Hunting Her (The Keeping Her #6) (19 page)

She felt
Logan take a deep breath at her back, his arms tightening around her to hold
her even closer, as if he would shield her from everything if he could.   Only
then did he speak, his voice resolute but soft.  "You matter to me."

 
"Yeah, I got that," Xena said on a sad smile.

It was a
long while later when Logan broke the silence again.

"Did
I hurt you?" He asked as if he expected the answer to be yes and regretted
that, but as intense as he had been, and as sore as she was going to be from
the pounding he had given her, he hadn't hurt her, and she was beginning to
believe he never would.

"No,"
she assured him quietly, and then with a little smile he would hear in her
voice she added.  "Though I think I am going to be pretty happy the healer
is here when I stand up and try to move around."

Logan
growled low, and Xena narrowed her eyes, knowing it was satisfaction she could
feel wafting off him, rather than remorse.

"You
like that I'm going to be sore from your pounding?" she asked part
accusation, part exasperation.

She felt
him smile against the back of her neck when he burrowed his face closer to her,
his arm tightening.  "As long as you can be healed before the
challenge," he said low, and arrogant.  "I fuckin' like."

Alpha.
Fucking. Wolves.

Standing
beside the council challenge circle, Xena looked around with some surprise at
the crowd that had gathered.  She figured it would be a big event, what with
the live unveiling of Margarete's misdeeds, and the challenge, unheard of
between a former council darling and an employee that was two steps away from
being a rogue.  At least she had been before she mated and officially joined
Lionsgate.  That was another reason there was probably so many in attendance. 
They wanted a look at the notorious mixed pack.

And what
a sight they were.  Lucas Gibbs, big and broad, lion gold with piercing blue
eyes, that were even now shifting from lion to human in his hard, but it must
be said, beautiful face.  His stance both menacing and clearly protective of the
small golden skinned, honey haired female at his side in a flirty skirt and
kitten heels.  Despite the fact that he was looking casually GQ in a suit with
an open collar, his hotness did not at all detract from the danger that exuded
from his pores.

Which
made him almost as intimidating as Demon, who stood on his right, dressed in
jeans and a black t-shirt that emphasized the sheer size of his large muscled
arms crossed over his massive chest.  With his height of seven feet, he stood
over even his alpha by a good five inches.  His face homely and scarred, his
wolf tattoo on full display and his eyes cold as ice that burned.

Mac, in
contrast, stood at their back, barely noticed.  Which in any other company
would have been unbelievable.  The man had a body that a woman would have to
look at more than once and hazy grey eyes that saw everything and promised
death to anyone stupid enough to challenge them.

Eli
stood close to Logan's back, his smile firmly in place and a wicked gleam in
his eyes as he studied the sight around him.  His hazel green eyes might laugh
at all of them, but his body showed a discipline and strength that belied his
easy smiles.  He was charming, she would give him that, and seriously hot in
his Irish bad boy ways, but she had the feeling he could be just as dangerous
as the rest of this pack when it was called for.

Then
there was Logan.  Her cowboy was looking dangerous and dangerously delicious in
cowboy boots and jeans that hugged his perfect hard ass with a loving grip she
envied.  One would think that after a night of hard sex she would be immune, but
no, her mate just did it for her.  Especially when he hovered over her and
glared at anyone who even looked at her wrong.

Miley
leaned around Lucas and grinned at Xena.  "She doesn't seem to be looking
forward to this," she said.  Gesturing to Margarete who stood across the
circle with her unhappy looking alpha and a few wolves that Xena assumed where
enforcers from her pack.

"Her
Alpha and his enforcers look even less happy," Xena muttered back.  All
three men wore angry scowls and stood as far away from Margarete as they could
get and still be with her.  Like everyone else, they were looking at the
Lionsgate pack.

Eli
suddenly raised his hand and gave them a jaunty wave.  "Top of the mornin'
to ya'." He yelled in that Irish accent he liked to affect.  Not that it
sounded fake. It sounded real and his smile looked sincere, it was just the
sparkle in his eyes that showed how little reverence he had for...well
anything.

"Eli,"
Miley hissed a warning at him. Her cheeks pinked in embarrassment.  Eli
chuckled.  If possible, the Alpha and his men looked even less happy then
before. Margarete glared at them all.

