Wild Ones

by Cassie Black

  "He hurt you," he said intently. I nodded.

  "I hurt him back," I told him with satisfaction. He looked puzzled.

  "How?"

  "Two hundred milligrams each of ketamine and propofol into a big vessel, possibly his carotid. And I drove over one of his limbs, I think. Might have been his head."

  He looked incredulous for a moment, and then he chuckled.

  "Impressive, my little love. Where is he now?"

  "Well, I left him lying by the side of the road. About twenty miles north of here on highway 22."

  "I need to let Atticus and Julius know. I'll be back in a sec."

  He stepped out as a policeman stepped in. He held a notepad, and l spent the next ten minutes filling him in on everything that had happened. He filled several pages of his notepad. I left out the wolf and vampire bits, of course. I expect he would have written a lot less if I had mentioned those. Maybe just one word. Crazy.

  Eventually he was done with me, and he stepped out too. Then Hugo was back, accompanied by Melissa and a suture tray. They argued briefly about who would do the suturing, but Hugo pulled rank, and rolled up his shirt sleeves. I eyed him suspiciously.

  "If you hurt me, I'll cry," I warned him.

  "You know the local anaesthetic will hurt, love. But after that you will feel no pain at all, just a tugging sensation," he explained with a grin, as if I knew nothing about this procedure at all.

  "I bet you say that to all the girls," I said. He winked at me, and then set about cleaning my wound, and injecting local under the skin. It stung, I'm not going to lie. It stung a lot. But I gritted my teeth and shut my eyes, and eventually the sting was replaced by a soothing numbness. A few minutes and six small neat sutures later, and it was all over. He taped a dressing over the wound and tidied everything away. I watched his face as he worked, taking in the tenseness around his beautiful mouth and the frown that creased his forehead. He looked up at me, catching me staring.

  "We need to get you to the witches," he said. I nodded.

  "Yes," I agreed.

  "Cade and I can take you now. It will take us a couple of hours to get there. We'll stop at your place so you can pack a few things if you want, but then we have to get going. Atticus and Julius are going to need our help to nail the bastard who did this to you."

  "You know who it was?" I asked incredulously.

  "Shh," he whispered, holding his finger to his lips. "I'll explain in the car."

  "OK."

  "You done in here?" Melissa poked her head around the curtain.

  "Yes, thanks. And I'm about to take Olivia home. Would you be able to sort out the paperwork?" he asked her, smiling.

  "Of course," she gushed. "I've told Simon what happened, and he said to take a few days off, Liv. He's found someone to cover you for at least a week. Let Michelle know when you'll be back." Michelle was the woman who created the roster out of dissent and chaos. It was almost magical how she managed it.

  "OK," I smiled gratefully at her, pleased that I wouldn't have to worry about letting my colleagues down. Working in ED was hard enough. Working a shift that was short of even one doctor could be a nightmare. We were that busy.

  "Right," said Hugo, and he bent over and picked me up as if I weighed almost nothing. Melissa pulled the curtain back for him, and he carried me out of there. I felt the curious glances of the staff as we left, but I closed my eyes and ignored it all, wrapping my arms around Hugo's neck, and resting my cheek against his shoulder.

  Part 5

  Cassie

  I

  I watched Leif drive away with his brothers. I had been surprised at how similar they were, apart from the colours of their eyes, until they spoke. Cade was slightly bigger, but much more intimidating. He moved and spoke with an innate reassurance, almost arrogance, and his green eyes held a challenge for anyone who looked into them. Take me on, they said. I will fucking break you.

  Hugo was different. Blue eyes weighed you up, assessing and analysing everything. Leif had told me that he was a surgeon, and I could see that it would be a profession that suited him. He was cleverer and colder than his brothers, but arrogant too, and he moved with easy precision.

  Leif was somehow warmer, but in the presence of his brothers, in the anticipation of the fight ahead, he had hardened, a frown settling on his brow, and an icy focus in his grey eyes. I felt slightly afraid of him then, even though he had shown me nothing but compassion and consideration. But I still felt unimaginably bereft when he was gone, leaving me with a bunch of people I didn't know and nothing but the clothes I wore. Oh well, could have been worse. I could have been with Jack and his lot, wearing no clothes at all.

