Sheppard, Daniel, and Matt sat at the dining room table, water bottles in front of them. Sheppard looked grim at the head of the table, but smiled gently at us as we filed in. To his right, Matt was leaned on the table, chin in hand. He looked bored, but his musky scent was sharp, something I had come to learn meant an agitation of some sort. But his heartbeat, when I listened for it, was steady—as was everyone’s in the house. The comfort of that steadiness washed through me as I came to sit at the table, close to the end on Daniel’s side. Daniel, on Sheppard’s left, had a stack of papers in front of him, which I assumed were insurance and other legal documents. I had never dealt with the ramifications of a house fire, but I saw the mountain of paperwork that went into my parents selling their home before they retired. I didn’t envy Sheppard.
Jamie and Ian sat across from me at the table. Jonathan grabbed a couple of water bottles from the kitchen and sat on my right, leaving an empty chair between Daniel and me.
In the spacious kitchen, Kaylah stuffed packages of meat into the freezer and stacking other packages of meat into the fridge. I did some quick counting—there was easily over 100 pounds of meat between the freezer and the fridge. They would have practically cleared out anything a grocery store had.
“Where do you guys get all of that meat?” I asked Kaylah. It was hard to imagine a store being happy with getting cleared out on any sort of regular basis.
“There’s a butcher on th’ north end a town ‘at we like,” she replied. “Sells bulk packs a meat fer a reasonable rate.”
And I thought I had been doing well before when I got two-pound packs of ground beef on manager’s special at the end of the week. I used to mix it with rice and eat off it for a week or more. Sometimes, I’d even add shredded cheese. It was what I would splurge on when I had a little extra in a paycheck. Now, I was pretty sure what used to seem like so much food would end up being a meal for two at best.
Chastity headed back outside after dropping off the paper towels and toilet paper in the corner of the dining room. She came back in a moment later with two huge bags of the good charcoal—the kind that was basically pre-burned chunks of wood. She had a bag slung over each shoulder as she came through the house. I jumped up to help her, but she speared me with a look as I got close to her.
“These aren’t heavy, Lynn,” she said, continuing past me. “They’re just bulky. I don’t need help. Thank you.” She placed them down next to the back door.
I sat back down. Matt smirked at me, but when I caught him, he folded his arms behind his head and leaned back in his chair. I caught Jonathan’s eye; he smiled at me too. I sighed as Chastity came and sat in the empty seat next to Matt.
Kaylah washed her hands when she was done putting away all of the meat and came to join us at the table, taking the empty seat between Daniel and me.
I closed my eyes for a moment, my heart swelling at the sound of the pack’s heartbeats and the intermingling scent of them all. As I concentrated on the feeling, reveling in it, I saw the strands of the pack illuminate again behind my closed eyes. I could see the tied strands of Kaylah and Daniel, and those of Matt and Chastity. Even if I didn’t know where Sheppard was at the table, I could have simply traced the thick bright cord in my mind’s eye to him. My own strand was thin, but it reached toward Sheppard and tied in with the knot that was the pack.
Matt took a breath to speak and I opened my eyes. “The vampires that set the house on fire came from the same cave where we found the caged werewolves.” He pulled a folded trail map out of his pocket and took Sheppard’s proffered pen. “The cave is here.” He marked the map. “And there are human sheep guards patrolling out to here.” He made an arcing line on the map. “There’s fresh blood on the walls of the cave. Fresh werewolf blood.” The hand holding the pen curled into a fist “But it’s not enough blood to cover the scent of the old blood mixed there. There was a new wolf in a cage, bringing the total of caged wolves to three, but the new one was just as crazed as the others.”
I swallowed around a hard lump in my throat as red seeped into the edges of my vision. Kaylah grabbed my right hand, squeezing it hard. I wasn’t sure I was ready to be thrown into this fight, but I also wasn’t about to let the vampires get away with all they had done. Burning the pack house was one thing, holding crazed wolves hostage was another. I didn’t understand it, but I was angry.
“We’ll hit the cave hard in the morning,” Sheppard said, “a few hours after dawn. How many humans?”
