Savage Surrender: A Dire Wolves Mission (The Devil's Dires Book 1) (6 page)

“Pardon?”

“Which Omega…? There are two of us.”

Motherfucker.
Bez felt his eyes go wide and his heart make a single, solitary slam against his chest. Of all the fucking luck. Two Omegas, two targets. If he’d known there would be two women to extricate, he’d have brought a second man to secure the second captive. That was basic policy on reverse kidnappings. One Dire per kidnappee. But now—

The woman’s face fell, her lips forming a thin line, and her eyes went soft. “I see. You’re here for Angelita?”

Bez nodded, slow and heavy. “The pup.”

“Then I suggest you get at it.” She threw a glance toward the door, gasping when she saw the fallen shifter. “Oh. Okay. Oh, God, he’s dead, isn’t he?”

Bez watched his mate as she visibly withdrew from the dead body of Marcus. For the first time in his life, he regretted killing something the way he had. Not for the loss of life, but for the way his mate seemed repulsed by it.

The woman finally looked away, closing her eyes tightly for a moment before turning that dark stare on him. “You need to take her, now. Before they come for her. I overheard something about moving her north. She’s just a baby, and what these animals intend to do with her would break her very soul.”

Bez’s wolf wanted to growl, but he held it back. It was recon time, not fight time. Not yet. “What are they planning?”

“I don’t know for sure, but it has to be bad.” Her eyes grew more worried, her frown turning into a scowl. “They call me the dud because I’m infertile. What does that tell you about their plans?”

The idea of other shifters forcing themselves on his mate snapped his carefully cultivated control. Bez growled, long and loud and unrestrained. The sick fucks deserved to die horrible, painful deaths—ones he’d be thrilled to visit upon them.

The woman glanced to where the young girl slept. “Don’t scare her. She’s young and extremely naïve. You need to take her right now. Get her the hell out of here before the rest of the men come back.”

By the gods, the fates didn’t mess around. She was perfect for him, so strong, so brave. And so smart—Bez knew she was right. He needed to haul ass and get the younger Omega out of danger, but he didn’t want to leave this woman’s side. He willed his legs to move, his body to respond, but his mind and heart and wolf were set. He couldn’t ignore the mating bond, couldn’t dare fail her. Just the thought of walking away without her by his side gutted him.

Bez shook his head and sighed. “I don’t—”

The sound of the other man in camp yelling for Marcus woke Bez from his mate-induced distraction. Fuck, he needed to
go
. Grab the young Omega and run. But this woman was his
mate
, his one and only, and he would have to leave her behind to be able to get the other Omega out as per the plan. His training told him to leave his mate, to grab the target, secure her, and call in a second team to come back to the houseboat camp. But he knew that wouldn’t work. The men would whisk his mate away before he and his team could make it back, leaving him chasing trails and ghosts until he tracked her down. And he would track her down. He was the best tracker anyone had ever seen, impossible to shake or outrun. But what could happen to her in the interim made Bez’s blood run cold. No. He couldn’t abandon her. Couldn’t risk her.

The thought strengthened his resolve and made his brain spin off on a secondary plan. For the first time in his very long life, he would not be following policies, procedures, or orders. He would not be working under the mantle of anyone else. He didn’t want to leave his mate behind.

So he wouldn’t.

Grabbing his mate’s arm, he pulled her out of the cot. “We go. Now.”

“But you’re only here for her.”

Bez yanked her to her feet, harder than he wanted to but needing her to
move
. “Not anymore.”

She gave him a hard look, obviously doubting him. Something that almost made him smile. He’d show her, teach her—the last thing she should do was doubt a Dire Wolf.

Bez held out a hand, backing toward where the younger Omega, Angelita, still slept, inviting his mate to follow him. She stared at him thoughtfully, her expression filled with a meaning Bez couldn’t figure out. But he wanted to, and he would. Someday. After he’d taken the time to learn everything there was to know about her. But that time wasn’t right then, and the place definitely wasn’t this shitty houseboat camp.

“Please,” he whispered, begging for what had to be the first time in his life. Something that finally got a reaction from his mate. She glanced at his hand once…twice…before taking a deep breath.

And then she grabbed hold of him.

Ignoring the tingles the simple touch sent shooting up his arm, Bez pulled her beside him. He loved the scent of her, wanted to breathe her in for days, but there was no time. The two hurried across the floor to where the younger Omega slept. Considering the reaction his mate had to him standing over her, he let her take the lead. He didn’t want to scare the girl and alert the other shifter. Bez stood guard as his mate knelt down next to the cot and brushed Angelita’s hair off her forehead.

