Broken (51 page)

I'd just finished identifying the raging
beast to the right as James, when Brandon stepped into the
light.

He looked like some kind of pagan god,
smeared all over with blood, an uneven circle drawn on his chest,
filled with sharp, angry lines that didn't mean anything to me, but
which made the wolves around me tense and growl.

"While I appreciate the sentiment, it really
is far too late to secure absolution by bringing me the girl."

His voice had changed, becoming deeper and
harsher, with elements that didn't sound like they could come from
any human throat. He stepped forward, and I felt my chest seize up.
The transformation I'd sensed the beginnings of at the dance, had
run its course now and any question as to why someone as cultured
as Brandon would associate with a near psychopath like Vincent were
put to rest.

He was shaking now, quivering with the need
to kill, and I realized that it didn't matter whether the darkness
inside Brandon had created Vincent, or just attracted him to orbit
in his sphere like a small moon. It was enough to know that
Vincent's was the lessor evil.

"Adri is here solely as a witness."

Alec's voice was huskier than normal, but
still carried most of its velvety perfection. As I looked at him, I
realized I wasn't feeling any power arching from him. Everything
centered on him now, but he wasn't adding to the storm. The wolves
behind Brandon growled as Alec stepped forward.

"Ah, and here I'd thought you'd once again
settled on a course of appeasement." Brandon's features were
hollow, almost skeletal in the harsh chemical light.

"No. We've come for one purpose and one only.
No more murdered hikers, no more convenient accidents. This ends
tonight."

Brandon somehow worked more mockery into a
simple clap than most of us could carry off with a full cast of
supporting actors.

"Always observing the old forms aren't you,
Alec. Well now it's time for a whole new batch."

One second Brandon was a human, the next he
was a huge monstrosity, a thing that normally dwelt in the bottom,
most primitive parts of the mind, venturing out only to star
prominently in nightmares.

The rush of power beat back at our entire
pack. If it'd been a physical wind it would've knocked me over.
Intangible or not, it still staggered me and only my grip on Jasmin
and Dom kept me from dropping to my knees.

Alec stood motionless for a pair of seconds,
and then seemed to explode and melt back into himself. I blinked,
and his human body had been replaced with the hybrid form that'd
saved my life once before.

Only this time he wasn't fighting wolves, he
was fighting another hybrid, and Brandon towered over him.

There was another ripple of movement on the
other side of the light. Jasmin and Dom both pulled away from me,
joining the other three, facing outward in preparation for the
inevitable attack.

Vincent's dark form inched slightly closer,
but Brandon's growl froze his henchman in place. The complete
stillness that resulted was suddenly shattered by a flash of heat
lightning off to the east, and when the spots cleared from my
vision, the two hybrids were a blur of motion.

Merely human eyes never could've hoped to
follow all of the action. I got the feeling Alec's technique was
superior. He seemed to move from spot to spot, motion to motion
with the smooth economy of a tree bending before the wind, but if
he was a tree, Brandon was the hurricane.

Flare-light reflected off of deadly claws,
and blood splattered the earth as Brandon drove Alec before him.
Gashes appeared on both leaders, wetly glistening in the green
light, but they were more numerous on Alec than on Brandon.

I expected the unseen plane to mirror the
fight I was so desperately trying to track with my inferior vision.
There should have been titanic clashes of power, ants marching up
and down my skin from being far too close to ground zero, but there
wasn't.

Brandon's energy beat down on Alec, beat down
on all of us, but although I could feel the answering flare of
power from the rest of the pack, Alec remained silent, dancing away
from the worst bursts of metaphorical death at the same time he
dodged Brandon's fangs.

The flares were almost dead, but there was
just enough light for me to see the smaller figure reel away from
the larger as a vicious slash sank home in Alec's chest. Time
stretched and pulled like taffy, and I seemed to have plenty of
time to watch Alec fall, to feel splatters of hot liquid even
standing so far away.

