Bodyguard (Shifters Unbound #2.5) (18 page)

Or so he thought, until his lieutenant's cell
phone quietly rang and the man stepped into a corner to answer it.
The lieutenant returned and whispered into Pablo's ear.

Pablo stopped.
Julio
. Son of a . .
.

"Problem?" the smuggler said. He had a reedy
voice but quiet strength behind it.

"No," Pablo said in a reassuring tone. "At
least not for you." He gave him a wry look. "Family."

"Ah. I understand." The man's light blue gaze
didn't waver. "Why don't you take care of that? I'll be back to
talk later."

Which meant Pablo would probably never see
him again. The smuggler wouldn't like any indication that Pablo's
operation was the least bit unstable, which could equal said
smuggler not getting paid. Even an unruly little brother could
upset a touchy shipment.
Shit
.

But Pablo couldn't sit here and beg like a
little girl for the man not to go. He nodded, pretending everything
was cool. "Sure. You have my number. You let me know."

The man nodded. He held out a hand, and
Pablo, his wrist still in a bandage, shook it.

The smuggler walked away, his thugs closing
around him, and Pablo knew that was the last he'd see of him. He
turned to his lieutenant. "Damn that little shit. Where did he take
him? Where are they?"

*** *** ***

Ronan stripped off next to the middle ring
half an hour later, but there was no sign of his opponent.
Elizabeth held his clothes, hiding her nervousness. She was good at
that, when she needed to be. Her courage made him warm with pride.
Ronan's lips were a bit raw from kissing her outside, but he didn't
mind. He hoped he'd have a chance to make them rawer later.

When the crowd parted to let through a large
male Shifter, surrounded by Julio's bodyguards, Spike said behind
Ronan, "Aw, crap."

"What?" Elizabeth asked. "What's wrong with
him?"

So many things. First, the Shifter wasn't
wearing a Collar. Second, the bodyguards weren't protecting the
Shifter--they were keeping him penned so he wouldn't start fighting
everyone he laid his bloodshot eyes on. Third, the man stank like
holy hell.

"He's a feral," Ronan said.

"Feral?" Elizabeth's eyes widened. "What do
you mean,
feral
?"

Spike answered. "It means his animal side is
close to taking over." He wrinkled his once-broken nose. "The first
thing to go is bathing."

"His animal side?" Elizabeth asked. "Because
he's not wearing a Collar?"

"Anyone can go feral, with or without a
Collar," Ronan said. "But it's harder with a Collar, because it
tends to shock sense into you."

"We lived for centuries without Collars,"
Sean said, sounding grim. "And we never needed them to keep us
tame. Seems nowadays, though, that most of the Shifters who refused
to take the Collar are feral or heading that way."

"Great," Elizabeth said. "So not only is he
feral, but he's angry because other Shifters let themselves be
Collared?"

"She's got it," Spike said.

"Ronan, you can't fight him," Elizabeth said
quickly. "Without a Collar, he has all the advantage."

"Too late," Ronan said. He touched her face
and gave her one last, firm kiss. "I've fought ferals before,
Lizzie. I can do this. This is my job."

Elizabeth looked up at him, eyes luminous,
but she closed her mouth and nodded. Her expression told him,
however, that she'd prefer to knock him on the head and drag him
back home, and would have if she'd been able.

Shifter fights had few rules, Spike had said.
Shifters could fight in whatever form they wanted, and shift back
and forth during the fight if they felt like it. The only hard and
fast rules were: no weapons of any kind--they couldn't hold
anything at all, in fact; the fighters had to stay within the
circle; and they had to fight, without rounds, until the refs
decided that one Shifter was down so far it would be
life-threatening for him to continue. The one who wasn't half-dead
was declared the winner.

Ronan didn't recognize four of the five
Shifters who stepped in to referee, but he rarely went to the other
Shiftertowns in the area. He'd bet that Julio had instructed these
refs to let the fight carry on past the point of no return.

Julio's bodyguards fell back, and the feral
stepped into the ring. He rose to his full human height and fixed
his red eyes on Ronan before he shifted.

The feral changed smoothly, almost
effortlessly, and landed on all fours as a large Alaskan gray
wolf.

