A Bleacke Wind (Bleacke Shifters Book 3) (32 page)

Beck hoped it’d been Trent who’d done it so Dewi could stay out in the field and help them hunt these guys down.

Beck was seriously considering stripping down and shifting. He could run faster on four legs than two, and it’d be a boost to his sniffer.

It also meant he’d have to put down his gun, and he wasn’t looking forward to
that
prospect.

“This way,” Joaquin said, pointing.

Beck nodded. Like this, it was easy to put aside any differences he’d once had with the man. They had to work together.

And once he had a chance to sit Nami down and talk to her, calmly, hopefully she’d change her mind about wanting to kill or castrate Joaquin.

He wouldn’t let himself think in any terms other than
when
he sat down with her.

Not
if
.

If nothing else, he had faith in Ken when others might not. He’d seen the immediate aftermath of Ken being able to oppose a Prime order, saving himself and Dewi in the process.

If Beck couldn’t be with Nami, he was glad Ken was.

The weather grew colder, the breeze picking up even more, the afternoon dim and grey, dismal. It didn’t take long for Beck to hear the clumsy sounds of humans running not too far ahead of them, their frantic footfalls and labored breathing, not even trying to be quiet the way they pushed through the woods.

Beck signaled for silence from the other two men as they closed in on their prey, guns at the ready. Once they had them in sight, Beck yelled, “Freeze!”

The two men whirled around, the larger one tripping and going down on his back.

The other man, seeing three guns pointing at him, dropped his and held up his hands. His English was rolled with a thick Spanish accent. “We’re lost! We heard lots of wolves!”

Beck felt his canines wanting to slide out, his jaw aching from the strain of it. “There are a lot of wolves out here. This is private land. How’d you get here?”

The bigger man stayed down, hands up. Beck smelled their fear—and their lies.

“A friend of ours. They have the car keys. We got separated. We drove over from Spokane for sightseeing, I swear. I don’t even know where the hell I am.”

“You got
that
right,” Joaquin said, smirking. “You fuckers wouldn’t
be
here if you knew where the hell you were. Where’s Manuel Segura?”

The standing man’s hesitation was all the proof Beck needed. He took a page from Dewi’s usual playbook and shot the guy on the ground in the arm before pointing his gun at the first guy again.

“Man asked you a question. Next one goes in your balls.”

The first man stared down in terror at his screaming partner. “I-I swear, we’re lost! I don’t know where he is!”

“But you
are
with Manuel Segura?” Joaquin asked.

The man swallowed hard and, finally, nodded.

“Fair enough,” Beck said.

“Please, we don’t want to be here! We’ll leave! We were trying to get out of here when we got lost, seriously.” Beck didn’t even have to question him, he started spilling his guts.

It was almost enough to make Beck feel sorry for him.

Almost.

Because four of the guys were somewhere out on the road south of town and going after Ken and Nami. He knew damn well they would have little to no mercy for his friend and his mate.

Beck rolled his head back and forth, cracking his neck. He
really
wanted to kill this guy.

In good conscious, he couldn’t.

Yet.

Not without a pack edict. Yes, they’d come into the compound looking for Joaquin. But these guys had bolted. They were, right now, guilty of nothing more than terminal cowardice and a crisis of conscience.

“Strip,” Beck ordered. “Down to your underwear.”

It took the man on the ground a moment to get up and start doing it, cradling his injured left arm as he did.

Once they were in nothing but their underwear, and Beck was sure they were unarmed, they started marching them north, toward the main road. A howl rolled across the woods.

Trent.

Beck howled in reply, making both prisoners turn, expressions of wide-eyed fear on their face.

“What the fuck?” the first man said.

Beck grinned, but it held no humor. “These woods are
full
of wolves.”

* * * *

Nami finally spotted the wolf during one of their increasingly frequent breaks.

She clutched Ken in fear. “Is that one of…ours?” she whispered.

The wolf was obviously done trying to hide from them. It no longer darted for cover when Ken turned to look for him. It never came closer than about twenty yards, close enough to keep them in view.

“I don’t know, but I didn’t want to say anything to you earlier and freak you out. He’s been following us for hours.”

