Not her. The others, yes, but Kayla wasn’t leaving him. He wouldn’t let her go.
He could see the hunters now. Three were already close enough for him to kill easily. Gage could leap forward and slice their throats in seconds. Did they honestly think the guns in their hands made them stronger? Fools.
“Let him go,” one of the hunters ordered from behind his black ski mask. Masks. These bastards were always hiding. And they said shifters were the ones who pretended to be something they weren’t.
“He’s been lying to you all,” Kayla said. Wait, hold the hell up . . . had she just put her weapon down?
Kayla lifted her empty hands in the air.
She fucking did.
Gage growled.
Lyle shouted, “Shoot her!”
Gage slapped his hand over the bastard’s mouth. “No matter what else happens here tonight,” he whispered into Lyle’s ear. “I’m cutting you open.”
Lyle heaved in his hold, but Gage was stronger. He just tightened his grip around the jerk.
“No one has to die tonight,” Kayla said, proving, quite clearly, that a human’s hearing was nothing compared to a shifter’s. “I’ve worked with you all—so many times—just give me a chance to prove that what I’m saying is true!”
They weren’t lowering their weapons. “Move back, Kayla,” he ordered. Because his wolves were going to spring up soon, and he wanted her away from the coming bloodbath.
“Let him go,” the guy at the front of the growing pile of hunters said. “Let Lyle go, then we can talk.”
Such a lie. Once Lyle was clear, the hunters would open fire. They were holding back only because Gage was a claw away from killing their precious leader.
“If Gage lets him go,” Kayla said, “Lyle will kill me.” After the briefest of pauses, she told them, “Then he’ll watch while you all die, too.”
The men shifted restlessly, from one foot to the other.
“Don’t you wonder why he’s never touched silver?” she questioned them. “Why he always uses his black gloves when he’s near the silver cells?” Kayla shook her head. “You’ve seen all this, just as I have. Only . . . I didn’t put the pieces together. I didn’t want to believe he was the real monster.”
The tension in the air thickened.
He didn’t like this. Every muscle in Gage’s body was battle ready. The hunters hadn’t fired yet, but Kayla’s small body had no cover if the bullets were to start raining on her.
Too vulnerable. Standing in front of him, offering herself up to the hunters. Hell, no, this wasn’t acceptable.
He heard the faint snap of a twig. To his left. Gage inhaled and pulled in the scents around him.
“I can prove what he really is,” Kayla said, her voice loud for all to hear. “I can—”
Gage leapt toward her. Lyle broke from him as he moved, rolling to the ground. Gage didn’t even look back at that prick. He grabbed Kayla even as the thunder of a gun echoed around them.
First shot.
Now it would be his turn to attack, and all the bastards would die.
The bullet blasted near him, scraping over his arm and ripping open the skin. Gage didn’t cry out. He was too long acquainted with pain for that. He twisted his body and took the impact when he and Kayla slammed into the earth.
Then he opened his mouth and roared the order, “Kill!”
The wolves had already shifted. They were ready. Eager for the fight to come.
The foolish hunters . . . they wouldn’t have a chance.
“No!” Kayla cried out, but it was too late. He’d given the order.
Streaks of black, gray, and white burst from the darkness and lunged for the hunters. The humans were trying to fire, but they couldn’t aim well at their targets. Not in the dark. Not with so many wolves rushing around them and moving so quickly.
“It doesn’t have to be like this,” Kayla whispered, then she shoved away from Gage. “It won’t be like this.”
She ran right into the battle.
Dammit, no.
His claws burst out of his fingers as he took off after her. Lyle had raced to a nearby SUV. Big surprise, he was trying to jump inside and make a run for it. Coward to the core.
“Going someplace?” Kayla demanded, then she grabbed a gun right out of the hand of a nearby hunter. She slugged the guy, and he fell to the ground with a thud.
Nice punch. That right hook was really killer.
Kayla aimed the gun at Lyle. “Get away from the vehicle. Get your ass out here right now, shifter!”
