Dire Needs: A Novel of the Eternal Wolf Clan (31 page)

Gwen had always known Max was tough, but this was the first show of real, albeit controlled, anger she’d seen from the young nurse. She also knew that if she drove off this property with Max, she was as good as dead. Or worse, if she got into the hands of the weretrappers.

She attempted to keep Max talking, to find some trigger inside the woman that would make her relent. “How long have you known about me and what I am?”

“Not for very long. At first, they told me they needed a doc to work with the witches. I told them you’d never
agree to it, but when they were insistent on you, specifically, I got suspicious. I didn’t know… half Dire. No wonder they tried so hard.”

Gwen cocked her head. “Were you ever my friend?”

Max shrugged. “I never had anything against you. I don’t really have friends—never did.”

“What about Liam?”

“He was my lover, not my friend.”

The words came out so brutally cold. Gwen saw red on Liam’s behalf. Had Max used him and the baby as an excuse?

Then again, she hadn’t fought—not once. She was truly protecting the life inside of her. She heard the rustling in her ears and her sight faded in and out for a second, even as every other one of her senses went into sudden, sickening overdrive.

Something took her body over—something vicious and kind at once. She blacked out for a second, and when she came to, Max was staring down at her belly and Gwen held the knife pointed straight at her baby.

“Gwen, we’ve got this,” Vice told her. She looked up and saw the men on either side of Max, restraining her—and looking at Gwen strangely. “Bite it back, Gwen. Breathe and give me the knife.”

When she did, Vice’s hand burned—actually smoked—at the touch of silver, but he smiled instead of grimacing at the pain. Liam handcuffed Max’s hands behind her back and yanked her toward the door leading to the house, and Vice held out his free hand and helped Gwen down from the truck.

“What’s going to happen to her?” she asked, although Liam had already told her. A part of her was hoping what he’d said was being reconsidered.

“Dishonoring a mating is grounds for death. And after what she just pulled on you—”

Gwen looked into his silver eyes. “You’re going to kill her?”

“It’s Liam’s job to do so,” Vice stated coldly. “It’s pack rules, Gwen, not mine. Traditions are made to be honored. If we lost those, we’ve lost everything.”

She understood what he was trying to cling to—those ways had gotten the Dires through thousands of years. And death by dishonor wasn’t a foreign concept to humans, either. “She’s pregnant.”

“She betrayed him—she needs to die,” Vice said, because to him, it was that simple. Betrayal was punished with death—simple and effective.

Max turned toward them—she looked miserable too. Not the confident woman who ran the ER nurses with surgical precision, but when she leaned in to Gwen, the same spark shone in her eyes for just a second as she begged, “I know I can’t be forgiven for this, no matter the circumstances. But please, let me have the baby safely. And then I’ll banish myself.”

“Do we look like a day-care center?” Vice demanded with a snarl.

“My son is still heir to be king of the pack, regardless of what I’ve done. The Weres respect that lineage,” Max said, her chin held high even as regret flashed in her eyes. “Liam’s son should not be punished for me. Will you protect me until the baby’s born? Keep it safe?”

Gwen held her breath, wondering if Liam—if any of them—would refuse that. She doubted they would, or could, but the thought of Max being turned over to the trappers… the witches… the rival gang…

“Why would Liam want the baby of a traitor?” Vice asked, and Gwen took a few steps back from all of them.

She was in a whole different world here, didn’t know any of the rules, and the rustling in her ears was so loud, she couldn’t
think. She covered them, knowing it wouldn’t do any good, and she left the room with Vice at her heels.

Gwen leaned against the wall outside Max’s room. Her body had broken out into a sweat, but she was shivering, like she had the mother of all fevers. She was vaguely aware of Vice’s words, but they were a jumble, mixed together with Stray and Harm talking in the ancient language.

Talking about her—the shift…

She brushed off Vice’s help and raced upstairs, the sinning wolf at her heels. She heard his muttering loud and clear, something about how women who could hear through walls were really goddamned dangerous.

She fell on the top step and Vice told her, “Don’t do this, Gwen. Try to hold it off.”

