Devi: Matefinder Book 2 (22 page)

                Sadie shook off her shock and clicked a leash on my collar. “Put up a fight at the gates. Make it look real.”

                Well, that wouldn’t be a problem.

                After walking through a thick stretch of trees, we made it back out onto the open road. The armed men in front of the gates saw us walk out of the woods and came running over, guns raised.

                “Our van broke down a mile back! We caught these two causing a public disturbance. Our orders were to bring them here,” Sadie said. She immediately handed him her badge.

                I quickly yanked the leash out of her hand and lunged for the guard, growling and showing my fangs. Sadie grabbed the leash and slammed me down hard. Ow! I’ll bet she had been waiting to do that for months. I met her eyes and growled low and deep.

                The guard fell back on his butt and handed Sadie her ID without looking.

                “Get them inside the holding pen!” he screamed at her. Alexa howled and Brett pulled at her leash causing her to wince. I felt sick and weak from the silver. We walked while the other two guards aimed silver bullet guns at us.

                “We have had a lot of drop-offs today. These things are coming out everywhere.”  The guard said.

                Sadie nodded.

                “How many do you have here?” Brett asked casually. The guard looked at him suspiciously but answered him. “About twenty. Half are in the research holding facility and the other half are going to the incinerator for disposal.”

                I stumbled and my face hit the pavement. The incinerator! Disposal!

                Brett tried to mask his anger. I could see he was pained too.

                “All right, well, where do you want these two?” Brett replied and a faint growl tried to escape his throat.

                The guard tipped his head to me. “They’ve asked for any dominate or overly feisty ones to go to research. You can take that weak one to the incinerator.” He gestured to Alexa.

                I growled and the guard shoved the gun in my face. Sadie pulled on the leash and muzzle. Sadie and Brett shared a look, no doubt communicating through their mate bond, and walked in separate directions. We followed one of the guards, as Brett walked away with the other. I didn’t like that we were splitting up. But I didn’t want ten wolves to die either. After a small walk, we approached a large cement industrial building, “This is research, you know the drill,” he told Sadie and waved his ID card which popped the door open.

               
 ‘Nahuel, go to the incinerator and help Brett. Sadie and I will get Kai.’

                ‘I’m inside the gates. I see you. I will follow them,’
he replied.

                Once Sadie and I were inside and walking down the hallway alone, I realized how awkward this situation was. Imagine Kai’s face when he realized his wife and ex-girlfriend of six years are his rescue party? Even though Sadie and I had our past, I was grateful for her help. Sadie lowered her voice. “I hope you have a plan once we walk through these doors.”

                I did. She wouldn’t like it, but I was going to use every advantage I had, even if that meant magic.

                She took the silver collar and muzzle off of my neck and snout. I could smell burnt flesh. I was very grateful for my silver immunity, I didn’t realize how vulnerable the other wolves were until then. I needed to remember to talk to Alexa about the possibility of getting more of that serum. I hoped that giving my immunity to Kai had given him enough strength to endure whatever it was they were doing. He had buried our mate bond and was in too much pain to communicate with me, so I was going into this blind.

                Suddenly, we heard Kai scream out in pain. Sadie’s face drained of color. It was the worst sound of my life. Kai wasn’t the type of man to cry out. I had seen him endure many fights. Searing pain shot through my mate bond and I began to growl. Sadie kicked open the door, gun drawn.

                I scanned the room. There were a dozen silver cages filled with wolves that lined the walls. Kai was strapped to an examiner’s table, a silver mesh net was draped over his body that secured him place. I didn’t even take the time to count how many people were in the room or measure my surroundings. I leapt across the room in three strides. No one was faster than me. The element of surprise was all I had. Three of Kai’s fingers were severed and laying on the floor. A man with bolt cutters and a white lab coat stood over my husband’s bleeding hand. It had only two fingers left. He inspected it and was about to make notes in a chart.

                The doctor turned to me when he heard the door kick in and my deep growl. I steadied my gaze on the pulsing vein in his neck. I ripped his throat out before he could even speak. Shots rang out from Sadie’s gun and two guards were down.

                Kai was panting. His body was in human form, but patches of fur had broken out along his torso. He was completely naked. A lab assistant cowered in the corner and Sadie knocked her out with the butt of her gun.

                I quickly shifted into my human form and unclicked the net and shackles pinning down my mate and slowly lowered him onto the ground. My fingers burned from my brief contact with the silver. Kai was panting. The stumps on his hands were bleeding freely. I was vaguely aware of Sadie uncaging the other wolves in the room. I took a deep breath and found a quiet place in my mind. I willed the blood in Kai’s fingers to clot and heal. Mist poured out of my palms and surrounded his hands. I could feel my energy draining. I needed to heal myself soon. The silver was seriously annoying me. The stumps on Kai’s fingers slowly stop bleeding and crusted over with dark scabs. I wrapped them in a gauze strip and met my mate’s eyes. They were yellow and full of pain and anger. His energy was dark. He didn’t look like the man I knew and loved. He looked wild.

