Kodiak's Claim (19 page)

Oh, how cliché and ridiculously super villainous. Reid laughed. “That is the worst line I’ve ever heard. Let me give you a better one. Let’s end this. Right here, right now. Man to man. Or bear to whatever you are.”

“A fight? As if a fight ever truly solves anything.”

Whatever happened to the good old days where disputes were solved with fists and then laughed about over a few beers? Some days Reid missed his time in the military. Especially the brave men he encountered and served with. Courageous men, unlike the one he currently dealt with. A true opponent wouldn’t hide. “I’ve got better things to do than waste my time with a coward.”

“Coward? That’s rich coming from you.”

“Says the guy who won’t show his face. Are you going to come out and face me or not?”

“What if I say no? What will you do,
bear
?”

“Proclaim far and wide that the man who thought to usurp my spot didn’t have the balls to face me.”

“So you’d leave? What a shame. And here I had a surprise waiting for you. Won’t she be disappointed? Ah well. I guess I misjudged your interest in her. I can’t say as I blame you. Humans are so delicate, and a man in your position can’t afford weakness.”

Those words got his attention. “What have you done to Tammy? Where is she?”

A low chuckle rolled out of a speaker that Reid finally located strung above the only door into the hangar. “You want the woman? Then come and get her.”

Yes, it was a trap. And, yes, it was a bad idea. It didn’t stop Reid. Not once he knew his city girl was inside.

Signaling to Travis and some of the others to circle around to the back of the hangar, he sprinted with a few more of his clan to the door, which swung open at his approach.

Not a good sign. “Du—”

The first shot cracked, whizzed by him so close he felt the zing of its passing. It hit too. Just not him. With a yelp, one of his guys hit the ground with a thump and cursed, “They’re using fucking silver. Bastards.”

The ultimate betrayal when it came to turf wars between clans or rogues looking to stake a claim. The unspoken unwritten rules of the shifter clans stated no outside weapons. Most especially not silver, the bane of their existence. A metal the hunters of old used on them. Or so his grandfather claimed.

Despite the close encounter with mortality, Reid didn’t slow his approach. However, he did watch the opening more closely. When he saw the barrel poking out again, he yelled, “Incoming.”

Their military training, and his tone of command, meant they obeyed without question. Bodies hit the ground, and the shot whistled harmlessly overhead.

There was no third attempt as the gravelly-voiced fellow shouted through the screaming feedback on the speaker, “You fucking idiot. I told you I wanted the bear alive.”

Great. Because alive, Reid could cause so much more damage.

And carnage.

He dove through the open portal, rolled, and popped to his feet, quickly scanning the environ. He managed a mental snapshot of the moment and interior.

Not exactly the most encouraging of places. Neglect hung over the abandoned hangar. The remnants of vehicle parts and machinery littered the floor and clustered along the wall. The concrete floor, what was visible, bore the dust of abandonment and detritus of animals claiming the space. Yet amidst the signs of neglect were those of more recent inhabitants. A pile of garbage, its reek held at bay by the radiating cold, which the scattered propane heaters couldn’t quite keep at bay. Ratty old mattresses also lay scattered here and there, sleeping bags strewn across them, a makeshift camp of vermin Reid planned to eradicate.

All these details he absorbed within a moment. However, most of it got shoved away in the later file. The most pressing issue, in his mind at any rate, was about twenty feet away from him. A gurney with a prone figure atop it, covered to the chin in a sheet. The face angled away from him. But he could guess the identity given the curls and the glimpse of red the person wore.

Before he could take a step, someone tossed a fire-lit rag on the floor. With a
whoosh
, a ring of fire rose like a curtain around the bed with the body.

His city girl lay helpless in the midst of the fiery circle. “What the fuck have you done?” he queried, more than a little taken aback at the craziness of the moment. Fire, the second thing shifters didn’t mess with. The forest was their friend. Fire annihilated it. Hence, they had a healthy respect for the most dangerous of elements.

“Choices, choices,” a voice mocked, the speaker hidden by the haze of smoke. “Save the girl. Find me. Or save yourself. What will you do,
soldier
?”

