by Bec McMaster
Twenty-One
LEAVING RILEY BY herself again was the hardest thing he’d ever had to do.
He knew she was strong and resourceful, knew that she could more than take care of herself. That wasn’t the problem. The problem was the choking fear that rose in him at the thought of everything that could go wrong. One stray bullet. Too many reivers rushing her. Cane somehow slipping behind his back….
If they got out of this, he was never going to leave her alone again.
In the chaos following the explosions he'd rigged, it was easy to slip across the wide expanse of the cavern floor relatively unnoticed. The afternoon's shadows had lengthened, predicting an hour or two until dusk, and fire still burst in gouts from the main mine shaft as other pockets of leftover dynamite went off. Reivers howled and screamed as each explosion hammered at their eardrums, laughing maniacally as several of their compatriots caught fire. They streamed toward the mine like ants, frantically trying to get inside. The bait was taken.
Adobe gleamed in the sunlight as Luc focused on the building where he'd scented his daughter. There were two reivers on duty, but most of their attention was on the pair of reivers rolling around in the dirt, trying to put their smoldering clothes out. Running past three more, he ducked behind a pair of armored trucks and wove between several canvas tents.
No sign of Colton or Cane yet.
Luc's eyes narrowed as he paused behind a jeep, squatting low. Riley would make for the gun turret, but hold off until needed. The longer they could use stealth as a weapon, the better.
Stealing a glance behind him, he caught a flash of movement as Riley slid to her ass in the dust beside the jeep with the gun turret. Their eyes met, and she smiled grimly.
Luc nodded, then turned his attention back to the job at hand.
Barely ten feet from the adobe hut where Lily was hiding. Luc licked dry lips, gathering his thighs beneath him for a short sprint. Leaning low, he took a steady breath and then gunfire ripped through the clearing, spraying off the jeep he was crouched beside.
Ping-ping-ping. Luc threw himself flat and rolled under the jeep, his heart hammering in his ears.
Fuck. He risked a look, and someone drilled another three holes into the dirt beside his face. Luc jerked back, sweat dampening his skin. Lily's hut was so close....
But then, that was the point, wasn't it?
To let him get close enough to scent his daughter, to almost picture wrapping her up in his arms, before pulling the rug out from under him. Cane was nothing if not pure bastard. Luc had spent two months tracking him and Colton, before he thought he'd burned them alive, and in every town the story was the same. Whores with burn marks on their skins, men who were goaded into fights that ended up being assassinations, settlements that were raided and burned out, the bodies left bloated in the sun... A monster in human skin. Cane didn't need night to fall for his true nature to emerge.
"Welcome to Copperplate, Wade!" Bartholomew Cane bellowed, his voice ringing clear through the canyon and echoing. "You made it further than expected."
Bullets haphazardly pinged off the metal flanks of the jeep, just enough to keep him pinned down. Fucking bastard. Luc bared his teeth.
Cane's laughter lasted all of three seconds. Then the semi-automatic gun on the back of the reivers' jeep drilled the cliffs where the shots had come from with bullets. Screams cut the air, and Cane fell silent.
"Go, Luc!" Riley screamed, pausing just briefly. "I've got your back!"
The ricochet started up again.
From the sound of it, she was raining hell down upon the cliffs where the reivers were pinned down. Luc rolled out from under the jeep on the far side and launched himself into a sprint. All he could see was the faded blue door that led to where his daughter was being kept. He threw himself at it and rebounded hard, but the latch broke, timber splitting down the center. Another bullet sprayed white chips of adobe as he flung his arms up to protect his head, slamming his shoulder against the door again.
Hope soared through his chest as it splintered in half; he kicked the timber slats free, and barreled through.
"No further," Colton warned, holding a pistol against Lily's head.
Luc froze.
The other warg's eyes were narrowed and he sidestepped, keeping Lily between them. There was a gag around her mouth, and her eyes watered as she looked up at him helplessly. Everything in him urged him to leap forward, to kill the bastard and protect her. A father's instincts, reignited after years of neglect.
