Dead Shifter Walking (24 page)

His carefully groomed features were gone,
replaced by the hunter he truly was, and I basked in it as I lunged
for him. He danced away, smiling as we continued to circle.

I expected some taunt from him, some low blows,
but nothing. We circled in silence each of our true natures fully
exposed. He lunged at me and I didn’t dance away fast enough as he
caught me around the middle, landing heavily on my torso.

The air flew out of my lungs as I punched him
hard in the shoulder. We had agreed to no face blows. Pulling back
to slam him again, he blocked easily. He then pulled back and
hesitated, giving me the opening to buck him off by thrusting my
hips up and unseating him.

I wasted no time in lunging at him, using my
momentum to take him down. We rolled as I tried to come up on top,
only to have him taking a cheap shot at a kidney. I threw an elbow,
successful connecting with soft tissue.

I’m fairly certain we would have gone on for
hours more, but Lorraine walked down the stairs, screeching. “What
the hell is going on down here?” she demanded, hands pressed
against her thin hips. “It sounds like a herd of rhinos down here,
and I have company,” she hissed, stomping her foot impatiently.

I giggled, and Logan, still on top of me, tried
very diligently not to share in my mirth.

Clearing his throat, he said, “Sorry, dear; we
are done,” quickly moving away from my body.

She nodded before taking her upturned nose
away.

Turning to me, I could see the regret in our
match being cut short as Logan nodded and said, “I’ll find out
where he was.”

I nodded, still giggling as I gathered my
weapons, Jerry and I beat a hasty exit.

…

I climbed the stairs to Blake’s bedroom, turning
the key he had left for me over in my hands, still feeling very
strange about having a boyfriend. I had never used that term for
any male in my life, ever. So what had changed? When had a
one-night stand become not enough? Maybe it still was, maybe I was
just being weak, bending my will to him. That idea didn’t sit well
with me as I opened his bedroom door.

He lay there, snoring softly, the dark sheet
draped dangerously low as heat instantly flooded between my legs.
Chewing my lip, I was weighing if I was too tired to jump him, when
he cracked an eye, smiling. “You smell divine.”

My grin widened as I went to him in bed,
decision made.

Chapter 20

I awoke to Jerry in my face, shaking me. Batting
him back, I glared up at him. I’m not a morning person.

“We have problems,” he said, shaking me again. I
shoved him away from me and growled.

As Jerry took a step back, Blake laughed, coming
out of the shower. “I told you she isn’t a morning person,” Blake
said, coming around the bed to kiss my temple. Snuggling in his
embrace, I inhaled the scent of soap.

“You failed to mention violent,” Jerry said as I
glared at him again, forcing him to fidget in his black pressed
suit.

“Give me a minute,” Blake said to Jerry,
stroking my face.

“Fine, but we need her, shit is going down,” he
said, slamming the door behind him.

With a sigh, I lay my head back down on the
fluffy pillows, stretching my limbs and groaning.

“You are needed, Olie,” he said softly into my
ear.

“Why?” I asked, my voice muffled by the
pillow.

He stroked my arm lightly. “You have been called
to Logan’s grandfather’s plot.”

I groaned, rolling to my back. “Jerry can handle
it.”

“He didn’t get an invitation and neither did I,”
he said, pressing a gentle kiss on my lips. Heat instantly flooded
my body as I leaned up to dive deeper into those sweet lips.

Pulling back, he smiled, saying, “I’m afraid I
must deny you this morning.”

I pouted as he picked me up out of the bed.

…

It was too fucking early for this shit or maybe
too fucking late. My days, nights, and mornings were a complete
disaster with the schedule I had been keeping, and, after the
amazing sex with Blake, a day off seemed to be in order, but no,
not according to the head of the shifter nation, who we were still
waiting on.

Tate toured the property as I sat on a
headstone. “Really Olivia?” he whispered.

I didn’t bother with an answer as Mercer came
from the trees. “This place is freezing.”

“It’s the magic,” I explained, idly feeling it
prick along my skin under my leather jacket and jean clad legs
braced wide.

Darren exited his flashy sports car, looking
haggard as he made his way to join us. “Where is he?” He asked,
coming to stand before me.