Two hunters jumped in front of Gage. He could have just slit their throats with one long swipe of his claws.
He knocked them out instead. Just slammed their heads together and stepped over them when they fell.
Another hunter was rushing up behind Kayla. Why were they all in their damn ski masks? Why—
Too close.
Gage leapt to take out the man sneaking up to attack Kayla but a gun blasted and, in the next breath, a bullet slammed into Gage’s upper back.
Son of a bitch.
The bullet went through right under his shoulder, and blasted out the front of his body. Snarling at the pain, Gage whirled around. Saw the hunter just steps away. The guy giving off the heavy scent of fear and sweat. The guy with the shaking hands. And the gun that was about to fire again.
“Bad mistake,” Gage told him. Then he attacked. His claws cut deep into the fool’s wrist. The gun clattered to the ground—and the hunter fell, too, crying and begging for mercy.
Mercy? What the fuck did he look like?
Kayla screamed.
Gage whirled back around. A hunter had her in his arms. Held tight against his chest. The masked man had a gun.
No. Not her. “Kayla!” His roar thundered across the gunshots and the howls of the beasts around him.
“Shoot her!” Lyle screamed. He was hanging with his body half-in, half-out of the SUV. Lyle’s hand was rising. He’d gone into that SUV to get something . . .
A weapon?
Kayla slammed her head into the hunter’s ski mask-covered face. Then she jabbed her elbow into his side and kicked down hard on his foot.
The guy’s hold eased on her. She moved, spinning around, and knocked the gun from his grip even as she put that hunter down on his ass.
Gage had never seen a better alpha female. Never.
He ran toward her, grabbed her, and pulled her close. “I fucking love you.”
Her gasp filled his ears.
Then, because Gage knew what was coming and he didn’t have time to do anything but protect the woman he loved, Gage twisted his body to shield her.
And when the bullet hit him—the bullet that had been fired from the gun clutched in Lyle’s white-knuckled fist, Gage felt the burn of the silver in every inch of his body.
“Gage!” Kayla’s scream. Her hands were on him, nails digging into his chest.
He tried to fight through the burning agony. Kayla wasn’t safe. Lyle would shoot at her again. The bastard had to be stopped.
The beast was coming out.
Gage lifted his hand and saw that the shift had already started. He hadn’t even felt the break and snap of his bones, but his hand—not the hand of a man.
Kayla lifted up her gun and fired at Lyle. Again and again. “Shift,” she whispered to Gage. “Shift!”
The hunter she’d pounded was trying to lift himself off the ground.
And the shift was too damn slow. Kayla was battling Lyle on her own, and Gage tried to force his body to transform faster. But the silver was in his blood and every breath hurt.
Her bullets slammed into Lyle, but they weren’t silver. She’d grabbed a hunter’s weapon, but the idiot hadn’t packed silver. Why? Lyle’s order? Had he wanted the humans to die?
When her bullets hit Lyle, the bastard just laughed as his blood flowed. And he took aim at Kayla again.
“No!” Not Gage’s scream, because he couldn’t scream right then. He could ro
ar and howl, but speech was lost to him.
The desperate cry came from the hunter that Kayla had attacked and knocked down. He was lunging for her now, but Lyle had already fired his weapon.
Kayla leapt to the side. The bullet tore across her hip and the scent of her blood broke Gage and his wolf.
The shift finished in a white-hot burst of agony. The pain didn’t matter. Kayla did. Gage leapt up and charged at Lyle. Lyle took aim on him then. Lyle’s finger tightened around the trigger. His total focus was on Gage.
You want me, asshole?
Gage snarled.
Lyle just kept smiling. Completely out of the SUV now, the sick freak stalked forward. Smiling, watching Gage, and aiming his gun.
The fool never saw the wolf closing in behind him. The wolf with a coat tinted red. The wolf who would want his own justice.
Shamus leapt at Lyle before he could fire again. His claws dug into Lyle’s back as the red wolf took him down.
Lyle screamed.