The way he said it … the mocking tone. It seemed somehow familiar. Another clan traitor like the drivers? Did it matter? By betraying him, they forfeited their lives. Later. Right now he needed to deal with dancing flames that perfumed the space with toxic smoke. “Why make a choice? How about I do it all?” Starting with the most pressing concern. Tammy.

Already the heat and smoke were proving uncomfortable, and if he found it so with his strength and training, then how must it feel to his fragile city girl? Prone on the gurney, she’d yet to move, something that worried him but shoved to the back of his mind lest it distract him. He needed to get to her, but how? The fire would singe him. Moisture would help, but he had no access to running water and didn’t spot an extinguisher.

Only old machine parts, wooden pallets on the inside, and snow on the outside. Snow. Wait a second, snow was—

Yeah, the light bulb went off, and it took only an instant to shed his clothes so he could shift. As he lumbered back outside, he tried to ignore the taunting voice. “Running away? So soon? If only your clan could see their fearless leader now.”

If only they could. They’d wonder why his giant bear ass was making the biggest Kodiak snow angel ever seen.

Snow coating his fur in thick clumps, Reid ran back in, four legs pumping, straight toward the fire. The icy particles caught in his fur melted at the heat, but he didn’t sizzle or burn. Much. The soles of his paws did get uncomfortably warm, but nothing he couldn’t handle.

But how long would his luck hold? And now that he’d breached the ring, how would he get Tammy out? It wasn’t as if he could roll her in a snowbank. A problem to worry about once he’d freed her.

With sharp teeth, he grasped at the leather straps holding her, tearing them from her feverish limbs, while trying to ignore the possible damage he caused in doing so. A few bruises and abrasions on her skin were minor compared to the possibility of burning alive.

She opened her eyes as he tore the fourth cuff, eyes that seemed to have difficulty focusing. “Reid,” she whispered. “Is that you?”

As his bear, he couldn’t answer, but he did his best to nod.

Her eyes widened. Not in fear, but surprised shock. She croaked, “Behind—”

He whirled before she could finish and narrowly missed the swipe from a massive paw. If Kodiaks were king when it came to size, polar bears were emperors.

And, in this case, supposedly dead.

Gene?

Before Reid could truly process the fact a man he’d once called friend, thought lost long ago in a far away land, faced him, he was in a fight for his life.

When humans fought, there was a certain elegance to it, a dance where blows were exchanged, where speed and skill played a large part. In a duel between deadly predators, those things applied, but add in biting and clawing, and things got ugly, as well as bloody, real fast.

They also got very physical, and as the inferno raged around them, encircling them in a cage fire, Reid knew he fought for his life—and Tammy’s. But Tammy wouldn’t last long, not if his gasping for oxygen was any indication as the flames sucked at the air, making it hard to breathe.

Head-butting his opponent, Reid wrenched free and partially turned, enough that he could shove at the gurney holding Tammy. It shot like a rocket toward the wall of flame. He could only hope the fire wall’s diminishing height meant the flames were weakening in strength.

A head butt into his side sent him staggering, and Reid didn’t have time to watch and see if she made it safely. Once again, wrestling for his life, he could only hope if the inferno touched her that she would rouse enough to save herself. He’d done what he could to give her a chance. Now it was time to save himself from a ghost returned to haunt him.

And apparently kill me.

An eternity of pain later, Tammy surfaced back into the world, unsure of anything other than the fact every part of her hurt. What the hell!

It was like having a full-body bruise. Every single part of her ached, and she whimpered. Prayed for some heavy-duty drugs. Even a warm—or gruff—voice to tell her everything would be all right.

She got squat. Much like that stupid tree in the forest, nobody seemed to hear.
Where’s some attention when you need it?
Then again, it wasn’t as if a soothing voice would have helped.
No, but even a couple acetaminophen would.
Oh, what she wouldn’t give for a great big joint right about now. For its medicinal value of course.

She couldn’t have said how long she floated on a wave of pain. If she had to guess, she would have said a long while, mostly because of the incomprehensible murmurs that encircled her. Too apathetic to care what they spoke of, she could only stew in her own misery.

