Chapter 23
Frankie had butterflies in her stomach and knots in her neck, shoulders, and back.
She had her phone in her pocket right next to their entire plan: a hypodermic needle with the anti-serum.
Dr. Cecilia Lu had made it clear that it wouldn’t reverse any brain damage, but it did noticeably decrease aggression.
So the plan was to get close enough to her brother to inject him.
If nothing else, it would ease off his push to drive the pack into war and hopefully allow her to reach the sweet boy he’d once been.
Not much of a plan as those things went, but it was all she had.
Plus Ryan at her back and the Griz waiting nearby.
The cops were aware in a general sense and on standby if things turned ugly.
That was the best she could hope for as she turned the corner to head to the front door of the community center.
“Frankie—” Ryan said, his voice low.
“You can’t talk me out of this,” she interrupted. “Anyway, it’s too late to turn around now.” They’d been spotted by the wolf stretched across the front step.
“I was going to say that I’ve got your back. No matter what.”
Her step hitched and she winced at her own stupidity.
Of course, he was going to say something supportive.
That was who he was. He served and protected, and right now that meant he stood behind her when she knew he really wanted to be in front shielding her from her own kind.
But this was a wolf matter and a bear could only make it worse.
Unless, of course, he was quiet, smart, and waited for her signal to go all grizzly. “Um, yeah. Thanks.”
Talk about a lame response. That wasn’t even remotely what she wanted to say.
She ought to be saying that she felt him deep inside.
He was a calm presence that gave her hope for a future that—a day ago—had seemed impossible.
That right now it was taking everything in her not to grab his hand and run away.
It didn’t have to be far. Hell, they could get lost in Chicago and live happily ever after.
That was only a short five-hour drive. And most of all, she wanted to say the words that she’d been holding back for a while now.
I love you.
She hadn’t said it and neither had he, but that’s what she felt for him.
But how could she say that to him when she might very well die in the next few minutes?
The odds of her winning in a straight fight against her brother were slim to none.
Then again, how could she not say it? It might be her very last chance.
And then she ran out of time. That’s what happened when she dithered. The wolf guarding the front door raised its hackles and growled menacingly.
“Get out of the way, Stark,” she snapped. That wasn’t the wolf’s real name, but he’d started styling himself after the brilliant superhero when he’d gotten a B in high school chemistry. “I’m here to put an end to this nonsense.”
The wolf didn’t move, just bared his teeth. To his credit, the threat wasn’t aimed at her but at Ryan. Didn’t matter. She lost her temper with the kid.
“Your mom knows you’re having unprotected sex.
She said if you get an STD, you’re enlisting so the government pays for your health care.
And if one of the girls gets pregnant, then your ass is getting a job.
In fact, she asked me to write down a list of the ugliest, dirtiest jobs I could think of.
” Frankie grinned. “I told her the government is always looking for more sewage grunts. Gave her a few names to call.”
Wolves don’t get pale, at least not that can be seen. They show fear in the tremors along their fur and stiffness in the tail. Right now, Stark’s tail stood out rigid as stone. The kid was terrified, probably because he knew his mother didn’t make idle threats.
He jumped off the steps with gratifying speed.
She moved past him and put her hand on the center’s door, but she didn’t push through.
Instead, she took a moment to find that place inside her where Ryan held strong.
She found it quickly, but just to make sure, she glanced behind her to where he stood with quiet power.
His blue eyes were clear, and his blond hair was a soft yellow under the streetlights.
He smiled at her with a slow, sweet curve of his mouth.
Right there was the image she wanted of him. One to hold on to in her mind for as long as she lived. Even if it was for only a few more minutes. She returned his smile, wishing she could put all the words she’d never said into her one expression. Then she opened the doors.
The place was unsettled. Given that it was barely four a.m., it should have been quiet.
But most of her brother’s men had come back and were milling around disturbing kids and parents alike.
Raoul was in a back room, and his angry voice beat the air of even this huge space.
She couldn’t make out the words, but the growling tone was obvious enough.
But first things first. She looked to the “quarantined” section of the room to check on her friends.
