Bearing Hearts (City Shifters: the Den Book 2) (14 page)

T
hey tracked
the car to the road through the forest that led to the BadCreek compound after one of Smith's secretaries called to say the old man had been attacked and taken to the hospital. They took a parallel road as far as they could, but when it veered away, Kaiser parked and they got out. Shifted. Axel didn't wait. As soon as his paws hit the snow, he took off. He could feel her, afraid. She was terrified. Not hurt, not yet. Just scared.

He heard a single gunshot and ran faster, tearing through the trees and over fallen logs as if none of it existed. Nothing existed in the world but her.

He still almost killed the BadCreek enforcer, but getting Lucy to safety took precedence. The rest of the den and the hyena queen were nowhere in sight as the BadCreek pack closed in around them, and Axel couldn't risk it. He should have stayed to fight with Nick, to buy them all enough time, but he couldn't leave Lucy unguarded, unprotected. Those BadCreek bastards would have hurt her. So he grabbed her. Grabbed her and ran.

She screamed at him to stop, to help the enforcer, and Axel both loved and hated that she cried over the other man. If Nick had been correct and killed the guy responsible for Ragnar's death, then Axel owed him a debt as well. But Lucy mattered more.

Kaiser, a giant polar-grizzly hybrid, and Josie, a cinnamon-colored grizzly, lumbered through the trees, while the hyena queen raced in a rolling, leaping gait. Lions appeared among the trees, golden ghosts as they charged through the snow, and wolves appeared on their side. Maybe Nick would make it out alive, after all.

He got Lucy to the SUV and shoved her inside, battering the door closed so he could protect her as a polar bear. He waited, pacing a circuit around the truck and through the half dozen other vehicles that brought the Council members to the forest, but only far away shouts and snarls broke the silence. Owen sat on the roof of one of the SUVs, a high-powered rifle in his hands, and scanned the woods for any threats, just in case some of the BadCreek minions thought they'd found a soft target.

An eternity passed before the alpha bear returned, followed by the others. Axel shifted back and threw on his clothes. "Well?"

Kaiser frowned as he pulled on some of the spare sweatpants from the back of the SUV. "We couldn't find the enforcer. Nick. There was some blood in the snow and a few stragglers from BadCreek, but they didn't leave the body."

"Was he dead? Or just taken?"

Josie scrambled into the SUV to change in the backseat, and the opening of the door gave Axel an earful of Lucy crying hysterically. His heart broke for her. Damn it.

Lacey Szdoka, less modest after a lifetime of growing up around shifters, didn't bother to rush putting her clothes on. Dark tattoos covered her back in wild designs and foreign words, but Axel couldn't decipher them without staring. "No way to tell. There wasn't enough blood to definitively say that he died, but there was a substantial trail leading back towards the compound. He also killed at least three of them, so it might have been their blood."

Sasha lit a cigarette, despite being bare ass naked in the snow, and shook the lighter at Kaiser. "He was brave man. Foolish, but brave."

"He saved Lucy." It hurt for Axel to say, to admit it, when his mate had been endangered. "He bought us enough time to get away. I owe him a debt. If we can help him, we have to."

Logan Chase, lion alpha, strode up from where he'd been huddled with the rest of his pride. "We'll check in on Smith and figure out what the hell happened. No telling how BadCreek got to him. He's got enough scary friends that I don't want to know what got through all of them."

The lion nodded to Kaiser and Lacey, and turned to go. The rest of the lions followed. Josie stuck her head out of the car and said quietly, "We should probably go, Axel."

He moved before he thought, terrified that Lucy had been hurt, and jumped into the back of the car to be with her. Kaiser got into the driver's seat once more, waved at the others, and turned the SUV back to the city. Axel caught Lucy's hands, though she stared at him wild-eyed and shaking. "It's okay. It will be okay."

She tried to pull at the door handle. "We have to go back. Help Nick. We have to help Nick."

"He's gone." Axel lowered his voice, trying to be soothing. "The Chases are looking into it. We'll look for him. We'll do our best to get him back."

He said it and knew it was a lie, or at least only a half-truth. The BadCreek enforcer was dead, or wishing he was, and there wasn't much the Council could do about it without taking down the entire compound. And they already knew that wouldn't happen soon, not until they knew what the hell injured Smith badly enough to take him out of the game.

Lucy stared out the back window, her gaze unreadable. "They must have known. When they let Nick meet me. BadCreek already planned to kill him."

