Dire Needs

by Stephanie Tyler

  The man who carried her had been slightly taller. She looked between both of them. “It’s not my blood… the wolf was hurt…”

  She didn’t mention killing a man.

  “You’re having a reaction to the medication the woman who attacked you gave you,” the second man explained as he wiped the blood from her hand.

  But Cordelia never got close enough to her with the syringe, had she?

  “Cordelia didn’t get me with the syringe, but she’s been following me since last night—she saw me with Rifter and came into the hospital for me to stitch a bite,” she said to the green-eyed one, but he simply said, “We’ll get you to safety.”

  She wasn’t about to argue. She hadn’t realized how far the wolf had gotten her from her house, but she was back near the woods on the edge of her property. And while the soot was still in her mouth and nose, she couldn’t feel the heat from the fire any longer.

  And she still had Rifter’s jacket tucked under her arm.

  “Where’s Rifter?” she asked as the darker blond man handed her a towel to wipe her face.

  “He’ll be along shortly. I’m Jinx. And I know you’re a doctor. Can you help Liam with me?” he asked, and she turned to see Liam lying on some towels, paler than he’d been before.

  Liam. Not a wolf.

  She decided not to mention that last part to these men.

  He was naked and his chest had been cut by a knife down the center, like someone had tried to flay him. She’d been battered, but she was breathing. The young man in front of her was barely doing so—and she moved toward him quickly out of instinct.

  “Are you kidnapping me to take care of him? Or because of what happened back there?” she demanded, her gaze flicking back and forth between Liam and Jinx. No matter what their answer was, she wasn’t going to fight them on this. She’d done too much of that today, and ultimately, these men—and the one dying—saved her life tonight.

  Why they’d put it in danger in the first place was another story altogether.

  “Little of both,” the man with tattoos along his neck said without a hint of apology… or an introduction.

  For some strange reason, that gave her comfort. “Then let’s get out of here—the fire’s freaking me out.”

  “Will do, boss lady.” The tattooed man smiled a little, and she swore his eyes changed colors.

  She wondered if she should admit that she wasn’t allowed to practice medicine any longer and decided they wouldn’t care about that. She was still damned good at what she did, and she would prove it now, to these men, and to herself.

  Chapter 11

  Once he’d gotten Gwen to the safety of his brothers, Rifter shifted back to human away from her. Now Vice was untying something from on top of the truck as Rifter raced toward it. The house was pretty remote, but they had only minutes before the real police arrived.

  Vice pointed to the jeans he’d left on the hood of the truck, which was parked far enough into the wooded area for a quick escape and out of sight of the emergency vehicles in case they pulled up faster than anticipated. The windows were too dark to see through, but he could smell Gwen even now.

  “What’s that?” he asked.

  “Witch. We’ve got to burn her,” Vice said, motioning for Rifter to come look at the body. When Rifter pulled himself to the roof of the SUV, Vice uncovered her face.

  Cordelia.

  “Jesus Christ.” Rifter continued to curse, checked her thigh and saw his bite from earlier. Seb would not take kindly to the death of his sister by wolf at all. “I bit her earlier, in the woods.”

  She’d been spelled when alive to look like a young woman. In fact, Seb’s sister was much older, with white hair past her shoulders.

  When Cordelia died, the spell had worn off. She was easily recognizable now as that old woman, a fate that Seb had escaped by refusing to practice black magic. Seb didn’t look a day over thirty, if that, much like the Dires. Then again, the witch was now practicing the dark arts himself, and his looks could be masking a wizened visage like Cordelia’s.

  “Burn her,” Rifter agreed. There would be hell to pay for this. And he was half tempted to do the burning right outside Seb’s door because the witch would not take kindly to the Viking funeral pyre.

  “This human’s brought nothing but trouble with her, Rift. Cordelia didn’t start circling you until last night, when you went home with Gwen—she admitted that herself,” Vice told him as he hauled the body over his shoulder and held up Gwen’s hospital badge, which he clipped onto the front of Cordelia’s collar. “This will literally kill two birds with one stone, at least for a while.”

