kill his woman, again. And they would stop at nothing to see her dead.
Dan stood, a roar welling from deep inside, trumpeting outward in a mighty bellow as all of his pent up fury and helplessness spewed out. It was like a trigger in his brain had flipped and a sudden heat enveloped him with an intensity that radiated from his core, infusing his body with an atomic energy that pulsed and multiplied in muscle, bone and nerve.
Something was happening. Something beyond his control. For a second, he wondered if he was dying.
The ache in his ear began to subside and then, with a pop, he could hear out of his shattered eardrum. The pain in his shattered ribs and shoulder dulled to a low throb. Scents assaulted from every corner of the room but none stronger than the coppery smell of Mina's blood, which only fanned the flames threatening to swallow him whole even higher.
Then all that took a back seat as his body lurched and a grinding agony shot through him.
Jesus Christ, how could he protect Mina if he’d been shot himself?
That was his last conscious thought for long moments, as pain became his world. Bones lengthened and crackled, expanding as the clothes on his body stretched then broke away, rags dropping to the floor.
He stared down at his hands only to find massive paws with deadly claws, inches long and sharp as any knives. The paws of a grizzly bear.
"Holy fuck," he muttered. But the words came out as a room-shaking roar.
An arrow whizzed past him, almost grazing his shoulder, jerking him from his shock. There would be time for questions later. He needed to act, fast.
He lumbered toward the table Mina still lay upon and looked down into her pale, motionless face. Then, he leaned his immense weight against the side until the metal legs scraped against the tile floor with a squeal. A minute later, he’d managed to maneuver the table into the pantry behind the mess hall, and out of the direct line of fire. With one last look, he nudged the door closed behind him.