A scream ripped itself free from my throat,
and it suddenly seemed we really were caught up in a hurricane. As
the flares finally died their final death, the pulsing pressure,
the pins and needles disappeared as well. Only that wasn't quite
the term for it. The power, the energy that'd become more than
oppressive, was sucked towards Alec and Brandon, dragging with it
my strength, and the unnatural vitality of the rest of the
pack.

I felt a lance of pain sink into my back,
mirroring the jolt in my ankle, as all five shape shifters
collapsed around me. I knew with a certainty I was going to die,
that we were all going to die, but somehow that didn't matter. It
was only right that my existence cease within heartbeats of
Alec's.

Chapter 31

As the normal grogginess of sleep wore off, I
realized just how thirsty I was. I reached for a drink, hissing a
little as my stitches pulled against the still-healing skin, but
the glass of orange juice remained steadfastly just beyond my
fingertips.

Alec appeared immediately, paint speckled and
undeniably alive from where he'd been working in his studio. "I
really wish you'd just call for me when you need something. All of
this moving around isn't going to help your back heal any more
quickly."

"You're not letting your
injuries slow 
you
 down."

It was a losing argument, but I hated being
cooped up in bed all the time, and it was the only argument I had.
Alec paused for a second to look down at the long, thick bandage
wrapped around his middle. The gash of white cutting across his
darkly-tanned skin was uncomfortably similar to what I imagined his
wound must have looked like just after Brandon had inflicted
it.

He sighed, but there wasn't any real
frustration to the sound. "Our cases are hardly comparable. You
know just how much more quickly I heal than you do."

An upraised finger cut me off before I could
latch onto my last remaining point. "The fact that your injury was
less severe is really quite immaterial. Even the fact that shape
shifter inflicted wounds don't heal as quickly as normal for me is
really a small matter when compared to just how much blood you lost
before we got the bleeding staunched."

And there was the real rub. Alec was well on
his way to being fully healed, while I still had fits of dizziness
every time I tried to stand. I even had to have Jasmin or Dom help
me to the bathroom.

There was no good way to know how long I'd
lay there with a branch stuck through my back, but it'd been long
enough for even a relatively small wound to result in near fatal
blood loss. I'd been nearly unconscious from the pain, so I didn't
remember any of what had happened next, but Alec had reluctantly
filled in most of the details.

Apparently the stress of the fight had
finally awakened his potential, and his power was a real humdinger.
The metaphysical hurricane that'd knocked me to the ground had
actually been Alec pulling power from all of the shape shifters and
humans in the area.

The experience had been
nearly as overwhelming for Alec as it had been for the rest of us.
He'd recovered just in time to find Brandon grimly pulling himself
along on all fours. Luckily Alec had recovered more quickly, and
once Brandon was deprived of the strength and
speed 
his
 power had bestowed upon him, Alec had been more than a
match for him, even wounded and exhausted.

Brandon's end had been quick, and if Alec
hadn't realized my blood was slowly leaking out onto the ground,
the rest of Brandon's pack would've likewise been quickly sorted
out. Instead, Alec had stumbled over, shifted back to human form,
and got the bleeding slowed to a point where I wasn't in imminent
danger of death.

Unfortunately that'd been all the delay
Brandon's pack had needed to make a run for it. Isaac, James and
Jasmin were trying to track down the worst of the lot, the ones
who'd taken an active part in Brandon's atrocities, but it was slow
going.

Part of the job had been resolved when Cassie
and two other wolves had tried to circle around and attack the
estate. Luckily Isaac and the others had stumbled onto them. The
fight had been brief and bloody. None of our guys had escaped
unharmed, but they were all going to make a full recovery, and the
same couldn't be said for Cassie or the others.

I shivered a little at the thought, and Alec
looked up with concern on his face. "Do you need another
blanket?"

"No, I'm fine, just a little worried about
Jasmin and the boys."

