Crimson (The Silver Series Book 3) (5 page)

She smiled again. “I doubt anyone’s that
open. Maybe you could be my seeing eye dog.”

I snorted. “People would run in terror. I’m
not exactly a mild looking creature.”

“
What do you
mean?”

“
I have red eyes and dark
red fur. I’d probably scare myself if I found a mirror.”

If that worried her, her expression didn’t
show it. “You could borrow my coat and I could hide here until you
get back.” She said it bravely, but my keen ears caught the tremor
in her voice at being left alone again.

I shook my head. “Separating isn’t an
option. We’ll figure something out, even if I have to ransack
another house.”

Luckily, that wasn’t necessary. We happened
across a backyard with laundry drying in the night breeze and I
helped myself to a pair of loose jeans, a red shirt I chose for the
ironic fact that it matched my eyes, and even a thick pair of
woolen socks for which my feet were very grateful. I took a soft
blue shirt, black casual pants, and another pair of socks for
Grace.

“
Sorry they didn’t have
any, um, bras, or anything,” I apologized while Grace pulled on the
clothes behind a bush.

“
That’s okay,” she said.
“I’ll just wear the coat and hope no one notices.” She stepped
around the bush and I took her hand. She had braided her long brown
hair and tied it with a scrap of cloth from the coat; a stray
strand brushed her cheek. She swept it behind her ear with her free
hand. “Where to, oh fearless leader?”

“
You can call me fearless
until we run into something really intimidating like a
spider.”

She laughed. “You’re afraid of spiders?”

“
Got bit when I was a child
and haven’t liked them since.” I led her over a log and across a
bare patch of earth.

“
I’m the same way with
bees. What kind of spider was it?”

“
Black widow.” We walked
around the house where fewer clothes now fluttered in the darkening
evening. I led her up the sidewalk and onto a paved road. “I had
stomach cramps for three days. Not pleasant.”

She gave a teasing smile. “Well, if I see a
spider, I’ll let you know.”

“
Thanks,” I replied dryly.
I limped painfully on my bad leg and it was hard not to focus on
the persistent ache. The heat that ran up my limbs stole my breath
and it got harder to put one foot in front of the other.

Grace turned her head to listen to my steps
and her hand tightened on my elbow, helping me keep steady. “What’s
our plan?” she asked after a couple of minutes.

I shrugged. “I don’t know. Call Jaze, see if
he’s the one that set us up, then figure out what to do from
there.”

Grace’s voice was soft when she asked, “Do
you think he’s a Hunter?” The underlying note of fear in her tone
lifted the hair on the back of my neck.

“
Whatever he is, he won’t
lay a finger on you without going through me first,” I said in a
tone I hoped was threatening and reassuring at the same
time.

She pursed her lips like she was fighting
back a smile and squeezed my hand. “Thanks, Kaynan. I can’t tell
you how much it means to have you here.”

My heart gave a strange thump. It was
different to be the one helping instead of causing trouble.

Chapter 4

I found a pay phone in front of a gas
station and was able to beg two quarters off a man filling up his
car, though I forgot about my red irises and lack of sunglasses
until I noticed him staring.

“
Contacts,” I explained
lamely.

He nodded and wordlessly handed over the
change. I called Jaze’s number and watched Grace as she wound and
unwound a strand of hair around her finger and stared sightlessly
out at the small town. I wondered if having the heightened senses
of a werewolf helped compensate for her loss of eyesight.

“
Hello?”

“
Are you the one that
sicced the suits on us?” I demanded without preamble.

“
You’re the one who set us
up,” Jaze accused. “There were armed men from who knows what
organization trying to kill us on sight. I don’t take lightly to
being shot at.”

I fought back a snarl at his tone. “Well,
that makes two of us. How do I know you didn’t set us up?”

“
Because I don’t do that,”
Jaze replied, his voice tight. “I help werewolves. My goal is not
to get them shot full of holes and silver. We were lucky to get out
with our hides in one piece.”

The frustration in his voice calmed my
agitation. I let out a small breath. “Us, too. Now what?”