The thing was huge. Ronan had met wolf
Shifters in his area of Alaska, but he and the wolves had given
each other a respectful distance. This wolf had lost respect for
everything a long time ago.

Spike was spouting advice. "You can do this,
Ronan. Don't try to take him down quickly--he's got the advantage
of speed at the first, but you have the advantage of stamina. He'll
wear down a long time before you will. Then you've got him."

Ronan nodded, but he had his own ideas. He
stepped into the ring, staying human, and nodded to the refs that
he was ready.

"What are you doing?" Elizabeth asked behind
him. "Why don't you shift?"

"You can't talk to him once he's in the
ring," he heard Spike say in the relative hush. "But you can yell
for him all you want."

The quiet lasted another few seconds, then
Elizabeth's shout sounded loud and clear.

"Kick
his ass, Ronan!
"

The crowd burst into sudden cacophony. Half
the Shifters and groupies around them were taking the feral's side,
or at least betting on him, but plenty shouted for Ronan. He was
popular in the Austin Shiftertown.

Elizabeth's voice gave Ronan strength. She
was the mate of his heart, and once he disposed of this effing
feral and got rid of the rest of her problems, he would make her
understand that.

Meanwhile, he stood, in his human form, and
waited to see what the feral wolf would do.

The Lupine circled him, growling, hackles
raised. Ronan turned with him, keeping his face to the wolf's.

The Lupine would try to goad Ronan into
attacking first. But Ronan's Collar wouldn't go off as quickly if
Ronan remained on the defensive. With any luck, Ronan could take
down the Lupine before the Collar emitted more than a couple of
sparks.

Not
gonna happen,
something
inside him said. This was going to be a nasty, brutal fight, and
Julio had known it would be.

He was aware of Sean, behind him, fading into
the crowd. He and the rest of the trackers were here to keep tabs
on Julio and find Casey, who must be around somewhere. Dylan being
here wasn't a coincidence. Sean had not been surprised to find
Dylan at the fights, but to find him actually fighting.

Ronan had planned to use the fight to
distract Julio, but Julio was using the fight to distract Ronan.
Ronan had to trust his friends now to take care of the periphery
for him while he concentrated on the matter at hand.

Killing the feral.

Meanwhile, the feral was gearing up to kill
Ronan.

To
the death? So be it.

The Lupine suddenly launched himself straight
at Ronan. Ronan opened his big arms and let him come.

The wolf landed against Ronan's chest, claws
digging into human skin. Ronan endured it for the few seconds it
took him to shift.

The Lupine now found himself inside the grip
of a two-ton Kodiak bear.

The crowd went crazy. Ronan had told
Elizabeth that he'd been nervous with all the Shifters watching him
when he'd first come to Austin. Now he had to ignore a hundred
Shifters surrounding him and shouting for blood. He made himself
shut them out and focus on the wolf.

Ronan's strength was, well, his strength, and
he used it to crush the feral between his huge paws. The Lupine
twisted, and faster than Ronan could have guessed he'd be able to,
tore himself out of Ronan's grasp. The Lupine landed on his feet,
mouth open as he leapt for Ronan's throat.

Ronan roared, paws coming out to stop the
leap, but the wolf moved like smoke to close on Ronan and sink his
teeth into Ronan's neck. Ronan shook himself like a dog, but the
Lupine held on, his body flopping.

The crowed shouted, and Elizabeth cried his
name. The sound of her voice galvanized him. Ronan grabbed the wolf
and yanked him away, feeling his own fur and flesh come away in the
Lupine's teeth.

The wolf landed on all fours. Ronan rose up
on his hind legs, roaring again, fur rising on his ruff, a Kodiak
at his most intimidating.

Ronan came down and charged the wolf. Ronan's
Collar sparked, but his fury didn't let him feel it. He went for
the wolf, who suddenly wasn't in the spot he'd occupied a second
ago.

The bastard could
move
. Ronan swung
around. The wolf was waiting, but evidently thought Ronan's bulk
would slow him more than it did. Ronan's blow caught him on the
side of the head, even as the wolf danced aside.

The watchers roared. The noise swelled louder
and louder, until Ronan could hear nothing but it and the crackling
of his Collar. He ran at the wolf again, who was feinting and
snapping. Ronan's animal was taking over, lust for the kill
overcoming all reason, but the human part of him still felt the
Collar.

