Claimed by the Beast Bundle (40 page)

**Part Six**

Chapter 1

Crystal smiled as the sun warmed her face. She’d been cold for so long but now, with the sun driving the dark clouds away, she could be warm again. Her skin tingled as she lay under it, warming her body and adding a tan to skin she’d been too embarrassed to show before.

Not anymore. Now she relished being naked. Clothing was stifling and restrictive. It made her itch and got in the way when she needed to shift. Or it would get in the way, if she could ever figure out how to shift fully and properly.

And then there was Hank. She let out a satisfied moan at the thought of feeling his skin next to hers. His flesh was so warm and firm, he filled her with love and need. He’d more than filled her in other ways too. Ways that left her too sore to stand on her own without help.

Where was Hank? For that matter, where was she? She’d been sleeping with Hank after they’d—she frowned as the memories started coming back. She’d shifted partially and freaked out. He stopped, more than halfway through their lovemaking, and gave her space to calm down. He’d been in misery, she found out later, but he’d done it for her. Because he loved her. Because they were mates.

What about the others? Ember, Adrian, Gwen, and their leader, Guntar. She couldn’t even think of any grassy hills near where the pack was staying. They had a clearing in a small forest. A pasture was a mile or so away through the woods, but that was it.

A cloud blew across the sun, blocking the light. Crystal frowned and tilted her head slightly, trying to reach for it. She struggled to open her eyelids but they felt so heavy. She wanted to sleep, but the ground was hard and it made a funny noise when she moved. Grass didn’t sound like that.

She managed to flutter her eyelids up enough to see a dark shape above her. She gasped, pulling in air through her nose. Her mouth wouldn’t open; something held it shut. Something that pulled at her skin but wouldn’t release her.

Her heart went from barely beating to thundering in her chest. Crystal stiffened and reached for the thing on her face. Her hands stopped within an inch as some kind of cord tugged at her wrists and kept them at her side. Her eyes opened wide and her nostrils flared as she began to pant through her nose. The dark shape above her was a man. Not just a man, but the man she’d seen holding the pistol and keeping Chad under control.

Chad! She remembered him reaching for her. Smiling at her. He wanted her. And then he fell. His blood and brains splattered in a fine mist on her. He twitched as she stared and then laid still. Forever. Dead. Not just dead, but dead by the shotgun in his father’s hands.

She whimpered and struggled again, pulling against the cords that bound her hands, feet, waist, and chest. They burned her skin when she rubbed against them. Not only from rubbing, but there was something else about them that burned her. She whimpered again and laid still.

The man sneered at her and backed away. Light burst into her eyes from the overhead light bulb he’d been blocking. Crystal squinted and blinked, trying to adapt to the intensity.

“She’s awake,” the man said. “You want to test her now?”

“What’s the point?” a tired voice said. She recognized him without looking. Barnaby Dixon, Chad’s father. He sounded different, though. Not just tired, but weak. Defeated. Served him right—he killed his own son!

“We need to be sure,” Robert Edgerton said. He was one of the other elite members of society. His daughter was also in love with Crystal, but that happened entirely by accident. Crystal wondered what Stephanie would think of her dad if she could see him now.

“Fine, then do it. She’s seen too much, regardless.”

“It’s a shame, such a good-looking girl,” Robert said. “A friend of my daughter’s, too. Terrible loss.”

“Yeah,” Barnaby snorted. “Poor you.”

Robert turned on him. “Mind your words! What happened to your son was the devil’s work, to be sure. He was claimed by the Beast and it could happen to any of us. But we must be strong. All of us must. You did the right thing—God’s will—and your sacrifice will not be taken lightly.”

Barnaby dropped his gaze to the ground instead of responding. Robert turned away from him and looked down at Crystal again. He shook his head before picking up a gleaming knife from a shelf along the wooden wall.

Crystal glanced around, too terrified to think of what he was going to do with the knife to dwell on it. She was in a small room with wooden walls and a slanted ceiling. The taller wall at the higher end of the slant had a wide wooden door in it. She couldn’t see the ground but the sound of Robert’s boots scuffing and the smell of damp dirt made her guess there was no floor, only ground beneath her.

She could see the wooden table she was on. It creaked as she shifted, but the sounds didn’t betray any weakness she could feel. Between the table and her was some sort of plastic fabric. A tarp, maybe? She didn’t want to guess what its purpose was.