“There were three on patrol at the time,” Matt replied. “But I could smell that as many as ten had been patrolling recently.”
“And how many vampires could you smell?”
“At least five.” Matt placed the pen down in a deliberate, controlled action. “But you and I both know that means there’s more than that.”
“Why?” I blurted. “Shouldn’t you be able to smell all of them?”
Matt opened his mouth, but Sheppard put a hand up, stalling him.
“The older a vampire gets,” Sheppard said, “the less of a scent they have. You already know what relatively new vampires smell like. Older vampires don’t smell like anything except where they just came from.”
“And it’s hard to smell anything past fresh blood,” Matt added as Sheppard’s hand came back to rest in front of him. He gestured around the table. “There’s enough wolf in all of us that instincts matter.”
I nodded. “But why wait till morning? Why not just go now?”
Though Matt’s scent had softened some when Chastity sat beside him, the edge was back and prickled my nose.
Matt’s palms hit the table. “What kind of idiot tries to attack a vamp stronghold at night?”
“Matt,” Sheppard said, a note of warning in his tone. “She’s new.”
Matt closed his eyes and huffed out a frustrated breath. The words came out slow and measured, like a practiced speech. “Attacking vamps at night is dumb. They sleep during day and are active at night. At night, you hit a den, and maybe they aren’t even there. Then you’ve blown your plan of attack. In the daytime, vamps usually just have sheep guarding them. They know sheep don’t stand a chance against wolves, but they also know we won’t kill sheep, which slows us down. But if we’re careful, with a good daytime attack, we can get the drop on a brood’s den and take them out without losses.”
“And killing sheep is never an option,” Sheppard said, “unless they’re trying to kill us. Sheep on patrol for a vampire are so addicted to feeding and addled in the head that they cannot possibly understand anything more than what they’re set to do.”
“So we hit the cave in the morning,” Daniel said, jutting his chin toward the map. “Who do you want on point for the sheep?”
“I’ll knock them out and get them restrained,” Sheppard said. “Kaylah, with your medical training, it’s probably best if you help with checking them in at Blood of the Cross. They know you over there anyway.”
“Sounds good to me,” she said. “Daniel, hun, can you rent us one a them big vans for tomorrow?”
“Sure.” Daniel nodded. “I’ll get it after we’re done here.”
“Wait,” I said. “Blood of the Cross is a rehab center, isn’t it? What good will drug rehab do them?”
“Being fed on is an addiction like any other,” Ian explained.
“And that center is run by the Catholic church,” Matt said.
I thought a moment. “So that means some of the staff there know about vampires, possibly werewolves too, and will get the people the care they need.” The words were slow and measured, coming out as I connected the thoughts in my head.
Sheppard smiled patiently at me, Jonathan reached over and squeezed my knee.
“Okay,” I said. “So what about the ‘world isn’t ready for werewolves’?” I used my hands to make air quotes around the last phrase.
“They’re not,” Sheppard said. “We’re just using resources that are already aware of us.”
“Then who a
ll knows about us?” I asked.
“Well,” Sheppard said. “Certain high-ranking members of the Catholic church, of course.” He held up his hand, pointer finger extended. “Then there are the other werewolf packs, as you’d expect.” He extended his middle finger too. “Then certain sectors of the military.” His ring finger extended as well. “The vampires know about us, obviously.” His pinky finger joined the other three. “And odds are good that certain members of occult societies have us figured out.”
“But they wouldn’t dare blab to the world or we’d be in a heap a trouble,” Kaylah added.
“Humans shoot first and ask questions later,” Matt said. “Even the sectors of the military that know about and have werewolves within them don’t advertise that fact to the rest of them. They know their own tendencies as well as we know ours.”
“But we’ve gotten off topic,” Sheppard said, gesturing to the map. “So, we’ll attack the cave tomorrow in the morning. Kaylah and Daniel will help with the sheep. Everyone else is on cleanup detail. Vampire bodies burn readily in the sun, so once they’re immobilized, just pull them out of the cave and the sun will take care of the rest.”
