Wolf Hunter

by Linda Thomas-Sundstrom

  “So what’s stopping you?” he said, shoving himself upright. “Bring it on.”

  * * *

  Abby had no idea where these Weres were taking her, though the direction was north. The only things bordering the park on the northern side were Cuban-generated businesses and rows of supermarket warehouses. Beyond those things lay a stretch of suburban homes considered by many people to be on the wrong side of the tracks.

  She began to get worried. Heck, she’d been worried from the get-go. The image of the way Sam had raised the rifle and aimed it at her heart played over and over in her mind. The words he’d used weighed heavily.

  Just like her.

  Right that moment, she understood his dilemma. She had claws.

  But what about being his daughter? Did that count for so little?

  Her mind flashed on who the two wolves guiding her through the night might be. Nice guys? Rescue mission? She hoped for both of those things, and that Cameron sent them.

  Her arm still hurt, but the muscle around it had gone numb. The unwieldy claws she wasn’t used to hadn’t disappeared, and scratched at her thighs as she ran. Each new scratch made the two werewolves beside her growl, as if the scent of her blood incited them in some way that harkened back to wilder times than these, when the blood lure was upon them.

  But really...no way could she imagine wilder times.

  Unfolding events were nerve-racking, and yet she was alive, and according to the female wolf she’d met earlier, Cameron was alive, too. That’s all that mattered at the moment. She had to hang on to the fact that someone waited for her, wanted her, called to her, in a world that had grown increasingly cold and lonely and dangerous.

  It was too late to go back.

  The wolves beside her had incredible strength and speed, contained enough to keep her alongside. When the warehouses came into view, they slowed, circled east and bounded through a series of dark, unpopulated streets and alleys where only people with nefarious businesses dared to show themselves after midnight.

  No one saw them. At least, she didn’t think so.

  “Cameron,” Abby whispered so the sound wouldn’t echo off the walls of the warehouses, sending her thoughts along the connection binding them. “Cameron, can you hear me?”

  They passed the buildings at light speed. The wolves didn’t shift back and forth as they raced in and out of the shadows and the moonlight, proving they had some control over their shapes. Abby kept a tight hold herself, realizing she might slip further from humanness the longer she remained in the presence of these wolves.

  Hindsight couldn’t be avoided. She knew now, from the sensations flowing through her, that wolfishness had been coming on for some time. Capping this were her empathetic reactions to Cameron’s shape-shift that had left her shaken and weak.

  Possibly that event had kicked off the actual physical changes leading to the appearance of her claws. A case of wolf by osmosis, maybe, or by association.

  The farther they got from the park, the sicker she felt. There was too much moonlight, and too much wolf to avoid the pain of the claws. Again Sam’s words came to the fore, as if he had just spoken them. Just like her.

  Her...

  He had been speaking about her mother—meaning that her mother must also have been rebellious or immune to Sam’s continuous demands. Maybe Sam had been a hunter back then, too, and her mother had disapproved.

  How was she going to find any of this out now, when it was obvious she couldn’t go home?

  They entered suburban territory before her wolf guides finally slowed. Neither of these wolves breathed hard, though she had to struggle. They pulled up by the side of a small duplex with a stone fence, and went right up to the door. One of them put a muscled shoulder to the wood, and the door opened wide enough to show a dark room beyond.

  She did not want to go in there. But both wolves waited beside the door until she did.

  Chapter 20

  Cameron huffed as he joined Delmonico on top of the wall. He watched her traverse the narrow ledge with a grace more indicative of a cat than a wolf. Her fur raised and rippled in the moonlight with her excitement. Blood had been spilled in the park beyond the safety of the Landau estate. Wolf blood. Delmonico smelled it, just as he did.

  His shift continued in earnest.

  Excruciating pain arrived in seconds. The sounds he made were blasphemous. Pondering how many times his body might be able to take this kind of torture, Cameron completed his transformation crouched on one knee.

