Desert Wolf (3 page)

Once upon a time, Faust preferred to settle every argument with his fists. Higher education and a simple dedication to improving himself taught him rational measures, control, and channeling his fury into personal power. The combination of dominance and skill made him a fierce Hound and a ferocious defender. The rage poured into her, igniting her wolf and erasing the tiredness from her system.

“Luv, you’re no fighter.”

“No, but I am a wolf.” She reached for the door handle, riding the buzz of his rage. Reflecting him would give her the power to fight, even if she had no real taste for bloodshed.

Stepping out into the hot, dry air she caught the wild scents of aggression surrounding them. More than the seven in front of her or the dozen circling on four feet—the stench of anger, excitement and even fear tainted every breath she took. How many did they have? Faust joined her, one step ahead and body blocking her from the immediate threat. He couldn’t protect her from all sides.

“Stay at my back.” He kept his voice low, almost silent, not that it mattered. Their welcoming committee didn’t seem interested in what they had to say.

“Of course.” Fucking animals. What the hell did they hope to prove with their overwhelming show of force? No one stepped forward to speak for the group. In fact, they seemed torn between their aggression and their fear. Heart slamming against her ribs, she studied the group ranging around them. The circle had almost closed.

“Ah, luv, I think my diet of not killing assholes is about to end.” The calmness of Faust’s voice seemed utterly at odds with their situation. A faint click echoed loud against her ears—he’d thumbed off the safety on the gun.

“Worse case scenario? Let’s try to keep one alive.” She raised her voice. “I need to know who is behind the little party, so I know who to thank.”

“Aren’t we the blood thirsty wench?” Faust’s comment faded beneath a roar as three wolves strode from the surging crowd. Shirtless, they strutted forward in all their tatted and pierced glory. Not one of those facing them was the Alpha.

“You’re trespassing on Sutter Butte territory, bitch.” The first one dropped his verbal gauntlet. Under the faint moonlight, his dark skin gleamed with sweat running in rivulets along his arms. “Delta Crescent has no place here.”

“We’re going to tear you apart.” The second added.

Then the third slammed one meaty fist into the open palm of his other hand. “We’ll send the pieces home to remind all of you, no one invades Sutter Butte. We don’t want your kind here.”

“
Tuat t'en grosse bueche.
” She didn’t spit, despite the desire. The pompous threats, the posturing? Were they peacocks showing off for her or an actual threat?

“What the hell does that mean?” The first one demanded, and Faust chuckled. The soft thread of his humor punctured their riot. An uneasy silence spread across the crowd.

“She said you have a big mouth.” Faust grinned. “I agree. May the lamb of God stir his hoof through the roof of heaven and kick you in the arse down to hell.”

The wolf nearest her side lunged forward, his a knife flashing in his clenched fist. Sovvan reacted, blocking with her right arm and stepping inside his reach. Years of training with the Hounds assigned to her paid off as she wrapped her body around body the assailant and rolled him, then slammed his head into the pavement. Blood scented the air, like chum in the waters, but she was already on her feet and the assailant—and his knife—were down.

“Not bad,” Faust complimented her. “Next time, break his damn neck.” He never glanced at the downed wolf, his attention fastened on the so-called leaders. A ripple of noise shivered through the crowd. “What? You thought she’d roll over and let you attack? Poor bastards, sorry to disappoint.”

The sentence seemed to pull the last trigger on their patience. The wolves rushed them—howling, screaming and furious. The world narrowed to the wolves racing toward her. Reflecting the rage-drunk of Faust’s temper, she slammed the flat of her palm upward and shattered the nose of one attacker. Another slammed into her midsection, taking her down. Gripping the wolf, she searched him and found his flaw—indecision and a lack of confidence. Flinging it into his face, she winced as his yell turned into a whimper. Wrenching away from him, she blocked another blow and then took out the legs of her attacker. Every time one grabbed her, she locked her body around them, throwing off their balance or she struck a joint. Bones crunched, blood spilled and the side of her face throbbed.

Her training never prepared her for waves of attackers. So far, she’d managed to avoid the worst of the injuries, but two cuts on her arm bled freely. Weakness swam through her extremities. Blood loss could be terminal, and a distant part of her brain recognized the symptoms. Blocking another blow, she struck blindly—groin, elbow, ear—shockingly hitting the ear hard enough sent most wolves to their knees. The stapes, a very tiny bone, shattered with a decent amount of force and would throw off their balance.

A neck snapped behind her, and she jerked around. Faust finished off another attacker, the stack of bodies at his feet sickening, yet none rushing from his side reached her. The speed at which he dispatched them served as a testament to his skill.

