Styx's Storm (12 page)

"It's a very nice thought though." He shrugged as Storme collapsed in exhaustion, hatred still spilling through her as she regarded him with a bitter sneer.

"Jonas, you're no' helping matters," Styx muttered, her lungs laboring as she fought to breathe through the panic assailing her.

"I'm not trying to help matters, Wolf." Irritation filled his voice as Storme kicked once again at the Breed holding her. "You're not going to be able to reason with her. Do you smell the terror rolling off her? She's beyond reason, Styx."

"Enough, Jonas."

She was not beyond reason. She was never beyond humanity.

"There's no reasoning with you," she sobbed, coming halfway off the bed to slap at the Breed holding her, only to have him push her back once again. "You're animals. Rabid, vicious animals that know nothing but killing. Nothing but death."

"Because we were given nothing but death." Styx was suddenly in her face, his lips pulled back from his teeth, canines sharp and wicked, snapping mere inches from her. "Your father helped create us. Your brother helped train us. We were given nothing but death, horror and pain, and you expect us to lie back and politely ask for more?"

"I expect you not to kill those helping you," she screamed.

"Call another Breed an animal again in front of me, and as God is my witness I will paddle your ass red." Those teeth snapped again. "You have no fear of death from me, you vicious little wretch. What you should fear though is being treated as the child you appear to be."

He released her.

Storme stared up at him in shock as he stood next to the bed, staring down at her as though he were no more than irritated over a child's antics.

"Dr. Armani's coming up the drive now, Styx," Jonas announced, the clear amusement in his voice drawing another glare from her. "You might want to get her out of those jeans before she gets here. I'd hate for Nikki to have to suffer those quick little feet for doing a good deed."

He didn't say a word. Before Storme could fight back, he tore apart the snap and zipper of her jeans, and before she could do more than rasp out a shocked "What ...," the jeans were coming off her legs, only to come to a stop at her boots.

Gripping the hem of the denim, she fought to cover the fact that she was completely naked beneath the jeans as he gripped one foot then the other and within seconds jerked the boots from her feet.

There was no way to fight him.

Furious tears rolled down her cheeks as she tried, only to find every move she made completely ineffective against him.

He didn't speak, he didn't argue with her, and he didn't demand she undress. He simply undressed her, as though she were the child he had accused her of being and he was tired of arguing the matter.

Storme found herself jerking the blanket from the bottom of the bed to cover the nakedness of her lower body as she sat on the mattress, glaring up at him with all the ineffective fury and fear that had ever raced through her system.

"Someone needs to do something about the stink of her fear," Jonas sighed. "Should I give her a reason to be afraid, do you think?"

"Shut up, Jonas." The muttered order drew Storme's gaze back to the irritated Wolf Breed that watched her with lush, heavily lashed eyes and a stern irritation in his gaze.

Her lips parted to throw a string of insults at him that would have withered even the worst of the filthy creatures that had been "created."

His finger came up with a sharp growl from his throat. "Don't make the mistake of thinking I'm joking about that paddling," he warned her. "It will happen."

As he stepped back, another, lower growl rumbled in his chest as the dark-skinned, braided doctor entered the room.

Storme stared at her silently. Dr. Nikki Armani. She was human. A child protege for the Council when she had worked for them. She had learned Breed genetics at her father's knee as a young girl and trained under the best scientists at several labs. For a brief time, she had even been in the Andes lab, several years before the Breed rescues.

"Keep her away from me." She was the enemy, just as the Breeds were, just as the Council was.

Storme's gaze slashed back to the red Wolf, the overwhelming fury that enveloped her burning through her mind. "Don't let her touch me."

"Shall I hold you down while she repairs that gash you just tore into your hip?" he snapped. "Settle your ass down or that's exactly what I'll do."

The gash?

Her gaze went to the flesh burning high on her hip, and her eyes widened. It was deep and bleeding sluggishly, while the flesh around it appeared to be bruising heavily.

It was at least four inches long and, judging by the amount of blood soaking into the sheets, deep enough to have been dangerous.

This was why she was so weak, why she couldn't fight. She was losing too much blood to maintain her strength and energy. Storme bit at her lip and felt another sob as it trembled through her chest.

"How are you going to escape, Storme, if you don't allow yourself to heal first?" Nikki snapped, her dark brown gaze cool and at odds with the harsh sound of her voice.

"Let me go and I'll show you." She pushed between clenched teeth.

"Then it wouldn't be an escape, would it?" Nikki asked, the sarcasm in her tone raking against the anger surging through Storme. "Now, let me fix that wound, then we'll see if we can't do something to keep you from tearing it loose before it heals. Wasting my time isn't something I enjoy doing."

Storme remained still, silent. Turning to her side, she allowed the doctor access to her thigh, despite the fear shuddering through her system.

As the doctor leaned closer, Storme whispered, "They'll kill me," trying to appeal to whatever compassion or mercy might lurk beneath the appearance of competenance.

"If they were going to kill you, then you would be dead." The doctor's voice was harder now, lacking either mercy or sympathy.

Storme knew there were those people who believed the Breeds could do no wrong, who thought the trials they had suffered in those labs had given the Breeds license to kill as they chose.

The world was slowly becoming divided over Breed rights. Were they animal or human? Should they be allowed freedom or be contained once again?

As far as Storme was concerned, they should be shipped to another planet where they could never harm another human simply because they had the ability to do so.

