The Dark Side

by M. J. Scott

  I smiled back, knowing that for the next nine hours or so I could let the wolf rule and not have to worry or think about everything that waited for us back in Seattle. “Last one to change is a rotten egg.”

  Dan’s laughter turned into a liquid howl as the moon broke over the trees and hit us. Wolves don’t laugh so I had to content myself with yipping at him, to let him know how ridiculous he sounded.

  He waggled his ears at me then came over and bumped shoulders with me. “Wanna run?”

  I leaned into him for a moment, breathing in his scent. But the moon surged in my blood, calling me to move. The wolf wanted action and I wanted to give her free rein.

  Rhi’s ‘don’t go into the woods today’ echoed through my head. I ignored it. I was surrounded by the Pack. Dan was here. The Retreat was safe.

  * * *

  I ran with Dan, dodging and winding through the forest trails, drinking in the night scents as we played, nipping at each other’s heels and staging mock ambushes in a puppyish fit of silliness that reflected the need to let the tension of the last few weeks go.

  When we crossed the trail of a larger group, led by Sam, we turned and followed it until we caught up with the group of wolves pelting through the night for no better reason than the sheer joy of movement. I lost track of Dan in the darkness and the flickering bodies of wolves flowing around me.

  When someone howled, signaling that a scent had been found, I pulled back.

  I didn’t want to hunt. Not tonight.

  I stopped on the side of the path until everyone had run past, ears flicking backward and forward as I tried to figure out exactly where I was. We’d run for miles and nothing around me looked familiar. I hadn’t been a wolf long enough to know every twist and turn of the woods that covered hundreds of acres of the Retreat.

  I could tell I was higher up than I’d started. That probably meant the main house lay down and to the west of where I stood. I could either go north on the tail of the pack I’d just left or continue upward on a faint trail I could see leading east.

  Up sounded good. If for no other reason than it should let me get my bearings if I could find a clearing with a view.

  I headed up, following my nose, which promised rock and grass up ahead rather than leaf mold and the damper scent of trees that surrounded me now.

  Twigs cracked under my paws and I amused myself pouncing on shadows as the trail grew steeper. The tension riding me started to melt away. Until I stepped out into the clearing at the trailhead and smelled a scent that didn’t belong anywhere in the Retreat.

  Vampire.

  I froze, half in and out of the tree line, trying to listen and smell and look.

  Nothing.

  Nothing but for the distinctive scent of vampire hanging on the breeze.

  “Don’t hide in the trees, little doggy.”

  The voice came from my right, soft and eerie. Sexless somehow. I turned my head, scanning the shadows, trying to decide whether to retreat or just stay where I was. There might be more than one. If I ran, I might just be running into trouble.

  “Dan,” I thought urgently.

  “I don’t think he can hear you from so far away, doggy.”

  The fur on my neck stood on end. The vamp had heard my thoughts?

  “I’ll come out if you do,” the voice said. This time it held a coaxing note that made me think female.

  “Fat chance,” I thought and took a step backward. “Dan, hurry.”

  “Don’t do that,” the voice said sharply. “Play nice or the other little doggies will be in trouble. Come here.”

  The last two words cracked like a whip.

  I fought the urge to move forward. “You come out first.”

  Leaves rustled and suddenly a woman appeared in the clearing. A woman where I’d swear no one had been a few seconds ago. She wore a long dark dress but where her skin was visible it glowed like the moon. So how the hell hadn’t I seen her?

  A growl rumbled in my throat. “Who are you?”

  “Oh no, puppy. No names. Not yet. All you need to know is that I’m the beginning and the end. Alpha and Omega.”

  She smiled at me and I moved uneasily, bracing myself for an attack. There was nothing particularly sane in the expression. It made me glad I couldn’t see her eyes. But crazy or not, there was something horribly familiar about her face. She moved her head a little and a shadow fell across her mouth, turning her lips dark and suddenly I realized who she was. The woman from the club. The one with the muzzled vamp.

  Fuck.

  “I said, come here,” she repeated and the urge to move blossomed within me.