Sure enough, Noelle was there, giving her a grinning thumbs-up.
Even Hazel was awake, waving her bandaged arm then clenching her hands in a get-fierce gesture.
Frankie headed there, hoping to get a word in before the trouble started.
She was at the edge of the quarantined area when her brother came storming out of the back room.
One of the sentries must have told him she was here.
His face was flushed, and his men flanked him on either side.
And then there was Delphine, back in her wolf form and spandex pants.
She bared her sharp white teeth the moment she came into view, and even Frankie had a moment of envy for her rich brown fur.
If nothing else, the woman had good hair.
Thinking of the hypodermic in her pocket, Frankie extended her arms out to hug her brother. He’d never been a touchy-feely kind of kid, but maybe things had changed. He had a girlfriend now, after all.
No such luck. He drew back from her with an appalled look on his face. “You are not welcome here, Frankie,” he said darkly. Then he glanced at Ryan. “And his presence is a declaration of war.”
Frankie let her arms drop to her sides. “I thought one of your demands was that they turn me over to you.”
He acknowledged the point with a dip of his chin. “Is that what you’re doing?” he asked as he turned to Ryan. “Are you turning her in to me?”
Frankie tensed. If Ryan responded to the jibe, it would make her look weak.
He had to keep silent and let her be the power.
She opened her mouth to forestall any of his comments, but she needn’t have worried.
Instead of responding, Ryan simply turned to smile at a nearby child who was whimpering in his mother’s arms.
It was perfect. Not only had he shown himself to be friendly, but he’d completely dismissed her brother as unimportant. And if there was anything her brother hated, it was being ignored.
She watched Raoul’s neck flush, but she didn’t give him a chance to speak.
“What makes you think you have the right to make any demands or speak for the pack?” she asked.
She held up her hands. “Our alpha isn’t dead.
You aren’t the beta. And yet you stand there and declare war as if you think our lives are your toy soldiers.
We aren’t. And we certainly aren’t going to war on your say-so. ”
“We don’t have a beta because they killed him!” Raoul snarled.
“Derek was killed when he attacked an innocent CDC doctor in front of her mate. If you ask me, he got what he deserved for being so stupid.”
Raoul shook his head. “Why are you spreading lies?”
“Why did you poison the city? Why do you want war?” She made an expansive gesture. “Are their lives nothing to you?”
His lip curled as he looked around. “You have no voice here. You can’t even shift.”
She watched his words impact the people around them. As one, the onlookers winced. It wasn’t fair or right, but full shifters had a stronger voice.
“I can shift,” she said loudly. “And I speak to the pack with an alpha voice.”
“Alpha voice!” he scoffed loudly. “That was disgusting. How dare you share your filthy relations with a bear over our link?”
She hated that her skin heated at his words. What she’d done—and shared—was neither filthy nor intentional. “I stopped the pack from following your stupid orders. Do you think the bears were defenseless? And the National Guard was on the way. Our people would have been slaughtered.”
“You have no faith in us. You’ve abandoned everything that makes you a wolf.”
She held her tongue, biting back an angry curse.
This kind of back-and-forth spat helped no one.
Worse, the antagonism keyed everyone up, and not in a good way.
She had to end this now, which meant it was time for desperate action.
She fingered the hypodermic in her pocket and judged the distance.
She needed to slam it into his neck, but she’d have to get past his guards first.
She knew Ryan was ready to leap into action, but would that be enough? Didn’t matter. She’d have to risk it. So she said the cruelest thing she could think of. She felt sick to her stomach as she spoke, but it was the only way to push Raoul into attacking her.
“No, Raoul, I have no faith in you. You’ve backstabbed your friends, poisoned those who love you, and betrayed the pack at every turn. Everyone knows it. And for those who don’t, I have pr—” She was going to say proof, but she didn’t get the chance.
He leapt for her as he screamed, “Lies!”
She was ready for the attack, so it was easy to flow with his lunge.
A smooth move to twist into his leap so he fell past her.
At the same time, she hauled the hypodermic out of her pocket, popped the cap, and slammed it down on his neck.
