Wolf at the Door (25 page)

Brandt bolted for Shay. She staggered, her
face pale. She’d clearly lost too much blood to get out of the way
on her own. He heard Tate move in behind him and knew the other
Hound would cover him. Then Timber was there, dragging one of
Shay’s arms over her shoulders.

Damn it. No! Brandt lunged. “Get out of
here!”

A gun fired and Brandt ducked, but never
stopped moving. He caught Shay just as he heard a solid thump of a
body hitting the ground. He didn’t know if it was Nathan or
Charles, but he needed to get both girls off this path and
somewhere safe. He jerked Shay toward the tree line just as he
heard Timber give a panicked cry when Wolfe jerked her to him. The
force that ripped Timber away made them all stumble. Brandt’s gun
was knocked out of his hand when Shay fell into him. He held her
up, even as his eyes sought out Timber.

Wolfe was gripping her arm and dragging her
along with him. Timber kicked out, wild, desperate, and her foot
slammed into the side of his knee. Her fist slashed down against
his temple and Wolfe let her go, ducking to avoid another hit.
Except Wolfe didn’t pull away. The clean, black outline of his gun
lifted and Brandt felt his heart twist.

Timber jerked, her body spinning to avoid the
shot before Wolfe even touched the trigger, but people just weren’t
that fast. There was no outrunning a bullet and she was too close.
“Timber!”

A shot fired, loud even amidst the chaos. The
sulfur smell of gunpowder filled the air, and for that split
second, Brandt couldn’t breathe, couldn’t move. Wolfe stumbled, red
blossoming across his chest. Brandt had a split-second to realize
that it hadn’t been Wolfe’s gun that had gone off after all, when a
second shot did fire, and this time it was Wolfe’s, but his hand
had already fallen and Brandt heard the thwap when the bullet
struck a tree somewhere behind Timber.

He’d missed.

Then she was gone, vanishing into the
trees.

Another shot and Wolfe hit the ground. Red
splattered across the ground. Brandt staggered to a stop, only to
see Tate standing in the middle of the path, gun raised.
Steady.

For a moment they both stood there
breathless, unable to anything more than stare at each other. Then
finally, voice hoarse, Brandt managed a rough, “Thank you.”

“Fucking hell, waiting for a clear shot.” The
muscle in Tate’s jaw twitched as he lowered his weapon. “Still
didn’t think I had it, but couldn’t wait.”

“You did fantastic. That was a hell of a fine
shot.” Brandt turned to see Timber step back onto the path, her
eyes locked on the dead man sprawled in the dirt.

Brandt joined her. She looked like she was
waiting for Wolfe to jump up from the dead. Then, slowly, he saw
the tension seep out of her shoulders and the first signs of relief
spread across her face. “He’s dead,” she said, her voice soft,
wondering, as he reached her side.

“Yeah.”

Her eyes closed, and she took a deep, deep
breath, down to her toes, and let it go. A tension that had gripped
her chest for so long finally seemed to ease. “I probably shouldn’t
be happy he’s dead but—”

Brandt touched her jaw, tilting her face up
with the slightest pressure of his fingertips. “It’s okay to be
happy. You’re safe. Shay’s safe. He can’t hurt anyone else. He
can’t hurt you anymore. That enough of a reason to be relieved. To
be
happy
.”

“Shay,” Timber spun and Brandt followed her
gaze. Shay leaned against a tree trunk. Her face was white, not
that the man standing next to her looked much better. Nathan had
shifted back and was slumped at the base of the tree. There was a
spot of blood on his shirt from where shifting back to human hadn’t
quite healed the gunshot.

Then again, Brandt would have been surprised
if Wolfe’s gun had been loaded with anything but silver
bullets.

“Let’s get a medic out here,” he yelled, and
the wolfhound who had been lying in the brush took off down the
path, a silver blur that disappeared as he raced for the road.

Brandt wrapped his arm around Timber’s
shoulders and pulled her close. Brushed his lips across her temple
in a soothing kiss. “Why don’t you go to the hospital with Shay and
Nathan? I have to wrap things up here, but Shay could probably use
a friend.”

Timber leaned into him, lingering for a few
seconds in his embrace before she pulled away and went to Shay.
Brandt waited until the medics arrived, but when Timber waved
goodbye, he smiled and got to work.

Chapter Twenty Four

Timber helped Shay to Nathan’s couch while the Delphi alpha hobbled
in behind them. He was faring much better than his enforcer, but
the silver had begun to take its toll on both of them. “You should
have stayed at the hospital,” Timber muttered as she helped Shay
sit. “Both of you.”

Nathan grunted from somewhere behind her, and
Timber turned to see him painfully lowering into his recliner. His
eyes closed the moment his butt hit the cushions. “We’ll be
fine.”

“It’s not our first rodeo, Timber,” Shay
said, her smile tight. “Hurts like hell every time, but pain
passes.”

“Does silver poisoning?” She didn’t bother to
hide the caustic tone. Shay had been shot twice, then held there
while the silver slowly ate its way through her system. She needed
to be in the hospital.

She needed a doctor. She
needed
to be
okay.

Shay caught her hand and squeezed. “Yeah.
Neither one of us was shot bad enough to waste a hospital bed. I
promise. Nathan has a spare bedroom that will do just fine for me
until STE has finished processing my poor house and I can go back
in and fix up the mess.”

Timber sank down onto the couch next to her
friend. “Call me. I’ll help.”

“Everyone in the pack will,” Nathan murmured
from his chair, his eyes closed. He sounded like he was already
half asleep.

