Unchained (Dark Shifter Romance) (9 page)

What was she supposed to do now? Lacey chewed her lip. "Okay, let's get you back in the bunker…"

Jenny’s hand shot out, grasping in a grip around Lacey's wrist. Her eyes burned with fear. "Lacey? How did you get through all of them?"

Lacey opened her mouth, but shut it with a snap.

Outside, she heard footsteps.

Lacey placed a warning hand on Jenny’s arm, willing her to be silent, but she didn't need to. Jenny turned her head to stare at where the sound was coming from, as if she could see who it was through the walls. For a moment Lacey let her mind imagine a happy solution: maybe it really was a rescuer, late but showing up in the nick of time, the cops having finally routed the monsters from the town…

Then she heard the low murmur of laughter, and she knew that it wasn't the case. "Come on," she said, tapping Jenny's hand. "The shelter, maybe we can get there in time…"

Jenny shook her head. "If they’re at the window, they’ll be able to see all the way straight down the hallway."

As if answering her, there came the sound of footfalls falling heavily on the living room floorboards. Whoever was outside had climbed through the window.

Lacey stood up from the bed, and picked up Jenny's gun from where it was leaning against the bedside table. Jenny's eyes went wide, but then whatever she saw in Lacey's expression dampened her fear. Grimly, she got up from the bed, following silently.

Lacey gripped the rifle, edging towards the door. Her heart pounded, her palms sweaty. She'd never really held a gun before, besides her dad trying to teach her how to shoot cans in the backyard. She'd never held it with intention to kill, to fight off an opponent. The monsters out there were definitely not tin cans, happy to fall obligingly one after another.

"Hello?” A man's voice floated up the staircase from the lounge room below. "Are you okay? I heard voices, I’m here to help!"

Jenny bit her lip, looking to Lacey for guidance, but Lacey shook her head. There had been two sets of footfalls hitting the ground beneath the window, but whoever was speaking had not made any mention of a friend.
I
he’d said, singular. People who hid in other people's houses did not tend to be heroic rescuers.

When she’d heard the voices on the street outside, she’d felt fear, the same fear she’d felt when she'd seen the monstrous wolf men approaching her in the streets for the first time. But now, with the gun in her hands and her younger sister breathing heavily behind her, that fear transformed into something else.

The men on the floor beneath her were
enemies
. They wished to do her harm. Worse, they wanted to hurt her sister, her
people
!

Her lip curled, teeth bared. How dare they! How did they come into her house, and threaten her pack! A sharp, electric shiver ran up her spine, her flesh breaking out into fierce goose bumps. Adrenaline coursed through her veins.
How dare they!

Gesturing for Jenny to be silent and still, Lacey walked over to the door, and peeked around the frame.

From the bedroom door, she had a view all the way down the staircase, and to the man who stood at the base of it. It was just the one guy, and for all intents and purposes he looked completely normal, as if he really were a rescuer there to help them out of this crazy messed up world of monsters.

But her house had been left the same way it had been when she was a child. Lacey's eyes flicked up to her mother’s mirror, mounted on the wall behind the man. So many times as child she’d peered into it, seeing her reflection smiling back at her. Now, though, all she saw was the other member of the pair, hiding behind the corner of the hallway. Lurking. Waiting for her.

"There," the first man said, raising his hand as if he meant no harm. "Are you okay? Come on, come down here, let's get you somewhere safe. Is there anyone else with you?"

Even though Jenny was behind her, out of sight, Lacey could still feel her little sister shiver with disgust and fear at the thing pretending to be human. But she stayed quiet, just as Lacey had told her.

Lacey edged out of the doorway a little, but she kept the hand holding the gun out of sight behind the door. "How do you know I was in here?" she asked, her voice nothing but trusting.

The man smiled, though now Lacey realised that it didn't reach his eyes. They tracked her, darting with every movement of her body, a predator trying to keep his prey where he could see it. "I heard you talking, and I said to myself, what do you know, the rescue teams must have missed someone." He gestured to her, beckoning. "Come on, sweetheart, let's get you somewhere safe."

Lacey forced herself to look thankful. "Thank God," she said. Her voice sounded fake to own ears, but the man below didn't seem to notice. "I've been up here for God knows how long! My leg, it’s hurt— can you help me down the stairs?"

The man smiled. “Don't you worry, sweet thing. It's not a problem at all.”

Lacey waited at the edge of the doorway as the man climbed the stairs, until he got nearly within reach of her, his eyes fixed on her.

Then she pulled out the gun and shot him.

She may have had no experience at shooting anything but cans, but at that distance, she didn't need skill. The shot rang out, unbearably loud in the quiet house, and the smile slid from the wolf shifter’s face, replaced by shock and horror and pure hatred.

Lacey held her breath, hoping for him to fall, but instead he lurched forward at her, blood spattering on the ground below him, arms raised and hands clawed to grab at her. His hand swiped at her head and face, his bloodied fingers trying to close on her hair, but it skidded away without finding purchase on her close-cropped cut.