My stomach felt a little queasy at the thought of that.
“Lynn,” Sheppard continued. “In the meantime, I need to know what you’re actually capable of.” His tone was fatherly. “So, I need you and Matt out back today, sparring.”
I was glad I wasn’t trying to drink anything, or I probably would have spit it out. “You want me to fight? And you want me to fight Matt?!”
I was practically a limp noodle compared to the football player physique Matt had.
“No one gets left behind on hunts,” Sheppard said. “It leaves us vulnerable.”
Matt leaned his elbows on the table. “The best way to learn how to fight a vamp, is to actually fight one.”
Sheppard looked at me. “Matt’s our best fighter. I trust him to judge your abilities. Like it or not, this is the war we fight. People’s lives are on the line, Lynn, and we are what stop the things in the night from eating them alive.”
TWENTY
MATT WAS GOING TO CRUSH me. I took a deep breath. Then another. I didn’t want to fight anyone. I just wanted to curl into my chair under a cozy blanket and read books. I hadn’t fought anything a day in my life. I mean, I ran sometimes, and I won a raffle through the newspaper for a few free months of a kickboxing class, but I had never actually fought anyone. Except for that wolf that attacked me, I guess. But even that nearly killed me.
“So,” my voice cracked, and I swallowed. “So what do you want me to fight him with? A knife? A gun?” My brain latched on to the last one. “You mean you want me to go to a shooting range with him, right? You just shoot...”
Everyone was looking at me like I was a poor lost puppy.
“Vampires are about as bulletproof as we are,” Jonathan said quietly. “We fight with teeth and claws. It’s what we were built to fight with.”
“But Matt’s huge! He’s going to kill me!”
“He will not,” Sheppard’s voice was stern. “He wouldn’t dare.” His voice softened. “He is likely to be quite a bit better than you, of course. But he isn’t going to do any actual harm to you. None of the pack would. Nor would he harm anyone in the pack.”
“At least,” Matt said, “nothing you won’t heal right away. If I go too easy on you, I’ll never know what you’re actually capable of.”
I wiped a hand across my forehead and down the side of my face before pushing it back up and into my hair. My heart was slamming into the backside of my sternum so hard I was certain werewolves two counties over could hear it.
“It’s not that bad,” Ian said, shrugging a shoulder. “It’s more like our own version of a physical.”
“Matt beat the tar out of me,” Jamie said, something grim in his expression.
“Yea, but you kept thinking he was going to go easy on you,” Jonathan replied. “You never stopped and took it seriously.” He looked to me and shrugged. “Matt’s a fighter. You have to think about it like you’re fighting a fighter. The vampires know you’re there to kill them. So they fight like you’re there to keep them from seeing another night.”
I sighed and squeezed my eyes shut, swallowing around the lump of fear in my throat and the dread in my stomach. I took another deep breath and tried to calm myself and met Matt’s eyes as I stood up.
“Then let’s just do this now and get it out of the way.”
Matt’s face was unreadable as he stood. His heartbeat was damnably steady. Of course it was. He wasn’t afraid of me. I’m just a girl.
He was going to crush me.
I followed Matt to the back door of the house, where he held the door open for me. Sheppard followed both of us into the spacious backyard.
“The houses on either side of us are empty this time of year,” Sheppard said. “But let’s not let anything spill into those yards anyway.”
“We’ll start with hand-to-hand like this,” Matt said, gesturing at himself. “Then you’ll go wolf and I’ll find out what your instincts are like. Like Sheppard said, I’m not going to kill you, but I’m not going to go easy on you, either. The vamps wouldn’t.”
I brushed my hand up my forehead and into my hair again. “Let’s just do this.”
And then Matt’s fist jabbed square into my mouth so hard my eyes watered, and I staggered a few steps backward. Dammit. I hadn’t even seen him move.
No one had ever hit me before. What the hell?
I was still reeling from the shock of having actually been hit when he jabbed me in the face again. Stumbling still more steps backward, I tasted blood and wiped at my mouth and chin. My fingers came back stained red and I spit what blood I could from my mouth.
