Half Wolf (18 page)

This guy wasn’t crazed like the Were in the library, Michael noted. That didn’t help matters. Intelligence was hard to work around in criminals bent on utter destruction of the things others held sacred.

“Why is that?” Michael asked, feeling his claws press against the inside of his fingertips, just seconds from his own big reveal. “You have no respect for the rights of others?”

“We’re passing through,” the Were announced. “Here and gone.” He blew out a breath to mimic a fast-moving rush of air and added, “Plenty of harm, and no foul.”

“What do you want?”

“Fun.”

“You can have fun elsewhere.”

“Are you kicking us out, Alpha Dog?” the Were taunted.

“As a matter of fact, if you come any closer, I’d love to give you the boot.”

“That would be hard when it’s two against one.”

“Piece of cake,” Michael said as his claws slid through the skin that had hidden them, causing no more discomfort than a light, familiar sting.

“How did he do that?” the other Were asked his partner with a ring of surprise in his tone.

“Fancy trick,” the Were on Michael’s right concluded. “Special effects.”

Michael smiled. He couldn’t help it. Shit was raining down on Clement, and here two of those jokers stood.

“Okay,” he said, fed up with everything that embodied the word
nasty.
“Let’s do this.”

The Were on his right took a moment to process what Michael meant. Then he came at Michael with the force of a battering ram, snarling like a rabid dog, head down, fists raised. Inspired by that, the other Were joined in.

Michael swung his arms, wielding his claws like blades, getting in a few good strikes that sliced Were hides and made rivers of blood. Fatigued beyond belief from the night’s events, he wanted to hold off a shape-shift for as long as possible, fearing that shift would take longer than usual and leave him momentarily vulnerable to these two greedy trespassers.

The fact that neither of these guys had weapons made things easier in an uneven playing field. Brawn was the universal calling card of Chavez’s creatures, Dylan had told him. Though one of these Weres had shown a glimmer of intelligence, they were basically nothing more than fighting machines.

He took three hits to the chest that sent him spiraling backward, and rebounded. He had sent the pack home a few minutes too early, and could have used some backup of his own. These Weres had been trained by a master. The stronger they were, the longer they would last in Chavez’s world.

However, Michael was no newbie to the fighting scene. His father’s pack had taught him well. Working wood all day honed his muscle and kept him in tip-top shape. Being physical was what he liked.
The more opponents, the better.

“Beasts like you threaten Were anonymity and place innocent people in danger,” he said, rallying for another strike. “You have gone after a friend of mine, and I cannot allow that kind of behavior to continue.”

He fought with all his strength and the fluid grace built into Lycan bloodlines—dodging blows, ducking flailing arms and returning to deliver his own brand of trouble. In this Lycan dance, he avoided real harm as the fight went on, with no one giving up or giving in.

Suddenly, there was another presence added to this skirmish, coming in from street side at high speed. For a moment, Michael was worried about those changed odds. But when a familiar voice said, “Need some help, Michael?” he could have kissed the Miami cop, Dylan’s pack-mate Adam Scott, square on the mouth.

The intruders didn’t seem to appreciate losing their advantage. Howling through human throats, they fought with all their might, no match for two of Clement’s defenders. In the end, both rogues turned their battered bodies around and sprinted in the opposite direction, with Michael and Adam close on their heels.

The idiots ran straight toward the shimmering veil stretched between the trees, seeming not to notice the density of that particular spot. They hit that black curtain at full speed, one after the other...and disappeared. Poof. Gone.

Michael grabbed Adam’s shirt and hauled the cop to a standstill. Adam hadn’t seen this anomaly. He had not heard the suggestions about its origins, and therefore could not possibly have understood what happened to the rogues.

There was no sign of them at all.

“What the hell?” Confused, Adam scanned the dark spot in front of him.

Before Michael could explain, a rolling ground tremor staggered them both. The black curtain wavered. A flash of light brightened the area, nearly turning night to day ahead of schedule.

Through that curtain came a projectile of bones, tossed by invisible hands back into the world Michael lived and breathed in. Those bones, Michael knew by scent, were the remains of the two rogues who had dared to trespass where they were unwanted.

