You’re just going to forget about that?”
Storm’s spine went rigid at the insult to his morals. “Of course not! I would not…I mean…I don’t know exactly how it would work.
Maybe I could stay in the neighboring town. I’ll be there whenever you want me for anything. That way you would not have to abandon your pack and I will still be there for you.”
That should do it. Storm wouldn’t have to be part of John’s pack if his alpha decided that Storm was too much of a wild card, and he would still be nearby for John so he could fulfill his life-debt. John wouldn’t be forced to leave his pack on some misconceived notion that Storm was his true love, and Storm could keep his honor.
This hardly seemed to make John feel any better. “You’ll just rent a room or a house somewhere and wait for me to sneak over whenever I want to fuck you, right? Sorry, not happening.”
“Why are you being difficult about this?”
“Because we’re mated and I love you, you stupid asshole!”
“You speak that way to the one you love?”
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John’s fists clenched. Storm prepared himself to get punched, but nothing came.
Storm continued speaking while he still could. “You only think you love me because you believe we are mated, which I am still not entirely convinced of. I took your virginity last night, and you’re mistaking the sensations you felt for love.”
Storm knew all about that. Tony had taken Storm’s virginity, and it took him a long time before he was able to realize that what he felt was not love either.
John’s face was red. He looked like he was about to pop.
Storm put his hands on the other man’s shoulders. He winced when John pushed him away.
So much for the loving caresses. “Whether what you feel is real or not,” Storm said, going for a new approach, “you cannot leave your pack for it. You might love me, but you have loved your pack, and they have loved you, for much longer. To abandon them would be suicide. Wolves survive in packs.”
“You survived without a pack. All cats do.”
And look where that had gotten him.
He wanted to say more, but then an odd smell wafted up his nostrils.
John seemed to notice it right when Storm had because he stopped glaring at him to search around for the source.
“That smells like burning,” John said.
“Yes,” Storm agreed. The scent of burning was never a good thing, and there was no stove or fireplace anywhere near this cheap motel that could be blamed for the scent.
Hunters liked to burn things.
“Get the clothes packed. Right now,” John ordered.
Storm didn’t need to be told. He was already grabbing the shirts and jeans that John had brought and stuffing them, along with everything else they’d brought with them, inside the shoulder bag.
John opened the door to the bathroom a crack to peek out.
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He motioned for Storm to follow. The smell of smoke was not coming from their room, and there was no black cloud hanging over their heads, either. Perhaps one of the neighboring rooms was on fire and it just hadn’t spread to here yet. It certainly felt hot enough. They were far from safe.
Storm put his palm against the wall, and it felt hot all right.
John went to the front door and looked out the peep hole.
“I don’t see anyone,” he said. “Shift and we’ll make a run for it.”
Storm nodded, grabbing the last of their supplies before he zipped up the bag and stuck it around his shoulders.
He had to admit that it was much easier changing into his cougar form with only that over his back, and the strap didn’t break or stretch uncomfortably either. It was much nicer than holding his clothes in his mouth. He was going to have to get himself a bag like this if he ever traveled again after this.
Because human hands were required to open doors, John carefully unlocked the door and turned the knob. He opened it just a crack before stepping away and shifting into his wolf. It took him about twenty seconds or so.
“When I open the door, we’ll both run to the cover of the woods.
We’ll keep traveling through them and stay off the roads for as long
as possible.”
Storm wasn’t about to argue. It was the very thing he would have done, and he was comforted by John’s ability to think of these things in this sort of situation.
John nudged his nose through the open crack in the door and opened it the rest of the way. The both of them bolted out like the devil himself was on their tails.
The screeching of tires on pavement sent Storm’s fear skyrocketing, and he didn’t need to turn around to know who was behind them.
The hunters had come for them.
Gunshots sounded, the bullets whizzing past their bodies but
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missing by several feet.
Storm knew from experience that firing a gun from a moving vehicle wasn’t as easy as it looked.
“To the trees! To the trees!”
John yelled inside his head.
The forest area was thick, and the truck wouldn’t be able to follow them inside it. It was strange. The trees weren’t actually that far away.
They were just across the two-lane highway, but as they were being chased by a truck that was quickly gaining on them, it felt like miles that they had to run.
The powerful engine growled right behind them, and just when Storm thought he was going to get his tail caught in the tires or something, they burst through the shrubs leading into the woods.
The truck actually followed them. It tried to, at any rate. John and Storm were forced to run another thirty feet or so, ducking and weaving under and around hanging branches and other growing shrubs before the trees finally got to be thick enough that the truck couldn’t pass them or run them over.
There was the sound of crunching metal and a hiss of a dying engine behind them as the truck rammed into one of the trees. Storm didn’t stop to turn and see what kind it was, or how totaled the truck was either. He could tell that they wouldn’t be following them in that vehicle.
As they got farther and farther away, Storm heard the vague sounds of yelling and cursing behind them as the hunters got out of the truck. More shots sounded as the hunters fired on them.
Storm thought they’d gotten away scot-free, and now it was simply a matter of running to safety since the hunters had no truck to follow them with and couldn’t keep up with them as they ran through the woods.
Then John all but tackled him, catching him off guard as he got his blind spot, and a long and pained whine came from his throat as they both lost their footing and rolled down a rocky hill.
Storm was better able to catch himself and get back onto his feet
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before rolling all the way to the bottom. He shook off the dead leaves from his coat, and now the long scratch down his side was hurting again. All that running, and then the fall against all those rocks, had ripped it open just enough to make it annoying and sting like a bitch.
He took a couple of test steps and was pleased that he could handle the pain. He would be fine.
