Pack of Her Own, page 8
“Slow down,” Wren hissed, her eyes focused on the trees as they surrounded us. I did as she asked, keeping quiet. But I did cast a glance her way. Her head was still out the window and she focused intently on the trees around us. Her focus and intensity made me wonder just what she was seeing and hearing out there. I hoped one day she would tell me what was going on—preferably before I went back to the city. With a shudder, I pushed that thought far, far away. Focus on today, tomorrow will come later.
The path through the trees widened briefly, with enough room on one side for a car to park. From the tire tracks on the grass, it was safe to assume some drivers had done just that. In the instant we started passing the turnout, Wren’s hand was suddenly on the wheel, turning us toward it. The Jeep bounced wildly as we exited the ruts, and I fought hard not to just slam on the brakes before we were safely out of the road and settled. When the Jeep came to a safe stop, I stared at Wren.
“What the fuck was that?”
She looked at me, her mouth peeled back in a snarl as I challenged her.
I shook my head, keeping her gaze. “No way, you don’t get to go all quiet and angry on me. You could have killed us! If you’re going to grab the wheel out of fucking nowhere, next time at least warn me!”
She backed off a few inches. “I didn’t want you to miss the stop.”
“Okay, so words work better than just grabbing the fucking wheel and taking over!”
At least she had the good decency to look chagrined. “I’m sorry.”
“Good!” I said with a snarl that could rival hers. “Glad we got that out of the way. Now, what the hell are we doing here?”
“Get out.”
My foot was on the ground, my ass still on the seat, when I realized I hadn’t even considered arguing with her. What the hell was that? We met at the front of the Jeep, but her eyes locked on the trees in front of us.
“If you dragged me all the way out here just to kill me, I want you to know I don’t plan on going quietly or easily.” I tried to sound confident while I said it, but a part of me was starting to wish I hadn’t followed her to the diner this morning. A very small part of me. The rest of me didn’t want to leave her alone for a minute.
She turned back to me with a look in her eyes like she was going to devour me. Another flash in my mind of us pressed up against a tree, kissing and fondling, almost kicked my feet out from underneath me.
“She’s here,” Wren whispered, “and so are the people who took her.”
“Shit.” I looked around as if I was going to see them through the trees. “What do we do?”
She looked at me for a long minute. “Do you trust me?”
“Yes.” The word was out of my mouth before I could even think about it.
“Follow me.”
She set off into the trees, moving slowly enough that I could keep up with her. I had the feeling she could probably move faster. Guilt rolled through me. If we took too long getting there, it’d be my fault for slowing her down. Again, I second-guessed chasing after her.
There was no discernable reason that Wren knew where she was going, but she led the way unerringly, until even I could smell the acrid smoke of wood fire drifting through the trees. She stopped, then crouched down. I followed suit.
“There.” She pointed between a couple of trees. I peered through them and saw a small, cleared area of ground that had a simple firepit built with stones ringing the outside. The fire was burning low, probably having not been fed in several hours. Beyond the flames was a body wearing dark clothing. It wasn’t moving.
“Is that Meg?”
Wren nodded. She lifted her head and sniffed the air. I had no idea what she might smell over the scent of the fire. “All right, we’re downwind, so we should be okay. I need you to listen carefully to what I’m about to say. Can you do that, Natalie?”
I shivered when my name crossed her lips, but I recovered quickly. “Okay.”
“Good.” She smiled and heat flared in the bottom of my gut. “I’m going to move forward and confront whoever took her. I need you to move straight to Meg, untie her, and get her back to the Jeep as quickly as you can.” Wren reached into her pocket and pulled out a small pocketknife, handing it to me as she pointed to the side, and I saw the ruts of the makeshift road. “Follow that trail back, then get in the Jeep and drive back to Terabend. In the GPS you’ll find a name, Dr. Maru. Take Meg to the clinic. Dr. Maru will take care of her.” She looked me right in the eye, and I could see her green eyes almost shining with gold flecks around the irises. “Can you do that for me, Natalie?”
I opened my mouth, but nothing came out. I wanted to say no, that I wasn’t going to leave her out here, but I had to believe that she knew what she was doing and there was a reason for what she was asking me to do.
“Okay,” I said. “I can do that.”
Strong arms wrapped around me in an awkward crouching hug. I let out a little gasp before leaning into her, nestling into those arms like I belonged there. “You know, I’m glad you talked me into letting you come with me.” Her voice was barely a whispered breath, but the words twisted through me until they smothered all the doubt I’d been feeling.
“Okay. Let’s do this.”
She nodded and burst out of the trees faster than I managed to track. One second, she had me in her arms, the next she was kicking dirt over the fire and challenging anyone in the clearing. I heard a yell and a screech but ignored it, pushing my way into the clearing and running to the limp woman.