“C’mon, hon. It’s time to go.”

The voice of the other guard grew closer, the pitch displaying his irritation when Marcus didn’t answer. Not that he could have. Though, the tall one had no way of knowing the man lay dead on the floor, but he would soon.

Angelita opened her eyes, jumping back against the wall when she saw Bez. Before she could scream, his mate put her hand over the girl’s mouth and leaned close to whisper in her ear.

“He’s here to help us. We’re leaving. Right now.”

It took the younger Omega barely a second to understand the words. Once she did, she hopped out of the bed and grabbed his mate’s hand. Clinging to one another, the two women looked up at him, ready but questioning. Wanting to leave but obviously afraid.

“What do we do now?” his mate asked. Bez didn’t want her to see what he was about to do, but he couldn’t lie to her. So he didn’t.

“You two hide. I kill the guard. Then we run.”

S
ariel stared
at the man who’d woken her, unable to form words. He planned on killing the guard…in front of her and Angelita. Her hands shook with the adrenaline racing through her bloodstream, and her skin felt clammy beneath the cotton tank top and shorts she’d donned for her nap. He terrified her with his casual cruelty, and yet her body yearned for him, demanding she move closer. The strength of the wolf inside her was the only thing keeping her from going into shock. Her mate…this man was her
mate
. Huge and beastly, with the lightest, fiercest eyes she’d ever seen, he stood before her talking about killing a shifter as if it were just another item on his to-do list. Which Sariel guessed it technically was.

But he was her
mate
.

When she’d first realized that fact, lying in the cot as he loomed over her in the shadows, she thought the fates were mocking her. Assuming he worked with the men who’d stolen her from her home, her stomach had roiled in dread. Thankfully, the fates had been kind, not cruel. They’d sent her a mate who was strong and powerful, near-savage it seemed. Not one who’d already done so much harm to her. They’d sent her exactly the man she needed.

And she wasn’t going to squander this opportunity.

“C’mon, kid. Let’s get out of the way.” She gripped Angelita’s hand and dragged her farther back, giving her mate room to do what he needed to. She’d told the girl they’d get out of this hell. If this man, this big beast of a shifter the fates had sent to her as her destined soul mate, was willing to help them, so be it. She knew she could trust the man fated for her. The man watching her with eyes she almost couldn’t tear her own away from.

Her heart skipped as he stared, as words defining their bond echoed in her head. Fated…mated…claimed. Her mate had found her. What a massive bit of craziness to add to this screwed-up situation. She’d met her mate while being held hostage in a houseboat in the middle of a swamp. That should have been the plot of some crazy movie, not reality. And yet, he’d shown up to save them. Well, technically, he’d shown up to save Angelita. She was more of a complication to him, it seemed. The thought of him leaving her behind, taking only Angelita and rescuing the young girl as he’d planned, had made her sick at first. Even sicker than assuming he was one of the men who’d kidnapped her in the first place. She didn’t want to be left behind. She couldn’t stand to live another second in this prison, especially now that she’d glimpsed a way out. She would have followed them if she’d had to. But she didn’t have to—he seemed just as against leaving her behind as she felt about being left.

The sound of approaching footsteps caught Sariel’s attention a second behind her mystery man. He turned his ice-blue eyes toward the noise in a move that was pure predator, all animal…totally hot in a weird he’s-strong-enough-to-take-on-my-enemies sort of way. And as much as she almost didn’t want to admit it, that level of aggression and protectiveness
was
hot. She’d been cooped up for weeks, terrified the men guarding her would hurt her in some way other than the mental torture that delighted them, and unable to figure a way out for her and Angelita. Screw her independent nature, her mate had shown up, big and bad and looking like a monster in the dim light, but he was ready to save her. She could fight her own battles another day. Right then, she wanted nothing more than to hop on that white horse of his and let him lead them all off into the sunset.

Or through the swamp, as the case seemed to be.

“Marcus,” the approaching guard yelled from outside. “Wake your lazy ass up.” The footsteps grew louder.

Sariel’s mate motioned for her and Angelita to move farther back, away from the door. Sariel dragged Angelita to the corner, crouching down and wrapping herself around the younger girl. He watched them, his eyes on hers, until he seemed satisfied that Sariel and Angelita were settled into a good spot.

