Fate Fixed (22 page)

And how is Alik so damn calm?

Pul ing on the thick tan gloves, he walked over to Lexie and kneeled down by her mother and pul ed her eyelids apart to check Ruby’s pupils. “Wolves are pack animals, there can only be one male leader at a time Lexie.” Standing up, he put his hand

out in front of her and gestured for her to hand him the sterling silver knife.

Without question, Lexie passed it over, wondering what he would do now and how they could stop Maxim from doing

more harm. “What about my mother? What have they done

to her?”

“Her body is fighting the virus. Bet you didn’t guess it was sexual y transmitted?” Alik walked behind his Dad and

rested a gloved hand on his shoulder, “Any time now,

Maxim should be here. Prepare yourself.”

She was about to ask what virus when suddenly Alik

slammed the silver knife right into Dragos’s back. The older man pitched forward with an earsplitting scream. Lexie skirted back as Dragos’s body thrashed on the floor next to Ruby’s. He shrieked in a language that could have only been Romanian.

Lexie jumped up, confused and horrified. “What –“

Alik rol ed Dragos over onto his back and thrust the

wedding gift into the man’s chest. Blood immediately

pooled through his linen shirt. Her step brother looked up at her and gave the crooked grin she was once fond of, “Might as wel put him out of his misery now.”

Lexie couldn’t breathe. Her bond with Torin flared through her.

Alik’s lost his mind…

She heard what could only be a howl as the large metal hatchway exploded and Maxim jumped down, landing in a

crouch. One look at his transformed appearance and she felt her knees weaken. She flattened herself against the damp wal .
I’m
going to die.

Standing across the room covered in blood and bits of fur,
Maxim stood nude on his hind legs. He resembled Alik’s figurines with his elongated face and oversized teeth, but it was his violent yel ow eyes and razor sharp claws that screamed monster. His body undulated with massive

muscles and sinew as he tore across the room leaping

between her and Alik.

He’s going to tear my throat out…

Lexie glanced down at Dragos; the silver cake knife stil protruding from his chest. Not being able to reach it, she scanned the dim area but could find nothing to protect herself with. She forced herself to keep alert and not give in to the madness around her.

Torin…save me…

Her breath froze as Maxim pressed his nuzzle into her

cheek. She clamped her eyes and mouth shut, trying to hold in her whimper as his thick tongue slid across her jaw, tasting the salt on her skin. With a snort, Maxim turned to where his father spil ed blood on the floor. Maxim’s head darted up and swiveled

to glare at his brother. A guttural growl resonated from his barrel shaped chest.

Alik stood tal ; holding Maxim’s gaze as he careful y

unbuttoned his shirt. “Brother, you have final y joined the party….”

Maxim snarled, “Leave her alone and stand down.”

Alik removed the rest of his shirt and threw it on to the floor.

His skin began to ripple, as if there were hundreds of snakes moving under the surface. “I’m afraid that isn’t happening. Do you want to know why?” his voice grew

throatier as he spoke. “Because you aren’t alpha material – you are ridiculous and stuck in father’s old ways.” Alik pul ed off his pants and stood before them naked as his body continued to pulse and swel as it sprouted hair. With stiff posture, he stared penetratingly at his brother despite the grinding and cracking noises his bones made as they realigned beneath his skin. His shoulders pulsed and split as his arms lengthened and his fists became claws.

Alik pointed at Ruby, “Father was weak fal ing for that woman and insisting upon doing nothing when her body

began showing signs of resistance.”

“And you,” his face revealing his pent up hatred, “are pathetic for trying to protect me by covering up my kil s.” He glared at Maxim in obvious disgust. “You took my trophies and

hid them in your bed when they were mine!” His eyes

flickered and rol ed back in his head before turning the putrid yel ow that now matched Maxim’s. As the smal bones in his face pushed and split, he took on the same horrific canine characteristics his brother had.

Shame fil ed her as she thought of how she responded to Torin’s facial features in the woods. How could she have thought he was a monster compared to this? She wished

she had listened to him, she wished she could have spent eternity with him. This was it; she was going to die in the basement.
The end
of my dream - so this is how it
happens.

