Angelina’s eyes narrowed. “Honey—where’s your limp?”
“My…what?” Sara asked, completely confused and distracted from slapping herself stupid.
“I’ve known you twenty years, Sara Morrighan. And since day one, I’ve watched you limp that wide ass around this town.”
“Hey. It is not wide!”
“And now, today, I watched you practically skip to the front door like goddamn Pollyanna. Pain free. What the hell’s going on?”
Sara looked down at her legs. She took a few steps. Nope. No limp. Because there was no pain. None. Stranger still, even on those rare occasions Sara didn’t have pain, her leg was always so weak she still had the limp. Now it felt like her wounded left leg was as strong as her right. And both felt even stronger than that.
Sara bent her knee and raised her leg up. She stretched the leg out behind her and leaned forward. No pain. No weak muscles. Just fluid movement.
Sara had been so late this morning and so busy thinking about Zach, she hadn’t even realized it. In fact, when she got out of bed she immediately started limping out of habit.
“I don’t know. It hurt yesterday.” A lot.
Angelina stood next to her now, concern written all over her face. She knew what her friend was thinking. Stuff like this didn’t happen to people like them. Random events of good luck is what Miki always called it. In their world, people didn’t win the lottery, meet the perfect man, or suddenly get better. And that meant only one thing…
“Oh, my God. I’m dying.”
“What?” Angelina shook her head. “You’re not dying, you idiot.”
“Everything okay, ladies?” Marrec had reappeared and was watching them closely. Sara opened her mouth to tell him she was clearly dying because her leg suddenly felt better and people always felt better just before they died and she felt he should know since they’d always been so close, and to make sure her funeral was a tasteful affair—
“Everything’s fine, Marrec. Thanks.” Angelina pushed Sara out the door into the parking lot.
“Where’s your truck?”
Sara pointed. “Over there.”
Taking the keys sticking out of Sara’s baggy khaki pants, Angie pushed her over to the vehicle. “Get in,” she ordered.
Sara looked at her friend. “I don’t want a big funeral, ya know. Just something simple.”
“Would you get the fuck in the truck,” Angie snapped.
Zach had just gotten back from hunting, stopping briefly at the nearby lake to wash the blood off his fur and paws. He’d since shifted back to human and, leaving most of the Pack by the lake’s edge, returned to the campsite to get dressed and track down Sara. He tried to convince himself it was simply to see how she was doing. To find out if opening her old wound helped her as he thought it might. But that was all just bullshit. He really wanted to see her. End of story.
He thought about her all night. Her smell, her taste, her hands in his hair. Her cries of passion and her growls of desire. He couldn’t stop thinking about her no matter how hard he tried. Not that he tried all that hard.
Already in his jeans, Zach had just pulled on his T-shirt and boots when Marrec arrived. A few of his Pack were with him and as soon as he jumped out of his truck he made a direct line for Zach.
Zach stood to his full height, but didn’t make any aggressive moves. Nor did he back down. He knew they were in this man’s territory because of Marrec’s goodwill, so he wasn’t about to risk that by ripping the old bastard’s throat out. At least not yet.
But before Marrec could get his hands on Zach, Yates and Conall, who had yet to venture down to the lake, stepped in front of their Pack mate. Yates, being Alpha, snarled, his canines extending.
“Back off, Marrec.” They may be in Marrec’s territory, but Zach knew Yates would never let the man get near one of his own Pack.
“You tell that bastard to keep his hands off her!”
Yates didn’t need any clarification as he and Conall turned to look at Zach. “Tell me you didn’t?” Yates demanded with a sigh.
Zach shrugged. “It depends on what your definition of ‘didn’t’ is.”
At that Marrec went for Zach again, but Conall pushed him back.
Yates glared at Zach before turning back to Marrec. “Is she yours? Did you mark her?”
“No!” Marrec seemed truly appalled. “She’s like my daughter.” He scowled at Zach again. “A very protected daughter,” he growled out.