Not that
the Lionsgate Alpha was any too pleased, Xena mused catching the blistering
heat in Lucas’s eyes as he trained them on anything and everything, while
occasionally glaring at her and Miley in passing.  He spared Eli one censoring
glance that had the man swallowing whatever mischief he had been planning
next.  Lucas was not seeing the humor in anything just now.  Like Logan, he did
not like her challenge, no matter the reasons she had for instigating it.

Not that
Lucas disagreed with it in theory either, they all knew Margarete was a danger
to them as long as the sick bitch lived, but he would never condone any action
that meant one of their females fought in a circle to the death while he and
his highly trained and bad ass pack were forced to watch from the side lines. 
Not their usual place at all.  And they really didn't like it.  Not to mention
his mate was now on council grounds with minimal protection.  If you counted
Lucas, Logan, Mac and Demon as minimal, which no one but Lucas would.  Still it
pissed him off.  Something he had shared with both her and Logan for nearly the
entire car ride to council territory.

The man
could give a dressing down to make a gunnery Sargent proud.  Longest car ride
ever.

But he
had eventually wound down, his mate sitting beside him and wincing now and
again, even while she gave Xena sympathetic looks.  Logan sat stoic, her hand
clasped hard in his while he got tenser and tenser the closer they got to the
council grounds.

Finally,
as they were pulling into the parking area beneath the trees, Miley lost her
patience.

"They
get it," she snapped.  "You're worried.  Enough."

Lucas
turned his glare to his mate, but catching the sparks in her eyes he narrowed
his and switched subjects just as they parked. 
Thank god.

"
You do not leave my side.  And you do
not heal Xena until we are back in the car and no one can see you.  Promise
me."

From the
look in Miley's face, she was not going to promise any such thing.  He looked
from her glittering eyes to her mulish mouth and cursed, practically ripping
the door off on his way out of the car.  He reached in and hauled his mate out
right behind him as she squeaked.

Xena and
Logan followed behind with Eli. Mac and Demon coming out of the front seat to
join them soon after.  Mac said not a word to her, but Demon stopped and
briefly spoke.  It was as a mountain suddenly spoke.  His voice deep and
overloud.

 "Don't
fuck around.  Kill the bitch."  And with those words he was gone,
lumbering ahead of them and clearing a path for his Alpha, who quite frankly,
didn't look to need the help getting shifters to scatter.

Eli
patted her head, his laughing eyes on Demon as he walked away.  "How do I
top that priceless spot of wisdom?" was all he said with obvious humor,
before he followed the others.

Xena
looked up at Logan beside her.  "Your pack is a bunch of sweeties."

He
snorted but his glittery eyes did not soften, nor his mouth curve up into even
a half smile.  He didn't speak.

Drawing
her mind from the Lionsgate pack, and Logan's continued silence, Miley spoke
again, bringing Xena back to the here and now.  "I doubt Margarete or her
pack want trouble with the council or Lionsgate, and they already know she
courted both with her actions. I would look unhappy too, if I was them.”

Xena
opened her mouth to answer but the mediator assigned to this challenge stepped
forward into the circle.  It was time.

"As
you know," he began.  "A challenge has been issued between two
council employees, a challenge that should never have been made."  The man
sent a look of censure to Margarete and then looked to Xena and Lionsgate.  He
looked no less happy with her.

"You
have been challenged.  Are you prepared to fight?"

"I
am," Xena called out in a firm voice.

He
turned back to Margarete and her pack.  "You are the challenger, are you
prepared to fight?"

Margarete
glared bloody daggers at Xena across the way, her words though had more anger
than strength behind them.  "I am."

"Then
join me in the circle and prepare to shift."

Xena
turned to look up at Logan.  A muscle ticked in his jaw and he opened his mouth
to say something.  Probably advice, but Xena jumped up and pressed her lips to
his, he growled and kissed her back, devouring her lips, seemingly trying to
absorb her through her lips.  She pulled back just as fast, her eyes alight
with too many emotions to verbalize.

He
sucked in a breath, his eyes glittery and hot, and she waited a second more for
him to speak, thinking he might be able to put into words what they were both
feeling.  Instead, he raised his chin and growled at her.  "Hurry
up."

