Desert Wolf

by Linda Thomas-Sundstrom

  Utilizing those resources, Paxton ran. Her nerve endings sparked, squeezed by muscle that seemed to have been replaced by thin sheets of steel. Her hair, longer, darker in color than usual, flew in her face as she moved.

  She didn’t dare look at her hands.

  The pain of her shape-shift hadn’t disappeared. Her head ached. So did her chest. Both legs burned like they had been dowsed in fire, and all ten fingers stung. In spite of that, Paxton kept moving, desperate to find Grant, the creature who held all the answers she needed now, more than ever.

  When she detected him some way ahead of her—a wavering mirage of joining senses—she saw that Grant repeatedly looked over his shoulder, toward Desperado. Toward her. Her mind told her that he was keen on getting back to her and that he had feared she would come after him.

  How right he was.

  Their astoundingly intimate connection was a heady reminder of the moments they had shared in the bunkhouse. Their insatiable passion for each other hadn’t been tapped out by multiple explosive orgasms, but strengthened by the keenness of their fervor.

  She still felt him inside her, penetrating deep, sending her soul to new heights. And in the process, he had unleashed a wolf. Her wolf.

  Werewolf.

  She felt feverish, new, different…and also the same. She felt stronger, fierce, feral and angry. Hell, yes, she was furious over being caught up in someone else’s nightmare. Grant’s nightmare. Because it was obvious Grant had instigated all of this.

  Running churned up clouds of dust that got stuck in her mouth. Leftover desert heat brought moisture that dripped like falling tears down her cheeks. She was fast now, incredibly fleet as she covered ground on two long legs like a heat-seeking missile. Possibly all she had to do was call to Grant with her mind and he would hear her.

  She didn’t make that call.

  He was on a mission, and she wanted to know what and who the beast was as much as Grant did. She didn’t want to meet that beast again, but being left alone with a bunch of strangers in the ghost town she had once considered to be her safe haven wasn’t a comforting thought, either. Neither was staying in this new shape for much longer.

  This could be a dream.

  In a dream, she’d be free to experience all that life had to offer without repercussions. She could again run without fear of being found by her father’s minions. No longer a kid, she got to decide how she spent her time and who she climbed into bed with, even if that person wasn’t actually human.

  “Grant.”

  The thought slipped into existence before Paxton could withdraw it, and the red mirage in the distance halted as if Grant Wade had run into a solid brick wall.

  *

  Some said that curiosity killed the cat, and that, Grant thought, might be expanded to include she-wolves too suspicious for their own good.

  Paxton on the loose was adding significantly to the problems at hand, and he couldn’t leave her on her own out here with a rogue Lycan on the loose. Taking her along on his search could lead her directly into harm’s way.

  Paxton’s imminent arrival also put him at odds with his vow to figure things out, and no muttered curse he could think of was good enough to describe how he felt about being at this crossroads.

  He turned toward her without backtracking. They were less than a half mile from Desperado’s gates, following the dry, sandy wash that ran east to west toward the outskirts of the city. Cactus silhouettes stood like prickly soldiers on all sides of him. All but the rim of the moon had sunk behind the mountain range. Daybreak wasn’t too far off. In the time between now and then, the night could potentially hold more surprises.

  “Okay, Paxton. All right.”

  She was going to be burning with anger. He had put her in the cage, and that hadn’t worked for either of them. Making love to her might have helped to catapult her wolf into existence, but couldn’t have been helped, given their attraction to each other.

  “In my defense, I couldn’t help myself. You are so very alluring. How was I supposed to resist?”

  “Wait,” she sent back. “The others don’t understand. Can’t possibly understand.”

  Grant knew what she was saying. Paxton’s past had been tied up with Desperado in ways she had never guessed, and in a few hours she had learned a lot. More than anyone would have cared to learn. She might now know firsthand about the existence of werewolves, yet had only an inkling about what was going on. And he was no better at piecing together this puzzle.

