I clenched my jaw as hard as I could. His neck broke with a crunch I felt in my own bones. His teeth fell away from my leg. He went limp beneath me.
I stood, licking blood from my muzzle, and found myself on the edge of the fight, near the tree line. My gaze roamed the crowd, sorting through lunging bodies, bleeding appendages, and snarling faces for a familiar muzzle, the unmistakable arch of a well-known spine.
Marc. He was about fifty feet to my left, backing slowly away from two toms in cat form. He had a pronounced limp and gashes across both of his left limbs, but he was alive and still moving.
Jace was on the other side of the melee, wielding a huge hammer against a much larger tom in cat form. Brian Taylor fought near him, having returned after his unsuccessful hunt for the remaining guns.
Colin Dean and his pistol had yet to make an appearance.
I jumped back into the brawl and pounced on the back of an enemy tom before he could attack Marc. My claws raked deep ruts down his sides before he tossed me off. As I fell, I aimed one last powerful blow at his skull. He went down like a cheerleader after prom.
“Faythe, look out!”
I whirled toward my father’s voice to see him pointing across the chaos at something to my left. I turned and my heart jumped into my throat. A large black blur slammed into me. I landed on my right side. Air burst from my lungs. Weight restricted my chest, and I could only suck in short, shallow pants.
An open jaw dropped toward my throat. Warm, sour blood-breath washed over my face. My pulse raced so fast I thought it would burst through my skin and into his mouth, no teeth required.
I kicked with my rear paws. One caught on his foot and pulled him off balance. The tom half fell, but recovered quickly. I swiped one forepaw over his muzzle. Blood welled in a line across his nose. He hissed. I stood. We faced off, both bleeding. Snarling.
He pounced. I dropped into a roll. A huge shadow soared between us and the little available moonlight. Something whooshed past my head. The thud of impact was almost tangible. When I stood, my foe lay on the ground, one side of his skull caved in. Liquefied brains seeped through the new cracks in his head.
“Faythe, is that you? Why can’t you cats ever visit without bringin’ trouble into my neck of the woods?”
Surprised beyond the capacity for rational thought, I looked up. And up. And up. There stood Elias Keller—all seven and a half feet of him. All three hundred fifty-plus pounds of him. Carrying a homemade club as big around as my waist. With his grizzled beard and incredible bulk, he even resembled a bear on two legs.
For a moment, I could only bathe in thankfulness that he recognized me on four paws. There was a time when he hadn’t been able to. Fortunately, I was the only girl-cat in the Montana woods at the moment.
But then, that’s what we’d thought last time—until Kaci showed up.
“What the hell are you all playin’ at?” His deep voice resonated in my bones. Of course, I couldn’t actually answer him, so I simply stared across the yard full of brawling cats, hoping the evidence spoke for itself.
Someone had freed the toms we’d captured, and they now fought hand to hand against our men still in human form. Jace punched one of Malone’s men in the face, then followed up with a devastating blow to the kidney. He barely paused to wipe the blood dripping into his own eyes before unleashing his bloodlust on another human-form tom.
I swam in a sea of grunts, hisses, and growls. All around me, bodies thunked into the ground, then got up for more. Toms bled, and screamed, and clawed, rarely pausing over their own injuries.
I crouched to jump back into the action, but Keller grabbed a hunk of skin at the back of my neck, holding me still as no other creature on the face of the planet would have dared. But Keller had little to fear from werecats. He could easily take on several toms at once—I’d seen him do it.
I growled and tugged against him, not willing to actually hurt him, for both of our sakes.
“Hold up there, little girl. This’s gotta stop.” He stood, and I noticed several things at once as he dragged a gigantic breath into his titanic lungs.
My father threw a bone-crunching punch at one of the toms who’d come to arrest us—he’d reclaimed a gun from somewhere. The tom brought his pistol up. My father knocked it away with a more nimble kick than I’d seen from him in years.
Movement on the left drew my gaze. Colin Dean stepped out of the woods holding his gun, flanked by two unarmed toms in human form.
Elias Keller roared, a deep bellow that sang in every cell in my body. I could practically see the shockwave flow over the crowd as his sound reached us.
Everyone froze, midblow. Heads swiveled his way. Obviously we weren’t the only ones who could Shift one part at a time—if that sound had come from a human throat, I was a werewolf bitch in heat.
“I don’t know what the hell you think you’re doin’, but this is my land. My home. Now you retract your claws and back down, or I’m gonna start a cat graveyard on the side of my mountain.”
Jaws dropped. Fists lowered slowly. Heads—both human and feline—turned, searching out Alphas who had the authority to make the final call on a cease-fire.
Something clicked on my left, as loud as thunder against the new silence. I turned toward the sound to see Dean staring across the paused chaos, his weapon raised. I followed his line of sight to see my father standing over the tom he’d taken down, holding the repossessed gun.