  I was led into the main house by a young witch called Jess, who seemed to be the complete antithesis of all things witchy. She was young and pretty and painfully cheerful, and chattered excitedly all the way from the front door to a small bedroom on the second floor.

  "Your bedroom," she explained. "There's a bathroom down the passage, and we have a selection of clothes that you can help yourself to. There are a couple of other wild ones here at the moment, and once you've settled in I can take you to the sitting room where they are, and introduce you."

  "Great, thanks." I was absurdly pleased by the offer of fresh clothes, and the bedroom, though simply furnished in pine and calico, looked comfortable enough. I was desperate for a shower and a change of clothes and a toothbrush. The small things in life.

  "Soap, shampoo, toothbrushes, everything you might need will be in the bathroom. Just look in the cupboard under the basin. I'll come back for you in, say, twenty minutes?"

  "That sounds good. Clothes?"

  "This way," she said, and showed me to a bedroom sized cupboard filled with jeans and t-shirts and warm looking jumpers. There were a few drawers filled with underwear, some of it a bit too daring for my fairly conservative tastes. Jess disappeared tactfully, and I selected about a dozen items in my size, and wandered back to my assigned bedroom, where I removed all the labels, and packed some of the clothes into a small wooden chest of drawers. I gathered up a bra, panties, jeans and a t-shirt and went to find the bathroom.

  Twenty minutes later I felt like a new person, and padded down a carpeted passage behind Jess as she led me to a large sitting room near the centre of the house. She paused on the threshold of the room, as if about to perform a momentous ritual, and then she waved me into the room with a flourish. Drama queen, I thought.

  "Ladies," she said annoyingly. "This is Cassie. Cassie was brought here by Leif Grantham. Cassie," she turned to me. "These are, from left, Madeleine Grantham, the Lady Milla Blake, Jenna Blake and Olivia."

  I smiled nervously at the women, who all wore jeans and t-shirts, and occupied a couch and two armchairs. They all stared back at me with friendly expressions.

  "Go away, Jess," the woman sitting second from the left suggested in a soft voice. "And close the door behind you, please."

  Jess bobbed a curtsey, and left.

  "I'm Maddie," said the woman on the far left. She had long dark hair and startling blue eyes, and an attitude. I liked her immediately. "That's a load of crap about my surname being Grantham, by the way. The witches insist on calling me by that name, but Cade is not my mate or husband or whatever these nutjobs want to call him. Pregnancy or no pregnancy." I grinned to myself. This woman was perfect for what I'd seen of Cade. She would take him on. Or not, as she was insisting. I almost felt sorry for him.

  "Millie," said the woman sitting next to her with the same blue eyes and dark hair, but a softer expression. "And this is Jen and Liv. Liv arrived just before you did, and we were about to share some information. You're welcome to join us."

  "Thanks," I said, sitting in an old leather wingback chair opposite them, and waiting expectantly.

  "Right," Millie began. "I'm not sure if you've been told about the wild gene." Nods all around the room. "Well, I discovered I had the wild gene after I was abducted by a couple of vampires and raped by one of them
while the other held me down." She said the words flatly, but I could tell that she was still distressed by what had happened. I wondered if this was going to turn into a weird support group. I glanced at the faces of the other women, and thought that it wouldn't be a bad idea, actually.

  "I found out I was pregnant a couple of days later, and was tattooed with the name of the vampire who had impregnated me. Left wrist, left thigh. And now apparently I belong to him, and cannot be touched by any other vampire or wolf for as long as Atticus is alive. Which sucks in one way, because who wants to be tied to someone who raped you, no matter how careful they were, or how well intentioned. But in most ways it's actually a good thing. The vampire that they're all hunting found me when I went shopping, and he was going to try to abduct me, but unlike Atticus, who tried desperately not to hurt me, this Marcus wanted to rape and kill me. I could see he would get a kick out of something like that. I showed Marcus and his brother the tattoo on my wrist, and they basically crapped their pants and ran. Marcus will be executed simply for touching me." She paused. "Good riddance."