"It was probably the coyotes," Kaiser said as the silence stretched and Axel couldn't speak. He just wanted to hold her. The alpha bear checked his radio, then eased the SUV onto the highway. "They attacked the hyenas guarding you at the meeting location so there wasn't anyone to sound the alarm or help if Nick tried to run. The BadCreek alpha must have hired the coyotes to track Nick as he was making his runs through the city, and spotted you some time in the last few days, tracked you back to us."

"So it was my fault?" Lucy's voice wavered.

Axel almost punched Kaiser in the back of the head. Instead, he grabbed Lucy and dragged her into his lap, holding her as tightly as he could as the polar bear rumbled and snarled, wanting to rub himself all over her until she didn't smell like fear or gunfire. "No. It wasn't your fault. At all. Nick made his choices. He worked with Smith for months. BadCreek probably caught him with Smith or Szdoka or doing any number of things — he helped Rafe's mate, Meadow, escape from the compound a couple of weeks ago. It wasn't your fault, Lucy."

She didn't speak and the polar bear grew frantic, desperate to comfort her, to convince her it wasn't her fault. He held her and rocked, rubbing her back and side, nuzzling her hair, making bear noises to at least show the fox part of her that everything would be okay. He didn't wait after Kaiser parked outside the gym, and instead picked Lucy up. Carried her inside and up the stairs without pausing. Owen appeared on his heels, toting the medic bag, and said something about giving her fluids.

Axel tucked Lucy into his bed, and paced back and forth through the room as Owen set up his stuff and talked to her in that cheerful, everything's-okay-even-if-the-world-is-falling-apart voice he always used when someone was hurt. For a brief moment, Axel wondered where he learned that. If anyone used that voice on Owen when he was hurting.

The polar bear cleared his throat but winced as Owen slid an IV into the crook of Lucy's elbow. "Just fluids, right?"

"Just fluids, brother." Owen attached a tube and lifted a bag of saline to hook on the poster of the bed, fiddling with his equipment. "Don't want to give her anything else until we know for sure if there's a little bear in there," and he poked Lucy's stomach.

She jumped and fixed him with a murderous glare, and Owen grinned. "There we go. Just in case, though, we got you prenatal vitamins and a couple of books. So you know what to expect."

"You mean Josie already had them upstairs and you brought them down a floor," Axel said, relieved that Owen prodded Lucy out of the blank silence she'd hidden in the entire car ride.

"Give me some credit." Owen frowned at the bag of saline and flicked the tube again, then glanced over his shoulder at Axel. "I went out and bought new stuff, along with all of your groceries and
other
errands," and the younger bear waggled his eyebrows in the direction of the guest room and Axel's secret project for Lucy.

Axel ground his teeth and attempted a smile as her eyes narrowed in suspicion. "Good job on the errands, then."

"That's what I thought." Owen gave a low whistle under his breath as he continued to fuss with the bag. "Shit, girl, you must have been damn near totally dehydrated. You want another bag or just to rest? You'll have to pee like a banshee in fifteen or so minutes, but you'll feel better."

"Just rest," she said, and watched as Owen removed the IV and pressed cotton against the wound.

He even used a pink Band-Aid with a cartoon character on it to secure the cotton to her skin, and Lucy gave him a look. Owen smiled. "I got those for the little ones. Leah won't let me put a Band-Aid on her if it doesn’t have some kind of princess or monkey on it. I've got superhero Band-Aids, too, if those are more your style?"

"I'm okay with princesses," she said, then sat forward to hug Owen. She even rested her head on his shoulder for a brief moment. "Thank you, Owen. You're a good guy."

The young bear blinked and floundered for words, then cleared his throat and carefully pulled free of her embrace. "Well, you don't really know me, otherwise you'd know that's not true."

"Owen —" she started, a frown wrinkling her forehead.

Owen's smile only grew, though something dark twisted in his gaze. He focused on re-packing the medic bag, his back to them both. "It's nothing worth talking about, Lucy, but I appreciate the sentiment. You're too nice."

He shoved to his feet and headed for the door, not once looking back. "I'll just leave the vitamins and books and things in the kitchen. Get plenty of rest and no funny business for at least a day."

Lucy looked at Axel with a desperate kind of worry, clearly distraught at Owen's despair, so Axel strode after his friend. He caught Owen in the kitchen, shoving a paper shopping bag onto the island. Axel grabbed his arm. "Dude, wait —"

Owen growled, and Axel stopped as if struck. Owen never growled. Never got aggressive. He white-knuckled his bear and his own ghosts, to prevent himself from shifting and possibly dying. Axel didn't release him right away, though, because the polar bear couldn't tolerate backing down from a smaller bear's challenge. But he lowered his voice. "Are you okay, Owen?"