  The intelligent rogue’s warnings had been steeped in mystery, and he was here somewhere. Grant could feel him. Paxton had fled Desperado hoping to find answers of her own without realizing she might be doing exactly what that rogue wanted.

  They were treading on treacherous ground.

  Life was about to get real.

  She ran toward him, easily covering the distance, already at one with her new physical form. Confusion ruled her thoughts and emotions, though. He was her focus. If she assumed he could offer her complete enlightenment, she’d be grossly mistaken.

  Paxton was also counting on this being a dream. The kind of dream where anything goes. He wished that was true and that they would all wake up.

  Appearing suddenly, as beautiful as anything he could have imagined, she stopped inches from him. Minus the ability to speak, she slapped him hard on his wolfish face.

  Lord help him. In spite of everything, Grant smiled. Ignoring for the moment the night and all its wicked possibilities, he pulled her close to him with a slight tug on one arm.

  Paxton shoved him back, then again stepped close. With her chest still covered only by a useless scrap of lace, her heat scorched his bare chest. She looked up with gleaming golden eyes.

  “Wolf to wolf, at last, and no time to finish this, little wolf,” he said, encircling her with his arms while damning himself for each second stolen from his reason for being out here.

  Standing there, wrapped up in each other, craving each other, they were sitting ducks ripe for plucking. He had never been so lax in regard to issues of safety. And yet, having this she-wolf in his arms and her eyes trained on him were all the proof he needed that they would find no way to outdistance their affections. Paxton would stay in Arizona with him…if they lived long enough.

  Now, his body shuddered with a desire for her that he could not express or act on until they were safe and Paxton fully comprehended her new reality.

  Her eyes were changing color from amber to gold and back as her desires melded with his. She had temporarily forgotten what shape she was in, with her wolf ruling her emotions. Her wolf sensed kinship, sought her mate, craved contact. That was the way of the wolf.

  “Must get you back,” he sent.

  “No,” she responded. “Tell me how this is possible.”

  “There’s no time to explain,” Grant replied. “We’re too far out here, and I have met the rogue.”

  “Show me how to change back.”

  “Not yet. Not here. I’ll help once you’re safe. We’re faster like this. Stronger.”

  She tensed. “We’re not alone.”

  She was right.

  A new scent reached Grant that was foul, fetid and reminiscent of a decomposing animal carcass. Sounds disturbed the quiet, odd noises of something skimming the ground.

  Grant’s heart began to race as he took Paxton’s hand, whirled and encouraged her to run. The rogue had warned of trouble coming. Grant hadn’t considered that the Lycan might have been hinting of a return visit to finish what he had started.

  That rogue might have seen Paxton all wolfed up, and was coming back for her.

  With Paxton in tow and a hold on her hand that would have broken bones if she had been in human form, Grant aimed for Desperado’s gates. Jolts of electricity sparked through him each time he glanced at Paxton. He reaffirmed his vow that nothing would happen to her on his watch.

  But tables had turned, and the hunters were being hunted. Alone, he would have waited for whatever kin
d of creature was going to show up. But he wasn’t alone.

  Flapping sounds, the kind giant birds made, reached him. No clear picture formed in his mind as to what he and Paxton were running from. Although Lycans possessed a lot of talents and special abilities, flight wasn’t one of them.

  The strange sounds came from several directions, too many for this to be any one person, creature, abomination. Maybe that Lycan actually had accomplices. They could have been waiting for the bastard’s signal to attack.

  Negating that was the fact that there was no scent of wolf in the air. With more than one Were on the loose, Grant would have read the signs. This scent was new and uncategorized in his databanks, suggesting that after all this time, a new species might have turned up.

  Old enemies, the rogue had warned.

  For the life of him, Grant didn’t know what that meant.

  He and Paxton ran like the wind, utilizing the reflexes handed down by their ancient ancestors. Paxton kept up as if she had been born to race, all balance and grace now. They reached Desperado’s gates in minutes. Ben and his companions came to meet them.

