Pack Poisoned, page 27
part #2 of Thrown to the Wolves Series
It’s the only reason none of us attacked them before they could finish shifting; we’re in an optimal position. With only those two in an otherwise empty room, there’s no concern that we can handle ourselves. The problem lies in the daunting realization that Joshua was smarter than I gave him credit for. If these men were carrying a dose around with them, the majority of the house likely is, too. We prepared for a handful of wolves, but the majority of the people here tonight were supposed to be armed humans, not countless lycan monsters. So if we want to have a hope of surviving the night, we need to learn anything even potentially useful now before we’re completely overrun.
“Plan still stands,” Slade says in a hush, barely moving his lips. We all feel it; the tense anticipation in the air. The extended moment as a predator has you locked in their sights, ready to pounce, and is merely waiting for you to start the game by trying to run. “Lure as many outside as possible.”
A cruel grin spreads across Damian’s face. “Sabrina, love, I need you to do me a favor. Throat, blind spot directly behind them, ankles are relatively pointless because of the upper body strength, headshot preferred after your experience with the last one. Take Slade and go show the others how it's done before they get themselves killed, will you? I’ve got these two.”
Without waiting for agreement or protest, he leaps forward, shifting fluidly mid-air and intercepting the first lycan as it lunges. His momentum knocks both of them into the second, giving us the opportunity to sprint out of the room.
The same time that seven more finish descending the twin staircases.
"Come on." Slade fires off a few shots before yanking the front doors open, encouraging them to follow us.
As soon as we’re clear of the house, he turns on his heel, shredding his clothes and dropping his gun as he shifts. He catches the first by surprise, snapping its neck between his jaws with a vicious snarl. Before he can fully release the body, the next one swipes out a clawed hand, aiming for the side of his neck.
I’m moving before I’m even aware of doing so, pouncing and tearing the arm clean off of the man’s body. My claws rake across his throat, tearing his flesh into a tattered, ruined mess in a single, harsh swipe. Instinct guides my movements without requiring any conscious thought, and my small discomfort at the concept is quickly squashed. His hand almost hurt my mate? Lose the hand. This monster alive and breathing poses a danger? Remove his ability to breathe. There’s no room for fear, only blistering rage.
A heavy head nudges against me, and I rip my teeth free to peer at Slade, blood staining his dark muzzle. Another nudge, and I follow his prompting to look around at the carnage around us, all of the mangled bodies scattering the steps and entryway. Stepping back, I look down at the remains of my current victim and wait.
And wait.
Yet no matter how many seconds pass staring at the mutilated corpse that I know was a person under the lycan body moments ago, is slowly becoming so again upon his death, I feel nothing for him, not a shred of remorse or self-loathing. Nothing but rage and satisfaction.
Taking the hint, I turn my back on them and get back to the task at hand. We race down the stone steps, leaping down the last few, and tear off through the rain-soaked front yard toward the side of the house that Cinjin was assigned to. Of all of them, he’ll be the most vulnerable.
The plan had originally been to utilize the storm, letting it mask the guys’ scents as Kaige, Hunter, Bo, and Cinjin placed the explosives around the house to give us an advantage over Alodia’s numbers. With only eighteen men capable of shifting in the pack, the weapons were the real threat. No matter how good the guys may be, if shots are coming from every angle, one’s bound to hit its mark. The bombs would take out a decent number right off the bat and send them into chaos, unable to coordinate or narrow in on any of our locations until it was too late. But now, we’re at the same disadvantage.
Claps of thunder accompany the sound of gunshots as Reid picks people off from his position hidden amidst the trees near the top of the hill at the back of the property. Where each explosion went off, it blew a massive hole through the side of the house, giving him a line of sight to the interior as well. The front was left untouched, where the three of us would be to offer as a distraction and buy time for them to set up. Cin and Kaige handled the rear, and Bo and Hunter each took one of the far sides. Better, whatever the hell Cin and Kaige concocted was chemical based, the storm doing nothing to stifle the flames spreading throughout the house, doing part of the work for us, if the screams are anything to go by.