Michael met Adam Scott’s eyes with a startled look that said
You might have missed something important.

“You think?” Adam returned.

Chapter 20

“K
aitlin? You all right?”

She recognized Dylan’s civilized scent of aftershave and laundered shirts without having to see that Michael had sent reinforcements to watch over her. She had been going after the curious visitor, and had made it only as far as Michael’s small front room.

The strange visitor in her doorway had left her feeling out of place and hollow inside, when tucked inside her was a wolf, all curled up and readying for its next appearance. She had no idea how to set that wolf free. Possibly some things happened according to a preordained plan, like Michael’s wolf calling to hers. Becoming a wolf had been like a sexual response to Michael’s nearness.

“He will be back soon,” Dylan said, appearing from around a corner.

For a minute, she wondered if the visitor had been Dylan, realizing that Dylan would have spoken back to her.

“Michael is in trouble,” she said. “And I’m grounded by a promise to behave.”

“You would go to help him if you could?” Dylan asked.

“Why haven’t you?” Kaitlin countered.

“Michael wanted to be alone. This is his area, and I am his guest. I’m obligated to follow his wishes.”

“Yes. He said Weres have rules.”

“Rules keep us civilized, at least on the surface.”

“And below that surface?”

“We’re not always quite so obliging.”

Kaitlin studied the handsome Miami Were, whose features were as chiseled as Michael’s, but whose scent wasn’t the one she craved. “Michael can handle himself,” she said.

Dylan agreed. “I’m sure he is capable of handling most of the things that come his way.”

Did that reply contain an underlying message about Michael being unable to handle his affection for her? Should she feel guilty about that?

“And,” Dylan said, “Adam is out there tonight.”

Adam would help Michael. That news brought relief.

“Michael asked you to watch over me?”

“He is concerned.”

“Are you older than Michael? I get that impression, no matter how much courtesy about adhering to a neighbor’s wishes passes between you.”

“Older by a few years. Nevertheless, age has nothing to do with how we treat an Alpha in a different territory.”

“I see.” She was beginning to view the shape of more of the rules these Weres lived by. “And the bad ones? The bad Weres? Like the old clichés, they are evil and ignorant?”

Dylan said, “Some of them merely choose to ignore the things the rest of us believe are good for Weres as a whole.”

“Does that apply to the guy you chased here?”

“Unfortunately, Chavez is the worst of the lot. He kills Weres and humans alike, going out of his way to do so.”

“Weres never kill other Weres?”

“Not if they want to live for very long among us.”

Kaitlin leaned against the wall. “You police your own kind?”

“Seems like every damn day.”

She saw that Dylan was tired, and changed the subject. “On your way in, did you pass the guy who left here?”

Dylan’s eyes met hers with a strong, intense gaze. “Someone was here?”

“Yes. Minutes ago.”

“Who?”

“I don’t know. Whoever it was didn’t speak to me, but left when I asked him to, so I figured he had to be all right. One of the good guys.”

“Scent?”

“I couldn’t tell. Maybe I’m not ready to detect some of the nuances.”

She witnessed a flash of apprehension in Dylan’s eyes. “Well,” he said. “Can’t be too bad, then, if whoever it was behaved.”

She might not have been one hundred percent up on scent, and yet Kaitlin sensed Dylan was lying about his thoughts on that. Like Michael, Dylan didn’t want to frighten or upset her further. He tried not to overtly sniff the air in order to get a whiff of her visitor, but the action was uniquely Were and hard to camouflage.

Dylan’s long fair hair swept across his shoulder, almost platinum in color. His eyes were light. His skin was a mild golden tan. All the Weres she had met were beautiful. She wondered if all the bad guys would look like the fiend in the library, and also wondered how much these friendly Weres knew about the depth of her feelings for Michael, her growing ability to read other Weres and what had gone on tonight when she and Michael were alone.

“I’m aware of most of what goes on around me, as most Lycans are,” Dylan said. “I’m not here to point a finger at anyone, for any reason, since my mate was human not all that long ago.”

Dylan offered her a brilliant smile and a further explanation. “Reading other Weres is a degree of telepathy that saves us a lot of time and repeated conversations. That ability is stronger when we’re in wolf shape, though it never disappears completely.”

