The One We Answer To: A Shifter MC Novel (Pureblood Predator MC Book 3) (28 page)

I shake my head, trying to clear the ringing from my ears.
 

Nash is screaming something at me, but I can’t hear him.
 

I want one thing and one thing only.

I want that motherfucking liar Connor Lerrick dead.
 

It figures Lerrick’s crew would be paramilitary.

Rich pricks and fascist assholes have always been tight.
 

Money and the law.
 

Fuck ‘em both, I say.
 

Give me freedom.

But guys like Connor? They can’t stand another man living free.
 

It means they got no control over him.
 

No say in how he lives his life.

The greedy, power-hungry pricks.

 
I scan through the smoke, searching for Lerrick.
 

The giant Kodiak bear was no hallucination. It’s Blue. The bear raises the dead crocodile over his head while Connor’s helicopters swing low, pumping cannon-fire into him, then hurls the crocodile corpse at one of the choppers. It smashes through the front window. The chopper, hovering only ten feet above the ground, nose-dives right into the cement, then spins and explodes right in front of the Kodiak giant.

My three shadow-wolves are back.
 

I’m healing, and right fucking quick if I do say so myself. My wounded hip is nearly sealed over. I send each shadow-wolf leaping into a different chopper. Every chopper is packed with Stricken motherfuckers, all dressed in military gear, half-men half-animal, readying to leap out at us. The shadow-wolves smash through them, aiming for the pilots. Another chopper goes down, then another whips over our heads and collides into stack of shipping containers.

Plumes of black smoke roll into the night sky.
 

The entire shipyard’s lit bright by the explosions.

It’s a fucking war zone. A bloodbath of the best kind, and it’s far too early in the night to declare victory or defeat.
 

I raise my clawed fists and howl. Take a step forward. Then another. Then another. The fucking crocodile didn’t kill me. My pack stepped in. They got my back.
 

That’s what packs do.
 

Look out for one another.
 

There’s no weakness in that, only strength and survival, and then I’m roaring, sprinting full speed at one of the choppers. My MC’s with me, a pack of mean, wild sons-of-bitches, and I leap into the air and grab one of the chopper’s landing rails and claw my way inside.
 

A slime-snouted donkey creature brays in shock when he sees me, then lifts his machine gun. Too slow. I tear the gun from his hands and part his neck with a single swipe. The pilot turns, blasts a few Glock rounds at me. I reach over the seat and rip his head from his neck. The chopper shudders, then plummets to the side.
 

I leap out as it hits the concrete.
 

My MC are everywhere, each taking down a Stricken or three. Carrying their own weight. There’s no room for cowards or freeloaders in the End Days Chapter of the Pureblood Predators, and every one of them knows it.
 

The chopper explodes, sending me sailing through the air.
 

I hit the ground hard, and when I look up I see Connor in wolf form, ripping open the chest of one of my MC. My guy’s on the ground, a lynx from the look of him, screeching, smashing at the wolf as the animal tries to tear out his heart.

I stagger to my feet and snarl.
 

The wolf lifts its head. Our eyes meet.
 

The wolf howls, tears my guy’s heart out, swallows it in a single bite, then bares his bloodstained fangs.
 

I hold my ground. Flash him a toothy smile.
 

“What you gunna do now, rich boy?” I yell. “You gunna run? Always took you for a pussy, Lerrick. You gunna prove me wrong?”
 

The wolf leaps off his kill and charges me.
 

That’a boy.

Connor closes the gap between us quick, and when he’s close enough I reach down, pick up a razor-sharp chunk of shrapnel and hurl it at him. He ducks, then steps to the side. The metal buzzes over his head, clattering harmlessly onto the concrete.

But that’s all I need. I threw the wolf off his stride. Now I step left as he thunders toward me, snarling and spitting, his crystalline claws punching into the cement.

Connor’s cocky. Soft. Coddled.
 

Been at the top looking down for too long.
 

Never had to learn what a street fight’s
really
all about.

It’s about the first strike. Nine times out of ten that first strike decides who lives or dies. Doesn’t matter much who’s bigger or stronger if that first strike hits home. That crocodile cocksucker’s first strike just about ended me, even though if we went toe-to-toe I could’ve crushed him.
 

He had the advantage.
 

But I had my crew.

I’m gunna make my first strike against Connor Lerrick count.
 

The wolf slows his charge, realizing his mistake, then tries to change direction. I clasp my fists over my head, summon every scrap of rage and strength I can muster, then bring my clasped fists down right at the base of the wolf’s neck. There’s a crunching sound, then the wolf howls and hits the pavement.
 

He’s twitching. Trying to stand.
 

But that’s hard with a set of snapped vertebrae.

Somewhere in the back of my mind I’m conscious of things beginning to quiet. The choppers are gone. The paramilitary Stricken pricks either dead or run off. My guys are enjoying a solid and well deserved feed.
 

I take a step at the dying wolf.
 

He’s flopping back and forth, his tongue hanging out his mouth, his head cocked at an odd angle.

I take another slow step, eyeing him, wary of a trap.

The wolf vanishes and there’s Connor Lerrick, handsome billionaire heir, lying naked in a pool of his own piss.

“Sad, how the body betrays us when we die,” I say, kneeling down beside him. Without the fur I can see just how badly Connor’s neck’s broken. His head’s twisted sideways, the skin stretched tight around the grim, swollen lump on his spine.
 

“It’s easy, when we’re alive and well, to forget what we are,” I say. “Mansions and choppers and Armani suits. They don’t count for fuck all now, do they? You’re just another half-dead animal pissing himself in the muck.”

I reach out, place my index finger gently against Connor’s shoulder.

Drag my claw into him.

Cut him a bit.
 

Mr. Big Shot quivers and flinches.
 

