Blood Rights [Wicked River 2] (Siren Publishing Ménage Everlasting) (10 page)

The noise increased in volume and ferocity, and Moira could see movement just ahead. She was close, but she needed a plan. The moonlight filtered down through the leaves, but it did very little to illuminate the path before her. Whatever powers she now possessed, night vision wasn’t one of them. She refused to be one of those girls who rushed into a volatile situation blindly and only ended up getting in the way.

All of her good intentions went right out the window when she got close enough to see the carnage littered across the forest floor. Two red wolves sprawled among the bodies of their black-pelted enemies, but even in the dim light, she could see them moving. The relief lasted only a moment, though.

The lupines may have all looked alike to an outsider, but Moira had no problem discerning Brock from the others. When a giant hybrid beast like the one that had attacked her on the full moon stepped out from behind a tree trunk, prowling in her mate’s direction, rage like she’d never felt before coursed through her blood until she could barely breathe because of it.

Electricity crawled across her skin, her muscles vibrated until she thought they’d catch fire, and sharp, shooting pains stabbed her between the shoulder blades. Invisible bands tightened around her chest, squeezing the remaining air from her lungs and dropping her to her knees.

Moira clawed at her throat, gasping and coughing, struggling to breathe. Indescribable pain seized her, and it felt like every bone in her body was shattering. What the hell was happening? Was this the power she was supposed to get? If so, she’d happily go right back to being mostly human.

A cold nose nudged against her cheek, and Koba licked her face, whimpering worriedly in her ear. It was a complete lie, but that didn’t stop her from trying to force words through her lips to reassure her mate. A weird keening sound was all that came out, though, and it only seemed to upset him more.

Something sharp pierced her neck, and Moira jerked her hand away, staring in horror as her fingernails lengthened into deadly talons and her skin turned a sickly, pale blue. Everything inside her pulsed, and she could feel the bones in her body melting and reforming. Doubling over, she wrapped her arms around her midsection and gritted her teeth, praying it would end soon.

Just when she thought it was over, blinding pain exploded in her back, and something resembling leathery wings unfurled to curl around her like a cocoon. Then it was over. The pain was gone, and all that remained was the feeling of strength, purpose, and…hunger.

When she sat up and opened her eyes, the moonlit night around her was as bright as if it was the middle of the afternoon. Even over the sound of the fight, she could hear small mammals and insects scurrying in the trees, feel the charge in the air, and smell the coming storm on the wind.

Pushing off with her legs, Moira shot forward, moving her new wings experimentally until she was hovering above the snarling wolves. There was no fear, no doubt, and beating her adversaries suddenly seemed too easy.

Crossing her arms over her chest, she closed her eyes, pressed her ankles together, and began to spin in the air, sending Walkers soaring into trees as she hit them with her wings. Once those idiots were dispatched, Moira turned her attention to the beast Brock was battling.

In the next heartbeat, she dove at the Walker with a loud screech, catching him around the chest and pinning his back to one of the nearby trees. Though she couldn’t see them, she could feel her teeth elongating, the pointed tips sharp against her tongue.

Striking hard and fast, she bit into the side of the bastard’s neck, groaning at the first splash of blood against her tongue. As she drank, she felt the body pressed against her growing smaller until it was once again that of a man. Before she could inflict too much damage, muscled arms surrounded her waist and wrestled her to the ground.

“Stop. Mo, you have to stop.”

Moira snapped her jaws at Brock, not recognizing him at first but feeling ashamed of herself once she did. In her defense, she wasn’t feeling very stable.

“You need to change back,” Koba whispered, kneeling on her other side as he looked frantically around the clearing.

She didn’t want to change back, though. Never had she felt so free and powerful. There were other things she wanted to do, though. Good thing they were already naked.

“What the hell is that?” a slightly hysterical voice asked. “Kill it!”

“No!” Brock snapped. “Just shut up!”

“What is that thing?”

“Why are they protecting it?”

“We’re all going to die.”

“How are we supposed to fight these things?”

Voices exploded inside her head, scared and desperate, yelling over one another until Moira thought her head would split in two.

