PS02 - Without Regret (16 page)

shove his hands away from her, but she couldn’t move him or stop him from moving her through thick brush that seemed to

swallow them whole before she found herself shoved into a fire lit clearing filled with men in various states of undress.

All the men stopped what they were doing to look their way, looking startled at first and then furious.

“Fucking Sentinels,” one of the men growled out, looking really pissed.

Sentinels? That was the third time she’d heard that word in the last twentyfour hours. When she’d been attacked this morning

she’d admittedly been focused on other things to really give that word much thought and when Chris had said it earlier she’d

been annoyed and pissed to be receiving the cult speech. Now they had her full attention.

She quickly processed everything she found out today, which wasn’t a hell of a lot, and came to a painfully obvious conclusion.

This was just another little ploy to scare the hell out of her so that she’d give up her work.

All of their vague bullshit now made sense. They acted like they were chasing after these men, but Isabella hadn’t seen them

consult a map or anything, because they’d already known where they were going to meet up with these guys. When they’d been

walking through the woods they never paused or acted unsure about where they were going.

They also did a damn fine job of scaring the living hell out of her. First this morning with “vampires,” which was the only thing

she could describe men with fangs who bit her and supposedly burst into flame. Granted the jerk that bit her neck did a damn

convincing job by sucking her blood, she thought with a shudder.

She’d bet that whole bursting into flames thing was an optical illusion, not that she’d fallen for it a hundred percent since she’d

been pretty sure she’d been drugged, and still was, but that made more sense than hallucinating for this long. There was no

they’d been unable to drug her again since she’d refused to drink or eat anything they’d given her and she’d checked her candy

bar really well before she’d eaten it, plus two of them had taken huge bites out of it and she really didn’t think they’d drug

themselves.

This morning had been pretty bad and they’d scared the hell out of her, but now she was prepared for whatever bullshit story

they’d throw her way. She wondered what they’d try this time. Demons? Witches?

Goblins? Frankenstein, Caper the Friendly Ghost, she thought with an amused snort that earned a curious frown from Chris. If

they really wanted to scare her they should have had her parents show up. Nothing on earth would have scared her more into

talking just so she could get the hell away from them.

“Whatever you do, don’t move away from my side,”

Chris stressed softly.

“Yeah, sure whatever,” she said with a lazy wave of her hand for him to get the show on the road.

“What the hell is wrong with you?” Chris demanded softly as he kept his eyes on the men around them, whom she noted were

now all naked. Some of them were inching back towards the woods while others were moving forward with an odd gleam of

anticipation in their eyes.

“Nothing,” she said around a loud yawn.

They weren’t going to kill her, she’d realized. They were going through too much trouble to scare her with elaborate hoaxes to

simply kill her. If they were going to kill her they’d at least threaten her by now, but they hadn’t, at least not yet. They were still

playing games and she was no longer as frightened as she was an hour ago. Instead she was back to feeling exhausted, hungry,

and pissed. They’d save themselves so much time and probably money if they’d just asked for the damn program so she could

tell them to go to hell.

“What the hell is he?” one of the men demanded as Ephraim suddenly appeared on the opposite side of the clearing, causing the

men who’d been inching away to move closer to the fire.

Almost as one, all of the naked men tilted their heads back and sniffed like they were dogs, making her roll her eyes. “Give me

a break” she m uttered, wondering when the theatrics would end.

“He’s not human!” one of the men yelled just as Ephraim’s eyes turned a bright red, making her sigh heavily and wonder just

how far they were willing to take this.

“We haven’t done anything wrong, Sentinel,” a man with shoulder length dark hair said, stepping in front of the rest of the men,

but turned slightly so he could keep a wary eye on Ephraim who looked ready to kill someone. “We know the rules, Sentinel.

You can’t touch us as long as we follow your Council’s rules.”

“You’re not following my rules, cupcake,” Chris said, looking relaxed, but once again that little muscle was ticking beneath his

eye. No doubt the man hated having to do this. Something told her the man didn’t enjoy drama of any sort.

“We don’t have to listen to you,” another man yelled, only to be silenced when the man in front of her held up his hand.

“The moment you crossed into my territory your asses belonged to me,” Chris said coldly, sending a delicious shiver through

her. The man might hate his job, but he was damn good at it. She idly wondered if he’d given any thought to acting

professionally. With his bad boy good looks and “take no shit” attitude he’d probably be a hit, she thought.

“We’re following the Council’s rules,” the leader said with a mocking smile as he gestured around them.

“We’re well away from the humans.”

“You’re two miles away from a bonfire,” Ephraim said, drawing everyone’s attention.

“Really?” the leader said, trying to appear innocent. “I guess we missed that,” he said, earning a few chuckles from his men.

“I guess you did,” Chris said tightly. “I guess we’re going to have to make sure you keep following my rules,” he drawled out

coldly, earning nervous, and in her opinion, over the top looks of fear from the naked men.

With a bored sigh she ran her eyes over the dozen naked men in front of her. At least she had something pretty to look at, she

thought as she ran her eyes over each man, noting their decent looks and mostly lean muscular bodies. She hadn’t missed the

fact that most of them seemed to be very excited. She simply didn’t care. They didn’t do anything for her.

The man glowering down at her on the other hand did many naughtily delicious things to her nerves. As she looked over the

leader of the bunch she couldn’t help but notice how well endowed he was, she wondered if Chris was as well endowed and

giggled when she realized the first time she wondered about a man’s naughty parts she was in the middle of the woods

surrounded by a group of gay actors, she guessed since they were all naked and obviously liking the view, who were going to

try and scare her into giving up a program that two days ago she would have probably just sold to the highest bidder if the FBI

hadn’t gotten involved.

