Every Dawn Forever (14 page)

They lunged at each other, wounds visible on both males, their coats dark with blood in places.  Crux rolled over top of her former mate and snapped his jaw around his throat, but the wolf
was too fast and kicked away, causing Crux to lose his grip.  If Crux saw her he didn’t let on, his eyes entirely focused on his opponent as they both panted for breath.

Creeping forward, she settled her body low and kept her finger on the button of the ant spray.  Her only hope was to blind her former mate
. 
Gathering her courage, she ran forward and leapt onto the wolf’s
back, squeezing the button of the spray directly in front of his eyes.  She held her breath as the chemical cloud bloomed in front of his
face, holding on tightly as he bucked under her like a bronco, whining and coughing.  He
tossed her off and she hit the floor, her head cracking hard, making her vision go fuzzy for a moment.  Even partially blinded, he
knew where she was.  Her former mate stepped towards her, his
head low and his growl a warning that she was not going to make it out of the den alive.  But Crux snapped onto his back leg and jerked hard.  Her former mate went down to the floor and his jaws snapped in surprise, but it didn’t last.  The wolf leapt onto her, his
paws bracing her shoulders, his thick claws digging in.  She went to throw up her hand to protect herself and found she was still holding the can.  He
clearly couldn’t see right, so when he snapped his jaws at her, she shoved the can in his mouth, his fangs scraping the top of her hand.  He flexed his jaws on the can and it crunched slightly, and she shoved against his chest with all her might, hoping to unseat him, but it was no use.  The can clattered to the floor next to her, and the dark growl came back.

Closing her eyes, she wished she’d told the guys that she loved them.  That she hadn’t waited all this time to share her feelings for them.

A guttural grunt sounded and her eyes popped open to witness Crux tearing her ex’s
throat out.  Blood welled from the gaping wound.  She shoved against his chest again and he went down.  His eyes were wild and blood bubbled up from the wound.  Crux went for his neck again and before he latched onto it, Sydney looked into her former mate’s eyes and said, “Goodbye forever, asshole.”

There was a cracking sound as Crux broke his neck, and the light went out of his eyes.

Sitting back on her heels, she put her head in her hands and wept.

Hands touched her and she shrieked in alarm, but it was Crux in his human form.  “Baby, are you hurt?”

She latched onto his neck with both hands.  “No!  Yes!  I don’t know!”

He lifted her off the floor and carried her over to the bed, which had a long tear in the center of it.  “He’s dead, love.  That’s all that matters.  Alyssa!” he called loudly.  “It’s safe, come out.”

The bathroom door clicked open and Alyssa came racing out, looking around wildly and then crying out when she found Mason.

“Are you hurt?  I saw blood.”  Sydney demanded as he sat next to her.

“I’m good.  Don’t worry about me.”

She laughed and the tears poured from her eyes.  “Can’t help it.  I love you.”

He went very still and then pulled her into his arms.  With his lips against her ear he said roughly, “I love you, too, Syd.”

Relief flooded through her, battling with the residual fear.  From up above, voices shouted in alarm, but Sydney knew it was her other men returning.  Heavy footsteps pounded down the stairs rapidly and when the cluster of men stopped at the bottom of the stairs and witnessed the destruction, they froze for a brief moment.  And then the groups split up, Alyssa’s clan joining her where Mason had shifted and was trying to stand up from the ground, and Orion and Sterling racing to her, while Nyte and his clan looked down at her former mate’s dead body.

She made the motion to stand up, but Orion and Sterling dropped to their knees in front of her.  They both sported bruises and cuts on their faces and bodies like Crux, but they were smiling in spite of the grim scene.

No one in their group spoke for a long moment, and then she said, “I was afraid I wasn’t going to get to tell you both that I love you.”

Although worry remained in their eyes, they both grinned simultaneously.  She felt like crying all over again, but for an entirely different reason, when they told her they loved her, too, and were glad she was safe.

“She’s not only okay,” Crux said with pride, “she’s a warrior at heart.”

Sterling growled, darting a glare to Crux.  “Why wasn’t she locked away in the back and out of harm’s way?”

Sydney leaned forward and draped her arms across Sterling’s shoulders, pressing her forehead to his.  “I was with Alyssa in the bathroom but then I heard someone get hurt and I didn’t think about myself, I just wanted it to end.”

Nyte said from the center of the room, “What’s up with the bug spray?”

She started to laugh, burying her face in Sterling’s neck as Crux related her bug-spray defense to the room.

Sterling’s hands moved slowly up and down her back.  “Are you really okay, Little One?”

“I am now.”

Orion said, “Let’s get our sweetheart out of the basement.”

Sterling stood and took her with him, cradling her against his chest.  Over his shoulder, she saw that Mason was standing with the help of his brothers and Fade had grabbed a blanket from the back of the couch and covered up
his
body.  Sterling carried her up the stairs and through the broken door. 
He
had smashed through the bottom of the door, underneath the steel bars, after disabling the alarm system, and came down into the den in his shifted form.

She heard Orion tell Crux that they had found the males, all in their wolf forms, in the woods near Dante’s home and they smelled her scent on one of the wolves.  They assumed it was her former mate and had given chase deep into the woods.

“Sterling nailed the bastard, but when we searched his body, we found strips of cloth tied around his legs that smelled like Sydney.  We knew we’d been duped into following the group away from the house.  Sterling and I came back here as fast as we could, and found the den door broken.”

While Orion and Crux talked about the wolves that had shown up, Sterling squeezed her a little tighter.  “I thought we’d lost you, Little One.”

She shivered and hugged herself closer to him.  “I was afraid to lose you, too.”

He sat down on the couch in the family room and settled her on his lap.  The others filed into the room, Orion and Crux joining them on one couch, and Dante and his clan on the other.  Nyte sat on the edge of the coffee table, his brothers behind him.  “It’s finished,” Nyte said solemnly, looking at Orion.