But Colton's pistol never wavered.
Colton wasn't the same type of man as Cane – Luc knew that. When he'd hunted them, witnesses spoke of how Colton had tried to restrain Cane's darker ambitions at times. That didn't make him an ally. There was some kind of bond between them, Colton following at Cane's heels, a slave to his whims.
"You don't have to do this," Luc said in a low, soothing voice, his gaze flickering to the pistol and back.
Colton swallowed. "Yeah, I do." His nostrils flared. "You don't understand. I have to do what he says. I have to. He's had me too long, and he's in my head. I can't disobey him."
They stared each other down. "So, you're just a whipped dog?" Luc asked. "When he tells you to kill little kids, you just go out and do it."
"You think I want this?" Colton snapped. His hand shook on the gun, and Lily whimpered as the barrel pressed harder against her temples. "I can... fight his orders sometimes. Sometimes it's long enough. Sometimes it's not."
"Easy." Luc eyed the other man's trigger finger.
"You're too late," Colton said. "You lost. You should never have come here. You just gave him everything that he wants."
"Me."
"No. Not you."
Gunfire fell silent in that second, and a shiver of premonition rasped along his nerves. Riley. The heat drained out of his face.
"That's how he works," Colton said. "There's a sickness inside him. And you nearly burned him alive, once upon a time. He can't forgive that, not now. He wants to take everything you have from you." The gun lowered, but Colton kept a grip on Lily. "But he won't do it himself. He'll make you hurt her instead."
That shiver became a bone-encompassing dread. "He won't get inside my head."
"He doesn't have to." Colton's gaze flickered toward his amulet. "Night's not so far away now. It's his favorite game."
Fuck.
"And he'll make you choose," Colton warned. "The girl. Or the woman."
Lily's face swam into view. She was terrified. And he'd failed her once already. It wasn't a choice, not really, but he knew that Riley wouldn't think it was a choice either.
He knew what stirred the beast – rage, fury, hunger, thoughts of hot, delicious fear dripping through the veins of its prey... The scent of fear was like a five-course buffet in his nose. The warg within him wasn't cruel. It was hungry. Hungry for flesh, or blood, or sex. Animalistic in the extreme. All of its desires were simplified. If it wanted, then it took. Even now, something trembled inside him at the thought. Claws sprang forth from his fingers, and he shook as he forced them back within his skin, reminding himself that he was part human too.
This wasn't always the case. It didn't have to be. He could fight this, if he had to. He could. But he had to do it smartly.
He'd seen wargs hunt and tear bodies apart, just for fun. He'd seen them defend their territory against intruders, or other wargs. The nature of the creature was primal. It wanted to be alpha, wanted to be the only warg standing, or to have others cringe at its feet in fear. No point in pretending that he wouldn't see Riley as prey. He would. What he had to focus on was the other part of his nature.
Make the warg see that she was his territory, to be defended and protected against other wargs. Focus on the hate and the rage, and direct it at the ones who deserved it. Then maybe, maybe – if Riley didn't panic – they might get through this.
"Wade!"
The bellow cut across the open valley of the mine, and Luc risked a glance over
his shoulder through the open door. This was his weakness. Riley stood arched up onto her tiptoes, with Cane wrapped around her, his claws digging into her throat.
Shouldn't have brought her... Should have come for Lily myself.
Indecision haunted him. His daughter would always be his priority, but to move now would cost Riley her life, and she knew it. He could see it in her eyes as she met his gaze.
Those determined brown eyes narrowed, her lips firming as she tipped her head up slightly. "Go," she mouthed, trying to take the decision away from him.
Because that was who Riley was. A woman who'd sacrifice herself, no matter what the cost was. A hero. A leader. A woman whose worth wasn't measured in gold, but in deeds.
Her father would have been proud, and Luc had a moment of doubt. How could he ever be worthy of her?
‘Humanity's for the humans,’ he'd said once. And he believed, truly believed that he was no longer welcome in those ranks. But staring at Cane, knowing what the bastard would do to her....
