Still barking, Sniper jumped left, then right, distracting the creature.
Cheryl flipped the safety off the revolver and aimed it with one hand, then remembered Tony’s instructions to always hold its butt with both hands.
The wolf entered the apartment and hunched forward, roaring. Sniper dove at the wolf and sank his teeth into Gomez’s throat. The wolf thrashed around, trying to shake Sniper loose.
Cheryl managed to grasp the gun with both hands, supporting Patty between her arms. She aimed at the wolf, but the flurry of motion kept putting Sniper into her line of fire. She didn’t trust herself to hit Gomez in the head. Patty wailed in her ear.
Cheryl fired twice over Gomez’s head, hoping to bring the police inside. The gunfire caused Gomez to flinch, and Cheryl pivoted and ran down the hall toward the bedrooms.
An instant later, Sniper let loose a shrill cry and turned silent.
Thirty-Six
In the dark elevator shaft, Norton stepped back just as the wolf swiped a claw at her face. She didn’t see the move but felt wind on her face. She knew her disadvantage: the wolf could see in the dark, but she could not. She positioned herself behind the cable for protection and reached into her pocket for another ammunition cartridge—her last one.
The alarm stopped ringing, and she heard the wolf step to its right, its claws scratching the top of the elevator. Maybe help had arrived.
Sudden pain flared in her right hand, and she dropped her Glock. She didn’t know if the wolf had bitten her hand or slashed it with a claw. The gun clattered on the edge of the elevator and scraped the wall of the shaft before landing on the basement floor beyond her reach. Instead of the clip, she took out her phone and pointed its glow at the darkness, illuminating the wolf, which roared at her. Blood flowed from a dozen or more wounds in the beast’s hide, slowing it but not stopping it.
The wolf lunged at her, and she jumped to her right. The beast grabbed the cable, almost losing its balance. Norton removed a small canister from her pocket, and when the beast lunged at her again, she discharged a blast of pepper spray into its eyes, eliciting an anguished howl.
The two Wolves on the desks leapt to the floor. One had a bloody face and only one eye. Norton had not backed down from them. They advanced on Mace, accompanied by the third Wolf, which crept forward on all fours. Mace clenched his fists and felt blood flowing through the fingers on his right hand.
“Raphael!”
The Wolves jerked their heads in unison, and Mace looked over his shoulder as Gabriel and Karol entered the squad room.
Thank God, he thought.
The unscathed Wolf stood straight and roared at Gabriel and Karol. The wounded Wolves dropped to all fours and charged. One Eye leapt onto Mace, who fell backward and kicked the beast over his head before it could inflict any damage. The move had worked against Janus Farel, and now it worked again. But he knew it would not work a second time this night.
The second Wolf knocked Karol to the floor, and as they rolled, Karol transformed into a Wolf with her clothes still on.
“Stop it!” Gabriel said. “We have to work together, not against each other.”
Raphael, the unscathed Wolf, tore out of the office.
Gabriel shape-shifted into a Wolf and took off after him.
Karol and the Wolf she fought bared their fangs at each other, and Mace found himself crouching like a football player against One Eye. The beast leapt on him again, and before he knew it he was on his back with the beast on top of him.
Cheryl ran into the bedroom with Patty in one arm and Tony’s revolver in her other hand. She slammed the door shut, pushed the button lock on the doorknob, and set her crying daughter on the bed. She tried to push Tony’s armoire across the room to block the door, but it wouldn’t budge, so she tipped it over instead. The wooden armoire crashed against the door, then fell to the floor with a thundering impact.
The door opened four inches and slammed against the top of the armoire. Cheryl threw herself onto the floor and pushed her back against the wall, bracing her legs against the base of the armoire and forcing it against the door, which closed. Gomez crashed into the other side, and Cheryl clenched her teeth, straining to keep her legs straight. The armoire held the door shut.
A clawed fist burst through a panel in the door.
Cheryl recoiled, but she refused to scream in front of her daughter. “It’s okay, baby. Don’t cry. Mommy’s right here.”
