“Marlon, get over here and hold Gwen’s hand.”
Marlon did so, demanding, “Will someone please tell me who the hell did this to you? Was it Brandt? I will seriously shoot the little bastard myself if—”
“It was a flock of birds,” said Gwen, tone flat. “Big birds with red eyes.” Initially, she’d been numb with shock, unable to properly process what happened. But the shock had given way to a controlled anger that left her able to think more clearly. “Shifters.”
“Shifters?” echoed Marlon, incredulous. “That’s—” Noticing that Gwen’s wounds were healing, Marlon said, “Wow.”
“Yes, shifters,” Ally said to Gwen with a sad sigh. “It’s shifters like those birds who give our kind a bad rep and make humans distrust us.” After a few moments, she sat back on her heels and puffed out a long breath. “You may feel a little drowsy, but I doubt you’ll lose consciousness.”
Yeah, “drowsy” was a good word. Gwen’s body felt limp and featherlight, like she could happily doze off. She probed the area where she’d had a long rake mark on her arm, surprised to find it wasn’t even tender.
Marlon frowned at Ally’s pasty face. “You don’t look too good yourself. Stay there, I’ll be right back.”
Gwen sat on the sofa, her movements sluggish. She took a deep, shuddering breath. “Thanks for healing me.”
“How do you feel?” Ally asked.
Gwen snorted. “Like I was attacked by a flock of birds. You came running outside as if you knew something was wrong. Did you?”
“I’m a Seer. I had a vision that you were attacked by goshawks.”
“Goshawks?” Gwen shook her head. “I’ve seen goshawks. They’re big, and some of them have red eyes, sure, but they’re not that big.”
“Shifters’ birds are often much bigger than their avian counterparts. Our pack had a run-in with harpy eagle shifters not so long ago. That was bad. One struck Zander hard from behind, barely missing the back of his neck—that move might well have killed him. Another actually tried to carry him off; it probably would have carried him high and then dropped him.”
Gwen’s chest tightened. She was pissed at him, but that didn’t mean she was okay with hearing he could have been seriously hurt or killed.
Marlon reappeared and handed both Gwen and Ally a bottle of water and a granola bar. “Here. Now, tell me exactly what happened.”
Gwen gave him a nod of thanks and unscrewed the lid of the bottle. “They just came out of nowhere. Zander, Derren, and Bracken shifted and attacked them while I pretty much lay there, unable to do a fucking thing. Ally thinks they were goshawks.”
Marlon swore. “The Moores will be behind this.”
“I should have expected Ezra to hire shifters to hurt me.” Gwen sipped her water. “No one would suspect him of that.”
“Bastard,” Marlon spat. He shot Ally a weak but grateful smile. “Thank God you were here.”
Gwen sighed down at her ruined, bloody clothes. “I really liked this shirt. Yvonne bought it for me. I’m so glad she decided to stay at Julie’s for the night. This would have sent her in a blind panic.”
Frantic footsteps were quickly followed by the door bursting open and Andie dashing into the room, breathing hard. “I saw the wolves running around like their asses were on fire.” She noticed the blood on Gwen’s torn clothes, and her eyes flashed cat.
“I’m okay. Ally healed me.”
Andie carefully eyed the she-wolf, who was munching on her granola bar.
“I’m no threat to you,” said Ally. “I’m one of Zander and Bracken’s pack mates.”
Looking a little mollified, Andie shifted her focus back to Gwen. “Did Brandt come back? Was it one of the Moores?”
“In a sense.” Gwen explained what had happened, leaving Andie gaping at her.
“God, I really hate that family.” Andie nostrils flared. “I think I smell fire.”
Marlon cleared his throat. “That happens sometimes. We’ll smell things like perfume or smoke or aftershave. Blame the ghosts.”
Looking fascinated, Ally went to speak. But then her head tilted. “Sounds like the boys are back.”
Silently, Derren entered first, scratches on his face. “They got away,” he bit out. “We followed them as far as we could, but . . . well, we can’t fucking fly.”
“At least we killed two of them before the others flew off,” said Bracken. “We dumped the bodies in the river.”
Zander stalked inside and made a beeline for Gwen, neck corded, nostrils flaring. Fury was stamped into every line of his face. A frisson of fear trailed down her spine.
“She’s fully healed,” Ally reassured him.
Zander sank onto the sofa and drew Gwen onto his lap, holding her tight against him. He breathed her in, using her scent to calm him. But the scent of her blood was still strong in the air, thanks to the stains on her clothes and skin, and it was hard to regain his composure.
He wanted to punch and bite and claw and mangle and kill, but most of the bastards had gotten away. He needed to see them pay, needed to tear them apart, needed the smell of their blood to replace the smell of Gwen’s.
He ground his teeth until his jaw ached. There was a tightness in his chest—unfamiliar and insidious, leaving him with a thick ache in his throat. He could see that she was trying to relax against him, but she couldn’t stop the delicate tremble that ran through her limbs. Couldn’t erase that her face was pale or that her eyes were wide and glassy.
Adrenaline still coursed through him, making it even harder for him to cool his anger. If she was close, if he could scent and feel her, just maybe he’d get through the night without losing his mind.
Gwen squirmed. “You can let go. I’m fine and—”
A growl rattled his chest. “Shut up and let me hold you.”
She pinched him, but the big bastard didn’t even flinch. “I don’t need your attitude right now, Devlin.” But she didn’t push him away, because she sensed he was on edge. She was still pissed at him for earlier. In fact, she was pissed at the other three wolves in the room too—they had no right to invade her privacy. But since one had healed her and the others had just risked themselves to hunt a flock of bird shifters who’d attacked her, she couldn’t really complain right then.
“Why can I smell burning?” asked Bracken.
Marlon quickly explained, only to receive skeptical looks from Bracken and Derren.
“The birds were goshawks, weren’t they?” said Ally.
“Big-ass goshawks,” said Derren. “Most flocks of their species are available for hire.” The light flickered, and he tensed as he glanced up at it. “There aren’t many of the flocks around these parts. We’ll find out which one it was, and they’ll pay one way or another.”
Gwen twisted as much as Zander’s grip would allow so she could look at Andie. “I don’t mean to scare you, but you could be next. If you’re not going to go to the shelter, at least move in here. You’d be safe inside the walls.”
Andie bit her lip. “About the shelter . . . I was thinking that maybe it might not be such a bad idea to check it out. I’m just a little worried that it’s not even real. It’s hard to believe a place like that exists.”