Claimed by the Beast Bundle (9 page)

**
Part Two**

Chapter 1

“I can wash myself,” Crystal grumbled.

Beth, her best friend, looked her dirty and bloody body over and raised an eyebrow. “I bet you can, but you look like you’ve been in a car accident and then run over by a riverboat.”

Crystal offered a tired smile to her friend. “Motorcycle accident, at least. But I’m fine. I don’t know how I’m fine, but I am.”

“Crys, your clothes are ruined and you’re covered in blood!”

Crystal sighed and pulled her tattered shirt over her head. She let it fall to the floor and then gave her ruined jeans the nudge they needed to slip over her hips and join the shirt. She stepped out of them and moved to the shower to turn on the hot water. She turned back to Beth and saw her friend staring at her body a moment longer than she should have.

Crystal glanced down at herself and understood why. She had dried blood stuck to her underwear and her skin. What Beth couldn’t see was that she wasn’t cut. Or at least she wasn’t anymore. She had been. She’d been scraped, torn, gouged, and even bitten. But between the time her friends had killed the Beast that hunted her and the ride back home, her body had put itself back together. It was impossible, but no more impossible than watching the five people turn into wolves before her very eyes and then shift back into humans.

“I’m about to be very naked,” Crystal warned her.

Beth crossed her arms in front of her. “You can’t scare me.”

Crystal laughed. “Get out!”

“No,” her friend insisted. “After what you went through, I’m not leaving you.”

“Beth, I love you, but—” Crystal trailed off, not sure what exactly to tell her friend. She knew about the Beast, but she didn’t know that the bikers seemed to have adopted her into their pack. She almost snorted when she realized she’d used the word pack. It was fitting, what with them being werewolves.

“Why are you shaking your head?” Beth asked.

Crystal blushed and stopped. She hadn’t realized she was doing it. “Things are crazy,” she admitted. She sank down to the closed seat on the toilet and folded her arms across her belly. “My life is crazy. I don’t know what the hell is going on.”

“Me neither,” Beth admitted. “But I’m here for you.”

Crystal offered her an appreciative smile and nodded. “You’re the best.”

“Damn right I am,” Beth whispered.

She laughed at her friend and stood up. She turned away from her and slipped her bloodstained bra off and let it fall to the floor on top of the other clothes. Moving fast and not looking or thinking about it, she pushed her boy shorts to the ground and stepped into the shower. She pulled the curtain shut behind her and moved into the hot water.

“One thing’s for sure,” Beth called over the patter of the falling water. “All this worrying must be killing your appetite. How much weight have you lost?”

Crystal closed her eyes and shrugged. Then she realized Beth couldn’t see her. “I don’t know. Seems like a few pounds every day.”

“Don’t take this wrong, but you look amazing.”

Crystal snorted. She had a long ways to go before she’d look amazing. She was tall and had broad shoulders. Unfortunately, too many microwaved dinners and trips to a drive-through helped make the rest of her body wide too. At least until this week. She didn’t think it was worrying that was helping her. If anything, her appetite had increased but she was still losing weight.

After the water beat on her for several minutes, she dunked her head in and began soaking her hair. She picked the sticks and leaves out and watched the water pooling around her feet turn red. She moved her hands down to her neck and winced as she rubbed across her shoulder where the Beast had bitten her as it had tried to breed her.

She shuddered at the memory. Breeding her had been his intention. She thought of it more as rape. In either case, he hadn’t been successful but it wasn’t for lack of trying. She wasn’t sore anymore from his misguided attempts to force himself into her but the memory still made her cringe.

That was only part of the crazy night she’d had. Guntar giving her the Beast’s heart to eat—raw—was probably the crowning moment. Seeing Hank naked and wanting nothing so much as to jump his bones came in a close second, though.

“Crys?”

Crystal shook her dark thoughts away and reached up to push her wet hair off her face. “Yeah?”

“Um, when were you going to tell me that Ember and Hank were werewolves?”

Crystal’s breath caught in her throat. Had Ember told her? Or Hank? When? They’d both ridden back with Beth to Crystal’s house and sure, Hank had been naked beneath the spare blanket Beth kept stored in her trunk. But nobody said a thing about them being able to turn into wolves.