“Shh,” I say. “I’m not gunna hurt you as much as I should. Not my style. But only if you cooperate, understand? If you don’t cooperate…well. I promise your death will last days.”

I grip Connor’s shoulder and roll him on his back. His mouth opens in a silent, pain-wracked scream as the bones in his shattered neck shift against one another.
 

I run my claw over Connor’s chest.
 

Feel his heart beating too fast behind his ribcage.
 

“You want me to make this quick, right, Connor?”

Connor gives me a look so full of hatred my animal howls to kill him instantly.
 

But I don’t.

I need something from him.

“Where is she, rich boy?” I ask. “Tell me where my bloodmate is and it’ll be quick. I promise you.”

Black blood spews from Connor’s lips.
 

Fucking hell. Might be too late.

I glance up to see my MC gathered around.
 

They’re bloodied but mostly whole.

“Where is she, Connor?”

Connor moans. He’s trying to speak.
 

I lean very close to his face, listening, then say, “Try again, Connor. One more time. That’s all I need. Tell me once more.”

Connor’s eyes close, and for a moment I think the bastard’s died on me. Then his lips tremble, and with his eyes still closed he mutters, “…f-f-f-f…”

“Fallen?” I ask. “The First Fallen has her?”

Connor shakes his head no.
 

His breathing quick and ragged.
 

Not long now.

“Fa…fath…”

“Father?”
 

Connor opens his eyes. “Fath…father…father…”

“Her father? Lily went to see her father?”

Connor lets out a long sigh.

“Where? Where the fuck is Lily’s father?”

Connor spits a mouthful of black blood. “Monroe. Crazy old man…Monroe Correctional…”

Got it. The Monroe Correctional Complex. A fucking nuthouse.
 

I lift my hand over Connor’s chest. Drop my claws.

Take a long breath. Sometimes you just gotta slow down, you know? Really make an effort to appreciate the moment of a kill. Life zooms by.
 

You gotta hold on to the things that matter.

Like cold-blooded revenge. Like murder.
 

Connor’s looks up at me. His eyes narrow as he realizes I’m not going to make it quite as quick as he might have hoped.
 

I flash him a grin.
 

Connor shakes his head from side to side. Fucker’s terrified. He should be.
 

Then he does something weird.

Looks me straight in the eye, says, “You’ve been…a good little pet. Cockbrother.” Then the prick bursts into a wheezing laugh.

The sound freezes my blood, and in that instant I know I fucked up.

Big time.
 

“Prez look out there’s a fuc—”
 

A shadow swoops low overhead, so fast I barely have time to duck.
 

My MC scatter like rabbits racing for their holes.

Death from above.

Fucking hell. No one kept an eye out?

I have time to realize I can see my breath. The air suddenly freezing—
 

Talons slam into my sides, tear through my flesh, then a wickedly curved and razor-sharp beak snatches my shoulder and the next thing I know I’m cartwheeling through space, ass over teakettle and screaming at Connor as a giant horned and red-eyed vulture lifts the rich prick in its talons and carries my kill into the broiling black-red sky—

M
IA
, T
RISH
, P
IMNIQ
and I make our way through the woods with six of Mia’s most trusted thugs spread in a wide semicircle around us. We’re following about half a mile behind Anik and Shiori, far enough away for my packmates to draw any potential ambushers out into the open but close enough to reach them if they’re attacked.
 

Hopefully.

Mia grabs me by the arm and leads me out of earshot, then says, “We continue north a few more miles and we’re at the Monroe Correctional Complex. It’s possible the Stricken signs lead there.”

I don’t say anything, but Mia’s smart enough to read the look on my face. “You believe your father’s the First Fallen.”

I nod, step of over a moss-draped log, then push through a tangle of huckleberry.
 

“What if you’re right?”

“Then I kill him.”

A slow, skeptical breath escapes Mia’s lips. There’s a machine gun tucked under her arm. It suits her perfectly, and for the hundredth time I wonder: why me? Why Lily Thompson? Why not someone more capable? Like Mia? Or Trish? Or even Shiori? I never believed in fate. The idea that our lives are scripted before we’re born always made me feel queasy. Like we have no control.
 

Now I’m not so certain we have control over anything.

Maybe control’s an illusion. It’s odd, how the people who believe in fate are often the one’s whose lives haven’t turned out like they hoped. Like they need something bigger than themselves to blame. And the ones who believe in free will, that we control our own fates, are the one’s whose lives have turned out like they wanted them to, and they want to take credit for that.

I don’t know what to believe.
 

I only wish I could believe
something
.
 

I envy Mia. She believes.
 

You are your own keeper,
the Dog God told me.

Mia understands that. She’s loyal to herself. To her own survival. It’s a world-view likely to make a person lonely, but at least it’s a world-view.

Mia knows where she stands.
 

Connor sent me to Aaron’s biker bar because he wanted the MC Prez to mark me and wake my creature. Aaron took me as his mate. Then the creature took me.
 

Where’s
Lily
in all this? What do
I
want?
 

To murder the First Fallen? Why? Because of some vision in the sky? Because that’s what everyone says the so-called All Encompassing
must
do? Because if she doesn’t the world’s gunna end?

I scoff. Mia shoots me a sharp glare.

Look around, Lily. The world’s already ended. What good will murdering the First Fallen do now? You can’t put the egg back in its shattered shell. Whether I murder the First Fallen or not…the world’s changed forever.
 

That’s why Mia sighed when I declared I’d kill my father if he’s the First Fallen. She doesn’t believe me. And you know what? She’s right to doubt. I don’t know what I’m going to do if Wil Thompson is what I’m beginning to think he is.
 

What do you want, Lily?
I ask myself as I push through the dark forest, following a series of smaller wooden pyramids.
 

Signposts of death.
 

I know I don’t want this. Not this killing.