by Lynn Red
Drake Garrison. He and his family hadn’t lived in Stratton long, moving to a city up north before they’d graduated high school. She’d heard on the grapevine that he’d gone loco and slaughtered his entire family. She shuddered. There was only one punishment for such a heinous crime.
The midnight run.
They, his pack, would open a gate to the darkness between this world and the next, between here and the Faerylands, and shove him through. A similar gate nearby would be opened, just for twelve hours. If the condemned could run the plains and make it to the other door, he or she was free, their crimes considered punished. As far as she knew, only one wolf had ever made it alive. Ever. Normally the other gate only ever produced a corpse.
The shudder of dread slithering down her spine, she put the thought from her mind and studied the picture again. Behind her and Drake sat a younger Max, but he wasn’t looking at the camera. Instead, he was looking at her, longing and possessiveness written on his face for anyone to see. As soon as she saw it, she knew who had taken the photo. His father, Bennett. He wouldn’t have allowed anyone else to see such a weakness.
Was it love? Or was it because she’d said no to him? She took a sip from the mug and grimaced. Coffee was cold. Well, not cold, cold. But lukewarm, too cool to drink. Distracted as she swallowed, she moved to the other side of the plaque to look at the other picture and stopped dead.
It wasn’t a photo. Instead the heavy wooden frame surrounded a drawing. Not a sketch or an artist’s impression that would have done the expensive frame justice. It was a child’s drawing, the lines shaking and the coloring had gaps where the crayon had missed. Two wolves under a full moon. She reached out to touch the glass that protected a moment out of childhood. Her childhood. His childhood. She’d drawn this for him when they were both kids, just after he and his family had moved here.
He’d kept it. All these years, he’d kept it.
Her heart swelled, unfolding like a flower under the sun. She loved him. Perhaps she always had, but she’d lost touch with that fact under his dominating attitude and her need to be free. She never had been free though. She’d just buried the feeling deep down, so deep she couldn’t feel it, determined to do her own thing.
Her chin lifted as she used her free hand to wipe her wet cheeks. Now she would do her own thing again, and claim him.
The front door to the cabin opened, out of sight in the main room but she felt the slight gust of air and the scents that swept in from the forest outside. She turned with a smile on her face, ready to face Max, chide him about being sentimental and tell him she’d decided to stay, but the smile dropped like a stone. The three scents that filled the cabin from the open door were wrong. Two bears and a wolf. Violence and death rode on their coat-tails and brought her hackles up, her wolf ready to break through the skin.
The coffee mug hit the floor, its contents spilling unseen over the carpet as she ran, knowing she ran for her life.
* * *
Kelli was his. After all these years, she was finally his.
A contented and happy smile spread itself over Max’s lips as he drove back up to the cabin as fast as he dared. The last thing he wanted was to roll the truck or get pulled over for speeding. Neither would be a particular problem. He could play chicken with a freight train and walk away, so a road accident would just mean an expensive bill for his truck.
And being pulled for speeding would just mean a lecture from the local sheriff, Bob Jenkins. Human in a town full of wolves, he’d long since given up locking any of them up. There was no point. If they’d wanted to, they could simply mangle the bars and walk out. Still, Bob had been sheriff since Max was a kid, so getting a lecture from him made Max feel seventeen again.
So he kept the truck below the speed limit despite the fact he wanted to floor it and get back to the sweet woman in his bed as quickly as possible. He’d left her there this morning to go and deal with a faulty heating system. Seeing her there, all sleepy and soft, naked under the sheet... It had nearly killed him not to slide back in there with her, but he had a business to run and ducking out on an emergency just wasn’t good. Like with the pack, the buck stopped with him.
He slid a glance to the seat next to him. As an apology for ducking out on her this morning, he’d picked up breakfast and a bunch of flowers on the way back. He had no clue what they were, but they were pretty with a delicate scent that reminded him of Kelli. She was delicate, all soft skin, silky hair and mouth-watering curves.
