Wolf's Den - A BBW Shifter Romance Novel (28 page)

I couldn’t fight them, even if they were just protecting their own, now. I didn’t think the rest of our small band of free shifters and their packs could fight either in good conscience. But if these people held at Wolfsbane were willing to fight for their loved ones, maybe they would fight against Lady Violet to gain their freedom. Maybe all they needed was a leader and a plan. But how?

“Do others feel the same?” I wondered.

“I can’t speak for everyone but we speak of it quietly, of getting away from here. We just don’t know what to do?” Ginnie told me. I glanced at Yeager. I could tell he was thinking the same thing I was. I invited him with my eyes to join me in convincing Ginnie to help us. Yeager stood up and came to us. He knelt before Ginnie and took her hand.

“I’m sorry this happened to you. We share something special. Agnes, Cassie and many more share it too. We can shift into wolves. We are a pack, you and I, all of us. We need to be free to live our lives as we see fit. We might live on the fringes of humanity to hide our true selves from humans but that’s our way. I hold no ill will towards humans. Like shifters, some are bad but most are good. Some are our mates, our parents, our sons and daughters. We need your help, Ginnie. Will you help us set these people free?” Yeager asked the girl.

Ginnie looked from Yeager to Agnes and then to me. I nodded to let her know it was OK. Then she looked back to Yeager. “You’re very pretty. I’ll help,” she said. I giggled and Ginnie looked embarrassed suddenly.

“It’s OK. He is pretty,” I told her. She smiled at me self-consciously.

“What do I need to do?” she asked us.

“First, you need to stop wearing these clothes. Destroy them. Maybe even sleep on the floor in case your bed is tainted. You’re bedding might be saturated with the pheromones too,” Agnes told her.

“Tell the other’s like you, the other female shifters, to do the same,” I added.

“How many are there like you?” Yeager asked.

“Um...maybe three dozen,” she said. I sighed as a wave of sadness overwhelmed me. Three dozen girls that had been brutalized and mutilated by Violet, not to mention those that she might have murdered like she planned on doing with me. It was sickening.

“Tell them to do the same if you can trust them. Then you need to get to the men, the shifters that have families here. You need to tell them we are coming and to be ready to fight for their freedom. They need to fight with us against Lady Violet. Will they?” I pressed.

“I think so. Yes, they will. I’ll make sure they will,” Ginnie told us.

“You need to stay safe too. Do what you can but don’t put yourself in too much danger. Agreed?” I added.

“I’ll do whatever I have too,” she said. I smiled at her wistfully. Maybe the idea no one would die was a fantasy but I had to try to minimize that risk.

“Just be careful, Ginnie,” I said and hugged her. She hugged me back as if she was holding on for dear life. “There is freedom out there for all of us. I promise,” I assured her.

“We should go, Cassie. We’ll come at dawn four days from now. Those that stand with us need to show their allegiance. Those that don’t will be...well, you know,” Yeager said.

“I’ll tell them. Thank you,” Ginnie told us.

“No, thank you. You’re a brave girl,” Agnes told her. The two girls hugged and then we stood and prepared to leave. Each of us shifted and Ginnie let us out of her cabin into the night. She watched us go. I hoped she could do what we needed. I felt she was genuine but a part of me wondered. There was so much manipulation and so many lies here at Wolfsbane it was hard to take anything at face value. Still, I had no choice and my gut told me Ginnie was being honest. I felt it even more strongly now through the prism of the cold, calculating thoughts of a wolf.

We made our way to the edge of town. We located the sentries that we could and determined how best to sneak out. Any shifter could have done so easily but not with their mate and children in tow or with the knowledge they would be killed if left behind. Yeager, Agnes and I regrouped after slipping through the sentries and I saw Amp and Edie ahead. Something was amiss, I felt it before I sensed the men with rifles that surrounded us.

“Don’t move!” one of the men said. I looked at him and recognized him. Gerard. One of Violet’s henchmen and the man that tried to seduce me. The man that betrayed me. Other men appeared bringing Amp and Edie down to us. I saw now that Amp and Edie were unarmed.

“Sorry, they got the jump on us. I don’t know how?” Amp said as they were pushed into our midst.

“Shut up,” Gerard ordered. “So, the traitors have come back to stir up more trouble. Well, that won’t be a problem now. Violet still has plans for you, Cassie, and whatever you had planned will now fail. And maybe you and I can finish our date, Cassie, whether you want to or not,” he said and chuckled. I salivated at the thought of tasting his blood. As a woman, as Cassie, I didn’t want bloodshed but as a wolf, I relished the idea. Killing was just a part of life. However, the half dozen men holding rifles on us prevented me from attacking. I was quick but not that quick.

“You’re a dick!” Edie exclaimed. Gerard frowned and walked over to her. He raised his hand as if to strike her but a moment later, one of his gunmen went down and Gerard was splattered with blood. He wiped his cheek and sniffed the fresh blood, not yet understanding what had happened. Then another man went down and I smelled death as he grabbed his throat drowning in his own blood. The other men turned, their rifles pointed outward in to the night.

“Find the shooters,” Gerard ordered but that was the last thing he ever said. I leapt before he could react and sank my teeth into his neck and dragged him to the ground. Amp had one man in his grasp and quickly relieved him of his rifle before pulling a knife from his boot and shoving it under the base of his skull and into his brain. I ripped at Gerard’s throat and tore free his windpipe. His eyes were wide and full of fear. Yeager and Agnes dispatched the other gunmen that remained, each tasting their own victim’s blood.

