Deuce (Swamp Desires Book 1) (12 page)

That was until I met Adele. She has filled the gap in my heart, tamed the beast, and given me something that is so special and rare. I will spend eternity showing her how much she means to me. Show her how she makes me feel every minute of every day. She will be treasured, and I will never treat her like she is lower than me. She is my equal in all aspects. She is the light to my dark. She calms me and keeps me centered. She is my everything. I have to get her back. Lord help those bastards who have kidnapped her and beaten her. Because hell is coming. Revenge for taking what is mine is at hand. They will pay the price with their lives.

My brothers stay as close to me as possible. They are lending me their love and strength through our bond. They know how much this is killing me inside. I have found the most precious gift in the world, and it has been taken from me. It has left a hole in my heart, until I have her back in my arms. I look to my right to see three of the most beautiful tigers I have ever seen, with Blaze and Gabriel hot on their tails. We cannot get to our destination fast enough for me. With every mile, my beast gets more and more on edge.

We can smell our mate on the breeze. We are getting closer. Soon, I will have justice. There will be blood spilled this night. And none of it will belong to me or my family. We will put a hole into their operation tonight. It will cripple them and they will have to rebuild again. With this blow, we will be able to search out for the other missing women. We will get one step closer to our goal of shutting this organization down for good. How dare they come into my town and do this? As you reap, you shall sow. Karma is a bitch and it is coming with four massive legs and huge jaws tonight.

Chapter Eleven

Adele

The magic is slowly wearing off. I am becoming more and more aware of my surroundings. I slowly open my eyes and quickly realize that I am not alone in my mind. A great feeling of warmth and comfort enfolds me. He is seeing what I see as I see it. My love is somehow with me. I am not sure how, but I am so thankful that he is in my head with me.

I look around to see I am in a room with no windows. I am in an iron cell, shackled to the wall by my hands and ankles. They kept the iron shackles on me. Fuck! As long as they are on me, I cannot shift. This is a shitty situation. I can hear multiple voices outside the door on the other side of the iron gate. I cannot hear what they are saying, but I know for sure that they are all male. The females that were with them earlier are gone. I am so weak and tired.

This room is so dark and smelly. It smells of blood and mold. I take it that I am not the only person they have brought here. I hope the previous inhabitants are still alive. But from the amount of blood I smell in this room, I fear that they did not survive. Which is really sad to me. No person deserves to be treated the way these women were treated. They must have died a painful and lonely death. Not being able to contact their families to help them. Iron weakens us to a point to where we cannot shift or mind talk with anyone. It pretty much takes our supernatural powers from us until the iron is taken off. For their own safety, I hope they leave the iron shackles on, because if they take them off, they will suffer greatly for what they have done. 

I try to get up off the floor, but I cannot move. I am stuck in place. So it seems they have spelled me into place somehow. Or it is the iron shackles that are hindering me from moving? This just sucks so badly. Why did they have to take me? I am not evil, like they say I am. I am a gift from God. I was put on this Earth to help people. I do not have an evil bone in my body. Why me? Why any of the women that they kidnapped? None of us deserve this. We may be different, but we deserve as normal a life as every human does. This is just not fair.

I can hear three males heading this way. Great, now what? I open my eyes to see if I can see them at all. It is so pitch black in this room that I cannot see the floor in front of me. I cannot see a damn thing in here. So I am relying wholly on my senses. The three males open the door, and the first one takes keys to unlock the gate. Once it is unlocked, they approach me. They are dragging something. By the sounds of it, one is dragging a billy club and the other two are dragging a baseball bat. What the fuck?

“We are going to beat you senseless. For this is what you deserve for being a vile, evil creature. Then in a few days after the bruises have healed, the witches will be back to cleanse you of your evil. They have a spell that will render your other side useless. You will become mortal like you were meant to be.”

