by Godiva Glenn
There was a knock on the door. Kalle froze.
“Open up,” a voice called.
A voice vaguely familiar. It took a moment to recognize it, but the realization made Kalle’s blood boil. He stormed to the door and threw it open. Dr. Gregor stood outside and Kalle yanked him in, throwing him across the room without hesitation.
“You did this!” he snarled. “Fix it!”
Dr. Gregor stood slowly, supporting himself on the wall. He peered at the bed and a look of concern creased his expression. “You left me no choice.”
Kalle crossed the room with every intention of ripping the doctor in half.
“You for her!” Dr. Gregor said firmly.
“What?”
“Come with me and I’ll let her go.”
“Fix what you did.”
“Come with me and she’ll wake.”
Kalle growled. “Give me a reason to believe you.”
“I love her. She’s a daughter to me.”
“Try again.”
Dr. Gregor shrugged. “Fine. Don’t trust me. But trust that others are on their way as we speak. Stay here and lead them to her, or come with me and I’ll call them off.”
Kalle’s wolf paced, teeth bared and hackles raised. This wasn’t a matter of trust. It was a gamble. Sky’s careful planning hadn’t been careful enough, but if she would wake up, she’d have a fighting chance. “Proof?”
“We can call the room.” Dr. Gregor glanced at the watch on his wrist. “Come with me and once we’re on our way, I’ll let you call her.”
Kalle brushed the backs of his fingertips across Sky’s face. Her heartbeat was normal now, as if she simply slept. He leaned down and kissed her soft hair. Lifting his face, he glared. “Fine. Where are we going?”
“My car. Better hurry if you want me to cancel this location.”
“Why would you let her go?”
“Because she’ll come back to me. It’s you who’s the loose end.”
* * * *
“What’s going on?” Sky’s voice crackled through the phone. “Where are you?”
“Run,” Kalle ordered.
The call ended. Dr. Gregor tossed the phone into his backseat beside Roman, who sat behind Kalle with a gun trained on the back of his head.
“If you want me dead—”
Dr. Gregor’s amused laugh cut into Kalle’s sentence. “No. Not dead. Incapacitated.”
“You’re lucky that it isn’t in our hands,” Roman sneered.
Kalle stared straightforward. “You aren’t the top?”
“Close, but no. At the end of the day, I’m no fighter, and fighters are calling the shots in this war. I’m a doctor who delves into the science of genetics. A cog in the great machine. Vital, respected, but not without limits,” Dr. Gregor admitted with an air of annoyance. “I have to hand you over.”
“That where we’re heading?”
“They’ll meet us.” His jaw ticked as he clenched it tight and glared ahead. Tapping his thumb on the steering wheel he muttered, “It’s not even my fault. That facility was a joke.”
“I noticed.”
The car skid to a halt. They’d arrived at the end of a dirt road flanked by tall trees, civilization far behind them. “It doesn’t matter. We’ll find another. The project will continue.”
“You said she’d be mine, now,” Roman hissed.
Dr. Gregor glanced back and Kalle’s nails bit into his palms at the implications in the words.
“In time,” the doctor reassured him.
“She’s like your daughter, and you’re going to turn her over to your son? Isn’t that a bit close to incest?” Kalle said through gritted teeth.
“She’ll need someone to help her.” The doctor gestured to Kalle’s door. “Out.”
“Help her what?”
“Raise the monster,” Roman said. “Though I plan on giving her a few of my own, as well.”
Kalle nodded slightly. “You have a death wish.”
“Out,” the doctor repeated to Kalle. To Roman, he spat, “And shut up!”
Kalle got out of the car, mirrored by Roman and his gun. A direct headshot would be the end. Could he survive a graze? Maybe. Probably. What was there to lose?
As Roman tapped the door shut with his body, Kalle turned and raked his now claws across the man’s face and arms. The gun went off and Kalle flinched but felt nothing but the pounding pain of sound slamming his eardrums. Roman fell to the dirt, crawling around and mumbling noises of panic.
