The hybrid arched his body. His hand tightened around her own before he fell back to the floor. His amber eyes stared around the room.
“Lucan?” Jamie said.
His eyes shot to hers and narrowed. The grip on her hand tightened the longer he stared at her. She tried to pull away, but he only gripped her tighter.
“Lucan, it’s me.”
Aaron laughed. “He can’t hear you,” he said. “He’s all animal now and will only listen to my words.”
She looked over at the evil man. “Stop him,” she said, and stood, yanking her hand away.
Lucan stood as well. He stalked her as she moved away from him.
“No.” Aaron’s words echoed in the room.
Lucan moved with purpose now. He gripped her arm and shoved her hard against the wall.
“Lucan, it’s me,” she whispered.
Tears leaked out of her eyes as she stared into the dead eyes of the man she loved.
“He won’t stop,” Aaron said from next to her ear. “You’re going to have to take him out before he takes you out.” She heard him take a few steps and then return to her side. He placed something cold and metal in her hands. “This isn’t a dart gun. A good shot should do it, especially to the head. If he doesn’t stop, just keep shooting until he does.”
“No,” Jamie said.
“Kill him,” he said. “You have no choice. He’ll kill you otherwise.”
“No,” Jamie said with force.
Lucan put his hands against her throat and slowly squeezed. She gagged and coughed as she struggled for breath.
“Kill him!” Aaron shouted. “Don’t die for this filthy animal.”
Jamie stared at Lucan, the man she loved, the man she would do anything for. If she didn’t kill him, she’d die.
“You’re stronger than this!” Aaron practically screamed. “Kill him.”
Jamie looked over to where the man was standing. His eyes bulged, and his face was red. His fists were clenched in rage.
“No,” she rasped out.
Bang!
The gun jerked hard in her hand as she fired it. She hadn’t been able to aim, but it didn’t matter. Aaron was close enough that it hit the first time.
Blood bloomed on his stomach, and he clutched it.
“You bitch,” he said, and fell backward onto the floor.
All the people in the room collapsed with the fall of Aaron, as if they were somehow directly connected.
The fingers at her neck loosened for just a moment. She turned to stare at the man in front of her.
“I know you’re in there,” she said with force. “Fight, damn it. Fight for control. You’re stronger than that piece of shit.”
Lucan pulled away from her. He tossed his head back and forth before staring at her again.
“Shoot me,” he growled. “Kill me while I’m still in control.”
Jamie shook her head. “No.”
She stepped forward, and he growled loudly, a feral sort of sound that made her heart race with fear. She took another step toward him.
“Shoot me!” he roared.
“Not a fucking chance!” she shouted back.
Before Lucan could run or think or anything, Jamie rushed into his arms, her own wrapping firmly around him.
“I’m not running from you,” she whispered.
For a moment, Jamie wasn’t certain if he was going to just kill her anyway until his large arms wrapped around her gently.
“Well, isn’t that sweet?”
They both turned and found Aaron leaning against a desk. Blood dripped on the floor around him. He had another gun in his hand, a pistol and not a dart gun.
“Now you can both die together I guess,” Aaron said with a snarl.
Five loud bangs filled the room. Aaron jerked with each bullet that pierced his chest.
“Guess again, you prick,” Nikon said, panting. “That’s for Alair, and all the other people you’ve hurt.”
Aaron collapsed to the floor. His eyes remained open, but he was dead.
Lucan watched, his body still tense from whatever had been injected into him. The urge to kill was so overwhelming that he had to fight for control.
Something clinked in the back of the room. It was the woman from earlier, the black-haired woman from the alley.
“Run,” she yelled.
Several explosions rocked the building, and the room erupted in flames before he could even think to respond. Debris collapsed on the woman, crushing her.
Lucan growled, and he shook his head. His first thought was to get Jamie and the people there safe before the whole building went down in flames. The urge to kill remained, but he was able to push it aside for the moment and concentrate on the immediate danger to others.
