Pack Challenge

Chapter Twelve

TOC

She could actually hear her phone vibrating and it was in the other room, buried in her backpack. She had to admit, she was starting to really enjoy this “freak thing.”

“Either you shut it off or I break it in half.”

Zach was lying on his stomach, his arm thrown possessively over her naked waist, his face buried in the pillow. And clearly he was not a morning person.

Sara slipped out of bed and silently padded into the living room. She found her bag by the couch, the dog muzzle right next to it. She couldn’t help but smile as she remembered Zach having that thing on his face.

She found the phone buried, as usual, in the very bottom of her backpack. She pulled it out and quickly answered it.

“It’s Miki,” was the reply. And she knew just by the sound of her best friend’s voice that something was wrong. “You better get to the shop. The cops are here and I just saw an ambulance pulling away.”

Sara hung up the phone and moved.

The slamming door woke him up for the second time that morning. But it was the banging on the window an hour later that actually made him move.

Zach literally dragged himself up and out of bed. He sleepwalked to the window and pulled the shades open. Conall stood on the other side. Leave it to his best friend to wake him from one of those great sleeps. The kind of sleep you only get after fucking the woman you love throughout her entire house.

Zach opened the window, “What?”

“We’ve got a problem. They went after Marrec this morning.” Conall shoved Zach’s saddle bags from his bike through the window. “Get dressed. And thanks for letting us know you weren’t dead.”

Zach stared at his friend, seriously confused. Then it all returned to him. That bastard touching his female. The fight. And the falling. He remembered Conall calling his name, but not much else… except gunshots.

“I’m really sorry.” Zach pulled his jeans out of the bag. His friend didn’t answer. “But if it makes you feel any better, she put a muzzle on me last night.”

Conall started laughing then. And didn’t stop until they got to the hospital.

Sara was already there when the two men arrived. She glanced at Zach when he and Conall walked in to the room, but quickly turned back to Marrec.

The look on her face said it all. She blamed herself for what happened. Blamed herself for bringing the Pride to Marrec’s territory. Blamed herself for putting him and his Pack at risk.

Marrec, though, seemed to be seriously enjoying the attention of three beautiful women. Miki was fluffing his pillows. Angelina was reading his medical chart. And Sara was holding a water cup to his lips so that he could drink. Zach and Conall exchanged glances. They both knew this was ridiculous. Marrec had clearly been attacked. Zach wouldn’t—couldn’t—deny that. Half his face and throat were covered in bandages that were ready to be changed. His hands were bruised and torn. The man was a mess. But he was also Pack. In two days he’d be fine. At the moment, as bad as he looked, he probably was just feeling a dull ache.

Zach turned and tested the air. Marrec’s Pack was around here somewhere, probably the cafeteria. And his Pack had just arrived. Unfortunately, Casey was with them. “Shit,” he muttered to Conall.

Yates came in first. He stopped in the doorway and observed Marrec. “Comfortable?” He asked with obvious amusement.

“A lot of pain.” Marrec forced out.

“Oh, come on!” Yates sneered in return.

Zach would have laughed too, except that Sara was pushing the red and grey hair off Marrec’s face. His hands balled into fists and he wondered what it would feel like to beat the shit out of an old man.

Casey entered the room, then. Her females behind her. Sara didn’t even look up. Zach smiled. She’d smelled Casey coming.

Casey moved across the room, her attitude one of complete dominance. Her females didn’t follow; instead they stood back and waited. He knew Casey well enough to know that she was about to show Sara exactly who was Alpha Female and although Zach could step in, he wouldn’t. He needed Sara to start fighting these battles on her own. Even the ones that she would lose.

“Excuse me, honey.” Casey grabbed Sara by her jacket and hauled her up and off the bed. Sara spilled water on the floor as she stumbled out of the way. Casey sat on the bed beside Marrec. “Oh, you poor, baby. Are you okay?”

The room grew quiet. Even Angelina and Miki weren’t speaking. They were too stunned. But they did take several steps back. The whole thing was feeling a lot more dangerous than it probably was. Sara wasn’t ready to take on Casey and Sara knew it.

Zach watched his woman take a deep breath and place the empty water cup down on a nearby table. She turned away from Casey and stared down at her sneaker-covered feet.

