by J. L. Wilder
“You think you’ve outsmarted them.”
Her smile was all teeth. “I know I’ve outsmarted them.”
It was arrogant of her, Owen thought, and yet, didn’t it also make sense? And could you really call it arrogance if it was just accurate self-assessment? He felt a thrill of attraction course through him and wished, for an instant, that they had time to steal away together. The lines of her body, the quick, sure way she moved as she prepared for battle, the commanding tone in her voice—it all made him feel breathless.
I am so lucky, he thought, not for the first time. I am so beyond lucky to have fallen in love with an alpha.
There was that word again. Love. At some point, he and Fiona were going to have to have that conversation too. But not today. Today we have more pressing concerns. If we survive this, I’ll tell her.
It was a pretty big caveat, he knew.
“Okay,” Percy said. Fiona’s second in command had been pacing around the kitchen for the past hour. Owen wanted to tell him to sit down—he was stressful to watch—but he had no command over the other man, and he knew it. “So what’s the plan?”
“We ride north,” Fiona said. “We create a perimeter around the place where they’re staying. It should be easy enough to find by following the scent. Carla and...who’s your best mechanic?” she asked Owen.”
“Nova,” he said.
“Right. Carla and Nova, you’ll go in and disable their bikes. Nothing dramatic. I want them to not work, but I want them to look like they’re going to work. And don’t draw any attention to yourselves. I don’t want you seen. When you’re finished, retreat to somewhere safe and wait for the rest of us.”
“We’re sitting out the action?” Nova looked unhappy.
“Think of yourselves as assassins,” Fiona said. “Your job is vital. It’s just not very eye-catching.”
“But what if you need us in the battle itself?” Carla asked.
“We won’t,” Fiona said. “You’re not a fighter, Carla. That’s not who you are. It’s all right. We’ll have all our muscle in the battle.” She turned to the others in the room. “Dusty, Angus, and Riley—the Feral Fangs will know we have bears on our side, and Damon will have prepared them to fight you. Be ready for that. Remember what you learned sparring with us. They’re likely to use the same techniques.”
The bears nodded.
“Okay,” Fiona said. “Leo, when I give the signal, you’re going to cause a distraction. I don’t care what it is, but you need to make some noise that lets them know we’ve arrived. And nothing that seems deliberate—you can’t just stand under their window and howl.”
“I’ll think of something,” Leo said.
“When Leo does what he does,” Fiona said, “I’m thinking the Fangs will come rushing out to confront us. Leo, you’ll have run off, so they’ll probably chase after you—but they won’t get far. Because that’s when the rest of us are going to attack.”
Around the room, the others were nodding. Most of them were smiling, as if they thought it was a good plan. But Owen frowned. “I don’t like it,” he said.
“What don’t you like?” she asked him.
“You’re putting yourself right in the middle of the fight, Fiona,” he said. Was she insane? “You’re taking one of the most dangerous jobs for yourself.”
“Of course I am.” She stared. “What did you expect?”
“You’re pregnant.”
“That doesn’t mean I can’t fight.”
“You shouldn’t be anywhere near the Fangs. Why can’t you disable the motorcycles?”
“And what, put Carla in the battle? I’m the best fighter my pack has, Owen, and you know it from training with us. You can’t seriously think I’m going to bench myself in the eleventh hour.”
“I would have thought you’d want to protect our baby.”
She glared at him. “I’m doing this to protect our baby. Putting together the best offensive possible gives us the best chance of success. Having the best fighters on the front lines makes us more likely to win. It won’t matter that I kept myself out of harm’s way if we lose the fight.”
“You’re not going to make the difference between winning and losing,” Owen said.
“You don’t know what’s going to make the difference,” Fiona said. “Besides, you’re not in charge of what my pack does. This is the plan. Are you in or out?”
He hated it. He knew he wouldn’t be able to relax as long as she was in danger. But what choice did he have? “In.”
