Bearing It All (Alpha Werebear Shifter Paranormal Romance) (24 page)

Pain just wasn’t real high on his list of concerns right then.

He stood up on his back legs, pounding his chest with his paws, blood running down his arm. Every single time he saw Violet breathing, or twitching, or heard her whimper, he felt stronger, wilder,
angrier
.

“This is what I pay you two for,” Marlin said. “Deal with him, and do it fast, or you’ll be dealin’ with
me
, get it?”

Marlin pushed past the shrieking banshee and into her house, shaking his head.

“Oh shit,” Davis Edgewood said, fumbling with the catch on his shotgun. “No, no, no, I don’t want to do this!”

Ash caught him full in the side just as Davis managed to open gun to reload the thing. It flew about ten yards and skidded to a stop near Violet. One of the two slugs he’d been trying to load lay beside the weapon.

“I’ll get this one!” Erik shouted, crouching down and driving himself forward. He exploded through the brush and right into Darrel Edgewood’s stomach. The slack-faced bear had begun shifting when he saw Ash bludgeon his brother, but he was caught partway.

Ash looked over when he had Davis pinned, and gave Erik a nod as the wolf snapped his jaws in the bear’s face.

“What do we do with them?” Ash shouted as the Edgewood he had trapped started to thrash. “And can you see Violet?”

“She’s okay,” Erik shouted back, strain and effort shot through his voice. “But I can’t hold this idiot for much longer!”

Ash drew back a huge bear-paw fist and slammed it into Davis Edgewood’s jaw. The crunch was satisfying. Tendrils of something approaching pleasure snaked up Ash’s arm, and made the skin on his neck tingle a little with the second blow.

He took a look at Erik who must also have had some pent up anti-Edgewood aggression – either that, or he just really enjoyed beating on bad bears.

The tattoos around Ash’s eyes burned a little, like they always did when he was fighting. The collar with his brother’s pendant constricted, tight against his throat. With each savage, crunching blow, the rage that boiled in his heart subsided little by little.

“Ash?” he heard. It was a soft voice, a weak one. “Ash? Where are you?”

When she stood up, frail and weak looking and trembling with fear, Ash saw her, and entered an almost Zen-like state of being. His fists were still flying, but the carnal pleasure was gone. The rhythmic thud-thud of paw on flesh reverberated through him, but all he wanted was to know Violet was safe.

Darrell Edgewood had managed to somehow get enough leverage to roll out from under Erik and the two of them were staring each other down in the furriest Mexican standoff there had ever been when Violet started wandering toward them.

“You!” Leota shrieked. “You girl! Come here!”

Her voice carried loudly over all the grunting and swearing. “I won’t have you ruin my plans! I will save my daughter from being a trollop if it’s the last thing I do! I won’t have her acting like... like
you
.”

Suddenly, the Edgewood brothers didn’t matter. Marlin didn’t matter, and the pack of goons hiding in pickup trucks didn’t matter. Blood pounded in Ash’s temples.

When Davis Edgewood strained one last time to get out from under him, Ash gave him one more brutal swipe with a paw that made the gray-haired bear’s eyes roll back in his head.

The witch stepped off her front porch, and as Ash watched, began levitating about six inches off the ground. Waves of power slid off her like water shimmering over rocks in a river. She flung her hands back and forth, orange light streaming from her fingertips.

“Don’t make me... kill... you...” Leota snarled.

Wind whipped wildly through the woods, sending leaves and branches skittering across the ground.

Ash tried to push against the barrier of wind, tried to get at Leota, but there was nothing he could do. No amount of straining and groaning and roaring got him any closer. He dug his claw into the ground underneath himself. The winds were so powerful that he was being pushed backwards, leaving drag marks on the forest floor.

As the witch floated toward Violet, the whirling force field went too. Violet’s hair hung as it always did, in a gentle brown cascade over her shoulder.

“What in the hell is going on?” Erik shouted. “I don’t think she has the right permit for this!” Davis Edgewood took the opportunity to lunge at Erik, but just as he jumped, Leota took a turn toward Violet, and the winds whirling around shot Darrel Edgewood backwards, straight into a tree.

The bear stood right up, stiffened, and fell flat on his face.

“There’s more than one way to skin a bear,” Erik said, looking over at Ash. “Er, sorry.”

