They were no doubt coming to find Liam, as they had directions to the meeting place and a note from their packmaster who’d sent them along as a show of faith for the new king.
Brother’s impeccable hearing told him that whoever dumped these bodies was close enough to have heard Jinx and Gillian. They were lying in wait, and Jinx’s hackles—and the violence held tight within him—rose.
The near miss with Rifter, the feelings Gillian brought out in him, the troubles with Rogue and purgatory, all of it conspired to make Jinx goddamned angrier than he’d been in centuries. The feeling grew quickly until it rattled everything inside of him.
More than anything, Gillian brought out his most primal side, the warrior who would fight for what was his. And he was more sure that Gillian was meant to be his than anything he’d ever known.
“Jinx, what happened to them?” Gillian was looking for a pulse on their necks until he stopped her with a shake of his head. “Were they . . . ?”
“Wolves. Weres, not Dires. They were tortured.”
“Why?”
“Because they’re wolves.” He wanted to sugarcoat it for her, but he couldn’t. Wouldn’t be fair to her anyway. She had to know what kind of world she was coming out in. There was no changing it—she had to know things to keep her safe.
“What kind of people do this?”
“Weretrappers. They’re angry at all of wolfkind because we killed their leaders and threatened their entire organization.” The Dires had expected blowback, but seeing innocent Weres bear the brunt of it turned Jinx’s stomach.
She looked around like she felt the trappers were still near them. “They’re still close, aren’t they?”
“They heard us, yes.” Their voices were low, their heads close. “We’re going to need to try to get back to the mansion.”
“We should stop them. Fight them.”
“You’re not ready for that. I’ll go after them after you’re safe,” he promised.
Shots rang over their heads. He shoved Gillian in front of him and he ran, because he would shield her with his body. And as much as he wanted to stop, rake his claws over the men who’d hurt the young Weres, they couldn’t stop—he couldn’t afford to have Gillian taken. But they were closing in on all sides and he pushed Gillian to climb the big oak, handed her a gun and told her to shoot anyone who came close who wasn’t a wolf.
She did so as he shifted. Turned, prepared to run into the trappers, confuse them by turning the chase onto them. He could handle bullets—the wounds would heal. At this point, Gillian’s might not.
He waited until he saw them in the clearing, maybe fifteen feet away, and he began to run. As he did, the earth beneath his feet shook. The air chilled and as the trappers descended, so did the dogs of hell. Shots rang out, and something caught him in the neck. It took Brother Wolf mere seconds to realize it was drugs, not bullets, and he cursed and tried to force himself to shift as the hellhounds passed him.
He tried to tell them to stand down but the tranquilizer was strong, had him wobbling, unable to shift. Hellhound didn’t understand wolf. All they understood was that they were supposed to keep Jinx safe. And that’s exactly what they did.
Through his position prone on the ground, he could see the way the hellhounds poised to rip the unsuspecting trappers to pieces. Three men who never stood a chance.
He was finally able to convince Brother that he should shift. It hurt like hell but he did it, managed, “No,” and the hellhounds whimpered but stopped. “Make . . . them . . . run.”
They did. The trappers had no idea that hounds of hell were at their heels but they knew something was after them and they ran for their lives.
Jinx lay on his back, staring up at the dark sky as his brother came up on him. “Gilly . . .”
“I’m here.” She moved closer, still holding the gun. “They’re gone.”
“I know.” He rolled over onto his side as Gillian told Rogue, “Help him, please.”
“Can’t take him back into the mansion,” he heard Rogue say and then someone—Jez—picked him up. He was vaguely aware of a rocking car ride, muttered something about deadheads being terrible drivers.
“Asshole wolf,” Jez told him, carried him up the stairs instead of taking the elevator without Jinx having to ask. So yeah, he owed the vamp.
“Gilly?”
“She’s with Rogue in the elevator—checking the apartment.”
“I think I can walk,” he mumbled but Jez didn’t listen, carrying him the entire way to his bedroom, where he laid Jinx on the bed and began to get supplies together.
“Gwen told me to run saline to get the drugs from your system,” he explained.
“You know how to do this?”
“I know how to find a vein,” Jez deadpanned and Jinx groaned and closed his eyes.
Cain, Cyd and Liam had been preparing for a night of patrols and meetings when they heard the ruckus. They’d run through the underground hallway that connected to the main mansion and burst into the living room in time to see the Dires headed out the window. Kate was following them and Cyd helped her out the window, picked her up and carried her to where everyone had gathered.
Cain passed him by when he smelled wereblood. Liam was right behind him. And now, minutes later, he was trying to process what he’d just seen.
Bigger than Dires. Blacker than night, foul smelling with glowing yellow eyes that looked more than other. Unworldly. And they were chasing the trappers through the woods.
It was obvious they could’ve caught them, ripped them to pieces. The question was, why didn’t they?
“What was that?” Gwen asked. She was shaken—they all were—but none of them could put a handle on exactly what they’d seen.
Vice was tracking whatever it was and nearly tripped over the bodies. “That’s why Jinx was running. He was trying to save Gillian.”
Cain came up behind him and knelt by the bodies. They were too far gone for anything, but he still passed a palm over both young wolves eyes to close them so they were no longer staring vacantly in death. “Things are getting more violent.”
They were. Nothing was as downright evil as when the weretrappers had both the Shimmin brothers in charge but since their deaths, the trappers had gone Wild West on all wolves.
Liam would be upset by this.
Stray and Killian were out there, both of them looking unhappy, and Killian more than a little disoriented as he sniffed the air. Cain’s wolf was pissed and confused, maybe more so by the fact that he hadn’t been allowed to help Jinx recently, and since that’s what he’d cut his teeth doing, he was lost out here. But only for a moment, because he’d gotten through his moon craze and was going to be the omega for Liam. He had other responsibilities, and he’d help Jinx whether the Dire wanted him to or not.
He approached Kate, who was staring off into space, hand on her chin. “You all right?”
“Not really. Rogue left with Jinx.”
“Do you think that’s a good thing?”
“It’s the best thing for now. Do you know what was in the woods?”
“I know of only one thing that makes tracks like this, but I’ve only seen pictures of it in books. Depictions, actually.” He stared down at the massive footprints again and back up at Kate. “These were made by hellhounds.”
Kate’s mouth opened and then closed. Finally, she said, “Do the others know?”
“I want to make sure before I open this up to them.”
“Rifter overheard Rogue saying they came to protect Jinx.”
“Why does he need protection from the Dires?” Cain asked, completely confused. He could feel the empathy coming off Kate in waves. She knew more than she was saying, probably because of her connection to Rogue when he’d been in the coma. There was a bond between them and he was grateful that at least someone knew what the hell was going on.
Finally, he said, “Jinx isn’t bad.”
