Deacon

  That didn't stop me from yelling to the moon, like the big yellow ball in the sky could help me. My eyes blurred. This was it. Everything was going to end and none of it—not one minute I lived—was going to amount to anything at all.

  “Deacon.” I shook. Or no, someone shook me. “Come on. Deacon. Wake up. Come back.”

  Lydia...

  I blinked, and she was in front of me. She had me in her arms. I was on the floor of the truck, my head in her lap. “Come on, love. Come back. What's wrong?”

  Margot stared down at me. “It's to be expected. For the next few days. Even as his liver and kidneys remove the filth from him, he's going to have some residual problems. It will stop. People come back from this if they're not killed in the process. Probably doesn't help he's being all superhuman and fighting monsters after digging holes when I've said he needed to stay in bed.”

  “I don't appreciate your tone. He doesn't have it in him to sit around. This is like a punishment for something he didn't do to himself. I thank you for your continued help. But the snide tone? I can do without it and so can he.” Lydia's gaze flared as he she dressed Margot down.

  The doctor gasped, and then tears slipped from her eyes. “I'm sorry. You're right. I'm… out of line. I don't mean to be so heartless. Where I'm from, people are not rewarded for basic human kindness. I think I've forgotten how.”

  Lydia let out a breath. “Margot, forgive me. I have no right to be yelling at anyone. I am pretty much a horrible person. Can we start again?”

  “Are you both real?” I couldn't stand it any longer. “Which one is true?” I pulled myself off Lydia's lap and crawled to the door. “Am I here or in the Vampire cage?”

  Lydia got on her knees. She reached for me. “Come back, love. This is real.”

  “Such an insidious drug”—Margot grimaced—“to screw with his head like this.”

  “Stop it,” I hollered. “I can't breathe.” As I said it, I realized it was true. “I can't catch my breath.”

  Margot shook her head. “You're breathing just fine, Deacon. If you weren't, you'd never be able to yell at us like that.”

  She was right.

  “I...”

  The world tilted sideways. Red flames filled the night sky around us. This time, however, my wife and the doctor seemed to see them, too. They both grabbed the side of the truck, and I groaned.

  The last thing any of us needed right then was the signal I received. “Werewolves. They seem to like burning shit lately.”

  Everything went black.

  I woke alone in the car. There were shouts outside, and given that the door to the truck was open and the flames still blazed, I didn't think much time had passed. I dragged myself to my feet.

  Enough was enough. I wasn’t still in the Vampire cage, fortunately, that crazy had passed. But I was done. The monsters needed to be gone. I was going to gut through this.

  I stumbled out of the car. There was a discarded, half-broken machete on the ground. I heard howls, shouts, and growls in the distance. It wasn’t Full Moon, those fuckers didn’t have to be here causing problems. They just wanted to and that pissed me off more. I picked up the broken machete, apparently having the strength to do that at the moment. Or maybe it was adrenaline. This would have to do. I didn’t know where mine was.

  A blade was a blade was a blade.

  If it took the head off the frickin’ monster’s neck, then it was all great as far as I was concerned. I limped. Couldn’t run if I needed to. The trick would be, then, to not need to. All of it seemed very simple.

  There was a large group of Werewolves, three dozen at quick count, attacking Warriors. I stood still and watched for a second, looking for who I wanted. It didn’t take long to spot the Alpha. Those furry asshats loved their Alphas more than they did anything in the universe, more than their mates, more than their lives.

  With a group this big, there was no way the Alpha wasn’t around and no way were they going to let him fight. Behind two big dog-monsters, stood the Alpha, two lengths of the forest back, observing the scene from higher ground.

  Well, wasn’t that cute.

  They’d set the woods on fire and threatened my people. Again. They could all go fuck themselves. I limped past the scenes of battle. They weren't interesting to me, and I could make them all stop now and permanently. The only thing I needed to accomplish what I planned was fire. The same stuff they were using on us, I would use on them.

