Beneath a Blood Moon

by RJ Blain

  I tried to speak, but I couldn’t hear myself through the ringing in my ears and head. Pain lanced through my head in tempo with my heartbeat.

  Pulling his hand out from under my shirt, Richard eased me against Sanders. His mouth was moving, but I couldn’t make out what he was saying. It hurt to move, but I pointed at my ear and shook my head. He took hold of my chin, turning my head. With a gentle touch, he brushed his fingers against my throat near my ear.

  My blood stained his skin red.

  Reaching down, Richard touched my mate’s neck. His expression turned neutral. Wrinkling his nose, he gestured to me, pointed to his nose, and mimed drawing a deep breath. Puzzled, I stared at him, and although my hand shook, I touched my nose. Realization struck me, and I pinched my nose closed, drew a deep breath, and popped my ears.

  It hurt even more than one of Richard’s bites, and I spat curses. Startled by the fact I could hear them, I blinked. “Ouch.”

  “Can you hear me now?” There was something wrong with Richard’s voice, as though I was submerged underwater trying to listen to someone above the surface.

  “Sort of.”

  “Where the hell did you get one of these? What are you doing out here? How did you get here?” he demanded, shoving the Glock 18 in my face.

  I whined, and in my desperation to put some distance between us, I crawled over my mate and crouched on the other side of him. I grabbed hold of Sanders’s shirt and tugged on it. “What’s wrong with him?”

  I knew my father’s body was somewhere nearby, but I couldn’t bring myself to look away from either Richard or my mate. Knowing my father was dead was enough.

  The scent of death clung to me, so strong it sickened me and my wolf.

  Richard’s expression softened. “Drugged. He’ll be all right, though it’ll probably be a few hours before he comes around—and when he does, he’ll probably be violent. That’s the least of our worries right now. Mr. Watson has friends, and they’ll be joining us soon enough.”

  I grimaced. “I have friends, too. Also, the only one you’re allowed to take orders from is me, Mr. Murphy. Understood?”

  Richard’s eyes widened. “Yes.”

  “Give me back my fucking gun,” I snarled.

  Grimacing, he obeyed. I unzipped my coat, pulled out the fresh magazine, and swapped them. I staggered to my feet, and the world spun in lazy circles around me. Richard grabbed me before I could fall.

  “Ruptured eardrums come with vertigo and a terrible sense of balance, Mrs. Sanders,” he informed me, forcing me back to the tarmac beside my mate. “Stay there.”

  “Richard Murphy,” Nicolina snarled, stomping out of the hangar.

  Sucking in a breath, Richard twisted around to face his mate. He paled several shades. “Nicolina.”

  Wendy and Lisa followed after Richard’s mate, both of them looking rather amused. Wendy joined me, touching my mate’s neck. Through the blood and other scents, I could smell her relief. “Let’s get him to the truck and warm him up.”

  “I’ll carry him,” Richard said, and with a grunt, he hauled my mate over his shoulders in a fireman’s carry. “Sorry. I’ll explain everything.”

  “You better—and you can start with why the hell you’re drugged with wolfsbane.”

  Richard grimaced. “Where’s your truck?”

  Wendy helped me to my feet and draped my arm over her shoulders so I wouldn’t fall. “The truck’s in the far hangar. Did I hear you say we’ll be having company?”

  “You did—they’re due about an hour after us.”

  “Who?” Nicolina stalked to her mate, circling him with the intensity of one of Dustin’s sharks.

  “Arnold, several other members of Sanders’s pack, and the start of a pack Watson was building—though by now, they know he’s dead. If those mutts aren’t running wild by the time they touch down, I’ll be surprised.” Richard sighed. “I don’t know how many of them there are. He woke me up so I could fly his fucking plane for him.”

  Lisa led the way to my mate’s truck and threw open the back door so Richard could wrangle Sanders onto the seat. I hopped in, helping to stretch my mate out across the back and pillowed his head on my lap. I ran my fingers through his hair, resting my fingers against his lips so I could feel his breath on my skin.

  “This looks a lot like Sanders’s truck,” Richard said, his expression as puzzled as his tone.

