Man to Man [Wolf Creek Pack 3] (Siren Publishing Classic ManLove) (9 page)

“Taylor just told me that him, Roger, the Teacher, and two armed guards are waiting for us at the circle. He’s told them that’s where we would be because he’s trying to keep the Teacher busy while Chase and the other guys go in for Justin.”

“Who’s Taylor?” Donovan asked.

“Taylor is Justin’s lover. He’s also one of the Teacher’s pets.”

“Can he be trusted?”

Nate grimaced. “I don’t know.”

Well, that isn’t good.

“Why does he need to keep the Teacher busy?” Donovan asked.

“I guess Justin is in touch with him, telling him that Chase is already at the warehouse. One of the guards called the Teacher and told them that they were being attacked. He was ready to turn back when Taylor told him where we’d be. He says he’s sorry, but it was the only thing he could think of to keep the Teacher busy.”

“No, no, it was a good plan. At least if we know they’re waiting for us, we won’t be surprised or ambushed,” Joe replied.

“You still want to go?” Nate asked.

“We have to, baby. Like Taylor said, we need to give Chase time to get the others out. Besides, the pack should be here any minute,” Joe said as he pulled the truck to a stop and turned it off.

Nate didn’t look so sure, but he nodded to Joe anyway. “Okay, if you say so. I think you’ve lost your ever-loving mind, but…”

Donovan could hear Nate chuckle from the backseat as he climbed out of the truck. He walked to the front of the truck and waited for Nate and Joe to join him. Joe pulled Nate into his arms and gave him a kiss. Donovan watched for a moment and then turned away to give the two men some privacy. He hoped that he and Jim would be the same way eventually. It was like Joe and Nate lived just for each other.

“Okay, let’s get this over with,” Joe said as he and Nate walked toward the front of the truck. Donovan nodded. He couldn’t think of anything he wanted more than to get this over with and go back to Jim.

As they walked onto the edge of the circle a moment later, Donovan carefully placed himself on the opposite side of Nate from Joe, placing the smaller man between them for protection. They came to a stop when they reached a large clearing that Donovan assumed was the ritual circle.

Donovan carefully eyed the five men he could see facing him from several feet away. He carefully sniffed the air. Four of the men were human, and one was shifter. Two of the men stood in front, two larger armed men off to the side. The fourth man stood behind them all.

“Hello, Nathan, I’ve been looking for you for a long time,” one of the men up front said. Donovan assumed from the expensive suit he was wearing and the air of confidence he had that this was the Teacher.

“Why don’t you come over here where you belong and we’ll just go? I wouldn’t want to see anyone else get hurt,” the Teacher said.

“No, you don’t own me, and you can’t tell me what to do,” Nate replied sternly.

“Nathan, I don’t like repeating myself. Get your ass over here before someone gets hurt,” the Teacher said as he pointed to a spot on the ground right next to him.

“No,” Nate repeated.

“Just remember that you brought this on yourself, Nathan. If you had just done what I had told you to do, none of this would have happened.”

Before Donovan could react to the threat he felt coming, the Teacher pulled a gun, raised his arm, and fired. Donovan felt a searing pain shoot through his body. He grabbed his chest and fell to the ground, his shirt turning red with blood.

He heard Nate cry out, then the sounds of a fight. The growls he heard told him that Joe had shifted and was even now fighting for their lives. Donovan tried to sit up, but pain shot through him every time he moved.

Donovan felt an acute sense of loss as he realized he might never see Jim again. Terrible regrets assailed him as the pain in his chest intensified. He might never get the chance to experience what Jim had felt earlier when Donovan had fucked him, never get to know the man he was mated to. He might lose Jim before he even got to know him.

Just as Donovan’s vision began to dim, he heard a low, tortured cry. Then hands were touching him, pressing down on his bleeding wound. Donovan lifted his eyelids to see Jim kneeling over him, tears trailing down his pale face.