Without warning, he stalked to the door, angling his head toward the sound of the approaching guard. There was something beautiful in his harsh extremes, something sexy in the way he let his inner animal rule his body. He reeked of shifter with very little of his human side shining through. That fact alone had her fixated on him, had her wolf practically hunting him. Wanting him.

Taller than most shifters or human men she’d known, he stood just behind the door, his head brushing the low ceiling. He curled his broad shoulders into a hunting pose, the muscles corded across his back. His thighs tight with anticipation. Pure and utter hunter.

He cocked his shorn head as the guard’s footsteps hit the deck of the second houseboat, ready and definitely able to fight. Moonlight shone through the open window, bathing him in a silvery glow. She assumed he was blond based solely on his lighter eyebrows and the hair leading down from his navel, not that it mattered. He was big and bold, larger than life, his body screaming of masculinity. And he was about to kill a man while she watched, to save them all.

Grabbing Angelita and turning her head away from the door, Sariel angled her body to protect the girl from what she knew was about to happen. Her mate had been sent here for the younger woman, and though Sariel hadn’t been a consideration of the rescue, she was grateful for him. She couldn’t have saved the girl on her own. She would have tried and tried hard, but she doubted she would have succeeded. Sariel would happily help keep the younger Omega safe so he could fulfill whatever plans Blasius Zenne had tasked him with.

The footsteps grew closer, the guard’s stride gaining speed. Her mate gave her one last look over his shoulder before he crouched into a pouncing position. Every inch of him hard and tense, ready. Able. Savage.

The guard kicked the door open at the exact same moment the blue-eyed stranger struck. Sariel barely had a chance to see what happened because her mate moved so fast. The door had only just opened when her mate’s hand slashed across the guard’s throat, his other arm pushing the man to the floor as blood sprayed from his neck. Before Sariel could even take a breath, her mate turned—eyes glowing, chest heaving—and looked right at her. She could feel the tension between them, relished in the tightening of the bond. The connection to him. Her mate had killed for her. Had protected her and the young one they were responsible for. He’d proven himself as a strong and able male. God, that was exceptionally sexy in a very primal, animalistic kind of way.

“We go. Now.” His words were an order, almost nothing more than a grunt. Sariel nodded. She may have been strong with the power of her Omega, but this beast was a totally different animal. He could raze the world if he needed to, and she knew it. She sensed it. That knowledge made something ancient and carnal burn through her blood, a form of attraction that had her growling low and soft. Her mate responded with his own growl, his light eyes following her as she stood and moved closer. But before Sariel could take more than a few steps, Angelita grabbed her hand, pulling her out of the moment.

“What do we do?” Angelita asked, sounding slightly panicked. Understandably so.

Sariel stared into the fiery eyes of her mate, refusing to look away even as she sensed how much more wolf than man he was at that moment. “We do whatever he says. We follow him from here on out.”

The man grunted, still watching her. She felt more than saw his wolf surge, those eyes going from washed-out aquamarine to bright silver and back. The color spinning in a way that pinged something in her memory. Something she’d learned about but never seen.

She faltered, unable to hold his gaze a second longer. The moment had gotten too intense, the pull to him too hard to resist. She had to break the spell.

“Now what?” she whispered when she was finally able to look up from the floor. He glanced from Sariel to Angelita, eyes hard and face giving nothing away, before motioning them over to the far side of the houseboat.

“Up and out, ladies.”

Not what she was expecting, but she didn’t refuse. The three slipped out the window, dropping into the swamp below. Sariel hated the feeling of the water surrounding her. Hated even more knowing there were things beneath the surface that could be more predator than she was. Though she doubted they were more predator than her mate.

Sariel swam and waded her way through the dark water and mucky riverbed, trudging on until they reached a spot of land dry enough to gain their footing. She stumbled up the grassy land first, holding on to Angelita’s hand and pulling her along.

“I never want to go swimming again,” Sariel said with a shiver. Her mate stalked out of the swamp, staring at her as if she were something to eat…to devour. And by the gods, she wanted that man to devour her. Droplets of water, mud, and muck clinging to every curve of his body, running down the length of it. Accentuating every hard muscle. She bit her lip and shivered, pulling at her sodden clothes. “What now?”

Her mate took a moment to investigate their location, looking all around them and even up to the sky. Sariel mimicked him, though she doubted she saw the things he did. Still, it was a joy to be standing outside underneath the night sky again. The moon hung heavy, on its way to its pinnacle. Full moons always made her twitchy, made her inner animal itch to be released. Tonight was no different. Hell, the moon affected humans every month. It certainly affected shifters just as much.