Yates sighed. “I understand that, but—”
Marrec cut him off, “Who’s not ready to be turned yet.”
Yates frowned in confusion. “Marrec, that usually takes years. No matter what Zach did or didn’t do.”
“Then why was she trotting around my store today like she was about to run a marathon? No pain. Just power. And guess what? Her friends noticed.”
Yates sighed again, his canines smoothly disappearing back into his mouth. “Shit, Zach, what did you do?”
Zach wasn’t ashamed of what he did, he simply didn’t know Sara would react to it so strongly or so quickly. “I bled her old wound, just like you suggested.”
“I didn’t suggest shit to you!” Marrec glared straight at Zach. “And exactly how did you bleed her without her knowing what you were up to?”
When Zach didn’t answer, Marrec again went for his throat. Yates and Conall pulled Marrec back.
Yates was clearly losing patience. “Marrec,” he snapped as he pushed the man back for what seemed the hundredth time. “The bottom line is she’s not yours. By blood or mark. So, I’m not exactly sure what your problem is.”
“Did you ever see someone turned quickly? It’s rare, but it happens.” Marrec took a deep breath and once he seemed to be under some kind of control, Yates silently allowed him to walk over to Zach and face him. The two men stood toe to toe and, although he was a good five inches shorter than Zach, Marrec’s power and why he was Alpha Male of his Pack was more than clear. “If something happens to her because of this,” Marrec warned in a deadly low voice, “no one will be able to protect you from me.”
The men locked eyes for a few more seconds; then, with a snarl, Marrec turned and walked away. The three men watched Marrec’s truck pull out of their campsite.
Conall gave his friend a sympathetic look, and headed off to the lake to meet up with the rest of the Pack. When he was gone, Yates rubbed his tired, bloodshot eyes before turning to Zach. “Let’s not bullshit around, okay, Zach?” When Zach didn’t reply, Yates went on. “We both know what Casey is up to. But I know that it’s time for me to step down, no matter what she thinks or wants. I’m tired. And I’m burnt out. I just want to be part of the Pack. Not worrying about who is doing what. And I want you to take over. But if you fuck this up, and that girl goes down because of you…there’s no Pack in the world that will have you.”
“I don’t care,” Zach answered honestly. “You didn’t see her in pain, Yates. She was dying.” Zach paused for a moment. “And I wasn’t going to let her.”
Yates seemed mildly surprised. He slowly nodded in understanding. “Fine.” Yates moved next to Zach so that he was right by him, his voice low. “Then you better watch her. Because if she turns as fast as I think she might, she will go down and she’ll take this entire town with her.”
Yates left Zach standing there in the middle of the campsite. And for the first time in Zach’s life, his first thought wasn’t about himself or the Pack. It was about someone else entirely. It was about Sara. The thought of anything happening to her caused his insides to clench up and his brain to shut down, leaving only one thought. He had to find her. He had to find Sara now.
Shit. Dick went hard again. He would really have to do something about that.
Chapter Twelve
Sara paced back and forth inside Miki’s tiny apartment. She was anxious, tense and extremely horny. This seemed odd, considering her current situation.
As soon as they left Marrec’s shop, Angelina dragged h
er to Miki’s. After banging on the door for several minutes, a clearly just-awakened Miki answered, snatching the door open. “What?”
Angelina blinked in surprise. “My God, were you actually asleep?”
“Yeah,” she replied sarcastically. “I was actually asleep.”
“Well, isn’t that rare,” Angelina stated honestly as she pushed her way past Miki, dragging Sara behind her. “You’re not going to believe this shit,” she announced. And before Sara knew it they’d forced her to act like a runway model, parading back and forth in Miki’s tiny, book-filled living room to demonstrate how her limp had all but disappeared.
By this point, Miki was fully awake. “Honey, exactly what did that guy do to you?”