  I took my broken machete. A big stick would get the job done. More and more, I was discovering how little I needed fancy stuff. I grabbed a low-hanging branch off a tree and stuck it in one of the flames. This was how I’d met Lydia—Werewolves and fire.

  I turned to catch a quick glance of her in the crowd. She fought next to Rachel and with three other Newbies, including Trevor. Chad was somewhere in there, too. That was great. They'd take care of her until I made this problem disappear.

  “Hey,” Micah called, running up to meet me. He was bleeding from his temple. It dripped down his face. Something had caught him with a claw. “What are you doing?”

  “You're hurt.” In battle, sometimes we had to state the obvious.

  He shrugged. “It's blood. I didn't take a blow to the head, just a scratch.”

  “Can you take off heads?”

  Between the fire and the moon, I could see Micah as well as if it were daytime. “Sure. Anytime, any day.”

  I pointed at the Alpha. “Take the one on the left.”

  “You think this is the smartest move? There are battles to be won. He'll leave once we've beat them back a bit.”

  “Sure, giving his royal assholeness enough time to plan again. I'm not interested in him having any more time on this Earth. This is the only play.”

  Micah grabbed my arm. “He's not Alpha because he's weak.”

  “I'm not still alive because I'm stupid.”

  “Not stupid, no.” He didn't let go. “But coming off an extreme amount of injury and sickness. I'm not sure you're in your right mind.”

  I laughed. “Micah, I'm not even sure what the fuck that is. Come with me or get out of my way. This is happening.”

  Even among those of us who were Warriors, who were tough, who fought all the time, there was a hierarchy. Sometimes it came from battle wins. To give Clancy her due, she was as high up as she was because she kicked major ass over and over, survived things that would make other people die, and arranged the death of Isaac Icahn by offering herself up in return.

  Patrick Lyons' kids had seniority based on their name alone. As much as I didn't hate Chad anymore, I wasn't sure if he was as badass as everyone else made him out to be. But Micah? I'd come to learn that every bit of power he had in our group was well earned. Most of the time, I'd back off and run his play in battle. Not today. He could get behind me or get out of my way.

  He nodded. “One of the left? Got it.”

  “Good.” It certainly would make it easier to have him with me than to do it alone.

  As we approached the Alpha his two guards snarled, their canines bared, their hackles up.

  “Mine,” I called out lest Micah forget.

  He snickered. “It's like football. You're calling the play.”

  I shook my head. “Not sure what that is.”

  Because the machete was wobbly, I had no choice but to hold it tighter around the top of the handle.

  “It's like you're choking up on the thing.”

  “Use comparisons I understand, or shut the fuck up.” With one loud howl, the fully black Werewolf on the right launched himself at me. He was huge and fast. Not surprising. The Werewolves guarding the Alpha would be among the very best. I swung at the Werewolf. He ducked, darting left, and jumped toward me. I had to roll right to avoid him. He was faster. I was more motivated. I swung the machete again and hit the creature's neck. He howled. The sound elicited no sympathy from me.

  I dug deeper, cutting through bone and muscle. There was blood and gore. This was not an easy sw
ipe. I ended up dropping my branch, which was fine, I'd retrieve it later. I needed leverage. I got on his back. Micah was right; this was becoming my move. I continued to chop off the monster's head.

  The Werewolf on the left must have gotten the hint this was not going to go well. He leaped at me. I didn't even look. Micah had said he had him, and I believed he did. The fact I wasn't dead lent credence to my faith in Prince Lyons.

  My Werewolf finally died. I fell to the ground, rolled, and got to my feet. I wasn't feeling anything, so my adrenaline had to be through the roof. Or I was having another side effect.

  The Alpha charged me. I'd had a plan, and I needed to execute it, which was easier said than done.

  Still, I had no choice. I could do it or die. I wanted to see Lydia again. Maybe the Werewolf had a mate. We'd see which of us came home to our woman.

  I grabbed the stick and dropped the machete. I took the branch and let it catch fire in one of the nearby burning trees. It caught aflame easily, considering how wet it had been. But a dead branch was a dead branch. It might not make a great campfire, but it could burn Wolf.