She’d been...she was...perfect. In every way, shape or form. The things they’d done, the way she’d been, submissive and aggressive by turns. The night was etched into his memory for all time. He groaned as the scent of his arousal filled the small truck cabin, his cock hard and aching within a heartbeat.
He turned the corner onto the private road that led up to the cabin, finally able to pick the speed up. Eager to get back to her. Hopefully she’d still be in bed, or would have just gotten up. She’d be warm and sleepy, pliant and open to the suggestion they should spend the day in bed. He grinned, a wholly masculine growl in the back of his throat at the thought.
Despite the anticipation and desire surging through his body, Max knew he’d been lucky. Last night he’d lost control, the wolf almost gaining the upper hand to claim the woman they both wanted. Whilst the outcome—his cock buried in her warmth as she writhed in ecstasy under him—was what he wanted, he wanted her to have a choice. He couldn’t...wouldn’t just take her and damn the consequences, even though that was what the creature inside demanded.
She’d talked him down, gotten him inside the cabin and waited until the man was back in control before surrendering to him. A shudder racked his body, his shoulders juddering against the back of the driver’s seat as the cabin came into view. If she hadn’t... No, he didn’t even want to think about that. Didn’t want to think about the bright, sassy spark in her eyes dimmed after he’d taken all her choices from her. He knew his wolf. Knew himself. Given half the chance he’d have bitten her, put his mark on her pretty little neck and she wouldn’t have been able to stop him.
Instead though, she’d talked. Using her soft voice and hands to gentle him, wait out the beast and bring him back to her. Only his true-mate would have been able to do that, and in that instant he knew he’d been right to wait for her. Ten years of freaking waiting, but he’d done it. For her. For his mate.
Pulling to a stop, he pulled the handbrake on and reached for the goodies on the passenger seat. Halfway there he stopped, his hands outstretched. The front door to the cabin was open. A frown on his face, he collected the takeout bag and the flowers, and slammed the truck door with a booted foot. Perhaps she’d nipped out...but to where?
“Kelli?” he called out as he neared the door.
The scent of bear answered him. The flowers fell from his hand, the bag following them to split, spilling its contents over the stone covered dirt and the smell of the food exploding onto the air. He ignored it, swift steps taking him to the open door. Something was wrong. Very wrong. Dread filled him, sliding icy fingers around his heart in a death-grip as he reached it.
He pushed it open and barreled through, ready for anything. The stink of bear was almost over-whelming but under it he could make out Kelli’s scent and another wolf, one that smelt familiar. The snarl was already on his lips as he looked around, noted the smashed patio windows and the trail of devastation down the garden, leading in to the forest.
“Bethany... I’m going to fucking kill you.”
Chapter Eight
Sunlight filtered through the trees, breaking through the canopy overhead to bathe the forest floor in a dappled carpet of light. The gentle breeze brought the scent of the wild and the mountains. Any minute now Max expected a couple of rabbits and maybe fucking Bambi to amble across his path.
He thundered through the forest like a one-wolf wrecking ball. Fully shifted, his paws were like dinner plates as they hit the dirt, claws digging deep to propel him forward
in a furry tsunami. His chest heaved, dragging in oxygen to power his massive lupine form as he raced up a rocky incline, bouncing off a tree trunk to land atop the rise.
He paused for a second, a howl ripped from the depths of his soul and welling up through his throat until he gave it voice. It was a sound borne of rage and a warning. They’d taken his mate. Taken his Kelli. And now they were going to pay.
Man and wolf were in accord as he leapt from the rock, picking up the trail with ease and chasing down his enemies with blood in his heart and murder in his mind. Kelli had run, and she was fast. Terror had lent wings to her heels as she’d led her pursuers a merry chase through the woods.
But she’d been caught. Max skidded to a stop as the scent of blood, Kelli’s blood, exploded on the air. Snarls filled the air as he snapped at it with his teeth, snuffling about in the undergrowth to find the blood. A few spots, nothing more, not enough to cause her permanent injury. He paused, analyzing the scents. She hadn’t changed. Why hadn’t she shifted? Fast as she was in human form, as any wolf was, she would be stronger and faster as a wolf.