The faint, fading sound of dull thudding of paws against the ground has me mentally sighing in relief that I assumed correctly. The few in the house that had a mate were wise enough to get her the hell out of dodge instead of trying to defend the place, slinking off into the shadows to live another day.
No wolves after all, then; only humans and lycans.
As we round the corner of the house, paws skidding on the wet grass, only Slade’s quick reflexes manage to save me from catching a bullet. A dozen men are clambering out of the collapsed wall above us, a couple already dropping to the ground from the wrap-around balcony that encompasses the entire second story, currently missing a decent chunk from the explosion. That gap gives them a clear line of sight to fire at us, and I’m honestly relieved that I’m getting shot at, because it means at least this drug goes for a pretty penny and they couldn’t swing it for the entire household. The relief is short lived, though, as a window shatters on the first floor, a lycan hauling himself through and another few appearing among the fleeing humans.
Eight shots come in rapid succession, men dropping like flies around us. So when Slade snaps a sharp bark at me before launching himself at the nearest beast, tearing his throat out in a spray of blood and gore washed away by the rain, it’s easy enough to interpret. With Reid backing him up, he can handle this.
I don’t question his judgment; he knows what he’s capable of far better than I do. Besides, the rear is going to be ten times worse. If he were pulling some martyr bullshit to try and get me to safety while he stayed behind to buy me time, he sure as shit wouldn’t be sending me into the hotspot alone. So with only a quick glance back, I take off.
It’s pure and utter chaos. The fire dancing on my right sends the entire yard dancing with shadows, the flashes of lightning making it even more disorienting. Shouts, gunshots, snarls, and that goddamn, incessant smoke alarm beeping are everywhere, the storm washing away most of the blood, chemicals, and smoke. Still, it’s sensory overload, murder on my heightened senses, and for a second, I nearly pause to throw up. I don’t though, because I don’t have any time to spare. If I stop, I’m an easy target. Inside the house, where there are walls working to my benefit, or with someone watching my back so that I can afford to have tunnel vision, is one thing. Out here, though? I wouldn’t see the threat until it was on top of me, or bullets were riddling my body.
On the next strike of lightning, I spot a glimpse of Cin on the balcony above before he’s lost to the shadows again, my eyes needing a few seconds to adjust from the sudden flash. As the following crack of thunder comes, I brace for the ensuing pain and throw myself at the glass sliding doors in front of me. They shatter, but shards embed in my side as I crash to the tiled floor of the kitchen, leaving streaks of blood in my wake.
Note to self, it may look cool in the movies, but motherfucker, it hurts like a bitch.
Forcing myself up, I quickly discover that claws and soaked feet aren’t the best combination for a place filled with tile and marble, so I skid a couple of steps before finding my footing. The people I encounter along the way, I either dispose of as swiftly as possible or bypass them altogether. Thankfully, after surviving the staircase without a broken neck, I reach the carpet-laden second floor.
From there, it’s trial and error finding a route that isn’t too crowded or completely sealed off with debris. By the time I’m finally on the balcony, I’m pissed off enough that the three lycans in front of me are a blessing. It allows me to burn off some of the aggression simmering in my veins, their bodies reduced to ash beneath my touch and fading away with the storm before I finally turn to a stunned silent Cinjin.
The clothes plastered to his body make a dull smack as I tackle him to the ground, glaring down at him with a low growl. He holds my eye without flinching away, a silent communication passing between the two of us in the temporary reprieve until the next enemy finds us.
Something’s changed. His counterpart’s changed so much since the last time I looked, he doesn’t even feel like the same person.
A teasing lightness appears in his ice blue gaze before he closes them and tilts his chin upward, baring his throat. “Please, no, I have so much to live for! A wife and seventeen children, a dozen rescue dogs depending on me. Think of the orphans at the soup kitchen that’ll be forced to serve their own dinners if you kill me.”