“
Where are you? They chased
us northwest until we off-roaded and lost them in the mountains.
Now we’re in some sort of mining community.”

“
We’re in small town a few
miles west.”

“
Is there somewhere we can
meet up?”

“
The gas station, unless
your phone’s bugged and we have to run again,” I said
wryly.

“
Mouse thinks it’s the
website. They must have traced the IP address to the library. We’ll
have to shut it down until we get it fixed.” He fell silent and
someone else spoke in the background. He listened, then said into
the phone, “It’ll take us about a half hour to get there, maybe
more, but we’ll push it. I don’t want to risk those other men
finding you before we do.”

Grace turned to me, tension in every line of
her body.

“
Who’s
we
?” I demanded.

“
It’s too dangerous for
werewolves to travel alone. I brought Mouse who’s a werewolf from
my pack, my friend Brock, and another werewolf named Jet who’s
handy to have around in a fight, which is definitely what we’ve run
into.”

“
Tell me about it,” I
muttered. The thought that other werewolves were helping eased my
mind a bit, but we weren’t out of trouble yet. I glanced at Grace.
Her hand that rested lightly on the frame of the phone booth now
gripped the metal so tight her knuckles turned white. I ran a
fingertip along her fingers and she took my hand. My leg throbbed
as if to remind me why we needed help; we wouldn't get much further
by ourselves. I closed my eyes. “Fine; we’ll be waiting. Try to
hurry and don’t let the suits follow you here.”

“
Great advice,” Jaze
replied drolly. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

I growled and hung up the phone with a loud
bang that made Grace jump.

“
Sorry. I guess I’m a bit
edgy,” I apologized. I took her hand and limped around the corner
of the gas station to a small grassy area in the back. The grass
was dried and mostly brown, but it felt good to sit down and rest.
I stretched out my leg and tried not to wince at the throb of hot
pain that ran up my calf.

From our position, I could see the road
coming toward the gas station from the north, which I guessed was
the direction Jaze would take. A black truck pulled into the gas
station followed by a car and a four-wheeler. Two loud men in
coveralls and cowboy hats passed from my vision into the station,
then a truck parked at a corner spot and the driver turned off the
vehicle but sat smoking a cigarette as if waiting for someone. I
kept an eye on him, but he never glanced in our direction. I
wondered if that was good or bad.

Eventually, a gray SUV with tinted windows
pulled up on the other side of the gas station and a boy about a
year or so younger than me stepped out of the passenger side. He
stood about six feet tall, had dark blond hair, and wore a faded
brown leather jacket. He was followed by another boy roughly a year
younger with black hair and a stance that said he could take care
of himself. The driver, a scrawny boy who barely looked old enough
to drive, hurried to their side along with another boy with spiky
hair who grinned and waved when he spotted us.

The first boy said something to the others
and they waited by the truck, though it was obvious the black
haired one didn’t like the idea.

“
Still think we’re
government spies?” Jaze asked when he was close enough. He stopped
a few feet away and I appreciated the space.

“
You could be informants,”
I hazarded, helping Grace to her feet.

A smile touched the corners of his lips.
“You could, too.” He glanced at Grace and his brow creased with
concern. “Let’s get you guys home. Looks like you’ve been through
the ringer.”

“
We have,” I said quietly.
I squeezed Grace’s hand reassuringly and took a step
forward.

She pulled back, her expression tight. “How
do we know we can trust you?”

Jaze glanced back at his friends, and when
he looked back his expression was honest but anxious. “Helping
other werewolves is what I do. We have a safe place where you can
lay low until we figure out what’s going on, but we’ve got to get
out of here before they track you down again.”

Grace turned in my direction and her body
trembled. “I’m scared, Kaynan,” she said softly.

I pulled her close and wrapped my arms
around her. She rested her head against my chest. “It’s okay,” I
said quietly into her hair. “I promise no one will hurt you.” I
took a breath to calm my own nerves and was filled with her wild,
werewolf scent mixed with vanilla and cinnamon. “I’ll take care of
you, okay?” My heart clenched at the same words I had once told my
sister.

Grace nodded and stepped back, her grip
tight in mine. “Okay.”

