by April Zyon
“Furry in front of civvie and furries two and three about thirty yards out from the south and closing in. They have slowed down and are looking around,” Victor reported. “They may know we’re here. I repeat, they may know we’re here.”
“Wolf, do you have eyes on all three furry targets?” Nolan asked.
“Got them all,” Mikhail reported. “Give me the go, and they’ll all be dead before Gunner even gets to her.”
Gareth snickered and shot a look up toward Mikhail, his best friend. “Cocky much?”
“Nope, that good.” He could practically hear Mikhail smirking over the line.
Mikhail had been lethally phenomenal before their training with the gods. After … well, after, he was a force to be reckoned with.
Gareth grabbed hold of the low wall he had to launch up and over, using it for additional forward momentum, and took a breath. “On my count, Wolf. Ready. Ready. Ready. Three, two, one.” He pushed off with his feet, yanked with his arm, and was over the wall just as the head of the were in front of the school teacher exploded.
As Gareth had known she would, she screamed and jerked back, right to where he wanted her. He heard a second body hit the ground as he got closer. And, just as he scooped her up and over his shoulder, he heard the roar of an angered beast as the third body hit the pavement.
Gareth just kept running. Fortunately, shock held the teacher still, but that would only last so long. “Coming your way, Dragon,” he called to Wyatt. “Is the doorway clear?”
“Copy that, Gunner. I have you in sight and the doorway is clear. Book it,” Wyatt replied.
Gareth gave a thumbs-up when close enough, and Wyatt turned on the engine. He dove through the back of the SUV, protecting the woman’s head as they landed.
And then they were off.
The others of the team would clean up the scene and then filter out of the area to their rendezvous point. Once there, they would hop a plane, do their debriefing, and deal with the civilian.
Lifting his head once the back of the armored vehicle had clicked shut, he stared down into the pale face. “Ms. Berry, I’m Gareth Gruffyd with the United States military. Are you all right, ma’am?”
Chapter Three
To say Camilla was terrified was an understatement. At first, she had thought the men closing on her were in sick and twisted costumed trickery gone bad, but when she heard the growl, she knew. It had been an honest-to-goodness wolf’s growl.
Then she had been waylaid from behind, just after the head of one of the things exploded in front of her, and she’d screamed. Who wouldn’t? Now, an exceptionally hard—and whoa, hot—man asked her if she was all right? She had to have hit her head in the classroom. Crap like this didn’t happen to people, especially not in this dinky little town. The man had red hair and green eyes. He had tattoos at his neck. She was a sucker for a man with tattoos.
“What in the name of God”—she heaved a breath—“was that?” Okay, so she might have sounded a little hysterical, but the fact that she hadn’t screamed the truck down around their ears was a testament to how tight a hold she had on her emotions.
He sighed and looked toward the front of the vehicle. “Civilian safe and we are en route to rendezvous. Gunner and Dragon, off coms.” Pulling the earpiece from his ear, he sat up and off her. “I’ll answer all your questions, ma’am, but I need to know, are you harmed? And if you say you’re all banged up from that three-point jump I just did into the back of the truck, I may just have to roll my eyes.”
“Two points, tops,” came from the front somewhere.
“Easy three,” the man next to her snapped back, but his attention never wavered off her.
“I almost have my head taken off by that. That. That—what in the name of God was that?” She didn’t want to say what she thought it was, because that was simply not possible. Things like shifters simply did not exist. “And you’re worried about your rescue score?” she asked with incredulity.
“No, ma’am, I’m more worried that there is something wrong with you that I don’t know about. So, again, are you injured?” His expression never once changed, and he never looked away from her.
“No.” She had to be dreaming. There was no other option. “I think I’m okay. Who are you again? And thank you. I think I forgot to say that. Thank you for saving me from … what? What did you save me from?”
“Gareth Gruffyd, ma’am,” he said with a nod. “You’re welcome, and that—” he waved, making a face he settled down into a cross-legged position and tipped his head. “Those were weres. Wolves, in this case. Or, as popular media and movies refer to them, werewolves. They really hate that term, by the way, and it’s a damn good way to piss them the hell off.”