  I jumped onto the back of the Alpha. He snarled, tried to turn his head to bite me, and bucked. I had to squeeze my thighs hard to stay on top of him.

  “Hey,” I shouted as loudly as I could. “You want your Alpha to die?” I held up my stick. “Keep fighting. You want to see this son-of-a-bitch again, and you'll stop. Now.”

  Silence hit the area hard. I'd never heard it go from such noise to nothing so fast before. The Alpha was still trying to knock me off his back. “I will burn him to the ground. I will burn him so fast all you'll hear from him are his screams as he dies. You love your Alpha? Back the fuck away, now.”

  I hoped my fellow Warriors were on their game. They'd better understand what I planned to do here. We had no history of attacking Alphas. Generally, we tried to survive encounters and what I was doing didn't fall into Patrick's constant strategy of live to fight another day. I planned to make it through this. But it wouldn't be because I played it safe.

  Howls started. That's good, boys, talk to each other. Back the fuck up.

  One after another they started to obey. I wasn't going to fall off their Alpha. They could see it. Sometimes I took the day, sometimes the monster did.

  Come on. Come on. Someone realize what I want to do.

  It was Chad who moved. He sprung forward, slashing the Werewolf near him until the neck fell off his body.

  There was a howl, and then I set the Alpha on fire. From the back of his neck, I struck over and over until even his rolling on the ground couldn’t extinguish the flames. I burned and burned and burned him until he fell backward.

  It was so much more brutal than taking off his neck. I wanted him to know, I wanted them all to see, just how vulnerable they could be. We were not weaker, and I was not afraid.

  A wall of Warriors formed around me. Any stupid wolf that didn’t run would face them. They wanted to set us on fire? Fine, I would burn them to ash. If they came at us, I would come at them ten times harder.

  The Alpha died. Eventually. It took a long time. When it was over, I threw down my stick into the snow and sat down, not caring if I got soaked or not.

  Micah was covered in soot. At some point he must have encountered some flames. He sat down right next to me. “Fuck. Man. Wow.”

  Yeah, that pretty much summed it up.

  A shadow fell over us, and I looked up to see the unsmiling face of Patrick Lyons. “When we get home, boys, we’re going to have a long talk.”

  Micah stared at his father for a moment before he burst out laughing. I didn’t know why. There really was nothing funny, except that listening to Micah laugh so hard was kind of funny unto itself. Soon, I was also cracking up. Right there in the snow with the dead Alpha nearby.

  Maybe we were both deranged.

  Fourteen

  Cleaning off without a shower was a problem. We melted snow, and I did my best not to freeze to death in the process. There were some things to like about Genesis, even if it was emotionally stifling and unforgiving.

  I hadn’t sought out Lydia. The longer I spent away from the ordeal, the more I realized I'd been half out of my mind during the whole fight. What in the hell had I been thinking? I didn't burn Alpha Werewolves to death. That wasn't how I conducted life. I'd done the whole thing without even thinking about how completely out of hand burning that wolf was going to get. What was the matter with me? Hadn't I learned anything from the Icahn ordeal? When I gave in to my impulses to slash and burn, things went to hell. The need to make big life decisions without pausing was how I'd ended up standing behind Keith when he’d had his throat slashed. I wasn’t okay yet from my ordeal with the drugs, but I was almost back to my normal self.

  I had to do better than that. I had to...

  I turned from where I stood, alone, by the fire to see my wife leaning against a tree. It was freezing cold, and I was doing my best to get my clothes back on without dying from exposure in the process.

  “Lydia?”

  She nodded. “Deacon.”

  Well, we knew each other's names still. That was good. “You okay?”

  “I'm fine.” She walked toward me. “I mean, why wouldn't I be fine?”

  I could think of about a hundred different reasons. “Some of the big things right off the bat? Your town burned down. Your mother has passed away. I got taken, you had to rescue me.”