                ‘I’m so sorry, about Devon, about this. It’s all my fault. They want me, not you,
’ I told him.

                Slowly, the old Kai returned and I saw his eyes soften to their hazelnut brown. His scowl faded and the mate bond burst open. I realized that he had closed it off partially so I wouldn’t feel all of his pain.

                ‘Of all the people. You brought my ex-girlfriend to help rescue me?’
He pondered.

               
I laughed and gave him a quick kiss.

                “Will they grow back?” I began to throw clothes on him and help him up. I wrapped him into a lab coat and grabbed one for myself.

                “I’m not sure. I think that’s the experiment, to find out.” He cradled his hand.

                There were ten wolves standing around Sadie. Most of them were dominant, one of them was more dominant; he began to shift.

                When he was human, he looked at me. “Thank you for rescuing us. We are from Seaside beach pack. We came to investigate when we smelled a foreign wolf on our land.”

                “You’re welcome. We have two others saving the wolves from the incinerator,” I told him. An alarm sounded and we heard a door slam down the hall.

                “Showtime!” Sadie shouted and drew her gun. She tossed me her spare. I stepped in front of Kai.

                I looked at the Seaside wolves. “They are just humans with silver! We’re stronger than them, faster than them, and smarter than them. Go for the throats.” They all looked injured and tired, but they also looked pissed off.

                The wolves growled. The Seaside dominant wolf grabbed a metal saw from the operating table. It would be dark soon. We needed to get back to Mount Hood to protect the pack before the vampires woke up.

                I turned to Kai. “This isn’t exactly what I had in mind for a honeymoon.”

                He managed a chuckle and I burst out of the room screaming. Sadie and the Seaside pack were at my back. Everyone who was involved in Devon’s death and torturing my mate was about to die. I collided with a security guard and gave him quick hard elbow to the temple, he was out. A bullet hit my thigh and I cried out but stayed standing. I shot blindly down the hallway as the wolves came out behind me. Time for some magic.

                I opened the palms of my hands and did a simple illusion charm Sylvia had taught me. White clouds poured out of my palms and approached the oncoming guards.

                “Holy shit,” Sadie commented. The Seaside wolves looked at me, confused.

                “She’s half witch. Don’t ask,” Sadie told them.

                But the clouds obscured us from them and gave the Seaside pack the cover they needed to attack. As wolves, our senses of smell and sight were much better than the humans. The small pack went into the thick clouds at the end of the hall and I heard growling and screaming. Shots rang out.

                Kai stumbled out of the door and came up behind me. My leg was killing me and I could feel it bleeding, but I kept my hands out before me to control the cloud cover. Kai was breathing shallow. I turned back for a second to look at him. He looked pale and weak. I was beginning to feel tired myself. I strongly suspected the bullet in my leg was silver. Suddenly, the alarm stopped going off and all of the lights went out. Alexa.

                “I need to eat,” Kai told me. “Healing these fingers is taking a lot out of me.”

                I nodded slowly to Kai, my hearing was going in and out. I was vaguely aware of Nahuel walking down the hallway in human form and catching me just as I passed out.

                When I came to, I was inside the car, lying in the back seat draped across Kai’s lap. I felt better, much better. The mate bond was fully open and my leg was healed. Kai must have given me back my silver immunity. I looked up at him. His color was good, but his eye lids were drooping. He looked exhausted. Brett was driving and Sadie sat shotgun. A Burger King bag sat on Kai’s lap. Ten crumbled burger wrappers littered the back seat of the car.

                “Where’s Nahuel? Alexa?” I bolted upright, panicked. My stomach grumbled. I was starving.

                Kai eased me back down. “Shhh, they’re fine. They stole a van and are right behind us.”

                I let out a breath. I sifted through the pack bonds checking on all the wolves. The sun was setting and the vampires would be awake soon. Emma was completely numb; I could feel her shock of Devon’s passing. Everyone else seemed to be alive and okay. Kai handed me three burgers from the bag.

                “Did you know Burger King makes veggie burgers?” He quizzed.

                I smiled, taking the food. “Yep.”

                “How’s the pack?” Kai asked as I tore into the food.

                “Emma’s completely depressed which is to be expected, but everyone else is okay,” I said through mouthfuls.

                He nodded.

                It was killing Kai not to be Alpha, I felt it. I held out my arm. “Take the pack back.”

                I could sense Sadie and Brett in the front seat leaning back to listen. Kai’s eyes bore into mine, going yellow. Something passed between our mate bond. He wanted to make sure I really wanted to give the Alpha power back. He longed to be in charge again, but wanted to meet my needs first. He had always sensed an Alpha lurking inside of me and wanted to make sure we sorted it out. Once he felt my true feelings, that it was way too overwhelming having to be in charge of all of these people and their feelings, he smiled.