A monster would walk away from her right now, without a care, except for his daughter. And a hero would make one last suicidal attempt to save Riley, because that was what heroes did.
But Luc was no hero. He was also no monster.
And Riley was the strongest, bravest woman he'd ever met.
His half-formed plan was risky and dangerous, and driven by Colton's words. His first instinct was to reject it, but what else could he do?
It was a gamble, no doubt. He knew what type of man Cane was. That was the monster, right there, and to do this meant pitting both of them against each other, in the most dangerous game of all. Even now, he could still feel the flicker of cold sweat dance over the back of his neck, because there were no guarantees that he could pull this off, that Riley would make the right moves... But he had to trust her, and his own instincts.
Did he have the strength of will to do this?
You are what you are, a little voice whispered. Nobody's hero.
But then, that wasn't what was needed, right at this instant.
Luc's nostrils flared, and then he spread his feet in a wide stance, dropped the knife, and swept his hands up behind his head. "I surrender."
* * *
"No," Riley whispered, as she saw the resolve form in Luc's face. She struggled weakly against Colton's hold on her, but she might as well have been wrestling with steel.
"I surrender," Luc said, in an eerily calm voice. "That's what you want, isn't it? Me? Let Lily go, as you promised, and you can do whatever you want to me. Riley can take her with her."
"Let them go?" Cane laughed. "Maybe I will let them go, out there in the desert. How far do you think they'll get with no supplies, and a hungry pack of wargs out there?"
Luc's face paled, but his eyes only narrowed slightly.
Not the result that Cane wanted. Riley could see the hungry look on his face swiftly denied, replaced by something more feral. It was as though he fed on emotions, on the bitter, gut-wrenching twist of them, and Luc had somehow denied him. "Grab him," he bellowed, striding forward. "And bring the woman," he snapped over his shoulder at Colton.
Reivers lunged forward and snatched at Wade as if he were a rabid dog, they a pack of hyenas. One of them had some sort of whip made of chains and lashed him across the middle, sharp, jerky movements that made him grunt as they pinned him to the floor, a swarm of bodies burying him in their midst. Maybe he didn't dare fight back, but she could see the rage in his expression, the way he had to clench his jaw not to.
"What are you going to do with her?" Luc growled, dragging himself to his feet with a swarm of reivers clinging to him.
"Something special. Put him in the cage!"
Tarps dropped from around the tray on a clapped-out old truck, and a silver warg cage gleamed. Luc was thrown unceremoniously inside, and the door clanged shut.
Cane paused beside the jeep, then reached out to finger a lock of her hair. Riley jerked away, but her hair pulled taut and she winced, then froze.
"Let her go," Luc demanded, the words soft.
Riley was dragged to her knees in front of the cage, every root in her hair screaming against her scalp as Cane hauled her against him. Thick fingers curled around her throat, and he licked her cheek. "I can see the appeal."
Wade threw himself at the bars. “You fucking touch her, and I’ll kill you!"
Smoke curled out from where his fists were clenched around the bars, flesh sizzling. He almost, almost managed to stretch the bars half an inch.
Riley strained. “Stop it, Luc! You’re hurting yourself.”
He let go with a snarl, but he was breathing hard. "Nothing will keep me in here. You hear that? Nothing. Let her go.”
Cane released her and Riley collapsed onto her hands and knees, touching her scalp tentatively. His boot stepped beside her and she flashed a seething look at it, wishing she had a knife. Wouldn't be so fucking smug if she jammed a blade into his foot. Fear burned hot in her throat though. There were a lot of things a warg and a pack of reivers could do to a woman.
"Nothing, huh?" Cane laughed. "Maybe I won't be doing anything to her at all."
Riley looked up and caught the faint silvery gleam in Luc's blue eyes. Their gazes met, and she felt like he was trying to tell her something.
A gunshot went off in the cliffs surrounding them, and something soared into the sky before exploding with a flash of brilliant bright light. Twilight was beginning to fall, and the flare gleamed like the first star in the sky.
