“When I moved to New Orleans, I was introduced to a pack,” Annie said, the words flowing quickly from her mouth. “They became kind of like my family, my extended family. We were a big pack and my dad was a Gamma—”
“Was a what?” Huck asked. He hadn’t known Annie’s father very well, but he did have a few memories of a strong, stern, older man.
“A Gamma. Dad was a Gamma. Werewolves have ranks within their packs and Dad was kind of like a lieutenant, I guess.” She let out a slow breath. “He died,” she added, paling. “Of cancer.”
“I’m sorry.”
She swallowed, obviously trying to get the conversation back on track. “An Alpha named Emily took me under her wing. She was six years older than me. She looked after me, made sure that I fit in.”
An interesting thing happened then. Bradley’s eyes cast down in what appeared as shame. Or was it embarrassment? Huck watched as the boy became more withdrawn as Annie spoke.
“I grew up with Emily,” Annie continued. Huck noted that she seemed to talk in a more reverent tone. “She was my best friend, even though she was a lot older than me. Got me a job as a waitress at her bar. She got married and became the pack leader along with her husband. And they were good.” She paused, a melancholy expression on her face.
“What happened?” Huck asked.
Bradley immediately turned a sickly shade of gray and his eyes started filling with tears. Annie’s face fell and a look of utter desolation crossed her features. Huck immediately regretted asking that question.
“They died a month ago,” she whispered. “Their private plane crashed in the Everglades. They’ve been investigating if there was foul play, but...” She paused, seeing how distressed Bradley was getting. “They left their only son as the next pack leader.” She turned her head and looked pointedly at the boy, giving him a small, encouraging smile filled with sadness.
Huck immediately picked up her meaning. “Oh.”
Annie willed her arm to transform back into a human arm. She ran a hand through her hair again. So far, she hadn’t started crying yet, although she was chewing on inside of her cheek, a nervous tic that she’d done since they were children. And to Bradley’s credit, while he had tears trailing down from his big blue eyes, he hadn’t yet broken down from the reminder of his parents’ death. He was tough, as he probably had to be.
Was all of this even real?
“In a wolf pack,” Annie said, her voice rough with emotion, “any wolf can challenge the pack leader, but a lot don’t because obviously the leader is the strongest wolf in the pack. Yet when you have a little boy as pack leader… You can imagine the challenges that Bradley got after his parents passed.”
Huck blinked. That was unexpected. If this was all true, people—people who Annie had thought were friends—were threatening to hurt Bradley. Or worse. But that couldn’t be. Why would they threaten a little kid like that? It was absurd.
Annie was watching him under her curtain of hair with a guarded expression. “In a challenge, anything goes. Last one standing is pack leader. A lot of times, the loser is badly hurt and even killed.” She wrapped an arm about the boy’s shoulders and held him close. “When you’re born a werewolf or you’re Turned as a child, you have to be a certain age before your body allows you to transform. Bradley is still too young.”
“So…?” Huck started.
“It would be a slaughter for him,” Annie finished. “When you’re transformed, you don’t care about a lot of things. Such as hurting a child.”
“That’s why we ran away,” Bradley said, speaking up for the first time in Annie’s story. His voice sounded small, weak.
She nodded. “I couldn’t stand to see that happen to him after everything he’s been through. I took him and we ran here.” She paused and let out a long, deep breath. “And that’s why I called you.”
“Why?” Huck said. “What good can I do?”
Annie was frowning as she looked at him. “I think your guitarist can help us.”
CHAPTER 3
So far so good. Huck was at least willing to listen to her up until this point, although she could tell that he didn’t really believe her, even though she had transformed her arm for him—he was probably too shocked.
You haven’t seen him in years. You disappeared into thin air. Of course he’s not going to believe a story about werewolves.
He might not believe in it, but he could still help them out. For Bradley’s sake, he just had to.