“I’m not answering that question again.” Sara had given them the barest of details on her sexual exploits the night before. So she wasn’t about to go into how she’d screamed and writhed under the man’s tongue like a horny dog.
“Would you focus,” Miki snapped. “There has to be a reason you’re suddenly…okay.”
Sara stopped modeling and faced her friends. “But I’m not okay. I’m dying.”
“What?”
Angie quickly cut off the potential insanity. “You are not dying, you idiot.” Staring at her friend from the safety of Miki’s old couch, Angelina looked Sara up and down. “In fact, you look as healthy as a fucking horse.”
“Which brings us back to the point,” Miki dived in again. “What did he do to you?”
“I don’t know. Nothing?”
As if rehearsed, both Angelina and Miki raised one eyebrow each, staring at their in-denial friend.
Sara sighed and crossed her arms in front of her chest, hoping to hide her hardening nipples. Christ, just the thought of him! “Look, I’m not telling you about…you know.”
Miki rolled her big brown eyes. “I don’t want to know where his tongue was—”
“Dude!”
Miki barreled on, “But did he give you anything? Any pills? Anything to drink? I mean, fuck, Sara, it was a rave.”
Sara thought back to that night. She remembered him rubbing her thigh, kissing her thigh, licking her…shit.
Sara turned and charged into the bathroom, Miki and Angelina close behind. As they walked in, Sara already had her khakis down around her ankles and was turning to the mirror to examine the wound she had cleaned off and slapped a large bandage on just that morning. With one move she tore the bandage off, revealing her old scar, ripped through with four new ragged lines.
“Holy shit,” Angie gasped as Miki knelt by Sara and examined her thigh. After several moments her eyes locked with Sara’s.
Miki shrugged. “They look like animal marks.”
“Bullshit!” Sara barked. “How would you know that anyway?”
Miki rolled her eyes. “Hello. I read everything.”
She left the bathroom, and Sara could hear her rummaging around her apartment, pawing through the huge number of books. After a few minutes, Miki returned with a huge, dusty tome. “Here.”
Grabbing the book, Sara and Angelina examined page two-hundred-and-thirty-four of the Encyclopedia of Mammals and saw a huge paw print. “Front paw print of six-year-old gray wolf, actual size,” read the caption.
“You see?” Miki demanded.
“See what?” Sara demanded back.
“It can’t be,” Angelina muttered, still staring at the book.
“Exactly.” Sara momentarily felt vindicated.
“The paw mark on her leg is much bigger.”
“It is not a paw mark!” Sara raged as she reached down to pull her pants back up. “You are both insane!” She pushed past her friends. “I’m outta here.”
Sara headed for the door, but both Miki and Angelina grabbed her just as she stepped outside.
“Oh, no you don’t, missy.” Angelina pulled her back in while Miki slammed the door. “Until we know what’s going on, you’re not going anywhere.”
That had been four hours ago. Her friends still had no answers, although a lot of ridiculous theories were running rampant. So, Sara paced and paced and paced. The walls were closing in on her—at least that was how it felt. Like she was trapped. The tiny apartment caging her in. She had all this sudden, untapped energy. She wanted to go for a run or something. She needed some fresh air. What could be the harm in that?
With Angelina and Miki arguing in the bedroom in whispers, a few minutes on the porch wouldn’t hurt anybody.
Moving silently to the door, Sara eased it open and slipped out into the night.
Zach walked into the diner, ignoring the fact all activity stopped as soon as they saw him. They were all shifters. Marrec’s Pack. And word about him and Sara had moved through the small town like wildfire. He was getting exceptionally shitty treatment all over the goddamn place. They acted like he’d tried to hurt Sara.
Shit, maybe his Pack should have just grabbed the woman and run. Cause there was nothing like redneck shifters to annoy a man.
Zach leaned up against the counter and motioned to the waitress.
She stood in front of him with a less than friendly expression on her face. “Yeah?”
“Have you seen Sara?”
“Yeah,” the woman replied.
Zach waited for her to finish, but she kept staring at him instead.
