Rogue wolf, p.25
Rogue Wolf, page 25
Then a soft voice intruded into the madness.
At first, Trey thought he was the only one who could possibly have heard those words in the cacophony of raging fire, creaking wood, and exploding medical equipment. But Kyson’s head immediately snapped away from the fire over his head, coming to rest on the young woman in the cage.
“Ky, I need your help,” Shaylee said softly, calmly, like she was talking to a wounded animal. “I need you to open the door.”
Kyson stared at Shaylee, his features relaxing and his gaze softening. But then a plank cracked above them, showering them all with flaming embers and a rush of heat, and the terror came roaring right back as Kyson’s whole body tensed. His friend was seconds from losing it.
“Ky,” Shaylee called out, a little louder this time. “I know you’re scared of the fire and that, right now, all you want to do is run and hide. But I need you. Your friends need you.”
Trey realized he was holding his breath as Kyson began to look back and forth between him, Samantha, and Shaylee, clearly unsure of what to do in the face of so much fear and confusion. But then his gaze locked on Shaylee’s and he was moving, heading straight for the cage. Trey had almost forgotten how fast the man could move. He was almost a blur as he closed the distance between him and the cage.
Samantha and Shaylee pointed desperately at the hasp on the outside of their prison, but Kyson ignored them, reaching out and wrapping his fingers in the framework of the door itself. With a single heave and a screech of tearing metal, the whole side of the cage gave way. He kept yanking until the grating came loose, then he was slinging the whole section of metal across the basement. Shaylee was up off the floor in a flash, rushing into Kyson’s arms, murmuring calming words to him even as she began to cough violently in the thick acrid smoke.
“We have to get out of here before we suffocate!” Samantha yelled, running out of the cage and over to Trey, laying her hand on his shoulder. “The ceiling could collapse any moment.”
He froze at the feel of her warm hand against his fur, subconsciously leaning against her hip as her fingers weaved themselves into its thickness and tugged gently. It was hard to put into words how amazing it felt. But he forced himself to put those thoughts out of his head. Samantha was right: they needed to get the hell out of here.
Trey moved toward the far end of the basement, and the stairs he knew were in that direction. Samantha was right beside him, but he’d barely gone ten feet through the heavy smoke and falling firebrands before he realized Kyson and Shaylee weren’t following.
Stopping, he swung his head around to look over his shoulder. Shaylee was trying to get Kyson to follow them, tugging on his hand and encouraging him, but his eyes were locked on the burning ceiling again and he wasn’t moving an inch. Shaylee wasn’t big enough to get him going, and her words were obviously having no effect.
Trey ran back to help but quickly realized there wasn’t a whole hell of a lot he could do, short of clamping his fangs down on one of his friend’s hands and trying to physically drag him out. Which was likely just going to piss Kyson off. Or freak him out.
Doubting they had time for this, but not knowing what else to do, Trey tried to calm down enough to reverse the werewolf shift and regain his human form. As he expected, it took longer than he’d hoped, but it helped when Samantha came over and knelt by his side, running her fingers through the fur of his shoulders and down his back. It was enough to help him forget the fire and smoke raging around them and the fact that his soul mate was choosing to stay down here with him instead of attempting to save her own life.
The pain of his bones cracking and reshaping was just as horrendous in this direction as it was in the other, and it was damn near impossible to ignore all the smoke pouring into his lungs as he gasped for air. But after another minute or so, Trey found himself lying naked on the concrete floor, the burns he’d gotten earlier in wolf form appearing along his back and sides. Huge pieces of the ceiling were falling all around them now, and the heat of the flames made every breath feel like his last. Samantha and Shaylee looked like they weren’t going to last more than a few more seconds.
Ignoring the curious way Kyson was staring at him, Trey shoved himself upright and ran toward his friend, grabbing one of his hands. He would have liked to try to talk his friend through this calmly, but there simply wasn’t time. “Kyson, we’re leaving. Now!”