“Good,” Fiona said. “We’ll break for half an hour so that everyone can make their final preparations. Then we go.”
THEY HIT THE FERAL Fangs’ scent almost as soon as they were on the road. It had been a mistake, Owen thought, for the Fangs to come to the Hell’s Wolves’ home. They had left a trail.
Didn’t they think of that? Surely Damon must have thought of that. I would have thought he would be smart enough to realize what would happen.
But then, maybe it didn’t matter. Both sides had known that it would come to a fight. Maybe the Fangs were simply past worrying about trying to forestall it.
The scent was pungent and easy to follow. It smelled of sweat and dirt and whiskey, sour and unpleasant. Owen and Fiona ran side by side at the head of the blended pack. Wolf and bear.
He glanced over at her from time to time, marveling at the beauty of the woman he loved in this unfamiliar form. He had been so prejudiced against wolves for so long that he hadn’t been able to see the magnificence of them. Now, watching Fiona run, watching the way her muscles pulled across her long, lithe limbs, he was amazed at how graceful she was.
Almost too soon, they arrived at the motel where the scent was concentrated. It was a few miles outside the city, which was good—this would have been much harder if they’d had to do it surrounded by civilians. Fiona loped off into the woods to his left. Losing sight of her was painful. What if the Fangs are waiting over there? What if she’s attacked and I’m too far away to do anything about it?
He took a deep breath and forced himself to focus. It wasn’t going to help anybody—not Fiona, not his packmates, and not his unborn son or daughter—if he slipped up and failed in what he was supposed to do here because he was to distracted by his worry for her.
A loud bang rent the air, followed by the sound of a car alarm. Leo’s distraction. Owen tensed, waiting for the moment to be right.
And then a door on the second floor of the motel burst open and a rush of men ran out. Some of them were in leather jackets, others in jeans and completely shirtless. Owen forced himself to stay levelheaded and to count as they ran. One...two...three...four...five...six...seven.
Seven men.
Seven Feral Fangs against four bears and three wolves.
They were in this with a fighting chance.
And then he froze, his breath catching in his throat as the Fangs stopped running in the parking lot and stood looking around them for the source of the disturbance.
Damon.
There he stood, among them, one of them, indistinguishable in his human form from the rest. If Owen hadn’t known Damon, he would never have known what separated this man from all the others. He would never have known that he was looking at a traitor.
Fury burned through him. It’s your fault Joel is dead, he thought. He was so young, and all he ever wanted was your approval. Your respect. And you got him killed, because you couldn’t deal with someone other than yourself having power.
And now they were here, about to risk their lives, and the scales had been tipped against them because Damon had sold them out to the enemy. If another one of the Grizzlies was hurt tonight—God forbid, if Fiona was hurt tonight—it would be because Damon had given the Feral Fangs the information they needed to prepare for the fight.
He was so angry, suddenly, that the plan flew out of his mind. He knew that he was supposed to wait for Fiona to signal him and the others by howling, but he couldn’t restrain himself. All
that mattered was that Damon was standing right in front of him, fragile and human, supremely confident. As if he belonged to these people. As if he had done nothing to feel ashamed of.
With a furious roar, Owen launched himself into the parking lot, straight at his ex-packmate.
It was clear that he hadn’t been expected. Nobody shifted or tried to run. They turned and stared at him in dumb shock as he bowled into Damon, the sheer mass of his bear body knocking his enemy over and sending them both rolling across the lot. A moment later, Owen had his teeth in Damon’s bicep.
Damon let out a weak, pained, human howl.
Owen despised him to his very core. Even the taste of blood, now flooding his mouth, wasn’t enough to get him off his old friend.
Suddenly, from behind, he was struck with a sharp, knifelike pain. He glanced over his shoulder. A wolf had landed on his back and was digging in with its claws, raking open gashes into him. Owen growled and tried to shake the wolf loose, but it clung to him doggedly.
And then, without warning, the parking lot of the motel was full of the smell of blood and the sound of snapping teeth.