She had first spotted Huck’s band’s poster a few months ago. She had always liked indie rock and used to trawl through the music stores in New Orleans. She’d find different bands through SoundCloud or Facebook. One day while at a club, she had came across a poster for an up-and-coming band called Half-Brained at a club. She immediately recognized the lead singer as Huck, even though he had grown up so much over the past twelve years. She took the poster home with her, not wanting to contact him because she didn’t want to drag him into her world, but not wanting to forget his face.
Then the thing with Emily and John happened, and she found that she had to contact Huck. Because he wasn’t the only person she recognized in the poster—Mark, the guitarist, also happened to be the leader of the Austin pack.
Fleeing from one pack to another was dangerous. By bringing a young pack leader with her, other pack leaders were open to challenging the boy to gain control of their pack back in New Orleans. Secretly, she had been hoping that someone would break pack laws and take over the pack, leaving her and Bradley alone, but her pack was full of staunch fundamentalists. The only way to become a leader was to beat him in combat, whether they were in the pack or not. Or, if the leader died suddenly, the next in line would take the mantle. That was it. So her pack wouldn’t leave them alone, and for some, it had become a personal vendetta.
She couldn’t believe how many people had turned on her and Bradley – even her stepmother had ratted them out. She couldn’t bring her mother into this – Annie hadn’t talked to her mom in years. When Elise had put her on a plane to New Orleans, she had pretty much severed ties with her daughter. Elise had never wanted to admit that her daughter was a real-life monster—she had probably even told her friends she didn’t have children.
Annie couldn’t go back to her hometown. She knew she couldn’t really trust anyone—everyone was out to get Bradley. However, even after twelve years, she still trusted Huck. If he was friends with Mark, then maybe Austin’s pack leader was a nice guy too who would be open to offering them asylum once he saw her friendship with Huck. It was desperate, but they had to do something.
She just had to convince Huck to get a hold of Mark.
And Huck was watching her warily.
“You think Mark can help you?” he asked, his voice breaking in shock. “How? What…why?”
She sighed and sat back. She resisted massaging her temples to get rid of the headache. This had such a slim chance of working, even if everything here went well, that she did not want to show how much stress she was experiencing.
“He’s a werewolf too,” she said slowly. “And he’s the leader of the pack in Austin.”
Huck’s face went from confusion to anger in a matter of seconds. He looked between Annie and Bradley a few times as his face flushed red. It was obvious he thought they were messing with him. Huck got up and started pacing in their tiny hotel room, his hands stuffed into his jean pockets.
“If you’d only call him—” she started, trying to disarm the situation.
“Are you fucking kidding me?” Huck asked angrily. Bradley’s eyes widened at that. “Not only are you asking me to believe in werewolves, you’re asking me to drag in one of my best friends to your craziness? I think you need some help.”
Annie felt her cheeks burn. “I am trying to get help,” she said evenly. It was hard to keep the frustration from her voice. She was exhausted. “I’m asking for your help, Huck. Please, just call him.”
Whether it was something in her
voice or it was just for old times’ sake, something broke down in Huck’s resolve. He pulled out his cellphone, flicked around a bit, and then held it to his ear.
“Hey, it’s me,” he said. Annie couldn’t hear what was happening on the line. “I have a weird favor. Can you come meet me? I’m at the D-Lux Motel off I-35. I have a friend here who wants to talk to you. Her name’s Annie Knowles.” His eyes flicked over to Annie, questioning. “She says you can help her.” Pause. Then quieter, “She...she says she’s a werewolf?” A longer pause, followed by another glance, this one filled with disbelief. “Okay,” he said, softer now. “Room 22B. See you then.”
He hung up and slowly put the phone in his pocket. He wouldn’t meet their eyes.
“He says he’s coming.” Huck sounded like he didn’t believe that outcome.
Annie closed her eyes. Thank you, she thought to the powers that be. She felt some of the tension in her shoulders dissipate. There was hope for them yet.
“Thanks,” she told him. “I know you don’t believe me.”
“I’m not sure what I believe right now,” Huck sighed. “Because this is all weird shit.”