“What?”  Sydney asked.

Orion turned his head slowly and reached for her hand.  Kissing the top, he looked at her and said, “They’re all dead.  There were six wolves in the woods that we killed, and then your former mate in the basement.”

She frowned and Crux asked what was wrong.

“I was just wondering who came with my former mate.”  Pressing her lips into a thin line, she looked at her three mates.  It was funny what a near-death experience had taught her about what was important.  Like not wasting time.  Or holding in emotions.  Or honesty.  “I’d like to see the wolves that are dead.”

Orion reeled back as if she had struck him, and Sterling and Crux both bared their teeth in displeasure.  She put up her hands.  “I need to see who came with him.  If his father isn’t among them, then he’s going to retaliate and we need to be prepared.  But honestly, I don’t think he would have let
him
come up here alone, and I fully expect to find his mangy carcass.”

Crux chuckled.  “See?  I told you she was a warrior.”

Dante cleared his throat.  “Sydney, it’s the tradition of our people to burn the bodies of those that have come against us.  It not only honors our ancestors, but it keeps things simpler where human police are concerned.”

“I understand.”

He nodded.  “Good.  We need to get the bodies to the fire pit.  If you want to see them before they’re burned, you can do it when we put them in.”

Dante’s and Nyte’s clans left and Sydney was alone with her guys again.

“Are you sure, sweetheart?”  Orion asked.

“I need to see it for myself.”

Sterling stood, lifting her in his arms as if she weighed nothing, and said, “Let’s get this done so we can put our mate to bed.”

“Bed?” she asked.

He growled, his eyes flashing.  “For rest.  We still have a lot of talking to do before anything other than sleeping happens between us.”

“Yes, Sterling,” she whispered, and he groaned.

By the time they walked through the woods to the fire pit, a pile of dead wolves was on one side of the clearing and the hyenas stood on the other.  Alyssa and Mason were missing, because Mason was still a little beat up and Alyssa didn’t want to see wolves’ bodies burned, even if they deserved it.  Sydney understood.  She didn’t really want to see it either, but she felt compelled to watch them come to their end.

The fire in the pit had died.  With her men surrounding her, she walked to the dead wolves and looked at them in the light of the moon.  Her former mate, who no longer held any claim to her body, lay at the front of the wolves, his throat torn open and his eyes open but unseeing.  Just behind him lay a gray and white wolf.  She said, “That’s the alpha behind the one who mated me against my will.  My former mate was the only heir and relation to the alpha, so there will be no one to avenge either of their deaths.  The others are the best fighters and guards.”  In a way she knew all the wolves like family, but they were still strangers.  There hadn’t been any friendship or kindness offered to her.  They had known of her brutal treatment and never raised a hand to help her.  They were her former mate’s friends, highly ranked in the pack, and valued in the alpha’s eyes for their own brutality.  She hadn’t ever wondered if others in the pack were treated as she was, because she had felt alone for such a long time, but now she wondered if the mates of these men had been treated as she had.  If so, then they were free, as well.

Lifting her head, she howled at the sky.  Around her, the other males lifted their voices, joining her in celebration of the first real day of her new life.

Free.  Truly free.

Several hours later, as she sat with the guys on the back porch, she tried to hide her yawn behind her hand, but Sterling saw it.  “Time to go to bed, Little One.”

They’d come back to the house after the wolves had been tossed into the fire pit, drenched in accelerant, and then topped with more logs.  Orion had given her a long piece of kindling and a lighter, allowing her to start the blaze.  After lighting the kindling, she touched the pile of bodies and wood and the flame spread fast, licking at the accelerant.  Within minutes, the fire pit was blazing so hotly that they had to move away from the heat.  She hadn’t been able to take her eyes off the bodies.  Although gruesome to watch, a part of her mind wanted this final proof that they were dead. 
Him
.  His father.  If Katharine hadn’t given up, she would now be free, too.  But she had found her own freedom, and although it made her sad to think of now, Sydney understood.

The clans were taking turns watching over the pit.  When a wolf was killed in its wolf form, it stayed that way forever.  If a human happened to stumble upon the fire pit, it would just appear they were burning animal carcasses.  Which in this case was an apt description.  There really wasn’t anything human about the males that had come for her.

Through the trees she could see a faint orange glow.  It was mesmerizing.  Sterling lifted her into his arms and carried her inside their home.

“I’m not tired,” she said, punctuating the statement with a yawn.

“Sure you’re not.  So humor me and let me take care of you.”

“If you insist.”

“I do.  And so do my brothers.”

When a bedroom door opened, she realized that they had taken her into Orion’s room, which was the master.  Orion pulled back the covers and Sterling laid her down.  “Sterling and I are going to take a shift at the fire pit.  Crux will stay here with you and we’ll be back in a few hours.  Try to rest, sweetheart.”  Orion leaned over and kissed her gently, and then Sterling kissed her and they were gone.

Her hands fumbled at the button on her shorts from a mixture of exhaustion and nerves.  Crux said, “Let me help you, baby.”

With nimble fingers, he stripped off her clothes, slipped a clean shirt over her head, and pulled the covers over her.  He stretched out next to her on top of the covers, still wearing jeans but with no shirt.

“Can I hold you, baby?” he asked in the darkness.

“Just don’t let go.”

“I promise.”

Chapter 12

The relief that Crux felt over the end of Sydney’s suffering was incredible.  Even though he could have lost her, especially with that stunt she pulled in the basement, he knew that the only thing that really mattered was that she was finally, truly free.  They’d hoped to just keep her hidden forever, but he realized now that she probably would have looked over her shoulder for the rest of her life.  And that was no way to live.