  Wendy laughed. “That’s because it is his truck.”

  “You took his truck.”

  “Took his lady, took his truck, and even stole his blanket,” Wendy reported. “Get in, Richard.”

  He scowled at his mother-in-law and didn’t budge. Instead, he whirled, snatched his mate by her wrist, and yanked her to him, burying his nose against her neck. Nicolina squeaked, and then she smiled as she wrapped her arms around him.

  “I’m sorry,” he murmured.

  “How did you get caught?”

  Richard sighed. “He surprised us—used a gas bomb loaded with sedatives and powdered wolfsbane. If he’d been smart, he would’ve taken the others as well, but as far as I know, he only grabbed me and Sanders.”

  Sighing, Nicolina rested her head on her mate’s shoulder. “Where did he get you?”

  “Your father’s house. They were waiting for us. I don’t know if they had been notified we were coming back or if they made a lucky guess.”

  “How long ago?”

  “Two or three days ago? Have no idea how long I was out for. Ugh. Everyone’s worried sick about you five, I hope you know. Alex was resigned, the last I saw him. I had to peel Desmond off the ceiling several times, and Sanders had been driving all of us insane. In a way, it’s a mercy he’s drugged. Wendy, please call your mate before he kills someone—if he hasn’t already.”

  “If they were behind you by an hour, we have less than thirty minutes to get out of here before they arrive,” Amber stated, climbing into the driver’s seat. “If you don’t know how many of them there’ll be, we can’t risk a firefight with them—especially not if some of them are likely wild.”

  “Their plane maxes out at nineteen in standard configuration. It’s a Metroliner turboprop.”

  “Those are not odds I’m comfortable with,” Amber replied.

  Shaking his head, Richard let go of his mate, giving her a shove in the direction of the truck.

  Nicolina scrambled inside, but instead of worming her way under my mate’s feet, she sat on the floorboard. “If they’re wild, we’re too close to the city to let them go. They need to be dealt with. As long as we have Sanders and Arnold is still in the pack, they’ll be able to find him. We have thirty minutes. Let’s make the most of them.”

  “Is there any way we can shoot down their plane?” Lisa asked.

  There was a long silence, and Richard frowned, the dull, glazed look returning to his eyes. “Maybe. It’s got a lot of electronics, and if those systems fail, it’s entirely possible they’ll crash on the way down. I don’t know if you’re up for the challenge, Nicolina, but if you can fry their systems, you might be able to bring it down. Otherwise, we can unload as many rounds into it as we can after it touches down and hope we get lucky.”

  “I doubt I can fry the plane,” the wizard admitted, shaking her head. “I could ice the runway for you, but hitting a moving target going that fast with lightning without practicing? I’m good, but I’m not that good.”

  “Icing the runway would be a damned good way to cause them some problems on landing,” Richard said. “How much ice and how slick can you make it?”

  “How thick do you want it?”

  “Let me think,” Richard replied, and with a low groan, he climbed into the truck, shifting my mate’s feet so he could sit. “You have no idea how sore and tired I am.”

  “You look like hell,” Nicolina reported. “Are you okay?”

  “I’m pretty sure I’m high on wolfsbane; I have no idea how the hell I flew that plane without crashing it. When Sanders finds out I kissed his
mate, he’s going to kill me. Hell, why haven’t you killed me? You should—both of you. I’m so sorry, Sara. I should not have done that.”

  “I do not hold anyone drugged with wolfsbane and given disgusting orders accountable for his actions,” was Nicolina’s neutral reply. “I could smell Sara’s fury from the hangar, so I’m satisfied she was not encroaching on my territory.”

  “Your territory is so not my type,” I replied with a shudder. “He’s got a nice mouth, though. You better put a leash on him. You’re forgiven this time, Richard.”

  Both of them flushed a brilliant red.

  “Behave, all of you. Seeing as we’re the cavalry and infantry, we need a plan, a good one, and we need it fast,” Amber declared, twisting around in the seat to face me. “Also, we’ll be talking about the fact you let Richard steal your gun while he was making out with you.”

  It was my turn to blush. “I ordered him to kill my father to please me,” I blurted.