I screeched.
Keller roared.
Dean’s gun flashed in the dark.
I stood, licking blood from my muzzle, and found myself on the edge of the fight, near the tree line. My gaze roamed the crowd, sorting through lunging bodies, bleeding appendages, and snarling faces for a familiar muzzle, the unmistakable arch of a well-known spine.
Marc. He was about fifty feet to my left, backing slowly away from two toms in cat form. He had a pronounced limp and gashes across both of his left limbs, but he was alive and still moving.
Jace was on the other side of the melee, wielding a huge hammer against a much larger tom in cat form. Brian Taylor fought near him, having returned after his unsuccessful hunt for the remaining guns.
Colin Dean and his pistol had yet to make an appearance.
I jumped back into the brawl and pounced on the back of an enemy tom before he could attack Marc. My claws raked deep ruts down his sides before he tossed me off. As I fell, I aimed one last powerful blow at his skull. He went down like a cheerleader after prom.
“Faythe, look out!”
I whirled toward my father’s voice to see him pointing across the chaos at something to my left. I turned and my heart jumped into my throat. A large black blur slammed into me. I landed on my right side. Air burst from my lungs. Weight restricted my chest, and I could only suck in short, shallow pants.
An open jaw dropped toward my throat. Warm, sour blood-breath washed over my face. My pulse raced so fast I thought it would burst through my skin and into his mouth, no teeth required.
I kicked with my rear paws. One caught on his foot and pulled him off balance. The tom half fell, but recovered quickly. I swiped one forepaw over his muzzle. Blood welled in a line across his nose. He hissed. I stood. We faced off, both bleeding. Snarling.
He pounced. I dropped into a roll. A huge shadow soared between us and the little available moonlight. Something whooshed past my head. The thud of impact was almost tangible. When I stood, my foe lay on the ground, one side of his skull caved in. Liquefied brains seeped through the new cracks in his head.
“Faythe, is that you? Why can’t you cats ever visit without bringin’ trouble into my neck of the woods?”
Surprised beyond the capacity for rational thought, I looked up. And up. And up. There stood Elias Keller—all seven and a half feet of him. All three hundred fifty-plus pounds of him. Carrying a homemade club as big around as my waist. With his grizzled beard and incredible bulk, he even resembled a bear on two legs.
For a moment, I could only bathe in thankfulness that he recognized me on four paws. There was a time when he hadn’t been able to. Fortunately, I was the only girl-cat in the Montana woods at the moment.
But then, that’s what we’d thought last time—until Kaci showed up.
“What the hell are you all playin’ at?” His deep voice resonated in my bones. Of course, I couldn’t actually answer him, so I simply stared across the yard full of brawling cats, hoping the evidence spoke for itself.
Someone had freed the toms we’d captured, and they now fought hand to hand against our men still in human form. Jace punched one of Malone’s men in the face, then followed up with a devastating blow to the kidney. He barely paused to wipe the blood dripping into his own eyes before unleashing his bloodlust on another human-form tom.
I swam in a sea of grunts, hisses, and growls. All around me, bodies thunked into the ground, then got up for more. Toms bled, and screamed, and clawed, rarely pausing over their own injuries.
I crouched to jump back into the action, but Keller grabbed a hunk of skin at the back of my neck, holding me still as no other creature on the face of the planet would have dared. But Keller had little to fear from werecats. He could easily take on several toms at once—I’d seen him do it.
I growled and tugged against him, not willing to actually hurt him, for both of our sakes.
“Hold up there, little girl. This’s gotta stop.” He stood, and I noticed several things at once as he dragged a gigantic breath into his titanic lungs.
My father threw a bone-crunching punch at one of the toms who’d come to arrest us—he’d reclaimed a gun from somewhere. The tom brought his pistol up. My father knocked it away with a more nimble kick than I’d seen from him in years.
Movement on the left drew my gaze. Colin Dean stepped out of the woods holding his gun, flanked by two unarmed toms in human form.
Elias Keller roared, a deep bellow that sang in every cell in my body. I could practically see the shockwave flow over the crowd as his sound reached us.
Everyone froze, midblow. Heads swiveled his way. Obviously we weren’t the only ones who could Shift one part at a time—if that sound had come from a human throat, I was a werewolf bitch in heat.
“I don’t know what the hell you think you’re doin’, but this is my land. My home. Now you retract your claws and back down, or I’m gonna start a cat graveyard on the side of my mountain.”
Jaws dropped. Fists lowered slowly. Heads—both human and feline—turned, searching out Alphas who had the authority to make the final call on a cease-fire.
Something clicked on my left, as loud as thunder against the new silence. I turned toward the sound to see Dean staring across the paused chaos, his weapon raised. I followed his line of sight to see my father standing over the tom he’d taken down, holding the repossessed gun.
I screeched.
Keller roared.
Dean’s gun flashed in the dark.