Gomez retracted his hand, and then eight elongated fingers reached through the broken wood and pulled it in opposite directions, making the hole larger. The wolf pressed his face against the door, his eyes on fire.
Cheryl raised the .38 in both hands.
The wolf snapped its jaws at Norton and managed to sink its fangs into her left shoulder, driving her onto her back. She heard and felt her collarbone snap, and she dropped her phone but held on to the pepper spray with all her strength. Warm blood flowed over her neck and left breast.
The wolf raised its head, tearing her flesh and muscles, and her blood spattered her face as she screamed. The monster straddled her, and she rammed her right knee where she estimated his scrotum to be. The wolf howled, an agonized sound that echoed up the shaft.
Ignoring the pain that shot through her left arm, Norton forced her hand into her pocket and took out a lighter. She raised the lighter and sparked it to life with her thumb. A tiny yellow flame burned in the darkness, barely illuminating the wolf as it moved in for the kill, its lips peeled back to reveal fangs jutting out at different angles. With tears filling her eyes, she lined up the pepper spray behind the lighter and triggered a long, steady spray that burst into flame. The fire ignited the pepper spray already on the wolf’s face, and Norton directed the spray at the creature’s torso and sternum.
The wolf howled nonstop, its fur catching fire. It staggered backward and slammed against the cable. Norton stopped spraying and dropped the canister, then rolled over and pushed herself upright against the wall of the elevator shaft. The wolf staggered toward her, the stench of burning fur and flesh turning her stomach, and she moved out of its way. It sank to its knees, then thrashed around, its howls sounding almost human.
Norton grabbed the cable for support and watched the wolf stop moving, the flames consuming its carcass and rising higher.
Gabriel chased Raphael out of the task force headquarters and into the hallway leading to the elevator. Raphael went straight to the stairwell door, threw it open, and charged up the stairs toward the roof. Determined to save his brother, Gabriel scrambled after him.
Karol snapped her jaws at Leon, drawing blood. Leon kicked at her thighs with his hind legs, shredding her slacks. They rolled around on the floor, biting and slashing each other. Then Leon sprang up, looked in the direction Raphael and Gabriel had run, and tore after them.
Karol whipped around on all fours and was about to give chase when she saw Mace struggling with Elias on the floor. Blood flowed from bullet wounds in Elias’s mangled face, and she sensed the Wolf had been blinded. The Wolf lunged at Mace’s face, and Mace twisted his head from side to side, dodging the attacks, and attempted to push the Wolf’s head away with his hands.
Her first loyalty was to Gabriel, the leader of her pack, but she couldn’t leave Mace in such a helpless position. She dove into Elias, knocking him off Mace. They rolled across the floor, and she raked his muzzle with her front claws. Elias roared in anger and took a swipe at her but missed.
Karol ran toward the reception area, then disappeared into the hallway.
Mace grabbed a desk and pulled himself up. He had to find Norton. Bright light filled the windows, accompanied by the steady roar of a chopper outside. Wincing, he glanced at his right hand. The Wolf strike had slashed all four of his fingers, and the gashes revealed bloody bones. He opened and closed his fingers, which felt numb, and wondered if they would ever function again.
He took one step forward and froze: the bloody Wolf that had attacked him padded back into
the squad room and stood erect.
The creature moved straight for him, but its movements seemed tentative, and he wondered if it saw him.
Mace crouched behind the desks where Willy and Karol had sat.
The Wolf snarled at him and flung the first desk aside, flipping it over, then did the same with the second.
Mace fled in the direction of his office and heard the Wolf close on his heels. He didn’t want to end up facedown on the floor, unable to defend himself, so he turned around just as the Wolf crashed into him, knocking him to his office floor.
The Wolf slammed one claw over Mace’s face, breaking his nose, and Mace seized the monster’s wrist with both hands and held it in place, hoping to prevent it from tearing off his face. But the Wolf only wanted to pinpoint his head and throat, and it leaned in for the kill.
