Frostbitten (29 page)

“Freaking amazing. A werewolf Wonder Woman. Is that how you’re going to play this? Yes, I’m smart… smart enough to know you don’t give a rat’s ass whether or not I can escape Tesler. You just want me to volunteer so you’ll feel okay about this. If you turn me over, he’ll kill me before I get a chance to fight.”

Joey shook his head. “He doesn’t want you dead. This isn’t about status or reputation. If it was, he’d have asked for Clay, not you.”

“So what does that tell you?”

He looked at me as if he didn’t understand the question.

“Tesler wants me. The female. Do you think he plans to woo me with roses and candlelight?”

“Well, no. I guess he…”

“You guess
what
?”

His gaze slunk to the side again, “It’s my son’s
life
, Elena. And if Tesler wants you, that means he won’t kill you. You’ll get a chance to escape. There will be time for Clay to get here.”

I could only stare, blood pounding in my ears. “You’re saying I should let him rape me, for as long as possible, because it will kill time until my white knight can arrive?”

“It wouldn’t have to be rape,” he mumbled.

The pounding blood filled my head. “Are you… are you asking me to seduce…?”

“Willing or not willing, Clay would understand. You did what you had to and he’d forgive you.”

“For—forgive me? He’d
forgive
me if I got raped?”

“No, I meant it would be okay. He’d still—”

“Want me? Touch me?” My voice had taken on a note between rage and outrage. “Is that what you think I’m worried about? Whether he’d still want me if I’ve been raped?”

I yanked at my bonds so hard I felt blood trickle down my arms, but I kept pulling, struggling to get to him, to grab him by the hair and smash that self-absorbed—

A flicker of movement in the woods stopped me cold, my rage congealing into terror. I was still bound and helpless, having spent my time threatening and fighting the only person who could save me. Now Joey would shove me out the door and speed away without a backward glance and I’d—

A porcupine poked its head from the trees and looked quizzically at the car. Around it, the forest stayed motionless.

I still had time.
Now stop screwing around and use it
!

When I turned back to Joey, the fear and rage had frozen over, cold and hard now, my brain and my path now clear.

“Do you really think Tesler is going to give Noah to you? Ever? Why should he? You’ve proven you’ll do anything he asks in the faint hope of getting him back.”

“Which will keep him alive.” His gaze lifted to mine. “Maybe they won’t let him go today or tomorrow, but as long as it’s to their advantage, he’ll live.”

“So you’re willing to do whatever it takes to keep him alive? Including tossing them the wife of your old buddy, to be raped, tortured and possibly killed? Just so your son can live another day?”

To protect my own children, I’d go farther than I care to contemplate. But I would never do this—throw their captors another victim to buy time I had no intention of using.

Joey was like a fugitive, holed up and surrounded by police, shooting random passersby simply to buy more time, to keep the cops at bay while praying the hand of the Almighty would reach down from the heavens and save him, because he sure as hell didn’t plan on doing it himself.

“And then what?” I asked.

He looked at me blankly.

“And then what?” I repeated. “I make this sacrifice and I distract them, and you will use that time to…”

“I-I’ll figure something out.”

“Of course you will. You may not be stronger than them, but you’re definitely smarter. You’ll outwit them.”

He nodded, relieved that I understood.

“Bullshit. If you were smarter than them, we wouldn’t be sitting here. We’d be up at that meeting point, and I’d be slumped in this seat, pretending I was doped up and out cold. Clay would be lurking downwind in the forest. Travis Tesler would arrive. You’d make the exchange. You’d take Noah. Tesler would grab me and I’d kill him while Clay killed his brother. The end.”

Joey stared at me. He blinked. He swallowed. His lips formed an “oh,” but all that emerged was a faint sound of pain. And with that, my hate evaporated, leaving only a thin film of disgust, even that bringing a stab of guilt.

It’d been twenty-five years since Joey had been a Pack wolf, and even then, he’d never been in the thick of it. Expecting him to know how to deal with his son’s abduction was like plucking a random human off the street, kidnapping his kid and expecting him to make the right choices. I couldn’t hate him for what he’d done, but still that veneer of disgust refused to disappear, turning my words brittle.

“You won’t figure out how to free your son. They’ll wring everything they can out of you, and then they’ll kill you. The only way to rescue him is to trust us. Starting with untying me, so if they show up, I’m not completely helpless.”

He hesitated only a split-second before giving a defeated nod, and doing it.

“It would have been easier if we’d skipped the whole ‘drugging and kidnapping’ scenario, but it’s too late for that, so the first thing you need to do is get us out of here before they find us.”

Headlights off, he restarted the car as I kept talking.

“Once we reach the highway, you’ll call Tesler. You’ll say your plan failed. You bought Malaysian food, hoping to hide the drugs in something spicy and unfamiliar, but Clay wanted plain American fare. You’re going to try again when we go out for drinks later. You’ll call him when it’s done.”

As I talked, Joey nodded constantly, first anxiously agreeing with anything I said, praying I had a clue what I was talking about, then nodding faster as he realized I did.

“Put the car in reverse… and let’s get out of here.”

He did. And we didn’t.

The tires spun, the small car burrowing deeper into the snow-covered lane. I scanned the dark forest anxiously as the whine of the engine buzz-sawed through the silence. He put the car in drive, then reverse, but it only rocked back and forth, getting more entrenched.

“Keep it in reverse,” I said as I swung open the door.

I stepped out. It was like putting my foot into a bucket of ice water. Apparently, dressing me for the weather hadn’t been one of Joey’s concerns. I still wore jeans, a long-sleeved jersey and sneakers.

“Here,” he said. “Switch. I’ll get out and—”

“No.”