I hadn’t seen him move that time either.
Worse, he was still coming at me, lashing out with a foot toward my stomach. I dodged to the left, still reeling from the punches, but at least he missed. He followed me with a couple of quick steps until he overtook me, placing his leg behind mine as he shoved me hard to the ground. Dammit all to hell. I hit the grass and dirt with an audible crack in my shoulder and stars exploded in my vision as the air was forced from my lungs.
I thought fighting someone would leave me scared, or at least anxious. I thought I’d want to just curl up and cry or run away until I lost them. But as I lay there on the ground with an agonizing ache in my shoulder, I didn’t want any of that. And I wasn’t scared. I was mad. I was angry. I was absolutely furious, actually. And I wasn’t sure who or what I was mad at.
The fight was over fast. Faster than I’d thought it would have been. If that had been someone actually trying to kill me, I’d be dead. I didn’t even know what it was exactly or how to describe it, but I wanted to beat the crap out of him for it.
I was ready to beat the crap out of him.
I stood up, reaching for my aching shoulder with my other hand. As I moved it, something cracked back into place.
Had he seriously dislocated my shoulder when he shoved me to the ground? Had I seriously just reset it?
Matt was talking, but I didn’t hear his words. I licked my lips, expecting to taste blood, but my mouth had apparently healed. Wow. My face still ached, though.
I balled a fist and aimed it for his nose. He sidestepped easily, deflecting my punch and pulling me in to his knee, slamming it into my gut in a single fluid motion. The air rushed from my lungs as I doubled over. Matt’s elbow followed, cracking into the back of my skull, driving my face into the dirt.
At least he wasn’t going easy on me.
His voice came from above me as I tried to regain my senses on the ground. “I told you. Stop. Thinking!”
Red seeped into the edges of my vision as my fist curled around a handful of dirt and grass. I threw it into his face as I rolled over, sweeping his right leg out from under him as he tried to clear the dirt from his eyes. I took that moment to scramble to my feet.
I stopped being a
ngry then. Squaring off against Matt, as he rolled back and used his hands to launch himself to his feet, I wasn’t scared, or mad. I was eager. Hungry. Ready. The red settled along the edges of my vision as a wolfish grin split Matt’s face. His heartbeat was as steady as it had been when we started, and while mine had been hammering away in my chest, it was slowing. I doubted my heartbeat would ever match his, but they were syncopated cousins of each other.
Matt’s hand came toward my face again, but I dropped below it, only to find his other fist coming at my face. I took a quick step to the side, avoiding the attack and pushing his arm away with my hand. But I was lined up then. I slammed my elbow hard into his gut and the air whooshed out of him in a grunt.
“Excellent,” he chortled.
I turned to smile at him in time to see his fist connect with my temple, driving me to the ground again.
I groaned with exertion as I stood up, blinking to clear my vision.
“Good,” Matt said. “Now clothes off, wolf out. Let’s see what you’re really made of.”
The rest of the pack was lined along the back side of the house, watching us.
“Out here?!”
Matt rolled his eye. “Yes.” He crossed his arms. “Out here.”
But I hesitated, my head throbbing, and Matt narrowed his eyes at me. I still couldn’t be sure how much vision he actually had out of that milky left eye.
“I suppose,” he said derisively, “if you’re still too modest for that, you could go inside and change, but a vamp wouldn’t wait for you.”
The red seeped back into my vision again.
Jonathan’s whisper carried over to me even from where he stood alongside the house. “It’s just skin.”
I scanned the pack and met Sheppard’s eyes. He nodded, the motion almost imperceptible.
I growled. “Fuck it.” I turned my back to the pack and pulled my shirt over my head as I stepped out of my shoes. “Let’s just do this.” I unhooked my bra and tugged my pants and underwear off my hips in a single motion. It was uncomfortable to be naked in such an open place, but this was my pack. I belonged here just as much as any of them. I took a breath and tried to clear the nervousness from my head.
A Place to Run (Trials of the Blood Book 1) Page 17