Too late, she realized the mistake of letting his battle distract her. An arm locked around her neck and hauled her backwards. Digging her claws into the forearm gripping her, she shredded the flesh and pierced muscle. The wolf she assaulted snarled, but didn’t release her. The force crushing her throat cut off her air supply. Terror swamped her, foreign terror, and she closed her eyes and reached for her wolf. A shift would be brutal, but survival demanded it. The beast keeping her captive suddenly released her in a wrench of sick, wet bone, and she hit the pavement.

Rolling onto her knees, she found a vicious blonde man holding the spine of her attacker—the man’s body at his feet. All around her wolves began to scream—and then run. Like a wild, bloody Celt from some film of the ancient fighters, the blond warrior launched himself into the war. Body after body hit the earth, and the stench of death polluted the air.

Torn between changing and watching, Sovvan stared at the blond as he tore the others apart. Faust fell back a step from the battle as even those hardy few who tried to vanish into the woods met the same gruesome fate.

“That…” Faust panted as he glanced her over, then grasped her hand and lifted her to her feet. “Would be the brutal bastard, Cassius, bless the fucking lunatic’s black heart.”

Oh.

Shit.

F
ury thundering in his veins
, Cassius savaged the last of the ambushers. Nostrils flared, he scanned the surrounding woods for movement even as he tested the air and listened. Too often wolves made the mistake of trusting one sense over the other, but he’d gotten wise to that weakness years before. A shift in the wind could disguise a scent, and a clever wolf didn’t make a sound if he didn’t want to be noticed. Violently aware of every wolf in the area, he tested pack bonds. He located his allies—Bianca. Jose. Cyril. They weren’t alone though.

The Delta Crescent wolves…a rock skittering over the dirt alerted him a second before the child darted away from a rest stop decorative boulder. Pouncing, he snatched the kid by his jacket and jerked him backwards. The poor thing pissed himself then covered his face with his arms.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry!” The hiccupy sobs effectively doused Cassius’ temper. The kid couldn’t be more than eight or nine years old. Disgust coiled in his gut. Which one of these morons brought their pup with them? Turning the child away from the slaughter, he set the boy down but kept him in place with a hand on his shoulder.

“Name?”

With a loud sniffle as tears tracked through the dirt on his cheeks, the boy raised his chin. Stubbornness vibrated around him in waves. Darting his gaze upward, he tried to hold Cassius’ glare, then jerked away.

Blowing out a breath, Cassius stuffed all of his fury down into a box and slammed the lid on it. Dropping to a crouch, he gave the boy’s shoulder a squeeze. His wolf was in a killing rage, but even the animal understood the need to protect the young. Between them they worked to soothe and calm. “What is your name?”

“If I tell you,” the child said, his lower lip quivering as another fat tear streaked the dirt on his face. “You’ll kill my parents.”

Chances were, he’d already killed them if both had been present. “Possibly,” Cassius said, choosing the words carefully. Some fool brought him to a kill box, set the child up to witness a slaughter. Though they’d intended to be the ones meting out the destruction, the boy still saw all of it or at least heard it. As it was, he had to be smelling it.

Cassius needed information and he needed it immediately. Jose and Cyril had parked their vehicles and made their way across the grass toward them. The mess had to be dealt with and erased. No one needed to know what happened at the rest area.

“I need your name and where you’re from.”

He shrugged—difficult for the boy to execute with the weight of the Alpha’s hand on him, but he did it anyway. “I don’t know.”

Not a lie, but not the full truth, either. They didn’t have time for this.

“Tell me your name.” The order wrapped around the child, and he fought it even with his shaking chin and fresh tears spilling from his eyes.
Tough little shit.
Under all the grime was a set of delicate features.

“Josh,” said the boy. No, not a boy. Cassius scowled, as the lie in the child’s voice scraped across his senses like a slap. “Maddy,” the kid confessed and
her
shoulders began to quake as she shook. “Maddy Shannon.” No longer fighting her sobs, the little girl’s grief tinged fear overwhelmed her. Cassius caught her before she crumpled then lifted her into his arms and stood. Pressing her face to his shoulder, he released the last of the rage simmering in his gut.

“Go to sleep, Maddy.” The command combined with her emotional exhaustion silenced her crying, but not the tears. They continued to run damp against his skin, mingling with the blood of his pack.

Carrying her past the destruction, he eyed the Delta Crescent pair. The woman—Sovvan—he knew by reputation only. She fought like a hell beast, or had until something distracted her. His wolves knew better than to turn their back on a battle. If he’d been a split second later, she would be dead and he’d have a ration of shit to deal with on the Serafina front, not to mention it would’ve torpedoed his plans for Sutter Butte.