They didn’t even have to speak. Lucan threw Jamie over his shoulder and grabbed another woman on his way out. He tossed them some distance from the building and raced back into the flames. Nikon followed with two other people.
The hybrids raced back into the building over and over, each time pulling out an unconscious person.
Lucan stepped out of the building and collapsed on the ground. The burns from the fire were nothing in comparison to the flame growing inside him feeing the beast and telling it to destroy those around him.
“Kill me,” he shouted to Nikon over the roar of the fire. “She can’t do it, so you have to.”
“No,” Jamie screamed. “I won’t let you.”
Lucan stared at her from his spot on the ground. “I don’t want my last act to be killing you.” He looked to Nikon. “Please kill me.”
Nikon nodded. He could hear Jamie scream and lowered his head. There was no way he could let her look into his eyes as he died.
Instead of a bullet, Nikon slammed the butt of a gun into the back of his head. Lucan’s world spun as he sprawled out on the ground and rolled over to stare at his friend.
“Sorry, man,” Nikon said as he stood over him. The hybrid slammed a fist directly into his face, and then again.
The darkness claimed Lucan.
Chapter Twenty-one
Lucan groaned as he awakened. His whole damn body ached from head to toe. It felt like he’d been hit with a sledge hammer for a week straight.
“Just relax.”
Jamie. Just hearing her voice was enough to calm him.
He blinked open his eyes slowly. Even doing that hurt like hell.
“The fire,” he rasped.
She placed a hand on his chest, and he quit trying to move around quite as much.
“They’re safe,” she whispered. “You’ve been unconscious for a day.”
The room around him slowly took shape as his eyes adjusted to the light. It was a small room with plain cream walls, and machines beeped all around him.
“Where am I?”
Jamie carefully took his hand and sat next to him. “The hospital at Luna Lodge,” she said. “What you did…”
Her voice broke as her lip began to tremble. All the memories of the show down with Aaron Kinkaid came rushing back. How Lucan had tried to kill Jamie. How he very nearly had.
Lucan moved to sit up, his body burned as he did, but he had to hold her.
“Baby, I’m so sorry,” he whispered. His hand touched her face to wipe the tears. “I never wanted to hurt you.”
She shook her head and gave a little smile. “I know that.” She turned and kissed his palm. “You saved them. You saved us all.”
Lucan frowned. “If you hadn’t gotten us all out, we wouldn’t have survived. You’re a hero.”
He shook his head. A hero didn’t nearly kill the woman he loved. A hero didn’t think about ripping out the throat of people, even sons of bitches like Kinkaid.
“I’m no hero,” he mumbled.
“According to the US government you are.”
Lucan looked toward the door of the room and found Colonel Hall standing there, Cato close behind.
“You and Nikon are getting a special medal fro
m the Secretary of Defense for your diligent work in bringing the perpetrator of the bombing to justice. Thanks to you all, we finally have something to go on with all this. And we also have proof of a serious and massive manipulation of US citizens.”
Lucan frowned. “Who thought a medal was a good idea?”
“Me,” Colonel Hall said. She smiled and stepped further into the room. “Although I may have ulterior motives for this.”
He glanced over to Cato. The other hybrid shrugged, but his face didn’t suggest any surprise or disagreement.
“We needed people to be the face of this win,” Cato said. “We need the public on our side. If we can get that, we can get the government on our side as well. Now that we have proof that the Group was not just screwing with hybrids, but humans, we’ll have more people on our side, and our enemies in the government will look like they are backing terrorists. So cheer up. You’re now the face of the good guys.”
Lucan snorted. “And what does Nikon say to all this?”
Colonel Hall and Cato looked between one another and then back to him.
“He’s not saying much of anything really,” Cato said. “We think he’s still processing killing his brother’s murderer.”
Lucan’s heart twisted for his friend.