There was no time for that, not with the sound of our escape attempt echoing through the forest. I tramped to the front of the car, cursing Joey under my breath, this time for his rotten choice of transportation. Selling a fancy little car like this in Alaska should be illegal. Did it even have snow tires?

I planted myself in front of the car, pushed… and felt it push back.

“Rev—!” I started to yell over the whine of the engine, before catching myself and mouthing and pantomiming “reverse.”

Joey nodded frantically, reached for the gear shift and—

I smelled Travis before I saw him, and my body recognized the scent before my brain could process it. I whipped my head around to see him making his way through the trees.

“Need a hand, honey?” he called.

Another scent flitted past on a crosswind, and I wheeled as Eddie came up behind me. To my left was a distant third figure, closing in, the three surrounding me and cutting off my escape routes.

I turned to the car. Joey hadn’t noticed the mutts yet. His hands still gripped the wheel, his head bobbing to tell me he had it in reverse now, so go ahead and push.

I looked at Tesler. The bubble of panic rose, then popped, evaporating as my muscles tensed, the fight-or-flight response kicking in, my brain veering wildly between the two.

Fight or flight. Fight wouldn’t be easy, with my only ally as useless as a Pomeranian at a pit-bull match.

No, fighting wasn’t an option. Flight was—leap onto the car, race over the top and take the only unguarded route into the forest. Run and leave Joey to his fate, hope that distracted them. And why shouldn’t I? It was no less than he’d planned for me.

I put my hands on the hood, braced myself… and gave a tremendous heave. The car jumped up and out of the rut, accelerating backward a dozen feet before Joey hit the brakes.

That’s when he saw Eddie coming up behind me, and Tesler, just beyond his driver’s side door. Joey waved frantically for me to get into the car, but I knew I couldn’t make it, had known it when I gave that shove.

So I waved just as frantically as Joey, mouthing “Get Clay!” then spun and raced toward the one figure who hadn’t yet emerged from the shadows. I heard the brothers coming after me… then the roar of Joey’s car as he sped off.

As I barreled through the trees, I saw the third werewolf ahead. The figure was as slight as a woman and no more than five foot six. The gait, though, was masculine. His head stayed down as he tramped through the snow, in no hurry to get to the clearing and see what waited there.

When he heard us, he lifted his head. I knew who he was—had known it from the moment I’d spotted his figure in the distance.

His face was young and smooth, with light brown hair hanging into dark eyes. He reached up and impatiently swiped his hair back as he squinted at me, his night vision still poor, his first Change barely behind him.

Noah Stillwell. Joey’s captive son—not bound and forced forward at gunpoint, but on his own, ready to help his pack mates take down their prey.

When he realized who was running straight at him, his hands flew up awkwardly, as if he hadn’t yet decided whether to stop me, attack me or fend me off.

With scarcely a falter in my stride, I grabbed the front of his jacket, yanked him off his feet and flung him to the side. I couldn’t imagine either brother stopping to help the fallen boy, and they didn’t, but the path was narrow and as Noah scrambled up, he got in their way, a chorus of grunts and curses echoing behind me. I hunched over, picking a path where the snow lay thinnest over the ground and running full out.

Running has always been my strong point. I’m particularly skilled at running away from things—I’ve been doing it my whole life, and not just metaphorically.

I’ve spent the last decade learning to stand firm and face my problems… or at least batter them until they’re unrecognizable. So now, when I ran from the Teslers, it hurt—a mental pain so acute it was like running across a bed of nails, the spikes driving into my soles with every stride.

I told myself I wasn’t running away, that this was just part of a plan that would eventually end in a standoff, a challenge and, of course, victory. The only part missing? The actual plan.

I darted through the trees, steering for the thickest part to hide my pale shirt and hair. Gradually, the sounds of pursuit faded, then stopped altogether.

I didn’t kid myself. I hadn’t lost them—they could easily follow my scent trail. They’d just stopped chasing me. I was miles from any populated place, running through the frozen Alaska wilderness dressed in a shirt and sneakers. They would regroup and come up with a plan to track and capture me. And I’d use this time to change into something a little warmer.

I just needed to get a little farther from them, so I could relax enough for the Change. I’d gone about twenty more feet when bobbing lights ahead had me plunging into the undergrowth. Once I was hidden, I peered out.

I could see a cluster of three distant lights, bobbing at waist level. Flashlights? A fourth joined the group, then a fifth and as I squinted, I heard the faint rumble of engines. Snowmobiles.

I remembered what Dan had said—that the Teslers had two other mutts in their group, currently in the Lower 48 setting up trade routes. Could the Teslers have recalled them when we killed Dan?

Possible, but if he had, they would have accompanied Noah and the brothers to the exchange. Far more likely, this was a group of humans. And if it was, then I’d run to them for help. My pride could withstand that indignity better than what was in store for me if the Teslers caught up.

Still, the small chance it was the mutts meant I slid cautiously from the bushes. The headlights bounced along like giant fireflies, the engines a low and steady rumble.

As I walked, the lights moved farther away. Did snowmobiles have rear lights? I had no idea, but they were clearly heading in the opposite direction. I broke into a slow jog.

The lights kept moving, no faster than me. Yet the engine rumble seemed to get louder, as if I was catching up.

I stopped. The hairs on my neck prickled as I looked around. The forest shimmered under the moon, a dusting of new snow glimmering on every branch. Quiet had fallen—not the unnatural silence that preceded the appearance of the beast, just an odd hush, as if even the night animals were careful not to make too much noise.

The lights stayed exactly where they were when I stopped. As if they were waiting for me…

Whoever was out there couldn’t see me from here. Surely they’d stopped coincidentally.

I stepped forward. The lights didn’t move. I took another step. Still they only bobbed in place. I could hear the engine, also seeming neither closer nor farther, but the rumble oddly muffled.