  Rifter nodded and watched Vice bring Cordelia’s body close to the flaming house before heaving her into the fire. When Vice came back, sirens sounded in the distance.

  “You still think Gwen’s weretrapper bait?” Rifter asked, didn’t wait for the answer. “Who’s the Were?”

  “Liam. The outlaws tried to kill him too—Gwen’s busy saving his ass right now.”

  Rifter blinked hard. “Son of a bitch.” On both counts. She was far too involved in their lives… and Brother Wolf was rising and demanding it be that way, thanks to his Father Wolf instincts. “We are a caravan of some bad shit right now.”

  Because Gwen was coming back to the house with them… where they had Harm shackled. The young heir who would be king of the Weres was currently dying in their truck, and, oh yeah, there was an entire pack of Dire alphas who weren’t supposed to exist—and soon they’d all be under one roof.

  Add a dead witch who’d been following Gwen since last night, and it was a recipe for disaster.

  “You sure you want to bring her back with us?” Vice asked. “Because she said she saw wolves. Jinx tried to convince her that Cordelia shot her up with drugs, but this one’s not buying it.”

  “She’s dying,” he told Vice, and that made the man go silent for a long moment.

  “You’re sure.”

  “Yes. And she’s all alone.”

  “How do you know she doesn’t have anyone else?” Vice demanded.

  “I know.” He could sense the deep well of loneliness because he’d felt it far too often. He had men he considered family. She had no pictures displayed in her house, just a small photo album tucked in a drawer and some wolf paintings.

  He knew interns were busy, but her whole life revolved around work and her illness. “She’ll die with us or without us. I’d rather her have someone there.”

  Vice nodded, and then, ever practical, said, “It’ll take care of the problem of having to kill her ourselves.”

  Rifter shoved Vice viciously against the truck, so hard it shook. “Don’t talk about her like that.”

  “You’re still wearing her scent,” Vice told him calmly, so much so that Rifter slammed him harder. “That explosion was meant for her, not you.”

  If Jinx hadn’t stuck his head out and pointedly said, “Police,” they would’ve fought until they bled.

  Vice’s eyes had turned, and Rifter wasn’t sure his had ever reverted from the earlier shift.

  “She almost died because of me tonight, and all she wants to do is really live,” he snarled at Vice before he released him.

  “So show her a good time, then,” Vice said, because that, he understood. “But tell me this—how the hell did she survive the blast?”

  Rifter had no idea, because his body ached from being thrown. She should be unable to move, but once he climbed in the passenger’s seat, he saw her moving around Liam’s prone body in the back of the truck.

  She didn’t seem to notice him or the fact that Vice gunned the truck through the back roads, because she was busy giving orders.

  Jinx was following those orders from Gwen, only because it was Liam, Rifter knew. And if he died, the packs would fall further into chaos than they already were.

  These Dires rankled at the idea of following any orders, except those of their king. It had made their years of military service interestin
g.

  “When we stop, use this to stitch him,” Jinx told her, holding the roll of black wire all the Dires used when helping a Were to heal quickly.

  “This is too thick,” she argued.

  “Use it,” Jinx said, and leaned back when Rifter turned to him. “He’s ripped out stitches before—trust me.”

  “You’re a doctor?” she asked.

  “Medic. Army. Combat medicine’s a lot like the ER.”

  She nodded and began to give him the respect she would a colleague. “This is infected—that’s why he was acting strangely.”

  “Must be,” Jinx muttered, and Rifter shot him a look. The truck swerved and Gwen held her own, balancing herself with the grace of someone used to rough ambulance rides with dying patients.

  And no doubt, Liam was dying. They could all smell it.

  Christ, they couldn’t let that happen.

  *

  “We need a hospital,” Gwen told Jinx, then glanced up briefly at Rifter.