“You die on me, Donovan Morgan, and I swear to god I will commit suicide just to chase you through hell,” Jim sobbed through gritted teeth. He quickly pulled his shirt over his head and pressed it against Donovan’s injury.

Donovan chuckled then moaned as pain swamped him. “Rather have you chase me through the bedroom,” he whispered.

“Gods, Donovan, how can you joke at a time like this?” Jim cried out. “You have a fucking hole in your chest.” Jim looked close to panic.

“I like pink.” Donovan grinned up at his mate right before he passed out.

Jim felt his heart stutter painfully in his chest when Donovan’s eyes closed, his body slumping back against the ground. Sheer, dark fright swept through him until he realized that Donovan had only passed out. Even now Donovan’s werewolf genetics were healing his wound. In a few days, he should be as good as new.

Knowing that still didn’t stop Jim from worrying.

The sound of a gun going off as they had arrived hadn’t frightened Jim nearly as much as the anguish he had felt the moment he had realized that Donovan had been shot. He had felt it even before he had seen Donovan lying on the ground.

Fear, stark and vivid, had enveloped Jim’s entire being until he had seen Donovan move as he ran toward him. He had fallen to his knees beside Donovan, instantly putting pressure on the bullet hole in his chest.

He knew that a bullet wound shouldn’t be fatal to a shifter, but the very sight of Donovan’s chest covered in blood made him ignorant of anything except the fact that his mate was injured and bleeding.

“James?”

Jim looked up to see his mother hovering over him and Donovan. Her face was a mixture of concern and confusion. “He’s my mate, Mom.” Was there anything else to say?

Jim felt his mom stare at him for a moment as she absorbed his words. He had never envisioned coming out of the closet quite like this, but right now, with his mate’s blood covering his hands, he didn’t give a damn who knew.

“Okay, James,” Maryann said as she knelt down beside Jim, “let’s see about patching your mate up.” Maryann started applying pressure to the wound, helped Jim stop the blood flowing from Donovan’s chest
.

“Thanks, Mom.”

Maryann smiled. “He’s your mate, son.”

Jim smiled over at his mom at her accepting nature. He knew he shouldn’t have expected any other response from of her. Maryann Nash had only ever wanted one thing from her children, their happiness. If he could get his mate patched up, that was exactly what he planned on giving her.

“Is he going to be okay?”

Jim glanced over his shoulder to see Nate standing behind him, a worried frown on his face. Joe stood right behind Nate, looking a little rough around the edges but otherwise okay.

“I think so,” Jim said as he looked back down at his mate. He watched his mother administer help to his mate, thankful when the blood coming from Donovan’s wound slowly trailed away. Once he felt like he could breathe again without his heart pounding out of his chest, Jim looked back at Nate and Joe. “What happened to the Teacher?”

The slight blush that covered his brother’s face surprised Jim, as did that giggle that came from Nate.

“Joe went all furry on his ass, killed the Teacher and his goons. We never have to deal with them again.”

“And your friend, Taylor?” Jim asked.

Nate smirked. “Chase took him back to Joe’s place.”

“Whose place?” Joe growled, pulling Nate back against his body.

Jim chuckled when Nate rolled his eyes. He had no doubt whatsoever that Nate wasn’t the least bit intimidated by Joe’s growling.

“Our place,” Nate replied.

Just to stop Joe from going on about Nate not calling their house, well,
their house
, Jim interrupted. “Hey, do you mind if we get my mate back to the house? I’d like to get him into bed.”

Nate laughed. “I’ll just bet you would.”

Jim rolled his eyes and carefully scooped Donovan up in his arms. He grunted and nearly stumbled when he stood up. Even with his werewolf genetics and super strength, his mate was heavier than shit.

“Mom, would you get the door?” he asked as he hurried toward his truck. Maryann ran ahead of him and opened the door and then stood back. Jim slowly lowered Donovan into the front seat. He paused for a moment, stroking his hand down Donovan’s pale face, and then shut the door and walked around to the driver’s-side door.

