The owner of the club and Head Barman, Roger, looked up as they reached the bar. In greeting he nodded at her, Caleb and Shaya. “What can I get you all?”
A Valium, maybe? “The usual for me please, Roger.” Being constantly on call, she mostly stuck to Coca Cola when she went on a night out. Depressing, but a drunken healer wasn’t a good one.
As Caleb ordered a beer and Shaya ordered some weird cocktail, Taryn discretely searched for her dad’s enforcers, Oscar and Perry. They stood at the other end of the bar, chatting while still alert. At least there was a decent distance between them all. She had to resist the urge to scan for any sign of Trey.
She, Caleb, and Shaya found some vacant stools by the bar and got comfortable as they drank and chatted. Although she was fully part of their conversation, it was always at the forefront of her mind that her life was about to change. She was about to enter a temporary mating with the wolf shifter equivalent of the Black Mamba snake and had a worryingly overwhelming effect on her body. To add to that, she would never be returning to her dad’s pack and this could even be the very last time she saw her two best friends.
“Thank God you’re here! I need your help badly.”
A curse flew out of Taryn’s mouth as she looked up to see Nicole, one of her pack mates. She had run over everything in her head before coming, but she hadn’t once accounted for someone needing her for her healing skills right in the middle of her fake claiming. Crap. As the pack healer, it wasn’t like she could refuse to help and nor did she want to.
“It’s Ashley,” explained Nicole as she took Taryn’s hand, pulled her from the stool, and began to lead her through the tight throngs of people. Shaya and Caleb followed closely behind them. The combination of the brushing of bodies against her and strange hands occasionally fondling her as she went by further soothed Taryn’s wolf while simultaneously rousing her.
“What’s wrong with her?” asked Taryn.
“She’s barely conscious. I guess she must have taken something, but Taryn you know Ashley doesn’t do drugs.”
Nicole abruptly stopped. Not because they had reached Ashley, but because there was such a large crowd of shifters huddled together that it was like coming up against a wall. Clearly there was a very powerful alpha male somewhere within that crowd who was being both protected and harassed. She wondered if it was Trey. A shudder rippled down her spine as she thought of what was to come – if he found her, that was.
Advancing further involved a lot of foot squashing and elbow clashing, but eventually they stopped before a chair where Nicole’s boyfriend, Richie, stood as though on guard. He gave them all a nod in greeting. In the chair was Ashley, slouched, pale, and limp.
Nicole crouched before her and rubbed her forearm. “Ashley?”
The small red head opened her eyes slightly, but her expression was pretty vacant. Yep, she’d been drugged alright.
Nicole, worrying her lower lip, rose and turned to Taryn. “Can you help?” She knew that Taryn didn’t have to help anyone who had been dumb enough to drug themselves into a practically catatonic state, but she had to agree with Nicole. Ashley wasn’t the type of person who would do drugs.
“You think Roger will let us use his office? I can’t heal her here.”
“I’ll go ask him,” said Caleb. Before she could say a word, his tall form had disappeared in the crowd.
“Do you think someone spiked her drink?” asked Shaya.
“She was fine up until those hyenas were sniffing around her,” said Nicole in a panicky voice, twirling a blond curl around her finger.
Richie nodded. “They looked like a bad bunch, so I chased them off.”
Taryn puffed. “Roger’s going to be so pissed off. Not only is someone using drugs in his establishment, but they’re using them to spike people’s drinks.”
“You not with Roscoe tonight?”
“It’s only a few days until the mating ceremony,” said Nicole. “You must be pretty excited.”
“Hey it was really cool when you knocked him out of his chair,” said Richie with a grin. Clearly Nicole had been one of the females staring at Roscoe, pissing Richie off.
“What had he done?”
Taryn ran a hand through her hair, hoping she didn’t look as stressed out as she was feeling. “You know how it is with alpha females and making sure their mates are worthy.” Feeling a tap on her shoulder, Taryn swerved to find Caleb. “Roger said it was okay?”
Caleb nodded. “He’s waiting by the door with the key. He likes to keep it locked.”
“Come on then people, let’s get Ashley moved.”
Taryn grabbed Ashley’s purse as Richie and Caleb each draped one of Ashley’s arms over their shoulders and lifted her from the chair. She didn’t react other than to let out a low whiny moan. With Nicole and Shaya on either side of her, Taryn led the way to the office, making room through the crowds for the guys to carry Ashley through without dropping her on her ass.
Five footsteps later Taryn accidentally bumped into a curvy brunette. A familiar curvy brunette. Everything about her was false; her breasts, her plush upper lip, her eyelashes, her nails. God, even the length of her hair wasn’t natural – she clearly wore hair extensions. Hell, she was so fake she probably had ‘Made in China’ stamped somewhere on her body. Taryn would happily have ignored her if she hadn’t turned and sneered, speaking in that acidic tone of hers.
“Well if it isn’t the latent.”
Having been listening to Brodie’s crap for years, Taryn could only roll her eyes and sigh. “Must we go through this every time? Yeah, I’m latent, get over it.”
“Should you even be in here? This is a shifter club and, when you think about it, you don’t really count as one, do you?”
Noting how loud and obvious Brodie was being and just how close she was to the notorious alpha of the local falcon pack, realisation dawned. “Oh, you’re putting on a show for the big bad alpha here. I’m sure he’s very impressed hearing you mouth off to someone who you clearly believe is weaker than yourself.”
Shaya snorted. “You’d think she would have learned her lesson years ago when you kicked her ass at the school prom.”
Brodie’s face scrunched up in mortification. “I had a migraine that day.”
“Sure you did,” said Caleb dryly.
Turning her attention back to Taryn, Brodie shot her a wicked smirk. “How’s your dad? Is he doing as good as when I left him last night?”
Her wolf growled inside her head. “You know, one day you’re going to get seriously banged up and need healing, and I’m not going to do a damn thing about it.”
“Ooh, did I touch a nerve?”
“You get on my nerves, does that count? Now as much as this might surprise you, Brodie, the world doesn’t revolve around you. I have shit to do, including helping out Ashley here, so run along.”
She stepped a little closer, pouting. “But I’m having fun, aren’t you little freak?”
With a speed that Brodie obviously hadn’t been expecting, Taryn grabbed her mop of hair and yanked down her head to connect with Taryn’s sharply rising knee. There was a crunch – her nose, probably. Then she flung a squealing yet dazed Brodie aside and watched as she landed awkwardly on her ass. “I am now.”
Ignoring the claps and cheers – did all guys love watching females fight? – Taryn continued making her way to the office. Roger unlocked and held open the door, allowing them all to enter before then clearing off the surface of his bureau. The guys then carefully laid Ashley on top of it.
Knowing the drill, Nicole opened the window and then stood against the far wall with Caleb, Shaya, Roger, and Richie to give Taryn some space. She placed her palm over Ashley’s forehead and, as quick as that, there were patches of luminous lights shining through Ashley’s skin, indicating where the most damage was done by the drug Ashley had taken. The first light was coming from her stomach, making her baby pink dress give off a neon glow. The other was beneath her scalp, gleaming behind her red hair.