Then he yanked his friend’s hand so hard Kyson almost tumbled off his feet. But when he kept pulling, Kyson didn’t resist. Samantha and Shaylee moved to join them.
They had to dodge several pieces of burning wood as they made their way to the stairs, along with an entire section of one of the massive support beams. Right before they made it to the door out of the basement, he couldn’t help looking back at the bodies they were leaving behind. The vita was lying limp and torn over by the cages, the doctor’s corpse burnt and curled into a ball in the midst of the broken glass from the vat his son had been suspended in. But when Trey glanced at the wall where Jamison had rolled earlier, he was surprised to find that the body wasn’t there.
Every instinct screamed at him to stop and find the kid, that something was wrong. But with the place falling apart all around them, he simply couldn’t. Samantha and Shaylee were barely able move as it was. He had to get them out of here.
They were halfway up the fire-filled staircase when Shaylee collapsed, though whether it was from smoke inhalation or exhaustion, Trey didn’t know.
“I got her,” Kyson called out as he reached down and scooped her up in his arms without even slowing. “Keep going!”
Trey had no idea which way to go when they reached the top of the stairs and stepped out into the middle of ornate open-air atrium, suits of armor everywhere and burning staircases curving up to the upper levels. He wasn’t sure how it was possible, but the fire seemed worse up here than it had been in the basement. This place wasn’t going to last long.
He was sniffing the air, hoping it would lead him to the nearest exit, when a completely unexpected scent hit his nose.
Trey spun in time to see Rogi standing there holding a large bore hunting rifle. In that split second before the man pulled the trigger, all Trey had time to do was take one step to put himself between Samantha and the weapon. Then he flew backward like a train had just smashed into his chest.
Chapter 24
Samantha was so focused on the fire rapidly climbing the walls around her that she didn’t even see Rogi until he stepped out of Louis’s study with the big rifle in his hand. She opened her mouth to scream, but the warning never had a chance to make it out before Rogi pulled the trigger. The resultant boom vibrated through her chest like thunder, then Trey was flying past her, smashing into one of the suits of armor along the wall, the bullet going right through the middle of his chest.
Her scream made its way out then, even as Rogi turned the barrel of the rifle toward Kyson, his hands quickly working the bolt atop the weapon, loading another round in the chamber in a fluid motion as if he’d done it a thousand times before.
With Shaylee in his arms, there was little Kyson could do to avoid the shot beyond twisting awkwardly to the side in a desperate attempt to protect the woman he cared for. Samantha heard the gunshot, saw a line of red slicing across Kyson’s back from shoulder to shoulder, watched the blood start to flow. Trey’s friend stumbled forward as some distant part of Samantha’s mind realized Rogi was working the bolt of the rifle again, undoubtedly preparing to put another round into Trey or Kyson, finishing whichever one he deemed the biggest threat first.
Samantha would be damned if she’d let that happen.
She spun around and grabbed for the first thing within reach, almost shocked when she realized it was the hilt of an antique sword resting in the hands of another suit of armor. The weight of the weapon shocked her. It was far heavier than she’d expected. It also seemed to somehow be attached to the armor. But there was so much adrenaline pumping through Samantha right then that she didn’t have a problem jerking the weapon free and lifting it. She ended up holding it more like a spear than a sword as she turned and charged toward Rogi with a savage yell.
Rogi was so focused on putting another bullet into Kyson’s back that he didn’t see Samantha coming at him until the last second. He whirled around, swinging the barrel of the rifle in her direction. She didn’t bother trying to slow down, knowing it was too late for that. The rifle went off just as she shoved the pointy end of the sword into his side right below the ribs.
Time seeming to slow as she realized the blade had gone nearly all the way through man’s body. Blood trickled down Rogi’s lip, shock on his face. Then the rifle dropped to the floor with a clatter, Rogi slowly tumbling backward, his weight dragging the sword from her hands.
