Before Izzy could stop her, Rissa leapt down the flight of stairs. She landed in a crouch and rolled out of Izzy’s field of vision.
Izzy swore loud and long—but only in her head. She couldn’t spare the breath; she was too busy running down the stairs as quickly as her stiff, clawed hip would allow.
“Never be where the enemy thinks you’re going to be,” her first drill sergeant had said. Two steps from the bottom, she crouched and hopped down.
It saved her life.
Something flew past her and smashed into the wall, right where her head would have been. Drywall exploded and pelted her back, leaving an eight-inch hole in the wall and a chunk missing from a two-by-six stud.
Openmouthed, she watched a freaking eight ball roll smoothly away.
Rissa flew past in a blur, crashing into the wall with a solid thump. Her pale blond hair whipped around with the impact, and she dropped to the floor like a marionette with its strings cut.
Izzy shouted wordlessly, bringing the shotgun around to point at—
Pain detonated in her side like she’d been hit with a round from a .50 cal. She collapsed, gasping like a landed fish. Get up! Get up! But she couldn’t seem to coordinate her flopping arms and legs.
Across the room, a guy with a graying beard held a pool ball in his hand. He tossed it up and down, as if weighing it. “Want another?” He was huge, almost as big as a...bear. He smirked at her and fingered a heavy studded belt wrapped around his stout waist. “Or do you want the belt?”
Uh, neither, thanks. But he wasn’t talking to her.
“Nah.” A hand grabbed the front of her shirt and yanked her up. “I think I’d rather use claws. And teeth.”
A man in his midtwenties with long brown hair and pale-gold cat’s eyes held her, six inches from his face. He curled his lip, and fangs lengthened in his jaws. “You killed my brother, bitch.”
“Today?”
There wasn’t quite enough time to call herself stupid before she slammed into the floor.
The rogue straddled her waist, digging his knee into her injured hip. She tried to punch him, but he caught her fist with ease. He looked at the bandage sticking out from her sleeve and tore both away, revealing the healing bite wound. He licked it and smiled. “My brother gave this to you. His name was Curt Markes. You’ll remember it, because I’ll have you scream it when we’re fucking you to death.”
Great. The other cougar.
Dread raced up her spine in an icy-hot rush, setting off her wolf. Its hum rang in her ears. It wanted out, wanted her to shift. Ants ran under her skin, a trickle of sensation that built into a damn marathon. To hell with that. By the time she shifted, she’d be dead. Besides, she had no idea how to fight on four legs. Mentally, she shoved the wolf back into its cage and locked it.
Markes blinked as if startled. Grabbing a fistful of her hair, he held her down and sniffed her neck. He laughed, then casually banged her head off the floor. “Guess the stories are true: a werewolf who’s afraid of her own beast. Pathetic.”
A bright, happy laugh—the kind you’d expect from Disney fairies—jerked Izzy’s attention to the corner where Rissa still lay in a crumpled heap. A woman crouched over her.
For one beautiful, amazing second, hope filled Izzy. Then Markes asked, “Is she dead?”
Bile burned the back of Izzy’s throat when the familiar voice answered, “Not yet. Gimme a sec.”
“Daphne,” Izzy spat, as if the name were the vilest curse she could utter.
Rissa’s younger sister appeared above Izzy. Of course it was Daphne. Hadn’t her mate, Rick, been one of the bastards shooting at them at the airfield?
“Traitor,” Izzy said.
Daphne shrugged. “Sticks and stones.”
Markes stood, dragging Izzy with him. He twisted her bitten arm behind her back, digging his fingers in. Trying to ignore the pain, she hissed, “Where are Hank and Abby?”
She could barely speak past her fear. Her foster parents would have completely trusted Daphne, their soon-to-be daughter-in-law’s family. Just like Izzy had.
God, she was a moron.
Again, but louder, she demanded, “Where are Hank and Abby?”
The enemies’ laughter was the worst sound Izzy had ever heard. More horrible than her mother’s last scream. Even worse than the thump of Bess’s body hitting the floor after she killed herself on camera. Because Izzy was responsible. All her life, she’d avoided werewolves and shape-shifters like the plague. But just when she should have been running the fastest to get her family away from them, she got all cozy with the Alpha.
She couldn’t have failed the Dodds more if she tried.
Or, maybe she could.
Abby appeared in the hallway on the opposite side of the room, an aluminum baseball bat in her hands. “Get your filthy hands off my daughter.”
The three weres turned and laughed again.
Izzy screamed, “Abby, no!”
The big guy stepped toward her foster mother, and Izzy kicked the back of his knee, collapsing his leg and making him stumble. Then she drove her head backward into Markes’s face. Something crunched and he howled, loosening his grip on her arm.
Daphne shrieked as a wrecking ball of blond fur smashed into her.
No time to celebrate Rissa’s return to the fight. With a twist and a knee to the groin, Izzy was free of Markes and diving for the bear’s legs. Wrapping herself around them, she held on. Not the most graceful offensive in the world—more like a toddler throwing a tantrum—but she had to buy Abby time.
“Run, Abby!”
Someone slugged Izzy in the side of the head, and all her muscles decided to take a vacay.
As if picking up nothing more substantial than a wet rag, Markes jerked Izzy up by her throat. Choking, she kicked and raked his hands with her nails. Useless. All useless. Black ate at the edge of her vision.
“Bitch,” he said. “When I get through with you, you’ll wish you’d died in that crash.”
As her sight shrank to a narrow tunnel of light, she heard a snarl and a crack! like a gunshot. Markes’s head whipped to the side just as a gray-and-white wolf leapt toward him, fangs flashing.
Izzy fell into darkness.