She glanced at Benedict. He looked bored. They might have been paying a visit to some tedious relatives.
But he would know just how scared she was. He’d smell it on her. Dammit, dammit… Lily took a breath and rolled the dice, staking her life, Bern’s, and his on her best guess. “No.”
“What? What did you say?”
“Once I put myself in your hands, I’ve lost all bargaining power. Send my sister out. Then we’ll talk.”
Benedict gave her a small nod.
Harlowe’s laugh was less convincing than it had been. “You must be joking. Do as you’re told, or Beth will regret it, even if you don’t.”
“My walking into that house won’t make her safe. If you’ve got both of us, I’ve nothing left to bargain with.”
“What about your safety?” Harlowe’s voice lost its music as it rose. “Do you see the shotgun pointed at you? The others have guns, too. What makes you think you have a choice?”
“Shoot us, then.” Her heart beat so hard and fast she thought she’d be sick. “Tell them to blast away. Unless, of course, you think that might piss off your goddess.”
“She doesn’t control me. I’m in charge, you understand?”
“Yeah? So how come you keep killing the same woman over and over, Patrick? Do those brown-haired girls remind you of anyone?”
That tipped him over some edge. He cursed her—and Her. All women. While he ranted, Lily stole a glance at Benedict. “How long?” she whispered, meaning, How long before we have backup?
Looking sleepy, he spread both hands, closed them, and then spread the fingers of one hand again.
Fifteen minutes. Surely she could keep Harlowe from acting for fifteen minutes—though he was getting so wound up, she was afraid he’d have them shot to prove a point. She broke into his tirade. “Okay, okay, you’re in charge. The big kahoona. I got that. But you still need to deal. You want me, you’re going to have to deal.”
Silence, except for his breath hitting the mouthpiece in windy bursts. He was panting as if he’d been running. “I’m not sending your sister out,” he said at last. “That would be giving up my bargaining power, wouldn’t it? Perhaps you need to be convinced. Felix,” he said to someone else, “would you like to rape her for me? You can listen,” he told Lily. “You can hear her beg.”
Her hands went cold and numb. She flexed her hands, swallowed bile, and said, “We’ll pull up to the curb, but I’m not getting out until I see Beth.”
He giggled. “Tell you what—we’ll take off her clothes while you’re thinking things over.”
Fourteen more minutes. She had to keep him talking for fourteen more minutes. “Don’t know much about this hostage business, do you? You’re not giving up enough to make me think I’ve got a chance. If I decide it’s hopeless, I’m going to call in forty or fifty federal agents just to be sure you pay.”
“And what do you think will happen to your sister if you do that?”
“I don’t know. Will it be as bad as what happens to you if you don’t deliver me to your goddess?”
Another long moment of silence. “Perhaps we can deal.”
SEVENTEEN
BENEDICT ended the call with a single growled word: Hurry.
Force rose in Rule like an imminent explosion, hollowing him until all that remained was purpose, tipping him away from the rationality of the human toward the power of the beast. He found a new balance. Thought remained, but altered; words no longer led, but existed as small chips of focus for the gathering storm.
Cullen was in the Mercedes’s back seat with his map spread out. Con was driving; Rule hadn’t wanted to split his attention. They’d made good time while they had four lanes, but construction had sent them on a two-lane detour. They were practically crawling now due to some fender bender up ahead.
They were close, though. Rule felt Lily clearly now, like a separate pulse. He felt the moon, too, with her different call. But that call now fed rather than cooled the tide surging within him.
Soon, he told the rage in his blood. Very soon. “Stop the car,” he told Con.
Con stopped the car. Rule hadn’t said to pull over first, so he didn’t. Three vehicles followed his, each riding the other’s tail much too close for safety, had the drivers been human. Because they weren’t, all three stopped immediately, as if they’d choreographed it.
Rule got out. So did those in the other cars—no questions, no debate.
Hunt rules.
“We’re out of time,” he told them, pitching his voice to be heard over the blaring horns of drivers behind them, speaking quickly because he couldn’t hold off the Change much longer. “Lily has reached or is about to reach Harlowe. He’s recruited a gang, a vicious bunch. I don’t know how many are involved. They’ll have guns.” Rule stopped, his breathing ragged.
Just a few more minutes. “Cullen,” he snapped, “stand back.”
Map in hand, Cullen retreated several feet.
“We’re very close,” Rule continued. “Cars will only slow us now, so half of us go ahead, four-footed, at full speed. We’ll approach from upwind—the humans won’t scent us, but Benedict will. The sight of us will surprise them.”
That brought a few grins. Very few humans had ever seen a lupus pack in full hunt. Those who had generally hadn’t live to speak of it. “The other half stay with Cullen, led by Etorri. Stephen.” He faced the other man. “Stay two-footed so you can give orders. Your job is to get Cullen close enough to destroy the staff. He can’t Change or fight—he must retain all his power for the staff. Get him there quickly.”
“Who goes with you?” Stephen asked quickly.
“Those nearest me, I ima—” But words shut off as the Change seized Rule. Earth stretched itself up inside him as if it would claw its way to the moon that called and called, using him as ladder.
As with birth or death, pain was part of the Change.
Sometimes it was a minor note in the song, like the ache of lungs and body during a race. Sometimes—when the Change had been held off too long, or took place away from Earth or at the dark of the moon—pain was a huge gong, belling its brassy note through every cell.
This time, the Change ripped him from human to wolf in a single, deafening blast.
One after another, those nearest him Changed, just as he’d expected. The sudden Change of an alpha leader sends a blast rippling out through the pack, dragging others along. As if reality were no more than a bubble waiting to be popped by some giant, mischievous finger, in eight places that bubble burst.
Clothing ripped. Horns ceased blaring as drivers stared, stunned. Somewhere a dog began to howl.
Seconds later, eight pairs of empty shoes stood where men had been. And eight huge wolves raced off into the night.
LILY’S breath felt harsh in her chest as she opened the car door. Her mind was a tight ball of focus.
Fourteen or fifteen young men—some in their teens, some in their early twenties—fanned out in a semi-circle in front of the concrete slab that served as a front porch. All were armed. She counted six rifles, two shotguns, and a wide array of handguns.
Barely visible behind them stood three people: Harlowe, Beth, and the gang member holding her motionless with one thick arm.
The darkness didn’t hide everything. Harlowe’s staff, for example. A dull black, it shouldn’t have been visible, yet her eyes found it as easily as they picked out the man who gripped it. The gang member holding Beth was easy to spot, being more than a head taller than everyone else and built like a bull. Other than his size, only the pale do-rag and white T-shirt stood out clearly, but a fugitive glint of light caught the barrel of the gun he rested against Beth’s head.