Mace released the Wolf’s wrist with one hand and pressed his palm against the creature’s nose, knowing it could bite his hand off at the wrist. Blood from the Wolf’s bad eyes trickled into his face, and he drove his thumb into the beast’s left orb.
The Wolf’s howl was louder than any sound Mace had ever heard a living creature make.
When Karol entered the stairwell, Raphael and Leon had backed Gabriel into the far corner of the landing above. The three Wolves traded barks and snarls, and Gabriel almost seemed to cower.
Karol ran up the stairs and sank her teeth into Leon’s Achilles tendon. Leon howled in pain, and Karol ground her teeth, tasting blood as she severed the tendon. Leon kicked at her with his other hind leg, but Karol refused to release him. Instead, she dragged him back down the stairs, allowing Gabriel and Raphael to settle their differences one-on-one.
With the playing field leveled, Raphael turned and bolted up the stairs, and Gabriel followed.
Cheryl was about to squeeze the trigger on the .38 when she heard excited voices in the living room. Gomez heard them too, and the Wolf turned in that direction.
The police, she thought. Her protection had arrived.
Gunshots rang out, and Gomez roared. A barrage of gunshots followed.
Cheryl’s eyes welled with tears. Thank God.
The gunshots stopped, and the house turned silent except for Patty’s wailing.
Norton backed as far away from the burning carcass as possible to avoid breathing smoke. The flames illuminated the elevator shaft, and she scooped up her phone, which reignited the pain from the lacerations on her trembling fingers. Sinking to her knees, she vomited from the stench.
Then she crawled to a hatch in the elevator’s ceiling and threw it open. The interior of the freight elevator was dark. She slid her legs through the opening and held on with her uninjured hand. Allowing her legs to dangle, she let go and dropped to the floor below. A shock wave of pain radiated through her left shoulder and broken collarbone, and she cried out.
She called Mace, and when he didn’t answer, she tried Landry.
“I’m almost there,” Landry said. “Where the hell are you? What’s happening?”
“I’m in the freight elevator in the basement,” she said, gasping. “I killed one of them. It’s right above me on top of the elevator, and it’s on fire. Get the fire department in here, but make sure they’re protected. There’re three more of them up there somewhere.”
“Are you all right?”
“I’m bleeding bad,” she said.
Then she dropped the phone and closed her eyes.
With her breaths coming in tortured bursts, Cheryl aimed the revolver in both hands. A long moment that felt like forever passed. Then a shadow appeared on the wall visible through the hole in the door. The muscles in her face twitched, and she could not make them stop. The snout and ears of the Wolf appeared, wet with blood, and Gomez turned toward her.
Cheryl looked at Patty. All she wanted to do was hold her crying baby, but she had to protect her. When she looked back at the door, the werewolf’s face filled the hole. Cheryl fired two shots into the Wolf’s skull, and the black shape fell to the floor. She had saved two bullets, one for Patty and one for herself, in case Gomez made it into the bedroom.
The door opened, pushing the armoire aside, and the bloody werewolf rose to his full height.
The Wolf seized Mace’s neck and choked him, a human method of killing. Mace grabbed the beast’s wrists and pulled on them, but he couldn’t wrest them from his throat. The stranglehold cut off Mace’s oxygen supply, and he twisted his hips in a feeble attempt to throw the Wolf off him. He felt tired and old and helpless, and he didn’t believe he could defeat this creature as he had Janus Farel.
His cell phone rang in his pocket, and he wondered if Cheryl was calling him. God, how he loved her. He wished he had quit his damned job and stayed home with her and Patty, experiencing life instead of his own death.
Mace’s head shook, he felt himself turning beet red, and the muscles in his throat locked.
A thrumming filled his head: the sound of his heartbeat. His vision faded, then blossomed, then faded again.
Then he lost consciousness.
Raphael burst onto the roof of the building with Gabriel right behind him. Both Wolves froze: a helicopter hovered above Mott Street, and it swept a spotlight over them, bathing them in white light, the turbulence from its blades blowing their fur.
