Chapter 12 #2
Neither of those things would happen under Mercer’s leadership, and I pitied the wolves subjected to it.
“How about you ask your escort there to take a step back and let us handle things the pack way.”
“Why would I do that,” Dane asked, having been invited into the conversation, “when she’s not a wolf?”
“Until she severs her ties to Sartori, she’s as good as a wolf.” Mercer’s smile gleamed. “Do you want to fight for her?” He looked me up and down. “Or did you bring your claws?”
Honestly, the thought hadn’t crossed my mind.
The silver claws I wore had been for protection.
Against my pack. I hadn’t required them while living among the Walshes, and with my dragon waking, and my ability to summon fire, I had felt confident leading this expedition without silver giving me an edge.
“You’ll wish I had fought you when she’s done with you.” Dane chuckled, dark and low. “But hey, it’s your funeral if you want to challenge her.” He pulled out his phone. “I’m happy to document your downfall for your pack’s enjoyment.”
A snarl pulled up Mercer’s lips, but I was too touched by Dane’s words to mind.
Boots smacking earth drew my attention beyond Mercer to where Seamus and the other enforcers emerged with blood smearing their cheeks.
Wolf claws and teeth had torn their skin, and their clothes.
They were all smiles, though. They looked quite proud of themselves as they formed a half circle behind Mercer, pinning him between them and me.
“The opposition has been crushed,” Seamus reported to me. “You handling this guy, or should I?”
“Take a number.” Dane tipped his head left to right, cracking his neck. “I call dibs.”
This mission was meant to be recon. I should have known better than to expect it to end peacefully.
But I hadn’t anticipated Mercer. Our doubts had proven fruitful that he let Carmichael go with a plan in mind, but I hadn’t foreseen this two-birds-one-stone solution to ridding himself of future competition.
“As enlightening as this has been,” Mercer said, “I have other matters to attend to before breakfast.”
Withdrawing a small device from his pocket, one about the size of a car fob, he smiled at me.
And mashed the big, round button right on the top.
An explosion rocked beneath us, and my heart dropped into my stomach.
“What have you done?” I searched the skies for smoke and found it quickly. “Where is Carmichael?”
“Buried under thirty feet of rubble, I imagine.” He yanked a charm from the collar of his shirt. I lunged to intercept but he was too fast. “I’m sure I’ll see you soon, Ana.”
Within seconds, his wolf ripped from his skin, aided by his instantaneous shift charm, and he bolted into the forest. Three enforcers gave chase, but it was a hopeless pursuit. They couldn’t beat a wolf on this terrain and couldn’t shift fast enough to counter him.
To my shock, Zoe stood her ground, her jaw set and hands lifted in surrender.
“What do you want to do?” Seamus set the question to me. “Can you still sense Sartori?”
With the steps engrained in me, I was able to find Carmichael faster than ever. Without my prior experience, I would have missed the fine thread binding us. His end was fraying, unraveling from mine.
“He’s dying. Fast. His healing can’t keep up with whatever damage has been dealt to him.” I clenched my fists. “Our connection is dissolving.”
“Follow the smoke.” Dane clasped my shoulder. “That will lead us to him.”
A tug of war raged in my heart, the little girl frantic she might lose her father raging against the woman who had accepted he was a curse and not a blessing in her life.
The easiest thing would be to do nothing.
Mercer killed him. We could prove it, if we recovered enough of the bomb to match it to the ones his people had set in Brentwood.
But could I live with myself if I allowed Carmichael to die?
“Let’s find out if he’s dead or alive.” Seamus stared down into my eyes. “Then you can decide what to do with him.”
Coward that I was, I was too grateful to argue the point.
He swept me away, and I was happy for someone else to take the lead and make the decisions.
Frail as my link was to Carmichael now, I struggled to point the way, and I kept seeing Sloane’s battered face in my mind.
I felt the slap of his hand across my cheek, the sting as real as if he had just lowered his hand.
Every ache and pain, every cut and bite, every sharp word or cold glance.
Those snippets flashed before my eyes like the final moments before death.
Had his life been reduced to a list of crimes against others, no one who heard it would pardon him.
“There.” Seamus indicated a smoking crater. “That’s got to be it.”
Dane ran ahead, touched the earth, then threw out a hand. “Stand back, all of you.”
“They’re still hot,” I realized, noticing the dense rock at his feet, which would store heat. “Let me help.”
Had I believed, for one second, Carmichael could survive those temperatures, the glance Dane shared with Seamus, and then me, confirmed only a dragon could hope to walk away from the oven Mercer created with his explosion.
Before my brain caught up to my body, I had palmed a large stone and hurled it aside. As it clattered several feet away, I reached for the next and the next and the next. I dug and scrabbled and cursed as my fingernails tore.