It struck her then that she’d killed someone. Samantha knew she should feel something, but as the flames continued to climb higher and higher around them, nothing came. And she didn’t have time to worry about that. Instead, she kicked Rogi’s rifle away from the body—just in case—then turned and ran toward Trey.
From the corner of her eye, she caught sight of Kyson standing up, Shaylee still protected in his arms. The wound across his back was already closed and healing fast, but he’d be left with yet another scar on top of everything else he’d been forced to live with.
It wasn’t fair.
No matter how worried she was about Kyson, all that disappeared the second she reached Trey where he lay tangled among the crushed pieces of antique armor he’d landed on, a huge pool of blood splattered all across his chest. Her doctor’s training immediately told her there was no way he could still be alive even as she watched him pushing himself upright.
“Is it safe for you to be moving?” Samantha asked as she dropped to his side and slipped one arm behind his back to help him sit up.
A quick glance at his chest revealed a ragged hole the size of her little finger to the right of his heart. It was bleeding, but not nearly as much as it should have been. And obviously not as much as it had been only a few seconds ago, considering all the blood running down his chest. Her instincts were screaming in confusion, caught between wanting him to stay still to avoid injuring himself worse and dragging him out of there right this second before the place burned down around them.
“Do we have a choice?” he asked, using her arm to help him stand, motioning toward the fire that was consuming the second and third floor like a living thing.
Trey was right. Staying here for even a few more seconds could mean the difference between living and dying.
Ignoring how pale his face had become now that he was upright, Samantha slipped her shoulder under one of his arms and did the best she could to help him in the direction of the front door, Kyson right on their heels, Shaylee still unconscious in his arms.
Just before they slipped out of the atrium entryway, Samantha looked back, catching sight of Rogi’s body lying there with the sword still sticking out of him. She knew that was going to be an image that stayed with her for a long, long time.
It was dark outside, and Samantha didn’t have a clue where they were going, but none of them stopped moving until they were a good hundred feet from the home. Even at that distance, she could feel the heat on her skin, and she turned to see that flames were already shooting up high into the sky. She supposed they didn’t need to find a phone to call for help. No way in hell someone hadn’t seen the fire already.
They crashed to the ground in a section of perfectly manicured grass. Samantha gently helped Trey lie back on the ground, immediately moving to take a look at that terrifying wound in his chest. But he waved her away.
“I’m fine. Check on Shaylee.”
Samantha hesitated for a moment, then reluctantly nodded. Turning, she saw Kyson sitting on the grass, still holding Shaylee in his arms, his blue eyes glassy and scared, his expression making her think of a little kid holding an injured puppy.
Samantha moved closer to check the girl’s heart rate and respiration, but Shaylee was already coming around, coughing violently as she gasped for fresh air. Kyson pulled her close to his enormous chest, rocking the girl back and forth, making soft calming sounds that seemed so out of place coming from a man his size.
The moment Shaylee stopped coughing, she reached up and threw her arms around Kyson, dragging his head down to hers and kissing the hell out of him. Kyson seemed a little surprised at first, but then kissed her back. It was so damn sweet that Samantha had to bite her lip to keep from saying aw. Trey’s big hand closed around hers, and she glanced over to see him smiling, clearly as affected by Kyson and Shaylee’s moment as she was.
“I’m okay,” Shaylee whispered, her resting her forehead against Kyson’s. “You got us out in time. You saved me. You saved all of us.”
Samantha was still a little amazed at how this evening had ultimately turned out. Yes, they’d been imprisoned by a complete psychopath, tortured, experimented on, almost burned alive, and then shot, but they were all alive…and together.
She turned back to Trey, finally able to get a look at the wound in his chest. It took a second to realize it wasn’t even bleeding anymore. In fact, there was already soft pink scar tissue starting to fill in the void.
“Rogi shot you through the lung with a high-powered rifle,” she whispered. “How can you possibly be okay?”