“Meg!” I yelped as I lightly slapped her face. I recognized her from the diner the other day, but she looked like shit. Her hair had blood in it, the side of her mouth was swollen, and one eye was so swollen and bruised it was completely shut. Her hands and ankles were bound with rough rope that had rubbed her skin raw, and I hissed in sympathy. I used the knife to cut through her bonds as someone yelled and attacked Wren. Wren blocked a wild blow from her attacker and slammed a fist into the guy’s gut, which doubled him over. From there she literally picked him up with both arms and tossed him into the trees with a loud grunt of effort.
I tore my gaze away from her and kept working on Meg. Her good eye opened slightly, sticky from blood and tears.
“W-w-who?”
“Shh, it’s okay.” I tried to soothe her. “I’m Natalie. I’m here with Wren. We’re going to get you out of here.”
She looked scared of me until I mentioned Wren’s name. She looked past me to the amazing efforts of her savior. It was hard for me not to look too, but I focused on the task Wren had given me. “Is she…”
I shook my head. “She’ll be fine. We need to go.”
“But—”
“We can’t. I promised her I’d get you out of here, and I’m going to do that.” I got her to her feet, took her weight on my shoulder, and we hurried down the road. I heard grunting and shouting behind us but didn’t look back.
Chapter Fifteen
Wren
Panting heavily, I held a hand to my wounded shoulder. Stupid, picking the asshole up like that. In the frenzy I wasn’t thinking, and now my arm wasn’t working properly.
The younger man rushed me again and I stepped aside, kicking him in the knee as his weight came down on it. It buckled and he screamed, loud and long, until I put my other boot into his head. He fell with a soft grunt and didn’t get back up.
Seconds passed as I waited for another attack. This punk wasn’t alone yesterday, and there were more scents around the campfire. One I knew was Jason, but it was muddled with other scents. The only other scent that was clear belonged to the girl who had been with them yesterday, but her scent was strange. And close.
I heard the Jeep rev, and the tires start to crunch back down the road as it headed for the highway, and I breathed a sigh of relief. Natalie had Meg and they were on their way. Once more, I was glad I had brought Natalie with me. Now I had no reason to hold back.
I lifted the asshole by his neck as his eyes flickered dazedly and focused on my other hand until fur rippled from fingers to elbow, claws elongating at my fingertips. His heart sped up as if he knew what was coming and I laughed. He had taken one of mine. Now he’d pay.
“Stop!”
Someone grabbed my arm. I growled, throwing the man away as I turned. The girl who’d been with him at the diner was beside me, gray eyes wide in fear, but her mouth set in a determined grimace.
“Please! Don’t hurt him any more!”
With a shrug of my shoulder, I threw her off and she fell to the ground. She landed beside the fire, her hand almost touching the flames as she scrambled away.
“You came into my county,” I snarled, as I took slow steps forward while she backed away in an awkward crabwalk. “You took one of my people and you beg—beg!—me not to hurt him?”
“We didn’t have a choice! You don’t know Jason!”
“You always have a choice! Always!”
“You don’t know him!” she cried. “He would’ve killed us! You don’t cross the Reid brothers and live!”
I faltered for only a second. The brothers had done enough to scar me in my time with the old pack. I shouldn’t have been surprised that they’d done it to others since I was gone.
“Where is Jason?”
She shook her head. “He told us to take her! To bring her out here! Then he just ran off. He had other wolves with him, wolves I hadn’t seen before today. They didn’t come from the Cardinals with us.”
Had they only been using Meg as bait? Was he gauging how I responded to a threat? Whatever was going on here, I wasn’t liking it. I sniffed the air again, staring down at the girl.
“What are you?”
She hesitated. “I…I’m a wolf like you!”
I shook my head. “Bullshit. I’m only going to ask you one more time. What are you?”
She shook from head to toe. “I swear. I swear I am a wolf.”
Her scent puzzled me. She smelled only barely like any wolf I’d ever met, but maybe she wasn’t lying. I let out a huffing growl and turned back to her compatriot. “Stay put,” I said to her. She froze in place.
The young man shook his head like he was coming out of a daze. I let the girl watch my arm change back to normal before I confronted him. His eyes widened as he saw me, and I felt his fear drive me to lift him up by his throat again. Anger stirred deep in my heart but couldn’t find an outlet. I didn’t want to kill the wolf, but an example had to be made. Something had to happen to him.
“It’s your lucky day,” I said, hefting him high in the air. “I’m going to let you live.” I shook him a little to make sure I had his attention. “What is your name?”
“C-Callum Palmer,” he choked out.
I nodded and let his feet touch the ground enough that he wasn’t going to pass out on me. I took a deep breath and felt the power inside me swirl with intent. The magic that melded my wolf and me together, that made us what we are, drew up and into my voice. As if in a dream, the words came to me without thinking.
“Callum Palmer,” I said in a clear, ringing tone. “As Alpha of this territory, I hereby banish you from it and revoke any and all access to it. You will never set foot in my territory again, wolf. And if you do, I shall know, and you will be hunted and made to pay for your transgression.” I let him fall to the ground. “So mote it be.”