  More vamp powers. Double fuck. I needed to shield. I reached for the knowledge Ani had implanted in my head but it was still a mostly confused jumble of impressions and feelings. So I went with the glass cage image, trying to imagine the moonlight solidified around me. For a moment, the need to walk toward her lessened and I thought I’d succeeded.

  Then she just laughed. “Don’t be rude, puppy. You don’t want to annoy me. Come here.”

  I couldn’t resist the words this time. The glass in my head shattered and my paws moved without me willing them to. One step. Two. Three. Then I sank my claws into the dirt and held on for grim life, snarling at her. “I’m not a pet.”

  “He said you would be difficult.” She sighed theatrically. “I had hoped he would be wrong.”

  He? Who was he? Smith? Tate? Esteban?

  “Difficult? You don’t know the meaning of the word. But you will once the pack gets your scent.”

  “I think your pack may be otherwise occupied.”

  As she spoke the crack of a gunshot echoed through the night. It was far away, but a barrage of furious protesting howls rose immediately.

  Furious but not anguished. I strained my ears, trying to catch every nuance of the sound. I heard only anger, not distress. There’d be more than anger if the bullet had found a target. I had to believe no one was hurt. Which meant my most immediate problem was making sure I didn’t get hurt either. I turned all my attention back to the vampire. “What do you want?”

  “You have something of mine. Several things.”

  “I really don’t.”

  “I want her.”

  “I have no idea who you’re talking about.”

  Anger twisted her face. “She is mine. We made her. You have no right to keep her from me.”

  Made her? Was she talking about Rhianna? No way was I handing Rhi over to some lunatic vamp. I tried to lunge at her but my paws were suddenly rooted to the grass.

  The vamp leaned toward me and her breath—old blood and something that made my hackles rise even more stiffly—blew across my face.

  “My child. I want the child.”

  Child? Well, I guess Rhianna was a child to a vampire. A growl rumbled through me. “If you’re talking about my friend then sorry, I know both her parents and neither of them is called alpha or omega.”

  “They will be called dead if you cross me.”

  “Try it.” I snapped my teeth, straining forward, though I got nowhere. She danced backward, the skirt of her dress swirling around her. Fabric brushed my mouth and I snapped again, felt teeth engage as the smell of vampire and violets and soap flowed into my nose. A piece of the skirt pulled free and I spat it onto the grass. “Just set one foot across Caldwell’s border—”

  “Give me the child,” she shrieked. Then, as the sound of howls rose again, closer this time, her face suddenly wiped clean of expression. “Last warning, puppy.”

  “Bite me.”

  She smiled, teeth gleaming almost as white as her skin in the moonlight. “Oh, I will. Eventually. The taste of your blood will be sweet.”

  Another snarl boiled out of my throat. “The last vamp who thought that found the price a little too high.”

  “I am not McCallister Tate.”

  “You’re doing a pretty good impression of being as batshit crazy as him.”

  “Do not presume, puppy,” s
he snapped. “I told you last warning.”

  “I heard you the first time.”

  The howls were closer still and she looked behind me at the tree where I’d been standing.

  “I have to go,” she said.

  “Really? So soon? But I wanted you to stay and meet the family.” I bared my teeth at her, wanting to throw my head back and howl like my packmates but still not able to move.

  “You need to learn respect,” she said softly. “Consider this a lesson.”

  Her hand slashed toward me, there was a searing pain in my head and then everything went dark.

  * * *

  I woke to the sensation of something warm and wet brushing the fur on my face. Dan’s scent surrounded me, sharpened by anxiety. I cracked open an eye just as his tongue swiped my face again.

  “Ew,” I thought, protesting. “What are you doing?” I was lying in the clearing, pretty much where I’d been when the vamp had put the whammy on me. I could smell other wolves. Sam and Ani. They stood behind Dan, watching me, ears flicking backward and forward between me and the noise of the pack howling in the distance.

  Dan nosed my ear. “You were unconscious.”

  “And you thought doggy breath would wake me up?” I tried to lift my head and fire shot through my skull. I lay back down.