  Grant began his reverse shift as he and Paxton slid to a stop, shaking off the discomfort of realigning bones that had grown worse in the last few hours and now plagued him no matter what shape he took. This reversal left him sweating and out of breath.

  “Don’t know what’s out there,” he said to Ben. “Can’t tell what it is.”

  “The Lycan?” Ben asked, anxiously scanning the desert.

  “That bastard is as intelligent as he is wily. But he’s not alone. Something else is haunting the desert tonight. The Lycan warned me about it.”

  Ben continued to search the area. “If you don’t think this is him, do you have any ideas about who is out there?”

  Grant shook his head. Paxton’s clawed fingers slipped from his and everyone’s attention turned to her, sensing the she-wolf had something to say.

  “Not wolf,” she sent to him, frustrated with her inability to speak those words out loud.

  “What else is there?” Ben was quick to ask.

  Grant waited to see if Paxton, so new at this werewolf gig, had the answer to that question when he didn’t have a clue.

  “Dead,” she said.

  Red-hot bolts of nerve fire roared through Grant, knocking on his skull, vibrating his ribs, as Paxton repeated the word.

  “Dead.”

  Any queries he had about that remark had to be postponed. Paxton had begun her reversal and sank to her knees in the sand.

  Chapter 26

  Dead.

  According to Paxton, the thing or things out there were dead. Grant would have worried about her mental state if it hadn’t been for the look of abject horror on her face, added to the rogue Lycan’s power of suggestion.

  The words old enemies bothered him. And anyhow, he couldn’t figure out how Paxton might know things he didn’t or how she had come up with a word that united the sounds and smells pervading the night so eerily.

  Paxton couldn’t say more. Reversals were new to her system and this one was taking longer. Doubled over, she sucked in breath after breath of air as if each of those breaths might be her last. In this state, she wouldn’t have heard his assurances that she would be all right.

  He wasn’t sure what dead meant in this case. Maybe Paxton had come up with the word because the scent of blood had intensified. The flapping sounds had vanished, and yet the air around them seemed heavier, as if the area had become crowded with things none of them could see.

  This was downright spooky. Grant’s skin prickled with warnings to get out of there fast. Tucking an arm around Paxton’s waist, he hauled her up and stood her on her feet. Supporting her with his body, he pressed the hair back from her face and cupped her chin with his palm.

  “Can you run?”

  Golden lashes fluttered over closed eyes when he spoke to her. Paxton’s face had regained its human characteristics and worrisome lack of color. Spine bones popped and snapped as each of her vertebrae found its groove, most of those sounds bringing a groan.

  As he waited for her to acknowledge him, the wind picked up, blowing sand in their faces. Enough of his senses were working to tell him this wasn’t good. With an arm protectively around Paxton, ashen-faced and weak from her recent ordeal, Grant whirled to face the expanse of darkened desert beyond the gates. Ben and the other two packmates joined him, wielding clubs that resembled baseball bats.

  What was out there?

  He kept his attention on Paxton’s white face. “What do you mean by dead?”

  In answer to that question, a deep, familiar, unwelcome voice filled Grant’s mind. “The dead rise again,” the rogue Lycan warned, his voice an unwelcome whisper, as if the bastard stood right next to Grant, understanding everything that was going on by the gates.

  Grant felt the blood drain from his face. Paxton had heard that warning also. He had to pull her tightly to him to strengthen his support. As the Lycan’s voice in his mind retreated, Grant’s brain shuffled random details into a pattern he hoped to be able to access.

  Blood.

  Slaughtered animals.

  Human bones in a cave, scratched by tooth marks Ben couldn’t identify.

  Words the rogue had spoken earlier that night came back to him: What’s coming is the worst thing you can imagine. Maybe even worse than that.

  And finally, The dead rise again.

  With a snap of insight, centuries of data began to add up, and the image that data presented made Grant blanch. “We have to get the hell out of the open,” he said. “Right now.”

