18. Bexley

18

BEXLEY

“Alphaaaaaaa!”

The instant I heard that little girl scream, I scrambled out of bed like a bat out of fucking hell. I watched Voss twirl his finger over his head, and from out of nowhere, a white and green wisp covered him in the clothes that were once on the floor. I stumbled off the bed and whipped toward the first window. Voss already had the curtains open, and I leaned against the glass as yet another burst of light erupted across the sky.

“Fireballs,” Voss growled.

I used my dress to wipe between my legs. Jesus Christ, what I wouldn’t have given for just a sliver of their powers.

“Come on,” Voss snarled as he grabbed my hand, “we have to go.”

As I continued using the inside of the dress to wipe up the shit dripping down the insides of my thighs, I tripped over my feet as Voss tugged me outside. I abandoned my efforts and gnashed my teeth together as the two of us walked side by side as a war raged around us.

“Alpha! Heeeeelp!” Little Annabelle shrieked.

I took off running in the direction of her sound. I felt Voss try to grab onto my hand, but it was still slick with sweat. I raced toward Annabelle, who was running from a flame trying to catch up with her as if the flame were somehow possessed. I scooped her into my arms and leapt out of the way as a rush of wind came barreling toward the fire. And in a flash, the flame was nothing more than smoke.

I quickly looked around and saw one of the healers from Voss’s pack swirling her hands around in the air. It kicked up wind all around us, rustling the trees and bending the branches as another gust of wind grew. I watched it churn as I tossed Annabelle over my shoulder. I scrambled to my feet when I saw another child running for the woods. I ran as quickly as possible as another gust of wind damn near knocked me off my feet.

I scooped Billy into my grasp, looking for any other signs of the children.

“Over there!” Billy exclaimed. “Joseph’s on the roof.”

“Alphaaaa!” the poor boy cried as tears wafted down his face.

And that’s when I saw it. A fucking vampire, doing its best to scale the house.

“Joseph!” I shrieked.

Then a cloudy gray wolf from out of nowhere leapt into the air and snatched the vampire off the side of the house. Its white underbelly was the only color on its body as it grasped the vampire in between its fucking teeth and ripped its goddamn head off. I covered Annabelle and Billy’s eyes. Limbs went flying. The head got tossed into the woods. And as the vampire erupted into a cloud of dust, the matching steel gray eyes of that wolf locked with mine.

Ronyn.

A massive black wolf with piercing blue eyes and that same white underbelly dropped Joseph from its jowls right at my feet.

Dom.

“Thank you,” I said breathlessly as I scooped the kids into my grasp.

One by one, the shifters of my pack came and snatched the children from me. I gazed around at the turmoil raining down on our beautiful solstice celebration, there were whips of blurs all around me. Wolves jumped into the air. Children screamed as they ran for their lives. The blurs rushed around the fire, starving the bonfire of what it needed to keep burning. Tables were overturned with nothing but the gusts of wind from the healer that kept swallowing someone’s fucking fireballs. As the tumultuous roar of the battle grew, I struggled to catch my breath.

It reminded me of the job I left.

Of the job that I abandoned.

Of the job I never wanted to start back at again.

“Alphaaaaaa!”

The shriek turned my head toward a child that wasn’t part of my pack, but I didn’t care. Ronyn’s gray wolf and Dom’s black wolf stuck with me, snatching those blurs right out of the air. I quickly figured out that the blurring motion was nothing more than vampires running at full speed. Running so fast that my human eyes couldn’t perceive anything except their blurred bodies like in the fucking movies. I shook my head as I scooped up the little girl. I raced for another boy that was headed straight for the woods, and the only thing that stopped the boy was Ronyn leaping in front of him at lightning speed.

I scooped up both of the children and put them on Ronyn’s back.

“Get them to safety, now,” I commanded.

And with a nod of his head, he took off as Dom, in his black wolfish form, stalked around me.

“We get the children out of here, understood?” I asked.

He nodded his head before he dipped down, as if bowing to me. It didn’t take me long to straddle his neck, and as I wrapped my hand up in his fur, I held on as tightly as I could.

Then, he took off.

The entire world seemed to be fucking burning as trees smoked in the distance. Dom and I whipped through the chaos, and I reached down for the small hands of children reaching out for the safety of his back. I pulled them onto me and encouraged them to hang on. Dom pivoted on a dime, causing me to wrap my arms around everyone before he came to a grinding halt.

Just as a vampire headed straight for us, another wolf jumped over my head. A rich, dark brown wolf with that same damn underbelly of white. It snatched that vampire right out of the air and I just barely got the kids’ eyes and ears covered before one snap of that wolf’s neck broke the vampire’s back. Dom and this other wolf wrestled with the corpse. I watched in horror as they grabbed either side of the panicked vampire, and its reddened gaze locked with mine.

Then, Dom and the dark brown wolf tore that vampire limb from limb.

When I finally looked up at the other wolf, I found those mischievous green eyes gazing down at me.

“Thank you, Voss,” I said as I reached up and petted him behind his ear.