I shifted, spat out Gerard’s flesh and wiped his blood from my mouth. Sprocket appeared, night vision goggles on and rifle at the ready. “Holy shit!” he said. Amp, Yeager and Agnes had taken care of the rest of the men, Yeager and Agnes still in their wolf forms. I bent close to Gerard as his life drained away.

“Thanks for the offer but I’ve got a mate and he’s not a sniveling dog like you,” I told him. His eyes went wide before he died.

“Hard core!” Amp said and then turned to Sprocket. “I knew you’d show up,” he told his buddy and then they bumped fists. “We better get out of here before more men come,” Amp told us but then turned towards the village and sniffed at the air.

“What?” I asked.

“She’s there,” he said. I knew what he meant. His mate was there. I wasn’t sure there was only one mate for each shifter but they did focus on specific women even if there were many potential mates out there.

“We’ll find her,” I assured him. Amp stared at the village and for a moment, I thought he might leave us but he looked at me and winked.

“I’m good to go. I’ll find her,” he said smiling broadly. Amp grabbed his weapons and gear from the dead guards along with Edie’s. Then he grabbed her and Sprocket and began running up the hill. I knew how hard it was for Amp to leave but his discipline served him well. I shifted and joined Yeager and Agnes as they bound after Amp and Edie. I looked back as I ran. I hoped Ginnie could do what was needed. There was only one way to know. In four days, we’d return through the front gates. We would find either a pack of allies ready to overthrow Violet or we would meet our doom. Only time would tell.

~~O~~

“You can trust her?” Murphy asked me.

“I think so. I didn’t sense any lies,” I assured him.

“We’re taking a big chance going back. We’re severely outnumbered. We could all die there or at the least be even further weakened,” Murphy said. Yeager leaned forward. Most of our pack, the shifters and their mates that came to our aid, sat around the fire the following evening. We had made it to the Jeeps and back down the mountain without incident. Sprocket had fixed his axle and made it to the end of the road just in time to see Amp and Edie get captured. He waited patiently, savvy enough to let Yeager, Agnes and I do what we went to do. When he saw us and had an opportunity, he took action.

We arrived back at the new camp that morning and slept throughout the day. We were in northwest New Mexico now hoping to stay one step ahead of Violet’s pursuers. As promised, Murphy sent coordinates and we joined the group after leaving the ranch. Once we had recovered and explained what had happened, we gathered to come up with a plan.

“We need to do this, Murph. I know it’s a risk but being a shifter in a human world is risky. I don’t want to live on the run and even if I did, I couldn’t live with myself knowing all those people are living under Violet’s thumb. I couldn’t live with myself if Violet did something rash and people died and I didn’t try to stop her,” Yeager told Murphy but his message was meant for the entire group.

“I’m not arguing. Just playing devil’s advocate. I couldn’t live with myself either. I think I speak for all of us in saying thanks for doing what you six did. You might have saved a lot of lives. But things might go wrong. This might all be a ruse designed to lure us in. We all need to understand that before we commit. I said it before but it bears repeating. No one here will blame anyone if they choose to leave,” Murphy stated and looked around the group. No one said a thing but some of us were obviously not intending to leave.

“So be it. We’ll move again tomorrow, closer to the ranch, and then we’ll head up there and see if that girl did what she said she’d do,” Murphy told the group. The men and woman around the fire nodded in agreement. Freedom, it seemed, was worth dying for. Freeing others was too. Each of us had much to fear from Violet but it was more than that. I think we all felt some responsibility to help those in need, to set them free, even if it meant we would die trying. I know I felt like I had to help.

“Hey, we need to get out of here,” I whispered to Yeager as the group began to discuss what had just been decided.

“Yeah?” he replied and waggled his eyebrows. I laughed softly.

“Maybe. Honestly, I need to run and we need to talk,” I told him. Yeager smiled and nodded.

“OK, let’s go,” he said. We stood and bid everyone goodnight. We’d slept throughout the day so we would be up all night. Others would pair off with their mates and run as well but Yeager and I were the only mates that both could shift in this group. We’d go far beyond the limits of the other couples to be alone. Agnes looked at Edie and my best friend blushed. I was happy for them. I’m glad Edie and Agnes had both found someone.

Yeager and I walked beyond the firelight to our motorhome and undressed, setting our clothes inside the door. We pressed our naked bodies together and kissed. I had to tell Yeager about my pregnancy. He had to know he would be a father before we returned to the Ranch. I didn’t want to think about why I felt compelled to tell him. I had to remain positive. I chose that moment to reveal what I knew. “I’m pregnant,” I told him, just blurting it out instead of slow playing my hand.

“What?” he asked. I smiled and pulled away. Yeager gazed at me, his eyes dropping to my belly and the life growing inside. He reached out to touch me but I shifted before he could and trotted away. I looked back and my eyes bid him to follow me. He chuckled and shifted as well, stunned by what I had said but willing to follow me to find out more. I loped away, needing to run and to give my mate a chance to consider what being a father meant. We’d talk it over later, hopefully after some wild shifter sex in the hills of New Mexico.

I savored the different scents here. The wetter climate caused the land to flourish in different ways than the deserts of southern California or Utah. Even as autumn shaded towards winter, the land was lush with all manner of secrets and surprises that only the nose of a wolf could discern. Frightened mice, stupid rabbits, timid mule deer and more lived in this land. I drank in their scents and those of the pinions and sage, the dormant wildflowers and the prickly grass.

Yeager chased me but followed his own path, searching out his own discoveries. We enjoyed our time as wolves apart but together, always close enough to scent one another but sometimes too far apart to see each other. The night and the land revealed themselves to us as we put distance between ourselves and the others. The low hills became higher and the vales deeper. Then suddenly, Yeager blocked my path as I followed the fresh tracks of a rabbit.