“Stop if you want Sky to be safe,” Dr. Gregor called.
Kalle laughed. He picked up Roman by the neck and threw him at his father. They landed in a bloody crumple.
The doctor shoved his son aside. “I’m serious!”
“I know.” Kalle walked over to the two men. “I can smell your fear as easily as I can smell him pissing his pants. Not very brave now.”
“Sky—”
“You said she’ll just go back to you. Maybe I think she’d be better off dead,” Kalle said coldly, lying through his teeth. “You played the wrong hand.”
Dr. Gregor fumbled through his pockets but came up empty. “Wait!”
Kalle squatted down and wiggled his bloodied claws directly in his face. “What did you do to Sky? How did you knock her out?”
For a moment, it seemed that the doctor had a backbone, but the color drained from his face. As he’d said himself, he was no fighter. Just a doctor. “Electric pulse to her implant.”
“Keep going.”
“The-the implant! The tracker!”
“She has a tracker?” He drew a line down the doctor’s cheek, not drawing blood but leaving an impression. “Where? Can she get rid of it?”
“It’s ah… right arm. Above the elbow. You’d have to—”
“Cut it out. Yeah.” Kalle stared into the man’s eyes. “Password.”
He shook his head. “I can’t.”
“Password or I gut your son and feed it to you,” Kalle threatened.
The doctor looked at his son, who had apparently passed out from shock. “You won’t. Sky said—”
“Honor. I’m aware. But she’s not here, and your kid was looking to rape and impregnate my mate.” He let the words hang in the air. “And so were you. With lupine sperm, I suppose. I don’t know what the fuck is your level of depravity and perversion, but I can put together hints.”
“She’s special.”
“I’m aware. And she’s not an incubator.” He took the doctor’s face in his massive paw, claws digging into each cheek. “Password.”
After a few seconds, the doctor winced. “It’s not an actual password.”
“What?”
“In my pocket. The thumb drive. It unlocks the laptop.”
Kalle dug around and found the small device where it was supposed to be. “No tricks?”
“If you let her use it, it’s only going to hurt her,” the doctor insisted. “You don’t understand what you’re looking for.”
Kalle stood, ignoring the warning. He had suspicions of what the doctor meant, but it didn’t matter. A refreshing calm came over him as if his wolf was asserting that all was finally going to be okay. He would find Sky somehow, before the Wardens got to her. They could remove her tracker and be on their way.
But what about his revenge?
He pointed to Roman. “Take his belt and tie up his hands.”
“He needs medical attention,” the doctor whimpered.
“You didn’t seem to care about him not but two minutes ago. Tie him up. Hurry before I change my mind.”
Kalle shook his hands back to their human form and wiped them on his pajama pants. Thank goodness Sky had told him to put on pants. He couldn’t imagine having done all this completely naked. The thought almost made him laugh.
Once Roman was secured, Kalle lifted the doctor to his feet and yanked his tie loose before shoving him against the side of the car. As he tied the man’s hands behind his back, Kalle hummed to himself.
Every cell of him wanted to end everything here. He could tell Sky it was self-defense or an accident. They could disappear into the sunset with at least two fewer degenerates on their tails.
The lie would eat at him, though. And if someday he came clean, then she would surely leave him. After everything they’d been through, he didn’t want to lose her again. They shouldn’t even be together. If the ancestors were watching, they were likely wringing their hands.
A hunter and banished lupine. A wolf and… whatever the fuck Sky was. They wanted to breed her. She wasn’t human. She was something else. Not lupine, definitely. Not vampire. But what else was there?
He popped the trunk and shoved Dr. Gregor into it. “Your phone is on. They can track that. They’ll find you.”
“But—”
“And we’ll be long gone.”