She staggered back, trying to put some space between the two of them, and his hands closed on the barrel of the rifle.

All she could smell was blood and rage. But with something primal inside her, urging her to defend her pack, any fear she felt became anger. Furious, she shoved at her attacker, forcing him back.

He stumbled back, his feet unsteady, and then he slipped. The rifle was yanked from Lacey’s hands as he fell backwards down the stairs, spinning with sick bloody noises, until he lay crumpled in a heap at the base of the stairs.

"What the fuck?!" The man at the base of the stairs leaned around the corner he was hiding behind, staring up at Lacey. Unlike the fake pleasantry in the face of his friend, his expression was filled with a pure hatred. "The fuck was that was for, you crazy bitch?"

Lacey breathed hard, staring at the gun. It had come to a halt halfway up the stairs. The others shifter followed her gaze, and there was a pause as both of them considered the weapon on the floor.

It looked like it was an equal distance between the two of them. Did it even have a second shot ready to fire? Lacey wished she could ask Jenny, but she knew the slightest sound would break the tension between her and man below. Palms clammy on the edge of the door frame, she felt overwhelmingly dizzy, like she'd run a marathon.

So, this was it. Do or die.

Unfortunately, she wasn't too sure about the do part of the equation. Wolf shifters were
fast
.

The man beneath her seemed to reach the same conclusion. His sick grin spread further. "You think you can get to it before I can? Maybe you can. But you know what? It doesn't matter." He let out a short bark of laughter, legs tensing. "You might need that thing to kill me, but I don't need it to kill you, bitch."

Lacey felt cold, like she’d been doused in icy water. Behind her, Jenny's hands clutched at the hem of her shirt, and she reached behind to free herself, pushing her sister’s pleading grasp away. "Yeah?" she asked, and the confidence in her voice was a surprise even to herself. "Let's just see about that."

The wolf shifter let out a low growl, a primal predatory sound that designed to send fear running down the spines of any mere human close enough to hear it. It was chilling, but Lacey ignored it. She’d heard worse.

One heartbeat. Another. And then Lacey was moving, throwing herself forward towards the gun, hoping that gravity would help her get there just one instant before her opponent did. In the peripheries of her vision she could see the other man bolt forward, racing towards her as she raced towards him, his bared teeth shining white.

She got there first. Her hand closed around the gun, yanking to into her grasp, but the other man was fast, too. As she pulled the gun towards her, beginning to turn on him, he slammed a hand down on the barrel, shoving it away from himself. He raised his other hand in a fist, swinging it towards her in a clawed grip.

The moment seemed somehow slowed, and Lacey thought of rabbits in the headlights, and news footage of people frozen as tsunamis bore down on them.
This is it
, some small part of her thought wordlessly, but instead of fear, what she felt was that same furious sense of
offence
, that she should be challenged by such a lowly wolf-- and on the heels of that, a sense of her sister behind her, her heart beating fast.

And then there was something else, just as the other man reached out to her, something that seemed loud enough to shake the house to the rafters.

A moment later she realised that just sounded loud her, her shifter senses taking in details that her human hearing could never have paid attention to through the fog of panic.

It was a growl.

And then, as her opponent leaned forward to tear her throat out, bared teeth angled towards the pale column of her throat, someone started running.

Something hit the man from behind, sending all three of them sprawling. Lacey hit the ground hard, the air forced from her lungs as she was thrown awkwardly back against steps. A sharp stab of pain fled up from her ribs, and she knew that she must have broken one on the sharp corner of a step.

Blinking the white light of pain from her eyes, she stared up at the man above her-- no, the two men above her. Her opponent was turning away from her, looking back over his shoulder at whoever had struck him from behind. And behind him, bearing down, his own teeth bared in challenge, was…

"Jack," she whispered, in what little voice she had left.

It was like a movie, slowed down to quarter speed, then suddenly sped up. Her attacker turned around, and then Jack's fist was lashing out lighting fast, the sound of fist hitting flesh filling the air. Her opponent crashed down in a snarling heap, but bounced back almost as fast, trying to get his feet underneath him on the uneven footing of the stairs.

On the ropes now, unsettled by this sudden attacker, the wolf shifter instinctively turned towards safer ground. In one fluid movement, he began to shift, fur beginning to ripple over his body even as he turned to leap at Jack.

But Jack had been prepared. He’d had the advantage of surprise, and he was an alpha wolf in the prime of his life. He reached out and caught his opponent’s throat in mid leap, holding tightly even as his foe turned from human to wolf underneath his bare palm.

With one bone-shaking growl, he threw his opponent downstairs. There was the thump of flesh hitting the ground, and then Lacey was aware of Jenny's hands on her shoulders, urging her back into the room. "Please Lacey, please, get back, we have to run!"

