SixBarkPackTabooMobi (10 page)

Not that he was calling in his pack. No, I think he had every intention of taking care of it all himself. But I heard distant, answering lupines.

I knew we had to get out of there or my brothers and I would be dead. How, though, to get my brothers safe?

You can see, by that point, I realized that--even wounded with a bullet--Bark could hold his own against the two of them. That’s why he’d been trying to get me out of the way. He didn’t need my sissy ass for protection.

The wolves were getting closer. Too close.

It never occurred to me to crinos and tip the scales. The fight, in my opinion, was stupid. It needed to be stopped, not finished. I didn’t want anybody hurt, or dead.

And already there was blood flying. More of Bark’s than anybody’s, because of the bullet that had ripped through him and out. But Leo and Tommy were getting tore up a little, too.

I screamed for them to quit. That didn’t stop the bouncing, kick box claw fest, though. Talk about your thick heads. Too into it, I guess.

For the first time in my life, I felt remorse for screwing around. Not that I ever felt sorry about being with Bark--really. But, for bringing Leo and Tommy to a place like that. For putting any of them in the position where they had to posture up.

Taking responsibility was a big friggin’ step for me. But I had to go one more--and come up with a way to fix the mess. The best thing I could think to do turned out not to be so hard, after all. It was my specialty.

Pop-shifting to full cougar, I let out a sissy hiss and flew out the door. Pulled my Houdini. They could kill themselves or chase. I was betting on them following me. They always had before.

Leaping in high gear, I bounced over the bushes, across the sedan, and headed into the woods. A wolf howl gave me a little bearing on the direction I didn’t want to go. I veered west, figured I’d loop around garou-ville, and get closer to a better side of town. Not that I was heading home. Just getting out of there. Right? But, yeah, your internal compass tends to direct you to your home lair. All in all, I was working my way north in no time flat.

I prayed to Gaia that my brothers had heard me and were hot on my tracks. It never occurred to me that, if they were on my trail, it would be easy for the whole wolf pack to follow, too.

Several miles out, I stopped for a breather. As far as I could tell, no one was coming. No wolves howling on a hunt. I walked through a creek, to cool my feet, to clear my trail. Went quite a ways like that.

I worried a little about my brothers--had the pack got them? Is that why they hadn’t caught up with me yet? And about Bark. I prayed they hadn’t killed him, that they’d had the sense to get out of there. But what if they hadn’t got free? What if he’d bested them? You can see I was making myself sick over it. I deserved that, I think.

Maybe the minute I took off, one or the other got distracted enough to--

No. I did not want to think about that possibility.

Wading through the water, up to my knees, sometimes up to my belly, I realized that I needed to get home. That was the only way I’d know what happened. It was really the only safe place I knew of. And I had a sudden need to be safe.

More important, I needed to warn Daddy that the wolf pack might be on its way. Because, if they had killed Bark, there was no doubt that the lupes would get their own back, one way or the other. I didn’t face the alternative, really, that my brothers may have met death right after I left them--that maybe I should have fought on their side.

How many times had Daddy said that we needed to know what side we were on, and stay on it, not ride the fence? Stand up for what we believe in. I always thought he’d been talking about racism. Maybe he was? And politics. Yeah. He was definitely talking about politics.

Could he have been right all this time, and I just didn’t see it?

No. I’d done a lot of good when I was mixing it up with other people. Made a lot of
people
think better about my kind. Okay. Maybe a few turned the other way. But, all in all, I’d been a people pleaser. Good P.R. girl.

The problem was that some people didn’t know how to let others live. Attacking somebody where they lived--that’s just plain wrong.

I saw where Leo and Tommy had done that to Bark. And how Barklay’s family might come to the compound, with the same attitude. I hated it all, wished they could stop.

It didn’t matter that I hated the thought of going home and facing
Daddy
. The more I thought of it, the more I realized that the wolves would end up at the door, no matter what had happened behind me, at Bark’s cabin. Leo and Tommy had crossed the line.

Oh, how I tried to push the thought that they wouldn’t have done it, if it weren’t for my stunts, out of my mind.

Getting to Daddy, getting into the compound, became my driving thought, the thing I latched onto.

I never once thought of confessing to sleeping with Barklay. And I’d forgotten about my hair, and escaping, and all my other little crimes of the last twenty-four hours.