He didn’t get time to think on the matter. A scream shattered the silence and echoed through the trees. His head snapped up, eyes narrowing as his lips curled back from his teeth. Kelli. They were hurting Kelli.
They were going to die. He’d be eating bear steak tonight and fuck what their alpha over in Katy thought about it. Stratton was wolf territory and they’d dared...dared to set foot here and commit violence against one of his wolves. Against his mate.
Launching himself in the air, he raced through the trees, following Kelli’s scent and the sound of her screams as he headed higher and higher. They’d taken her up onto one of the ridges... His heart stuttered in his chest, paused and slammed painfully against his ribcage. It was hard to kill a wolf, they healed everything but the most grievous injuries, but it was possible if the damage was great enough. Throwing a wolf off one of these cliffs, with the razor sharp rocks below... Yeah, the damage would be great enough.
He upped his pace, running flat out. Fear pounded in time with his heartbeat. If he was too late... God, he didn’t even want to think about that. He had to be in time, or his life was over. After he killed as many bears as it took to avenge his mate.
He neared the top of the rise, paws scrabbling over the loose rocks but he kept going forward. Never losing ground. Not slowing. The screams stopped. Fear exploded as he put on a last spurt of speed. He had to get there in time.
* * *
“You fucking bitch. You just couldn’t take the fucking hint, could you?”
Bethany had a hard fist in the back of Kelli’s hair, yanking her head back so she could snarl into her face. The utter hatred and rage there took Kelli’s breath away. Pain lanced through her body from the silver spikes, each the length of a finger, that Bethany had driven into her body while the bears held her down. Four points of icy-pain and fire, agony radiated from them, stopping her change and locking her into her weaker human form.
“Hint? You’ve got something wrong in the head, lady. I told you I was going back to the city before midsummer,” Kelli gasped between the waves of agony. She had been going back to the city. Past tense. That was no longer the plan, but this crazy bitch didn’t need to know that.
“Yeah?” Bethany snarled again, showing teeth longer than human in her anger. “But you just had to screw about with my mate first? Is that it? You had to fuck him, didn’t you?”
Driving a finger into the wound in Kelli’s shoulder, Bethany twisted, driving the spike deeper. She hissed in pain. The silver burned, the pain like acid eating at her flesh, but she refused to scream. She wouldn’t give the bitch the satisfaction.
“Your mate?” she asked when she managed to regain her breath. “Funny, all my life I’ve been told bonded mates can’t fuck about with others.”
Stupid thing to say. Bethany threw back her head and howled her rage to the sky. When she looked back down, her eyes were the clear amber of her approaching beast.
Kelli knew she had to fight, to escape, but with the silver impaling her, her wolf was caged and out of reach. She couldn’t match Bethany’s strength. Her heels dug furrows in the dirt, small stones scraping against the half-buried rock as the two bears looked on, their faces impassive and massive arms folded over their chests.
Appealing to them for help would do no good; they’d held her down as their wolf friend had driven the stakes into Kelli’s shoulders and thighs. There was no love lost between wolves and bears, but since Max had become Stratton Alpha, he and the Bear Alpha had reached an understanding. Why would they risk the treaty by helping one wolf kill another?
“We haven’t managed to finish the bond yet,” Bethany growled, her voice too low for human as she dragged Kelli bodily to the edge of the cliff. “But we will, as soon as you’re out of the fucking way.”
Oh God, she was really going to do it. Gasping, Kelli fought every step of the way, desperate to stay away from the cliff. She’d grown up around here so she knew exactly what awaited her over the edge. Even with her ability to heal, she wouldn’t make it. Her body would be shattered and sliced on the rocks below, too broken for even her wolf to heal. Sorrow filled her. She’d never told Max she loved him. That she planned to stay. Planned to claim him at midsummer.
She’d grown up around here.