“Stand down Alik,” Maxim warned again. “I’m the alpha

now. Let Lexie leave.” His massive body crouched, getting ready to pounce.

With disbelief, the realization hit her.
Max is trying to
protect me
.

Alik’s lips curled back; his mouth contained a row of razor sharp teeth that bulged from his gums. A growl boomed

from deep within his chest. He charged ful force and struck his brother. As Maxim rocked backwards, Alik rode up on his shoulders, using his claws and teeth to slash at Maxim’s throat.

The larger brother grabbed him by the esophagus and

pitched Alik to the floor. Maxim pounced onto Alik, his
claws digging into his brother’s chest.

“You can’t overpower me,” Maxim’s spittle shot over Alik.

“You wil leave and never come back. You are no longer a part of this pack.” He pul ed his claws from Alik’s muscle.

Lexie watched as Alik’s chest healed as quickly as Torin’s injury.

Alik rol ed onto his feet, and lurched forward. Maxim

dodged his attack, sending his own elbow down between

Alik’s shoulder blades. Their bodies shifted position so fast, it was hard for Lexie to see where one brother ended and the other began.

Just when Maxim appeared to be subduing Alik, the

smal er of the two would gain leverage with speed,

attacking with bites to Maxim’s neck, chest, and haunches.

Lexie covered her ears, the sound of their flesh tearing and bones breaking made her stomach turn. Each time she

was convinced one was mortal y wounded, their body

regenerated.

Both were covered in blood and their rasping sounds made her skin crawl. If there was a way she could have

disappeared into the dank wal behind her, she would have.

Her brain screamed at her to start moving and make an attempt to slowly step towards the stairs.

I can’t die here, not like this.

She pushed her fear aside and began to advance towards the steps. An abrupt yelping sound startled her and she spun back around towards the brothers. No longer battling, Maxim lay sprawled across Alik’s huddled form. Maxim let out a

victory moan and proceeded to clamp his jaw down on the back of Alik’s limp neck. Both were breathing laboriously as their blood slickened bodies began to mutate back to their human features. They were only inches away from

where Dragos’s dead body was pouring dark crimson onto the cement floor.

Lexie wrestled with what to do next. Her mother was just a few feet from them and if they began to attack again, Ruby was vulnerable.

Lexie dismissed her pounding heart and hastily proceeded to her mother. “Mom, we have to go, you have to wake up.”

A painful pressure clamped down on to her ankle. As she spun, Maxim leaned forward holding her tightly. “I tried to protect you Lexie,” his voice pleaded as his eye color
returned to his usual steel blue and his facial contours softened. “I made him submit.”

She attempted to pul her foot away, but his crushing

strength hurt. “Please, let me go Max. I won’t tel anyone.”

His sul en expression showed his disappointment, “I love you Lexie.”

Alik’s arm suddenly darted out to where Dragos’s body lay beside him in a slump. Grabbing the knife, he bound up in a broad powerful arc. With a sudden twist of his wrist, he forcibly thrust the knife right through Maxim’s heart. Maxim let go of

Lexie’s ankle and pressed his hand to the punctured hole.

Tilting forward, he hit the cement in a sickening thump. His bril iant red blood poured from the wound, mixing on the floor with what Dragos already left behind.

Alik dropped the knife, his hands blistered from touching the silver. “Wel that was easier than I expected.” His cal ous yel ow eyes traveled the length of Lexie’s body.

“Now, we just need to get rid of that freak you cal your boyfriend.”

The earlier rain shower couldn’t mask the stink one of the Serovs left behind. The burning sulfur stench burned in Torin’s nostrils as he sped across his parent’s property and through the woods into Cian’s yard. The metal ic scent of human blood was everywhere – splattered over grass, tree limbs, and rocks. The beast was making a statement, the blood was a warning.

Teagan rushed up the driveway, “I just checked my place –” Alarm ousted his usual grin. “He’s been there too.”

