Dark Wolf Running (Bloodrunners) (28 page)

He closed his eyes for a moment, exhaling a ragged breath, then slid her a dark, shuttered look. “Damn it, don’t do that,” he rasped, keeping his voice low. “You know I don’t have any choice. If Seb is right about his brother, I can’t throw away the opportunity to stop him before he causes us more trouble. I’m not letting that bastard anywhere near you.”

“And if he’s not?” she whispered. “What if he’s not right? What if it’s something else?”

Reaching behind her neck, he pulled her toward him and pressed a quick kiss to her trembling lips. “I know how to take care of myself, El. You don’t need to worry about me.” Then he let her go and started heading toward the door.

Panic made her voice shrill, her breaths coming in sharp gasps. “Why are you doing this? Putting yourself in danger because of me? I’m not your woman, Wyatt. We haven’t bonded. Haven’t made any promises. This isn’t your responsibility!”

He didn’t bother turning around as he said, “There might not be any promises between us, but you’re fucking blind if you think you don’t mean anything to me.”

With those stunning words dropping like a massive weight between them, he went outside to join Sebastian, slamming the front door behind him.

*

Minutes turned into a half hour...and then another...the passage of time slowly killing her. Elise knew something was wrong, but there was no one besides Carla to complain to, and the Runner agreed with her. Unfortunately, there wasn’t anything Carla could do until the others made it back. She refused to leave Elise alone, which meant she couldn’t go after Wyatt. And he wasn’t answering his phone.

As the minutes rolled by, her tension increased, making her shaky and ill. She about jumped out of her skin when someone started pounding on the cabin’s front door, hoping like crazy it would be Wyatt. But as she wrenched it open, Elise found a haggard-looking Sebastian Claymore standing on the porch. And he was alone.

“Where’s Wyatt?” she demanded. “What the hell did you do to him?”

Claymore struggled for the breath to explain as he stumbled past her into the house, bracing himself with one hand against the interior wall. “We were attacked.”

“Attacked? By who? You just
left
him?” she growled, amazed when she felt her beast begin to stir deep inside, from a place she had never thought it would break free from. Clenching her jaw, she smashed the feeling back down, unable to deal with it when she was in pure, blinding freak-out mode over Wyatt. “Where
is
he?”

“We got separated,” the Lycan panted, “and I couldn’t get back to him. But he’d told me to come here if anything happened and make sure you were okay.”

“No,” she said in a low voice, something about him making her feel incredibly anxious. He made her freaking skin crawl! “You’re lying.”

He looked confused. “Elise, why would I lie? What have I ever done to make you distrust me?”

“I don’t know you,” she forced out through her gritted teeth.

“I was a friend of your father’s,” he offered, still struggling to catch his breath.

Huh. If he’d thought that was going to win him any points in her book, he was sadly mistaken. And she was done wasting time on the idiot. Turning to Carla, she asked, “Do we have weapons we can take with us? We need to go out and look for Wyatt.”

“Yeah,” the Runner murmured, casting an uneasy look at Sebastian. “But I don’t think you should go, El. Wyatt will kill me if anything happens to you.”

“We don’t have a choice! Everyone else is too far away. It’s up to us to go find him!”

Sebastian took a step toward her, shaking his head. “I’m afraid I can’t let you do that, cherry. I told him I’d keep you safe.”

Oh...
God.
She couldn’t explain how—she just knew. In that moment, Elise knew
exactly
who had been in her house the night of her brother’s wedding. Who had whispered in her ear all those years ago, when he’d been tearing her body apart. And then she realized what the Lycan had just called her.
Cherry. Cherry girl...

“You sick bastard! Why me?” she whispered, the words feeling strange on her prickling lips. Her heart was racing, skin cold, clammy. She blinked, data crunching in her head too quickly to keep up with all the details. He’d known her father, but she’d never met him before today. So why
her?
What had she done to deserve what had happened?

“Why you? What do you mean?” he asked with a phony look of confusion, acting as if he didn’t understand what she was talking about.

Wishing like hell that she could release her claws and rip him to shreds, she said, “You know exactly what I mean, you son of a bitch!”