  Amber blinked. “Seriously?”

  Richard leaned forward, resting his forehead against the back of the driver’s seat. “She did. Because she did, I was able to do it, too. Sara’s a deviously clever woman. Why the hell does she have a fully automatic? I pulled the trigger and was not expecting to empty the entire magazine.”

  “You’ve seen them before, Richard—I thought you would have recognized it.”

  “I was a bit distracted,” he confessed, his face reddening to a brighter shade. “I’m actually impressed I hit him, though it was pretty much point-blank range.”

  Amber laughed. “It’s the only gun she qualified with. She can’t hit the broad side of a barn at point-blank range with a Beretta, but she can speed swap four magazines with unerring accuracy with the Glock. If I hadn’t seen it, I wouldn’t believe it. She flinches and closes her eyes like the Beretta is going to rip her legs off and feed them to her. With the Glock? She’s all business.”

  “Wait. If all of you are armed, and with Amber here I bet you are, why didn’t you just shoot him yourself?” Richard demanded.

  “We were going to, but he was too close to you and Sara, and with you drugged with wolfsbane, I was worried you’d turn on her,” Nicolina admitted, staring at the floor. “We were waiting for a good shot.”

  “Why the hell were you pawing up my shirt anyway?” I demanded.

  “I knew you had been with Amber, and where Amber goes, guns follow. I figured she was going to corrupt you like she corrupted my Nicolina, and if she had, there was a good chance you had a concealed weapon on you somewhere.”

  “If I had known Nicolina had come pre-corrupted, I wouldn’t have corrupted her further,” Amber stated before bursting into giggles. “You have me there. We almost made it to Alaska before I caved and decided I had to arm Sara and make sure Wendy got some time in at the range.”

  “Don’t tease him too much about it, Sara,” Nicolina said. “He’ll wallow in guilt for weeks over this, I’m certain. He’s completely hopeless when it comes to wolfsbane. Hell, we have the pack trained to give him orders not to obey anyone except Frank, Alex, or some other responsible adult whenever he’s drugged with it. To make matters worse, it could be a week or more until it wears off.”

  “That long?” I narrowed my eyes at Richard, smiling as I considered what I could do with him for the next week. “Interesting.”

  Richard’s eyes widened. “You wouldn’t.”

  “Oh, Richard. I’m pretty sure that while you’re Nicolina’s mate, you currently belong to me, and you must do as I say.”

  “No, please,” he whispered.

  “We’re down to maybe twenty minutes, folks,” Amber warned. “How long to ice the runway, Nicolina?”

  “With this much snow around? Five minutes—less if we can find a water truck and hose.”

  “Five minutes will work. Richard, go move the plane so they think the runway is clear.”

  Richard sighed, opened the door, and slid out, careful to rest my mate’s feet back on the seat. “On it.”

  “What do you want me to do?” I demanded.

  “Cuddle your mate and keep him company. I’m going to scout around and see if there’s anything we can use to blow them sky high.”

  “Jet fuel’s flammable, isn’t it?” I asked.

  Nicolina and Amber stared at me.

  “It is,” Nicolina replied. “Very much so.”

  “How much is left in the plane Richard flew?”

  Amber opened the door and yelled, “Hey, Richard! Check the fuel levels in your bird, and tell me how much is left when you finish parking it.”

  He lifted his hand in acknowledgment.

  “A real job, Amber. I want one.”

  “For now, keeping your mate warm and comfortable is a real job. I’ll think of something, even if it’s unloading your magazines into the plane when it touches down—or into anyone still moving once they’ve landed. I’m regretting I didn’t bring any of the full-sized magazines to give you more ammunition.”

  I frowned, staring at my sleeping mate. “What if he wakes up?”

  “I suggest you figure out how to control him and quick. While turning him loose against the traitors would be ideal, I’d rather not end up as his dinner.”

  In a way, I was relieved when everyone left me to prepare for the arrival of the second plane. While my mate slumbered, being able to touch him and reassure myself he still breathed helped. My awareness of my father’s death haunted me.