Seriously, I was meant to be what I am. If I was meant to be human then I would have been born human. The one with the billy club starts hitting me in my legs and ankles as hard as he can. Immediately, I shut down so I do not feel the pain of their attack on my body. The others with the bats hit me in the back, and arms and stomach. The one with the billy club puts down his weapon and climbs on top of me and punches me in the face repeatedly. Once my face is bloody and bruised, he punches me in the stomach until I cough up blood. Eventually, the beating stops all together. They remove the shackles and leave the cell, locking the gate door on their way out.

I can feel Deuce is still in my head, trying to give me comfort. I notice right away that he has taken on the same injuries that I was given by these three men. How in the hell is that even possible? I must rest. I have to escape this place somehow before the witches come. When night falls tonight, I will attack my guards when they come in to check on me. I have to get away from here. My life depends on it. I feel Deuce in my head, and then he speaks.

“My love, listen to me. We are coming for you at dusk. Keep this link open as much as you can, so that we can find you quickly. Please don’t give up. I love you, Adele. You are the best thing that has ever happened to me, and soon you will be back in my arms. Please rest and heal until we get close. I will give you a signal when we have arrived. Then you shift and take as many as you can out, and we will take care of the rest.”

“Deuce, please hurry. I am so weak from the iron. I need to rest, to heal. I will rest until I get your signal, my love. I love you, today, tomorrow, the rest of my life,” I say.

I have to hold on until they get here. The cavalry is coming. Hell will reign down on these fools tonight.

***

I lie on this cold, damp, smelly floor trying to get some rest. I know I should rest, but I cannot. My mind keeps going back to Deuce. I know he is coming for me. My heart skips a beat knowing that he is risking so much to come after me. I know his brothers are with him, and so are his cousin and her new family. I still cannot believe how selfless these people are. To risk their own lives to save someone that they are just getting to know… I do not know how I got so fortunate. I am just a lonely woman.

My body aches in places I never knew existed before now. Thank God they took the shackles off. Now I can shift. That is the only way I can heal faster. So once the idiots are out of earshot, I shift. I let the change take over and course through my body. In a matter of seconds, I am in my wolf form. I stretch and bend until I get all the stiffness out of my body. I can feel that my body is not as sore as it was in human form. I walk around the room in wolf form, just smelling everything, trying to find out what has happened in this room before me. For all of my senses, I cannot figure any of it out. Honestly, I do not want to know what has happened here, for if I did, I think I would go mad. I walk around the room for a few minutes taking it all in, trying to see if there are any other escapes routes that may be hidden in this room. There are no trap doors, or any other routes that I can find in this damn room. The only way out is through the gate then through the door leading out of the room and hopefully out of the building. I have no idea what is on the other side of the door, and that sucks. I have no idea how many rooms this building has or how many people are guarding it. I am only one wolf here; I can only do so much. Even in wolf form, I can only do so much. I have to wait until Deuce and his family get here. That is the only option I have right now. I have no choice; I have to wait to try to escape.

I shift back into my human form. I have been in my wolf for about thirty minutes, which is long enough to heal some. Once I am back in my human body, I can tell my body is still heavily bruised, but does not hurt as much as it did just a half an hour ago. I lie back down in the exact same spot as they left me. Except I turn my back to where it is facing the gate and my front is facing the wall.

If I get out of this alive, I will tell Deuce exactly how I feel about him. Yes, I told him I loved him, but I did not explain how it truly feels. That man is the very air I breathe. I am so honored that his family is coming with him to help rescue me. I feel so honored to be a part of his incredible family. I want to wake each day in his arms, and go to bed each night in his arms. With him, I feel safe and protected. He could not have stopped them from taking me even if he tried to. I know deep in my gut that they spelled him as well. So they could capture me. The second I laid eyes upon him, I knew my soul was complete. All that was left was for him to own my heart. Well, he owns that now. I give it to him willingly and selfishly. He is my soul, my light to the darkness that is buried deep within my soul. I am whole once again. I will never let him go. He is mine for all of eternity. I love him so much. I never thought I could love someone like I do him.