He saw the struggle on her face. Knew what she wanted to do. And knew what she could handle. He expected her to walk away. And she didn’t let him down. She walked away…for about five feet. Then with a snarl, she spun back around and grabbed Casey from behind. One hand in the woman’s hair, the other grabbing the denim jacket she wore. She snatched her off the bed and slammed her, face first, into the wall. She yanked her back, leaving a splash of blood on the white paint, and slammed her again. Then she threw her. Across the room and out the door, an arc of blood slashing across Marrec’s bed. Zach heard Casey hit the wall with a sickening thud.

Sara was about to go after her when Miki and Angelina, not Pack and not knowing better, jumped in front of her.

“Hey! Hey!” Miki pushed her friend back. “Sara, NO!”

Sara halted in her tracks. She looked at her friends as if debating whether to tear their throats out or not. Instead she took a deep breath and looked over their heads to Zach. He shifted his eyes to the rest of the Pack females and, to his growing pride, Sara picked up on it immediately. Her head snapped around and she nailed the four other women with one look. “What are you bitches looking at?” She snarled.

Zach watched them all look at the floor, the door, the ceiling. They looked at everything but Sara. He bit back a smile and thought about mounting her right there in front of everybody.

That’s when Miki grabbed Sara’s jacket and dragged the woman from the room. Angelina following after them.

Once gone, Yates went over to see the damage on his woman. They all knew his time as Alpha Male was now over. And the man looked relieved.

Conall shook his head, “Your woman is a major bitch.”

Zach grinned, “Isn’t she, though?”

Sara let Miki drag her out the hospital and around the back. Eventually stopping in the doctors’ parking lot, the forest behind them. She was letting her do it. Sara couldn’t quite believe how strong she had gotten in just a few days.

Miki finally released her, “What is going on with you?!” She snapped.

Sara looked at her friends. Tired and worn from worry over Marrec, they wouldn’t be up to hearing the truth. Hell, even Angelina was wearing sneakers and sweats. So what was Sara supposed to say? Apparently I’m Pack now and I was exerting my dominance. You wouldn’t understand. That would play well. These pushy, tiresome, sometimes psychotic women were her best friends. They had been there when no one else had. She didn’t want to lose them, and she knew that if she told them the truth she’d lose them forever. Wouldn’t she?

“Nothing. I’m fine.” Boy that was lame.

Angelina and Miki exchanged glances. Sara had a feeling whatever they were about to say to her was something that had already been discussed between the two of them. Angelina leaned back against an expensive car with MD plates and smiled. “Miki and I were reminiscing last night. And I forgot how much my grandmother hated when I went over to your house. At the time, I just couldn’t understand why because she liked you so much. So I asked her. And she said it was because your grandmother was lobo del diablo. Roughly translated, ‘devil wolf.’ I just figured it was my grandmother’s way of calling Lynette a bitch because of the Church Bake Sale Incident of 1984. But it wasn’t that, was it?”

Sara, staring down at her feet, shook her head. She just couldn’t face her friends. Instead she studied her feet and marveled at how big they were. She wondered what they would look like furry.

“You’ve gotten really strong.” Miki noted, “You threw that blond chick around the hospital room like a rag doll. Which, by the way, was so many levels of cool.”

“And that growling thing you’ve been doing lately,” from Angelina.

“And the snarling,” Miki continued.

“Bottom line is,” Angelina finished, “Maybe they’re not werewolves. But they’re not quite human, are they?” The women locked eyes. “And neither are you?”

Sara scratched the back of her neck and looked down at her feet again, “I… uh…”

“Why don’t you just tell her? Tell her what you are.”

The three friends spun around at the sound of a strange voice. It was the man she’d shot at the night before. And, as before, his three friends were with him. All golden and beautiful. And so cold that Sara felt her stomach drop. Why, oh, why hadn’t she killed them?

“Hello, pretty. Now, why don’t you be a good little puppy and come with us.”

“She’s not going anywhere with you.” Miki moved to step in front of Sara, but one of the men backhanded her. She flew across the hood of a car, landing on the other side.

There was a brief moment of silence as Sara and Angelina looked over at their fallen friend. Then they slowly turned back to face the four men standing in front of them.

“Angelina?”

“Yes, Sara?”

Sara was staring straight at the leader. Their eyes locked, “Go.” She bit out, just as she punched the man closest to her in the groin.

Angelina turned and ran; sliding over the hood of a car and charging flat out back to the hospital.

Sara charged off into the woods. Hoping, praying, that they would be more obsessed with getting her then going after Angelina.

She couldn’t hear them, but she could smell them. If they shifted she probably didn’t stand a chance. She was pretty sure she was slower as human. And she had no idea how to change to anything. So she ran. And she prayed. Prayed her Pack would come for her before it was too late.