“I can smell her. That can’t be Moira, though.”
The voice belonged to Joss, but thankfully, it wasn’t nearly as loud as the others. He still didn’t sound very happy, though.

“We have to get her out of here,”
Brock thought, eyeing the pack warily.

“This is going to have consequences. They all look so scared.”
Koba’s voice followed right on the heels of Brock’s.
“Hell, I’m scared.”

Louder and louder, the voices bombarded her in a cacophony of sound, making Moira’s head spin and bile rise up in her esophagus. Slumping to the earth, her eyes rolled back in her head, and she welcomed the darkness that finally swallowed her.

* * * *

Brock had never seen anything like it in his life. Moira’s skin was the palest blue, making her veins stand out in sharp relief, looking almost black in the silvery beams of moonlight. Her golden hair was white as snow, her body long and spindly, and her eyes—those gorgeous green eyes—were hard, glassy pools of pure onyx.

“What is that thing?” one of the pack members asked, jabbing his finger toward Moira’s sleeping form.

“
She
,” Brock growled, “is our mate and your alpha. Show some fucking respect!”

“They’re just scared,” Casey said quietly as he crouched down beside Koba. “She’s a demon, Brock. How did you expect them to react?”

“She’s no different than she was.” Koba brushed the hair away from her face tenderly, but Brock could see the concern in his expression. “We need to get her home.”

“She’s not our alpha!” the same idiot yelled. “That thing isn’t even one of us.”

“It’s an evil abomination.”

“She doesn’t belong here!”

“She’s going to get us all killed.”

“She’ll kill us herself!”

The men in the circle were practically tripping over each other to denounce their loyalty to Moira. All because of something she had no control over. Listening to the belligerent epithets they called her made Block’s blood pressure rise and a red haze settle over his vision. After everything she’d done for them, this is how they repaid her? The one time
she
needed
them
, they turned their backs on her.

“Shut up!” he roared as he jumped to his feet and stalked forward toward their loosely formed circle. “No one is going to fucking touch her, and she’s not going anywhere. If any of you so much as breathe in her direction in a way I find offensive, it will be the last breath you take. Am I understood?”

Wide eyes and open mouths greeted his threat, but no one argued. What they did was much, much worse. As a synchronized unit, every man in the group—other than Koba and his team—stepped forward, knelt to the ground, and dropped their head—exposing the backs of their necks.

“We understand, Alpha,” Joss said respectively.

“Wait, no. That’s not what I meant. I’m not your alpha.” He’d never had any desire to be alpha before, and he certainly didn’t now.
Shit!
Moira was going to kill him.

“Brock.” Koba pressed against his back, whispering quietly in his ear. “We need to get Moira home, and then we need to talk.”

That was a bit of an understatement. “Take her to the house. Casey, follow them.”

“Yes, sir.” Whatever the problems the pack had with Moira, Casey didn’t seem to share the same prejudices. “Do you want me to stay until you get there?”

Brock grunted and dipped his head curtly. He wasn’t worried about something happening to his mates, but he had a feeling that Casey might have some useful information for him. First, he needed to set the pack straight about a few things.

“I am not your alpha,” he repeated.

“You are,” Joss argued. He didn’t look happy about it, though. “By blood, you are the alpha of this pack. Run all you want, but you can’t escape destiny.”

“Are you honestly saying I left Mo here and took off so I wouldn’t have to take over the pack? Oh, that’s fucking rich considering you did everything you could to make sure I wouldn’t come back.”

“What the hell are you talking about?” Climbing to his feet, Joss stared at him in obvious confusion. “I didn’t try to keep you away. Hell, I tried to find you and bring you back, asshole.”

A couple of Brock’s guys snarled at the slander while the rest of the pack gasped in shock. It didn’t mean anything to Brock, though. He’d known Joss Emerson since the tenth grade, and he didn’t find the beta’s reaction disrespectful. It was real, honest, and it made him think there was even more to the story than what he’d already discovered.