  Delmonico waited patiently. When he finally stood, she nodded her head and preceded him to the ground in an area he hadn’t explored on what had to be the northern side of parkland. Delmonico didn’t stop to show him a map or acknowledge the grunts of leftover pain he coughed up. She started out at a lope on well-honed legs conditioned to chase after things, assuming he’d keep up.

  Damn if he wouldn’t.

  They moved in and out of the trees on the park’s periphery. The hour had to be late. Few cars passed by on the road beyond their sightlines. Residents of this section of the city had long since tucked themselves in.

  And then, before he knew it, they were out of the park, sprinting along white lines in the center of the road. Not long after that, Cameron began to recognize things. When his internal GPS placed him on the outskirts of his own neighborhood, his mind cleared despite the awful lingering sharpness of the pain radiating from behind the gauze taped to his chest.

  His block. His street.

  He glanced at Delmonico questioningly, but she kept running, right past his fence and up the steps of his front porch.

  Cameron had scented wolf presence from halfway around the block. Dead center in the tangle of those smells laid the heady fragrance he had been searching for. Abby’s lush scent mingled with the metallic tang of werewolf blood.

  Abby was here.

  He blew through the wolves manning the door, and into his living room, skidding to a stop on the polished wood floor. Excitement kept his wolf front and center until he beheld the familiar stubborn look of defiance on Abby’s beautiful face.

  Cameron waited for her invitation to approach. I’m here, Abby. You’re all right?

  She didn’t reach for the knife strapped to her leg, and reluctantly met his eyes.

  There it was: the snap of the meeting of their souls. The bond that tied them together with an undeniably intimate connection. Nothing else mattered—not his lousy condition, the presence of his wolf or the fact that others might be observing this reunion. He wanted to touch her, and didn’t dare. Not yet.

  When Abby finally spoke, her voice broke. “Sam tried to kill me.”

  Cameron continued to stare at her without being able to console. Touching her when looking the way he did might be another kind of blasphemy, and scare her to death.

  She looked so damn hurt.

  Closing his eyes, building a wall against the level of the pain sure to come, he began his shift reversal by willing his wolfishness inward. The power of his need to hold Abby, to be with Abby, drove his rugged exterior back to a more manageable shape. It wasn’t easy. Not even close. But the wolf eventually drew back to expose a human configuration.

  Crushing blows of pain hit him, returning from wherever the pain had been hiding with the wolf in charge. He immediately wanted to wolf-up again in order to withstand this kind of trauma, but held out against it. When he opened his eyes, he reached for her with smooth human hands.

  Abby took a step back.

  “It’s what we are,” he said, ignoring the quakes that still rocked him. “You and me, Abby. However it happened, and whatever comes next, we can face this. We have to. And we’re not alone.”

  She looked tired, frail, gaunt, and no wonder. Sam had tried to kill her? Was it even possible to wish harm upon a beautiful soul like hers?

  “I had no idea it was this bad,” he said.

  Abby’s gaze dropped to his chest, to the bandage above his heart. She came forward tentatively, an
d rested her fingers lightly on his chest. “How badly does it hurt?”

  “I don’t think I’ll be liking silver anytime soon, or any other kind of flying bullets. I must have missed the class on ducking to avoid this kind of thing.”

  Abby’s fingers presented no painful pressure. She spoke in a low voice. “They think silver is effective because it’s like moonlight molded into metallic form. They believe that a substance mirroring moonlight injected deep into Were tissues can explode a wolf from the inside out, as if it’s too much of a good thing. I never understood that. If it’s like moonlight, which can heal as easily as it can transform, surely that’s a good thing?”

  “Or not,” Delmonico said from the hallway, where she leaned against the wall with her arms crossed, naked as a jaybird and not the least bit self-conscious.

  Abby’s attention transferred to Dana. “I met you in the park.”

  “You did.”

  “You helped Cameron.”

  “The guys by the front door are responsible for that.”

  Abby looked to the door, then again at the bandage on Cameron’s chest. “Silver is supposed to kill Weres when nothing else can.”