I am lying on the floor, trying to rest up my body and regain some of my strength. It is slowly building back up. Hopefully, when the time comes, I will be strong enough to help in the fight. I think I will be. I will not let those gator boys have all the fun. That would just be wrong, after all. Who said that tigers, alligators, vampires, and a wolf could not work together? We have proved them all wrong. We are an exceptional team. We will take down this operation, piece by piece, and save all those women and return them home. I can tell Skylar’s spirit is near, but her body is not. She is waiting for the guys to get here.

I can tell the sun is going down outside. Soon, it will be dark. I can sense my gator is on his way to me. He has an incredible sense of smell and knows this area so well. He will get his revenge for them taking me from him. We will destroy them together. Tonight, karma is coming. With teeth and claws the like of which these fools have never seen before. I close my eyes, knowing full well what is to come. I will be back in my love’s arms. I will have the family I have always wanted. I can feel Skylar‘s spirit is in the room with me now. She comes into my body and gives me strength for the fight ahead. God, this woman is a blessing from God—literally. She has become a great friend these past few months and I will treasure the friendship I have with her.

Enough thinking. Time for me to rest now.

Chapter Twelve

Deuce

The four of us stay close together in the water. My brothers are flanking me while I lead the way. We travel down every canal and gateway throughout the swamp. We have been searching for hours and hours. Time is going by too damn slowly. I need to be there, like now. I look to my right and see the tigers and vamps are having no problems keeping up with us. I feel like we will never find her. I cannot smell her anywhere yet. Am I going to find her? Or will she suffer at the hands of these cruel, soulless humans?

We come to a junction of sorts. You can either go left or right. I sniff the air from both directions. The channel to the left will lead us to the river. The one to the right takes us down a channel. I choose the channel to the right. We do not need to take the one to the left and head to the river. That would take us in the opposite direction. My gut is telling me that the channel to the right will take us to Adele.

We ease down the junction to the right. It is narrow and we have to go in single file. The water is much shallower here. Our family has to run and jump from embankment to embankment. The land is broken up in-between the channel. My brothers and I slow the pace down considerably due to the shallow water. We have to pretty much walk through this water. Hopefully, at the end of the channel is deeper water so that our pace can pick up again. The tree branches are low and hang over the water like a canopy. These trees are so old, and have taken over this channel.

Finally, we approach deeper waters. The channel opens up to a waterway that has huge old oak trees curved at the top to create a gateway. The tree tops curve at the top with the Spanish moss hanging from each branch. Some are hanging in the water while others have not grown as long. Now we are able to swim again. Our furry family has gone ahead just a bit to scout for any buildings. They have not sent any word yet. Hopefully, they come across one soon. I can see that they have stopped and waited for us to catch up with them.

We have traveled so far, I can tell we have reached the other side of town by the looks of how the swamp is. We should be getting close to some buildings soon. We travel along this channel for a couple more hours until we finally come up upon another junction in the water. But this time the junction is different. One way takes you back around to where we are now, and the other takes you down a small creek. We approach the bank and shift back into our human bodies. As soon as we are back in human form, our clothes magically appear on our bodies. The tigers stay in their tiger form. We stop for a few minutes to rest up. We have been swimming for hours and hours, and the tigers have been running for that long, too. We all need a chance to catch our breath and preserve our strength.

***

After we have rested for a while, we start heading down the path on land. This must be a heavily traveled path, because it is worn in pretty good. I never knew about this path before now. But it is not often that I come on this side of town. After tonight, that all changes. We need to expand our search, and it needs to include this part of the swamp. The tigers have gone ahead of us.

We are on this trail for at least two and a half hours before we come to yet another junction on the trail. One way leads to a dock. The other leads down another trail. I take the route with the trail. Again, my gut is telling me to go this way.

This trail takes us another hour to navigate. It has fallen branches and huge rocks in the middle of it. Obviously, this trail is not traveled as much as the other one was. Finally, we approach an old shack. It is so run down that it is rotting to the ground. The vines have grown all over it. The boards have rotted so much that it has become a part of the land again.