He looked down to the bottom of the hill, expecting to have to inwardly admonish his younger wolf lover for being clumsy and knocking into him.
The sight of John lying motionless at the bottom of the hill stole his breath away.
He ran down to him.
“John?”
There was no response. Storm’s heart kicked up several beats.
He skidded to a halt at the bottom beside his lover, kicking up loose and damp leaves.
John’s eyes weren’t open with blood coming out of his mouth and nose. They were shut, and his chest was just barely rising and falling.
He was alive.
There was, however, blood soaking through a patch of fur just over the muscle of his left leg.
Fuck. John hadn’t just lost his footing like some clumsy wolf.
He’d taken a bullet for Storm.
Storm stuck his large paw on the wolf’s shoulder, being careful not to grip him with his claws. He shook the wolf a little, then leaned down and licked along his muzzle, hoping to wake him.
The wolf groaned and opened its eyes halfway. That long mouth opened, and the tongue lolled out in a panting smile.
“Hey,”
John said.
“Can you walk?”
Storm asked, leaning down to sniff the wound.
He licked it, and John’s leg jerked.
“That hurts!”
“I know. I’m sorry,”
Storm said, for both the pain and for thinking John was clumsy.
“You need to try and get up. They might still be
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following us on foot.”
That alone seemed to be enough motivation to get John to attempt to get back to four paws. He cried out and nearly fell back over again.
“It’s silver,”
John said.
“I can’t do it.”
“No! Stay up!”
Storm used his teeth and grabbed John by the scruff, forcing him back up until he was standing on his own again.
“We need to go. Stay with me until we can find a safe place where
I can dig the bullet out
.
”
How exactly he was going to do that with no tools, Storm had no clue. They had to find another place to hole up for the night.
John just had to last until nightfall came, and that wouldn’t be for another nine hours at least. Who knew where those hunters would be by then.
He didn’t mention that to John. He wanted to keep the man’s spirits up. The run was slow, but they moved on ahead, and no more gunshot sounds followed them.
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Tatum sniffed the air and smiled.
The other man he was with, Robert, cursed and yelled and kicked at the tires of his truck. The engine smoked and hissed, which was expected due to the way it was wrapped around the pine.
There was nothing they could do for it. The truck would have to be scrapped. They would come back for it later and maybe sell it for parts, but until then they needed to get their supplies and find another ride.
He waited until Robert released one more scream of rage before informing him of their luck.
“You don’t have to scream like that. My bullet caught the wolf before they disappeared down the hill.”
Robert stared at him. “How do you know? I could barely see them when you were shooting.”
Tatum knew because he’d seen the way the wolf had jumped in front of Storm and how it had jerked when the bullet struck. He could also smell the blood in the air.
Sometimes being transformed into a demon monster with all these heightened senses really had its perks.
“I’m a good shot, and I saw the way the wolf fell over.”
Robert’s brows went up into his hairline, and his mood immediately improved. “Great. Let’s go pick up the carcass.”
They were still moving. He hadn’t killed the wolf, just injured it.
He could follow the scent of them, and that would have to be good enough. “I doubt I killed it. I just got it in the leg. It’ll slow them down and make them easier to track. We didn’t lose them yet.”
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Already Tatum was reaching into the truck and pulling out bags of ammunition and weapons. He was going to have to be careful when it came time for him to start loading the guns with silver bullets, but he had a pair of gloves with him for that.
Robert wasn’t moving. He was just watching as Tatum eagerly hoisted the heavy bags over his shoulders.
“What do you want those two for? They killed my family. That’s why I want them, but you specifically want them, too. Why?”
Tatum clenched his jaw. He really didn’t have time for this shit.
He hadn’t stuck around long enough to discover exactly what Storm was for himself that day he escaped before the wolves could kill him. No, he’d found that part out later, and he wanted to kill both him and Tony for hiding something like that from him. A shifter had been hiding out in his team of hunters and had probably been waiting for the right moment to strike at them for who knew how long.
As for the wolf, well, he was part of the pack that was responsible for the fact that Tatum was now a demon creature.
He’d thought about eating a bullet once or twice, but he just couldn’t bring himself to do it. Tatum was a survivor. He’d survived the loss of more than one team, and he survived being attacked by werewolves, he was not about to take himself out of the running for life.
The first couple of times he’d transformed, just to wake up with the dead bodies of normal, clean-souled humans next to him, well, that had nearly been his undoing. He swore he would learn to control what he was, and he would get his revenge on those wolves for what they did to him and for what they made him do to those dead humans.
“I have my reasons,” Tatum said. He wasn’t about to get into sharing his shit with this guy. “Every hunter does. You should know that.”
Robert actually blushed. Was this guy for real?
“Yeah, I guess you’re right.”
“I am right. Now hurry up. If we keep a steady pace, we might be
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able to catch up with them. They have to stop and rest sometime considering that wolf has a silver bullet in him.”
* * * *
John wasn’t going to make it. The world swirled around him, and for the fourth time he found himself about to keel over.
He would have, too, had it not been for Storm.
Storm was always there to grab him by the neck and force him back to his feet, like a mother helping her cub along. John didn’t particularly like that comparison, but it was the only thing his foggy brain would produce.
“Keep moving. Just a little farther,”
Storm said encouragingly.
He’d been saying those same words for what felt like hours now, and John had gotten to the point where he was just blindly following the other shifter along. He couldn’t even navigate himself away from a tree before he ran into it.
With every painful step he took, the burning in his leg grew worse. At first the pain was nearly unbearable, but then it had numbed and John was able to quicken his pace a little. He’d still hobbled, but it hadn’t been that bad, and he’d even started to think that maybe the bullet had only been silver plated.