  “I don’t have doggy breath.” His nose nudged me again, sniffing my fur. “What happened?”

  In truth, he didn’t have doggy breath, he smelled like Dan.

  “Vampire,” I said.

  “I can smell that,” he said impatiently. “What happened to you?”

  “I don’t quite know. One minute she was making threats, the next minute I was knocked out.” I remembered the gunshot. “Is anyone hurt?”

  Ani padded closer. “No. No one.” Anger thrummed though her mental tone. “Apart from the guy with the gun,” she added with vicious satisfaction.

  I decided I didn’t want to know any more about that just at the moment.

  I braced myself and tried lifting my head more slowly. It hurt but not quite as much as my first attempt so I risked rolling to my stomach.

  “I can’t see any wounds,” Dan said. “What did she do to you?”

  “I said I don’t know. She waved her hand then wham.”

  “Someone hit you?”

  “I don’t know.” I snarled then whimpered as my head throbbed a protest. Dan nosed my ear and I closed my eyes and pushed to my feet, swaying a little as the world spun around me.

  Sam moved around to my other side, pressing into me to keep me upright. “Did you recognize her?”

  “Yes. She was the one with that muzzled vamp at Maelstrom.”

  A rumbling growl broke from Dan’s throat. “I knew that suicide was too close for comfort.”

  “Did she say what she wanted?” Ani asked.

  “As far as I could tell through the crazy talk, she wants Rhianna.”

  Dan’s ears went flat. “I don’t think so.”

  “That’s what I told her.” I took a deep breath and caught the lingering smell of violets and vampire. The dress. I looked around me but I couldn’t see anything lying in the grass. “I tore her dress. Can you see a piece anywhere?”

  “No.” The thought came from all three of them.

  Ani twitched her tail. “There was nothing here in the clearing but you. Dan heard you call him and we came pretty fast but it must’ve been at least thirty minutes before we got here. We’ve got people following the scent trail out of here but it will probably dead end at the nearest road.”

  Damn. The fabric might’ve been able to tell us something; might’ve even held a trace of DNA. Now we had yet another mystery. I stifled the whine that rose in my throat.

  Dan’s nose rubbed my cheek again. “So this woman and our suicide vamp are mixed up with Smith?”

  The hairs on my neck rose again at the mention of Smith. “I guess. Rhi was bitten by one of Smith’s vamps and she wanted Rhi.” I looked at the sky, trying to judge the time. The clouds were starting to turn that deep blue predawn shade. “Shouldn’t we head back before sunrise?”

  Sam cocked his head. “Are you up to it?”

  “There isn’t much choice. It’s not like you can piggyback me.” Werewolves are bigger than normal wolves but we still can’t do most things wolves can do. And none of us can change back to human form under a full moon.

  Dan sat. “We can wait. You might feel better if you changed.”

  I shook my head. “I’m not walking miles with no shoes, no hat and, oh yeah, no clothes. Let’s go.”

  * * *

  It was a long and painful trek back. My head pounded with each step and I felt like I hadn’t eaten for days. By the time I limped from the tree line near the Retreat, just as the sun was threatening to break above the horizon, I was ready to drop.

  I reached the cabin Dan and I were using as the moon set and shimmered into human form gratefully. The pain in my head eased but didn’t vanish completely. Which told me whatever had caused it wasn’t completely physical.

  Perfect. Because what I really needed was another vamp with bonus psychic whammy powers pursuing me. I was getting very tired of being chased. Not to mention knocked out.

  Dan left me alone while I showered. When I came out wrapped in my towel, the table was laden with enough food for about five people. Or two hungry werewolves as it turned out.

  We ate in silence, shoveling eggs, bacon, steak and toast down as fast as we could. The food eased my head a little more but pain still niggled, biting hard if I turned my head too fast.

  “What’s wrong?” Dan asked after I’d winced reaching for the platter of bacon.

  “My head hurts.”

  “Since before you changed?” His voice sharpened and I nodded.

  “Because of what that vamp did?”

  I shrugged while I chewed and swallowed. “You’re the expert on supernaturals.”