Timber glanced at Shay. The woman looked just
as tired, her eyes furiously blinking as she fought to stay awake.
Shay never gave anything up without a fight. Timber squeezed her
hand one last time before she rose. “I’ll get going now. Call if
you need anything.”

Shay murmured a sleepy, “Okay.”

Timber let herself out, the afternoon sun
warm against her face as she used the key Shay had given her to
lock the door behind her. She turned toward the street and her car
when she saw the sleek STE vehicle parked in front of it, Brandt
leaning against the passenger door. His dark, curly hair looked
like it’d been bronzed by the sun, rich golden highlights peeking
out where the sun touched.

His arms were folded across his chest, but he
didn’t look upset. If anything, Timber could swear she saw his eyes
soften as she walked toward him, turning a warm, gentle brown. His
lips hinted at a smile. He dropped his head back so it thunked the
car. “I have a present for you.”

Her heart thumped and then picked up speed.
Brandt had always been able to do that, make her heart race with
just a glance or a smile. She should have known the first time it
happened that he’d be the one to snare her heart as his. “Oh?”

“Take a ride with me. We’ll come back for
your car.”

These past two days had been so liberating.
Freedom again. She’d been able to drive herself back and forth from
Brandt’s to the hospital, to go to the grocery store, to be normal
without having to worry about Wolfe finding her. She still found
herself jumping at shadows, and the nightmares still came on a
regular basis, but for the first time, Timber felt safe.

And a lot of that had to do with this
man.

“Okay,” she said with a soft smile, and
Brandt turned to open the door for her.

He looked relaxed for the first time since
she’d met him. She knew he was sleeping better. Like her, she
didn’t think Brandt had gotten much sleep over the course of the
past few weeks. Not with Wolfe out there. Not with the likelihood
he would kill again.

She recognized the road leading up to her
house and shot him a questioning look. “Kicking me out?”

She didn’t believe she’d said that, even as
she said it. Brandt was as much invested in nurturing their
relationship as she was, but then again, maybe he felt she missed
her space. Maybe...

“No. It just seemed like a fitting place to
do this thing I thought of.”

Timber frowned at him, but Brandt didn’t say
another word until he pulled into her drive and stopped in front of
her house. “Come on,” he said as he got out of the car.

She followed him out, working her way around
to his side while he dug a large white box out of the back seat. It
was slim, but tall. He set it on the lawn, right next to a ring of
rocks. He flipped open the box and her heart stalled, a flash of
pain arrowing straight through her.

Those broken eyes that had once been hers
stared up at her. She could see plea in her face, for Charles to
stop. To just go away.

Brandt touched her hand and she glanced down,
just as he pressed a lighter into her hand. “I figured this was
where you came to start over. It should be where you
truly
start over. No reason to ever have to look back.”

Timber tried to turn away before she could
cry, but Brandt cupped her chin and forced her to look at him. His
voice was soft and low as he continued, soothing.

“In some cultures they say pictures steal a
person’s soul.” He glanced down at the one on top. It was large, a
poster-sized image. He didn’t have to wonder what she was thinking.
One look at the woman in those pictures, and Timber knew that with
every click of that camera Charles had been whittling away her
soul. There’d been moments when she’d been sure not a piece of it
could survive him. Not a piece of
her
. “You deserve the
chance to take back what he stole from you. Burning them won’t fix
everything, but maybe it’s a starting point.”

She felt the warm slide of tears down her
cheeks, and she leaned into him. Her fist gripped the lighter in
her hand. “Thank you,” she whispered, touching her lips to his.
“Thank you.”

She kissed him again. The kind of kiss meant
for healing, for strength, the kind built on those beginning sparks
of love. Brandt skimmed fingers over her jaw, tender, a constant
reminder that he loved her just as much as she loved him.

She pulled away and turned to the images. One
by one, Brandt lifted one up, removed the frame, and held it while
she lit a corner on fire. Together they watched the broken,
shattered pieces of her soul burn and fall into the pit in the form
of ashes. Ashes of a newly risen phoenix.

And this time, when she rose, it’d be on
wings stronger, more vibrant, un-breakable. Together they burned
away the darkest nightmares of her past so that she could truly
forge a future, out of ash and fire, into something greater:
Love.

When the last picture lay crumpled and
smoking in the pit, Timber leaned against Brandt, his arm around
her. His lips touched her temple, a silent, loving touch filled
with strength and promise, and she’d never felt more right. More
complete.

And for all that was bad, all that Charles
had done to them both, something wonderful had been born from it
after all.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

To my readers. You guys blow my mind every
day. I wouldn’t be able to live my dream without you all and I
thank so much, every single day.

To my closest friends and family for having
faith in me and helping me when the beginning of this year was so
rough. In the roughest times, you find out who you true friends are
and I couldn’t have done it without you guys.

To my fabulous editing team and beta readers.
This book really shined under your help, thank you so much.

About the
author
: During the day, Sadie Hart works as a secretary
in a library. At night, she writes steamy, paranormal romances
revolving around the things that go bump in the night - both the
spooky and the naughty kind. She lives in Michigan with two large
dogs and a flying pig, who’s possibly a superhero and possibly a
figment of her imagination. You can find her website here:
http://sadiehart.com/

Shifter Town Enforcement Series:

Hounded

Cry Sanctuary

Shifter Town Enforcement Volume 1 (Hound
& Cry Sanctuary Set)

Big Cats Don’t Purr

Christmas Moon: Shifter Town Enforcement
Novella

Novellas and Short Stories:

Silver Bells (free Christmas short story)

Moonlit Lovers Short Story Anthology

What the Heart Haunts (also available in
Bending Steele)

Bending Steele

Thank you for reading!