Huffing an amused breath out of my nose right into his face, I gently clamp my teeth around his neck until I taste blood, then immediately release. Gently butting my nose against his jaw, I imbue as much encouragement and comfort as I can before swiping my tongue over his cheek and pulling away.
“Wrong head, angel; gross.” He complains as he sits up before doubling over with a grunt.
Buying him as much time as I can, I leap over his crumpled form to intercept the lycan dragging himself through a doorway fifty feet away, his legs limp and useless behind him. Pouncing onto his back, I take the back of his neck in my mouth and jerk before he can manage more than a howling shriek. Keeping half an eye on Cinjin as he works through the agony of his first shift, I fight tooth and nail through the steady stream of enemies that appear out of the woodwork. Pouring everything I have into the effort, I quickly start to slow, rapidly burning through my reserves.
When Cin’s pained sounds finally stop, replaced by a savage snarl and the sound of limbs being torn from bodies as he goes full-fledged feral, his other half far more psychotic in his first taste of freedom than the others, I capitalize on it to catch my breath. Chest heaving, I manage all of ten seconds of a reprieve before a shot grazes my shoulder, sending me flinching back a step, blood rapidly staining my coat.
And Cinjin absolutely loses his shit.
Biting the scruff of my neck like some wayward puppy, he fucking chucks me through the massive hole in the siding of the house, forcing me to seek refuge amongst the dying embers before jumping over the railing to the yard below. Panting, I glance around, able to see through a line of what used to be several bedrooms, the walls between each blown out in the explosion. Part of the roof has collapsed, furniture strewn about in a splintered wreck. To my right, the wall is decimated, leaving a clear view into the hall and the fire that’s still raging in full force within the depths of the house.
Bright side, it looks like I joined the ranks of Kaige and Damian and got a bonus ability, so I don’t need to worry about burning to death.
Keeping up the mental pep talk until I catch my second wind, I eventually get to my feet, stretching out my limbs. Soon, the stinging in my shoulder joins the dull ache of the glass still embedded in my side, keeping it from healing completely. Shaking off the exhaustion, I take a few steps towards the balcony, only to pause when the hairs on the nape of my neck stand on end. Hackles raised, I scan my surroundings more closely, but still find nothing. All of the men that were here are either dead or gone, the majority of the hallway so engulfed in flame it’s impossible for anyone else to pass through unless they’re desperate, most already out on the lawn.
Taking a tentative step, a violent twisting lurches in my chest, my stomach sinking with a sense of dread. Darting off into the hallway without another thought, I follow the impulse, wading my way through billowing smoke that coats my lungs. Chuffing and shaking my head, balking from the chemical scent, I strain my hearing for whatever is setting my other half off. The heat doesn’t bother me, but the toxic stench and lack of oxygen certainly are doing their damndest to take me out of commission.
Five minutes later, I’m on the farthest side of the house near the opposite explosion site, the raging fire chasing away anyone else that might have been lurking. Straining my senses as it gets increasingly harder to breathe, I’m about to call it and bolt for fresh air when I hear a faint slew of curses broken up by a coughing fit.
Heart lodging in my throat, I round the next bend, zeroing in on the door dangling precariously at an awkward angle. Carefully creeping into the room, the fire has nearly consumed it, smoke hanging so heavily in the air that it burns my eyes. The majority of the roof is still intact, but several chunks have come down in what used to be a rec room, if the broken pool table is anything to go by, looking like a tornado ripped through it. The wood creaks and groans, the massive television hanging on one wall melting and warped, dangling from its last bracket.
“Godsfuckingdamnit,” the familiar voice mutters, and I search the room, finally finding a small movement on my left near the far side.
Cautious of each step, I stalk further into the room, bypassing a sea of bodies and debris. Finally reaching the corner, my stomach flips at the extent of the damage. Two beams are crossed over him, pinning Hunter to the floor, but also keeping the worst of the weight from crushing him completely. If one shifts more than a couple of inches, the entire precarious mass could come crashing down, along with the last of the wall that they’re braced against, currently sagging in towards us along with a chunk of the ceiling.