“I don’t know how,” she managed, but the chills stopped, long enough for her to stop shivering uncontrollably.

“That’s it—just breathe and concentrate. Let’s get you back into bed.”

“No,” she said fiercely, then picked herself off the ground and walked into the room where Harm was being held in time to hear the man who was her father beg, “Letting her shift is the biggest mistake you could make, other than not killing her.”

And then Stray saw her and muttered, “Shit.”

She might not have shifted yet, but her wolf hearing had obviously kicked in. She’d been three floors down and they’d been behind closed doors.

She took a step forward, even as she heard Rifter’s voice behind her, calling to her, urging her to come to him.

That need was strong, but something pushed her to move toward Harm. She stared at him, processing things—no wonder he’d looked familiar to her before. Her father was the former lead singer of one of the most famous heavy-metal hair bands from the eighties.

And he was also, apparently, a wolf. How all of that worked was beyond her, but now wasn’t the time for a father-daughter chat.

“Gwen,” Rifter started, but she put a hand on his massive chest and pushed him out of the way. She heard a low growl emanate from his throat and was under no illusions that Rifter allowed her to move him.

But she was tired of being coddled. “You’re really my father?”

Harm nodded. “I’m your father, yes.”

Rifter growled again, and the entire tenor of the room changed. Because the man in front of her—his eyes—were different, and when she looked back at Rifter, his looked oddly similar.

They were wolf’s eyes. And she had a strong feeling hers looked similar.

She got closer to Harm. “You want me dead.”

“It’s not that simple, Gwen. There’s so much you don’t know,” he told her, and that was true. Her head began to spin and the familiar symptoms tugged at her.

She held out a hand, and Rifter caught it. “Rifter, it’s happening.”

“Another seizure?” Rifter asked.

“I smell a wolf.” Vice sniffed the air. “A Dire.”

There was dead silence, and it took her a long moment before she realized that it was her shift they scented. She was half blind, like they’d lowered the lights, and she stumbled, hands flat to the wall until she found the door.

Rifter was on her before she could leave the hall, his body pressing hers, hot and familiar. “Am I dying?”

“I won’t let you.”

If only it was that simple.

His voice sounded different—hoarse, huskier, and in the room they’d left came a howl that chilled her to the bone. “You’re going to shift and I’m going to help you.”

“I’m scared. Of the shift… of you…”

“You should never be scared of me,” he told her. “I’d die if you were.”

She wasn’t. She knew on a logical level that she should be, but she put her hands on his shoulders. “Help me.”

From what, she had no idea. All she knew was that the urge to run was overpowering. She needed to do so in the same way she needed air—there was no substitute or compromise. And when she ran, the stairs shifting in front of her like she was on an LSD trip, she heard Rifter behind her, telling her he wouldn’t leave her.

Finally, she was outside. She took a deep breath—smelled fresh grass under the wintery ground and the incoming rain. And Rifter—he was with her. She spun in a circle—Rifter’s wolf eyes glowed.

She was Alice down the rabbit hole and she knew she was dying, right then and there. Or at least a part of her was. Whether she’d be reborn into the wolf depended partly on her will and on a lot of things well out of her control.

As she watched, Rifter shifted impressively. The rustling in her ears got louder, like her wolf was trying to communicate with his.

“Rifter,” she said, and the wolf turned to look at her with Rifter’s eyes, the way they’d looked when he’d kissed her today.

He did love her. It was all that mattered.

She fell to the soft grass on her hands and knees, her skin tight and hot, and how she ached. She heard a growl, could’ve sworn it came from her.

“It’s happening,” she said, and the wolf was nuzzling her.

Your Sister Wolf is coming,
the rustling said, and Gwen saw the blackness cover her eyes like a blindfold.

N
othing happened like it was supposed to. Gwen collapsed, twitched a little, but she remained in human form. Unconscious human form.

Brother Wolf howled and tried to get some kind of response. Still nothing.

Rifter would have to dreamwalk with her, but not out here, with the sky darkening and the thunder rolling in. His skin felt like a thousand pinpricks as electricity crawled the air.

This was unnatural, but that was literally the least of his worries at the moment.