Landry pulled his SUV up to a blockade at the Mott Street intersection before the block with the task force headquarters. A fire truck idled at the curb, strobe lights flashing.
He lowered his window and showed his ID to the PO who approached him. “I’m assigned to the task force on the fourth floor of that building. Some of my people are inside, and there’s a fire in the elevator shaft in the back of the building. Tell FDNY, and let me the hell in there.”
“Okay, but you’ll have to walk,” the PO said.
Landry shut off his engine and climbed out of the SUV.
“You can’t just leave that vehicle here.”
“Write me a ticket. Is anyone from the FBI here?”
“Not yet but the SWAT team is.”
“I need to speak to whoever’s in charge before anyone goes inside.”
The PO pointed to a SWAT truck parked in the middle of the street. Three men in SWAT uniforms conferred with each other.
Landry rushed over to them. “There are four Class Ls in there.”
“Who are you?” one of the SWAT team members said.
“Landry. I’m with the task force. An FBI agent is trapped in a freight elevator in the rear of the building, and there’s a fire in the shaft. FDNY has to get in there, and they need cover. I need to get my colleague out of that elevator.”
Karol severed Leon’s other Achilles tendon, then climbed on top of him and went for his jugular. She couldn’t take the chance that he wouldn’t reveal the secrets of the pack when captured, and she was willing to break the laws of the pack to protect it. Leon turned and jerked, and Karol ripped his throat out with her teeth, his blood splashing her blouse. Leon’s body quivered and stilled, and Karol felt sick to her stomach.
The sound of the helicopter grew louder, and she forced herself to assume human form.
My shell, she thought.
Every cell in Mace’s body seemed to scream with pain, his survival instincts kicking in as the curtain closed. He felt his heart straining and his blood coursing through his veins. Picturing Cheryl and Patty, Mace opened his eyes. They felt ready to explode from their sockets. The air stung his nostrils like smelling salts. A door in his conscious mind swung open, as if his body had refused to expire and had awakened new senses in him.
The Wolf, still choking him, salivated.
Mace thought he had been losing consciousness—that he had been dying—but that wasn’t the case. His eyesight was just changing, the color draining from what he saw. At the same time, his olfactory senses exploded, and he took in different smells radiating from the Wolf on top of him. The sound of the helicopter outside became deafening. His heart pounded and pulse quickened, and when he thought he
should be dying, he felt stronger than he ever had in his life. The muscles in his body were alive, dancing around his bones. Every nerve in his body tingled, and Mace felt renewed—free. Bones in his body snapped, crackled, and popped, and he unleashed a cathartic cry that became a howl.
The Wolf cocked its head, its nostrils flaring.
Adrenaline rushed through Mace, and he released the Wolf’s wrists and seized its throat instead. His fingers elongated into claws, his flesh darkening as coarse fur sprouted out of the backs of his hands and his wrists. And then his face and skull exploded, and his teeth burst from his gums.
This is insane, he thought. This isn’t happening. It can’t be.
But he didn’t question the change: he embraced it. Angela Domini had once told him that Wolves who had no idea of their true nature existed in human form and often lived their entire lives in ignorance. Gomez had been suspected of being a sleeper until he had discovered the truth; now it was Mace’s turn, and he understood why he had been able to think like Gomez and apprehend him in the first place. The information Angela had provided made him question his own identity and consider the possibility he was more than human. He had never believed that to be the case. Now he set his inner self free, and he felt wild and natural.
Releasing his grip on the Wolf’s throat, he lunged forward and fastened his jaws on it instead. One Eye arched his back and howled, and the howl became a gargling sound. Mace tried to climb out from under his foe, but his legs, which now had extensions, proved awkward to control. Tasting the Wolf’s hot blood, he closed his jaws tighter, then brought his right leg out from under One Eye and set his rear claw on the floor, bracing himself. Then he twisted his head to one side, tearing the beast’s throat out.
The Frenzy Wolves Page 26