“Who’s there?” The sound of a gun being cocked immediately follows the demand.
Carefully working my way over the splintered remains of jagged pieces of wood fueling the nearest bonfire, I aim for a non-threatening bark so that he doesn’t assume I’m one Alodia’s wolves, though who the fuck would be so suicidal as to come in here simply to murder him instead of waiting twenty minutes for the inferno to do the job is anyone’s guess.
“...Sabrina?” It’s an incredulous whisper as his eyes rake over me in disbelief before they quickly become livid. “What the fuck are you doing in here?”
Ignoring him, I shift to a new position to better inspect how everything’s held together, searching for a way to get him out.
“Get your ass outside before you get yourself killed!” he shouts, swatting a hand to bat me away.
His demands fall on deaf ears as I hastily leap back over the rubble I just bypassed in search of something to act as a temporary brace.
“Thank the gods,” he mutters, barely audible, followed by the faint sound of his head thudding against the floor.
Bolting to the other side of the room, I scavenge for one of the fallen beams, jaws aching as I drag it through a mess of debris. The floor releases an ominous groan, and I hurry past that patch, returning to his side a minute later.
“You suicidal, fucking woman! Just go!” he snaps, along with a series of other furious commands that carry no weight.
Eventually accepting that I’m not listening, he turns his efforts into actually helping, his worry manifesting in escaping, if only to haul me out of here himself. It’s a bitch not having thumbs, forced to use my jaw to maneuver the beam into place with my head turned sideways, relying on Hunter’s one free hand to guide it into place. Trusting him to hold it, I dart off to grab the largest remaining chunk of a chair, dragging other pieces of scrap beneath the beam and slowly shoving them closer and closer. Inch by inch I lessen the weight crushing his chest, using whatever I can find to support our makeshift lever since there’s no way in hell I’m going to be able to lift it and drag him out at the same time.
With a sharp gasp, he begins furiously coughing, able to draw his first full breath in who only knows how long. I sink my teeth into his shoulder, pulling with everything that I have to free him. As the groaning wood creaks and starts to splinter, I yank harder, my paw slicing on some debris in my haste. Drawing on the final vestiges of my stolen strength, I burn through the last of my reserves, left with only my own exhausted muscles to frantically drag him out and far enough away before everything completely collapses on top of us both.
We barely make it to the doorway before the supports explode in a spray of splintered debris, the sudden onslaught of weight the final straw and punching a hole through the floor, sending everything crashing to the floor below. Still, I don’t stop, can’t stop. The fire’s spread to encompass not only this hall, but the next few over. And while I’m not sure what state Hunter’s in, the fact that he hasn’t bucked to free himself from my jaws yet confirms my assumption that his legs were likely crushed in that mess. He’ll heal, but only with time, time that we don’t have with flames licking at his clothes, singeing the fabric and making him hiss in a pained breath.
By the time I’m dragging him onto the corpse-laden balcony outside, I’m wavering on my feet, vision dotted with black and on the brink of collapse. Each breath is an active effort, more of a wheeze, and the rain soaking and matting my fur to my body is the most glorious thing that I’ve ever felt in my life. Dropping him as soon as we’re in the clear, I flop to the ground a few feet away.
“Fucking hell, woman,” Hunter grumbles before devolving into an aggressive coughing fit, rasping, “You might be even more stubborn than me.”
The words you’re looking for are ‘thank you, Sabrina. I owe you foot rubs every day for the rest of your life, Sabrina.’
With every cough and wheeze, fresh air chases away some of the smoke from his lungs, his body desperately trying to heal as quickly as possible out of pure determination. Struggling to catch my own breath, I give him a quick scan, assessing the damage to see how totally fucked we are. The rain is cutting lines through the soot streaked across his body, revealing multiple burns beneath his blood-flecked clothes. My stomach roils as I see a glimpse of bone jutting through a rip in his jeans, his legs lying limp and blood still pouring from the wound.