Bradley swallowed audibly. “I’m going to go to the bathroom,” he murmured. He got up from Annie’s side.
“Sorry,” Huck muttered. “I didn’t mean to...in front of the kid...”
“It’s fine,” Annie said. “You haven’t said anything he hasn’t heard before.” She tossed the remainder of her pizza slice on her plate, her appetite gone. They were in Mark’s hands now, as soon as he showed up.
“So you basically took the kid and now you’re here,” Huck said. It wasn’t a question.
“Basically,” she said, offering a small smile. “We didn’t come here first though. I didn’t want to bring you into this. After so many of the wolves in our pack challenged Bradley, I snuck him out. I knew they’d kill him. It was bad. And I couldn’t let that happen to Emily’s son. I couldn’t let it happen to Bradley.”
The silence that stretched between them held twelve year’s worth of unanswered questions. She wanted to ask how he was and if he had a girlfriend. No, she thought to herself. No I don’t want to know that.
They spent the next few minutes in silence. Bradley came back from the bathroom and sat on the couch watching the Cartoon Network. Annie was glad Bradley could buffer some of the growing awkwardness and sat with him. She adored the boy like a little brother. Even if he hadn’t been Emily’s son she still would have escaped with him. She remembered babysitting him and watching him grow up. Initially, she had been disgusted and disturbed by so many werewolves trying to take advantage of the situation—this was a little boy, after all. But now, she was just tired and wanted it to end. They had been on the run for so long. She was dipping into her meager savings to finance their hotels and gas and it was running dangerously low.
She had foolishly thought that being away from the group for a while would calm things down and they would be able to return. No such luck. They were being chased by the more tenacious members of their pack. Everyone they reached out to either flatly refused to help, couldn’t help, or wanted to challenge Bradley as well. It was their way of life. She just couldn’t believe that was just how things were.
She really hadn’t wanted to bring Huck into it. But here he was, and he was helping them. She could still depend on him. There was no way she could express her gratitude for just making that phone call. After all, they were probably going to have to leave town when Mark showed up—everything depended on Mark’s willingness to help. He just had to give Bradley asylum until the boy was old enough to be pack leader himself. A lot of pack leaders they had reached out to had initially seemed helpful, but had ulterior motives. She had no reason to believe that Mark would be different, but if Huck trusted Mark, she decided trusting him too had good enough odds.
Somehow, Annie accidentally slipped off to sleep with Bradley nestled into the sofa next to her. She didn’t hear the car pull up to the hotel twenty minutes later. She didn’t hear the footsteps coming up the outside stairs. And she didn’t smell who it was either.
“DON’T OPEN THAT DOOR, HUCK!”
Bradley’s yell tore her out of her sleep and she opened her eyes to find, too late, that Huck had unlocked the door.
Then it burst open, and all hell broke loose.
CHAPTER 4
Huck was thrown from the doorway. He struck the back wall with his shoulder and slid down in a heap. Pain exploded throughout his senses. His shoulder hurt badly and he couldn’t hear or see for a few terrible seconds. When his sight returned, he thought he’d hit his head, and hard, because he saw a huge wolf standing in the doorway. No, it was a monster about seven feet tall with peppered fur. Within its snarling maw were huge teeth the length of Huck’s hands. It growled in his general direction. Then Huck realized it was actually directed at the boy who sat a few feet away.
Holy shit, Annie was telling the truth!
There was a fucking werewolf in the hotel room! How could something like that exist without normal people knowing about it? And didn’t Annie say that she was one of them?
The monster turned its huge eyes towards Bradley and howled. It started advancing towards the boy with a snarl. Huck was too stunned or terrified to be able to do anything.
I’m going to die, he realized.
The wolf was tackled from the side by a whirlwind of ginger fur. Huck blinked, realizing it was a second wolf, this one much smaller. Where had it come from? Then he saw that the clothes Annie had been wearing were shredded on the sofa. He worried for a moment that the second wolf had eaten her.