“How, um—”

“When that thing sent Hank’s bike flying and went for you, I saw Hank. He hadn’t even stopped sliding across the ground and his clothes went flying in pieces. Then this giant dog takes off after that, that thing.”

“The Beast,” Crystal mumbled.

“Yeah, sure, whatever. By the time I got my car stopped, my door was open and Ember’s clothes were on the seat and floor. She was gone and another dog—”

“Wolf. They’re wolves, not dogs.”

“Okay, wolf. Well, she ran to Hank and then, right before my eyes, she turned back into Ember! She told me to go get her friends at your place. Then Hank climbed to his feet—I mean paws—and she fell down and turned back into one again. Then they took off like bullets. I never seen something move so fast.”

Crystal nodded and pulled the shower curtain back enough to poke her head out. “I didn’t want to scare you,” she said.

“You failed,” Beth responded. She offered a smile. “I’m scared shitless. But you’re still my BFF, and I’m not turning my back on you.”

“You’re not—you don’t think I’m some kind of freak?”

“Not for a second.”

Crystal bit her lip and blinked back the tears in her eyes.

“Are you, um, are you like them? Isn’t that how it works, they bite you and you turn into one?”

“I have no idea,” Crystal breathed. “I don’t think so, but I don’t know. None of them bit me, anyhow.”

“I thought that beast bit you?”

Crystal jerked and reached up to feel her tender shoulder. All her other cuts and bruises had healed—why wasn’t that one? It was like her foot when she’d been bitten the first time—it had taken a couple of days to heal. Still crazy fast, but the difference didn’t make sense. “He did, but he wasn’t like them. He was something else.”

“Oh.” Beth paused for a long moment before she asked, “What was he?”

Crystal shrugged. “I don’t know. They just said he was some kind of beast. I think Guntar said he had a bloodline that went back a really long time.”

“Weird.”

“Yeah.”

“Crys?”

“Huh?”

“This kind of thing isn’t real. Are we dreaming?”

Crystal let out a nervous laugh. “Don’t you think I’ve been praying for that all week?”

Beth frowned. “Maybe it’s my dream?”

“Wouldn’t you be the one getting chewed on and beat up then?” Crystal asked. “Or at least the one who has to fight to keep herself from screwing Hank?”

Beth’s lips pursed and she looked away. “Okay. It’s real then. I don’t know how, but it’s real.”

“At least we can count on one thing,” Crystal said.

“What’s that?”

“Stephanie is going to always be a bitch!”

Beth laughed at the mention of the social elite girl who had made tormenting Crystal her personal mission their senior year.

“Mind if I finish showering?”

“Oh! Yeah, sorry. Don’t mean to leave you wet and naked.”

Crystal smirked and pulled the curtain closed. As much as she loved and trusted Beth, being wet and naked sent her thoughts to Hank. The muscular biker was proving himself to be everything she’d ever dreamed about. Well, none of them looked very wealthy, but he made up for it with his good looks, killer body, and the way he treated her.

Crystal’s thoughts were shattered as somebody pounded on the bathroom door. “Hurry up.” Ember’s voice drifted through. “We’ve got a lot of talking to do.”

Crystal scowled and reached for the shampoo. As wonderful as the shower was, Ember was right. The Beast had poisoned her and she had to figure out what she had to do in order to survive. Especially now that he was dead. She smiled as another thought came to her. If nothing else, she had to at least find a way to get Hank alone before it was too late.

Chapter 2

Wearing yoga pants and a loose t-shirt, Crystal led the way back downstairs to the living room. The furniture was taken up by the bikers, forcing Crystal to stand in the entryway and earn a squawk from Beth as she bumped into her back.

Gwen was sprawled on the couch and lying in Guntar’s lap. Her eyes were closed and her breathing was heavy enough it almost sounded like she was snoring. Adrian sat at the other end of the couch and looked at her with his intense gaze. He seemed oblivious of Gwen’s foot that was resting on his thigh.

Ember was curled up in one of the two chairs in the room, with her legs tucked up beneath her and one arm propping her head up. Her eyes looked heavy, as though she were fighting sleep. The last chair in the room was occupied by Hank. He was big enough to make the recliner seem like a tea party chair even with how he was sprawled out in it. Crystal had to fight the urge to laugh at the tight-fitting pink sweatpants he’d borrowed.