Reaching out, she traced her fingertips over the area, her medical training telling her it wasn’t possible. Without questioning why she hadn’t thought about it earlier, she checked Trey’s back for an exit wound. Sure enough, there was one, the hole on this side worse than the one in the front. But while it was obvious that a lot of blood had poured down his back in the beginning, the thumb-size hole was closed up now. She sat back on her heels again.
“Is it because it wasn’t a silver bullet?” she asked.
“Nah, silver has nothing to do with it,” he said softly. “I’m alive because the bullet missed my heart. That’s what it takes to take to kill a werewolf—severe damage to the heart or head. With the bullet passing clean through, I healed in minutes. If any of the bullet had been left inside, it would have been worse. In fact, the small piece of scalpel blade Rogi left in me hurts worse than the gunshot wound ever did. That’s going to have to come out at some point.”
Samantha was more than a little rattled about the casual way he talked about werewolves dying, never wanting him to even think those words. But she pushed those thoughts aside, leaning in closer and trying to find anything that looked like a cut made by something thin and sharp like a scalpel. But other than the dried blood and endless scraps and abrasions from his fight with Nadia, she didn’t see anything obvious.
“You won’t find it that way,” he said. “The skin has already closed up.”
He cupped her face in a gentle hand, lifting her chin. That was the moment she remembered quite clearly that Trey was as naked as the day he was born.
“The moment an ambulance gets here, I’ll have them take you straight to the hospital,” she murmured, trying to stay focused on the pain Trey had to be feeling and not how much she wanted to kiss him. “A few X-rays to pinpoint exactly where it is, and they’ll have it out in no time flat.”
Trey leaned in and snagged a quick kiss, which turned into one that wasn’t so quick. Fortunately, Kyson and Shaylee were too busy with their own tender moment to pay any attention.
“Don’t worry about getting me to the hospital,” Trey said softly. “In fact, we don’t even need an ambulance. All we need is a pocketknife and a pair of pliers, and you can dig the fragment out yourself.”
She waited for him to say he was kidding, but when he continued to look at her, she realized he was deadly serious. “Oh, hell no. I’m not cutting into you with a pocketknife. I’m not cutting into you at all. Remember, I’m the doctor who chose to work with dead people because the living ones scare me too much.”
The sound of sirens in the distance interrupted whatever Trey might have been about to say, and while the expression on his face suggested he hadn’t given up on that stupid idea, it was Kyson jerking upright suddenly, his face displaying pure panic, that grabbed all her attention.
“Ky, what’s wrong?” Shaylee asked, her voice betraying her own alarm as she tried to keep her grip on his arms even as he attempted to set her back down on the grass. “What are you doing?”
Kyson scrambled to his feet, his head snapping left and right in the dark, like he was trying to pinpoint exactly where the sirens were coming from and how far away they might be.
“I have to go,” he announced, his breath starting to come faster. “The cops will know I was out there when the doctor and Rogi dumped those body parts. All I ever did was carry the pieces, but with the doctor and Rogi dead, you know they’ll be looking for someone to pin all of this on. They’ll lock me in a cage just like the doctor did in his basement. I can’t live like that. Not again!”
Kyson was hyperventilating by the time he finished, and Samantha knew he was seconds from running, even if Shaylee was holding on to his arm like it was a life jacket. It occurred to Samantha then that Kyson was speaking normally, though she didn’t know if it was thanks to Trey’s werewolf blood coursing through his veins or the knowledge that he was finally free of Louis and his torture.
“Then I’m going with you,” Shaylee said, clearly about to lose control herself, tears starting to roll down her face. “I just got you back. I’m not giving you up!”
Kyson shook his head, trying to pull his arm out of Shaylee’s grasp. “No! They’ll be coming after me. I’ll have to go on the run forever. Mexico, maybe South America. I won’t let you ruin your life to be with me. You deserve better than that.”
Samantha thought Shaylee might smack him, and she wouldn’t have blamed the woman if she did. God save all women from men and their grand frigging sacrifices.