  She’d known he was close before he’d gotten in the truck. He’d never gone far from her—she felt him like a warm tingle along her spine. And the way he looked at her… it heated her all over.

  He glanced at his leather jacket, which she kept close, like it was some kind of good-luck charm. She’d resisted the urge to put it on, but only because both her hands were currently holding Liam’s chest together.

  “My house has a clinic—we’ll be there in a couple of minutes,” Rifter told her, and she nodded crisply, wondering why they would need a private clinic.

  The gang thing was looking more and more likely. “I need more gauze, then,” she said, and Jinx produced it. The truck was stocked like an ambulance as well. She packed the wound, and Liam groaned softly at the pressure. “I’ll stitch him once we stop. He might need a transfusion.”

  “We can do that,” Jinx said, his voice low, his eyes not leaving Liam’s newly opened ones. He put a hand over them, told Liam, “Close them and rest,” and when he took his hand away, Liam had.

  As they zoomed up the private drive, she couldn’t make out more than the outline, thanks to the fog. The moon still looked full tonight, seemed to hang low over the house, though, shining a path for them.

  At the same time, she heard a garage door opening, noted at least ten Harley motorcycles lined up and several Hummers, and this place had to be huge.

  The clinic was in the basement, which was through a series of doorways down a wide hall, right off the attached garage they’d pulled into. Although she hadn’t been able to pay attention to much beyond holding the gauze in place when Jinx picked Liam up and put him on a stretcher another young guy wheeled out for them, she noted that the place wasn’t sterile looking.

  Somehow, despite the lack of windows, it felt warm.

  They ended up in the last room on the right, which had all the makings of an OR. Jinx swiftly grabbed what she needed, and together they worked nearly wordlessly, hanging fluids and blood, stitching Liam with the industrial wiring Jinx had suggested, all the while without the use of any pain meds.

  If Liam felt it, he didn’t complain. His heart rate was higher than she’d like it to be, though. “I still think he needs—”

  “He’s allergic to everything—too much risk of complication,” Jinx cut her off, then said, “You’re doing great.”

  She washed the mud and Betadine sterilizing solution and blood from Liam, careful not to turn or wake him. He was covered in bruises, all in different stages of healing. She couldn’t turn him without risking opening the wound again.

  “How old is he?” she asked.

  “Twenty-two,” Jinx said.

  “Did Cordelia do this to him? I mean, they were fighting, but I didn’t see a knife.” I did see a wolf, though…

  Rifter chose that moment to stride in, looking even more massive in a pair of jeans and a black ribbed sleeveless undershirt. She caught sight of a tattoo below his collarbone along his shoulder, and then she completely lost her train of thought when she saw him holding a bloody towel pressed to his biceps.

  Instead of Jinx answering her question, Rifter posed one of his own. “How do you know Cordelia?”

  “She came into the ER today with a nasty bite. She was asking me about you,” she admitted. “Rifter, I don’t understand any of this. Are you and your brothers in some kind of gang?”

  “Is that what Cordelia said?”

  “She inferred that. She also mentioned…”

  She stopped short, felt way too foolish to say the word monsters or to tell them Cordelia accused her of being one too. “She’s part of some take-back-the-night program.”

  Jinx snorted, and Rifter shot him a look.

  She was locked in a house with men who were… killers. And no matter how they tried to hide it, they knew exactly who Cordelia was.

  She wanted to ask about the men impersonating the police, wondered if they’d been in on the explosion. Did Rifter and his family know who they were?

  She assumed someone would tell her eventually. Rifter knew she was in no position to rat them out.

  “She seemed like a jealous ex at first,” she said, her gaze locking on Rifter’s. The air stilled between them, and he said, “She’s not an ex.”

  “I’ll let you two work this out without me,” Jinx said, then smirked at Rifter and exited the room, calling over his shoulder, “Let me know when Liam wakes up.”