The smell of humans is assaulting my nose. We must be getting close to some homes or camps. We pass by several camps along our way, all of which are empty. We continue along the messed up trail for several more miles. I can see that the bayou has opened up here. But there is, like, an island in the middle of it with a rundown building. You have to use a boat to get to it. I sniff the air; no one is there either.

Finally, I can see the trail ends just ahead. At the end of the trail is building with humans surrounding it on all sides. It is a small building with only one level. I can see there are no windows in this building. We hide behind the trees for cover. We wait to see if this is the place we are looking for. The humans have huge machetes they are carrying around with them. What the hell? Then, out of the blue, the wind shifts in the other direction. I pick up a scent that I have been waiting to smell all night. We have finally reached our destination.

She is here, in that building.

We stay hidden in the bushes while we check this place out. We need to know how many we are up against. But, that is the best scent I have smelled all day long, other than smelling her on her bed. I have waited patiently all day and almost all night in order to smell her scent again. Soon, she will be back with me. I will get her away from these idiots. Luckily, for us, we cannot be killed. A normal alligator can only be killed by killing them in their kill spot, which is a small spot on their heads. Our heads are not built the same way. We do not have that soft spot—where it should be soft, it is hard like stone. We do not have that kill spot. But those idiots will probably think that we do have it. Sometimes humans can be so damn stupid. The tigers creep around the brush to get a better look at the terrain. I try to contact Adele through our mind link.

“Adele, baby, can you hear me?” I ask.

“Yes; I can hear you, Deuce. Where are you?”

“We are outside of the building now. We are getting our plan together soon. When it is time for you to shift, I will say ‘now’ through our link. So be ready soon. We will attack this place from all sides. How are you feeling, baby? Have you been able to shift to heal some of your wounds?” I ask.

“Yes, I was able to shift earlier for a little while. As soon as I shifted, I could feel my body start to heal, but I did not stay in my wolf form for very long. Maybe for a half an hour; just long enough to heal some of my wounds. I could not risk being caught in my wolf form just yet.”

“But how are you feeling, my love? Are you strong enough to fight?”

“I feel much better now. I have rested some also, so that helps. Yes, I do believe I will be strong enough to fight. I cannot let all of you have all the fun, now can I? That would be so wrong. Yes, right now I am a damsel in distress, but I am a damsel that can kick some ass. And ass I will kick.”

That is my love. Always the fighter. She is so tough and strong. So courageous and brave. Most women would cower in her situation. But she is not most women. She is my woman. She is a precious gift from God. A gift that I will cherish for all time.

“You do know that I can read your thoughts, jackass. Are you sure you can handle me for all time, Deuce? Are you ready for that? I can assure you, that I will not make it easy on you.” She laughs.

“You better believe it, my sweet. I am ready for the challenge that is all you. I mean it; I will cherish you for all time. You will never want for anything. I will keep you safe and protected. Yes, I know that was a bit chauvinist, but I am a man, after all. I want you to always be safe.”

“Yes, you are all male. But, we are equals, remember? We are in this fight together. As long as we stand side by side together, we can overcome anything, my love. Trust me as your partner, your other half. When we work together, we are a well-oiled machine,” she says.

“You are right, my love. We make an awesome team. As long as you are by my side, I have everything. You are my life, my heart, my soul. You are everything to me plus more. I love you to the moon and stars, and back again a hundred times over. I will love you for as long as God sees fit to keep us on this Earth. Which I am hoping is for a very long time, though I do not think forever will be long enough.”

“Deuce, I love you so much. You are my heart, soul, and the very air I breathe. I will love you forever and then some. To the moon and stars, and back again. I will spend the rest of our eternal lives showing you how blessed I am to have you in my life. Since my parents died, all I have wanted was a family. And, with you, I have that. Everyone has accepted me into the fold without hesitation. I will be forever grateful for that. Thank you for following me that night. For letting me into your heart and soul. From the moment I set my eyes on you, I knew that one day you would be mine. And you would own my heart and soul. I love you, Deuce.”

