Reno clearly hadn’t been joking when he spoke cryptically about wolves and alpha powers.
But Dallas didn’t have time to reflect as he continued to run circles around the mercenaries, and a second later, the big white wolf appeared at his side, keeping up with him.
“Told ya I’d be right behind,” Reno said, light-blue eyes even lighter in his wolf form as they continued to draw fire.
“They’re trying to capture a basilisk.” Out in the clearing, he could see the big tattooed man tossing mercenaries left and right, his eyes glowing red in anger as they attempted to suppress him with electric shocks and tranquilizer darts.
Not good.
“What?” Reno said, aghast.
“When are the others getting here?” Dallas ducked behind a row of vehicles, catching three people off guard and whopping them away easily with the pads of his tiger paw.
“They’re coming, but Dragonclaw’s a fair distance, even flying—Whoa!” Something like a grenade exploded nearby. “You told me these guys were assassins, not a fucking army!”
Dallas peered over the cars to get a better look at the commotion in the clearing.
Oh no.
The man—or basilisk—in the rags looked like he’d finally had it, and as the people around him ran in terror, he was starting to shift into an enormous, red-eyed, pissed basilisk.
“Friend angry. Must help,” a familiar voice said suddenly from Dallas’s side.
The man with the red and blue eyes was there, standing next to them, acting like everything was fine and not going to hell. But both his irises were glowing brighter than before.
“Who the fuck is this?” Reno growled, but Dallas was used to this man’s ability to appear and reappear all the time already.
“Can you stop him?” Dallas asked. “Hold him off long enough to get my mate to safety?”
The man nodded just as he leaped up onto an overturned SUV. “Yes.”
Then he leaped just as shimmering sparkles filled the air around him and a loud hum resounded in Dallas’s ears.
And as quickly as Dallas had seen Harrison or Beck shift, the man turned into a titanic basilisk, and he charged through a line of vehicles, sending people flying backward, making for his red-eyed “friend” in the clearing who looked moments away from crushing everything in sight.
Thankfully, Dallas could still see Mel hidden at the far end in her vehicle, peering over the dashboard as the two titans clashed, making the ground shake and sending people falling onto their knees from the impact.
“That’s our cue. Me left, you right,” Dallas commanded, and Reno just nodded as they bolted for the main area at the center, using the distraction as the basilisks fought to their advantage.
He couldn’t draw the Blackhearts away, or they could threaten the townspeople. Or worse, come back and try this all over again.
Mel’s gorgeous face was in the back of Dallas’s mind, the need to love her, to protect her, surging through his veins as he leaped into the middle of several dozen people and cougars, prepared to give everything he had in defense of his mate.
Cougars and humans turned to Dallas in unison, their attention all on him. Then, in the split second before he became tiger stew, Reno crashed through the other side where the mercenaries hadn’t been watching, sending cars rolling and people screaming for their lives.
The cougar shifters didn’t run or back away, though, years of training making them experienced fighters. Dallas leaped to fight them off as Reno worked his way through anyone and everything caught sandwiched between the two rampaging shifters.
Two cougars snarled and jumped for Dallas, and he swiped both of them with a long arc of his talons, then whirled on a third creeping from behind and chomped down on its neck until it hissed in surrender.
And in the midst of the melee, Dallas’s eyes searched for Madsen, knowing him by scent even though he’d never seen the elusive leader of the Blackhearts himself. But if they were going to stop this madness, they had to make sure he didn’t get away.
Above them, the friendly basilisk with two different eye colors rammed into the other basilisk he’d called friend, and the other sent huge spikes flying toward him in retaliation.
Together, Dallas and Reno made quick work of the mercenaries amassed at the center of the blockade, ducking and biting and dodging and clawing until anything that was still moving was either running, unconscious, or cowering on the ground in fear.
Nearby, one SUV made to escape, tires squealing as it pulled away, when suddenly another one came crashing into it, slamming the side and stopping it in its tracks.
And in the front seat, Dallas saw Mel, pumping her fist victoriously.
She opened her door and nearly tumbled out of her seat, a little dizzy from the impact, but Dallas was there to catch her in an instant, using his big body to keep her up.
“Couldn’t let them get away, now could I?” she exclaimed.
Just as she finished, a tall man with a black coat fell out of the driver’s side of the car Mel had just rammed, and he leaped to his feet, hoping to run.
But Reno cut him off, grabbing him by the scruff of his jacket and dragging him backward.
“You were supposed to stay safe,” Dallas said, body humming with happiness at just the nearness of his true mate.
He’d never let her out of his sight again.
“Yeah, well, I couldn’t let you guys have all the fun. And I was safe, right where I was supposed to be.” She turned and nuzzled against his fur, and they shared a moment together as the basilisk fighting seemed to be slowing far away from them.
They both looked, and Dallas saw their basilisk friend pushing the other raging beast backward, away from the town and the rest of them. They roared at each other as if only they could understand what was being said.
Reno got their attention. “Uh… guys?”
The three of them turned to see
