Consumed (Dark Protectors) (4 page)

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Authors: Rebecca Zanetti

BOOK: Consumed (Dark Protectors)
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Chapter 3
 
K
atie tugged leather gloves on her hands, her boots clomping on the docks of the marina. Jordan had kissed her.
Finally kissed her.
Then he’d apologized.
Fucking apologized
.
Salt coated her skin, breezing in on the muggy wind from pounding waves of Lake Pontchartrain. Darn saltwater lake. After spending hours on the phone until the half moon rose, the truth remained the same. Jordan had been infected with the virus. “The Kayrs lab has a possible cure generated from Maggie’s blood.” Okay, not exactly what Emma, the Realm queen and chief geneticist, had said, but close enough.
Baye twirled a wicked knife in his hand, his gaze alert on the covered docks toward the south end of the lake. “If Jordan believed he’d be cured, he wouldn’t have set my brother up to lead and called me home.”
“I know.” But Jordan was a good leader and a true planner. He’d cover every contingency. “This is the first time the lab has blood tests from a male shifter
just infected
. That has to be good.” Usually the shifter didn’t know until the first full moon ... when he changed into a werewolf. Forever. At least humans got three full moons until turning into beasts for life.
Lance nodded, his gun at ready. “They’ll find a cure in time—they have nearly five nights until the full moon. I mean, counting tonight. So four nights.” The tiger had joined the New Orleans squad a year ago, his tracking abilities almost as good as Katie’s. He’d lost the two other members of his old squad in a werewolf raid and every once in a while suffered panic attacks. Post-traumatic stress disorder didn’t only affect humans, unfortunately. But he was a good fighter, and his intense protection of his current squad made sense. He snarled. “Pride is strong. Don’t worry.”
Katie gave him a grateful smile. Lance was always on her side. He topped out at six feet, long and lean, dangerously quick. Angular tiger features made up his sharp face, his mouth generous with a smile—usually. Better yet, Lance treated her as an adult, while Baye sometimes still saw the child she used to be.
Baye halted, sniffing the air. Shaking his head, he resumed the hunt. “Leave it to Jordan to feel a little weird and instantly order a blood test. Through arrows tipped with the virus. We didn’t see that one coming.”
“No. To be honest, I figured at some point the bug would go airborne.” The idea of the world being infected made her head ache. Only humans, vampires, and demons would survive. And maybe witches. Nobody knew if witches could be infected. Trials attempted in test tubes led to uncertain and odd results.
“All we need is an airborne killer.” Lance cracked his knuckles, his body staying tense. His lips turned down, and a dark frown settled between his brows.
Katie glanced at his tight features. “Are you all right?”
“Yes.”
This was more than Jordan’s news, considering Lance and the lion leader barely knew each other. Katie shoved hair out of her eyes. “Come on. What’s wrong? Is it Linda?” He’d been extremely cranky the last week after his girlfriend dumped him.
“I don’t want to talk about Linda.” He surveyed the boats on either side of the dock.
Katie sighed. She wished he’d snap out of it and be her jovial friend again. “Are you sure?” They’d spent the last week talking about the situation, with the tiger showing up drunk on her doorstep more than once. She’d force-fed him coffee to sober him up. The poor guy had passed out on her sofa several nights in a row, trying to snuggle with her to sleep.
Tigers were known to be good snugglers.
“I’m sure.” He flashed a grin. “Though we could get drunk later and hash it out again.”
Yeah, unless she was packing. “I feel like I should go with Jordan to the lab.” She’d need to cancel two lunch dates and a hair appointment the next week. “Maybe I can get someone to cover for me at work.” She’d made a good life with a lot of human friends the last decade. In fact, she was mainly human now. Just disappearing wasn’t an option.
Lance nodded. “Well, besides the guy we’re chasing, just turned werewolves are few and far between. The shifting clans are doing a good job staying underground, so we could probably handle things here without you for a spell. A very short spell.” His cell phone buzzed and he lifted the device to his ear. “When? How bad? Okay.” Flipping the phone shut, he smacked his fist into his other hand. “We’ve had a report of an infected human—guy showed up at the hospital with fur growing all over his body.”