“You look scared,” Robert said as he looked down at her. He shook his head and held up the knife. “This is a silver alloy knife. If we’re right about you, this is going to burn and you won’t heal like you normally do. If we’re wrong…well, then I’m sorry. This will still hurt.”

“Get on with it,” Barnaby grumbled.

Robert frowned and glanced at Crystal’s eyes. She shook her head and tried to scream for him to stop. She couldn’t make out her muffled words behind whatever they’d used to gag her. She knew she had to stop him. Had to find a way to convince him to let her go. The silver would hurt; she knew that much from touching Stephanie’s necklace. She struggled but that only made him put his free hand just above her breast to hold her still. She pleaded and begged behind the gag but his gaze was on her body, not her eyes.

Chapter 2

He lowered his hand and pressed the knife into her shoulder. The blade stung like a hornet when it touched her and then it got worse as he pressed down and broke the skin. The knife felt like a burning coal burrowing deeper into her body. She screamed into the gag and tried to shift out from under it. There was no escape from the pressure and the agony.

He pulled the knife back, ending the assault but not the pain. Crystal’s breath hissed through her nose and she didn’t feel like she could get enough air. Her heart hammered in her chest and everything looked blurry from her tears. She blinked and tried not to cry but she couldn’t even bite her lips to stop herself.

He put the silver knife down and picked up another one. “Now the regular knife. This should heal faster, if we’re right.”

She squeezed her eyes shut as he leaned over her, refusing to give him the satisfaction of seeing her cry. She began to wonder if he was teasing her when she felt the knife push against her other shoulder and then part the skin. The pain made her strain against the cords and arch her back as much as the rope across her hip and under her shoulders allowed.

He pulled it out and she collapsed onto the table. Crystal sobbed into the mask and blew bubbles out her nose from the tears draining into her sinuses. It was disgusting and it made her choke and gag, but she couldn’t stop herself. The steel knife hurt—nothing like the silver knife had—but she still felt the pain as it cut her flesh. She blinked through the tears and saw him staring at her, his eyes flicking back and forth between the wounds.

She closed her eyes again and tried to calm herself. If she could keep herself from healing maybe they’d think she wasn’t one of their enemies. She wasn’t evil. She didn’t answer to the devil. She was a good person! She got good grades and just wanted to have friends and spend time loving Hank. What was so terrible about that?

Crystal tried to stop herself from crying but couldn’t. They were going to kill her. Her shoulder was on fire and that was only the beginning. They were going to hurt her, and hurt her bad. They called themselves men of God but they weren’t. They were pigs! Paladins? Hardly! Unless they were the type of holy knight she’d read about who spread the word of God through raping and pillaging non-believers.

Her eyes snapped open. Oh God, were they going to rape her too? She whimpered and shook her head as fresh tears fell down her cheeks. Robert glanced at her face and then returned his attention to her arm. He reached out, his hands covered in a latex glove, and wiped her shoulder off with a tissue. “Healing yet?”

Was she? If she didn’t heal, maybe she’d be safe? She could promise them to never talk and they’d let her go. Or maybe she’d have to convince them she believed like they did, and then she could join their sick group of butchers long enough to get away. She couldn’t go to the cops, though; not with the county sheriff on their side. She’d have to run away and keep running.

But first she had to stop herself from healing. She blocked out the pain and tried to focus on keeping herself from feeling it. Within seconds, the pain in her left shoulder began to lessen. It was healing! She whimpered and tried another tactic. Instead of ignoring the pain and willing it away, she focused on it. She let herself feel the agony and lived with it. She heard someone moaning and knew that she was doing it.

She opened her eyes again and saw him frowning. “She’s not recovering from either,” Mr. Edgerton said.

“Damn it!” Barnaby swore and stepped up to get a closer look. “We were so sure! Why did Chad want her so bad?”

Robert shook his head. “She’s a beautiful girl. I heard that she stood up to him and gave him a piece of her mind. Perhaps he didn’t like that?”

Mr. Dixon scowled and turned away. “Deal with her,” he grumbled before opening the door to the shed and storming out. The man with the pistol watched her for a moment longer and then looked up at Robert. He nodded and turned to follow Mr. Dixon out. He shut the door behind him, cutting off the extra light that had come in through the door and leaving them alone.

Was this it? Was this when he raped her and killed her? More tears escaped from her eyes.

