Chapter 2
Chapter Two
P arker
“W-w-what job?”
“We have to pick up a couple of packages.”
“Right.” Declan rushes away and returns wearing jeans and boots. He pulls on a shirt and rubs his hands together, his eyes flashing bright green. His animal is close to the surface. “Let’s do this.”
I’ll need to go slowly and spell things out carefully, like I’m talking to a toddler. “First we need a car or bus that will fit all of us–”
“Done.” Declan whirls around and leaps right out the window. There’s a pained yip.
“He forgot about the cacti,” I tell Laurie. “ Again .” I lean out the window and shout to Declan’s retreating form. “Where are you going?”
“To see a man about a van!” he shouts over her shoulder.
“Is he going to walk there?” I ask Laurie. The owl shifter shrugs, and the movement sends more tiny, downy feathers wafting into the air.
I rub my face. It’s going to be a long December.
Two hours later, Declan pulls up in a VW bus with mismatching orange panels. There’s a huge evergreen tree lashed to the top of it, the tip of it bowing over the windshield.
Laurie and I head out of the house to meet him. “What’s this?”
“The van.”
“What’s with the tree?”
He shrugs. “It came with the bus.”
I pinch the bridge of my nose. “Declan. Did you steal this bus?”
In reply, he lays on the horn. Laurie’s already slid the side door open to climb into the back seat. He looks back, catches my eye and shrugs.
“Fine.” I growl, settling my hat firmly on my head. “But I’m driving.”
Turns out Declan is rubbish at sitting still and riding shotgun, so I banish him to the backseat while I follow my GPS to the first location coordinates Lucius sent me. We pull off the highway onto a long dirt road. After a mile of kicking up red dust, we reach the drop.
“Is this it?” Declan squints at the squat building in the middle of nowhere. There are two gas pumps out front, but the sign says gas is eighty cents a gallon, so it hasn’t been in use in a while.
I double check my phone. “I guess so. I don’t really have service, but this is where he said to go for the first package.”
“Any idea what the package is? What it looks like?”
“None.”
“Right.” Declan rubs his hands together. “Let’s see what we got.”
We spill out of the van together and approach the building. I rub grime off the old windows and cup my hands around my eyes to see into the space. It’s an old convenience store, the racks cleared out long ago, and now covered in spider webs.
Laurie prods the door, and it sighs open with a creak that makes me shiver.
“Not creepy at all.”
“Oh come on,” Declan says. “Ya think the king of the vampires sent us out here on a wild goose chase, just to get us shanked in the middle of nowhere? If he wanted to kill us, he could just rip our heads off or drink us dry.”
“Not helping,” I grit out.
“This place smells abandoned.” Declan sniffs the air.
But there’s another scent, faintly floral. I follow it to the back, but there’s nothing but a brass cash register from the 1800s. “Dead end.”
The shadows move behind us, and there’s the unmistakable sound of a racked shotgun. We turn as one, shocked someone snuck up on us without us scenting them.
A slim figure stands in the door with the gun trained on us. “State your business.” The voice is female.
I raise my hands high into the air. “I’m Parker. This is Declan and Laurie. We were sent by–”
The shotgun lowers. “Lucius the Vampire King. Took you long enough.” She turns, settling the gun at ease onto her shoulder. “This way.”
We scramble after her. She’s already walking down the dusty road, but a few strides, and I’ve caught up. She’s a five foot nothing dark-haired woman with a pound and a half of black eyeliner edging her brown eyes. She looks familiar.
“Do I know ya?” Declan asks.
“You tell me, Whiskey Dick.” She glares at him.
“I knew it,” he snaps his fingers. “You’re one of the shifters rescued from the slavers.”
“Ding ding.” She wrinkles her nose. She used to have a nose ring, I remember. It’s gone now.
“Fiona, was it?” His voice turns soft and crooning. “A fine Irish name for a gorgeous lass such as yerself.” I don’t have to look to know he’s got a grin and that look in his eye. His scent has turned candy sweet.
The goth girl sniffs and scowls at the road. Up ahead, there are a few buildings with empty door frames. A ghost town.
“You live here?”
She shrugs.
I toss Laurie the VW bus keys. “Follow us, as best you can.” He nods, his Adam’s apple bobbing, and scurries back the way we came.
The place is overgrown, bushes and cacti crowding around the buildings. A roadrunner darts across our path. Then another. And another.
They’re flowing down the road in the direction we’re going: towards the floral scent that’s up ahead and growing stronger.
A palo verde bush shakes, and a coyote pokes its head out from behind it. Its eyes flash yellow. Declan gives it a wave and elbows me in the ribs. “Look, it’s one of ya brothers.”
“I’m not part coyote,” I mutter. “We’ve been over this.” Data X experimented on me. My animal’s a hybrid mishmash of all sorts of species.
“Then what are you?” Fiona asks straight up.
Declan raises his thick black brows. “Yeah, Parker, what are ya?”
There’s a flash of panic, and a heavy metallic scent fills my nostrils. My world narrows until I’m looking through silver-coated bars that burn and burn…
Overhead, an eagle screams, and I blink in the sunshine.