“Elise?” Carla asked sharply, moving closer to her side.

For a moment, she thought he was going to keep denying it. Then he shook his head and gave a low laugh, a sly smile kicking up the corner of his mouth. “What can I say?” he drawled, his dark eyes glittering behind the thick lenses of his glasses. “You were my first real taste of power and I loved it. It
stuck.
”

“What the hell is he talk—”
Thunk.
From the corner of her eye, Elise watched as Carla’s body slumped to the floor. A man she didn’t recognize was crouched behind the petite blonde, holding a square of white cloth over her nose and mouth.

Shit!

Elise sucked in a quick breath, ready to scream, when she felt someone behind her, a strong arm suddenly shoving something against her face.

Then everything went black.

Chapter 16

W
yatt had never known anything as viciously savage as the emotion that tore through him when he realized what he’d done. That he’d allowed himself to be tricked by a lying little bastard because of his thirst for revenge and, in doing so, had put Elise in danger.

Christ, I am such a goddamn idiot!

One second he and Sebastian had been making their way through the forest, deep in conversation, and in the next Wyatt had found himself surrounded by a group of Whiteclaw soldiers. A group of males who had obviously taken the “super soldier” drug. He knew he’d been set up, and in that moment he’d been consumed by every dark, deadly, visceral emotion that he’d ever seen or experienced in others. His mind had filled with visions of him ripping the Lycans to pieces, and both he and his wolf had relished the mental images. But a bloodbath wasn’t something he’d had the time to execute, even if he’d been strong enough. Not if he wanted to save Elise. Save her not only from Sebastian Claymore and his psychotic family, but also from her own demons. Because he knew what she would do if she found herself facing that nightmare for a second time. She might be beautifully strong and a romantic at heart, but there was no way she would let them have that kind of control over her ever again.

Knowing he had little time, Wyatt had used his knowledge of the woods and successfully evaded the soldiers, but they’d blocked his way back to the Alley. Thankfully, he’d heard them talking about how Sebastian would be taking “the Drake bitch” back to Hawkley, and so he’d used every ounce of speed he possessed to make it to the Whiteclaw’s pack town as quickly as he could. It wasn’t difficult to evade the scouts patrolling the pack’s borders, but finding the house where Elise had been taken wasn’t nearly so easy. He thought he was done for when a soldier called out an alarm after spotting him, but then a disturbance at the edge of town drew everyone’s attention. Hiding between two buildings, he heard one of the Whiteclaw males tell another one to get more guards for the house where “Sebastian’s bitch” was being kept, and thanks to the light drizzle that was covering his scent, Wyatt was able to follow the Lycan to a dilapidated building at the end of the street. Despite the rain, he caught a whiff of Elise’s scent the second he came around the back of the house, the guards still getting themselves organized in front. Hoisting his body up through an open window, Wyatt found himself in a shadowy hallway with a series of locked doors down either side.

Pulling in a deep breath, he followed Elise’s scent to the second door on his right and unlatched the locks as quietly as he could, not wanting to alert the chattering guards who were gathered out front. The instant he stepped into the dim room, he spotted Elise hunched down in the far corner. She was almost in the same position she’d been in after the Lycan had attacked her in her bedroom the night of the wedding—arms wrapped tight around her knees, body swaying forward then back—and his heart damn near shattered.

“Oh, Christ, El.” Quietly shutting the door, Wyatt hurried toward her and dropped to his knees, wanting to yank her into his arms but terrified to touch her. She was still dressed in her clothes, but her hair was a wild, tangled mess, smears of blood and dirt on her pale face, arms and legs. And there was a damn manacle wrapped around her left ankle with a metal chain that was attached to the wall, a broken manacle lying off to the side. “Are you okay, baby? Did they hurt you?”

She’d flinched at the first raw sound of his voice, and now she wet her lips, blinking up at him like a person suddenly being drowned in light after days of darkness, her voice little more than a whisper. “Y-you came.”

“God, baby. I was so scared that you’d been hurt.” His voice cracked, and he had to clear his throat before he could go on. “Terrified that you would do something...that you would—”

“I wanted to,” she confessed, cutting off his rambling. She bit her lip, then said, “When Sebastian told me what they’re planning for me tonight...
Oh, God, Wyatt.
I wanted to. But I couldn’t. I kept thinking that if I killed myself then I would never get to see you again.”