“Damn if I know,” I answered with a shrug, just
as exhausted. The directions from Logan had been exact, wait in the
center of the shifter cemetery at noon with only Tate, Mercer,
Darren, and me. It truly made the man look paranoid. I would have
liked having Blake and Jerry here, although perhaps it made me
paranoid to want them here.

The actual piece of property, located ninety
minutes outside St Ann was breathtaking. Rolling hills dotted with
plots carefully hidden from the road with sweeping trees. We were
all seated under a weeping willow; well, I was seated. The other
three just looked uncomfortable.

“What’s the matter, boys, don’t spend much time
around the truly dead?” I asked, my foul mood pressing against my
barriers.

None of them dignified that with an answer.
Shrugging, I looked out towards the rest of the cemetery and the
crypt high on the hill. This didn’t feel like the same place as the
vision I had, but looking up there now, I had the distinct
impression that was where I had been.

I had just stood up about to head up there when
I felt the ground beneath my feet rumble. “What the hell?” I asked
looking down as the ground cracked. An ugly wail sent chills to my
gut, an dreadful suspicion seeping into my thoughts.

“What’s going on?” Darren asked me, his dark
eyes starting to shift.

“We walked into a trap,” I answered, holding
perfectly still, as though that would stop what was crawling its
undead way out of the ground.

“Trap?” Darren asked looking around as the
ground beneath his feet began to shift “Logan wouldn’t have—” He
stopped mid-sentence looking up at me with a mix of annoyance and
disgust as a bony hand clenched around his foot. “This is
disgusting.”

I nodded as an entire arm pushed out the ground,
the fingers coming even with my hip. This was a hefty one, chunks
of ligaments attached to rotting muscle. I rolled away from the
tombstone as the other arm exploded from the dirt and watched
Mercer and Tate tackle their own undead problems from a crouch.

Big and nasty came up belting unintelligible
words from a jaw hanging partially down, eyes glowing deep red. He
rounded on me, pulling his long legs from the broken coffin with a
final snap.

“Hey there, pretty boy,” I said, smiling, “come
and get me.”

He didn’t need a second invitation, launching at
me with claws extended swiping wildly. Leaping back, the claws
sliced through my dark turquoise t-shirt.

“You’re lucky that wasn’t my leather jacket,” I
scolded. The force of the swing made it unstable as it lumbered
back to find me in its sights.

“How do we kill these things?” Darren yelled,
landing a solid right hook into a skeleton’s jaw.

“I don’t suppose you have a blow torch hidden in
your brassiere?” Tate asked me, ducking under a wild punch.

“I don’t even know what that is,” I answered,
dipping back out of range of the next swipe.

“Your bra,” Mercer answered, shooting at the
skeleton head. Chunks of brain and skull plastering Tate.

“Really!?” Tate said annoyed, brushing chucks
off his expensive suit.

Mercer shrugged. “Worked, didn’t it?” he said,
indicating the now truly lifeless body of the shifter.

“It did,” I said shocked, standing out of my
crouch. Vital mistake. Big and ugly’s next swing found home,
launching me across the cemetery and smashing my back and wrist
against an angel statue; well, it was a statue. Rolling to the
softer ground, white plaster wings sprinkled my body. I
groaned.

“Ouch,” I muttered, pushing onto my knees,
leaning heavily on my elbows. The ground beneath my body shook as
the giant took awkward steps toward me. Fuck.

Scrambling to my feet, I used the now broken
angel for support.

“Aim for the head!” Tate yelled at me, taking
down another shifter. “These ones are different than the
other.”

Well, no shit they were; I was still conscious.
Although, to give him credit, I hadn’t thought of that.

Pulling a long blade from the holder at my back,
I dodged left using the shifters own unstable thighbone as a step
to give me the height I needed to slice his undead head off.
Landing on my feet, I was still, waiting, holding my breath, to see
if it really did work.

The snarled, skeleton head rolled down the hill
to the broken angel statue the red eyes reduced to empty eye
sockets. Pushing out a relieved breath, I turned to face a massive
pair of jaws. This was going to be one of those days.