Cato sighed. “I wish we could have taken A.J. Kinkaid alive, but I doubt I’d be able to restrain myself in the same situation, and the government thinks they’ll still be able to recover a lot of material from the ruins of the building.” He shrugged. “Also there have been reports of a lot of people in town who came down with strange headaches, which are now clearing up. According to what the tech guys have told the colonel, they’ll be able to track down all the booster stations in this town within a few days, but just their first sweeps were enough to ensure that the place that burned was the main mind control facility.”
Lucan nodded slowly, processing the enormity of their win against the Horatius Group.
“When can I get out of here?”
Cato stepped forward. “We don’t fully understand what you were injected with. They have removed the small metal piece that was inside you, but the doctors want to keep an eye on you for a few days. It should give you time for your burns to heal.” Lucan glanced down at his arms and noticed, for the first time, that they were covered in bandages.
“The damage wasn’t as bad as it looks, but they have you wrapped to speed up the healing. Few days, and you should be ready.”
Lucan looked between Cato and Colonel Hall.
“Rest up, and we’ll check on you later,” Cato said, and turned to leave.
Lucan nodded and watched the pair leave, closing the door behind them.
Jamie stayed quiet during their exchange. She didn’t have anything to add to the whole thing. Hell, she was still trying to process what had happened herself.
“You shouldn’t be with me,” Lucan said suddenly.
She was out of the chair she was sitting in so fast it nearly made her head spin. “What?”
“Being with me is a danger. People get hurt when they’re with the hybrids.”
Jamie snorted. “Are you still going on about that?” She moved back to sit with him on the bed. “I don’t give a shit.”
Lucan looked up, surprised.
She glared at him. “What part of how I handled things makes you think I’m some sort of wilting flower? Someone comes for me or someone I love, I’ll do what I have to do every fucking time.”
His eyes widened at her words, but she didn’t give a shit if he knew. She was tired of pretending like he wasn’t the best thing that ever came into her life.
“But what if I hurt you again?”
She shook her head. “You won’t.”
Jamie could see the doubt in his eyes, but he had to know that none of that mattered to her. “I trust you,” she said softly. She moved in closer to him, careful of the burns on his body. “You could have killed me, but you didn’t,” she said. “All those people couldn’t do anything, but you broke free. I trust you, and I always will.” She placed a soft kiss on his lips.
“I just don’t want anything to happen to you,” he whispered, his mouth still against hers.
Jamie smiled. “And I don’t want anything to happen to you.”
Lucan stared at her. She could see the weight of her words setting in.
“Then I guess we’ll just have to watch out for one another,” he said with a smile.
Jamie grinned back “I watch your ass, you watch mine?”
Lucan laughed. “It’s a fine ass to watch.”
She leaned in for another kiss, this one deeper than the last.
“I do love you,” she whispered.
He rested his head against hers. “And I love you,” he said. “I love you and your fine ass.”
Lucan took her then in a deeper kiss, and she sighed against him. They had won against Aaron. They’d had destroyed the source of the mind control.
He’d earned the win he so craved against the Horatius Group, and still had his Vestal. Nothing could stand against them now.
A Note from Madison
Thank you for reading Lucan. If you enjoyed this book, please consider reviewing it. We authors live and die by reviews.
Please keep an eye out for the next book in the series, Rollo.
You can join my mailing list at http://eepurl.com/OX9r5
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Author Bio
Madison currently lives with her husband and two children in the Valley of the Sun in Arizona. After leaving the frozen tundra of the north, she was more surprised than anyone with how much she has enjoyed living in the desert. Seeing as she stated on more than one occasion before moving to Arizona how much she hated heat, it was an odd move, but it seems her hatred for sub-zero temperatures and ice has won out in the end.
When she’s not writing, she’s enjoying time with her family. Madison and her family frequent festivals in the area, as well as local cultural events, and spend time with family in the area. In the summer, she is most likely to be found in th
e pool with the family and in the winter by the fireplace. Since both her children are autistic, days can be a little chaotic, but with her husband beside her, there’s nothing she can’t handle.
Her webpage is http://madisonstevensauthor.com/
She can be contacted at [email protected]
Lucan: #14 (Luna Lodge) Page 10