His eyes closed for just a second before they popped back open. Then, with a nod of his head, he charged back into the battle.

Dom took off around the perimeter.

I thought back to Ronyn’s training. To the way I had to roll my hips and clench my thighs just to stay on his back in the woods. Fire broke out on just about all sides of the compound. The flames mounted as we continued gathering the children who hadn’t hit their shifterhood yet. They were helpless without the ability to shift, and I held them close as a war raged in front of me. Wolves of all shapes, colors, and sizes squared up to motion blurs that never stopped until the wolves themselves knew that they could kill those vampires. I’d never seen a race of humans so bloodthirsty in all my life.

No wonder shifters hated vampires.

Dom took off randomly, and I yelped as I clung on for dear life. I scooped the five kids close to me, feeling them tugging my dress as they hung on for dear life. Fire encroached upon us. Trees went up in flames. Fiery leaves floated through the air as that damned healer continued to cast miniature tornadoes like it was her motherfucking job. We bobbed and weaved through it all, and that’s when I realized exactly how nimble on his feet Dom really was.

It was honestly impressive.

That is, until I figured out where he was leading us.

“No!” I exclaimed, tugging on his fur.

I heard his growl as he continued sprinting toward the one opening in the fire.

“No! It’s a trap! We’re being funneled!”

I continued yanking at him, but he continued storming toward the opening.

“Dom!” I exclaimed.

“Alpha?” one of the panicked kids asked.

“It’s okay, it’s okay, you guys,” I said breathlessly as I reached up Dom’s neck and hooked my finger into his jowls.

I pulled with all my might and that brought him to a grinding, glowering halt.

“We can’t go that way!” I exclaimed above the roar of the flames. “Look!”

I pointed all around us before Dom’s wolf stared back at the only exit we had.

“She’s funneling us with the fire! It’s a trap! We can’t go that way!”

“Then, what the fuck do you suggest we do!?” Voss exclaimed as he quickly shifted back into his human form.

Ronyn sprinted toward us and came to a skidding halt in his human form. “She’s right. They’re funneling us. We can’t go that way.”

Voss held his hands out as chaos rained down around us. “Then where the fuck do you suggest we take the pack!?”

Dom stood there, tall and strong, with his gaze locked onto the only exit we had from the forest burning around us. The kids clung to him, and the longer we waited, the more he dipped his nose to the ground.

“He’s going to take off if we don’t do something,” Ronyn growled.

Then a plan formulated in my mind and I pointed at Ronyn. “Get two sets of your troops to go through first. They’ll fight off whatever first wave is headed for us.”

“On it,” he said as he shifted back into his wolf form.

“Voss,” I said, whipping toward him, “get the healers working on this fire. We can’t put it out, but one of those healers is spinning tornadoes. Get her to put out the perimeter. We need an alternative exit, or at least we need to look like we’re working on one.”

Voss nodded. “What does Dom need to do?”

I walked around to the front of his wolf and gazed deeply into his blue stare. “You keep running with those kids on your back and you don’t stop until we’ve got somewhere for you to take them. Understood?”

He nodded his head, so I pressed a soft kiss to his snout. “Good boy.”

I swear his eyes glinted with deviousness. And I swear, even with hell raining down around us, Dom made me smile.

Almost like it was his talent to be able to make me smile in the direst of situations.

“Down boy. Now, get out of here. Let’s go, let’s go, let’s go, let’s go!” I exclaimed.

Then I was scooped off my feet. “Ah!”

The fiery red wolf beneath me didn’t even have to turn her fucking head for me to know who it was. And in a few bounds, Merida had me up on the roof of the bath house. She pinned me with an icy look from her blue eyes that told me to stay put, and for once in my life, I didn’t have to be told twice. It was a tactical advantage, too. The bath house was removed from the rest of the compound. It sat in the corner, which meant it had a great view of everything. God, what I wouldn’t have given for a bit of groupthink just so I could give everyone a bird’s eye view of what I saw.

The moment didn’t last long, however.

Aa-aa-aa-aa-aa-aa-OOOOOOOOH!

Aa-aa-aa-aa-aa-aa-OOOOOOOOH!

Aa-aa-aa-aa-aa-aa-OOOOOOOOH!

The look in Merida’s wolf’s eyes made my heart stop in my chest. For a brief moment, everyone stopped. Everyone stilled. And as the echo of the howl reverberated across the compound, I saw Voss and Ronyn’s wolves galloping toward the sound.

Dom.

“Merida!” I exclaimed as I leapt onto her back from the roof. “Get me to him, now!”

She took off in the direction of the whimpering howl, anger flushing its way through my veins. My heart slammed so hard against my chest that I thought it might shatter. I had to get to him. I had to get to Dom. That howl wasn’t good, and it didn’t take a genius to know that if Voss took off running, it was bad. Merida pumped her legs as quickly as she could go, tearing across the compound even with vampires hot on our heels. Desperation filled me to the brim. Dear fucking God, if Delilah got her hands on him, I’d torture her myself.

I’d string her up in that fucking cave and treat her like one of her fucking vampires.