The chaos around them seemed too quiet for a moment. Hunters spun around. They’d ignored gunshots, too immune to the sound, but Lyle’s echoing scream of pain and rage—they hadn’t ignored that.
Two men immediately fired at Shamus.
He jumped away from Lyle’s bleeding body.
Lyle rolled clear of Shamus, then he managed to stagger to his feet. “K-kill—” Lyle began.
“No.” It was the other hunter again. The one who kept going after Kayla. The one who was now holding her arm. Holding her.
Gage tensed. That scent . . .
The hunter jerked off his ski mask. Jonah. “Everyone just—stop!” Jonah shouted.
The wolves weren’t stopping. They were attacking. Killing.
The hunters fought back. No one was listening. Shamus was transforming slowly back into the form of a human. Lyle was trying to grab another weapon.
And more asshole hunters were attempting to get at Gage and Kayla.
Kill them all. They could end this now.
“Screw this!” Kayla’s voice. So sweet and vicious. That was his lady. His head jerked around and he saw her bend down. She grabbed a gun from the holster on Jonah’s ankle. “Silver?” He heard her ask.
Jonah nodded.
Kayla lifted the weapon. Aimed it at Lyle. “Silver!” she screamed.
But even as she fired, two hunters pointed their weapons at her.
Gage took one of the assholes out with a slash of his claws across the guy’s legs.
The other hunter—Jonah shot him in the arm.
And Kayla shot Lyle. Her bullet ripped into his chest. Lyle flew back and fell onto the earth. Smoke drifted up from his wound. Smoke . . . as the silver burned his flesh.
And the hunters were watching him. Every. Second . . .
“What the hell . . . ”
“How the fuck . . .”
Many stood now, lost, confused. It was the perfect time for the wolves to take out the humans. So easy. Like slaughtering sheep.
“He’s a wolf!” Kayla shouted. “He’s been lying to us, tricking us all along!” Her voice seemed to echo in the night.
The men and women in their ski masks still had their weapons. But they weren’t fighting. Not yet.
Some were too injured to fight. The scent of blood was strong in the air.
Some were too scared. A wolf always knew the scent of fear.
“Gage and his pack . . . they aren’t evil.” Kayla’s voice was clear and strong. “They haven’t done anything to the humans in this city.”
Well, nothing that the humans hadn’t asked for. The wolves weren’t exactly perfect.
No one was.
“We don’t have to destroy each other!” Kayla’s eyes burned with intensity, just like her voice. “We can just . . . walk away.”
If the hunters didn’t start walking in less than five seconds, they wouldn’t have a choice in the matter.
The wolves were standing back, for the moment, but it would just take one roar from Gage to send them into action. Just one roar . . .
Then Jonah strode forward. “We aren’t killers.” His words carried easily. There was a heavy edge of command in his words. “We protect. This isn’t us.”
Lyle was digging the silver out of his chest.
A few of the hunters lowered their weapons.
“A damn shifter? All along . . . ”
A woman yanked off her ski mask. Her face was pale. Shaken. “What . . . what have we been doing?”
“Following the wrong path,” Kayla said with a sad shake of her head. “And it’s time to change that. It’s time for all of us to change and to make this right.” She was at her brother’s side. “Walk away from the wolves. These shifters aren’t the ones who are evil.” She swallowed, exhaled, and said, “To them, we’re the evil ones. We’re the ones who came after them when all they were doing was trying to live.”
Silence.
The wolves were straining forward. So eager to finish the fight.
Gage didn’t give the order to attack. Not yet.
“Put up your weapons. Clear out of here,” Jonah said. His words held the unmistakable whip of an order. “This fight isn’t ours.” His gaze slanted back to Lyle. Still on the ground. Still clawing at his chest as he tried to dig out the silver. Disgust tightened his face. “And you sure as hell aren’t our leader.”
The rest of the hunters lowered their weapons. Then they slowly headed back to their vehicles.
No more fighting. Just . . . walking away?
Well, fuck me.
Kayla had been right. They weren’t out to kill blindly. They weren’t killing at all.