In his peripheral vision, he could see that more bears had joined the fight. Something struck the wolf on his back, knocking it off of him. Owen stumbled to one side, and Damon scrambled to his feet, shifting as he did so.
Owen dove after Damon again, but this time Damon was ready for the attack and met him in midair. Their bodies came together hard. Owen clamped his jaw down around Damon’s shoulder, but Damon had managed to bite him in the neck, and they both clung on, shaking their heads, trying to out last the other’s stamina and win the bout.
Owen’s back felt raw and shredded, but he did what he could to ignore that. He focused instead on Damon’s front leg, which gushed blood. Damon seemed unable to put any weight on the limb.
Owen could work with that.
He relaxed his hold for a moment, lulling Damon into a false sense of security. Then, when Damon seemed to be struggling slightly less, he jerked his head hard to one side, flipping his adversary’s body over his injured leg. Damon landed on his back and Owen stepped on his throat, holding him in place.
He looked around.
He accounted for his bears quickly enough. Everyone was still going. Everyone was still fighting.
But there were too many wolves in the lot for him to be sure of who was who.
He couldn’t pick Fiona out of the crowd.
Chapter Eighteen
FIONA
As Owen sprung out of hiding and toward the Feral Fangs, Fiona’s heart felt as if it had stopped in her chest.
What is he doing? That wasn’t the plan! He was supposed to wait for my signal!
But the plan was out the window. Fiona watched in horror as Owen bowled over his old packmate. It only took the rest of the Feral Fangs a minute to adjust to the new reality, and then they had shifted and joined the fray.
There was no way they could stay out of the fight. Fiona knew that if she waited even another minute, the consequences could be dire. Already, one of the enemy wolves had leapt onto Owen’s back and dug in with his claws.
Fiona let out a low howl, signaling the rest of her pack that it was time to attack. Let it be enough.
She had counted on the element of surprise. And they still had it, to a degree, but not to the degree she had hoped for. Owen had blown that, blown it with his stupid, stupid impulse attack. Even as she and the others raced out into the open of the parking lot, the Feral Fangs were wheeling around to face them, ready to meet them head on.
He didn’t want me here, she thought. He wanted me to sit out. And now his stupid move might be what gets all of us killed.
Well, Fiona wasn’t going to let that happen.
The Feral Fangs were falling into a clear formation around one pack member, and Fiona felt sure she’d identified the alpha. She sprang at him, claws raking and teeth snapping, driving him to the ground. Around her, she saw each member of her pack choose a member of the Fangs, dividing them so that the fights would happen one to one.
How are the wolves going to fare against the bears?
She didn’t know. She would have to hope that the bears’ superior size and strength would be more than a match for the wolves’ speed.
Time seemed somehow distorted by the fight. At some points, such as when the Fangs’ alpha got his teeth into her flank, Fiona felt as though each second was ticking by with agonizing slowness. Then the fight would sway and she would gain the upper hand, and things seemed to move very quickly.
She wasn’t aware of the moment when the lot around her went quiet.
She wasn’t aware of a point at which the bears and wolves around her disappeared to be replaced by their human counterparts.
She didn’t realize the fight was over until she was pinned to the ground, the hot muzzle of the Fangs’ alpha leering down at her, his claws raised and ready to rake her across the torso. To let her bleed out and die, as Joel had.
She closed her eyes, despairing, and thought of her child. Owen was right, she realized. I should have run away.
Then a voice rang out across the lot. “Tell him to stop.”
“Stop,” another voice said. There was agony in that tone. Anguish. Fiona opened her eyes, confused. “Stop. It’s over. Don’t hurt her.”
The Fangs’ alpha hesitated, then stepped back. and looked around. Fiona scrambled to her feet, ready for a renewed attack.
And stopped, stunned.
Whoever had spoken was right. It was over.