“News flash, I was already freaked out, even before that. If he hasn’t attacked us yet that’s good, right?”

“I don’t know. I hope so. Both times we heard the gunshots, he disappeared.”

“Disappeared?”

He looked down at her stunned tone. “I meant it ran off. Not literally vanished.”

“Oh.” She weakly laughed. “Wouldn’t
that
be a magic trick?”

The wolf stared at them. It didn’t act afraid of them. Ken got the feeling it was more curious than anything. Like they were being studied by their lupine stalker.

“Yeah,” Ken said. “It would. Funny thing is, it came back both times. Why would it do that?”

“Maybe he’s waitin’ for us to die from exposure and get hisself a free meal.”

“That’s not funny.”

“I wasn’t kiddin’.”

She held onto the small tree she was leaning against and tried to reposition herself so she could keep her weight off her bad foot for a few minutes. It had swelled even more and her brown skin looked much darker, bruised, around it. Ken wasn’t a doctor. She could wiggle her toes, but he didn’t know if that meant anything was broken or not.

“I really want to sit down,” she said.

“Sweetie, you can’t. If you do…” He hated to admit it. “If you get down and can’t get up, I might not be strong enough to help you get up.”

He hated having to admit that, especially when he’d seen Beck easily sling Nami over his shoulder one-armed before.

“I’m not a wolf. I’m just a damn computer geek.”

“I’m so tired. And cold.”

He wrapped his arms around her, rubbing his hands up and down her arms. “I know, sweetie. Me, too.” Her flesh felt cold and she trembled.

His even bigger fear than Nami getting down and not being able to help her up again was he feared if they stopped moving and sat still for too long in one place that hypothermia might set in.

He had a thought. “So what kind of wedding dress are we going to get for Malyah?”

She straightened. “
This
changes
nothin’
. I’m
still
gonna kill that boy when I get my hands on him.” She pushed herself away from the tree and started to take a step. Fortunately, Ken was ready to help steady her. “Cain’t
believe
he just done
took
her into the
woods
and had his
way
with her!”

Righteous indignation, for the win.

He wished he’d thought of that sooner.

Ken glanced back at the wolf. “Hold up.”

“
What
?” angrily said.

“Shh!”

“What?” she whispered.

“Okay, new rule, let’s keep the evisceration plans to a whisper, all right? I’d rather
not
announce to the bad guys where we are.”

“Oh. Sorry.”

He turned to the wolf again and patted his thigh, calling to it.

“Uh, you sure that’s a good idea?”

“He could have attacked us at any time. If he’s reasonably tame and wants to stay with us, maybe he’ll help keep us safe. Or snuggle up with us and help keep us warm.”

“Good plan.”

The wolf watched him for a moment before approaching. When it was about five feet away it stopped, staring up at them, nostrils flaring as it sniffed them.

“Good…boy. I think. If you’re a girl, my apologies.”

“You’re talking to it like it understands you.”

“I think it might.”

“If it was a shifter, wouldn’t it have shifted by now?”

“That’s what I was thinking.” The symbolism of having a wolf with them helped calm Ken. Its brown eyes seemed to intently study him. “But maybe if he’s with us, he’ll warn us if anyone’s coming. Or anything.”

“Any
thing
?” She snorted. “Like what, Sasquatch?”

“Bears. Mountain lions. Coyotes.”

She let out a sick-sounding noise. “You coulda just made me happy and agreed with Sasquatch. If we’re gonna keep movin’, we need to keep movin’, or I’m gonna sit down right here and die.”

“We need to try to find shelter. A rocky outcropping or something. To get out of the wind.” He helped her start moving again. The snow, as he’d thought it might, wasn’t sticking. It was melting and making everything wet, as if they were caught in a mist.

“Maybe,” she quietly said, “you should just leave me here and head toward where you think the road is and get help.”

“No. I’m not leaving you alone. You’re Beck’s mate, and I’m staying with you.”

She stopped and looked up at him. “I’m cold and wet and cain’t hardly walk. If you go, at least—”

“Nami, I’m
not
leaving you. Pack doesn’t leave pack. And you’re a mate.”

She snorted. “So are you.”