She fought back the sobs that would have escaped her throat at the memory, still so vivid, of the Breed bending his head, his canines digging into her brother's throat before ripping it from his neck. The blood that covered his face, that spurted from her brother's neck. The rage and sorrow in her father's face and the desperation that filled his gaze.

Her father and brother had tried to help the Breeds. They had worked for years to deceive the Genetics Council and they had died for it. She had lost everything she loved, everything she had known of security in her life because of those monsters.

She ignored the pain at her thigh as the doctor cleaned the wound and repaired it once again. She held back the rage that screamed inside her, that tunneled through her muscles, tightening them, pulling at them, demanding that she do something, anything. That she hurt them as much as they had hurt her.

Styx stared at the trembling young woman, her back to him, the soft bare curves of her lovely ass leading to the creamy, satin flesh of her bloodstained thigh.

This, unfortunately, was one of the side effects of the tranquilizers Ghost Team used. Styx had forgotten the paranoia that affected some humans when they were given the drug. A variety of conditions could make it worse, chief among them anemia, exhaustion, dehydration.

He could see her trying to fight it, but sweet wee lass, she was too tired, too weak to do much more than give in to the rage she kept bottled up the majority of the time.

Nikki blocked much of the sight of her, but nothing could block the scents that rolled from her. The smell of such bitter agony that it was almost acrid. Pain. Horror. Rage. They lay inside her like a festering wound as she fought to hold on to the control that restrained her trembling lips.

Breathing in deeply, he turned back to Jonas, giving a quick nod as the director jerked his head in the direction of the living room.

Styx followed him from the room, but only because he was aware of the Breeds outside the windows securing the black iron bars to the openings.

He hated being closed in, but damned if he was going to have her jumping out of windows every chance she had. At this rate, there wouldn't be a piece of glass left in his windows, and replacing them actually wasn't something he was looking forward to.

"I forgot about the fucking tranquilizer," he growled as they moved to the kitchen.

Jonas gave a hard nod. "And she evidently has all the weaknesses that make the symptoms worse. Though I have to give her credit." A grin tugged at his lips. "She's more restrained than some of the human soldiers stationed here at Haven and at Sanctuary. We dose them with it before they begin their duties, to accurately predict any resentment they harbor against the Breeds."

Styx could see where it would be a proper indicator.

"Her father's and brother's throats were ripped out by a Coyote Breed," Jonas muttered as he moved back to the coffeepot, the controlled fury that invaded his body making him appear more lethally dangerous than ever before. "I told you I suspect she was watching as they died." Jonas breathed out as he turned back to Styx. "She's been running from Council Coyotes for years, refusing to trust us, suffering the death of any friend she may have even considered having. They were brutal, Styx. Honestly, I'm surprised we're not having to restrain her."

She had suffered because of Jonas's pride where the Breeds were concerned. Because he had a basic resentment toward any human who feared them.

"And you didn't fucking pull her out of it?" he snarled back at the director. "You could have, at any time."

The thought of that enraged him. That Jonas had allowed such a young woman to live such a life. But hell, for two years Styx had chased after her, always standing back, protecting her yet never pulling her into the safety of Haven or forcing her to release her fears of the Breeds.

"I found her when she was nineteen, Styx. I've kept in contact with her; I've made offer after offer to protect her, to help her, with or without the information I know she has. She's refused. She's terrified of Breeds, and rightly so. It wasn't just Coyotes that the Council sent after her. They sent Lions, and they sent a Wolf." Jonas's expression hardened. "They reached her before I did. I was able to help her escape, but while I was dealing with the bastards sent after her, she slipped out of my grasp every time."

Styx bit off a snarl that would have easily carried into the other room had he not throttled it.

He could imagine the hell her life had been. For years after the rescues had begun, there were still those Breeds under Council control for one reason or another. Hell, even now, more than thirteen years later, there were rumors of a few shadow Breeds other than Coyotes that the Council retained.

"We captured her easily enough last night ..."

"You were lucky last night," Jonas broke in. "If the woman that has continually stepped in and interfered with my efforts over the years whenever I was close enough to help her was there, then you wouldn't have had the chance to get close to her. We suspect Gena Waters is with the Council, but Storme doesn't know or want to believe that, and until she betrays Storme, there's nothing I can do."

Styx shook his head, before striding to the counter and the forgotten chocolate coffee. He pushed it into the microwave and nuked it, before drawing the steaming liquid from the appliance and sipping at it.

He could feel the anger building, brewing. Anger was something he tried to keep out of his little world. It served no purpose; getting even was far better. But there was no one here that he could get even with.

"Where is Waters, then? Have you found her?" he finally asked, knowing Jonas wasn't just standing there tormenting the hell out of him. He would have men searching for Gena Waters, tracking her, and learning where her orders originated from.

Gena Waters had latched onto Storme six years before, during a time when the Breeds had lost track of her. In those six years she had seemed to be slowly gaining Storme's trust. Though she hadn't yet gained enough of it to acquire the data chip the Council was so desperate to acquire.

"I have Rule and Lawe on her," Jonas said and nodded. "They should have something soon. But catching her won't ensure Storme's safety. Until she gives up that data chip her father gave her, then she'll never be safe, Styx."

And that was no less than the truth. The Council had been chasing her for ten years now; they weren't going to give up just because she was currently under Breed protection. They would wait, knowing that eventually the Breeds would have to blink. And when they blinked, the Council would strike.

"She's not going to give us that data chip," Styx said and sighed.