Wild golden eyes met his. Her wolf didn’t shy away, not even a little bit. Blood slicked her cheek, and an open cut above her swollen right eye dripped blood. Scrapes and cuts littered one arm, while both of her hands showed signs of injuries, with scabs trying to coat her knuckles. He inventoried the damage, all the way down to her bare feet. From the colorful, silk blouse shredded by claws and giving him a glimpse of her black bra to her loose, yoga pants, which had been sliced from hip to knee, baring her thigh.

Most of the harm seemed to be relatively on the surface. She still breathed, and her heart still beat. Meeting her gaze once more, he inclined his head. “Sovvan Stark of Delta Crescent, I bid you welcome to Sutter Butte. From this point forward, you are under my protection and your safe haven I will guarantee with my life’s blood.”

“If this is how you welcome people you invite, I’d hate to see how you treat invaders.” A provocative mix of black leather, patchouli, smoky incense and sweet vanilla—all cloaked in musk and eerily mysterious—teased his nostrils, chasing away the stench of death, blood and injury. “Or maybe you changed your mind and forgot to mention it?” The verbal slap aggravated his already pissed off wolf.

“Lady, when I make a decision, you’ll know.” Cradling the back of Maddy’s head, he shifted the little girl so he wouldn’t disturb her with his snarl. “Like the fact I decided not to let your stupidity get you killed.”

“Watch your mouth, Cassius.” Faust inserted himself between them. “Alpha or not, Sovvan is not your punching bag. You guaranteed her safety when you invited her, and you made an oath to
my
Alpha regarding her safety—an oath you failed to honor with this greeting party.”

The Hound irked him nearly as much as the woman. Whistling once, he signaled the all clear to Bianca. Even suspecting the ambush, he’d not accounted for the sheer number gathered to the battle. He’d slid the bike to a halt at the entrance to the rest stop, left Bianca with his bike and raced into the fray.

Had they been there as witnesses? Or had mob mentality seized them? With only Maddy as a survivor so far, he had no one to question.
Maybe I should have left one alive…

“Pity none are alive,” Sovvan said, wiping at the blood on her cheek. Despite the weariness in her voice, her tone still carried a combative note. “We could have asked them what the purpose of your stunt was.”

“Sovvan,” Faust said under his breath, but the woman wasn’t listening to him. She staggered a step then crouched to check for a pulse. Finding none, she rose and stumbled on to the next. “Sovvan,” he repeated, then caught her arm. She jerked away from him with a snarl and Faust’s expression tightened as he raised his palms.

Jose and Cyril trailed Bianca. Smart wolves may have been a few minutes behind him, but defending their healer took precedence. The healer did her best not to look at the carnage, but her distress pulled at him as fiercely as Sovvan’s anger annoyed him. “Take the child,” he told Bianca, even as he glanced at Jose. “Stay with them both.”

“What about…?” Bianca’s attention went to the mad Omega checking body after body.

“Leave her. When she calms, she’ll need you.” The last thing his healer needed to deal with was an infuriated Omega. Fortunately for all involved, Bianca didn’t argue as she took charge of the slight weight of a child. The little one’s presence at the ambush incensed him all over again. Had the pack fallen so far that they didn’t even protect the weakest among them?

Fire burns, but it also makes us malleable. If you don’t forge the next generation in fire, what will happen to them?
Ignoring the echo of the past playing on a loop in his head, he pointed a finger at Cyril while he tracked Bianca’s movements away from the death box. “Bring your people in. Sanitize the location. Identify all the bodies, catalog what they have with them—return all personal items to their kin.” He wouldn’t wait for notification. As soon as Bianca and the child were out of sight, he returned to inspecting the bodies, memorizing the faces. Some he knew, some were too young to have participated in a previous Reaping—though a handful had been present.

“Alpha?” Cyril had his phone in his hand, but he wasn’t calling or texting anyone. Instead he stared after the Omega.

The wolf continued to weave from body to body like a drunken sailor. Her faithful Hound trailed her, not interfering in whatever the fuck she was doing. “Ignore her and do what you were told.” Cassius didn’t have a lot of time. If Faust couldn’t get her in hand before they had to go…
I’ll what? Assault her?

The attempt to contravene his orders indicated a full-fledged rebellion within Sutter Butte. Cyril Quintero shook his head. Whether in disbelief or denial, Cassius didn’t know or care. The wolf obeyed him, issuing orders to those answering the phone. The Quinteros had a fortune invested in trucking companies—refrigerated trucks which carried supplies from one end of the desert to the other. They transported everything from meats and vegetables to dry goods. In this case, carcasses. One face caught his attention as he nudged the body over onto its back.