Honestly, I can’t say I was too upset; I like
killing things. Hell, it’s probably one of the few things in life I
really love. Even though they were already undead, I’d still like
to think it counted toward my average.

The four of us sliced, diced, shot, and Darren
half shifted, his clothing straining at the seams under his massive
thighs and wider torso, to eliminate each and every threat. Towards
the end of the fight, when only a few undead were still able to
fight, I turned toward the crypt. My nagging subconscious making me
uneasy, I thought it was my hopeful imagination that saw the white
blond head of Steven in the distance. My mind blacked out and I was
looking at the vile Steven close up before the connection was cut
off.

I stumbled from the swift and brief moment of
connection, before growling and taking off at a sprint. I wasn’t
going to make it, a full football field separated me from the
murderer, who had drawn us out and attempted to eliminate us, not
to mention the dozen dead at his hands.

But I wasn’t alive today because I ever gave up;
I pumped my legs, forcing the muscles to respond after the brutal
assault moments earlier as I continued uphill. Darren caught wind
of my attempt, running on all fours, loping faster than I could
toward the crypt.

I was going to be more than a little ticked at
him if he took my kill from me. Anger helped push me to go faster,
but it was no comparison to the swiftness of the half lion in front
of me. Snarling reached my ears from the crypt, violent blows
sending shock waves through the ground as I tore around the side of
it to find Darren holding a quickly healing gash along his
side.

He looked at me, all the anger and hatred hardly
contained under the surface of those dark chocolate brown
depths.

With a growl, he hefted himself off the ground,
standing feet taller than me. “Your suspicions are correct,
Olivia.” Brushing off the dirt from his scuffle, he looked down at
the wound closing upon itself, trailing thin rivets of crimson down
his side.

“Steven,” I said, following Darren’s gaze to the
forest where they had retreated. I debated a moment, my body
shifting forward as I thought about going after them.

Darren hefted an oversized paw on my shoulder,
stopping me. Looking up at his face, he shook his head, lines of
worry present on his forehead. “We are in no shape to go after
them; as powerful as they are, we will need a mage of our own.”

I growled, knowing he was correct and not
enjoying it. “Besides,” he said, turning back to the mess of body
parts “we have to take care of this mess and with Steven’s powers,
we could spend days out there and not find them.”

I groaned, which ended in a whine, hating the
fact that he was right on both accounts.

Chapter 21

“Unbelievable,” Logan said, surveying the damage
we had inflicted upon the shifter graveyard. “What do you have to
say for yourself?” he asked, rounding on me, anger rolling off him
in powerful waves. “And what could possibly possess you four to
think that I would call a clandestine meeting out at a graveyard?
How did that little nugget of information not have any of your
realizing it was a trap?”

“You are such an ungrateful asshole!,” I
answered, limping over to him, “You are far too absorbed in your
own asshole to really understand what is happing here! One, we know
Steven is the puppet master, two we kept the undead from wreaking
havoc outside this graveyard, and three you are a terrible leader!”
I screamed at him.

Logan growled, his caramel eyes glowing as his
fangs descended in his mouth. “You will show me respect.” His beast
pushed to the surface.

I licked my bloodied lip, watching his eyes
follow my movements. “Make me,” I challenged.

He flexed his hands, and I waited for claws to
sprout when Jerry stepped up. “You guys alright?”

“No,” Logan growled through clenched teeth.

I snarled at him, snapping my jaw, ready to
fight again.

“Olivia!” Blake yelled, running to my side.
“Down,” he commanded as I snarled at him as well.

“Control your woman,” Logan hissed demeaningly
at Blake.

“You better shut up, shifter; she is borderline
berserker, and I will not step in her way if you push her much
more,” he said, holding his hands up to me, reaching out.

“Berserker? She isn’t hurt that badly,” Logan
said disgustedly.

“Let him feel it, baby,” Blake said, smiling
knowingly.

Always a practical problem solver, I dropped my
guard, letting the pain in my leg seep into Logan along with the
throbbing in my temple, not to mention the gash along my back. He
staggered, and I grinned, my true evil nature loving to share my
pain.