  “What?” Ben asked nervously. “What is it?”

  When Grant could speak again, he turned to Ben. In a harsh, gravelly voice, he said the word that would have made anyone who heard it wish they never had.

  “Vampires.”

  *

  Paxton’s ears rang with the word Grant had spoken.

  There wasn’t one place on her body that wasn’t plagued by pain, and on top of the skin-tearing horror of her own shape-shift, a new terror had been introduced.

  “Vampire,” Ben said. “You’ve got to be kidding.” His expression conveyed that he was waiting for Grant to renege on that statement.

  It was a ghastly idea but, given that werewolves were real, why not fang-bearing dead people who drank blood?

  Grant hustled her through Desperado’s gates with an arm still wrapped around her. “No dream,” he said.

  “Should I wait?” Ben shouted after them. “Shouldn’t someone wait to see if it’s true?”

  “Hell, no,” Grant replied sharply. “Come in. Get them all inside. I can almost guarantee that Lycan was onto something.”

  “What if he comes back?”

  “Let him,” Grant muttered. “Let him come.”

  Somehow, Paxton kept up on unsteady legs. Back in her human form, her real shape, she felt heavier, awkward. Grant’s unhealthy buzz of fear had become hers, but could vampires actually exist?

  “Can’t take a chance,” Grant said to her as they trotted toward the lights in the distance.

  “He could be lying,” Ben said, following behind. “That rogue could be pulling one over on us.”

  “Yes,” Grant returned. “There’s always that possibility.”

  “The bastard eats cows,” Ben said, pointing out the mental imbalance of anyone who could do that.

  “Suddenly, I’m not so sure he does,” Grant argued.

  “What can…a vampire…do?” Paxton asked in disjointed syllables as they reached the first light globe leading into town. “Out here?”

  “I’m not sure,” Grant admitted. “My knowledge of bloodsuckers is next to useless.”

  “Do we have to worry, then?” Ben called out. “Because the wolf out there said so?”

  Really, none of this was making sense to Paxton. Ben was right to question Grant’s enthusiasm for trusting the wolf they had been after. No one could imagine why Grant might believe anythi
ng like that.

  Was that rogue the thing that had jumped on her car? Grant was letting some information slip through his carefully monitored net. She saw the rogue’s outline in his thoughts—the size of their opponent and the hood that covered his face.

  “I think we have to believe it,” Grant said, reading her thoughts clearly. “Just don’t ask me why that Lycan seems willing to help us out on this occasion.”

  They were halfway to town when another harrowing howl stopped everyone in their tracks. It had come from behind them, near the gates. Not too far away.

  Paxton faltered when Grant tugged her ahead, before catching herself. Fear overwhelmed her. Her stomach turned over as the sound the beast had made rang in her mind.

  Not just a sound. No.

  God…

  Was she the only one here who knew the damn beast’s howl had been meant for her and her alone? And that inside that awful sound, curled up in a wolfish disguise, the beast had called her name?

  She sent her mind outward, reaching, searching for the thread tying her to that beast. When she felt that thread snap tight, Paxton leaned forward to reel it in, imagining her hands rolling up that thread, willing herself to find what connected with her on the other end.

  When another, sharper image came, it rocked her backward. Paxton stumbled with a hand over her mouth. The connection she had searched for was with the creature that had dented her car, the thing that had looked at her through the windshield with unblinking eyes. She saw that thing now in her mind—big, dark, furry and ferocious. She relived the fright of seeing it in person.

  Grant’s beastly Lycan—it had to be the same—had just made contact with her on a personal level. She had never been so afraid. She was petrified.

  “We can’t stay here,” Grant warned. “Paxton, are you all right?”

  Hell, no, she wasn’t all right. She was as far from all right as was humanly possible, because she wasn’t human and neither was anyone else around her. Out there in the desert was a beast that had her number. Knew her name. Knew how to disrupt things so utterly and completely by flooding her mind with a memory so clear she could have touched it.