Baye frowned. “We haven’t had a human infection in a year. What’s that about?” He rubbed his chin, surveying the docks. “All right. You head over there to find out if he’s really a werewolf or some idiot on meth. Katie and I will keep looking around here—though there’s no way a lair is on a boat.”
Lance sniffed the air, concern shadowing his eyes. “I sense a werewolf signature ... one has been here lately.” He nudged Katie with his hip. “Why don’t you come to the hospital with me?”
She rolled her eyes. Now Lance was getting overprotective, too? Sure, she’d been weaker lately from the virus, but she hadn’t thought anyone else had noticed. “I’m fine. I need to track this guy.” So far, she was the only one who could actually get into the beast’s head ... or heart ... or wherever the evil lived. The other shifters only sensed the bastard. “Besides, we never hunt alone.”
Baye eyed her. “I’m just surveying the land and trying to find where the werewolf last played—no hunting tonight. Why don’t you go with Lance?”
Oh, no way. Her squad was not going to treat her like some fragile human. She settled her stance, glaring at both men. “We. Don’t. Hunt. Alone.”
They shared a look. Baye shrugged. “Fine.”
Lance grimaced. “Fair enough. I’ll call you later with answers about the human. Maybe I’ll drop by Linda’s after the hospital.”
“No.” Baye hissed out a breath. “Let the woman go. She said it’s over.”
Katie gave Lance a sympathetic smile. He’d really liked the psychologist. “Either forget her or tell her the truth about yourself. She knows you hide something ... it’s the only chance you have.”
Lance shook his head. “I can’t tell her about shifters unless I mate her, you know that. And I’m not ready to mate.” He tucked his gun in his jeans, the odd glow of his eyes piercing the night.
“Then she’s not the right one,” Baye muttered.
A slow smile wandered over Lance’s chiseled face. “You’re the only woman who truly knows me, lioness.” He shot Katie a wink and then pivoted, loping slowly out of sight.
Katie stifled a grin. What a flirt.
The breeze picked up, bringing salt and the smell of fish across the dock. She shivered.
Baye leaned over and eyed the still water. “Let’s find where this werewolf was, so we can prepare for him coming back.”
Katie nodded, opening her senses.
The creak of the dock over water masked their footsteps as they stalked closer to a row of pleasure yachts, white decks shining in the soft moonlight. The lap of water gently rocked them to and fro.
Baye rolled his neck. “I’m so sick of saltwater. Why can’t this bastard head inland?”
“Because we hate saltwater.” The beast had a brain and a sick sense of fun. Each time a full moon came and went, his strength increased. A sad and newly discovered fact regarding shifters turned werewolves, as was intelligence. The beasts seemed to get smarter the longer they lived—smarter and fully psychotic. The monsters hid for most of the month, waiting until the moon rose high to hunt and kill. For some reason, the rays gave them strength. “We need to find his lair.”
Though finding werewolves in lairs had nearly gotten Katie killed numerous times. Of course, that’s what she’d signed up for. She wasn’t supposed to fight but needed to get close in order to sense the beasts. At that point, fighting became inevitable.
Baye eyed the nearly full moon. “This guy is underground—somewhere close. The full moon isn’t for several nights.”
“I know. But he comes here when he goes out to play.” A sense of oiliness coated the docks. A psychic footprint only Katie sensed. Sometimes she feared the evil would seep in through her senses and take root. “If we found where, we could have troops waiting.”
“Sounds like a great plan.” Baye dropped to a crouch, wiping a hand across the faded dock. “Uh, what’s going on between you and Lance?”
Katie’s head jerked to the side. “Nothing. Why?”
Baye shut his eyes and lifted his head, nostrils flaring. “Just making sure. Emotions get in the way when hunting animals. You know that. We don’t date members of our own squad.”
She so didn’t need the lecture on dating in the workplace. Sometimes Baye forgot she was all grown up. “Lance and I are just friends.” Good friends, sure. They’d fought together and she trusted him. “You know how I feel about Jordan.” Everybody knew.