“Could you tell me where I can find her?” he finally asked, working really hard not to start tearing throats from bodies.
“I could tell you…”
“Okay.”
“…but I won’t.”
She knew something was seriously different as soon as she walked into Skelly’s. Since the day Sara had fake I.D. she’d been coming and going out of Skelly’s virtually unnoticed unless someone accidentally ran into her or a person new to Skelly’s happened to spot the scar on her face.
But as soon as she walked into the club this night, she realized she had every guys’ attention. True, a little overwhelming, especially at first when she didn’t really know what they were looking at or why. Yet, at the same time, strangely exhilarating.
Moving through the crowd, Sara’s eyes kept scanning left to right, her entire body ready to deal with whatever came at her. Actually, she kind of looked forward to something coming at her. Her senses felt on overload. Smells she’d never noticed before assaulted her, like Leon the bouncer’s overuse of Old Spice. And even that couldn’t block out the fact the man probably hadn’t showered since the night before.
Sounds, too, seemed more intense. Louder. And the bass from the music pounding through the speaker system pulsated through her body. The feel of it almost sexual, causing her nipples to tighten and her pussy to clench. But even with the music going full blast, she couldn’t understand why everyone was suddenly screaming. She could hear them fine, couldn’t the person in front of them?
Sara walked up to the bar and motioned to the bartender who worked on Miki’s nights off.
“Hey, Sara. Miki’s not here tonight.”
“Yeah. I know. Can I get a shot of…” She stopped. Mhhhm. Perhaps tequila was not the best thing tonight. “Make that a beer. Dark.”
He nodded and had it in front of her in less than a minute. Before she could dig the fiver out of her pocket, a male arm reached around her. “I got it.”
Sara looked over her shoulder and blinked. Kent Ethos? He didn’t belong to any particular club but was definitely a rider and gave Marrec a lot of business.
“Uh…thanks, Kent.”
He smiled down at her and she realized there was real intent behind that smile. “My pleasure, Sara.” He leaned against the bar, staring at her like he had his eyes on the hottest piece of ass ever.
“So, you just hanging out tonight?”
Sara bit back her typically sarcastic remark and instead said, “Yeah. I guess.”
“Hey, Sara.”
Sara looked at the man standing on the opposite side of her. She knew him as Jazz and that was about it. And definitely part of a club. O
ne of the tougher ones. Last she heard they still hated her by association. They never forgave Angie for what she did to their leader all those years ago. For a while Sara thought for sure they’d try and retaliate but Marrec handled it and since then they all stayed out of each other’s way.
Until tonight it seemed.
“Hi, Jazz.”
“So, you just hangin’ out tonight?”
Sara had a hard time maintaining a neutral look on her face. She really wanted to stare at them all in shock or laugh hysterically until she peed in her pants. Especially when one of the riders from another cycle club walked up behind her and simply stood there watching her.
“Yeah. I’m just hangin’,” she said somehow without laughing.
“Everything all right, Sara?”
One of Marrec’s older sons stared at her from across the bar, a deep scowl on his rugged face, several of his siblings and cousins standing behind him. Uh-oh. She knew that expression. The same one they all got when they thought someone was putting Sara down or hurting her feelings.
“Yeah, she’s all right,” Jazz snapped. “So back the fuck off.”
Uh-oh.
Zach was about to howl in frustration when he got the call. For hours he searched for her. He eventually found out she’d gone off with her friends, but he lost her scent once she left Marrec’s. Including the diner, he also tried her house, the other two restaurants in town and the local movie theater.
Then Conall called. “You better get over here.”
It turned out “here” was the club he first saw her in. He had gone there earlier, but it was a quiet evening with just a few patrons hanging out so he quickly left.
But when he rode his bike up, Conall was standing outside with Kelly and Julie. Standing with them was a small group of patrons, wearing their requisite Goth black and leather. They all looked like they were waiting for something, but he was afraid to ask what.