Xena
smiled, then laughed, shaking her head. 
Alpha Freaking Wolves.
 

"Yeah,
I love you too."  She turned to the challenge circle without waiting for
his reaction.  She needed to get her head in the game if she was going to take everyone’s
helpful advice to, "hurry up", and "kill the bitch."

Xena was
a fast shifter and it was more honorable to wait for Margarete to finish before
she attacked.  But Logan was right, she might be a crazy bitch, but Xena was
small even for a coyote and Margarete was a wolf.  Xena had just decided to fight
dirty and attack while Margarete still shifted to give herself a better chance
but she had waited too long. 

Margarete
finished shifting, and looking at the black wolf that was snarling at her,
teeth bared in challenge, Xena realized Logan was wrong.  The Nazi bitch did
not have fifty pounds on her, more like twice that.

It was
painfully easy to see where a pure bloodline might be helpful in this
situation. 

The wolf
charged with an angry snarl.  Xena moved fast.  Even so, her initial hesitation
cost her.  She was a hairsbreadth too slow.

Feeling
the heat of pain slash up her side and smelling her own blood, Xena cursed. 

A second
slash caught her across the back before Xena got her shot at the wolf’s flanks
and snapped her teeth around the bone there.  Only to be kicked off by the
wolf’s powerful hindquarters. 

Well,
shit.
She thought
circling the snarling beast.  The Nazi bitch might be crazy, but she was fast,
and clearly her ancestors had learned a thing or two from Genghis Khan. 

For
once, Xena's coyote was pushing her way out, wanting to take over the fight. 
She needed the speed her coyote could call up, but she didn't relish
relinquishing control when she knew what everyone was going to see when she
did.  Of course it was either that or possibly death.

Her
coyote snapped at her.  Xena let go with a curse, and her last thought before
she let her coyote take over the fight was that they needed to win for their
mate. 

Coyote
agreed, baring her teeth in a savage growl at the bigger wolf coming at them.

Logan
knew the exact minute Xena let her coyote take charge.  One moment the small
coyote was moving defensively, fast and mostly out of reach.

He
winced at each new wound his mate received.  His wolf was strangely calm when
the man wanted nothing but to stomp out there and kill the big black bitch
himself.  With each new strike that passed his mates defenses it got worse. 
Then the careful quick movements changed, and the wild coyote that his mate
always kept so restrained burst free and went after the wolf.  No rhyme or
reason to the attacks, just really fucking fast and vicious as only a feral
animal could be.

She tore
into that black wolf while the big bitch was still wondering what had changed. 
Then, Margarete in wolf form howling her rage at the pain and blood, Xena's
coyote charged again.  The big wolf tried to take her down, pin and crush the
smaller animal, but the coyote was too fast.  So fast, it was as if the big
wolf were moving in slow motion by comparison.  Logan had never seen anything
on four legs move that fast.

"Holy
fuck," Logan heard Demon say behind him.  Yeah, that about summed it up.

Within
minutes, the wolf was bleeding so badly from multiple wounds, she could barely
move.  Everyone could see that the bitch was already dead.  She just didn't
know it yet.  Or maybe she did since she pulled all her strength and lunged at
the coyote in one last final try at clamping her jaws around that slender
neck.  But like every other time, the coyote was just not there. 

Going
for her wounded belly the coyote savaged the wolf one final time, and then the
wolf dropped. The utter silence that followed the fight lasted until the wolf
stopped twitching, her blood and intestines spilling out into the dirt of her
ancestors.

The
coyote was standing over the wolf growling, watching, until the breath left her
body.  Then the coyote howled her triumph to the skies, and turned to look for
her mate.  She started to shift back to human.

Logan
was already coming for her, so he was nearly at her side when Xena's human form
collapsed from blood loss.  She was unconscious when he lifted her in his arms
and shouted for Miley.

"Fuck,"
he cursed, watching the blood flow freely from her sides and back.  The pack
surrounded him, offering little in the way of comfort until Miley had her hands
on his mate, and with not even a look for the council rep and the rest of the
crowd watching, she sent healing energy into Xena.

Logan
could only watch as the wounds closed and the blood stopped flowing.

The
noise all around him suddenly penetrated and he understood Miley was urging him
to get to the vehicle.