Only once I stood knee-deep in a hole of my own making did the filament bonding me to Carmichael Sartori since my earliest memories…
…break.
I sucked in deep gulps of air, but I couldn’t choke down enough oxygen. I radiated pain, shuddered with tremors, and fire crackled across my skin in response.
“We have to get her to Rían.” Dane, who was fireproof, caught me before my knees hit stone and lifted me in his arms. “She’ll go into shock if she doesn’t get clan support ASAP.”
“Hold on.” Seamus whipped out his phone. “He can fly here faster than we can drive her.”
Heat crackled and hissed, engulfing me, and my dragon did her best to explode from my chest and wrap me in her protective embrace.
“Fuck.” Dane set me down fast and stumbled back. “She’s too hot. I can’t touch her.”
“Hold on, Ana.” Seamus ventured as close as he dared. “Rían will be here soon.”
“Dad…” I wet my lips, and they split open. “He’s…”
“I’m sorry for your loss.” Seamus knelt, head bent. “Truly.”
He meant it. He regretted my pain. He respected my confusion.
But he was relieved Carmichael was dead. He made no attempt to hide that from me. Perhaps he was simply grateful that I hadn’t had to kill him, through words or deeds, myself.
I shouldn’t be so upset. I had known this was coming.
Hadn’t I? How else could it have ended? There was no other way to make him back down.
He wouldn’t have quit coming after me. Eventually, I would have ended up like my parents.
And, when he was done with me, Carmichael might have set his sights on the others.
Fayne, Rían, and Liam would have made for difficult targets, but Goldie…
I would have killed him without an ounce of hesitation or remorse if he had laid a hand on her.
And that made the conflict squirming within me that much harder to reconcile.
As my thoughts chased one another in circles, I huddled deeper and deeper into myself, ignoring the chaos unspooling around me.
“Ana.”
Time lurched forward again at the sound of my name, but I couldn’t find it in me to answer.
Hands grabbed at me, ripping me from my spiral, and voices mashed together into one soothing tone.
A weightless sensation swamped me as I was lifted and carried away to where a cool breeze kissed my skin, and then grassy dew was soaking through my pants.
“I’m here, bestie.” Sloane pulled my legs across her lap. “You’re going to be fine, okay?”
“Give me your hands.” Liam knelt at my hip. “We need to do this fast.”
“I’m going to move you just a bit.” Rían raised me until he could slide my upper body onto his lap. “There we go.” He stroked my cheeks with his thumbs, wiping away tears. “Are you ready?”
“Yes,” I rasped, throat sore from holding in sobs, the radiating agony tearing me to pieces.
Words that made no sense to me poured out of him, his accent worn and familiar around the sounds. The taste of copper filled my mouth. Blood? I wasn’t sure but swallowed eagerly. Questions, ones I could understand, drifted down to me in a soothing cadence.
The hurt receded enough for me to catch the smiles beaming down from the faces leaning over me as I finished the last words of a vow I could no longer recall.
A soft glow filled me, spilling out of my pores, and my dragon stretched her wings within me.
This was right. This was how it was meant to be. This was who I should have always been.
Had I ever doubted my parents belonged to this clan, that I had been born into it too, there was no denying the truth as the sensation of a snapped thread fusing together sang through me. The bond solidified, welcoming me home.
“Welcome to the clan.” Rían echoed my thoughts, kissing my forehead. “You’re a Walsh now.”
“You’re official.” Liam tousled my hair. “That means you owe me a drink.”
“I sense you again.” Sloane wriggled like a puppy. “I forgot how much I missed that feeling.”
“Mmm.” I did my best to get my mind back on track. “How did you all get here so fast?”
“We rode on Liam,” Sloane screamed loud enough to wake the dead. “Rían is too conspicuous, so it was Lizard Lips to the rescue.”
Wake the dead.
And just like that I was reminded I had been christened into a new clan above the grave of my old one.
“We’ll retrieve the body for you.” Rían pressed his forehead to mine. “We can bury Sartori wherever you’d like.”
“I won’t risk anyone for a retrieval when we know what they’ll find.” I breathed in Rían’s scent to soothe my ragged nerves. “The ground is unstable, and we can’t be sure that Mercer didn’t set more than one explosive.”
Bile rose up the back of my throat when it hit me how fast my mind had blanked, how quick I had been to hurry in and save him when I could have gotten myself killed with carelessness.
“There’s no rush.” Liam fiddled with his phone. “I’ve marked the site, so we can always come back if you change your mind.”
“Thanks.” I shut my eyes, and the warmth of connection with so many other souls washed over me, filling me, comforting me. “Can we go home now?”