“Ya’d know if ya heard ‘im laugh,” Declan tells Fiona. “But he hasnae laughed in a long time.”
I blow out a breath. “He’s wrong.” I’m only part hyena. The rest is a big fat question mark. “You know what, it doesn’t matter what I am. What are you?” I shoot back at Fiona.
She shrugs and shifts the barrel of the shotgun on her shoulder “Fuck around and find out.”
The eagle swoops down and lands on the closest roof, glaring at us.
“What’s going on with this?” I wave a hand at the bird. “What’s with the menagerie?”
Our guide heaves a sigh. “Allison.”
“Allison?” I ask.
“I remember,” Declan says. “She was the other shifter with you. The one who attracted all the animals.”
“That’s Allison.” Fiona nods ahead. At our feet, a trio of jackrabbits hop out of the shade of a nearby saguaro. The coyote only watches them with a bemused expression. Even the eagle is stoically not looking at the fresh meat.
A flock of twittering red finches fly overhead.
A young woman steps out from a building and pushes back her dark brown curls. The birds land on her shoulders and arms, still chirping. With her lovely face and flowing skirt, she looks like the heroine in a movie, about to burst into song.
“Fecking A,” Declan says with awe.
“Hello. I’m Allison. Mr. F. said you’re going to escort me to Taos?”
There’s a choking sound from Declan. Probably a reaction to this sweet-faced young woman calling the King of the Vampires “Mr. F.”
“Taos?” I asked. “What’s in Taos?”
Fiona swings the shot gun down and checks the barrel. “A few things he ordered. As gifts. They got waylaid.”
“Go now,” Allison whispers to the birds. “Tell them we’re coming.”
As one, the birds take flight.
Allison turns to the eagle on the roof. “Watch over them. Please?”
The eagle screams and pumps its huge wings, lifting off and heading in the same direction as the flock but at a greater height. Not following to hunt, but to protect.
“Unbelievable.” Declan whistles. “Now that’s a sight.”
I turn to Fiona and Allison. “So we’re taking you to Taos, then. Both of you?”
Fiona racks the shotgun. “I’m her bodyguard.”
“She needs a bodyguard?” Declan asks. “She’s got all sorts of animals eating out of her hand. Like a fecking Disney princess.”
“I’m better with prey animals, actually,” Allison says. “I make them feel safe.” There’s a squeaking noise, and a mouse peeks out of her sundress pocket. She lifts it out and sets it carefully down on the ground, so it can disappear through a crack in the ground beside the empty house.
“And what happens when there’s a threat?” I eye Fiona. “You shoot them?”
She gives me an empty grin that shows all her teeth. “Fuck around and find out.”
Gravel crunches behind me. Laurie’s rolled the bus up to where we stand.
“Is that your bus? Looks like something out of Scooby Doo.” Allison sounds delighted.
Fiona’s expression is skeptical. “Why does it have a tree?”
“For Christmas,” Declan says.
“Ah,” Fiona says, as if this makes sense.
I give a weary nod. “All right. Come on, Snow White. Let’s get this freak show on the road.”
“Shotgun!” Fiona and Declan shout at the same time and scramble for the front side passenger door.
I let them fight it out and head around to take the keys from Laurie. A few seconds later, there’s a pained yip, and then Fiona opens the door to hop into the seat beside me. She settles the shotgun at her side and holds out a hand. “GPS?”
“Thanks.” I hand my phone to her. “He hasn’t sent the coordinates….”
“Don’t worry. I know where we’re going.”
I adjust the rearview mirror. Laurie settles in the backseat next to a growling Declan.
Allison climbs in, holding a backpack with a faded floral pattern, and settles in the middle seat. “Hi there,” she greets Laurie in her soft voice.
He pales even more than normal.
“What’s in this?” Allison opens a pistachio-colored mini fridge that’s secured to the floor beside her. It’s full of old fashioned milk bottles, filled with a white liquid.
“M-m-milk?”
Declan takes a bottle and gives it a test shake. “Probably eggnog.”
“I wouldn’t drink that,” I warn.
“Ah, why not? Just a wee thimbleful wouldn't hurt.”
“No,” Laurie and I shout at the same time.
“Fine.” Declan puts the bottle back and hauls out his silver flask. “Not like I need the liquor diluted.”
Drunk Declan. That’s just what we need.
I put the bus in gear and hit the gas. The bus engine coughs a little but then settles into a loud and rhythmic purr. It might just get us all the way to Taos.
“So how have you guys been?” I ask Fiona carefully. Her scent is a little more apparent in close quarters, earthy and a little peppery. It’s still not clear what her animal is or if she’s a hybrid like me. A mutt.
It’s been a while since we met her and Allison when they were newly rescued from the shifter slavers. Both Declan and Laurie were interested in getting to know them better, but they needed time and space to process the horrors they’d been through.
Maybe Declan and Laurie needed time to process too.
“Pretty good. We stayed with the Tucson pack for a while. Sheridan taught us how to bartend.” Fiona shrugs. “We pick up shifts at Eclipse and Fight Club when we need money.”
