Relentless (24 page)

With a sigh, he pulled back.

“How can you walk away from this, away from me?” My voice cracked uncontrollably.

He fingered my damp hair, pushing it back from my face. “It’s the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do.”

“Then don’t do it.”

He moved half a step back from me. “I have to, for both of us. You are as important to your pack as I am to mine. You have to follow your destiny.”

I knotted his shirt in my fists, holding on to him. “Don’t be ridiculous, I don’t have a destiny.”

He covered my hands with his and squeezed. “Yes, you do, and you have to follow it, follow the black wolf.”

I went still. “How do you know about the black wolf?”

The corner of his lips went up in a smile, and he pulled my hands free from his shirt. “He comes to me, too.”

“But—”

He pressed a finger to my mouth then moved it to kiss me again.  He let me go abruptly, the cold rushing in around me as he moved away.

“Wait, I don’t understand.”

“You will.” With that, he took a step backward and disappeared over the edge.

A scream erupted from me, and I fell to my stomach, half hanging off the ledge. I tried to see through the dark, hear a sound, a groan of pain. But there was none. Scooting back, I rested my head on the snow-covered stone and let the tears flow. I didn’t want to be part of something bigger than me. Right now, all I wanted was to be with Eric, to have a normal life. One where we could go out and grab a pizza then see a movie. Why couldn’t we have that kind of life?

A hand pressed against the center of my back. “We have to go now, Alexis.”

It was Myles. I rolled to a sitting position, my clothes cold and wet against my skin. I started to shiver. He sat beside me putting an arm over my shoulder.

“He went over the edge. One minute he was standing there, and the next he just took a step off, and he was gone.” My throat constricted on the last words, and I sobbed.

Myles hugged me to him. “He’ll be fine. We heal easily, remember?”

“But what if he doesn’t? What if he gets some injury that doesn’t heal right, a broken bone that heals crooked, a brain injury?”

He shook his head. “It doesn’t work like that. Others will be looking for them soon, for us, too. We have to go.”

“Why does it have to be so hard, Myles? Why can’t we have a normal life?”

His arm tightened around me. “We’re not normal. Besides, even people who have a normal life have hard times.”

“Not like this.”

“It probably feels like this to them.” He stood and pulled me to my feet. “Sometimes things don’t turn out the way we’d like them to or the way we hoped they would.”

I wiped the tears from my face and thought about Lana and Robert. He obviously knew there was more between them than just friendship. Where did that leave him?

As if he knew what I was thinking, he gave my arm a shake. “Let’s go. Dwelling on all the things going wrong in our lives won’t help get us out of here. We’ll have to work it all out later.”

We went into the cave. The others had found a large, loose boulder. It took all of us working together to shove it in front of the opening. If the Fenryrians did decide to follow us through here, at least it would slow them down for a minute. Or five seconds, I thought sadly, remembering the image of Thea’s friend who’d died helping us escape.

In the low light of the lantern, Brynna was bent over Noah, wiping a damp rag over his face and chest. His eyes were open now, and he stared up at her. His lips moved as though he was saying something, but it was too low for me to hear. Brynna’s gaze never left him, and in the dim light, her face was softer, gentler than I’d ever seen it. I’d never imagined Brynna as the type to nurse anyone. But apparently I’d been wrong. His eyes fluttered closed, and her face creased with panic. She looked to Lana, who was on the other side of Noah, pulling a syringe from the pocket of the lab coat she still wore.

“He’s okay,” she said.

“We have to get moving.” Thea replaced the jalmar into the sheath under her coat. She studied the needle in Lana’s hand. “What are you giving him?”

“Something for pain and fever while his body fights the virus.”

“Don’t kill him. We need him alive,” Thea said sharply.

“Don’t you think I know that?” Lana’s voice was hard. Robert put a hand on her shoulder. Across the room, I think Myles might have winced, and then Lana’s eyes met his. Thea continued to talk to Jared and her partner, but I didn’t hear them. I was caught up in what was passing between these two. The sorrow seemed heavy in the air. A tear formed at the corner of Lana’s eye, and she wiped it quickly. Myles disappeared farther into the cave, well past where the dim light could reach him. The knuckles on Robert’s hand whitened slightly as he squeezed Lana’s shoulder. She covered his hand with hers and lowered her head. On the other side of Noah, Brynna studied them and frowned before reaching to push wet hair away from Noah’s forehead.

