16. Raine
16
Raine
Delilah shifts before the male, a shifter that I vaguely recognize as one of Daniel’s top enforcers—Abram—gets to the last step.
She charges forward at him, quick and agile as she lunges forward with her teeth bared as she knocks into Abram. They both tumble back onto the stairs, where Delilah pins him, growling loudly in order to keep him from moving.
He shifts under her, his jaw snapping in fury as he tries to catch any part of her between his teeth.
My heart pounds in my chest as I watch them, my entire body pressing against the bars while wishing I could just dematerialize to the other side of them and help her. Delilah isn’t the strongest female, but she makes up for it with her speed and agility.
Abram knocks her back, all but tossing her across the cellar as she lands on her back and skids down the row of cells. He scrambles back onto his feet and lunges for her, just barely missing when she skitters off to the side and slams her back into the cell two down from mine.
My eyes snap around the small space as my wolf howls, begging to be let out so that she can tear into the male trying to hurt my best friend. I look around for anything that I can use to help her if she can get close enough to me.
That’s when I see a set of keys hanging on the wall next to the stairs.
“Delilah! Keys!” I yell, pointing to them. “On the wall by the stairs!”
Her head snaps over to look, her hackles flaring when she spots them. Abram pushes up off the ground and tackles her again, pinning her down with the kind of strength that only enforcers possess.
She snarls at him, wiggling and fighting while trying to get him off of her. But he bears down with his paws pressed down against her chest, snapping his jaw at her.
“Fuck, Delilah!” I slam my body against the bars. “Leave her alone!”
Abram turns his snarl on me, glaring with enough hatred to make my blood run cold.
The distraction is enough to give Delilah the chance to twist herself far enough to latch onto Abram’s leg with her jaw. He lets out an agonizing howl when she bites down, blood spewing everywhere when he yanks his leg back, trying to get it out of her mouth.
She doesn’t let up and simply bites down harder.
“Yes!” Glee shoots through me.
Finally, Abram wrenches his leg from her and stumbles back into one of the cells behind him. The entire thing rattles from how hard he hits it, momentarily disorienting him in the process. Delilah scrambles to her feet and races for the keys.
Time seems to move in slow motion. Delilah shifts and grabs the set of keys from the ring they’re hanging from, Abram croons in pain as he tries to roll back onto his—now injured—leg and go after Delilah again, and I desperately reach through the cell bars, hoping to catch the keys that are thrown my way.
And all I can think about is Aiden.
Is he worried about me? Does he miss me? What will he say when I tell him about the baby?
The arch of the keys is high enough where I don’t think I’ll be able to catch them.
I reach out anyway, straining to grab them as they descend toward my cell.
Delilah shifts again, racing forward just as Abram lifts himself up into the air to try to snatch the keys before they can get to me.
They hit each other hard enough to make a sound, crumpling together onto the cold hard concrete.
Miraculously, the keys land directly in my outstretched palm.
And then, the world is thrown back into real time.
Quickly, I fight to get the jumble of them through the bars while Delilah and Abram go at it again. My hands are shaking so bad that it’s hard to arch my hand around to where the lock on the other side is, much less get the key into the small hole.
Fuck, why did Daniel make these so goddamn difficult to open?
He’s such a sadistic fool.
Delilah lets out an agonizing scream.
“Stop!” I yell. “Don’t hurt her!”
Finally, the key lands and the pins move into the correct position. Like it was never even locked, the door to my cell swings open and I’m free once more.
I drop the keys and shift, launching myself through the air to land directly on Abram’s back. My teeth bite down into the skin at his neck, ripping at him from the scruff and hauling him away from my best friend.
Like Delilah’s agility, I’ve got brute force behind my wolf. She’s anger personified and I let myself lean into it, giving her full rein to take the lead.
Abram struggles as I drag him backward, blood soaking my mouth from how hard I’m biting. I’d feel bad if this weren’t life or death and Daniel’s entire enforcer team isn’t hell-bent on making my very existence a living nightmare.
Delilah scrambles back onto her feet again, but there’s a sag to her that wasn’t there before. She has blood coating her fur from a wound I can’t see, and she’s limping.
I throw Abram to the ground once more and dart toward the stairs. Come on!
She follows close behind me, stumbling.
I don’t bother trying to be sneaky getting out of the estate—I’m sure our fighting has attracted some kind of attention and enforcers will be swarming the place soon, if they aren’t already.
Delilah and I make it out the doors just as a patrol is arriving for a shift change.
Seeing us, they immediately dart for us.
Shit, run! Woods! I push into Delilah’s mind and sprint.
I run as fast as my legs can carry me, blowing through the town and hoping like hell that Delilah’s right behind me. I can hear something following me, but there’s no time to look back and see if it’s her or another enforcer hot on my ass.
Heading into the woods, I run through the deeper parts, where the thicket is overgrown and hard to manage, even by skilled patrols.
With Delilah’s injury, I want to get us as far away from the enforcers as possible in order to hunker down and recover while she heals.
But that’s only if we can lose them first.
Delilah! I howl back, hoping.
The lake…we can lose them there.
Relief floods through me when I hear her in my mind.
I detour off our path and head for it.
The lake is large and untouched by humans. It’s a place where we all go during our patrols to freshen up and recharge before continuing to check our borders. However, to get down to it, you have to navigate a steep rock incline, which is hard to do when you’re being chased.
I trust her though. She has to have some kind of plan—
There’s a snarl behind me and then something heavy hits the ground. My paws dig into the dirt, stopping me from continuing on as I circle back around.
One of the enforcers has Delilah by the neck again, pinning her down.
Go! she screams at me, struggling under him.
I can’t leave her. What happens if—
Go to him! she whimpers as the teeth around her neck tighten.
I don’t have time to think or argue with her. I turn on my heel and run fast through the thicket and the overgrown foliage. I run as fast as I can possibly manage and push past even that, the distance growing between me and my homeland as I run for Pollis.
No one pursues me, which feels like a slap in the face. But it’ll give me a chance to get there—to get to Aiden and tell him what happened.
He’ll help rescue Delilah and then she can come to Pollis and live with me. She’ll be free and won’t have to be punished for my sins.
I don’t know how long it takes me before I reach the Pollis border, nor do I realize I’ve crossed into them until I realize I’m being followed on either side by a couple of enforcers, clearly curious as to what the hell I’m doing.
My body collapses the moment I come to a stop, exhausted from running for gods know how long. I shift into my human form, lying in the cool grass while I pull in huge breaths of air to try to stop the world from spinning so much around me.
“Are you alright, miss?” someone asks me.
I have no energy to lift my head, only mumbling into the grass, “Aiden…”
“What did she say?” someone else says.
“I don’t know. But she looks exhausted.”
I feel someone get close to me, leaning down to pat my shoulder. “Miss? Do you know where you are?”
“Ai…den…” is all I can manage to say before the world goes dark around me.