Ash shot him a grim smile, then turned his attention back to Violet who seemed to be held in some sort of trance.

“Is anyone else coming?” Ash asked as Erik slowly made his way over. “Those girls, they’re...”

“Hyenas,” Erik replied. “But who knows when. The girls are going to be fine though. We have to take care of this witch. If we don’t, she’s gonna pull half the forest down on our heads, and that is
not
something I want to deal with on a Thursday.”

A car horn honked.

Both Erik and Ash turned their heads in the direction it came from and exchanged a confused glance. “Do the hyenas drive old Explorers?” Ash asked before gritting his teeth and trying once again to force his way through the winds.

Erik grunted a laugh, but then the door of the car swung open, and one single, long, leg with furry-cuffed on one end and very,
very
short shorts poked out.

“Her daughter,” Erik said. “Or step, I guess.” He was gritting his teeth and growling the words. “I can’t remember her name, but—”

“
Jasmine!
” Leota hissed. “What are you doing here? Aren’t you supposed to be in class?”

The wind let up ever so slightly from the distraction and before he knew it, Ash had managed to push inside the swirling bubble.

“Decided to come home early this weekend. Class was a real bitch,” Jasmine shot back.

“Swearing!” Leota howled. “I...
hate
... swearing!”

Ash shot a glance at Violet, who was gasping and holding her throat.

“Help... me,” she said in stutters. “I’m choking, can’t... breath, my heart...”

Leota’s eyes flared when she turned back to Ash. “I’ll take care of you first, you—”

She cocked her head to the side when she finally got a good look at Ash’s face. “You’re not familiar to me, but those markings. “Are you a Morgan? Oh I had quite a time with one of you.”

“My... brother,” Ash growled, with his head low. “You scarred him. He never forgot.”

“I don’t see how he could,” she said, dismissively. “After all, he bounded in here like an idiot, interrupting a ritual. I seem to recall it was... Oh yes,” she turned to Violet. “This isn’t the first time I’ve laid eyes on
this one
either.” She narrowed her dark green eyes to slits.

Violet started thrashing, clawing at her neck like she couldn’t breathe, as Leota stepped closer.

“You can... stop... this...” Violet croaked. “Please... please!”

“Let her down, Leota,” Erik growled as he pushed through the storm. “You’re going to jail either way, but if you hurt her, it’ll be for a lot longer.”

“You can’t do that to me, pup!” Leota said, pointing a long, gnarled finger at Erik. “I don’t care
who
you are. You’re a baby. You’re nothing to me. I’ve been here longer than ten generations of your family. Why would you ever think you were a threat to me?”

“Leota?” Jasmine said, stumbling into the clearing and stepping over a falling Edgewood bear. “Why... what is this? What’s going on?”

“Stay back!” Erik ordered. “Don’t come any closer! She’s dangerous, pissed off, and at least half crazy.”

Violet made another gagging sound.

“If
you
come any closer, I’ll drown your little fox,” Leota said.

“Drown her?” Ash said. “But there’s no water, how—”

On cue, Violet started gagging and gasping for air.

“Leave her alone!” Erik and Ash both shouted.

The witch just twisted her hand and then as Violet began to thrash, she twisted her thin lips into a crooked smile. “
You
leave,” she said. “Or the girl goes in the pot with all the others.”

“Do you think she’s telling the truth?” Ash whispered to Erik. “Or is this some kind of play?”

“Does it
look
like a play?” Erik shot back. “We just need something to distract her. Anything at all.”

Distant sirens in the background hit both Ash and Erik’s sensitive ears at the same time.

“Good,” Erik said, “but not fast enough. They’re still three or four miles away and she doesn’t have that long. What we need is—”

“Leota! Hey-ho, neighbor!”

Jenga Cranston, oblivious to the world, wobbled out from behind Leota’s house. “How do, there. Oh – uh, hey alpha,” he said when he saw Erik. “I’ve been real careful about keeping my zombie perfumed. Though I have to say, he don’t much like being called a zombie. Ain’t that right, Atlas? Atlas? Where’d you go?”

Shrugging his shoulders dramatically, the jingly-bearded witchdoctor smiled and wandered forward, then rammed straight into the swirling winds and looked exactly like a cocker spaniel who rammed into a clean glass door.

“What in the hell? Wait a minute,” he said. “Just what’s going on here? Atlas? Where did you go? Damn it all!”