The moment the last syllable left my mouth an unnatural wind exploded into the clearing, blowing the campfire out and leaving nothing but wisps of smoke. The girl on the ground leaned into the wind and let out a keening scream that was lost in the storm. The wind whipped around Callum, forcing him back. He howled in fear and crouched as fur overtook his body. His face started to shift, and his muzzle jutted out as his ears rose to the top of his head. He howled again, this time all wolf, and the wind pulled at him even harder. The storm threw him up into the air and hurled him into the trees where he disappeared from sight.
Both the girl and I stared at the empty space where he’d been. There was one last long drawn-out howl before it faded into silence.
What the fuck?
The girl turned her wide, fearful eyes to me. I did my best to deserve to be looked at like that and tried to keep my composure. Yup. Totally knew that was going to happen and planned the whole thing. Yessir.
I mean, I knew my knowledge of how to be an Alpha was severely lacking, but now I could just do things like this without knowing about it? That definitely wasn’t in the brochure.
I turned back to the girl. “Now, what do I do with you? I mean, since you claim to be a wolf and everything. You’re still within my borders, and you took one of mine. That comes with consequences.”
“I told you! Jason made us do it! I have no idea where the hell he went!”
“And he’ll get what’s coming to him when I find him. But for now…” I looked down at her. She needed to be taught a lesson. She needed to be held accountable, but she was in such a sorry state that I couldn’t bring myself to do anything rash. Even the power I’d felt when I banished the other wolf had settled down inside me. “What do I do with you?”
“Please!” she said. “Please just let me stay! I can be useful! I can help you!” She wiggled around until she was on her knees in front of me. “Let me join your pack! You’re an Alpha, I can help you!”
The moment she said the word pack I had to fight not to run away. Pack wasn’t a dirty word in the werewolf world. It was supposed to be the way our world ran—wolves in packs and sticking together.
Not for me.
I didn’t have a pack. Didn’t want a pack. I’d claimed my territory and would fight for it, and for the humans who lived there, but I’d do it by myself. No one else.
“No,” I said. “No. No pack. Never again.” I shook my head to clear it. “C’mon. You’re coming with me anyway, though.”
She nodded without argument and stood with her head lowered like she didn’t want to look me in the eyes.
“You might not be pack,” I told her, “but you can still help fix the damage you’ve done.”
“Yes, Alpha.” I cringed at the title, but the words were already in the air. Not something I ever wanted.
I helped her to her feet, taking one last sniff of the air. There was no clear scent of Jason or the others he apparently had with him. I guessed he left these two as sacrifices to see how I reacted. I wasn’t about to let him hurt my people ever again, but I couldn’t chase him if he went onto another Alpha’s lands. Not without seeking permission from that local pack leader. And I wasn’t sure if Kendra, the Alpha who controlled the surrounding counties, would okay my hunt in her territory.
“C’mon, girl.” I motioned for her to get moving. “Let’s get walking.”
“Heather,” she said quickly. “My name’s Heather McKenna.”
I hesitated for a second before offering my hand “Wren Carne.” She took the hand tentatively, giving a light shake. “Now, let’s get out of here.”
Chapter Sixteen
Natalie
I glanced at the speedometer again, took a breath, and eased off the accelerator. Despite the age of the Jeep, Wren had a GPS, and I looked up the doctor’s address. As we hit the town outskirts, I was ready to turn in behind the main highway through town and drive directly to the doctor’s office.
My mind wandered back to Wren, standing tall and protecting us from whoever had taken Meg. She’d looked larger than life, willing to put herself on the line to save a friend. And I couldn’t help but admit she looked damned sexy doing so. I wished she’d been turned toward me, so I could’ve seen her eyes and her face, as she growled and fought against the kidnappers.
Something hit my shoulder and pushed me out of my thoughts as I glanced at Meg. Her eyes were closed, her breathing strained, and her head was limp against me.
“Hey!” I shouted and pushed the pedal down a little harder. “Hey, hold on. Don’t you pass out on me. I don’t know what the hell I’m doing!”
Maybe the slight movement of her head was some kind of reply, but I couldn’t tell. I stared at the GPS, trying to make sure I followed the damned thing. I turned onto one of the roads that led deeper into the town, then several more turns, before pulling into the parking lot indicated on the system. The strip mall was small and unassuming, with a medical clinic, a pharmacy, and a convenience store with a gas station. The front was all glass windows and doors, but the building itself looked like it’d been built in the sixties.
I parked the Jeep in front of the doors and climbed out as quickly as I could. I had to stop and push Meg back up to sitting in her own seat, then ran around to open her door. By the time I’d levered her out of the Jeep and barely managed to keep her standing, the door to the clinic swung open and a short woman in a lab coat with deep black hair stormed out. Her eyes were hidden behind a pair of slim glasses with purple-tinted lenses, and they were focused on Meg.
“What happened?”
I shook my head. “I don’t really know. Wren sent me. Meg’s hurt.”
Her gaze softened a little as she pulled Meg from my grasp with a surprising amount of ease. “Get the door, I’ll get her inside.”
I opened my mouth to argue but was rebuked solely by her glare. I let her take Meg and ran forward to open the door for her. Dr. Maru—I assumed—carried Meg in like she weighed no more than a sack of potatoes.