“Well, it seems both cuts will heal normally. Unfortunately, you won’t live long enough for that to happen. I’m sorry to say that you’d have lived longer if we’d have been right, but we can’t have loose ends. We do the Lord’s work, ridding the world of demons and evil beings. Sometimes that requires the blood of innocents be lost. Regretful, but their sacrifice is for a higher cause,” Robert said. “I know you must have been a pure and innocent girl once. I remember Stephanie speaking highly of you. Are you at peace with the Lord, child?”

Crystal’s eyes flew open as he picked up the steel knife. She stared at it, frozen with fear. Her lungs seized up and her throat squeezed shut. All she could do was shake her head as tears trickled down her face. It had nothing to do with her relationship with God; she was trying to tell him he didn’t need to do it. He didn’t need to kill her. She’d never tell anyone! Not a soul. Not a—

“I’m not a priest, but I’ll see to it you receive last rites,” he said. “Close your eyes, pretty one, and dream of what reward awaits you in the Kingdom of Heaven.”

He lowered an open palm over her face, forcing her to shut her eyes instinctively. His hand rested on her face and deprived her of sight. Crystal whimpered and realized she could breathe again. It had been her, all along. She’d stopped herself from breathing. Her reaction. Her fear.

A hammer smashed into her chest, breaking her into a thousand pieces. She convulsed and threw herself against the ropes. The pressure on her head intensified while Crystal writhed in agony that was easily ten thousand times worse than even the silver knife in her shoulder. He moved a little, removing some pressure from her chest, but she still felt like she’d taken a lightning bolt in her heart.

Her heart! Crystal shuddered as she realized she couldn’t feel it beating right. She began to tremble just as her heart was quivering. He’d stabbed her. Stabbed her in the heart. She was going to die!

Her toes and fingers began to tingle. She was losing strength already. How could it happen so quickly? She could hold her breath over a minute! Wasn’t that what the heart did, delivered oxygen? Why was this happening to her? Why now, when she had so much to live for!

Even breathing was becoming hard to do. So hard. First her shoulders and then her heart. Even her thoughts were starting to get fuzzy.

Her shoulder!

She’d focused on willing the pain in her shoulder away and it worked. The pain started to fade because she’d felt her muscle and tissue coming back together. Could she do the same with her heart? Did she have time? She concentrated, pushing away the darkness that was trying to cover her like a warm blanket. She focused harder than she’d ever focused in her life. More than when she’d studied for her advanced algebra final and even more than when Stephanie had been feeding her fashion tips when they went shopping together months ago.

The pain started to lift but it was so hard. So much work. She was breathless and ached all over. Her body felt heavy. Heavy and weak. She wanted to gasp for breath but even that took too much attention away from what she was doing.

Help me!
She begged the wolf inside her. The wolf that had become a part of her.
If we’re going to live and figure this out, you have to help me!

The wolf was silent. Not a growl or even the thump of a tail on the floor. Was she already dead?

No! The wolf had become a part of her. Or maybe Crystal had become a part of the wolf. They were one now. Maybe her hands and feet shifted because when she needed them to change, they did it. The same with healing. She needed her wounds to heal and her body did it. Like walking or breathing.

The pressure came off her face. His stubble on his cheeks scraped her lips but it felt like a mosquito landing on her arm. She didn’t have the strength to react. Something that felt as light as feathers brushed across her eyelids before a kaleidoscope of colors burst into her brain. She couldn’t make anything out other than triangles and circles of light.

The light disappeared with a rustle of the tarp she was on. She heard a muffled echoing noise. Something about rising up and being saved. Then there was a thud of wood striking wood. The darkness began to fade away into a surreal scene where she found herself bounding through fields of grass chasing after a black and white rabbit. She was a wolf, white as the fresh snow. She ran effortlessly, closing the distance on the rabbit and knowing that once she caught it, her chase would be over.

She turned, following the bunny, and caught a glimpse of other wolves at the edge of the forest. A gray and red one stood next to one with a silver stripe. Beside them were three others, but her eyes fell on the largest one. She knew him. He was her friend. More than that. He was special. Why wasn’t he hunting with her? He was pacing back and forth.

Crystal slowed but so did the rabbit. She knew her prey was getting tired. She felt weightless. She could run forever. She turned towards the rabbit and then looked at the large wolf again. She turned towards him. Maybe if she went to him?

She felt something bump her leg and turned to see the rabbit had come to her. It looked up and tilted its head. One eye blinked as it offered its neck to her. She opened her mouth out of instinct and prepared to snap the bunny up. She hesitated. This wasn’t how real animals acted. A rabbit would never give up like this. It wasn’t the way of things. Something so full of life, of natural life, would never give up fighting for life.