Not telling him that
we had riled up the wolves
would have been unforgivable. I had faith that Daddy could fix anything. That he could stop the wide-scale annihilation of bastets, which, suddenly, seemed like a real possibility.

All the things Ali had said came back to haunt me. Every leap, every bounce, every mile...I realized that I had tripped a finely laid wire. She’d tried to warn me. Bark had tried to set me back on my heels. Gaia knew Daddy and Leo and Tommy had tried to get it into my head that the world was not safe for little girls like me to play around in.

I made myself totally ill. Broke the pace to throw up even. Had to get a drink, rinse my mouth.

Picking up speed, I left the stream behind me. The truth that maybe I had paid more attention to politics, or maybe all that I’d heard, in one ear and out the other, had actually clicked in, just been waiting for my perfect recall to decide to review it, kind’ve hit me. The full ramification of the fact that my whole world could come crashing down nearly did me in. Certainly gave fleet to my feet. Lesson to the wise? Never think that a war somewhere else can’t end up in your own yard. That’s what Daddy had been trying to tell me. I’d been so stupid, thinking that what other men did wouldn’t, eventually, affect me.

Their hours watching Lupe Press TV all made sense to me...finally. What the dogs did,
did
matter. Gaia. I felt like such a fool for not seeing it before.

My mind was circling. Was it better to be the victim or the perpetrator? I didn’t believe either side was good, or right. But maybe you
do
need to decide which you want to be?

Even with all the energy that pushed me to race home, I lost my momentum by the time I got close. Lost in trying to decide. I think that happens to a lot of us. We get so fuddled up in thinking, that we don’t make the necessary decisions.

One thing about that...if you don’t make the decision for yourself, someone else will. In some ways, I’m very grateful for the strong men in my life. Men who take action. Makes me proud.

Made me wish I could just...hug them. And stop the nonsense. That I could sit down to dinner, like a civilized person--with all the people I love.

My steps slowed more and more. With dread. With indecision.

Sitting with Daddy, Tommy, Leo
and Bark
would probably, no, could
never
happen. Maybe I should go away and hide somewhere? Die on my own. I could see nothing but misery.

Gaia, Bark’s cabin had been miles away!

My feet were sore. My head pounded. And I had to wonder, as I slowed my steps, when had I lost those cute shoes? Okay, I was looking for any return to normalcy.

Not that I’d have had them on in full cougar. But I had liked them a lot. And I couldn’t remember shedding them.

Wherever
they
were, they were safe. Safe in Bark’s car? Or at his cabin?

Oh, I longed for the feel of his arms around me.

Sirens. I heard sirens in the city. Lots of them. I did my best to ignore them.

And gunshots. Lots of gunshots. As I drew close to the compound, they got louder.

Dawn rose above me.

Holy Gaia. It looked like a war zone out front. All around. Cars, SUVs, trucks--racing everywhere. Uzi fire.

You can’t imagine the horror. Or the relief when I saw Tommy’s car inside the gates.

I laid low, tried to figure out--

How long had it been going on? There were dead bodies inside the gate, and outside, too. Too many to count.

Daddy yelled, “Where the hell is she?” It was unbelievable that his voice carried, but I was upwind, looking down a hill on the whole scene.

Poking my head out, I tried to see where he was at. The house was far enough in that I couldn’t have heard him from there.

They were screaming above and between the intermittent gunfire. Leo answered, “She took off! Headed this way!”

So they couldn’t have been there long.

Leo told Daddy, “I need a gun!” And, after Daddy popped some shots off with his .44, “Tommy’s hurt--in the car.”

My heart lurched. Tommy was hurt? Because of me? I wanted to go to him. Another volley of shots, two more drivebys. They seemed to be making circles of the perimeter. Every couple of minutes, more cars, different trucks. In and out.

Ah. I saw where Daddy and Leo were. On the back side of the car, ducked down. What had Daddy been doing out there, so close to the gates?

Looking for me? Waiting for them?

Leo hollered, “Tom, hang on. We’ll get you out of there.”

Vehicles from the house came streaming up the drive, guns blazing. The rescue team leaped out, helped pull Tommy from the car. There was blood everywhere, all down his front. He cried out as they yanked him around.

Even at that, I heard Tommy say, “You gotta find her before they do. They’ll kill her!”