This
is going to hurt like a
bitch,
was Ronan's last coherent thought before he charged.

* * * * *

Chapter Fifteen

Pablo Marquez heard the noise of the fighting
long before he reached the barn at the top of the hill, the edgy
roar of people in a blood frenzy.

He and his four bodyguards had had to park at
the end of a long line of cars on the dirt road and hike up to the
door of the huge barn. A massive number of people and Shifters
crowded around one of the rings inside, no other fights going
on.

A large Shifter stepped in his path. Pablo
recognized him as one of the Shifters who'd come to the body shop,
the black-haired one called Nate. "No weapons," Nate said. "You
gotta leave your guns in your car."

Rules of the fight clubs. But the space
between Pablo's shoulder blades was itching, a sign he'd always
learned to heed. His instincts had saved his ass more than once. At
the moment, they were telling him to keep his gun close at hand.
"We're not going in," he said to Nate. "Just tell me who's
fighting."

"A bear called Ronan, and a feral Lupine.
Don't know his name."

Mother of God. What was Julio
doing
?
"Stop the fight. The Lupine's mine."

Nate narrowed his eyes. "Shifters fight by
their choice, not for someone else."

"Yeah, well, that Shifter's insane and
doesn't know what he's doing. My brother's running him, and he has
no right to. The Shifter belongs to me."

Nate didn't move, but Pablo felt the man's
anger like a cold front. "No one owns a Shifter."

"My brother thinks he does. Stop the damn
fight."

"It's against the rules."

"Cristo
." Pablo started to say more,
but he sensed, rather than saw, shadows under the trees to the left
of the barn. He signaled his guards to follow and noticed,
distractedly, that the Shifter faded back inside the barn, out of
sight.

"Julio," Pablo said as he approached his
younger brother. "What the hell do you think you're doing?"

His brother detached himself from a fairly
large group of men, some Latino, some white. "Oh, good," Julio
said. "I was hoping you'd come."

"
Idiota
. You cost me the biggest deal
I was ever going make in this town. To do what? Run my Shifter and
try to get back at that girl? Let it go. If you make me lose the
bail money because you do something stupid, I will beat you until
you can't stand."

"You're running scared from
Shifters
,
man," Julio said, his voice filled with disgust. "You backed down
from them. You let them do what they wanted."

"I didn't back down because I was scared, you
shit. I've learned how to weigh risk with reward. The risks in this
case are too great, and I'm not going to get a big reward going up
against a bunch of Shifters."

"Whatever, man. It's another way to say you
let them walk all over you. I think you aren't strong enough for
this business now. So I'm taking it."

"Don't be such a dumb-ass." Pablo glanced at
the white man who had a big, shining Sig in a holster under his
jacket. "Who the hell is this?"

Julio started to speak, but the man
forestalled him. "The name's Casey. Zach Casey. I don't really give
a damn which of you wins this family spat, but Julio says if he
wins it, I get my girlfriend back. Thanks for finding her."

Pablo looked him up and down in impatience.
Another person who couldn't cut their losses. Elizabeth Chapman, or
Rachel Sullivan, whatever you wanted to call her, had left this
S.O.B. six years ago. Move on, already.

Julio had his hand on his holster. "You were
the dumb-ass to come out here, bro," he said to Pablo. "All I had
to do was have one of Zach's crew call you and tell you I was
running your feral in the fights, and you came charging out here to
stop me. So let's talk."

"Yeah, let's," Pablo said. "Somewhere a
little more private."

"Fine by me." Julio nodded at one of his
crew. "Take his gun."

The guy stepped forward. Pablo didn't move,
but he didn't have to. His own men got in front of him, ready for a
fire fight.

Julio didn't look as afraid as he should
have. "If you come fight for me," he said to Pablo's men, "I'll let
you work for me on the same terms as you did for Pablo. If not,
I'll shoot you alongside him. You're outnumbered. You want to die
tonight?"

Pablo knew full well that most of his crew
worked for him for money. There was some friendship, sure; but in
the long run, they worked for Pablo because he paid them well. What
surprised him was not that two of the men immediately went over to
join Julio and Zach, but that two of them stayed.