“What’s so funny, bitch?” the leader growled, making her laugh even harder.

“What the hell is wrong with you?” Chris demanded as he half stepped in front of her and pushed her back.

“Oh no, you guys went through so much trouble,” she said, not bothering to hide the fact that she was annoyed as she stepped in

front of him, determined not to miss the little show that they went through so much trouble to put on for her, “the least I can do

is……….,”

her words trailed off as she watched the men in front of her suddenly drop to their hands and knees, some growling as others

cried out in pain.

She watched in horror as limbs elongated, sharp black claws shot out where fingernails should be, backs arched and

lengthened the same time as their faces morphed from human to doglike as various shades of hair began to cover every inch of

their skin.

“What the hell?’ she mumbled, stumbling back. This was real. Oh god, this was really happening. There was no way any of this

could be staged considering it took movie studios weeks and hundreds of hours of tech work to get the same results she was

seeing in person in a movie.

That meant…..

She swallowed hard. That meant she’d really been attacked by vampires or whatever the hell they were this morning and these

men were turning into beasts right in front of her. Her eyes shot over to Ephraim who was kicking anything that tried to crawl

into the woods back into the middle of the morphing men with surprising ease, sending them flying through the air as they

howled.

He wasn’t human. None of them were human, she realized, taking several steps back as her brain screamed for her to run.

Chris grabbed her arm and pulled her closer until his warm breath fanned her ear. “Whatever you do, don’t run.”

Chapter 12

Izzy trembled beneath his hand and somehow he knew that they’d finally gotten through to her. Whatever bullshit she’d

convinced herself was going on was now safely out of her mind and the new understanding that she needed to have in order to

move forward and do her job was firmly in place.

He knew it would take time before she fully accepted her new understanding of the world and that was fine with him as long as

she did her job while she figured things out. There wasn’t any time for sugar coated bullshit or hand holding. Madison had two

babies on the way that they needed to protect and thanks to whatever she’d done to catch the attention of every fucking Master

on earth they had a war to stop.

“Let me go!” she cried, struggling against his hold, momentarily making him feel like the heartless bastard so many accused him

of being, but he pushed it aside.

She had a job to and she’d been slacking for way too long.

“We need to stop them from reaching the bonfire,” he bit out harshly as he yanked her forward once again.

“Please just let me go!” she begged, struggling uselessly against his hold. She was still weak, he noted with distaste.

He started to yank her forward again when movement out of the corner of his eye caught his attention. Barely giving the

werewolf a glance, he backhanded the bastard across the muzzle, sending him flying through the air.

“Oh my god, you’re not human,” Izzy gasped.

“No, I’m not,” he said, dragging her closer. When she squeezed her eyes shut he gripped her chin. “Look at me, Munchkin,” he

ordered. When she reluctantly opened her eyes he continued, “No one in this field is human,” he said, watching as his words hit

home.

“But, I’m-” she started to protest, but he didn’t have time for this bullshit.

“You’re a fucking Sentinel. Now get your ass in there and do your job before one of these assholes gets loose and gets their

hands on one of those kids,” he said, giving her a shake.

“What kids?” she asked in a daze as she frantically looked around.

“The fucking kids at the bonfire. They’re here to snag a few little girls,” he said, feeling the same disgust well up in him as it

did when he’d first heard what these sick fucks were up to.

They were all a bunch of pussies too fucking afraid to deal with a real woman so they were going around trying to snag

themselves little girls. Since no female shifter in her right mind would join a pack without the protection of an Alpha they were

forced to create their own females, females too weak even when changed to pose any real threat to the men.

Of course the moment the little girls came into their adult powers, became too much trouble or turned out to be a female Alpha

this pack would kill them without a second’s hesitation and start looking for the next group of young girls to serve them. That’s

exactly what happened two weeks ago according to his sources. These assholes killed every female in their pack when they

started to come into their adult powers and was now on the lookout for little girls to take their place from his territory.

Not fucking happening.

The pack, now completely shifted, backed away from him and his father on two hind legs as they watched them warily. They

all knew that there was no way the three of them were going to be able to take down all of them, but none of the shifters were

willing to volunteer for the job of being destroyed first and that’s exactly what they would have to do if they attacked or tried to

leave. Spending the night babysitting a bunch of assholes around a campfire wasn’t exactly the way he wanted to spend the

night, but he’d do it if he had to and the second they shifted back to human he’d drag their asses to the nearest pack and let an

Alpha deal with them.

He watched as they tilted their massive heads back and scented the air, probably hoping to see if Chris had back up. When their

heads dropped and their eyes shot from him and Izzy, the two they knew were Sentinels, to his father who was slowly pacing

along the far edge of the woods like a caged animal as he glared at the pack through glowing red eyes.

They shifted on their hind legs as they tried to scent out his father. Even in human form they were able to tell that he wasn’t

human, but unless they’d come across a Pyte before they would have no idea what the hell his father was capable of, giving his

father the upper hand. Like the other shifters they’d been forced to take down over the years they’d probably assume he was

some unknown type of demon and underestimate him, making it easier for his father to take advantage.

Demons were naturally stronger than vampires. They usually only had two abilities and as long as you figured them out quickly

you could take advantage and use their abilities against them whereas vampires were stronger than a human, had speed, and