“No. No. I just want to make sure we have the order of worship down correctly.”
This was getting bad and he was having a hard time concentrating with her smelling like that. All he could think about was bending her over the sink and fucking her stupid.
“I didn’t mean—”
“You know, I’m glad we’re getting this out now before we get back to Sara’s house, and we give her and Angelina the wrong impression.”
“What the fuck do they have to do with anything?”
“Well, they said to give you a try—and that’s exactly what I did.”
She aimed that one to hurt. Aimed it to cut out his heart and leave it on the ground so she could stomp on it with her Docs.
At first, he didn’t say anything. Simply stared at her. Then he pushed her change of clothes at her. “Get dressed. The Pack is waiting.”
She snatched the clothes out of his hand and practically ripped her business suit off and put her regular clothes on. When done, she moved to the bathroom door and snatched it open. But Conall’s big hand was there slamming it back.
“Wait.”
“Why?”
He was so close to her. His body almost, but not quite touching hers. “Because we’re not done.”
“We’re done because we never started.”
Miki pulled the bathroom door open and this time he let her. She marched out into the hallway, Conall right behind her.
“What exactly are you scared of, Miki? It’s clearly not me. So what is it?”
“We are not about to have one of those bullshit conversations about feelings.”
She retrieved her backpack, shoved her business clothes inside it, and slung it over her shoulder. She took her computer bag and placed that over her other shoulder then headed toward the stairs.
“This conversation is over, Conall.”
She walked off. She was about twenty feet from the stairs when she heard him growl. Not his usual “You’re getting on my nerves, Miki” growl either. Something else altogether. She turned and saw that he’d shifted. Not parts of him. All of him. For the first time since the night of the Pride fight, she saw Conall the wolf. No wonder he’d been pissed about the golden. No way could that little pup be confused with the powerful predator in front of her.
Conall shook off his clothes and then he charged her. Teeth bared. Hackles up. With a tiny squeak that didn’t sound anything like her, Miki dropped to her knees, her arms over her head. She waited for impact but there was none. She looked up to see that Conall had sailed right over her and right over the stair railing.
“Holy shit! Conall!” She dropped her bags and charged over to the railing. She saw him hit two hyenas on the stairs, knocking them down half a flight. But there were six more and they were all looking at her.
Miki didn’t even think about it. She ran.
Chapter Eighteen
Conall didn’t know what happened. One minute he was arguing with the crazy woman he secretly called “wife” and the next he was wolf and making mad dashes over railings.
As he sunk his teeth into a throat, he briefly wondered what happened to his Pack. Then he heard them. Growling. Snarling. Fighting. It sounded as if they were kicking some ass, too, but there were so many of the hyenas. As soon as he destroyed one, another two were on his back. Mostly females, vicious beyond anything he’d ever experienced before.
Then he remembered Miki. Last he saw she was ducking and covering. Had she actually thought he’d hurt her? He was the least of her problems.
Still, Conall wasn’t worried about Miki as much as he was worried for her. Because the one thing he knew about his woman—she could take care of herself.
Miki charged down the stairs on the opposite side of the building. She heard the hyenas coming for her. They had the most disturbing howl she’d ever experienced, like brutal, mocking laughter. She had to force her body to move. All she really wanted to do was hide in a corner and cry. Anything to block out that sound.
She took two steps at a time, and stopped on the second floor, running down the hallway until she hit Conridge’s office. By then they were snapping at her heels. She had barely enough time to get into Conridge’s office and slam the door. She held her body against it and could feel them throwing themselves at the hard wood.
Seconds later Conridge was beside her, adding her weight against the door. The woman had thankfully changed clothes. She now wore a pullover sweater, jeans and running shoes. It seemed she would need the running shoes.
“What the hell?”
“Hyenas,” Miki panted out, her mind scrambling for what to do next.
Even as Conridge locked the door, the two women continued to keep their bodies against it. But it wouldn’t last much longer. With every hit the hinges became weaker.
“We’ve got to get out of here.” Conridge’s eyes began to search the room for some escape. She didn’t have a window, but she had a vent. But Miki wasn’t about to get trapped in that with hyenas on her ass.
Her amped-up Stop the Bark tragically still sat in her backpack with her house keys, and there was no way to get to it without heading back toward the hyenas. No way. Plus she needed to kill these things, not incapacitate them.
“Is there any chance in hell you have a gun?”
“Bottom drawer on the left.” When Miki just stared at her, “I don’t have claws, Ms. Kendrick. So I had to find other ways to protect myself. You know the world does not revolve around the Magnus Pack. The Van Holtz Pack has its own enemies.”
Fair enough. Miki left Conridge to hold the door while she tore through her drawer. She almost cried when she found two loaded Sig Sauer P239s. The P239s were compact and fit her hand pretty well. Both were .357s, so there were only seven rounds per magazine but, bless her, Conridge had extra clips already filled with ammo. She liked this woman more and more.
Miki stuck one gun in the back of her jeans and several already loaded clips in her front jean pocket. Then she stood in front of the door and dropped to her knees. She leveled the weapon in both hands and watched the door as the hyenas on the other side relentlessly pounded away trying to get to her. She watched the movement of the door. The way it buckled and where it buckled. She listened to the sounds they made when they made contact with the wood. Then she waited for that “click” inside her head.
Conridge watched her but didn’t say anything. When Miki finally spoke, she was ready.
“Move.”
Conridge took several quick steps back and covered her ears. Miki took one more second to clear her mind and body and then she shot three rounds through the door. She heard yelps of pain and surprise and then nothing.
After a minute, Conridge stepped forward and listened at the door.
“I don’t hear anything.” She put her hand on the doorknob. “Be ready,” was all she said before she eased the door open and glanced into the hallway.
“Holy shit.”
Miki looked at her professor. It was the first time she ever heard the woman utter anything except “hell” and the occasional “damn”.
“You’re a hell of shot, Ms. Kendrick.”
Miki stood and went to the door. She pulled it completely open, the gun out but at an angle so she didn’t accidentally kill someone important. There were three hyenas dead on the floor. Miki frowned.
“There were six on the stairs that Conall wasn’t fighting,” she whispered. She pulled the other gun out of her waistband. She offered it to Conridge, but the older woman shook her head. “I’m not the best shot.” She gazed at the hyena corpses. “Not like you.”
Miki shrugged. She’d been smart enough to learn to shoot with both hands. Amazing what you can get done when you’re under house arrest.