“We need to get him to the motor home. He needs a bed, blankets…and I don’t know, maybe some aspirin,” Brynna said.

Jared came over and, with a grunt of effort, lifted Noah to his shoulder again. Thea picked up the lantern, and we followed, with her partner bringing up the rear.

An hour later, the passageway ended with another crack in the stone. We each slipped through and found ourselves at the edge of an open field covered with snow.

“Where did you leave the motor home?” The driving wind carried Thea’s voice away from us, and I stepped closer so I could hear.

“It’s about a mile north of town, just off the main road. There’s a small camping area there.”

“Do you think you’ll be able to get it out in this storm?”

Myles shrugged. “We’ll do what we have to do.”

She nodded. “Come on. We’re not that far from there. We should be able to make it before daylight. It’ll take a few hours on foot.”

A hand shot out in the dark and caught Thea’s arm. “He’s going to freeze out here with nothing on but those scrub pants.” Brynna tightened her grip on Thea, as the other girl tried to shake her off. “You said you didn’t want him to die.”

“He’s a werewolf; he’s not going to freeze to death.”

“Give him your coat.”

I knew that voice. You didn’t say no to Brynna when she used that voice. Apparently, Thea could sense that, too. She jerked off her coat and wrapped it around Noah as best she could, tucking it between his body and Jared’s shoulder to hold it in place.

“Satisfied?”

Brynna folded her arms. “Yes.”

Thea held the lamp up. The night was pitch black, and the wind made the lantern swing, throwing odd shadows across her face. “We’re going to have to lose this light.”

“There’s no way we’ll be able to stay together in the dark with the snow this heavy.” Fear made the words tremble as they came out of Lana’s mouth.

“We’ll go in single file, one hand on the shoulder of the person in front of you. I won’t douse the light until we’re all connected. If you lose your grip, stop immediately and call out.”

Brynna positioned herself in front of Jared. Robert and Lana were behind him. Myles got behind Thea and I took the spot next to last in front of Thea’s partner, just behind Lana. Once we all had a grip on the person in front of us, Thea turned around, and the world went black. Werewolves have good night vision, better in wolf form than in human, though. But this wasn’t a normal night. It wasn’t the night itself but the thick snow and driving wind that made it nearly impossible to see only a few feet ahead. There was no way to tell where the sky was, where the earth started. Sometimes I thought I could make out the shape of a tree, but it would soon blend in with the whiteness around it. After an hour of walking, we came to a road barely visible in the light halfway down the drive of someone’s home.

It had been plowed at some point, and snow was piled along the edges, but a good six inches of snow had already accumulated again. Thea left the road, and we walked parallel to it in the drifts.

“Why can’t we walk on the road?” Lana said, turning back to me.

I could just make out her features in the last rays of the light as we left it behind.

“In case someone drives up on us. With the noise of the wind, we wouldn’t see him until he was on us.”

“We’d see the lights.”

“If they’re looking for us, they’ll be driving with lights off for that reason. So we won’t see them coming.”

She didn’t respond, but I felt her shoulder slump under my hand.

“We’ll be there soon.”

She didn’t seem very reassured. We began to pass homes with lights more often, and it made walking a little easier when we could occasionally see our surroundings even though we had to skirt around the houses. Wet and freezing, we all wanted to get to someplace warm. It took us another two hours until I finally saw several lights dotting an open area.

The few campers in the campground were covered in snow. Most places closed for the winter, but this one stayed open for a small group of construction workers who were here for a building renovation in town. I opened the door of the motor home as Myles stood at the front, studying the snow-covered driveway.

“Think we can get out?” Thea asked.

He shook his head. “Not on its own power. I’d feel better if we didn’t crank the motor right now, anyway.”

“What do you mean?”