“Right.” Typically, she would have told him to seek medical treatment for mental instability, but she had seen it with her own eyes. “How? Why were you there, and how and why did its head blow up? Are they ill or something, and the illness makes their heads explode?” No one’s head just exploded like a rotten melon.
“No, ma’am, they aren’t ill. Our sniper took the head shot to ensure the target was terminated. Same with the other two sneaking up on us from the south. We were there because we’d had reports of were activity in the area. Normally, they aren’t big on coming into towns and cities, but they were coming for you in particular. And no, we don’t know why. Our orders were to get you out of there, and terminate any were that got between you and us.”
“Me?” Camilla knew her voice squeaked, but she couldn’t help it. “What did I do to those, those…” Holy crap, she wouldn’t call them weres, because that made it far too real. “Oh God.” She felt ill. Why her?
“Unknown at this time, ma’am. All we are certain of is that they were targeting you. We will gain more information when we return, I’m sure. But for the mission, all we needed to know was the location, target, and the enemy combatants. You’re safe, and we’ll get you answers as soon as possible. For now.” He reached over, popped a panel open, and tugged out a bottle. “It’s water.”
“Thank you.” Accepting the water, she looked at Gareth and smiled. “Please, call me Camilla. The kids at school call me ma’am, so I would really appreciate it if you didn’t call me that.” He was far too attractive to call her ma’am and have her ego survive intact.
“Yes, ma’am.” He grinned. “Sorry, reflex. Camilla.” He said her name slowly, seemingly savoring it. “You may want to get comfortable. We’ve got an hour drive to our rendezvous, and then we’ll hop on a plane to our base, where we’ll all be debriefed and, hopefully, get you some more answers.”
“A flight?” What the heck had she gotten into? “Where exactly is your base, by the way? How far away are we going?” It wasn’t like she had a life or anything, but she would like to know where they were going. She had her teaching, but it was winter break and that meant she had time to figure things out.
“Sorry, but that information is classified. I could tell you, but then…” He shrugged and grinned at her. “It’s not that far away. Should take about four hours to debrief. Then we’ll need to do risk assessments and figure out if you can return home safely, or if you’ll need to go into protective custody.”
“No,” she said without hesitation. “I might live in a small town in the middle of Texas, but I love where I live and I refuse to give it up. Besides, if these things found me once, they will find me again, right?"”
“Which is why you’d be going into protective custody. It would be somewhere these beasts couldn’t get to you,” he said. “I can’t say more than that, but trust me, there are places that these things just can’t go.”
“I don’t give a flying Fig Newton if God himself stepped forward and told me where to live, I refuse to give up my life. Those kids depend on me.”
“And if you are in class when one of those show up?” he asked, his voice gentle. “What happens then? How are you going to protect all those kids if it gets through you? I’m not saying this to be cr
uel, Camilla. But sometimes you have to do the right thing, even if it’s the last thing you want to do. Just think about it. It may be a total non-issue. I can’t honestly say one way or another now. Just think about what I said and try to relax.”
“Crapballs.” She took a swig of the water. Blast the man for making sense. Narrowing her gaze on him, she muttered, “You are seriously hot, but you make sense when I don’t want you to. You took away my only hope of being able to go back to a normal life.” Ass. But that she left unsaid. Now she simply had to figure out why the heck the wolves wanted her, and how long had there been wolves around? What the freak was going on?
“Of course I make sense. Thank you for the compliment as well,” he said with a grin. “I am sorry that this is messing up your plans for your life. But I’m just the messenger here. No shooting the messenger.”
Oh, she wanted to do something to the messenger, if her wet panties had anything to say about it. Why the hell was she reacting this way, now of all times? She should be screaming her head off and demanding to be taken to the police, instead she was in the back of a truck, letting complete strangers take her God only knew where.