“You’re so damn strong,” he groaned, unable to wait a second longer to take her into his arms. “And you’re never getting rid of me,” he growled, crushing her against his chest as he pressed his lips to her forehead.

Burrowing closer to him, she spoke in a broken, breathless rush. “Sebastian told me that I was their t-test run. His and his brother’s. That they used the first compound of the drug on me to see how it would w-work.”

He cursed rough and low under his breath, his teeth clenched. Wanting her out of that damn manacle, he reached down and cracked it apart with his bare hands, careful not to hurt her. Then he started to pull her back into his arms, when he spotted the broken manacles lying on the floor on the other side of the room. Blood drained from his face as he finally caught a lingering, familiar scent on the air. He’d assumed his partner had gotten away during the kidnapping, but that obviously hadn’t happened, because she’d been in this room with Elise. “Sweetheart,” he croaked, bringing his worried gaze back to hers. “Where’s Reyes?”

Tears streamed down her face. “She’d gotten free of her chains and had started to work on mine, but then she heard the guards outside the door talking about how you’d just been spotted in town. I tried to stop her, but she said you would never make it to us with all of them after you. So she...she tricked them into opening the door and then got past them and I could hear them all going after her. I think she tried to sacrifice herself or s-something so that you could reach me.”

He swallowed against the rise of bile in his throat, his head pounding as he tried to come to terms with what she’d done.

“Do you think she got away?” Elise whispered.

“I hope to God she did,” he said with a choked growl. “And when we find her, I’m kicking her crazy little ass.”

“Me, too.” She hiccuped.

Taking her tearstained face in his hands, Wyatt took a deep breath and said, “Elise, you have to shift. The instant the moon rises, I need you to change. Okay?”

“Wh-what?” she croaked.

“You heard me, sweetheart. No arguments. I need you to do this for me.”

Panic twisted her pale, beautiful face. “I can’t!”

“You can,” he growled, determined to fight her on this to the bitter end. “You
have
to, because I love you and I’m not going to lose you.”

“Nooo,”
she sobbed, shaking her head. “I can’t! I
won’t!
”

Wyatt gripped her shoulders and gave her a firm shake, making her lift those tear-drenched eyes back to his. “Listen to me, El. Either we leave here together or we’re going to die here together. You understand? If we’re going to fight our way out, you’ve got to shift, sweetheart.”

Clutching his arms, she cried, “Please, Wyatt. Don’t do this. If you can’t get us both out, then go. Leave me here. Don’t you dare stay here and die with me!”

“I mean it, Elise. You want me to live, then you had better help me get your ass out of here. Because I refuse to leave the woman I love behind!”

She blinked, looking stunned, as if she’d only just realized what he’d been telling her. “You love me?”

He held her face in his hands and lowered his forehead to hers. “I do. I have for a long time now. And I’m a fucking idiot for not telling you before.”

Her lips parted, but before she could say anything in response, Whiteclaw soldiers burst into the room. Shoving Elise behind him, Wyatt immediately released his claws and fangs, fighting with everything that he had, but it wasn’t enough. Blood sprayed as he slashed, jabbed, kicked and torqued with a savagery he could only imagine was scaring the hell out of her, but there were too many of them. Once they’d overpowered him, they took the gun he had on him and dragged him from the room still fighting and shouting, and carried him out to the street. He was so goddamn terrified for Elise that he couldn’t think straight, his rage obliterating his reason.

The biggest of the Lycans threw him to the ground, and two others grabbed his arms, jerking him to his knees. Knowing damn well they were all powered-up on the Whiteclaw’s “super drug” even though they were still in their human forms, Wyatt jerked his gaze up to clash with Harris Claymore’s narrowed brown eyes. The bastard stood only a few feet away from him, looking older than the last time Wyatt had seen him, the years away from his pack obviously spent doing some hard living. As he studied the Lycan, taking in the size and shape of his body, Wyatt realized it was Harris he’d fought in Elise’s living room the night of the wedding.