He smiled again—a nice, earnest smile. Charming.

“Your mate,” Kaitlin said. “If she was human, doesn’t that mean you broke the rules?”

“It means exactly that,” Dylan replied. “Some of us have found that love usually wins in the end, and over everything else.”

He waved a hand at the room. “Now, would you like to share something to eat, or do I really have to earn my keep by avoiding the kitchen?”

“Earn your keep by keeping me in your sight?”

“That was the task assigned to me. However, if I don’t get something to eat soon, we’ll have to worry about my partner, Dana, coming here to see that I do.”

“She keeps tabs on you?”

Dylan grinned. “I wouldn’t have it any other way.”

Kaitlin looked to the door. “Capable or not, Michael might get hurt out there.”

“I doubt a Were or two can get the better of a Michael and Adam team. Michael seems to have a good handle on what goes on around here.”

“Does that include the mysterious black curtain in the park?”

“Do you know something pertinent about that?”

“It doesn’t scare me the way the vampires do.”

“That’s curious, since it rubs everyone else the wrong way.” Dylan glanced over his shoulder. “Can you tell me anything else about your visitor here tonight?”

“Afraid not, other than that the room seemed cooler when he was in the doorway, as though he’d left the front door open.”

“You said
he.
The visitor was male?”

“That’s just the impression I was left with.” She pointed to Dylan’s nose. “What do you perceive?”

He didn’t have to reply, Kaitlin supposed, but he did. “There’s a lingering scent of nature. Trees. Flowers. And straw. No species I know of smells like that.”

Another chill wafted over Kaitlin. Those were the same things she had smelled. Trees. Grass. Open spaces. She had dreamed of those things, and had placed Michael in the dreams. The fact that Dylan had sniffed them out and, as experienced as he was, didn’t have a conclusion to the question of who those scents belonged to, was disconcerting.

Expecting more of an inquisition from this tall blond Were, Kaitlin was surprised when she didn’t get one.

“Do you think you might find the kitchen while I have one more look around?” Dylan asked.

“Then we can have a nice chat at the table while bad guys and vampires threaten the town?” she volleyed.

“The first thing to learn about vampires,” Dylan explained calmly, “is that daylight isn’t their friend. That much, Hollywood got right. As for the other bad guys, we have that covered for now, and will remain vigilant.”

Kaitlin glanced to a shuttered window. Dawn had a distinct taste that coated the back of her tongue. Daybreak wasn’t too far away, and she couldn’t wait to see the sun.

“Hell of a day,” Dylan agreed. “Michael will be back shortly. For now, we do the best we can to ensure that we’ll be ready if a call to action comes. That readiness includes fuel. So, how about it? Kitchen?”

Kaitlin closed her eyes. “I can’t.”

“You’d be surprised by what the smell of a good sandwich can do. If that won’t entice you, it would be nice if you’d keep me company until my friends arrive.”

“All right,” she conceded. “I can rustle something up for you. I need to keep busy. I hope you’re not disappointed though.”

“In the company?”

“In my lack of kitchen skills.”

* * *

“It’s not so easy to hide a pile of bones,” Adam Scott said, staring at the heap of them on the grass. “I guess we could always throw these back.”

“They did this in seconds,” Michael mused. “Unless they have a different sense of time than we have, and the two time frames don’t align. That’s about as possible as anything else that’s gone on here tonight.”

Adam kicked at a femur bone with the toe of his boot. “Dylan mentally included me in your earlier conversation, Michael. I just wasn’t sure where this thing was. Another layer of the world was how one of your friends described this place, right? I have to admit that it’s been a long time since I personally have encountered something completely new.”

“As a cop, I thought you’d have seen it all.”

“More than I would have cared to see, believe me. But the real world has nothing on the supernatural one. That’s where the truly interesting stuff is.”

Adam absently touched his scar before continuing. “I thank whoever counts as being thankable that most of the people in this world don’t yet know what goes on beneath their focus.”

Michael pointed to Adam’s scar. “Chavez did that?”

“Not himself personally. The wily bastard put me in the ring with a bunch of hyped-up, drugged-up, drooling monsters. That was my first sight of werewolves, my first inkling that they existed. It was also my crude initiation into the moon’s cult.”