“Get dressed and meet me at the house in ten minutes. The rest of you, clean this up and go home.” Knowing his orders would be followed without hesitation, Brock shifted back to his wolf skin and ran toward home.

The scent of blood hit him the minute he leapt up on the back porch, and he threw himself against the door, barking and clawing at the wood to try and get inside. When that didn’t work, he abandoned his attempt and jumped off the deck, sprinting around the house to the front door.

“Brock!”

Moira was back in her human form and still completely nude. Her eyes were wide and terrified, and she looked from Brock down to Casey where his head rested in her lap. The man was pale and shaking, his breaths coming in choking, gurgling gasps.

Several bites and scratches littered his body, spilling blood across his skin and onto the wooden planks beneath him. Most appeared to be superficial, but the cut running down the side of his neck from ear to collarbone was deep, jagged, and gruesome.

Footsteps thundered behind him, and Brock spun around, head low and hackles raised. Joss barely glanced in his direction as he ran past and fell to his knees beside Casey. “Okay, Case. Shh, now. It’s going to be okay.” He held his hand out to the side and shook it in Brock’s direction. “Please.”

Brock bit down on the fleshy part of Joss’s palm, piercing the skin and then stepping back as the beta moved the bleeding appendage to Casey’s mouth. Apparently, there had been a lot more than sleeping going on in that barn since their arrival. It was kind of nice to see relationships flourish in even the darkest of places, and Mission Landing was becoming the deepest of those dark recesses.

Casey would live to fight another day, but something wasn’t right. Something was missing. With a sense of dread that settled in his stomach like a ball of ice, he suddenly realized what was wrong. Shifting for the fourth time that night, he stayed on his hands and knees, panting for air as he searched Moira’s face for answers.

“Where’s Koba? Where is he, Mo?”

A single tear trickled down her cheek, and she looked out toward the main road at the end of the driveway. “He took him.”

“Who took him?”

“I tried to stop him, but then Casey got hurt, and there were so many Walkers.”

“Moira!” Scrambling to his mate, Brock cupped her face in both hands, forcing her to look at him. “Snap out of it and tell me. Who took Koba?”

“Rip. It was Rip and…”

Brock brushed his thumbs over her cheeks, impatient but trying to rein it in. “And who? I’m going to get him back, but you have to tell me.”

“Why are we sitting here?” Moira paced the living room, waving her hands around in agitation. “We have to go!”

“Where are we going? Do you know where they took him? Do you have a plan to get him back?” Brock wasn’t trying to be harsh, and he wanted Koba back just as much as Moira did. There was very little they could do without a plan of attack, though.

His father was a mean bastard, but he was also cunning. It would take more than a wish and a prayer to get Koba back and defeat Steven Lancaster. Brock needed as much information as he could get before even attempting it. Otherwise, he’d end up getting them all killed.

“We sniff them out, drain them dry, and bring our mate back here. Seems pretty easy to me.”

“I know you’re scared, but we have to be smarter than that. If my dad took him, it’s because he wants him for something. Koba is safe for now.”

Joss entered the living room from the hallway and dropped down on the sofa beside him. He plucked at the white T-shirt covering his chest and shrugged. “I borrowed some clothes. Hope that’s okay.”

“No problem. How’s Casey.”

“Sleeping. He’ll be fine, though. I put him in the spare bedroom.”

“Any ideas why my dad would want Koba?” It wasn’t that he was insensitive to Casey’s injuries, but he needed answers ten minutes ago.

“Isn’t it obvious?” Joss looked at him like he was a few bricks shy of a load. “Koba’s an omega. He’d be invaluable if your dad needed to control some people. Like Shadow Walkers.”

“Or the pack,” Moira added, still walking a hole in the carpet as she chewed on her thumbnail. “Does anyone care to tell me what the hell happened out there in the woods?”

“You shifted.”

“Really? I never would have known.”

Brock bit the inside of his cheek to keep from smiling, but damn, his girl was sexy when she was pissed. “You shifted into a demon.”

Moira growled and threw her hands up in the air. “I meant right before I passed out! I could hear everyone inside my head. I could hear what they were thinking.”