And it’s all my fault.
Like a dumb ninny in a movie, she’d gone rushing off without a proper plan, a disregard for danger, letting her emotions rule instead of common sense. For that, she deserved a bitch slap. Not this. The memory of an IV dripping poison into her arm, faint-inducing agony, and a certainty this just wouldn’t end well.

Speaking of ending, though, to her surprise, when the pain finally ebbed into numbness, she didn’t immediately notice it. The gradual ease of tension and aches permeating her occurred so slowly and smoothly, she never took note. But when she did, a heavy sigh burst free.
Maybe I’m not going to have to worry about winning a TSTL Darwin-type award.

The problem with sighing was it garnered her some attention. Ah, for the good old days, when she was easily ignored. Until she did something off the wall. Tammy never did like fading into the background.

A much-too-jovial voice, belonging to the guy with messed-up eyes, noted her consciousness. “She awakes! And just in time too. Your teddy bear is racing to your rescue.”

Tammy had no problem deciphering his words.
Reid’s coming to rescue me!

She might have exulted in the news more if her skin didn’t start itching worse than the time she’d rolled into a patch of poison ivy. Multiply the I-need-to-scratch-NOW feeling by ten and you might have understood her newest torture. Worse, she couldn’t move to ease it, not with the straps binding her to the gurney. A lack of mobility, of course, made the itch worse.

Everything irritated her from the leather chafing her exposed wrists and ankles to the bright lights above. Those pupil-seeking bastards seemed determined to burn holes through her eyelids. Her sympathy for mythical vampire figures and their aversion to daylight, shifted. No more would she mock the nocturnally challenged.

A sharp crack of a gunshot made her moan as the sound reverberated in her head.
Hello, still in need of a pain reliever here.

The second ringing bang didn’t see her faring any better. She struggled to open her eyes, utter a sound or move, but it was as if her body were apart from her, tethered to her consciousness yet adrift when it came to use. Probably not a bad thing considering her untenable situation.

A situation that was about to get better?

She heard the rumble of an animal, a bear. How she knew, she couldn’t have said. But something within her recognized it.

Consciousness wavered for a moment as she struggled and strained to understand what happened. This whole unable-to-see-events-unfolding sucked. Relying on her other senses made her feel so vulnerable and out of the loop. Deciphering the situation was like putting together puzzle pieces blind. She did her best though.

It seemed those torturing her were under attack. Good news for her, but luck short-lived as she heard a
whoosh
that sent a chill through her.

Oh no. Not again.

Those who’ve lived through certain traumas remember key aspects. For victims of tornados, it was seeing that cone of wind and debris. For Tammy, her trigger was that whooshing noise, the sound fire made when it announced its grand entrance, hungry and ready to consume everything in its path.
And crisp my chubby thighs into Tammy bacon. Everyone knows everything’s better with bacon.

Humor didn’t alleviate her terror. Smoke tickled her sensitive nasal passages, its invasive stench permeating the air and bringing forth a whimper. Memories long forgotten, memories she’d buried and locked away for her own peace of mind, surfaced and forced her to recall the last time she’d confronted fire.

Just a child, she’d gone to the cabin with her dad. A father-daughter weekend of target shooting and fishing. Of roasting marshmallows and snuggling as he read her a book.

A crisp and cool night, her father built her a crackling fire. They were just about to read some fairy tale with a dragon and his princess when it happened. A simple everyday occurrence, a popping ember from the fireplace. A hot glowing chunk hit the rug and didn’t immediately extinguish.

Her father, barefoot at the time and thus unable to stamp it out, urged her to fetch a glass of water. Tammy rushed to the sink and the counter with its keg of water. No well meant they brought their water with them in big plastic jugs with a tap in the side. A tap that poured molasses slow.

Young and clumsy, she tripped and spilled the cupful of liquid before she could return. By the time she’d fetched another, curling smoke rose from a dancing flame.

“Run outside, Tammy. Let me take care of this, and then you can come back in for a story,” her father urged as he grabbed the small cup of liquid and splashed it. She would always remember the sizzling sound of her tiny cup of water as he poured it over the growing fire, a sound that said not enough. But she’d not understood at the time. She’d skipped outside, convinced her daddy would fix it. Daddy fixed everything.