Walking Wolf Road (Wolf Road Chronicles Book 1) (38 page)

Loki seized the opening and pulled me out of the lobby. As we rounded the corner we found Kat cowering there as Officer Jenson ran past. I lifted her over my shoulder as Wolf rose within me and lent me his strength. Despite the painful alarm, my ears flicked back as Jack let out laugh that sent chills down my spine. Officer Jenson yelled over the chaos, his handgun drawn and aimed, but Jack kept Bo between them as a human shield.

My eyes latched onto a door handle, which thankfully opened when I turned it. I pulled Loki and Kat inside and locked the door as soon as it was closed. Even with my eyes fully shifted, it was difficult to make out the interior other than it was a janitorial closet, and I felt over the walls for the light switch. Loki panted as she gripped me, and I clenched my eyes shut to flip the light switch.

“Jimmy… It hurts…” her voice was so faint, and a wave of fear staggered me as I flipped the switch. Hot pain seared my eyes as I opened them too soon and turned around. She looked fine, aside from a few places where sweat had soaked through her dress and her unusual pallor.

“What—” Her knees gave out and I kept her from falling. My hand fell on one of the wet spots, but it was hot to the touch and a thin film of crimson colored my fingers. That stain wasn’t sweat, and it was getting bigger…

“Oh no, Loki
no
!” I yelled, and fumbled with her corset. Kat stared, frozen and useless, watching with wide deer eyes.

“Jimmy…” Loki moaned as she hyperventilated. I tore my vest off and wadded it up, and then shoved it into her corset to try to stanch the bleeding. She cried out as I pulled the laces of her corset tight again. ‘
Stop the bleeding, make her safe, stop the bleeding, make her safe’
recycled over and over again through my head.

“Okay Loki?
Listen to me, here’s what we’re gonna do, okay? We need to get you to the hospital. Do you think you can walk?”

“I’m fine, I’ll fucking crawl if I have to…” She growled as amber faded in and out of her pain-
filled eyes. She gritted her teeth and struggled to stand, tenacity written on every part of her body, and I loved her more than ever. She lost the fight against gravity with a pained gasp, and I lowered her back to the floor.

“Yes, Loki, you are obviously the definition of ‘fine’.” One thing was clear; she’d never make it out fast enough. Jack could just take us out one-by-one at his leisure. “Okay, plan B. You need help, so we can’t stay here. I’ll draw him away. Wait a minute or two, and then get outside, okay?”

Terror overpowered the pain in her eyes, “No… No, Jimmy, don’t go out there, he’ll kill you! Please, I can’t lose you too!” Her slender hands fluttered, clenched onto mine, then reached for my collar; the pain was too much for her to hold still.

I forced a smile and tried not to flinch as I heard more gunshots through the heavy door, “Don’t worry, there’s no way I’ll lose.” I said with forced cockiness, and my smile slipped as I realized it was truly now or never. “Loki, please forgive me, but I love you. I love you
so damn much, you have no idea—
”

“Shut up Jimmy.”

Her words stabbed deep into my chest.

“I think I know…
exactly
how much…” She gasped as she slid her fingers under her necklace and lifted out the moonstone ring that hung from it. The scarred shield over my heart cracked like porcelain, and then she slid her shaking hands up to cup my face and pulled me down into a kiss. Our wolves stirred and a cloud of energy burst around us as our auras entwined each other like lovers’ legs and goosebumps erupted all over my body.

I wanted to scream; all this time, if I hadn’t been so afraid of losing her, I could have been with her!

“Kat? Kat!” I shouted, and finally shook her out of her shocked reverie. I dug my cell phone out of my pocket and forced it into her hands, “Kat, I need you to call 911. If the coast is clear, I’ll come and get you. If I don’t, then wait for me to draw him away, and get her out of here. Do you understand?” She nodded shakily, and I made her repeat my directions back to me before I turned back to Loki.

“Loki, you simply do not have the option of dying on me, got that? I’ll come find you when I lose him.” I grabbed her face and stole another kiss, because I didn’t know if there would ever be another. My fingers smudg
ed her own blood on her chin. “I love you!”

Her choked cry broke
my heart as I ducked back out the door and engaged the lock behind me. I surveyed the hall with a quick sweep of my eyes. People screamed in the gym, so not everybody was out yet, at least they’d killed the damn music. My ears shifted, and identified a few trampling victims nearby mewling with pain. I eased around the corner and looked back out into the lobby.

A grinding squeak shot through my jaw as I clenched my teeth. Bo lay face down in a dark pool that soaked through the short carpet.
Another one
… One after another this fucker was trying to destroy everyone that I held dear. Not far away, Officer Jenson lay crumpled in his own bloodstain.

Click.

My muscles screamed in protest as I pushed them to their extreme. Jack was still raising his rifle as I blurred backward smashed my fist into his face.

Too close to Loki…
Jack stood directly in front of the closet, so I dashed past him and around the corner that led to the mostly dark hallways. For the briefest of moments, I’d actually entertained the notion that I would do just as I’d told Loki I would; lead him away and double back for her. But in my heart I knew I would end this fight tonight, either with my life or his.

At least now I had something to live for.

“Fuck!” I rounded the corner and nearly ran right into the security fence they’d pulled across the hallway to keep students out. I prayed my skull was thin enough to make it between the vertical poles as I shoved myself into the gap. It felt like one of my ears almost ripped off, and I popped buttons off my shirt as I fought through.

Jack came a
round the corner and emptied Officer Jenson’s handgun as I tried to pull my other foot through. My free foot slipped and I fell down out of aim. Sparks showered over me as they ricocheted off the steel fence, but I wrenched my foot through and ran.