“Adele, everything you feel for me, I already feel for you. Our minds, hearts, and souls are one. We are one, as it was meant to be. Destiny never makes a mistake. We were created for each other,” I proclaim. “Okay, enough of the mushy shit. Hurry the hell up and get me the fuck out of here would you?”

I laugh. “Yes, ma’am.”

I cannot help but chuckle to myself. I definitely have a spitfire on my hands with her. I love it. I would not have her any other way. She is perfect in every way. 

We wait patiently while waiting for the tigers to come back. We need to come up with a plan. We cannot just simply attack. We all need a designated area to secure and take care of. If we do not plan this out, we will fail. Failure is not an option. Not this time, not ever. We know that the four of us will go in as gators. Jos, Dean, and Matthias as tigers. And Blaze and Gabriel … well, as they are, badass vampire and angel.

Dean and Joslyn come back toward us. They stay in their shifter form. We can mind speak this way also.
“What have you discovered?”
I ask.

“Well, there are five guards around each corner of the building. There is only one way in and one way out of the building, and that is through the front door. There are two guards just inside the door. They are guarding Adele. Each man has a machete. They are merely humans, but they are evil. So we will have no worries about killing them. They have chosen the wrong path,”
Dean replies.

“We should split up into teams of two. Deuce, I will team up with you. The rest know already who they are working with,” Pierre suggests.

“We will crush them before they know what is happening on each side. We attack all sides at the same time. They have no back-up near. It is only them. Pierre, we are attacking the front. I have already contacted Adele; she is waiting for the signal for her to shift. She will take care of the guards on the inside. We all will take care of the guards on the outside. If anyone should need help, just let the others know. All the guards should be dead by the time me and Pierre reach the front door,” I say.

We stand in silence for a few minutes, letting the plan sink in. Blaze and Gabriel will take the rear. Dean and Joslyn will take the west side. And Alexandre and Sebastien will take the east side. All sides of this building will be covered. The wind has changed direction again. Our sounds as we creep up upon the house are muted by the breeze.

The ground has become soft and pliant to our feet. Once we are just on the other side of the house, my brothers and I shift. It is taking everything in me not to attack. Every ounce of control I have is used up. Only sheer will keeps me from attacking just yet. My brothers and I let out the loudest growls you have ever heard, shaking the ground as we approach the house.

We split up into our teams and attack. We catch the guards by surprise. They did not think they would have any trouble this night, or any night for that matter. They must have been informed that no one would be coming for her. Boy, were they
dead
wrong. Pierre and I lay back just a bit and let the others fight it out. Because we have to go around the entire house in order to get to the front. We watch in awe as each guard is taken out one by one. Either by a blade, teeth, claws, or by being completely ripped apart. Once the east side of the house is cleared, Pierre and I head to the front. The guards up front are ready for us. Perfect. I love a good fight.

The remaining guards from the back and west side of the house have moved to the front of the house. Somehow, two from each side got away during the fight and moved up front. The more, the merrier. We all stand our ground. The guards have their machetes at the ready, waiting to see who will attack first. 

Enough of this shit. I charge ahead. The first guard I approach, I grab him by his legs and throw him behind me. Pierre catches him and rips him into pieces. My brothers flank me on both sides. We approach the rest of the guards. Each of us charges and takes them out with one bite of our sharp, deadly teeth. Dean and Joslyn attack the two guards who are trying to run away. Nope, not going to happen. They knock them down and suffocate them with their jaw on their necks. Gabriel and Blaze corner two guards and cut them into pieces with their blades.

Once all of the guards have been killed, the bodies magically start to burn. So many little fires around this house from all of the bodies and body parts. Skylar is setting any evidence of these guards on fire. There will be nothing left but ash. The others stay back as I approach the house. I shift back into my human body and try to open the door. It is locked from the inside. I put my ear against the door, listening. It is quiet, but I quickly hear the guards inside move and stumble.

“Hurry, we have to kill her before they get in here. She cannot live. The master said if we are attacked that we have to kill her,” guard one says.

“You dumbass, you took the shackles off her earlier. How are we supposed to kill her now? She will be able to shift,” guard two scolds.