Michael shuddered to think of how that had gone down. “You survived.”

“Tory, whom I had met prior to that incident, raced to the rescue and called in the good guys. That’s how I lived to see another day.”

“And your life changed,” Michael said.

“Yes.” Adam’s hand dropped from the scar on his face. “While a maniac named Chavez got away.”

Adam moved another bone with his foot. “Got a big bag handy? There are a lot of bones, and I’m guessing we can’t just leave them here.”

“We can wrap some of the bones in my shirt.” Michael began to unbutton as he studied the black curtain. “I don’t suppose we can thank whoever is back there for taking care of these two idiots, or that they’d want to hear anything from a couple of werewolves.”

“I don’t suppose they would,” Adam agreed. “This might have another meaning altogether, you know.”

“A warning? Our visitors showing us an example of what they can do?”

“We can’t rule it out.”

“Then why don’t they come here and finish us?” Michael asked.

“Who’s to say they won’t if we stand here long enough?”

When nothing jumped out at them to make that suggestion a reality, Michael spoke again. “You can take the bones back and dispose of them. I’m not leaving this spot, in case some unsuspecting human stumbles in.”

“What if it stays here permanently?”

“We’d have to post a red flag. Seriously, I don’t think it will remain.”

“You think this, why?”

“Sooner, rather than later, we’re going to have to find out exactly what it is, and what they want. We’re going to have to deal.”

“By bringing Kaitlin here?”

Michael opened his shirt. “If I have to.”

“Okay.” Adam looked down. “I’ll cart some of these things away. You can bring the rest with you.”

They kept their eyes on the black curtain as they scooped up the bones that made the bad-guy tally two less than before, hoping this would cramp Chavez’s style. When they were done Michael sensed yet another Were’s approach. Adam didn’t have to intervene. This scent was now familiar to Michael.

“Go,” Tory said to Michael with her eyes on Adam, the mate she had played a big part in rescuing, much in the same way Michael had rescued Kaitlin.

Tory understood longings and needs. She also had seen what Kaitlin could do to a glow factor. No doubt she had been listening in on the Were hotline and heard about what they were facing here, as well.

“Go to Kaitlin. I’ll stay here,” she said, waving a hand to ward off any protest. “Perhaps, if hybrids aren’t their cup of tea, they’ll like me. If not, I hope whatever comes out of that black hole tastes good.”

There was something to be said about a tough Lycan female with a sense of humor, Michael decided as he helped Adam hoist the detritus of a branch of their bloodline that had gone bad.

He would have liked to spend downtime with all of these Miami Weres, and vowed to do that one day if things in Clement got settled. He would take Kaitlin, as Tory suggested. Having already met three members of that pack, Kaitlin might be at ease among them. Since Tory and Adam were accepted by the others in the Landau compound, he and Kaitlin also stood a chance. It seemed that the Miami pack didn’t mind too much about breaking old Lycan rules.

He’d also take Rena, Cade and Devlin. He would see his father after two long years spent in Clement, which he told his father were designed to form a small pack of his own.

He had chosen misfits for his pack-mates—humans who had been bitten and turned and now were in need of a family. He had helped to ground Rena, Dev and Cade, explaining about the species they were now part of. That had turned out well. He had found a home among them.

“Is Tory this fearless and formidable all the time?” he asked Adam as the street came into view.

When Adam smiled, Michael took that for a yes.

* * *

“I have questions,” Kaitlin said to Dylan. “Before Michael gets here.”

Her bones still ached. Being in Michael’s house gave her feelings of comfort that she feared might not last long if there was going to be a war between species in Clement. Daylight, arriving soon and welcomed, would eventually turn into night, with more action for the pack and more surprises for her.

She was sorry she used to think that school was boring.

“Wouldn’t it be better for Michael to hear what you want to ask?” Dylan said.

He laced his fingers together, which seemed to her such a normal thing for a werewolf as powerful as Dylan was to do. He had polished off the sandwich they had made in record time. Weres had fast metabolisms, Michael had told her not long ago. She had made Dylan another sandwich, and toyed with her own.