That oughta slow him down…

Another shot flashed with a metallic clang as he blew out the lock.

Maybe not.

My body screamed in protest and my legs almost buckled. My chest heaved as my lungs struggled to feed enough oxygen to my starving cells. When a shadow detached itself at the end of the hallway, I lurched to my feet and ran.

Our footsteps echoed around the corridor, and I tracked him with the sound. I heard the difference when he came into the hall behind me.

“Fuck!” He screamed as he tried to shoot, but didn’t have any bullets left in the magazine. I threw myself into the hallway toward the library. Wolf liked that; the library gave cover, and deep shadows to hide in. Finally, a chance to turn the hunt on the hunter…

I slammed against the bars on the library doors with enough force to bruise my shoulder, but it forced the doors open. I dove under the computer desks and crawled under the tables until I was out of view from the windows, then I loped into the heart of the Library and the concealing forest of eight-foot tall bookcases.

Half of the overhead lights were still on, so I reached out with my shifting energy and pushed as hard as I could at them. I ground my teeth and strained until the flickering fluorescent tubes popped one by one and went dark. Only the flashing strobe of the fire alarm system survived.

Dark at last, I wrapped the shadows around myself and slipped in between the tall shelves, just as I heard the door open. Jack crouched down and swept his gun under the computer desks, searching. He popped the magazine and loaded four more rounds into it. How many shots did he think it’d take to kill me?

“Come out, come out, wherever you are…” he sang as he checked behind the checkout counter and then sidestepped toward the bookcases with his rifle ready. “It’s time to send you back to Hell.”

“You think
I’m
a monster? You’re a murderer Jack!” I blurted before I could stop myself. Lucky for me, the bookcases diffused my voice and he glanced around for its source. Wolf growled low in my throat, and my ears laid back as my temper rose and I fought to keep my head clear. “Why did you kill him? Why did you kill Fen if you were after me?”

“I saw you and that freak fighting at the school, so I followed you.”
That car!
“No one else saw you for what you were; only I knew the truth! Only I knew my duty. I waited all night for you to come out, but he got in the way, he… He looked straight at me, and I—” Jack’s voice broke, and I realized that was where the rot had taken hold; the panic that pulled the trigger back, the cold-hearted murder of an innocent. I felt so stupid, I’d assumed he was in jail, it never occurred to me Jack’s father might have come back to bail him after we left.

“Only, now I understand.” Jack continued his fanatical rant, “It was God’s will. Every night I saw his eyes, until I realized he carried the same demon you did.” Jack laughed and it made my skin crawl, “It wasn’t a mistake! God found me in that cage you put me in, and showed me my mission. God charged me to destroy the devil by any means necessary!” He said it like it was his shield and sword all in one, and I thought I’d be sick with disgust. I flashed back to my dream, and realized that it was Jack’s voice I’d heard, his obsessive nightmare I’d tuned in to.

Bless me father for I have sinned…

Jack entered the rows of bookshelves and I muffled the sound of my voice with my hand. I needed to remove the advantage his weapon gave him… “Is that how you’ve justified the blood on your hands? That it was Go
d’s will? That you murdered in his name? Somehow, I don’t think that’ll endear you to him at your judgment.”

“Shut up! I’ve lost everything because of you!”  

“
Oh, you poor blameless soul. None of it was your fault; attacking a six-year-old boy, or treating your so-called ‘friends’ like peasantry. I bet you even think that I made you pull that trigger.” He passed the end of my aisle, rifle ready at his shoulder, and I held my breath. When he’d passed I slipped out of my shadows and crept down the aisle. “‘God’s will’ is just a pathetic excuse, and you fucking know it. You’re just twisting faith to justify your sins.”

“Shut up! Shut-up-shut-up-shut-up!” he screamed. “You’re a freak! An abomination!”

“No wonder your daddy beat you,” I growled, “You’re the reason some mothers eat their young.” A plan formed in my head, simple, but it was the best I had.

I looked down at my hands. Loki’s blood had dried into a crust that cracked in the creases of my fingers
as I made fists. I had to stop him. Anger devoured my urge to run. My rage waited for the moment I’d need it most. For Fen, Loki, Bo… For my family…

I swallowed hard and reached out toward a book propped up on the shelf. I nudged it with a finger so it fell over and slipped off the shelf with a soft thud. I whispered, “Shit!” and then silently slid to the end of the aisle and eclipsed myself in the shadows. The sound of Jack’s shoes tapped over to my aisle. He double-checked the aisles next to it, and then stepped toward the book I’d knocked over. I’m sure he thought he was silent, but I heard him breathing like he was right next to me. I slipped down the next aisle and laid down on my stomach where I watched for his shoes through the gap under the bookcase until he stepped into position.

I stood and said a silent prayer, and then braced myself and slammed all my weight into the bookshelf between us.

Several hundred pounds of paper and wood crashed down, the sound of his panicked cry almost lost in the cacophony of splintering wood and falling books. I went down with it, carried by my own inertia.

My fall stunned me, and I shook my head as the cloud of dust started to settle, and then froze when I heard a metallic click to my left. Cold fear congealed in my belly and I forced my head to turn.

Jack stood just outside the rubble with his rifle aimed at my head. He smirked, and the gold cross on the chain around his neck glinted red in the darkness. In a sinking moment of horror, I realized I’d waited just a mo
ment too long and missed him. Now it was his turn…

And my last…

This close, there was no way he’d miss. Wolf’s rage flared in me and my hand seized one of the books underneath me in a defiant last reflex and I threw it at his face as a crack of thunder flashed out of the gun’s muzzle.

The sickening sensation of tearing flesh and cracking bone flooded my brain.