Ash and Erik both tensed. The muscles in their necks, in their forearms and their back legs were all taut and hard, waiting to pounce. Leota’s eyes flicked back and forth from those two to Violet and then to Jenga for a second.

“Don’t come any closer! Stay back!” Leota screeched. “I’ll burn you all to cinders!”

The swirling winds calmed, and for a second, Ash thought he was going to have his chance. But then, intense, brutal heat pushed him backward. Every breath he took filled his lungs with boiling, steaming pain.

“Come on, Atlas!” Jenga said loudly. “Our neighbor ain’t bein’ so neighborly. Let’s go home!”

“But... I... found... this.”

Atlas stepped out from behind Leota’s hut with a
very
irritated crocodile suspended four feet off the ground. Marlin’s half-shifted, stumpy legs were flailing around. Helplessly, he punched at Atlas’s giant arm.

“What... is... it?”

The sirens were getting closer. Erik shot a look over at Ash. “A minute,” he said. “Maybe less, and they’ll be here. But this heat, she’s going to kill us all before they get here. Any other time, I’d be cracking a joke about that guy wiggling around in the zombie’s hand, but I’m thinking this isn’t the best time for witty quips.”

Ash’s fur was starting to curl. A few more seconds and it would start to burn. Once that happened...

“No!” Ash roared, lunging forward when Leota looked over at Marlin’s squirming. “You can kill me, but you won’t hurt her! Or them!”

When his head hit the witch in the chest and she flew backwards, there was a moment of utter, absolute silence. A wave of heat burst out of Leota’s jarred body and thudded heavily against Ash, sending him to the ground.

He blinked, but when he closed his eyes, he couldn’t open them again. Every fiber of his being felt like it was being ripped apart, like he was going through a black hole and coming out a string of spaghetti. But then, it just all stopped at once.

The blood running down his arm, running down his chest, and the wave of power that just knocked him to the ground were almost too much. He couldn’t see, couldn’t hear. He could barely feel anything but the heavy, impending darkness swirling around him.

Ash took a breath and it stung.

He took another, and it hurt even worse. He moaned and clutched his ribs. Sore, definitely. Broken? It was possible.

Sirens.

Closer. Almost there. One last time, he opened his eyes and saw Erik stirring. He pushed himself to one knee, then to his feet. That zombie was still standing in place, holding Marlin, and kind of laughing at him, but Marlin was just hanging there, limp.

Erik was pulling Violet to her feet as Ash’s grip on reality started to slip.

The sirens were still going, but there were people all around. Cages opening, people crying. All around him, there was absolute chaos, but all Ash could think about was... love, for once. Not revenge.

––––––––

“A
sh?” I whispered. “Ash? Are you with me? You in there?”

I tore a strip off my shirt and wadded it up, stuffing it into the gunshot on his shoulder. He didn’t flinch. No reaction at all.

“Vio... let?” he gasped, and rolled over to his side. “Is that you?”

He coughed and then groaned in pain. I stroked his bloody, beautiful face and stared into his fluttering eyes.

“Yeah,” I whispered and bent to kiss him gently on the cheek. “I’ve got you, Ash.”

“Are my... are my legs still on me?”

I couldn’t help but giggle. “Yeah, legs, check. So are your arms. And,” I paused to count. “Yep, all your fingers are accounted for too.

“Lips?” he asked.

Smiling, I stooped over and touched his lips with my fingertip. “Yeah,” I said softly. “There they are.”

“Make sure,” he whispered.

Even with the ash and soot and dirt all over his face, the taste of Ash’s lips warmed me from head to toe. When he lifted his arm and I felt those fingertips curl on my back, I let out a soft gasp. “I guess your hands work,” I said, pulling away from his beautiful lips for just a moment.

He took a slow, deep breath that rattled a little. “Am I cut up?” he asked.

I shook my head. “Whatever she did, it just knocked the ass out of everyone. I think Erik got a couple nasty bruises from some flying debris, but nothing too bad. You got the worst of it, but...”

I couldn’t say it. I couldn’t face the fact that about five minutes ago I was seconds from dying. Then I saw his eyes again, his soft, beautiful, dark brown eyes, and suddenly instead of shaking from fear, I was trembling with something else entirely.

“If you hadn’t done that, I’m pretty sure we would all have been incinerated.”