  Dan pushed back his chair. “We should get you checked out.”

  “I just want to go to sleep,” I said. “I’m tired and I want to get back to Rhi.” I gave him a pleading look. “I promise, if my head still hurts when I wake up, I’ll let the doctors at the base take a look at me.”

  “But she might have—” he broke off as I shot him a look.

  “She knocked me out. She didn’t thrall me. I know what being thralled feels like, remember?” At least I didn’t think she had. She’d made me come to her but she hadn’t controlled me totally.

  Dan’s eyes darkened. “I could hardly forget.”

  I sighed, swigged the last of my orange juice and wiped my mouth. “Let it go. Just for a little while. Please, Dan? I’m going to bed. Are you coming?”

  * * *

  I woke up alone. I vaguely remembered Dan crawling in beside me at some point but he’d obviously left again. The clock on the bedside table told me it was almost midday. Five hours sleep wasn’t exactly enough but it would have to do.

  After my run-in my new least favorite vampire I was uneasy about leaving Rhi alone, even on a heavily guarded military base. Smith seemed to have a long reach and I didn’t want him to get his hands on anybody else I knew. Especially not Rhi.

  By the time I’d taken another shower to wake myself up and made coffee, Dan reappeared. He tucked his cell phone into the pocket of his suit jacket as he joined me near the coffeemaker.

  “News?” I asked.

  “No.” He poured himself a cup. “But I need to check in with the office before we go back to the base. So we’re going to Seattle first.”

  I stiffened. A little consultation might have been nice. “How about you go back to town and I’ll go back to Lyman? Someone here will lend me a car.”

  Dan shook his head. “Marco will watch out for her.”

  “She doesn’t know Marco. And she didn’t really seem that keen on vampires generally. She’s all alone there.”

  “Something she’ll have to get over.”

  I almost choked on my coffee and shot him
a death glare. “Gee, Dan, your empathy is making me cry.”

  “Ash, I know she’s your friend but the sooner Rhi adjusts to reality, the better off she’ll be. You know that.”

  At least he sounded as though he thought she might adjust to reality. I hadn’t told him about Marco’s assessment. It was easier to try and believe Dan was right. “Not everyone can just snap their fingers and be overjoyed their whole life has changed,” I pointed out. “Rhi’s only had a few days. And she’s been unconscious for most of that time.”

  “I know.” He rinsed out his mug and set it on the sink to dry. “But I’m not letting you drive back there alone. Not if Smith and his crazies are planning on making another move. Going back to the city won’t take too long. I’ll see if I can scam a helo to take us back to the base afterward.”

  “You could get someone from the team to escort me.”

  “Ash, they’re all busy right now. Besides, I need you to see if you can ID your vampire from Esteban’s tapes.”

  Right. Busy with what had happened in Caldwell. And here at the Retreat, presumably. “How many dark-haired women leading muzzled vamps do you think were there that night?”

  Dan shrugged. “It’s a dark club. Who the hell knows?”

  He had a point. Besides, if I could ID our lunatic vamp, maybe we’d find her image in one of the criminal databases. Maybe we’d finally have a lead.

  Or maybe not.

  “What if she’s not on the tapes? We need to keep looking for Smith too.” How the hell could we get at Smith? What was the chink in his armor? When in doubt, stick to what you know best. In my case, that’s money. Money equals leverage. “Maybe we should try and encourage him to make a move.”

  We weren’t having much luck tracking Smith down following the paper trail. If we could smoke him out and capture him then we’d solve all our problems. Stop the anti-vaccine. Cure Rhi. Kill Smith and all his cohorts slowly and painfully.

  Dan looked as if he thought I’d gone mad. “That’s a bad idea.”

  “Why? We’re hitting nothing but dead ends.”

  His frown deepened. “I suppose you think you should be the bait?”

  Hardly. I wasn’t planning on putting myself back in the not-so-good doctor’s hands any time soon. But Dan had a point. I was the most obvious thing to use to provoke Smith. Apart from Rhi. And that wasn’t going to happen.