  “Let me take care of that for you,” she said to hide how flustered she was, pointing to his arm, suddenly feeling foolish for acting jealous herself. With everything else going on, her love life should be the least of her concerns, but she couldn’t get Rifter out of her thoughts; his scent wafted past her constantly.

  Rifter didn’t argue when she ushered him to the second stretcher on the other side of the room behind a movable curtain. He sat and waited while she found the supplies she needed. When she got back to him, she unwrapped the cloth that was wound around the huge biceps and stared at it stupidly for a long moment.

  “This is a bullet wound.”

  “Yes.”

  “Were you near my house when those men started shooting?”

  He nodded, and she wanted to ask why, but she didn’t. It seemed almost rude, considering he’d saved her life. The female in her also gained satisfaction that he’d wanted to see her again.

  “I already took the bullet out—just needs to be cleaned,” he told her.

  “Now you’re a doctor too?”

  “Little bit.”

  She cleaned him up and bandaged the round wound, which was already on its way to healing. “There you go. This needs to be changed daily.”

  He was watching her with heavy-lidded eyes that were deceptively lazy. This man was anything but.

  “Thanks for saving my jacket.”

  She felt her face flush. “Those men were holding it. I just… freaked.”

  “I guess it was your good-luck charm.”

  No, that’s turning out to be you, she wanted to say, but she held that back because it was too soon to tell.

  She had nothing to go back to, and her stay would be short, no matter what. Maybe she could get used to being a biker chick. God knew she wanted Rifter. So she could be freaked or spend the rest of her time living, and doing so above the law seemed both appropriate and appealing.

  “I obviously have some kind of brain tumor, and that’s why I’m hallucinating things I can’t have possibly seen. I also can’t fight you and your brothers. I won’t go to the police, and I know you don’t trust that. But they wouldn’t believe my story anyway. I don’t even believe it. But those men said to put me in the van and to call Mars,” she told him. “Where were they going to take me?”

  “You’re safe now, Gwen,” he said, and she couldn’t accept that non-answer. The next confession came out of her mouth before she could stop it, but maybe it would make him understand why she needed to know everything.

  “My mother was killed by fire. So were my aunt and uncle. Now my hou
se explodes, right after a strange woman chants and shows me a pentagram. So I really hope I’m losing my mind or else—”

  Or else the possibilities were too frightening to say out loud.

  “I’m a dangerous man to be around. But you knew that already,” Rifter said.

  She couldn’t deny that she knew it, not when it drew her to him like a moth to the flame. Literally, at this point. “And I feel like I’m a dangerous woman to be around,” she countered.

  “This isn’t about you. I have a lot of enemies.”

  “And now so do I.”

  “As far as the rest of the world’s concerned, you died in that fire,” he said bluntly.

  “There’s no one in the world who’d care,” she said quietly, hadn’t expected him to drag her toward him or hold her tightly.

  “I goddamned do.” His voice was gruff, the emotion behind it real. Her body pressed against his hard one. She fit between his opened thighs, her head level with his chest, and she looked up to catch his gaze.

  It was smoldering. Her body was tugging her down a dangerous path as his erection pressed her—and he looked completely unashamed about that as he repeated quietly, “I goddamned care.”

  She wasn’t really aware that she’d started to trace a finger along the tribal tat near his collarbone until he actually shuddered a little under her touch. She wanted to trace it with her mouth and fought that urge, instead moving her hand to the outer square of the bandage.

  When she looked up at him, he was watching her with a heat in his eyes that ripped through her body like a fire.

  “You gonna kiss it and make it all better, Doc?” he breathed.

  Yes, she thought she might. And when he brought his mouth down on hers, she melted for him. This was so easy, probably the easiest thing she’d ever done. Her tongue played against his as the kisses deepened. She was ready to climb him, to let him take her the way she’d wanted to last night.

  His hands roamed her body, brushing her breasts over her shirt, and she squirmed impatiently, allowing his hands to move underneath the fabric. Her own tugged at his shirt as well, and she touched her palms to his warm skin.