He roared as the plunger sank home, but she had her knee in his back to keep him down.
Done. Now she just had to wait until he simmered down.
It was only then that she realized things were happening all around them.
She’d been completely focused on Raoul, but suddenly she noticed that she was not being dragged off him by his henchmen.
That’s because Ryan had stepped into the breach.
While she’d been injecting Raoul, he’d blocked or punched out four others.
Pretty impressive for a guy who hadn’t even gone grizzly.
And then there was Hazel. She’d apparently leapt the quarantine barrier at just the right time.
As Delphine lunged to attack, Hazel had landed feetfirst on the wolf’s hard snout.
Wolf and woman had gone down in a tumble with Hazel coming out on top.
Frankie caught enough of the fight to see Hazel deliver three blows to Delphine’s face, hard impacts from her good hand.
“That’s for my arm,” Hazel said as she punched. “That’s for your ugly clothes. And that’s because you’re a bitch.”
Delphine’s wolf eyes rolled back into her head. Unconscious.
Great, but that was only the nearest of her brother’s allies.
Raoul had a lot more men around, and they’d been spoiling for a fight.
As Frankie quickly scanned the crowd, she counted a half dozen moving forward.
Most of them had been patrolling on the edge of the room, but now they stalked her.
Hazel adjusted her stance, preparing to fend them off.
Ryan flanked her on the opposite side. But then rescue came from an unexpected place.
“Stay back!” Raoul called out as he dug the needle from his neck. “There’s no point in fighting within the pack.”
Frankie exhaled, the relief in her body making her weak.
Her little brother was back. There was no other explanation for his sudden change in heart.
“Raoul,” she breathed, and there was joy in her voice.
Except he didn’t look at her with kindness.
What she saw on his face was pity, and that knocked the wind straight out of her sails.
“What was in this?” he asked, as he held the hypodermic.
“It’s from the CDC. It counteracts the aggression that comes from taking your serum.”
He rolled sideways, dislodging her knee.
She didn’t fight him. He appeared completely rational.
And as he sat up, he tossed the needle onto a nearby table.
“I haven’t taken any of that. Don’t need it.
” He pushed up to stand before her. “I’m a full wolf-shifter with a big brain and an implacable will.
Why would I need anything to push me to fight for the wolves every way I know how? ”
She stared at him. She saw no lessening of the darkness inside him. He stared at her with hate, and when he looked at the pack around them, he spoke calmly, clearly, and with enough alpha power in his voice to resonate through the pack link.
“I fight for the wolves against the bears who killed our beta. I fight for the wolves who are low in number and need new blood. I fight for the wolves who have been hiding in the shadows but now need to come out into the light of day. Did I give you vitamin serum? Yes. And you feel better for it! Did I declare war on the bears? Yes! We will not let them stop us! And when my own sister turns on us, I will deal mercifully with her out of the love we share for our father.”
Oh God. Oh no. He sounded completely rational, and her entire plan had hinged on the fact that he was addicted to his own serum.
But if that wasn’t so, then his madness was completely his own.
The horror of that squeezed her chest. And yet, she couldn’t give in to that pain. She had to fight for sanity.
“You attacked our father,” she cried. “We have the proof.”
“Lies!”
“You poisoned an entire city!” She looked around. “How many of you had friends who got sick? Businesses who suffered because the city shut down?”
“A temporary setback,” Raoul said loudly. “When werewolves take their rightful place—”
“The normals will hunt us, capture us, and kill us. Bad enough that he incites a war with bears, how will he protect your children when billions of frightened normal people come? He terrorized an entire city.” She looked around, her heart in her throat.
These were people she’d known all her life.
How could they not see what he was doing?
In the end, she held up her hands. “The pack has to choose. He incites war. I give you love. He sits in a lab and tinkers with chemicals. I help with your children, give support in times of need, and created a safe community center in which to gather. The pack has to choose. Hatred or a happily ever after?”
She thought the answer would be obvious. Who wouldn’t want a happily ever after? But as she studied their faces, she realized most of the pack didn’t think the way she did. Which meant she was doomed.