"I really wish people would stop asking me that." Owen dropped the medic bag and faced Axel, pulling free, and folded his arms over his chest. Dark circles gathered under his eyes, and his throat and face flushed, though dark stippling from shrapnel and IED shit discolored as the blood rushed to his face. "I hate that. I hate that question. I'm not okay. I haven't been okay for a long time. I don't think I'll ever be okay. So what's the use in asking me about it, except to remind me that I'm not okay? Jesus."

"Thank you for helping Lucy," was all Axel could think to say. He almost wanted to hug the kid, but didn't know how that would go over, with the way Owen's eye twitched and the tendons stood out in his neck. "And for getting that stuff for me. How can I help you?"

"You can't." Owen sounded resigned more than angry. Just tired and defeated. "You can't fight these demons, Ax. Neither can I." He headed for the door, but paused long enough to tilt his head to where Lucy waited in the bedroom. "I'm serious. Let her sleep. Lots of liquids — water, some tea, chicken soup or broth. Josie made her a doctor's appointment for tomorrow afternoon."

Axel tried to thank him but by the time he opened his mouth, the door had already shut behind Owen. Axel growled in frustration, but retreated to the bedroom once more. Lucy curled up on her side, staring at the wall, and didn't look at him as Axel slid into the bed next to her. "Do you really think Nick is still alive?"

"Yes," he said, and that time, at least, he meant it. "I think they'll keep him alive for a while, either to learn from him or send a message to us. We have some time to get him back."

"We have to get him out," she said, and turned so she could curl up against his side, her head on his chest. "Please."

He wanted to grumble in irritation but didn't dare disturb her as Lucy's breathing grew deep and even. Yes, he would find Nick. He'd do everything in his power to give Lucy what she wanted, and if she wanted that scar-faced bastard free, then Axel would make it happen, even if it meant taking on BadCreek by himself.

The polar bear relaxed, finally, since he had his mate in their bed and could protect her. The man responsible for killing Ragnar was also dead. He exhaled and concentrated only on the sound of Lucy's breathing and the faint drumming of her heart.

T
ime passed in a blur
. Axel and the others ran around to meetings and searches and all manner of things, but I stayed at the apartment or upstairs with Josie. I still didn't feel like myself — after so long planning on how to deal with Ragnar's killers, it all ended too soon. Too abruptly. One moment Nick asked me if I wanted to pull the trigger, then the asshole was dead. Done.

I didn’t know what I’d envisioned doing, when I found Ragnar’s killers, but it hadn’t been sitting in a car while someone else shot them in the throat. Not that I’d imagined myself with the gun. And I didn’t really feel better, even knowing the guy was dead. Ragnar was still gone, and I still felt his absence every day in a sharp pain. That hadn’t changed. I started to think it never would.

There were probably other culprits still running around in BadCreek, and part of me hoped that the three dead wolves they found in the woods had been the ones responsible, and Nick finished them off because he could. A Green Beret and a Boy Scout. And not at all who I expected him to be in person.

It felt like an eternity but just a blink before I found myself back in the car with Axel and Josie, driving to the doctor's. I didn't want to go. Didn't want to face the doctor and confess I'd been too distracted and maybe too stupid to notice I was three months pregnant. Didn't want to know for sure. Pressure rose in my chest again and I took a shaky breath.

Luckily it wasn't a long drive to the doctor's office, and there wasn't much of a wait in the reception area. Axel practically vibrated with tension and the need to be near me, wanting to go back in the room with me, but he folded himself into a chair, picked up a battered magazine with a baby on the cover, and pretended to read it. His foot bounced so fast it blurred, but he managed to smile. "I'll be here whenever you’re done."

Josie went back with me, and held my hand as they took blood for the test, and squeezed my hand when we were back in the exam room and the doctor came in. She seemed nice enough, smiling and cheerful as she congratulated me.

Congratulated me on being pregnant.

A ringing in my ears drowned everything else out and I could only stare at her. A baby. A mother. I was going to be a mother.

A
mother
.

My throat closed and I tried to breathe, though it came out a hiccup. The doc never stopped smiling and giving me instructions on vitamins and what not to eat, though she handed me a box of tissues without missing a beat. I missed most of what she said as I stared at her and watched her lips move, and wondered whether the baby would be a polar bear or a fox. If it would be a boy or a girl.