Baye sighed, standing and opening his eyes. “I thought maybe you got over that crush.” His tone hinted he’d hoped she’d let go of that dream. “Especially now, Kate. Time to move on.”
“With Lance?” Humor lifted the corners of her lips.
Baye twisted his neck to see beyond a stack of buoys. “Maybe. If he can get over the damn psychologist.”
“I’ll think about it. But, really, I’m not taking dating advice from a lion who goes through women like cat treats.” In fact, she’d never seen Baye get serious about any woman.
“I’m too young to settle down.”
“You’re over four hundred years old.”
“Exactly.”
Katie chuckled. Then, a scent ... an intent carried in with the breeze. Dark images of death and blood filled her vision. Holy crap. Was the werewolf waiting? Couldn’t be. He’d be underground until the full moon. Storing his strength. She pushed the grotesque vision out of her brain. “I think the werewolf is here.” Too bad Lance hadn’t stayed.
Baye’s shoulders went back. “Werewolves stay hidden until the full moon.” Even so, the shifter’s stance dropped to fight, his body going deadly still.
“This one’s different.” The bastard was close—she just knew it. She cupped her hands around her mouth so her voice would reach the rafters. Maybe more than bats and water spiders hung out in the high beams. “Come on out, Snuggles. I know you’re there.”
Baye snorted. “Snuggles?”
“I got tired of thinking of him as ‘sociopathic monster.’ So I named him Snuggles.” She kept her tone matter-of-fact. In truth, the werewolf scared the crap out of her. She felt him ... he carried more inside than mere beast. A darkness, oily and evil, slid through the images she gleaned. No way had he been a decent man before turning into a werewolf. Researching him had led nowhere. She had no clue what his name had been—many werewolves didn’t have files. Unfortunately.
“He’s underground, Kate.” Baye’s cautious surveying of the area belied his words. “But I do find it interesting he’s stayed around town with us taking so many of his kind down.”
“No you don’t.” She reached for the knife along her calf, eyeing an empty berth at the end of the dock. A yacht horn blared lonely and sad in the far distance. Waves lapped up on the shore. “As always, you have a hypothesis.”
He shifted his weight, stepping in front of her to inch down the dock. Blocking her. “As a matter of fact, I do.”
She hustled to his side, growling when he elbowed her back. “Get out of my way.”
“Rules. You sense, you direct ... you do not fight.” Baye kept his voice low, his gaze forward. “There’s something up ahead, I sense some type of animal. Maybe good old Snuggles is living on the water full-time now.”
“I’m an excellent fighter.” Sure, she’d lost some ability from the incredibly slow progression of the virus. But she could still fight. The fact that part of her wanted to run and hide from the brute forced her shoulders back and her feet into motion. The second she let evil intimidate her, she lost.
“Rules.”
“Screw the rules.” If Baye had a clue as to the nightmares this werewolf had given her, he’d try to force her out of the field. Could Snuggles actually be near? “We have one night to get this guy before you head home and I go to Oregon.” She’d go with Jordan just to get him there for Emma to experiment on. To cure. Then she’d figure out the rest of her life.
A boom echoed behind her. She swiveled, her back smashing into the bow of a pleasure yacht. Bruises cut deep, and she bit her lip to keep from groaning. Feet braced, hair bristling, a seven-foot werewolf stood in the middle of the narrow dock. The stench of unwashed animal assaulted her nostrils. Her eyes actually burned.
Baye shoved her behind him.
Another hairy beast leapt out of the shadows to block her way. She angled around, pressing her shoulders against Baye’s back. They both dropped into fighting stances.
Images of death and such pleasure taken in killing almost dropped Katie to the ground. She yanked mental shields into place. Her chest tightened. Her hands dampened. Drawing on years of training, she settled her mind and tilted her head to the side, studying the deep black fur of the monster in front of her. Intelligent yellow eyes glinted in the dim moonlight. Adrenaline shot through her tissues, shooting the night into pinpoint focus. Why wasn’t he attacking? “Well now, Snuggles. We finally meet face-to-face.” Her voice wavered slightly.

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