Cane looked up, an ugly expression crossing his face. Maybe glee. "Looks like we got company, boys!"
Hoots went up around them, reivers ululating in their throats like animals and shaking shotguns here and there. Some of them had clay smeared across their cheeks and faces in red stripes, and it looked like dried blood. One or two of them wore masks, with empty goggle eyes glinting in the sunlight. Animals. All of them animals. Or no, that wasn't fair, for she'd never seen real animals behave like this. These were scavengers and, like a pack, they were shaking with the excitement of the hunt.
Because that's what this was. A reiver scout had seen something out there on the plains. For a second, Riley thought it might even be some of the guards from Absolution, but then McClain's face sprang to mind. Absolution had lost its compass. Would those men and women there come after her and Wade? Would they take a risk like this? For two strangers?
Not strangers. No, she was forgetting something – Lily had lived there. As far as the people of Absolution knew, Lily was one of them, and she was just a little girl. Absolution might be all shook up, but it looked out for its own.
"Lock 'em up," Cane told Colton, as an aside. "Everybody else, mount up! We've got scalps to claim!"
"Remember what I told you," Luc demanded, eyes wild-shot with silver, not quite human. "I'm still there."
Riley was shoved past him, into a small, squat building beside the one in which Lily had been kept. "What?" Her gaze danced between him and Cane, but the taller man was gloating as he and Colton manhandled the cage closer.
There was something in Wade's eyes. An intensity that she couldn't quite understand. Or a demand.
Trust me, his gaze seemed to say. I need you to trust me.
And then the cage door opened and Luc was stumbling toward her, Cane's hand ripping something from his neck at the last second. They collided, and Riley went down as Luc tried to grab her. Every part of her body ached from the toll the last few days had taken, and the adrenaline was only just strong enough to take the edge off it. The world spun as she righted herself, but Wade didn't help her up. There was no hand stretched out to her, no words to quell her fears.
Instead, he was on his knees, his fingers curled as he clutched at his head. In pain? Or... something else. Riley didn't know why, but every hair along her arms lifted as if her instincts knew something that she didn't.
"Lock the girl up next door," Cane told Colton, then smiled. "Have fun, Wade. I'll see you in the morning."
Cane took one last look at them, and then he slammed the door shut.
"No... fear..." The words were a twisted, guttural grunt that could barely be called language. "No... matter... what..."
Riley froze, her blood running cold.
Because the face that had uttered them wasn't entirely human.
Not anymore.
Twenty-Two
“WADE,” RILEY WHISPERED, backing up against the bed as the warg overtook him. There was no answer in his glittering gaze, no sign of the man she knew. “Luc?
No sign that he even heard her. Black hair spilled from his entire body as the change overtook him, his features twisted and deformed, half-animal, half-man. His lip curled back off his dangerously sharp teeth, and he advanced with a menacing step.
What had he said before? I'm still there. He was aware of everything that happened when the fury of the beast had him in its grip. That meant he was somewhere in there, somewhere inside. She just had to find him.
It was terrifying, but he'd known. And he'd allowed it, which meant he believed that he might get through this without killing her, as Cane no doubt intended. It all came down to her though, and how she reacted.
Strong emotions set him off, made it harder for him to keep control. And that was when he was human.
“I’m not afraid that you’ll hurt me.” Riley swallowed the hard lump of fear in her throat and forced herself to meet his silvery gaze. “Luc,” she called. “I know you won’t hurt me. I know you can do this. You can hold it off. Control it. You can win. And in the morning, we can kill Cane for this.”
A growl erupted from his throat, and she almost flinched.
Keep going. Keep him listening.
“I love you,” she blurted, as he started toward her. “I want you to know that. No matter what happens.” Swallowing hard, she added, “It’s okay. This is not your fault. I love you.”
A rippling shudder went through the massive form, a slight hesitation. Riley leapt on it, her breath hitching in her throat, almost a cry of fear. Oh, God. What if she couldn’t get through to him? What if, no matter how hard he fought, he couldn’t control himself?