“Yeah, but I’m a guy.”

“So?”

“After…after the incident. When I killed Endquist. Beck and I talked. He told me then, before he’d ever met you, that he respected me and trusted me. That if he ever found his mate, he knew he could trust me to help take care of her. I’m not going to let him down now.”

“I’m scared,” she quietly admitted.

“I know. Me, too. I know we’ll find someplace we can stop for the night. Let’s just keep—”

The wolf softly chuffed at them. He’d circled around in front of them while they were talking and now he stood there, waiting, looking over his shoulder at them.

“What’s he doin’?” Nami whispered.

“I don’t know.”

The wolf took a couple of steps forward, looked back, and softly chuffed again.

“I think he wants us to follow him,” Ken said.

“What if he leads us to the guys who are after us?”

Ken stared into the wolf’s eyes. “No,” Ken finally said, “I don’t think he will. Let’s follow him.”

He thought Nami muttered something that sounded like, “Lord, save me from crazy white boys,” but she let Ken help her and they started following the wolf.

It was what Ken’s instinct told him to do, and so far, they were still alive.

Hopefully
that
wouldn’t change any time soon.

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Joaquin was good with killing Segura’s two guys right then, but knew Beck had seniority. If he said they had to stay alive for now, that was it.

They marched the prisoners north toward the main road. By the time they reached it, the two nearly naked men were shivering, their color looking a little on the blue side. Except for the one who’d been shot in the arm.

He looked distinctly paler from blood loss.

Beck and Trent had howled back and forth as they walked, coordinating their meeting place. By the time they emerged at the main road, they spotted Trent and Dewi heading toward them.

Beck pulled out his phone and checked it. “Finally.” Joaquin watched him place a call.

Well, tried to. Apparently voice mail picked up.

“Hey, babe, it’s me. Call me as soon as you get this message, okay? If you can’t get me, try Dewi or Trent. It’s an emergency. Love you.” He looked distinctly unhappy as he put his phone away.

“Where are your guys?” Beck asked Trent as he walked up.

“They’re coming.” He hooked a thumb over his shoulder.

Joaquin looked to see one emerge from the woods, something large slung over his shoulder.

Then he dumped it on the ground.

A body.

The two men they were guarding saw it, too, when the second man emerged from the woods and dumped a second body on top of the first.

Joaquin noticed how Dewi hung back a few paces from her brother as they walked up. She pulled her phone out, checked it, and tried calling someone. She frowned as she hung up and slipped her phone into her back pocket.

Joaquin didn’t need to be a Prime to guess who she’d tried to call. He suspected she couldn’t get hold of Ken, either.

Trent handed two cell phones to Beck. “Got these off the other two. Maybe we can use them to track the seven we haven’t found yet. Take them back to Peyton. Do you have the phones off these men?”

“Yes, sir.”

The man without the extra hole in his arm dropped to his knees. “Please, we don’t want no trouble.”

Trent already had his gun out. “Yeeeaah, but that’s not why you originally came here, is it?”

He pointed to Joaquin. “FYI, that’s the guy you all were looking for. He rightfully executed the rapist and murderer of a
girl
. One of
ours
. By order of the Targhee pack, and speaking for the pack Alpha, I hereby find you guilty of intrusion into pack territory for the express purpose of committing murder of our kind. Blood crimes call for blood. By pack edict, I sentence you to death.”

Trent dropped the begging man mid-plea with a shot between the eyes. The larger man tried to turn to run, but one of Trent’s men stuck out his foot and tripped him.

Trent shot the prisoner in the back of the head.

Joaquin wouldn’t deny he silently cheered Trent on.

Not when he’d never be able to erase the horrible images from Mexico from his mind.

Trent holstered his gun and pulled out his cell phone to make a call. Joaquin assumed Peyton, and his suspicion was soon confirmed.

“Four bogeys verified and terminated. There are three more in a second vehicle somewhere in the compound. They have satellite photos and maps and were planning on meeting in the vicinity of the great hall… Four others, armed, in a vehicle, sent south down the road after Ken and Nami, but no idea where they are now, if they are in the compound or not. That makes eleven total… Right. Send Paul over to pick everyone up.”