The doc patted the end of the exam table. "Lay back and we'll do a quick ultrasound, just to check and make sure everything's going well. You should be able to hear the heartbeat."

"The what?" I looked at her, frozen. "You can hear that?"

"Oh yes. It's amazing." The doc fussed with the equipment as I lay back.

My chest tightened. Something didn't feel right. Josie squeezed my hand and I looked at her in a panic. "Would you —"

"Want me to go get him?"

"Please," I whispered.

She grinned and hugged me, then headed for the door. "Of course. Just wait a sec and I'll send him back."

It seemed like the door hardly closed before Axel charged through, out of breath and wild-eyed. He startled the doctor enough that she squirted almost half the tube of gel stuff all over my stomach and side. He flushed and muttered apologies as he stood next to my shoulder, staring at the blank screen where something mysterious would appear. He laced his fingers through mine and squeezed, brought my hand up so he could kiss my knuckles and murmur, "Thank you."

"Here we go," the doc said, still cheerful, and pressed the wand against my stomach. She fished it around a bit, searching for something, then she pointed at the screen, where a blurry field of gray was disrupted by a black pod and a little flicker. "See that, right there? That's baby."

"That's —" Axel cut off, staring at the screen. I couldn't breathe. That tiny thing. That little, minuscule, impossibly small thing was a baby. A little peanut, hitching a ride for six more months.

"Everything looks great, mama," the doctor said. She clicked a few buttons and did stuff with the machine as Axel and I stared in silence at that constant flicker. A heart. A beating heart, floating inside me. "You're at about thirteen weeks, it looks like. Baby looks perfect, healthy, no signs of any issues."

Healthy. Perfect. Thirteen weeks.

Then she hit another button and a fast whooshing noise filled the room, over and over, steady and strong. My breath caught and my heart stopped and I almost jumped up. "Is —"

"That's your baby's heartbeat," she said.

Axel stood in silence next to me, squeezing my hand, and I tried to understand. Tried to process the sound of my baby's heartbeat. Something alive inside of me. A new life. A brand new little person who I would meet in six months. "It sounds — good."

"It's a strong beat." She glanced over and smiled, then offered a box of tissues.

I took them but blinked. "I think I'm too in shock to —" but cut off as she tilted her head toward Axel.

And immediately I wanted to cry. His eyes, red-rimmed and watery, focused on that monitor, and his entire face flushed. He cleared his throat several times, making his voice deeper than normal as he dashed tears from his cheeks. "Sorry, I think I got something in my eye."

"It's called love," the doctor said, laughing. "Don't be ashamed of it, dad. Hearing your baby's heartbeat for the first time is a miracle."

"I'm not —" he started, but I dug my nails into his wrist as I clenched his hand in mine. He would be the father. Of course he was. There wasn't any question.

The doc hit a few more buttons, then started cleaning up the machine. "I'll print a few pictures for you to take home, and I want to see you back here in a couple of weeks. If you have any problems, call me. I'll leave the list of books and supplements and foods to avoid up at reception. You have a lot of studying to do, Lucy, but I'm sure you'll be fine."

She left, shutting the door quietly behind her, but Axel and I remained frozen, staring at the screen with a frozen picture of the baby. Not just 'the baby' —
my
baby. I finally forced myself to sit up, wiping the gel crap off my stomach just so I had something to do, even though I wanted to stay there forever. "Well. Now we know for sure. Thirteen weeks."

"I can't believe we heard the heartbeat." He took a tissue from the box but it wasn't enough, and he turned away for a moment to make gruff bear noises in what sounded like a 'toughen up or else' pep talk.

I slid to my feet and started to pull my clothes back on, though my hands shook too much to work the button on my jeans. I'd have to get new ones soon; already my stomach pressed against the waist. The button slipped out of my fingers for the third time and I cursed, wanting to scream and cry and laugh at the same time. Then I sucked in a deep breath because Axel turned and swooped me up in a hug, the kind that spun me around a few feet off the floor, and he buried his face in my hair. "That baby is a miracle, but you are
my
miracle."

My arms linked around his neck and I closed my eyes, letting the warm comfort of his embrace sweep me away. Everything would be okay.

"Ragnar's heart beats in you," he said, a thread of sound in my ear. "You bear his heart within you, you carry him every day and I will carry his memory and his child will carry his spirit."

"We'll carry him together," I said. I rested my head on his shoulder and thought about a nice hot bath and a warm bed and plenty of soup, and Axel hovering over me like a mother hen, clucking as he added more blankets to the pile. "Take me home."

And he did.