“It’ll be better if no one hears us leave. Then there’s nothing to report. I paid us up to stay here through the week, so it’s not like they’ll be looking for us to pay the bill. We’ll be less memorable if we just disappear.”

Thea studied him for a minute. “I assume you think we can all push this thing onto the highway.”

“That’s exactly what I think. Lana can steer. She has the least strength. If the rest of us get on the sides and back, we can push it onto the highway. After that, we can start it up and get going.”

“Okay then, get everyone out here.”

Myles disappeared inside to get the others. I waited with Thea, shivering. No point in trying to warm up if we were going to get cold again.

“What’s up with him and the blond girl?” Thea asked.

“Huh?”

“Something’s going on between Myles and that blond girl.”

“Oh, they’re together, you know, mated. They have been for years.”

I could make out the arched eyebrow in the dim light. “Didn’t look like that to me.”

“Yeah, well. I think there might be some problems with that. We just didn’t know until now.”

“It happens.” Thea rubbed her hands together. “Sometimes picking your mate at thirteen isn’t a great idea. It’s not even a good idea at fifteen. People change, especially after their Becoming.”

“Speaking from experience?”

She gave a half smile. “Unfortunately, yes.”

I’d have liked to hear the story, though I don’t know if she intended to tell it. The rest of the group piled out of the coach, including Robert. We all lined ourselves around the sides and back of the motor home and started pushing. At first, it didn’t budge, then slowly the tires began to crunch the snow, and we inched forward. As we edged up the driveway, the coach started to slide on the ice. The bulk of it pushed against me, and I shouted. Suddenly Jared left his position at the back and threw his shoulder against the motor home. It ground to a stop.

“Thanks.”

He grinned. “Didn’t want you to get crushed under this thing if it went off the driveway.”

I glanced behind me at the mounds of snow and remembered the drop-off on each edge of the drive that had been visible when we got here. He disappeared around the back, and we started moving again. Ten agonizing minutes later, the motor home was positioned on the road, and we all raced inside. Lana had already vacated the driver’s seat, and Myles slid behind the wheel to start the engine. I dropped onto the sofa. Everyone collapsed, some on the floor, Jared beside me on the sofa. I struggled to my feet and went to the panel near the door and started flipping switches. Thea gave me a questioning look.

“I’m turning on the water heater so we can have a little hot water.”

“That sounds good.”

I moved to the empty front passenger seat by Myles. The sides of the road were only discernable by the piles of snow that had collected after a snowplow had passed. Luckily, one had gone by recently, getting the road ready for morning traffic, though the driving snow was already covering the road. Myles gripped the wheel and leaned forward slightly as if it would help him see.

“Where are we going?”

“Down.”

“What does that mean?”

“We’re going down out of these mountains to get out of the snow.”

“How long will it take?’

He glanced at me. “Too long.”

He was right. The motor home inched forward at a snail’s pace, and I hoped they wouldn’t track us down anytime soon.

Two hours later, daylight had arrived in the form of lighter sky. The snow had lessened slightly, and the mountains were behind us now. Thea’s partner came up behind Myles’ seat.

“Pull over somewhere and let me drive for a bit.”

Myles nodded and pulled over a few hundred yards later in the parking lot of a small store. He got out of the driver’s seat. The other man positioned the seat and looked at me.

“You, too. Get out of that seat and go find somewhere to get some sleep.”

I eased out of the seat, glad for an excuse.  I went to the bedroom to check on Noah and found Lana and Brynna both with him. He looked infinitely better than he had when we’d first seen him in the lab. His eyes were closed, but his sleep appeared peaceful. He’d tossed back the blankets covering him so that his arms and shoulders were uncovered. Amid the tattoos, scars crisscrossed his skin. Lana lay asleep on one side, her back to him. On the other side, Brynna slept facing him, one hand resting on his shoulder. Myles came to the doorway beside me.

“Did Thea say why he had to come with us?”

He shook his head. “I haven’t really had a chance to talk to her about it.”

“Me, either. I’m too tired to care right now.”

“Agreed.”

We went back to the living area where Jared was asleep on the couch. Robert had made the dining banquette into a bed and was sleeping there.