Son of a bitch…
The wolf staring sightlessly up at him was Jose’s son. “Cyril.”

The other wolf told whomever he spoke to, to wait. “Yes, Alpha?”

“Have a care with them all.” Jose told him he’d sent his son home, but what if he’d had more than one son involved? The boy before him couldn’t be more than seventeen or eighteen.
Children.

They’d sent children to fight. Rising, he glared at the bodies and returned to his own pacing off of the fallen. Closer to the epicenter of the action he found their
leaders
—but none of the three wolves with their throats torn out were skilled enough to coordinate such a blatant rebellion against his authority.

Several of the downed wolves had bullets in them. Who the hell brought a gun to a wolf fight? Sovvan let out a gasp, and he was at her side before he’d even half-acknowledged the sound.

“This one’s alive,” she said, arm outstretched.

If he’d hadn’t shed his jacket on the way to the fight, he would have brushed her arm aside. As it was, he snapped at her Hound. “Stop her.”

Faust caught her wrist and Cassius knelt into the blood-damp earth next to the body. The woman was between twenty or twenty-five, with stringy blonde hair. He could barely make out her features because gore caked her face. Cupping her cheek, he swiped away some of the grime with his thumb. “Give me your name.” Her life force responded to his call, the sense of her barely there—a single, frayed thread.

“Eileen,” the girl whispered. Yes, girl. Even if she were twenty-five years old, she seemed a tiny, delicate thing. Not a Hunter or fighter, yet corded muscle stretched over her petite frame. She’d been training. The name tickled an old memory in the back of his mind, but he ignored it in favor of her.

“Family name?”

“None.”

None? Cassius frowned. Could they save the girl—Bianca was near enough and his strength could anchor her. “You have no family?” Had they rejected her?

“Out—sider.” Blood bubbled at her lips, and then she gripped his arm as her milky eyes opened. No, he couldn’t save her. Life fled her too swiftly and she knew. “No…more…reaping.” Her last breath rattled in her chest, and she released him.

Behind him, Sovvan made an aggrieved sound. He passed his hand over Eileen’s eyes, closing them before glancing at the Omega. Her golden eyes still burned with ferociousness, but her expression seemed more devastated than angry. “Why did they attack us?”

“That’s a stupid question.” He rose, the reek of death would follow him for days. So much of it needless, yet those who would challenge his authority and outright rebellion could not be allowed to survive.
To save many means I must sacrifice some.

“For someone who wanted me here, so much so you made numerous promises to my Alpha, you are very rude.”

“I also just killed wolves who belonged to me to protect you.” He had no time for her womanly vapors. Omegas were powerful tools, and Sovvan one of the strongest he knew of, but she needed to adjust her expectations and get up to speed quickly or Sutter Butte would eat her alive. Ignoring her for the moment, he focused on Faust. “Get her in your vehicle, pull around the bodies, and meet me at the entrance. I’ll have my healer look you two over and then we’re back on the road.”

“Alpha,” Cyril interrupted. Did the wolf need him to hold his damn hand and sing kumbaya, or could he not do his job?

“What?” That child shouldn’t have been in the kill box. None of them should.

“My trucks will be here within the hour. Do you want to tell Jose about Andreas or should I?”

Andreas Garcia.
Dammit.
Cassius shook his head once. “I’ll do it.” He owed Garcia that much. The man sent his son away and brought word of the rebellion to him at great personal expense. Cassius would have been within his rights to execute them on the spot.

“As you wish.” The flip nature of his tone grated like sandpaper on an open wound. Especially when neither Sovvan nor her Hound moved to do as he’d instructed.

“You seem very blasé about this, Cyril.”

The other wolf shrugged, then his gaze tracked past Cassius to the Omega. “I am hoping
she
is worth the cost you have committed us to, as this is only the down payment.”

“If you don’t like it, you know the answer.”

“I haven’t needed a Reaping in years, Alpha.” Cyril spread his hands wide, surrendering the field. “I see no reason to engage you on that field. I will follow—as will all Quinteros. Ours have not chosen the path of the Outsider. Not yet.”

He nodded once. “See to it they don’t.” If they did… Well, Cassius didn’t have to tell the other man what would happen. The pack had been borne in blood, honed in fire, and would be reborn in blood. They would grow stronger, form bonds and turn their indestructible will towards building a more unified pack.

Sovvan and Faust had yet to take a step when Cassius rounded on them. “What are you waiting for? An engraved invitation?”

“No.” Despite her shattered composure, the Omega didn’t give an inch. “I want to know what the hell you’re doing and what you expect me to do about it before I go another step. I have blood on my hands and I haven’t had to fight for my survival in years and never to this extent.”