  She moved her hands to her hips. “You went crazy, thought you were back in the cage, then pronounced yourself King Werewolf Killer like a lunatic. How's that? Extra two things, maybe?”

  Okay, the wife was pissed. I’d have to be even stupider than I already was to not get that right off the bat. “Lydia.” I needed a better answer than I had. The truth would have to do. “I don't have an answer for you. I just did it. I’m like that. I make rash decisions, and I can't see that they're wrong or thoughtless or crazy until after I've done them.”

  She sauntered toward me until she was right under my chin. I could smell her springtime scent. Her eyes were wide. Her hands moved fast, and she shoved me. I stumbled back.

  “Not okay, Deacon.” She poked my chest. “You scared me to death. Do you get that you’re important? To me? That we made a commitment to each other means you have to actually stop and consider my feelings before you do things? Maybe you don't have to actually do what I want or agree with me. That's fine. But you have to pause. You have to go that far.”

  She had pushed me. I almost couldn't believe it. “Lydia...”

  “Shut up. My husband tried to get himself killed less than twenty-four hours after my mother died. I am so mad I'm seeing red. There's only solution for it.”

  I swallowed. Whatever she needed, I'd do. “Are you going to, ah, beat me up?”

  Her smile was slow. “Nothing so easy, Deacon.” Her mouth met mine. I hadn't expected the kiss, and it startled me. She pushed me again until I backed into a tree. A short distance away, a forest was burning to the ground. After the fight, we’d moved closer to Genesis then stopped again. I could still see it. But even that fire had nothing on the heat coming off my wife.

  “Lydia...” I tried to speak between our embraces. I wasn't complaining. There was nothing I wanted more than to make love to her. I missed her in every way possible. I couldn't sleep because she wasn't next to me. I couldn't think because I didn't have her hand in mine. I needed her as much as I loved her. “Anyone could come.”

  “Then I guess you'd better be quick about it, Wolf-killer.”

  She tugged at my zipper, pulling it down until she could slip her hand inside of my pants. In the tight space. Her perfect hand found my cock and stroked it. I sucked in my breath. “Wow. Okay. I can't make love to you in the snow. There are some things that just don't work.” Improvisation had been my friend lately. The truck. The one they'd been keeping me in while I was out of it. No one was in it right then.

  I scooped her up, since it seemed most efficient, an
d carried her over. Somehow, one handed, with my body still fighting me in movements, I got us both into the back of that truck. Like the truck her mother had been in, this one was cleared out of seating and was empty in the rear. There were no locks on the doors, or none that worked. Chad had rebuilt all of these vehicles. Locks were not clearly one of his top priorities.

  She tugged at the shirt I'd just put on. Her movements were frantic, very un-Lydia. “Baby.” I kissed her neck where it was slightly exposed outside of her coat. “Let me make love to you.”

  My wife shook her head. “We can do slow and caring another night. Okay, because what I really need—and if this sounds terrible then I can apologize, or not, later—is for you to take me the way I hear other women describe it sometimes. I want it hard, fast, and over.”

  I got what she was saying, sort of. We had never done it that way. “I...” This was what she wanted. “Okay.”

  Her nod was fast, and then her lips met my own again. I knew how to fight, how to win, how to screw up royally. I'd even gotten pretty adept and understanding her body, how she liked to be touched, and what movements made her moan. Yet, every time we did something new sexually, I worried I was about to be an inept buffoon. I'd never tell her that. I had to keep some pride, but, damn, this had me worried. Fast and furious. What if she didn't like it?

  I didn't have much time to keep obsessing. Her hands were everywhere. She pulled at my shirt until it was off, and to keep pace, I got hers over her head and discarded somewhere, too. Next, her breasts were freed from her bra by Lydia herself. My mouth watered. I really loved her, and her naked breasts were like a small piece of heaven for me. I reached forward and tweaked her nipple. She sucked in her breath.

  “Too much?” This was her show, I planned on enjoying myself, but my inexperience could ruin everything if I wasn't careful.