Jim didn’t bother waving to anyone as he peeled out and drove toward Nate’s house. He would have rather taken Donovan back to his place, but he knew the doctor was at Nate and Joe’s, caring for the men who had been rescued. And Donovan needed a doctor more than Jim needed privacy.

He hadn’t had a chance to speak to his father yet and knew that confrontation was coming. Jim just hoped his father took the news of new mating as well as his mother seemed to have. When the rest of the pack found out his mate was a man, Jim was pretty sure he was going to need the support of his family.

His pack wasn’t horrible by any means, and the younger crowd was very accepting. But some of the older members were not. Joe had had a very hard time when he found Nate. They seemed to have no problem with Joe being gay. They just didn’t want him to have a male mate paraded around in front of them. It was like they found it offensive or something.

Jim didn’t want to go through that with his mate. He just wanted to live happily ever after in his little valley with his mate and family and pack. He didn’t want any drama, people spitting on him because he was mated to a man, or turning a cold shoulder in his direction because of what he was. Was that too much to ask?

Jim was growling by the time he pulled his truck to a stop in front of Nate and Joe’s house. His hands had tightened around the steering wheel so much that it creaked under his fingers. He was angry, agitated, and downright bitchy. And he knew it.

He took a few deep breaths to try and calm himself. If Chase had indeed rescued the men being held captive, he needed to be levelheaded when he went inside. Jim imagined they were scared out of their minds.

He glanced over at his mate, watching as Donovan’s chest rose and fell with each breath. Jim slowly felt himself calming, his control returning in bits and pieces. He reached over and brushed the light-brown hair back from Donovan’s face.

“You better be worth this, Donovan Morgan.”

Jim climbed out of the truck and walked around to Donovan’s side. He pulled the door open and carefully lifted his mate out and then headed for the house, not even bothering to shut the door. Someone would get it later.

His arms were full of his mate when he reached the front door so Jim just kicked at it until someone answered. Jim took a quick step back when the door opened. The man standing there was not someone he recognized, and he would have immediately known him. The man was hard to miss. He was even bigger than Jim.

“Where’s the doctor?” The man merely arched an eyebrow at him. Jim rolled his eyes. He didn’t have time for this shit. His mate was still bleeding, but only barely. “Look, this is my brother’s house and—”

“Is that Donovan?”

“Yes.” Jim took a step back, trepidation filling him. But how did this stranger know who Donovan was?

“Oh man, Chase is going to shit kittens when he finds out his baby brother got hurt.” The man started to reach out for Donovan. “I’ll take him.”

Jim didn’t know how he did it, but he held Donovan against his own body with one hand and reached over to grab the stranger with the other. He squeezed his fingers tightly around the man’s neck until his face began to turn red and then shoved him away as hard as he could.

“Don’t ever put your hands on my mate again!” Jim snapped. He swung both his arms up under Donovan again and lifted him back up before storming past the choking stranger. He didn’t have a clue who the man was, but if he ever touched Donovan again, his life would be very short.

His steps faltered when he reached the living room—the very populated living room. Several men were dressed in white shirts and tan slacks. Others were all dressed in black battle gear.

Besides their modes of dress, the demeanor of the two groups was clearly different. The men dressed in black all stood close to the exits with their backs to the walls. They avoided the windows and watched everything with intense stares. It was a little creepy how none of them were speaking, not even Chase, who sat on the edge of a side table with his arms crossed. He seemed to be intently watching a small red-haired man sitting on the couch.

The other men in the room sat huddled together in little groups on the couches in the middle of the room, talking in hushed tones, occasionally casting darted glances at the men surrounding them. They looked scared, nervous, and hungry. But mostly they looked scared.

Hell, they looked terrified.

“Where’s the doctor?” Jim asked, gaining everyone’s attention. “Donovan’s been shot.”