  “I’m not sure what it does exactly, or why,” he said. “But it hurts like hell. I was damn lucky to have had experienced help on the spot. Whatever they did was its own form of supernatural.”

  Abby looked up at him from beneath long lashes in a way that gave him a thrill. “I can’t go home,” she said.

  “You’ll stay here.”

  “Sam will find us.”

  “He’d have one hell of a time trying.”

  “I can’t stay.”

  Cameron waited for her to explain herself.

  “I have to do something about them,” she finally said.

  “Them, Abby?”

  “The hunters. Sam’s hunters.”

  She faced Delmonico. “They think you’re all monsters. They will never give up what they do out there. They will never stop.”

  “We know that,” Delmonico said.

  Abby rushed on. “Now that you know who they are and where they are, what will be done?”

  “That’s not up to me personally. Neither is it up to Mitchell.”

  “You don’t want to stop them?”

  “Didn’t you want that? You scouted for them,” Delmonico calmly tossed back.

  “Always,” Abby said. “I always wanted the violence to cease. But there are monsters, and they’re killing innocent people. Sam’s arguments were believable.”

  “And now?” Delmonico pressed.

  “Now you’re...” Abby didn’t finish the statement, probably, Cameron supposed, because she didn’t know how to. She had no idea how to process events that had unfolded so quickly in the span of a mere forty-eight hours.

  When she found her voice again, Abby said sadly, “They will continue to go after Weres, good or bad.”

  Cameron said, “We can try to keep all the good guys away until we have a case to build against your father for something people actually know about. You do see the problem, Abby? Who believes in werewolves?”

  Abby shifted her focus again to Cameron. “You patrol the park for that reason, to keep bad wolves in line?”

  “Hell,” he returned, running his fingers over his face to try to ease the ache inside his cheekbones. “I didn’t know there were any good guys.”

  Abby shook her head. “Neither does Sam.”

  “What if he did?” Cameron asked. “Would it change anything?”

  Abby had no answer for that question.

  “How’s the bar business? Prosperous enough that your father wouldn’t miss the money from a pelt or two?” Delmonico asked.

  Deathly pale now, Abby closed her eyes.

  “Maybe it’s more that hunting is a sport?” Delmonico pressed.

  “Power,” Abby said with her eyes still shut. “It’s about power, and who wields it.”

  “Guns kind of mess that theory up,” Cameron said. “As far as hunting goes.”

  “So do men who can change into beasts and purposefully sever a human artery with one swipe of a claw,” Abby said. “Beasts that can change a person’s DNA by passing along a contagion that either kills or transforms.”

  The room fell silent for several seconds.

  “There are bad guys in every corner of the planet,” Delmonico finally said as she pushed off the wall. “Which is why some of us are in law enforcement, and also why we’re having this conversation. Everyone here knows the kind of damage a bite or claw can inflict, and has vowed to prevent that whenever possible. Weres hate the ease with which a bad batch of virus can be passed along from one being to another as much as Sam Stark does. The true Lycans among us dread that contagion even more.”

  “Lycans?” Abby repeated.

  Cameron might have been imagining it, but thought he saw interest cross Abby’s peaked face.

  Wilson entered the room before Delmonico addressed Abby’s remark. Thankfully, Wilson wore pants. “You know,” he said, “that’s five more sentences than I’ve heard Dana say in as many months.”

  Abby stared at the newcomer.

  Cameron spoke up. “Abby, meet Matt Wilson, werewolf detective with the Miami PD.”

  “Oh,” she whispered, taking this in and swaying slightly. “I’ve ruined your coat.”

  “And your arm along with it,” Wilson noted. “Shall we have a look at that cut?”

  “It’s not deep.”

  “Yet I can smell the silver in it from here.” Wilson nodded to Cameron, asking for permission to close the distance. “Dylan, are you there?” he called over his shoulder.

  Delmonico stepped forward. “Maybe it’s not a good idea to expose Dylan right now, too.”

  “She’s not going anywhere,” Wilson said. “Are you, Miss Stark?”