"It's okay." She shivered, forcing herself to watch as Jack finished off the man who would have killed them.

Jack, his task is grisly task now done, looked up at two of them. He looked awful, harrowed. His chest heaved with exertion, but that didn't seem like the reason he couldn’t say anything. He didn’t need to. His eyes fixed fast on Lacey's own like a lifeline, she felt what he was his emotions, as surely as if he'd opened his mouth and said them out loud.

I'm here.

Jenny was still shaking Lacey, trying to get her sister to move, and Lacey stood up. Throwing one arm around her sister, clearly confused and scared, Lacey stared down at Jack. "It's okay, Jenny." She took a breath. "I know him."

The new girl was different from her sister, but Jack could see the resemblance. The surprise and fear of a new situation was written over her features just the same as it had been when Lacey had finally woken up, chained to his bed.

When Jack had seen Lacey the first time, he’d thought she was beautiful. He’d wanted to claim her. But now, even though the very same features were staring at him wide eyed, he felt something different.

It was the urge to protect Jenny.

Lacey had followed him silently after he'd led them from the house, and though he’d had thing to say to her, he’d been glad for her surreptitiousness. Everyone in a huge radius would have heard the gunshot, he knew-- it was how he’d been able to find her, after all-- and not everyone else being drawn by that sound would have the same good intentions as he had. The trek back to the cabin had been a fast one, Jack and Lacey looking back over their shoulders, heads cocked to the sky as if to catch the first sound or scent of any pursuit.

Jack ground his teeth, suppressing a shiver. All Lacey had cared about on the trek back was getting her sister to safety, and, distracted from her own pretence of being human, he'd seen the way her senses had taken over, telling her how to sniff the air, how to tilt her ears towards every new sound in the distance.

The gestures were exactly as Jack had seen experienced alphas do, ones that had been born to the shifter life. It sent a strange thrill of recognition through him. The mark on her shoulder had been proof enough that she had been bitten, but this was the true sign of her shifter powers beginning to emerge, tugging her towards a new animal nature that she had never experienced before.

Lacey said nothing to him, not until they were all back at the cabin. She'd scanned the empty room implacably, and then turned those intoxicating eyes on Jake. "You don't have company?"

He shook his head. "He left," was all that he could say.

Lacey let out a short bark of laughter, completely humourless, and then focused towards getting her sister settled. And it was clearly her sister, though same features, those that share familiarity, all touches and gestures they showed that they had known each other for their whole lives.

Without a look back, Jack left the tiny cabin. He leaned against the wall, exhaling shakily, his hand balled into fists.

When Mark had said what he had about Lacey, Jack had felt torn between two impossible choices. But soon as Lacey had left, hurt and anger radiating in those collar eyes, he'd known what he was going to do.

"You’re choosing some out-pack bitch over me?" Mark had laughed bitterly, staring incredulously at Jack. "You don't care about your pack as much as I'd thought. I guess."

"I don’t care?" Jack snarled. "
Everything
I've done, I've done for our pack.”

Mark had laughed bitterly, and turned towards the door "Yeah, right. Good luck replacing us all with your new piece of ass." And then he'd left, leaving Jack with the sound of his retreating footsteps in the forest leaves as the last member of Jack's pack turned his back to him.

Jack shook his head, trying to force the memories away. Mark’s rejection had hurt like a stabbing wound, making him bleed inside. But he hadn’t waited for the pain to fade. He'd headed out into the woods-- not on the trail of his pack, but the trail of the one he knew he knew
should
be
his pack. His mate. And then he'd arrived almost too late, seeing that wolf poised to end her life…

Jack looked up from his thoughts to find Lacey, closing the cabin door behind her. She tilted her head towards the woods, and, without waiting to see if he would follow her, headed out the direction she'd indicated. Wordlessly, Jack trailed along her footsteps, his eyes fixed on her back.

Eventually she leaned back against a tree, arching one eyebrow at him. "Arriving just in time? You're a real hero."

Jack snorted. "It wasn't hard to follow the gunshot.”

“Well, forgive me for not defending my life with the quietest method possible. Next time I’ll remember to bring some ninja throwing stars.” That issue apparently dealt with, she levelled a steely gaze at him. “What your friend said you were doing with me? That was fucked up. Do I have anything to worry about from here on out?”

“Global warming. Spiders. Colt.” He locked eyes with her. “Not me.”

She laughed, but he could see how tired she was. It made him want to pull her into his arms, letting his presence wash her worries away, but he held himself back. “Really? Because for a moment there I thought you were going to let your flunky kill me.”

Jack ground his teeth, the memory still raw and painful. “I wasn’t.”

“I know that now. It’d be kind of stupid to save someone from certain death only to kill them yourself later.” She smiled, that dark, wry smile he’d now become familiar with. “Thanks, Jack.”

With a nod of her head, she slipped back into the forest, leaving Jack alone with his thoughts.

Above him, the moon began to emerge, swelling towards fullness.