The wind shifted, bringing a predatorial scent to Kalle’s nostrils. He spun and saw a hulking lupine form holding Roman. Before he could lift a hand, she’d ripped out Roman’s throat. Dropping the body, she eyed Kalle.
“Brother?”
Kalle stared at Roman’s corpse, barely hearing the careful greeting. “Sister.”
He met her golden eyes, which gleamed from beneath her matted black fur. She was unknown to him, but she recognized him as her kind, and that kept him safe, perhaps.
“What’s going on?” the doctor asked.
Kalle glanced at him and the female lupine did the same. She lifted her muzzle and sniffed. “The other.”
“Calm,” Kalle said gently.
“No calm,” she snapped. “Why do you defend the hunters?”
“Not defending.” He tilted his head. “But we are not murderers.”
“We are protectors.” She placed a hand on her stomach, which had a subtle curve.
He nodded. She was carrying a pup. Pieces slid together. The Wardens were seeking another male. “Where is your mate?”
“Buried.” Her eyes glowed with tears she couldn’t shed. The lupine form gave her strength and took her pain.
“What happened?”
“The full story died with him.” She kicked Roman’s body. “All I know is that I saw him with my mate, struggling in the woods. He shot me with something, and I woke up alone. I tracked his trail and found my mate dead.”
“I’m sorry for your loss, sister, but—”
“They are together, are they not? The humans?”
“You got your revenge. Shouldn’t you return to your pack?”
Her eyes fell back to Roman and something passed over her expression. “Not yet. He was a hunter. He was ready for us. So why was he here with you? And the other?”
“It’s a long story. They caught me, and I’ve just—”
“But you don’t think you should handle him?” Her eyes narrowed. “What is missing from your story? You smell only of them. Of humans.”
He growled. In lieu of explaining everything, he could display a warning. “My business.”
She stepped forward. Her lupine form towered over him. He could shift, but he didn’t want to fight, especially knowing the state she was in. Grieving and pregnant. He likely wouldn’t even win the fight. Lupine females were terrifying enough on a normal day.
“I can’t let you harm him.”
“What’s going on?” Dr. Gregor asked again.
Kalle slammed the trunk shut. “Walk away. You got your revenge.”
“And if left alive, he will seek his,” she reasoned.
“Return to your pack. I will handle him.”
“Can you promise he will never hunt again?”
Kalle licked his lips. “He doesn’t hunt. He just—”
“You should walk away, brother.”
“I can’t.”
“Do you have a mate?”
He nodded. Technically, Sky wasn’t his mate. She felt like his mate, and he wanted nothing more than to bind her to him, but that was neither here nor there.
“Perhaps you should go protect her. Animals like this will take her from you.”
It was the truth. As they spoke, Sky was running around with a damn beacon in her arm, and she had no idea. How long before they caught her? While Kalle stood here and argued for a life he had only moments earlier considered snuffing?
What did he owe the man awaiting death? The man who wanted to breed Sky? Who had done ancestors knew what with her already?
“You hesitate. Do you have love and loyalty to her? Or to him?” the lupine asked.
“My mate doesn’t want me to kill.”
“You have not killed him. Even if you walk away, you have not killed him.” The female stepped close. “He has killed himself.”
Kalle shook his head. He couldn’t return to Sky with blood on his hands, even indirectly. “That’s not how it works.”
Sympathy crossed her face, brief but recognizable. “You don’t have a choice. I am not alone today. My friends aren’t far behind me. If you don’t leave, they will tear you apart.”
“But…”
“I have seen your scars. You do not want to show them to my brethren.”
His spine stiffened. The marks Ian had inflicted, branding Kalle as a traitor, were a raised target on his back.
“I have no quarrel with you,” she reasoned. “But if you stand between my pack and that human, your mate will know the emptiness that I know. The pain that fuels my every breath and heartbeat. Is that what you wish?”
A distant howl punctuated her words. Kalle tapped the trunk. “I’m sorry.”