“I’m sorry,” Gage heard Jonah say to Kayla. “I should have trusted you sooner. Hell, you’re the only one I should ever trust.”
Her hands reached for his.
Gage’s eyes narrowed. Get to her. He raced toward them, his claws tearing over the earth.
Faster, faster . . .
“Everything’s gonna be okay now,” Jonah told her, and he pulled her close for a hug.
Gage opened his mouth and roared.
Jonah jerked away from Kayla and saw Lyle—charging right for them. Bleeding, but with the silver gone, the guy wasn’t done yet.
Not even close.
“This isn’t how it ends!” Lyle screamed as spittle flew from his mouth. “Not for me!” His claws lifted. “Not for you!” He went for Jonah’s throat.
Gage locked his teeth around Lyle’s leg and jerked him back. He’d wanted his pound of flesh, and he had made a promise to the other wolf.
You’re dying. A promise was a promise.
“This is how it ends,” Kayla said as she backed up, pulling her brother with her. “So have fun in hell, asshole.”
Lyle was shifting. Fighting. Clawing. “Your father—you know he begged to live!”
Kayla flinched.
“Begged!” Lyle spat. His face was elongating, his eyes burning bright. “So did your bitch of a—”
Gage slashed his throat.
The bastard stopped screaming.
You won’t hurt her anymore.
The other wolves closed in.
And Lyle didn’t scream again.
“Come back with me,” Jonah said. The other hunters were long gone—headed back to base or to who the hell knew where.
Maybe some of them would just keep driving. Keep running.
Kayla didn’t blame them. Everything they knew had all just changed. They had to figure out what they were going to do . . . who they were going to become.
Lyle was dead. The wolves were shifting back to their human forms. Turning to their alpha for guidance.
“You don’t belong with them,” Jonah told her. Her brother was standing strong and steady beside her. His hand rested on her shoulder. “Come back with me. We can go forward.”
“Forward to what?” she whispered. When you were lost, how the hell did you know which direction to take?
His hand tightened on her.
“Not everything was a lie. Lyle was working for the government. He was a contractor, yeah, but he was being sent out after real killers. Those cases were real.”
“Not all of them.” And that knowledge would keep tearing her apart. “Some of those people that we captured, they were innocents, Jonah. Supernaturals that Lyle just framed because he wanted them under his control.” Or because he’d just wanted to take them out.
“Then we free them,” he said simply. With such determination. When had her kid brother grown up on her? “We find the containment areas that are housing them, and we make sure that they get their freedom.”
She nodded. Yes, yes, that was what they had to do. No matter what it took, she had to give the ones she’d taken justice.
“We can do it,” Jonah said, voice rough, eyes deep, “together.”
Her gaze slipped away and found Gage. Surrounded by his wolves. Standing tall. Powerful. “He told me that you were . . . missing. That you’d disappeared from the compound.”
Silence.
She didn’t need Jonah to confirm the lie. She’d already figured it out on her own.
“He didn’t want me to go back for you.” Her shoulders sagged a bit. It had been one hell of a day. Week—year.
“It doesn’t matter,” Jonah said instantly. “I was coming for you. I saw Lyle burn in that holding cell, I knew the truth, and I was coming to make sure you were safe.”
No wonder he’d been stationed so close to Lyle.
“I figured it was my turn to stand guard,” her brother told her softly.
She glanced back at him. Found his gaze on hers. He looked so worried. So . . .
“I’m sorry.” His voice held a ragged edge. “Oh, damn, Kay, I’m so sorry for everything that happened. I shot you.”
“With a tranq.”
He looked away. “You’re the only thing I care about in this world. The only thing that kept me in this world, when I was sure ready to leave it.”
She’d known that. She’d seen his eyes. All those long days in the hospital. All the surgeries. All the pain.
It was her turn to reach out to him. “You’ll make it up to me.”
“Following orders . . .” He muttered and shook his head. “I’m not a damn robot, and it was you. I should have trusted you. Not listened to the lies about you falling for a wolf.”