                “Tough job, eh?” he asked.

                I nodded. “I’m not a fan. I don’t like being told what to do, but I don’t want to feel everyone’s pain and issues and feel responsible for their every move either. I’m not ready.”

                He nodded. “Alpha bonds can pass between dominant mates, but you must willingly give it back.”

                I transformed my hand into claws. “Kai, I name you pack Alpha. Blood of my blood. Take it.” I swiped his good arm. Pressing mine to his.

                Suddenly my chest felt empty. My head was free of the chatter. I sighed. It was lonely and relaxing at the same time. Kai’s face relaxed, he looked at peace. Being an Alpha was his place, not mine. Then, he winced.

                “I will have to check on Emma as soon as we get back.” He declared.

                I nodded and brought him up to speed on the militia and all that had gone on in the media since he was captured.

                “So what’s the plan?” I queried.

                “Kill Layla and anyone else who threatens our way of life,” he said.

                Sounds like a bloodbath.

                Getting back to the mountain was more challenging than we thought. There were police checkpoints, riots, and then militia and werewolf checkpoints. We had to hide Kai in the trunk because he would be recognized as the werewolf on TV. Once we reached the base of the mountain we saw Max and Earl standing behind a barricade blocking the road. We stopped the car and popped the trunk. Kai jumped out. His hand was wound up in a bandage and he was disguising a limp. I could feel he was completely drained of energy and in pain, but he didn’t let it show. He embraced Max.

                “Good to see you home, brother,” Max told him.

                “Good to be home, brother.” Kai grabbed his shoulder.

                “Howdy.” Earl tipped his hat.

                Kai extended his good hand. “Nice to meet you, sir. My mate tells me you have been a big help. I’m honored to host you on our mountain.”

                Earl smiled. “The honor is ours. We just want to do what’s right for our people when the time comes.”

                The last bit of sunlight hid behind a large grey cloud. Kai looked up.

                “That time is now. Assemble your people. Pack meeting,” Kai told him.

                The barn where we had our wedding reception could hold 300 comfortably. There were about 800 of us packed into and spilling out of that barn.

                Kai stood on the stage and addressed the crowd.

                “Welcome to our home! The knowledge of our race was supposed to remain a secret. But after seeing the vampires drug and bleed humans to death for pleasure, I couldn’t keep quiet any longer!” Kai roared and the faces of the people in the crowd took on menacing looks. I spotted Sylvia and the rest of the coven. They hadn’t yet wanted to come out to the human race and asked Kai not to mention them. They would help, but wanted to go undercover as humans.

                “Our kind have long been the protectors of humanity. We have always gone against the vampires. Unfortunately we have been dying out, unable to repopulate our numbers to keep up with the fast growing numbers of the vampires.” The humans were whispering, some looked fearful.

                “But there is one race that has bigger numbers than all of the supernatural races combined! The humans!” Kai bellowed.

                A roar cut into his speech as the militia began chanting and screaming battle cries. I could see a bunch of people with smart phones were recording Kai.

                “That’s right! The vampires think that you are weak, and working alone you might be. But if we work together, we can wipe out this threat forever!” He roared the last words in his deep Alpha voice and the crowd went wild. Silver stakes and guns were being tossed around and people were suiting up.

                “My mate is special.” Kai pointed to me. “She has the power to bring together mated werewolf couples. The vampires don’t want our numbers to grow, so they would seek to kill her. She must be protected at all costs.”

                He wasn’t telling them about my blood being able to give the vampires fertility? Of course not. The humans would probably kill me right where I stood.

                I stepped forward to address the crowd.

                “But not all vampires are bad. It’s important that you know that. When all of this is over, there will be some left that wish to live in peace with all of us. They feed off of blood bank donations and do not wish to be lumped with the rest.”  I felt it needed to be said, for Alek’s sake.

                Earl nodded to me and stepped on the stage. “There are two ways to kill these blood suckers, a stake through the chest or take off their heads! Happy hunting!” He took off his hat and raised it up. His people screamed and chanted ‘happy hunting.’ I glanced at Kai who smirked. Well, it was show time. If balance was what the earth needed then the cleansing was about to begin.

                Kai quieted everyone. “Fight in teams, with a werewolf leading a pack of humans. We can smell out the vampire dens.” And with that final command the entire mob disbanded running off into clusters.

                Kai turned to me and cupped my face. “We’re mated now, your blood is fertile, the vampires have everything to gain from capturing you. Stay with Emma and Diya and be safe, while we go out and fight.” It was an order and request all at the same time. Normally, I would refuse but he was right. One more person out there fighting wasn’t going to matter and if I was captured it would be just what the vampires wanted. I kissed his soft lips.

                ‘Okay.’

                He sighed in relief. “Okay.”