Each of the Feral Fangs, with the exception of their alpha, was held tight in the grip of one of the Wild Grizzlies or the Hell’s Wolves. Some of them were nursing wounds that looked extremely painful. One of the Fangs was white with pain as Carla worked to strap what was clearly a broken leg to a piece of wood she had found somewhere. He snarled as she worked, but he didn’t reach out to stop her.
They had beaten the Fangs, and beaten them soundly.
With no deaths, the fight was over.
She shifted back into her human form and ran over to stand beside Owen. He had an arm around Damon’s throat and looked ready to start choking him. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine.” His eyes were warm with concern.
“You’re bleeding.”
“We can deal with that in a minute.”
“You went before you were supposed to.”
“We can deal with that later too.” He jerked his head back toward the Fangs’ alpha, who was still in wolf form, hackles raised and watching the two of them.
Fiona turned back to him. “Are you ready to deal?” she asked.
He inclined his head.
“You walk away,” she said. “We walk away. You get off our land and out of the state of Montana, and you don’t come back. You can go to a hospital before you leave, if you’d like. We’ll allow that. But if you’re still here by morning, we’ll track you down. Do you doubt that we can?”
He shook his head. His eyes cut sideways to Damon, as if asking a question.
“Take him with you,” for all we care,” Owen said. “We don’t want him.” He released Damon and pushed him back over toward the Fangs’ alpha.
Another one of the Fangs—the second, if Fiona had to guess—spoke up. “We don’t want him either,” he said. “We let him stay because he gave us information, but it was never a long term arrangement.”
“Whatever,” Fiona said coldly. She turned to Damon. “You’re not welcome in Montana either. We don’t care if you’re with the Feral Fangs or not, but you can’t stay here.”
“You don’t speak for my pack,” Damon said, his voice a growl.
“Sure she does,” Owen said. “You got Joel killed, Damon. You sold us out to a pack that wanted to hunt us down. Fiona fought at our side, and so did the rest of the Hell’s Wolves. Who do you think we’re going to side with now?”
“We’re family,” Damon protested.
“Not anymore,” Owen said firmly. “T
hat’s over. When you turned on us, we turned on you.”
“I THINK EVERYONE KNEW what was up when you said they could stay out late tonight,” Fiona teased Owen.
“I don’t care,” he growled, lifting her and tossing her gently onto the bed. “We’ve never done this indoors before, and I intend to enjoy it. If that means everyone else knows what we’re up to...well, it’s a small price to pay. Actually, it’s no price at all to pay. Nothing good was coming from keeping it a secret.”
“I agree with you there.” She smiled at the warmth of his skin against hers. It was very different, being naked together inside, where they could control the lighting, where she was surrounded by blankets and pillows instead of tree bark and dirt, where it was warm and there was no wind and no ambient noise of birds and squirrels.
It was so human.
They had taken the time to dress each other’s wounds, and Fiona had given fervent thanks for the quick healing shifters benefited from. By the time they’d gotten home, Owen’s injuries hadn’t been bleeding badly at all, and she had been comfortable wrapping his torso in bandages and forgoing the idea of stitches. She had lain facedown on the bed and allowed him to treat her own wounds, enjoying how gentle his hands could be.
They had always been so urgent with each other before. So rough. Now it felt as though they had all the time in the world, and Fiona luxuriated in it.
She closed her eyes as Owen kissed his way down the line of her jaw, up and over the rise of her breasts, and on down to the curve of her hip. “You almost got us killed today, you know,” she said softly. “Jumping out like that.”
“I saved us, too,” he murmured, his voice muffled by the flesh of her thigh. “I saved you. He had gotten the best of you. It’s thanks to me that the battle stopped when it did.”
“It’s thanks to everyone.”
“Mmm, no, you didn’t see it. The tide turned when I got the upper hand against Damon.”
“Mmm-hmm. Sure.” She rolled over him gently, pulling him up into a seated position so as not to put weight on his injuries. “I’m sorry you had to fight him,” she said quietly. “I meant to avoid that. I would have taken him, if things had gone according to plan.”