Gareth shifted around and then stretched out in the back, his knees bent slightly to allow for his height. He closed his eyes, crossed his arms over his chest, and let out a breath. For all intents and purposes, he looked like he was going to sleep.
“You are going to sleep?” she asked with a frown. “Should I climb up in the front with…” She looked to the front. “I’m sorry, what’s your name? Diver McGhee here lost his manners and didn’t introduce anyone. I’m Camilla, and you are?”
Gareth’s hand shot out and caught her wrist. He didn’t even open his eyes, she noticed. “Stay back here. The front window isn’t tinted, and we’re not taking any chances that someone spots you. That’s Wyatt doing the driving,” he said. “D, this is Camilla, Camilla, that’s Wyatt.”
Wyatt lifted a hand and wiggled his fingers but didn’t say anything.
“Right, so just what, sit here on the floor?” she snapped, but then sighed. “I’m sorry. You don’t deserve to be treated poorly. I apologize for being mean. It’s just that my whole world has turned on its ear in two seconds flat.”
He cracked open an eye to peer at her. “That was mean?” Snorting, he shook his head and let the eye close again. “Camilla, if that’s mean, you are really going to need to toughen up that hide of yours, or the team will eat you alive. You could lay down. There’s a blanket near your back you can unfold. Always sleep when you can, because you never know when you’ll next get a chance.”
“Right.” Camilla grabbed the blanket. She looked at the floor, then him, then the floor. Shrugging, she decided to hell with it and climbed up on top of him. After covering them both with the blanket, she patted his chest. “Sleep when you can, because you never know when you’ll next get a chance.”
Chapter Four
“Are you going to wake her up?” a voice said.
“Kinda have to, considering where she’s laying,” another voice said. This one came from under her ear.
“Well, wake her up. We have a plane to catch, and the others will be here in three,” the original voice said.
“Yeah, yeah. I just feel bad waking her up. She’s been through hell today, and crashed hard as soon as she laid down.”
“I still can’t believe she just crawled up on top of you and fell asleep. Like you were an air mattress or something.”
“Considering I still have all my gear on, I have no clue how she’s even comfortable,” the voice under her said. “Hell, I’m not comfortable sleeping in all this shit on the best of days, let alone with someone on top of me.”
“Okay, when did you last have someone sleeping on top of you while you were in full tactical gear?” the other voice asked. Then, after a very long pause: “Right, never. Oh, we got dust trails coming our way.”
“Shit,” the voice under her muttered. “Camilla, sweetheart, you need to wake up and move please. I really need to get up and at least pretend to appear professional for a couple of minutes.”
“Shush, you two talk too much.” Camilla grumbled and rubbed her cheek against the stiff vest Gareth wore. “You would be much more comfortable without all the gear, I agree. I think I could sleep a week then.” She was teasing, mostly. Her face was hidden by her hair, a grin on her lips. The corkscrew curls of long red hair had long since given up their bun that she kept them in, and were currently spilled over his arm and shoulder, but she couldn’t seem to find it in her to care.
When he poked her again and asked her to wake up, she sighed. “You two are really killing me here. First you kidnap me—save my rump, whatever you wanna call it. Now you’re waking me up from a perfectly good dream where those dog things don’t exist, and instead you met me with flowers or something crazy like that. Just no apples.” She wrinkled her nose. “I have more apples given to me than an orchard holds, I’m sure.”
“Right, no apples,” he said.
“Gareth, one minute!”
“Shit.” Camilla found herself on her back with Gareth hovering over her. “I really wish we were in a better place to explore this position, without all the clothing, too.” He grinned. “But there’s a potential threat coming up the road, and I really need to have a gun in my hands. Though I will say for the record, I’d much prefer to just hold you.” Gareth winked and rolled off her, then did some kind of a flip out of the van. On his feet, he had a weapon in hand and pointed in front of him in seconds.
“Holy crapballs, do you boys practice that move or what?” She panted. Every inch of the man was hard. Every thick, long, and hard inch of him had clearly been felt by her, too. She should be cowering in fear, but she found herself fanning her face. “Damn.” She didn’t curse often, but this instance called for it.