  “Actually, she probably is,” the man with the blond hair corrected from the doorway. “Miss Stark might need some space when she hears a few things that her father neglected to tell her. When that’s in the open, she can decide what she wants to do.”

  Dylan Landau turned his light eyes on Abby. “Isn’t that right, Abby? You need to understand what’s going on?”

  She took Cameron completely by surprise when, instead of answering Dylan’s question, Abby turned and fell into Cameron’s open arms.

  * * *

  Abby refused to turn her head. Although Cameron’s chest was partially covered in gauze, his skin felt as warm as she remembered, and she desperately needed warmth.

  Careful not to disturb his wound or cause him more discomfort than she’d already seen etched in the lines on his face, she kept her cheek pressed to him, comforted by the sound of Cameron’s heartbeat. The rest of the Weres gathered in the room allowed her some time without speaking, and for a while she enjoyed a false sense of being at peace. But that peace came with a hefty price tag soon to be exacted.

  Cameron spoke first. “Lycan. Can someone please explain what that word actually means?”

  Abby dreaded whatever the explanation would be.

  Dylan Landau said, “Lycan is a term for being born Were, with no artificial injection of the wolf virus.”

  “Born, as in from birth?”

  “From two pure-blooded parents,” Dylan said.

  “Are you one of those, Dylan?”

  “I am, yes.”

  Lycan. Pureblood. Rare. Fifty thousand bucks per pelt. Those facts rushed through Abby’s mind with the force of Sam’s voice behind them.

  “Are any of the rest of you Lycans?” Cameron asked.

  “No,” Wilson replied. “Dana and I were bitten, just as you were. We’re relatively new to this side of things.”

  “Does that make a difference in the Were world? Being bitten versus being born a Lycan?”

  “Oh yes,” Wilson said.

  “How?”

  “Abilities. Senses. Reactions. Strength. The ease with which problems are dealt with. An internal encoding process and the proper system f
or passing the original genes along to family.”

  Abby made herself look at Dylan. The handsome being standing in front of her was the elusive catch that Sam had always hoped to find. He was a myth. One in a million.

  Her stomach clenched. She swallowed a groan, lifted her head and said, “I might have been bitten when I was young, but can’t recall the incident. Wouldn’t I have changed before now if that was the case?”

  Dylan nodded. “You would have changed with the first full moon after the virus had been introduced to your system. Moonlight at full strength is the catalyst that kicks the wolf into full bloom for all of us.”

  “For all Weres, yourself included?”

  Dylan nodded. “Lycans can decide when to shape-shift after the initial wiring phase is over. After the first moon, most of us can change without moonlight.”

  Abby took this in. “You mentioned wiring.”

  “That first phase comes upon us at different times,” Dylan said. “Some Lycans shift early, at puberty. Some of us take longer. We have no say in the matter of timing, but the end result is inevitable.”

  Abby felt like laughing hysterically. All this time, Sam had watched and waited through full moon after full moon, year after year, for a pure-blooded werewolf to show up, when Lycans possessed the ability to shape-shift without the moon. It was irony strong enough to kick Sam Stark in the groin. It was the reason Lycan pelts fetched astronomical prices. With the ability to shift at will, catching one off-guard would be tough. Maybe impossible.

  She had been in the dark about so many things, and she hadn’t been the only one.

  She spoke again to Dylan. “So the fact that I haven’t changed means...what? That I didn’t have enough wolf virus inside me to process a full change in shape, yet enough to give me claws and an innate awareness of other Weres around me?”

  Her heart began to pick up its pace in anticipation of more dreadful news soon to be delivered. The room seemed suddenly airless and way too small to contain both her new knowledge and her growing anxiousness. The walls closed in, as did Cameron’s strong arms.

  Dylan’s voice remained calm. He said simply, and in the manner of having explained this to more than one person in his lifetime, “Your symptoms indicate that you are coming of age, Abby. A late bloomer isn’t completely rare or all that unheard of. Maybe because of your circumstances and your fear of being the very thing you are, your body has held off on presenting your wolf to the world.”