  Manipulating Richard into murdering him left a bitter taste in my mouth. In my cowardice, I hadn’t even looked at my father’s body. Biting my lip, I leaned over Sanders and breathed in his scent, closing my eyes to steady myself.

  The tentative touch to my cheek startled me so much I launched myself towards the front of the truck, dislodging my mate from my lap in my haste to escape. He yelped and hit the floor. I made it halfway up before I got stuck between the seats, one of my feet trapped beneath Sanders with my knee twisted at a tear-inducing angle.

  “Sara,” my mate breathed, and grabbing hold of my waist, he pulled me back. I went limp, torn between whining from embarrassment and laughing my relief.

  “You’re supposed to be asleep for hours,” I complained, swallowing until the feeling of something lodged in my throat eased. “You startled me.”

  “I thought I was dreaming,” he murmured, and lacking his usual finesse, he climbed back onto the seat and settled me on his lap. “Where have you been, you devilish little bitch?”

  “I’m armed and dangerous,” I warned him, and before he could reply, I wrapped my arms around his neck and pressed my lips to his.

  I liked Sanders’s kisses far more than Richard’s, even if Yellowknife’s Alpha had a nice mouth.

  “That’s a nice way to be greeted,” he said, cupping my face in his hands. His words slurred into each other, although I was able to understand what he was saying. “I have a feeling I should ask where we are, how you got here, and what’s going on, but I don’t think I’ll like the answer.”

  “I told you we were going to a resort in Alaska,” I replied.

  “That doesn’t explain how I got here.”

  “It seems my father kidnapped you and Richard. He made Richard fly the plane. It was my job to lure him out here so we could deal with him, and he brought me two males as presents. I graciously accepted both. I ordered Richard to kill him, which he did. He’s drugged on wolfsbane right now, and I own him. If I’m nice, I’ll let Nicolina have him.”

  “I don’t remember a thing,” he complained, sighing and resting his head on my shoulder. “All I remember is going to Desmond’s house. Something surprised me, and I don’t recall anything after that. Waking up was nice, though.”

  “The others are trying to figure out how to crash a plane,” I said.

  Sanders lifted his head to kiss my cheek before taking a look around. “I could swear this is my truck.”

  “That’s because it is your truck,” Wendy said, poking her head in through the door
. I squealed, twisting around to face the Fenerec. Laughing, she shook her head. “Relax, Sara, or Amber’s going to take away your gun privileges. How are you feeling, Matthew?”

  “Sleepy,” he replied. “How are you, Wendy?”

  “Better now that you’re awake—about six hours ahead of schedule, according to Richard. Judging from his reactions, he’s so doped on wolfsbane he’s feeling no pain at all. I doubt he’ll remember any of this tomorrow, and he’ll probably be dancing to Sara’s tune for a week and a half.”

  “Poor Richard. Is this really my truck? How the hell did it get here?”

  “I stole it,” Wendy replied, grinning at my mate. “I also stole the blanket from your bed so Sara could have something with your scent all over it. You may have to fight her to get it back.”

  “She can have it so long as she shares with me,” he replied.

  “Smooth, Sanders. Very smooth. Think you’re up for a walk? We’re almost done preparing, and Amber sent me to fetch your mate so she could play her part.”

  “What’s your part, Sara?”

  My mate’s worry marred his scent.

  I opened my coat and showed him my Glock. “I qualified!”

  “That’s a Glock 18, and she’s absolutely vicious with it. Never, ever give her a Beretta or any other reasonable weapon because she’s got terrible accuracy, but give her that baby right there, and she’s as good as Nicolina or Lisa,” Wendy said. “I didn’t see it live, but Amber showed me the recordings.”

  “Glock 18,” my mate murmured, shifting my coat out of the way so he could look at my gun. “What’s special about it? It’s a gun.”

  “It’s a fully automatic gun with enough recoil to knock your teeth out if you’re not ready for it. It’s light for a fully automatic, but it still makes the Beretta feel like a toy in comparison. Amber let us all fire it while you were napping at the range, Sara. Come on. I’m afraid we don’t have a gun for you, Sanders, but you can stand by your mate and growl at anyone who gets too close. You are not invited to play.”