  "I met Marcus too," said Olivia quietly. We waited for her to continue.

  "He stabbed me in the leg and abducted me, and he was going to rape me too. I injected him with a drug we use to anaesthetise patients, and managed to escape. Hugo told Atticus and Julius where I left him, but he wasn't there anymore. I hope they get him soon. He is evil."

  "He would have killed you, Liv," said Millie. "Sex with a vampire is a life-threatening exercise, and if they're not very careful, you'd end up being badly damaged. And if, like Marcus, they're not careful at all, you would die."

  "Yeah," said Maddie, noting our confused expressions. "They have massive dicks with spikes on them. Not for the faint hearted."

  Millie and Jenna nodded emphatically. Olivia paled. Jenna cleared her throat, and spoke then, hesitantly at first.

  "I was almost raped by four of them. Marcus and his three brothers. But Julius and Atticus rescued me by shooting them to pieces. I was surprised they'd survived that, but apparently they heal amazingly well. Millie explained everything to me when they took me back to their place. So I asked if Julius would do the honours for me, and he did, and it wasn't that bad. It was pretty good, actually," she said with a shy smile. "I would have died that day, no doubt about it, but Julius and Atticus rescued me, and now I will hopefully be protected, just like Millie here. I also really like Julius, and my daughter Sophie will have a little brother. I had a husband, but he turned out to be not the nicest man, so no loss there."

  "And you, Cassie?" Maddie directed her question at me. Gosh, what to say.

  "Well, I met Leif when he rescued me from another wolf that wanted to abduct me too." I stopped for a few seconds. "I'm starting to see a theme here."

  "Yeah," said Maddie. "Sucks to have the wild gene."

  "True," I said. "Sucks big time. But we can't change our genetics, and if the way we smell is going to make us a target for every sex starved vampire or wolf, we will always be in terrible danger. So I made the decision to accept what is, and to make the best of a crappy situation. Luckily Leif was the one who rescued me, so the decision wasn't as hard as some of the ones you guys have had to make. But I am safe now, and in a few days, with any luck, I will be out of reach of all but a few nutcases like Marcus, and that is something I can live with. If I have to bear a child for a man I hardly know, then so be it. I will live, and even though I hardly know Leif, I am comfortable enough with that decision. Plus he's seriously hot," I added, trying to inject a touch of flippancy into a sombre conversation. I saw Maddie's eyes narrow.

  "I know what Cade did to you, Maddie," Liv added in her quiet voice. "Hugo told me. But I'm not sure if you know why he did what he did. Apparently he'd been watching you for a while, but was too shy to ask you out."

  "Cade? Shy?" Maddie said incredulously.

  "I know. Sounds bizarre. But there were four wolves hanging around watching you, and Cade took them all on when he heard that they were going to take you. He saved you from that, at least. And apparently there is a code in their pack that says that if a wild one strays onto their land, and the pack leader doesn't claim her that night, and by claim, I mean.."

  "I know what you mean," interjected Maddie wryly.

  "Well, if he didn't claim you, the rest of the pack would have had dibs, and Hugo says they like to share." Maddie paled at that, and looked sick.

  "He did say that he couldn't let the pack have me," she whispered. "I wish he'd bloody explained before..."

  "You know, I told Atticus the same thing," said Millie. "He told me that they didn't think I'd believe them. Well maybe I wouldn't have believed them, but I still think they could have tried to explain."

  "Typical men," said Jen sourly. "If Millie hadn't been there to explain things for me, I would have been in the same boat. I was so grateful to you," she smiled at Millie.

  "Well," I said. "We have an opportunity here."

  "What, to form a special unit that goes around hunting vampires and shapeshifters?" said Millie, grinning. "I hear they're pretty hard to kill."

  "God, no. I met Cade, and he scared the bejeezus out of me. I wouldn't take him on for anything."

  "I'm not scared of him," said Maddie flatly. "He bleeds the same as all men do. I stabbed him in the gut," she explained when she saw my bewildered expression. I grinned widely. Yup, she was perfect for him.