Jaze led the way back to the truck. He
glanced back once and asked, “What happened to your leg?”

I had been trying to hide the limp, but
after all the walking it was so pronounced it didn’t matter. “Got
shot,” I said simply.

Grace’s hand tightened in mine, but she kept
silent.

“
You’re still alive, so
I’ll assume the bullet’s not silver. Couldn’t get it out?” Jaze
asked in a level tone I appreciated.

“
Not on my own. The skin
healed over it by the time we stopped running and personal surgery
isn’t a specialty of mine,” I responded dryly.

He gave a slight smile when we got to the
SUV. “Jet, found someone who apparently likes bullets as much as
you do.”

The black haired boy lifted an eyebrow at me
but opened the door without saying anything. I stepped inside and
helped Grace up, then guided her to the back seat and sat down
beside her. She buckled her seatbelt, then whispered for me to do
the same. I fought back a smile and obeyed.

“
You taking care of me?” I
whispered as the scrawny boy started the SUV.

“
Apparently you don’t do a
good job of it on your own,” she whispered back, a touch of
resentment in her voice. “Why didn’t you tell me you got
shot?”

“
Nothing we could do about
it. I didn’t want to make things worse.”

She gave a soft, endearing snort. “Things
were already worse. Not telling me doesn’t help anything.”

I watched the road race outside the window.
Jaze had taken the front seat again, and the other two boys, one of
whom I was surprised to smell was human, took the seats in front of
us to give us the back seat to ourselves.

I was grateful for their consideration when
Grace’s eyes shut and her head tipped forward. I scooted over
another seat and lowered her gently so she could rest across the
seats with her head pillowed on my lap. “Thank you,” she whispered,
her face pale and worn. “But you should be the one sleeping.”

I shook my head, remembered that she
couldn’t see it, and brushed a strand of hair from her face. “I’m
not tired,” I lied. “We’ll trade when you wake up.”

She mumbled something that sounded like
‘alright’ with a soft smile that touched my heart, then she fell
silent. The steady sound of sleep breathing soon followed.

Sitting was apparently worse than walking
with a bullet in the leg. The adrenaline from being chased and the
necessity of pushing ourselves had kept me from focusing on the
pain, but sitting and doing nothing made it throb and burn until my
body ached with fever again. My shirt stuck to my sweaty skin, and
my vision blurred at the edges.

“
You don’t look so good,”
the human with the spiky hair, Brock, said some time
later.

He passed me a bottle of water; I downed it
and was thirsty for more. He exchanged a concerned look with Jet,
who glanced at my leg.

“
Throbbing yet?” he asked
in a reserved tone.

“
Now that I have time to
think about it, yeah.”

“
Meg’ll take care of you;
she’s great with removing bullets. Jet can tell you. He’s had a lot
of experience,” Brock said with his affable grin.

Jet motioned for me to lift up my pant leg.
I pulled it up carefully so as not to wake up Grace and moved my
leg so he could see it better. The movement sent a surge of pain
through my calf and I gritted my teeth. A red and white pocket
surrounded the bullet’s entrance; red lines streaked away from the
wound up my leg. I looked away. A tough stomach wasn’t one of my
strong points.

“
It’ll heal when the
bullet’s out,” Jet said.

I liked his simple way of speaking, to the
point with nothing frivolous. I compared him to Renee and almost
laughed at the conversations they would have.

The thought of my girlfriend back home
brought a sickening pain to my stomach. They thought me dead. All
of them did. After what I had done, it was better they continue to
think that. A shiver from the fever ran through my body.

“
Want more water?” Brock
asked.

I nodded and he handed me another bottle. I
finished it, then sat back and stared out the window at the
darkening sky and the barren desert beyond. I had never been to New
Mexico before, but my first impression was of sand, the sun setting
behind red mountains at our back, and eyes that gleamed in our
headlights. The hair on the back of my neck rose at a glimpse of a
dog-like creature I thought was a coyote. The urge to chase it
surged through my body and I fought the impulse to phase. I loathed
the animal instincts that warred with my tattered human thoughts. I
closed my eyes and tried to block out both.