He couldn’t leave Sky like that. Nor could he reason with a pack for the sake of a life at the expense of his own, and Sky’s safety. He hated every step he took, but he turned and walked away. The scent of her pack followed him on the breeze, and he swore under his breath.
They wouldn’t be alone. Whoever Kalle was being delivered to would be there soon, and it would be a blood bath.
But it wasn’t Kalle’s problem.
FOURTEEN
As Kalle jogged back to the hotel, regrets piled up with every step.
Regret that he hadn’t grabbed shoes when Dr. Gregor had escorted him out. Ditto with grabbing a shirt.
Regret that he hadn’t asked more questions, because if the answers Sky needed weren’t in that laptop and encrypted notebook, she’d probably lose her mind.
Regret that he had never learned to drive, and on that same tangent, regret that he hadn’t been able to just hop into the doctor’s car and drive off, leaving that wolf and her pack in his dust.
Just a shit ton of regret and nothing to be done about it.
Previous to this moment, or maybe previous to meeting Sky, Kalle didn’t have regrets. He didn’t dwell in what could have been. He made his mistakes and moved the fuck on. In matters where he had no choice, like joining the Sarka pack, he had distaste, but not regret.
There had to be a level of shit a lupine could take before they broke inside. Not physically, but mentally. His human form was previously just a means to an end. A way to walk around without people running away in terror and a way to get laid. Now it seemed it had connected him to the part of human life with which he had no interest. Human drama.
The mess with the Wardens was one-hundred-percent human bullshit. Lupines didn’t capture their enemies and torture—eh. He shook his head at the thought.
Well, they didn’t experiment on anyone, at least.
They certainly didn’t have secret bases with cameras and guns and high-tech doors controlled by computers. They didn’t put tracking devices in each other, that’s for damn sure.
And even the strange situation between him and Sky was complicated by her involvement with the human world, even if she maybe wasn’t human.
If she were lupine, they would’ve mated and be done with it.
He wouldn’t be stuck in this mind-fuck of a loop where one minute he couldn’t imagine a life without her, and the next, he couldn’t help but want to run away.
The hotel’s massive sign
finally broke through the rest of the buildings and he paused to wipe the collected dirt and tiny rocks from his feet. He was a sight. His thin pajama pants did nothing to disguise the obvious outline of his dick, which had bounced painfully during his run back and was now drawing the attention of every female within eye-banging range on the sidewalk he stood on.
He needed to get back to the hotel room to get Sky’s scent and track her, but he couldn’t imagine how that was going to happen. The staff had all but called the cops when Dr. Gregor had escorted him out wearing barely anything. There was no chance they’d allow Kalle to walk back in looking like he did now.
Dirty. Sweaty. And he didn’t have a mirror to check, but he assumed a bit bloody. Clawing up Roman had definitely left blood on him. He’d wiped the splatters from his chest, but knowing his luck, he had more on his face and neck.
He had no money and no way of getting any.
Reflecting on how things had been going lately almost made him laugh. This was not the life he’d predicted after leaving the pack.
“Were you robbed, bro?”
Kalle turned to the man who’d asked the question. “Something like that.”
The guy, who was about Kalle’s size, took off the flannel shirt he was wearing over his t-shirt and handed it to Kalle. His gaze was filled with indifference, as if Kalle’s appearance was strange but not at all rare. “Here. I can’t even imagine what the fuck you’ve been through.”
“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you. Thanks.” Kalle put the shirt on and felt an ounce better.
The guy waved two fingers and walked off. Kalle glanced at the other people watching him. Humans were strange creatures. He buttoned the shirt completely and looked back in the direction of the hotel. He’d never been in the middle of a town quite like this. The hotel stood out like a beacon, at least.
It had taken time to backtrack based on the directions he remembered from riding on the car, but he was close. Rubbing his neck and checking the sinking sun, he couldn’t believe he’d lost an entire day. At least he got a password and all things considered, Sky was a bit safer now without Roman and his dad on the hunt.