He shifted back to human form, saw Vice and Jinx waiting for them on the back porch. He picked Gwen up as gently as he could—goddamn, she was pale—and moved her indoors.

“Help her, Jinx,” he said as he stood in front of the men he’d lived with like family for three hundred years and saw the same helplessness in their eyes that was no doubt reflected from his.

“Go to her,” Jinx urged, then leaned in and took the dream-catcher necklace off Rifter’s neck. He’d made Rifter put it on again as soon as they’d finished talking to Gwen the previous night.

“
Suppose she comes with me into that nightmare?” Rifter asked over his shoulder as he walked up the stairs to his room. He laid her on the bed, on his pillows, as Jinx took the dream catcher down from the headboard as well.

“Better she’s with you than alone,” Jinx said. “None of us deserves to be alone.”

Liam had watched the Dire wolves handle the outlaw attack with military precision. He’d known Rifter was trying to save the pack on his own, and he knew Rifter’s brothers would never allow Liam to be captured without a fight.

Tonight, he’d repaid them by nearly letting his mate kill Gwen, the woman about to be mated to the Dire king. And as he watched Gwen run—perhaps even partially shifting—he knew that, in order to take control of his pack, all the training in the world wouldn’t help him prove shit unless he confronted the demons he’d refused to face.

He still held Max by the arm in the corner of the garage. Her cheeks were stained with tears although she’d never admit to crying—never cried in front of him, actually.

He’d admired her strength at one time.

“If Teague came here tonight, would you go with him?” Liam demanded of her, and she jerked uncomfortably in his grasp.

“To save you—and the baby. That’s all I wanted to do.”

It still didn’t make her answer go down any easier. Any trust they’d had over the past year crumpled. And here he’d thought he could hang on to something… anything, connected with his past.

It was all future now. And, like Vice said, women would only complicate matters. “Are you sure this baby’s mine?”

Her face lit up with indignation. “Of course.”

But something inside pulled at him hard not to believe her. If the outlaws had been planning their takeover for a while, what better way to infiltrate their newfound enemy than with his own mate?

Had she ever loved him? His anger rose hot and he knew what he needed to do. “So let’s bring you to him right now.”

He unhooked her and recuffed both hands behind her back. Not that he couldn’t handle a human, but if she went at him, he might have a problem controlling her without hurting the baby.

He borrowed one of the trucks in the garage—a Humvee built like a tank and able to withstand the weather outside. The rain hit the windshield in sheets, and it was definitely difficult driving, but he made it across the bridge and past abandoned cars and finally pulled in front of Teague’s house.

“This is a death wish,” Max told him.

“For Teague—not for me.” Liam had trained and sparred with Vice only once, but he’d learned several tricks that were mostly dirty—and effective.

This was war—and while he could utilize some of the old traditions, Liam was about to institute some new ones. He slammed open the door and pulled Max out with him—called to Teague with a rough howl that made Max wince next to him.

As the rain lashed at him, Teague came out of the house, his eyes already lupine.

Control, Liam,
he ordered himself. In a time not too long ago, simply seeing Teague’s anger would’ve brought about his own shift. Now that lack of control shamed him, even though he knew it was simply Were nature.

He would fight that—and continue to—if he was to prove himself a worthy leader.

This was for Linus, his father—for their entire pack and its future. “You’ve
betrayed me and the pack—I can’t let you live,” he told Teague.

“Young wolf, don’t you understand? You can’t survive this,” Teague called back, his canines long, cutting his lip as he spoke.

Without warning, Liam pulled Max in front of him and held his knife to her belly. It was silver and it burned the shit out of his hand, but it would hurt her a whole lot worse.

Teague stopped cold. Max was frozen in his arms, and he waited and watched. “Come closer and I’ll do it.”

“Don’t,” Teague managed.

“What do you care if I kill my mate and my child?” he asked, because he already had his answer.

This baby wasn’t his.

“Get back in the goddamned truck and don’t make a move,” he warned Max. “Not if you give a shit about that baby.”

She moved fast as soon as he let her go, scrambled into the truck as he went forward to Teague. The man was no longer standing stock-still, but the initial shock gave Liam an edge.