She stilled as the thought slammed back into her head. Bethany gained more ground, dragging her limp form another couple of feet as Kelli thought rapidly. If the other woman had been interested in killing her straight away, then she’d have already been over the cliff and shattered on the rocks below. But Bethany was more interested in making sure her final moments were as painful as possible, her finger in the wound in Kelli’s shoulder, twisting the silver deeper as she dragged her to the edge.
Kelli closed her eyes as they reached the edge, lest she give herself away, her hands around Bethany’s on her shoulders. She’d grown up around here. She knew these cliffs. She just had to hope Bethany didn’t.
“You’re a high flyer, aren’t you Kelli?” Bethany snarled, holding her out over the edge, hands on her wounded shoulders. Only her grip on the other woman’s wrists kept Kelli from failing. “Some big wig in the city...it’s all Max fucking talks about. Let’s see how good you are at flying.”
Kelli opened her eyes and smiled. It wasn’t a nice smile. “You know the saying, what doesn’t kill me...” and then she let go of Bethany’s wrists.
* * *
“Nooooo!”
Max crashed into the clearing by the cliff just in time to see Kelli fall, tumbling into human form to give voice to his pain in a bellow of anguish and rage. Bethany turned, the expression on her face startled and guilty.
“Max...this isn’t what it looks like. She attacked me... I-it was awful. I had to defend myself,” she wheedled, excuses rolling off her tongue as easily as the lies he was used to. “But it’s all better now. She can’t hurt me...can’t hurt us anymore. She was a cancer... You needed to be free of her.”
She took two steps toward him, her hand outstretched in placation. It trembled, matching her bottom lip, but Max didn’t care.
Energy rolled through him, around him, and whispered over his skin. His wolf form was less than a heartbeat away as he stalked toward her, the sounds rumbling from his lips nothing close to human. He was going to kill her, tear her limb from limb. Make her suffer for taking Kelli from him.
He couldn’t speak, couldn’t form the words through his rage. He simply growled at her as the bears moved to block him, the threat of violence hanging in the air, so thick that Max could taste it.
He bared his teeth, the canines wolf-like and lethally sharp. He’d go through them if he had to, and the sudden flash of aggression in their eyes told him that they knew it too.
“Out of my way,” he warned on a low growl, gathering energy and rolling it through his hands. As the bears watched, they changed. Snick-snick-snick. His talons extended with soft fleshy
sounds. Just the talons, nothing else, the famous control of a pack-alpha keeping the rest of his body human.
The lead bear, a blond Max had seen before on one of his infrequent trips into Katy, lifted his chin. “Make us.”
Max grinned, the expression evil as it spread over his face. “I thought you’d never ask.”
With a roar, he opened himself to the wolf inside. The creature burst free, bones popping and his human skin tearing as between one step and the next he went from man not to wolf, but to something in between. Over six feet of wolfman, he was like something out of a nightmare, with talons that would put a sci-fi monster to shame.
Clawed paws hit the dirt as he rebounded off it, a deadly snarl in the back of his throat as he leapt into the attack. They were slower to change, only partway through when he hit the first one in the middle of the chest. Caught between man and beast, a dark eye widened as Max’s talons bit deep, tearing through skin starting to sprout fur like a hot knife through butter.
Blood poured over his hands as the bear roared in pain. Max roared back, muzzle to muzzle with the creature as he hooked his claws through its ribs and tickled its heart with a deadly touch. The bear gasped, convulsing as razor sharp claws shredded heart and lungs and slumped. He threw it aside, the half-turned body sliding and rolling down the slope until it came to rest against a trunk, loose stones and dirt piling up against it.
He turned at the sound of a roar. The remaining bear hit him in the midriff, tackling him to the ground. The air rushed out of his lungs as he hit the dirt, the back of his skull slamming against a rock. Stars exploded over his vision as the bear rose over him, claws raking his furred skin as it roared again. Almost as tall as he was, it’s weight alone was crushing. Madness shone in its eyes as it hunkered over him, trying to get a purchase with claws or teeth.