Braden crouched by the fountain Cian’s mother had sent over from her childhood home in Westport. Blood was

mixed in the pool; the cherub sculpture that stood in the center was bathed

in the thick oozing substance. “The blood is from the same person,” he stood, drying his hands on his pants.

Torin studied Cian as his cousin talked quietly into his cel phone. As he dragged his free hand through his tousled hair, his shoulders were visibly more relaxed. From the soothing tone of his words, it was apparent that Brooke
was unharmed. Torin was thankful; he didn’t think Cian could survive that kind of loss.
I couldn’t if it were Lexie.

He closed his eyes, focusing on the area al around them.

Awareness streamed through his senses: he felt motion as it vibrated across the ground, he could taste the musk on the air, and heard the rain slowing to a mere drizzle. Torin tipped his head back, sniffing the scents floating past on the breeze. Giving himself over completely, the hunter within him charged into the tree line. The overwhelming potency of blood cal ed to him.

He could feel the others behind him, dodging trees and gliding over the fal en limbs and ruts with ease. His speed built rapidly, blood was out there in great quantities: pooling, dripping and waiting. He broke into a clearing ful of long grass and smal brush and came to a complete stop – it was once their favored place to build forts as smal children. Now, splayed out like Michelangelo’s Man, the naked body of Courtney Parsons sat decomposing in the

woods.

As Torin approached, Braden flanked his left side. The predator’s scent was hours old, but from the look of her body –
Courtney had been dead for at least a day. Her platinum blond hair was now colored rust from the staining of dried blood, her eyes stil open and hazy. Her once slender body was covered in bruises and jagged claw marks. Missing

one foot and both hands, her chest sustained the worst of the damage. The creature had eaten her heart.

Cian spil ed into the clearing, fol owed by Teagan. Both halted as soon as they spotted Torin and Braden standing motionless. Cian shook his head in disbelief, “How could she have been out here without me smel ing it?”

Braden turned his head from her broken form. “She didn’t die here. I think he kil ed her somewhere else. Judging from the marks, he raped her first – then finished her. I think she’s only been here since the rain eased up.”

Torin felt ashamed. Courtney real y liked him, but he didn’t even try to be her friend. He had always been turned off by her overtly sexual behavior. Now he wished he could have been there for her in her time of need. No one deserves to die like that.

“But, why Courtney and why in my backyard?” Cian asked.

Torin’s bond with Lexie tugged.
She’s nervous.
A shooting pain began to radiate down his arm. Wondering what she was doing, he took a ful breath and focused harder on her.

It jerked again, this time he could feel her growing sense of panic.

She’s in trouble.
He stepped back from Courtney’s body, a pressure burned in the center of his chest. His stomach rumbled with nausea and a cold sweat broke out over his skin.

Braden shook his head unsure, “I don’t know, I’m guessing he’s letting you know it can be Brooke next time.”

Torin tried to move, his body only wobbled. The pain was rapidly spreading – his neck and jaw grew so stiff he

couldn’t swal ow. His hands shook as he grasped Teagan’s shoulder.
I have to get to Lexie…
No longer able to support himself, his knees buckled and he pitched forward shuddering.

His cousins stopped talking and glanced down at him

curiously.

The burning pain in his chest roared up into the back of his throat, setting the soft tissue in his face on fire. His spine arched, every disc in his back stretching and cracking, before knitting back together, fol owed by his ribs. Torin’s pounding head flipped back, his eyes and teeth changing
as a grating scream forced its way through his esophagus.

Lexie needs me…

Teagan eyes revealed his panic. “Oh hel – he’s changing!”

“It’s al of the blood – we have to keep him away from it.”

Braden seized Torin under the arms. “We need to confine him. Cian, go get your father.”

No, I have to get to Lexie.

Words wouldn’t come, just relentless agony. Another

rasping cry pitched past his lips as the bones and tendons in his arms and legs swel ed before shattering. The pain in his chest reached al the way down into his intestines, his organs squeezing and shutting down. Braden’s grip

tightened as Torin’s body began seizing. With one last desperate gulp of air – he could feel his heart stop beating.

His cousins stood over him. As they looked down at his pale form, they waited for it –
One, two, three…
Both hearts came online.