Hank looked at her and smiled. He jerked and climbed to his feet. “Crystal! Please, sit.”

Crystal felt her cheeks heat up and mumbled a thanks as she made her way over to the chair. She sunk in it and saw Beth staring wide-eyed from the open archway to the kitchen. Ember blinked as she glanced at Beth and then looked away. Hank stretched, his fingers almost brushing the eight-foot ceiling, and moved to the front door to peer out the window.

“So, uh, what do you want to talk about?” Crystal ventured after several awkward seconds of enduring Adrian’s stare.

“You must have questions,” Guntar said.

“Uh, yeah!”

He nodded. But Adrian was the first to speak. “The girl must go.”

Crystal’s breath froze in her throat and then she realized he was talking about Beth, not her. She turned and saw Beth staring at the direct man with her lips parted.

“She’s my friend. She already knows what’s going on.” Crystal came to her defense.

Adrian’s lip twisted in a sneer. “I doubt it. We’re not even sure what’s going on.”

Crystal stiffened. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“She’s not one of us,” he said. “She doesn’t have the blood. She can’t know our secrets.”

“Adrian, she wouldn’t be the first norm,” Guntar said.

Adrian clamped his lips shut for a moment and then tried again. “She’s too young. She’ll talk. What is she, sixteen?”

“Hey!” Beth protested. “I’m seventeen, almost eighteen.”

He shrugged. “Too young.”

“I’m only eighteen,” Crystal pointed out. “What makes me different?”

“You were chosen by the Beast.”

Crystal clamped her mouth shut and glanced at Ember and Hank. Hank offered her a smile and a shrug. Ember looked to be almost asleep in the chair.

“She stays,” Guntar decided.

Adrian’s scowl remained but he nodded acceptance. “Very well.”

Guntar turned his attention on Crystal. “Nobody knows where we came from,” he said. “How the first of us learned to change from man to wolf.”

“I thought when you bit somebody, they turned into a werewolf?” Crystal asked. “I mean, that’s how it works in the movies, right?”

Adrian made a choking noise and turned away. Hank chuckled and even Ember smiled from her position of repose. Guntar shook his head. “It’s not so simple,” he said. “The blood holds the secret.”

“But I’ve been different since the Beast bit me. I mean, I’ve been hurt and the next day it’s gone. Tonight when I got hurt, I felt better even faster. After a few minutes, even.” Crystal hesitated as she realized what she was saying. Her eyes grew wide and her heart began to thud hard against her ribs. Was she one of them now? Adrian had said Beth had to go because she wasn’t like them. She whimpered, “Oh my God!”

Guntar turned to Adrian and ordered, “Tell her of the legend.”

Adrian sighed and focused on her. “We have been around longer than man has recorded history. Before notions of religion and government. But creatures like the Beast are older still.”

“Wait, I thought werewolves were evil? Everybody rips on the movies that came out that make you guys seem all sparkly and friendly because you’re supposed to be demons or something.”

“Are we demons?” Guntar asked.

Crystal hesitated and glanced at Hank. She licked her lips and shook her head. “No, I guess not.”

“There are many who insist we are.” Adrian recaptured the floor. “The legend our alpha would have me tell is one story of how the first of us came to be. It’s only a story, though; nobody knows if it’s true.”

Crystal leaned forward in the chair, giving Adrian her full attention.

“A beast attacked someone, some say it was a woman he chose to breed and others say it was a man he wanted to kill. Whoever it was, they fought and somehow the norm defeated the beast. Their blood mixed and the human, being primitive, ate his conquered foe in a primitive attempt to absorb his powerful essence. Instead, that person became the first one of our kind.”

Crystal’s eyes widened. “Wait, I ate that thing’s heart!”

Beth gasped. “You did what?”

Crystal glanced at her and nodded before turning back to Adrian. “And my cuts—the Beast was covered in blood when he touched me! His, I think. He bit me again too, on my shoulder. It’s still sore but everything else feels better.”

She turned to Guntar as she heard a rumbling sound coming from him. He was chuckling deep in his chest. “You should have seen yourself when you ate his heart.”

“What? Why?”

Guntar reached up with a hand and opened his mouth. She gasped as his face shifted before her eyes, blurring and making her blink in confusion. He tapped his fingers against his tooth. His unnaturally long and pointed canine.

“Oh my God!”