“They’re coming back.” Her mate looked out across the water they’d crossed, his eyes sharp and his chest still as he held his breath. He glared into the distance, a steely determination on his face. “We need to run.”

“As wolf or human?”

He turned to her, his eyes blue once more. “Wolf.”

Sariel pulled her tank top over her head, glad to be rid of the sticky, wet fabric. The night air felt amazing against her skin, for once the humidity a benefit instead of an irritation. Her mate watched her, his eyes following her hands as she dropped them to the waistband of her shorts. She hooked her thumbs beneath the elastic and slid them over her hips. The weight of the water pulled them down her legs, and they fell to the grass with a muffled splat. Sariel kicked them off, standing on the balls of her feet, and stretched.

“God, I’ve missed my wolf.” She wanted to dance in the night, celebrate being released from her cage, but she knew there was no time. Still, she stood brazen and bold, completely naked in front of her mate, and let the slight breeze blowing through the trees caress her body as it hadn’t in months. Her mate watched her, stared at her, ate her up with his eyes. His gaze slid over every curve of her body, head to toe, almost as if he was memorizing her. Every inch of her felt that stare, responding as if to touch. Nipples hard, goose bumps rising, Sariel held still and let her mate
see
her as she waited to let her wolf free.

“I can’t.” The little voice may as well have been a bucket of ice water thrown over Sariel. She and her mate turned in an odd sort of unison, both staring at an extremely uncomfortable-looking Angelita.

“What do you mean, you can’t?” Sariel asked.

“I can’t shift on command. I’ve never been able to.”

Her mate growled as the sound of an engine grew in the distance. “Our wolves have a better chance in this swamp.” He turned those glowing eyes on Angelita, the power of his inner wolf making the air feel electrified. “Shift to your wolf.”

Angelita whimpered and shook her head. “I can’t.”

The thump of car doors closing reached Sariel’s sensitive ears, and her heart raced as she watched the showdown between man and girl.

“Omega, you need to shift. Now.”

Angelita met Sariel’s concerned gaze, her eyes wide with fear. “I can’t. I swear, I can’t. If I try, I’ll fail. I can’t even feel my wolf spirit right now.”

Sariel looked to her mate, ready to follow his lead. He gave her a heated once-over, his eyes resting on her chest for a long second before meeting her own.

“Shift.”

With a nod, Sariel shifted to her wolf form, sinking fast to the gray wolf of her second form. The man went still, eyes wide as he looked off in the direction of the houseboats. The scent of something rotten and wrong met Sariel’s nose, and she shook her head to try to rid herself of the stench. The man breathed deeper, nostrils flaring, hands clenching into fists.

“Motherfucker,” he hissed, turning back to the women. “Do you smell that, Omega? Do you sense the wrongness of the monster?”

Angelita nodded, her eyes bouncing from the man to the darkness behind him.

“That’s the scent of werewolf, little one. Real, honest to God, beasts of the moon, werewolves.”

Angelita gasped and took a step back as Sariel whined, desperate to run. There weren’t a lot of things that could make her feel the level of terror currently winding around her heart, but the presence of a werewolf was certainly one of them. Half dead, rotting away under the full moons, werewolves were the epitome of all that was wrong with an animal and human mix. They hunted relentlessly, killed indiscriminately, and wreaked havoc for three nights whenever the full moon lit up the sky. The way it did that night. And—the most terrifying fact of all to her—they only hunted female shifters. They attacked mercilessly, sometimes wiping out every female in a pack in one night, feeding off the bodies of the fallen women. A fact that led most shewolves to run for their lives when the beasts showed up. And damn, did Sariel want to run. But she wanted to bring Angelita with her.

“Omega,” the man said, the stiff set of his jaw the only outward sign of the tension that had to be nearly suffocating him. “We have to—”

“I can’t!” Angelita exclaimed, her breaths coming so fast, Sariel worried the girl would hyperventilate.

Sariel whined and rubbed her side along Angelita’s legs, pushing her fur against the girl’s skin, wishing it was enough to get her to reach her wolf spirit. But Angelita stood, human as ever, trembling and gasping in her fright. Sariel had one terrifying moment when her mate turned away from them, thinking he’d run off and leave Angelita behind. But she should have known better.

With a growl, her mate grabbed Angelita around her waist, hauling her off her feet. The girl yelped as he tossed her on his back and began to move, strides long and aggressive. In two steps, he morphed from man to animal, his sterling wolf form taller and longer than her own. A huge, uniquely colored beast that almost made her stop in her tracks.