“Sheridan’s mated to Trey who runs Fight Club. Have you ever worked one of those nights?”
“No,” Fiona says casually, but her scent flares spicy red. Cayenne pepper with hints of haba?ero. It tickles my sensitive nose until I have to fight to hold back my sneeze. A scent of anger… with underlying fear? “We don’t work the fights.”
“That’s our job,” I say. “We run the books.” You’d think being surrounded by giant, adrenaline crazed shifters would be freaky after my time in the Data X cages. But it’s the opposite. Being around shifters, especially strong, fight-focused ones, makes my animal feel safe. If I had to guess, I’d say Declan and Laurie feel the same way.
“Did you ever think of joining the Tucson pack?” Allison asks. Her voice is soft, but I hear it clearly from the middle seat.
“No. You?”
“No.” Fiona’s scent is red hot now, and her voice is flat. She’s seriously pissed.
“Garrett offered, but…” Allison trails off. Her floral scent is faded, like a dried flower left pressed in a book’s pages for too many years.
“Same.” I clear my throat. We ride in silence for another ten miles. Declan and Laurie stare out opposite windows. No one wants to say the truth: when Data X took us, experimented on us, they didn’t just steal years of our lives, our sense of security, pieces of our sanity. They stole from us the chance to be a part of a pack.
Because when you’re too different, too weird, you don’t fit in with anyone.
Fiona
The road stretches before us, smooth and dry. For the first three hours, the landscape was brown desert, rocks and the occasional ranch. After we hit New Mexico, things got more interesting, with mountain ranges contouring the views. The ride hasn’t been that bad. There’s a spring digging into my ass, but the bus is cool. If we have to, we can flatten the seats and sleep in here. Allison and I have had a worse time roughing it, for sure.
The only issue is the sour smell of our van-mates. Dopey, Mopey and Featherface. Mopey sits next to me, his hand steady on the wheel, a pensive look on his hat-shadowed face. He’s thinking sad thoughts. The scent is like overripe fruit.
Allison sits in the back, her orange-blossom scent cutting through the worst of it. Featherface, the owl shifter with the scent like a full moon on a winter’s night, sits stiffly beside her. His eyes are huge behind his birth control goggles. Every time he twitches, a few feathers fly out of his hair.
“What’s with the feathers?” I call to him. “Are you shedding?”
“Birds don’t shed feathers,” Allison says. “They molt.”
“Whatever. Another hour, and we could stuff a king-sized duvet.”
In the rear view mirror, Allison gives me a disappointed look. “She doesn’t mean it,” she whispers to Featherface.
I sniff and turn my glare on Dopey. The Irishman. Wolfhound crossed with a whole lot of other animals. His scent is a mystery, like Mopey’s, but soaked in hard liquor. He smells like staying up ‘til four a.m. and bad decisions.
I kinda like it.
I enjoyed it the first time I scented it, but my animal was too skittish to get close to anyone but Allison. Allison’s like Xanax for my senses. And I’m like Adderall. Between the two of us, we make one half-sane shifter.
It sucks being so broken you need a friend like a crutch. Allison’s never told me she resents it, and she would never. And it has to suck for her, living on the fringe of society. Never being able to be part of a pack.
My animal just can’t be around big groups of strong shifters anymore. Not after my last ‘pack’ sold me out to shifter slavers. Turns out they weren’t as loyal to me as I was to them because my animal didn’t match theirs.
Their loss, but I’m not signing up to be part of another pack any time soon. Not until Allison and I find a group of shifters who make us feel like we belong.
My stomach rumbles. Mopey gives me a glance but doesn’t comment. Dopey meets my gaze in the rearview mirror and holds up the flask, offering me whiskey for lunch. I shake my head and pat my shotgun in case he gets pushy.
“Ah, lass, ya know how to use that ting, do ya?” His Danny Boy accent is stronger when he speaks to me.
I shrug and turn away from him to look out my window. There’s a sign for my favorite burger joint, but then, I see something more disturbing. Three big black SUVs with tinted windows all in a line.
“Get off at this exit,” I tell Parker, a.k.a Mopey. In the backseat, both Declan and Laurie sit up straight.
“Now?” Parker goes to turn his head, and I hiss, “don't look. Just do it at the last minute. Now! ”
He swings into the exit lane. The black SUVs barrel on past. Their opaque windows show me nothing but the reflection of our bus.
“Who was that?” Parker asks.
“No clue. New route.” I pull up the map on his phone. “Take a right at the stop sign…” I guide him through a series of turns that put us back on the highway. We can’t take back roads all the way to Taos.
My stomach’s growling in earnest now. My animal wants to hide behind a burger chain and disappear into a dumpster.
This time, when Declan offers his flask, I accept it and take a hit. The whiskey scorches my throat but spreads with a sweet melting heat in the pit of my belly. Surprisingly good.
I hand it back. “Thanks.”
“Think we lost them?” Parker asks.
I check the mirrors. It’s been almost a half an hour. I’m about to give the all clear when they appear, marching like ants, one by one. Three black SUVs. Tinted windows and all.
“It’s official.” I sink back in my seat. “We’re being followed.”