  "The opportunity..." I tried again, and this time they sat silently while I tried to think of a way to explain what I was thinking.

  "Two things. The first is easy enough. We have knowledge that should be available to all wild ones. It shouldn't be hard to do that. I've been meaning to write a book, and this could really make a difference to women like us, women with the wild gene."

  "I see it now," grinned Maddie. "An Idiot's Guide to the Wild Gene."

  "Smartass," Millie told her, chuckling. "It's a damn fine idea, though. But it has to be a book that people would read. Maybe a story. Non-fiction disguised as fiction?"

  "You could tell my story," Liv offered. "But you'd have to change my name and not mention any places that could identify where we live. I'm a doctor, and I really would like to avoid any attention that might affect my professional reputation."

  "OK," I said.

  "You could tell all our stories," suggested Millie. "We have a couple of days together while our men are chasing that freak."

  "OK," I said again, pleased and stunned that they had accepted the idea so easily. I had been worried that they would laugh it off, but apparently they also saw the value in it.

  "The second thing," I started slightly more hesitantly than before.

  "Spit it out, Cass" said Maddie teasingly.

  " We could change things. Together we could make them change their goddamn precious Law so wild ones would be protected from the kinds of abuses some of us have had to endure." I stopped and looked around the room, expecting incredulity. But they were nodding.

  "I would make Cade change the rules governing his pack. The would be no more fucking sharing," Maddie's expression was resolute. "If he wants me, he's going to have to make a bloody big effort." She glanced at Millie who sat next to her, open mouthed in amazement at her statement. "I can't stay here forever. I'm bored shitless, and there's something wrong with these witches. I don't trust them."

  "I know what you mean," said Liv. "They seemed very keen to know if I was pregnant yet. One of them, Meredith I think her name was, suggested that she could knew of another wolf looking for a mate. I told her no, but she said we'd have to wait and see, and there was a twenty percent chance it didn't take, whatever that means. She creeps me out."

  "Also," added Maddie. "I think Millie is secretly a bit in love with Atticus, and I would not be surprised if she abandoned me here." She softened her words with a big grin. Millie blushed, but admitted nothing.

  "It's really hard not to like them," I said, the voice of reason. "They look so good and they have so much, er,
talent. And if they weren't such a bunch of dicks about this, if they actually asked first, they'd be impossible to resist. They need to be told."

  "Let's do this then," said Maggie with a wolfish grin. I thought of the child in her belly, the combination of her and Cade, and decided, no matter what, I would make sure to be his favourite aunt. Self preservation, see.

  "I need a laptop."

  II

  Millie managed to persuade the witches to give me an old laptop that was gathering dust in one of the many storage barns that littered the extensive acreage surrounding the alleged sanctuary. I think she actually ordered them to do it. She seemed to be getting used to being the wife of a powerful vampire. I was just pleased with my score - it was a lot bigger and newer than the one I'd left in that cabin in the woods.

  I fired it up and sat in that sitting room, listening to their stories. Some of them were excruciatingly hard to hear. Maddie and Millie sat together, cousins, but in a far more real sense, sisters too, and best friends. Their stories were the hardest of all. I made frantic notes during these sessions, and sat into the early hours of the morning, typing and remembering the expressions on their faces as they had spoken the words that appeared in black and white on my screen.

  The sessions became a kind of therapy for all of us, and at the end of five days we had formed a bond beyond anything I could ever have imagined. We were all determined to make the best of the situations we had been catapulted into. Even Maddie seemed to be looking forward to Cade returning. Probably so she could yell at him, and boss him about, but it was progress of a sort.

  Liv and I had been approached by that bitch Meredith again. She mentioned other options available to us, and suggested we keep our minds open just in case. I spoke to Lucy about it and she investigated, and found out that two of the witches, Meredith and Kerri, had been approached by a couple of paranormals, and had been offered obscene amounts of money to get us to agree to meet them someplace out there. Who knows what would happen after that. I asked Lucy what she was going to do about it, and she grinned evilly, and said she'd told them she would discuss the matter with Cade. Apparently Meredith and Kerri had disappeared after that.