“Leave him out of this,” Adrian snapped. He relaxed and shrugged. “Or don’t, it’s your decision. None of us have ever seen anything to show we are the devil’s minions or God’s creatures.”

Crystal looked around and saw the other bikers had nothing to add to Adrian’s statement. “Okay, so what does that mean? Am I like you? What happens on a full moon? Will—”

“More Hollywood bullshit,” Adrian growled.

Guntar laughed. “The lunar cycle myth is older than that.”

Beth looked just as shocked as Crystal felt. “Myth?” Crystal asked. “But—”

Adrian shook his head. “It’s brighter out at night during a full moon. Easier for hunting. Easier to spot us,” he explained. He shrugged. “There’s been some studies over the past century showing the lunar cycle and tidal forces can have an effect on the brain chemistry of unstable individuals. If one of them happens to have the blood of the hunter in them, well, they might act out.”

“It’s like steroids,” Hank offered. He jerked when everyone looked at him and had the abashed look that suggested he wished he hadn’t said anything at all.

“Pray tell,” Adrian encouraged him.

“All right, well, I knew a lot of guys who juiced. The ones who were dicks to start with became bigger dicks.”

“I thought steroids shrank your, um, you know—your junk,” Beth blurted out.

Hank fixed her with a raised eyebrow. “Speaking of myths,” he muttered. “It doesn’t shrink your junk. Might shrink your balls, but that’s a different talk. Point is, what happens if you give a crazy guy a gun or a knife? You run like hell. Same thing with juice. Same thing with what we got.”

“Oh,” Beth said. She opened her mouth to ask a follow-up question but a quick shake of Crystal’s head made her clamp her lips together.

After a long moment of silence signaled the end of the derailed conversation, Adrian said, “That brings us to how we’re made.”

Crystal was confused and had the courage to prove it. “I thought you said nobody knew?”

“Originally, yes. But all of us were made by another. In fact, Guntar changed everyone here except me.”

“Did you turn Guntar?” Beth whispered.

Guntar and Adrian chuckled. “Far, far from it. We were both changed by the same woman. That was quite a night.”

Gwen shifted and growled in Guntar’s lap. Crystal’s eyes opened. “I thought she was asleep?”

Guntar chuckled. “Just resting her eyes.”

Crystal shook her head. “Okay, sorry, keep going.”

“Blood,” Adrian explained. “The blood spreads through blood. If I cut you and then myself and my blood gets in you, there’s a chance it will change you. It’s a small chance, but still a chance.”

“Wait, a small chance?”

“The more blood, the better the chance,” he admitted. “It takes around four weeks, another reason for the lunar cycle myth. Tangle with one of the blooded on a full moon and in four weeks, they survive the change and become one—on another full moon.”

Crystal winced. That made sense, except she didn’t like the part about surviving the change. It sounded bad, but she had to be sure. “Oh, so I might end up a—a norm, after all?”

His grin was more sneer than smile. “No. If it doesn’t change you, it kills you.”

“Oh, shit.”

Beth whimpered and moved to stand next to Crystal.

“What about the part about becoming savage and killing innocent people?”

“Are there any innocent people?” Adrian mused.

Guntar ignored him and said, “No. We know who we are and what we’re doing. We may be a little more wild, but we’re not savages.”

“What about the Beast?” Beth wondered, mirroring Crystal’s thoughts.

The three men, still fully awake, looked at one another and shrugged. “None of us has ever been a beast. I think they prefer to feed on animals, but I doubt they’d be concerned if a norm wandered across their path.”

Crystal nodded and thought of everything he’d told her. So far she’d been poisoned by the Beast’s bite and had to be bred or she’d die. Then she’d gotten his blood in her cuts and probably the blood of her lupine friends, which meant she’d either change or die. And then she’d eaten the Beast’s heart, which was one possible way that the first werewolf had come to exist. He, or she, was long dead now too.

There was only one possibility they hadn’t offered. “You said that those things, the beasts, are born. Does anybody ever turn into one? Like, um, like you guys changed into, uh, what you are?”

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Guntar and Hank glance at each other but Adrian held her gaze with his. “We don’t know, but it would make sense.”

“Oh shit,” Beth breathed beside her.

“And if I do?”

Guntar answered for them. “Then we tear you apart like we did him.”