Then he noticed the familiar red fur, and he knew.
“Fuck. Annie?” he asked in shock. That was all he could say—his brain seemed to be unable to process anything else.
His comment made her falter momentarily, which was enough for the bigger wolf to pounce. She yelped in pain and then rebounded, growling with a ferocity he never knew Annie had in her.
She had changed a lot in the last twelve years. A hell of a lot.
Someone had grabbed his hand and was trying to haul him to his feet.
“Get up you idiot!” Bradley screamed in his ear. “Unless you want to get eaten!”
Between the shock of seeing his childhood crush fighting a huge monster and the pain from getting thrown across the room, Huck felt incredibly sluggish. He stumbled to his feet with the kid’s help, but he couldn’t quite make things work the way they were meant to.
“Get up Huck!” Bradley pleaded.
Across the small hotel room, Annie yelped. So far, she was keeping the other werewolf from coming any closer to them, but she was bleeding profusely from several wounds on her back, and there was a deep gash on her forehead.
The other wolf slammed into her again, showing no mercy, even though she was far smaller and less powerful.
“Annie!” Huck yelled. She might have been a werewolf, but he still saw the Annie he’d grown up with.
“She’s trying to protect us, you idiot!” Bradley yelled again. “We have to get out of here, before anyone else comes.” He grabbed his backpack and pulled Huck out the door. Bradley was white as a sheet, his eyes wide with fear. He was obviously freaked out by what was transpiring in the hotel room.
“Where’s your car?” Bradley implored.
Huck felt dazed.
“Your car, Huck!” Bradley cried. “I don’t have the keys to Annie’s. And we don’t have time. She might show up!”
Huck wondered who “she” might be, but he recovered enough to point to his Nissan Frontier. He fumbled in his pockets for the keys and managed to wrangle the driver’s door open. Bradley threw open the passenger side door.
“What about Annie?” Huck exclaimed, glancing behind him. “I’m not leaving her!”
“She’ll come,” Bradley grunted as he buckled himself in. “Turn on the car!”
Huck still didn’t know what to make of the boy, but he complied. Should he reach for his
pistol? It was in the glove compartment. But what would he be trying to shoot at? The fight that he had witnessed between Annie and the wolf had been too fast for him to aim. He might hit Annie if he fired it.
Despite himself, he cried out at a loud clunk in the bed of the truck. He turned around in his seat to see what made the noise, but Bradley screamed, “GO, GO, GO!”
Huck hit the gas pedal and peeled out of the parking lot. His hands were shaking so badly he could barely grip the steering wheel. He kept glancing in the mirror, trying to see behind him in the dark. What he could see, under each of the streetlights they past, was the hulking beast that invaded their hotel room. It was running on all fours, keeping pace with the truck.
“What do I do?” Huck yelled. “What do I do?”
“DRIVE!”
It wasn’t Huck who said that. Annie’s face appeared in the window to the cab. Bradley gave a cry of relief and slid open the back window. Huck glanced behind him once again to see a flash of her bare skin.
Holy shit, she’s naked!
Alabaster skin, toned body, a cute smattering of freckles across her collarbones, a flash of her perfect breasts as she situated herself. Then he focused back on the road. She was back there, injured from protecting them, and he was trying to imagine what her body looked like without clothes.
He did what she said, accelerating even harder. The monster started trailing behind them.
“Are you okay?” he asked.
“I’m fine. Bradley, can you hand me clothes?” Annie’s face flashed in the window again, illuminated by the passing streetlights.
She appeared pallid white, except for the bruises that were purpling across her face. She was bleeding from her deep scratches in her cheeks and her stylishly cut hair was matted with blood from the gash in her forehead. While he had been initially excited to see her naked, he now realized that she looked worse for wear. The kid dug into the backpack and handed her clothes through the window.
“It—it looks like you two have done this before?” Huck stammered. They certainly seemed like they were well-versed in what they were doing.
Paranormal Magic (Shades of Prey Book 1) Page 79