“Just every other Sunday,” the one Gareth had introduced as Wyatt said. “They’re our trucks,” he added a moment later. Neither man moved, though.
The vehicles they had all previously looked at as possible enemies pulled to a stop and parked. The doors opened and more men in military gear got out, all with their hands out and away from their bodies. Except one. He had his hands on a gun. A really big gun, and he looked like he knew how to use it, too.
“Really, Mikhail? One of these days I’m just going to shoot you when you do that shit,” Gareth said, slipping his weapon back into its holster.
“Try it,” the man with the large gun said. He kept walking right up to them and looked at her with icy blue eyes.
“Oh my gawd,” she whispered, and had to reach out and touch the big man. “How the hell are you so hot? Is it in the water?” Camilla realized what she’d done and said and slapped a hand over her mouth. She needed to restart her brain because it seemed her libido was in control of her mouth. “Sorry, rude of me.” She flushed pink, which she knew with her red hair made her look like a tomato. “So, are you the one who made that head explode?” This man was born and bred to kill, and from the look of him, she was next. “I’m not bitten or whatever they do to make little puppies, so please don’t make my head go splat?”
One of his dark eyebrows went up in an arch as he stared at her. Then he finally blinked and looked to Gareth. “Did she hit her head at any point during your less-than-graceful jump into the vehicle?”
“No!” Gareth said. Then he looked at her and frowned. “At least, I don’t think so.”
The big one grunted and looked at her again. “Yes, I’m the one that blew his brains into the next century. As to the rest, way too much to cover. We need to get in the air,” he said before spinning on a heel and walking to—oh hey, look, a plane.
Gareth held out a hand. “We really do need to clear the area, Camilla. You can keep harassing him on the flight. Which should be fun.” He gave a slight smile.
“Oh good lord, I didn’t hit my head.” Instead of taking Gareth’s hand, she dogged the big guy’s heels. “And you know you could introduce
yourself. Lord, seems I am going to have to instill manners into every one of you.” She turned and cast her gaze about. “That’s right, I’m including all of you in this lesson.” Camilla grabbed Gareth’s hand, pulling him along with her as if she were the one trying to get him on the plane. She followed the massive man with the white blond hair and called out to him, “Hey, big guy who makes people’s brains take a hike, wait up. Short legs here, and I’m so not done with you yet.”
The first snicker behind her had the big guy stopping and turning around slowly. If she’d thought his eyes had been chilly before, they were positively glacial now as he looked at the laughing men. But he didn’t say anything, just spun back around and took the last couple of steps before climbing up into the jet.
“That’s Mikhail,” Gareth told her with a chuckle. “He’s not overly communicative. With words, anyway. But you get to know the little ticks and eyebrow movements pretty quick. Snipers aren’t exactly the most warm and cuddly of folks. Up you go,” he said when they reached the plane’s stairs.
“Right, well, that’s just not going to work. I’m a teacher and I like to be talked to. Not at. Not around, and not down to. I like to be talked to, communicated with.” She enunciated the words and then lost all train of thought when she looked up at the perfect ass of the man that Gareth had called Mikhail. Her mouth went dry, and she stopped dead in her tracks. Holy Mother of God, the man was spectacular. And there went her libido once again. Dammit, she was going to have to pull off her panties and wring them out at this rate.
A hand on her ass got her moving. When Camilla entered the building, she turned to find Gareth grinning at her. He obviously knew why she’d been distracted. “Grab a seat. The ones back where Mikhail is actually recline for better napping,” he said with a wink.
“Right, better napping.” Camilla didn’t hesitate, though. She moved right on back to the large man and plopped her fanny into the seat beside him. Grinning unrepentantly up at him, she said, “Hi. You can’t get rid of me that easily.” Accepting the blanket that one of the men passed her, she only gave him a brief glance. Then she realized only two of the twelve men made her panties go wetter than water. Interesting. “So, have any good stories to tell?” Camilla needed something other than the fact that they were getting ready to fly to focus on.