Now he did frown. He wasn't excited that he
had to stay here instead of leading the tracking group. I
personally was glad he couldn't go along, and not just because it
was dangerous work. I wasn't positive he'd really come to terms
with having killed Brandon.

"They'll be fine. You need to worry about
getting better, and nothing else."

My pout met with just as much success as it
usually did. After a second or two I gave up and nodded.

"Ok, I promise to be good and concentrate on
getting better, if you'll come keep me company."

The flash of emotion, barely visible in
Alec's eyes was a source of hope and despair all at once.
Eagerness, desire. Both curbed by the same iron will that'd
continued fighting long past where most people would've given up
and died.

I patted the bed next to me, wincing slightly
as even that simple motion pulled on things that weren't meant to
be pulled on. He stared at me for several seconds, and then sat
down on the bed. I waited, and then when I was sure that was as
close as he planned on getting, I slid closer, resting my head on
his arm. As long as I was careful not to go too far, not to touch
too much of him, I could get away with that much.

His half-imagined sigh sent little trills of
satisfaction through me. He wasn't going to initiate contact. If I
didn't know with an absolute certainty that he wanted to be with
me, I would've despaired already. Still, Dominic had been right so
many days ago. Alec was worth it, and as long as he still loved me,
I was going to do my best to help him see that we belonged
together.

Human or shape shifter, homely or gorgeous,
none of that mattered. All that mattered is he made my heart beat
faster, and I could no longer imagine my life without him. I guess
you call that love.

--THE END--

Author’s Note:

In some ways it feels like I've been at this for
decades, in other ways it feels like I only just sat down to try
and put Adri's story down in words. Now that it's live, I can only
say that I hope you enjoyed it as much as I enjoyed writing it. If
you haven't read Torn yet, please go check it out. When I set out
to write Broken, I never expected that I was going to end up
writing the same story from Alec's point of view, but I'm pleased
with how both Broken and Torn have turned out, both individually
and as a combined work.

They are done in very different styles, but
ultimately that was exactly what I was after. I think there is
plenty of cross-over of guys reading paranormal romance, and girls
picking up more action-packed stories. Ultimately I think most of
us just want a compelling story, but sometimes the labels that get
applied to books get in the way of us discovering them, rather than
helping as they are meant to do.

I think one of the things that made the Harry Potter
books so successful was the fact that the whole family could share
in the series. I remember as Twilight came out thinking that there
were plenty of guys who would enjoy Twilight if they ever sat down
and read it, but most of them wouldn't ever give it a try. My hope
with Broken and Torn is that the two stories combine into something
that both guys and girls can enjoy. The girls are likely to start
out with Broken, while guys are likely to pick up Torn and enjoy
the extra action there. Either way, my biggest hope would be that
the guys can introduce their wives and girlfriends to Broken, and
the girls can introduce their husbands and boyfriends to Torn.

Lastly, if you've enjoyed Broken, please send me an
e-mail and tell me about your reading experience. You can find my
e-mail on my blog deanwrites.blogspot.com. While you're there,
please consider signing up for my mailing list. I promise not to
give away your contact information, and it will allow me to give
you a heads up when a new book is released. Not only that, I'll
occasionally send out freebies to the people who've signed up.

In the meantime, I've included excerpts for both
Torn and Splintered (the sequel for Broken and Torn) below.

Acknowledgments:

A big thanks to all of the fans who are doing so
much to help get the word out. There are tons of you that I don’t
know, but I do want to make special mention of a few dependable
souls that I’m very grateful to know, and who’ve helped in various
ways with Torn, and who I suspect will continue to go above and
beyond with Broken. Cassy & Mark, I’m glad you both turned out
to be story addicts just like me. Thanks for everything. Dad, not
everyone gets to be best friends with their parents. Thanks for all
of the feedback and the ongoing support. Mimi, thanks for sticking
with me long enough to get addicted and to fix some of my biology
facts along the way. As always, Katie deserves special thanks.
Without her, Alec and Adri’s story never would have seen the light
of day.