Dez heard scrambling against the concrete floor. Considering she typified lazy when it came to clipping her dogs’ nails, she knew that sound. She crouched, her gun arm steadied against her knee. She jerked her trigger finger away in time and let out a shaky breath.
Not a hyena. A wolf.
“Sissy Mae?” The wolf yipped in response. “I’m lost and he’s running out of steam.”
They heard more screams, more roars, and that disturbing howl that sounded like hysterical laughter.
Sissy Mae put her head back and howled. She called to her Pack. Dez grabbed Shaw’s arm. “Get up, Mr. Shaw. We still need to keep moving.”
He did his best, dragging his body up, using the wall as leverage. Once he stood on his own two shaky feet, Dez pulled Shaw past Sissy Mae. She turned the corner as six wolves charged past her. Two stopped and shifted back into males.
Naked males. She shook her head. Nope, not the time to get all lusty. Honestly, what the hell was wrong with her?
“He can’t make it. Take him.” They grabbed Shaw and dragged him away. “Sissy Mae, let’s go!”
Sissy followed after the males. In a few moments she heard canine nails pounding concrete as they caught up with her.
Within a few turns, they found the exit Dez had come in through. The wolves dragged Shaw up the stairs. She heard more running. More beings, not human, were moving toward them.
She aimed the gun. “Sissy, go!” Sissy tore up the stairs as more wolves came from other hallways. They all moved past her and up the stairs. That’s when she saw them. The hyenas were back. Not all of them, but quite a few. Covered in blood. She quickly counted. Nope. She didn’t have enough bullets for all of them.
Then suddenly a lion and wolf slid in front of her. Mace bellowed out a roar, and the hyenas all made a weird yipping sound, darting back and forth, apparently searching for a way to get to her. An opening they could use.
Smitty growled, his canines flashing as he snapped at the hyenas in front of him.
Mace took a step back, pushing her toward the stairs with his body. But before Dez could hightail it out of there, more hyenas came from another hallway. The only reason they stopped was because she aimed her gun at them.
This wasn’t good. At some point, the hyenas were going to bum-rush the three of them, and that would be it.
Dez desperately searched for a way out of this that would leave all of them alive, when she noticed Gina as hyena walking slowly around the corner, her sister’s body again in her mouth. Another hyena standing beside her let out a loud call, and the others challenging Mace and Smitty turned and charged back the other way. The ones facing her simply ran off.
Just like that it ended.
Gina looked at Dez, her eyes sending a clear message. She was going to let Dez go because she’d done her a favor. She’d taken out the only thing between Gina and absolute control of the Brutale family and given her the ones that had killed her lover.
Gina turned and trotted off down the hallway, her sister’s body a trophy.
Okay. No more animal night in New York for Dez. She turned and charged up the stairs. As she cleared the entrance, strong hands grabbed her from behind and pushed her out into the alley.
Roasted coffee, muffins, sewage, and a light rainstorm were the welcome smells assaulting her. She wanted to take a deep breath and enjoy the cold air, but the arms that grabbed hold of her suddenly began crushing her to death. If she hadn’t recognized the body attached to those arms, she might have been worried.
Instead, she couldn’t breathe.
“I think you’re killing her, Mace.”
“Good.” He pulled her closer to him and buried his face in her hair.
Dez waved desperately at Smitty. Unlike his now-human-again sister, Smitty was still naked. “Help me,” she barely managed.
“Well, darlin’, what did you expect? You had us worried sick.”
“That’s not helping,” she squeaked.
The door slammed shut and Dez finally felt safe.
Sissy Mae shook her head as she quickly handed her brother’s clothes to him. “I think they got some other lions. I heard it.” Once dressed, Smitty gave Sissy a big, brotherly bear hug.
“That’s not our problem. And good job, little sister.”
The girl glowed with pride at her brother’s words. Or it just looked like she glowed because Dez couldn’t fucking breathe!
“Still dying!”
Mace finally released her, and she took in big gulps of air. He swung her around to face him. “That’s it! No more helping strange children you don’t know.”
Dez pulled away from him, her breath coming in ragged gasps, the adrenaline finally leaving her body. “Are you insane? I’m a cop. If a kid comes to me, I’m gonna help ’em. So get that fuckin’ thought outta ya head.”
Mace took a deep breath as his gold eyes drilled holes into her. After a moment, “Fine. But next time make sure they don’t have fangs.”
Dez grinned. “That I can do.”
Chapter Twelve
Dez opened her eyes. Then closed them again. Never again would she drink anything referred to as “Uncle Willy’s ’shine.” Her head throbbed. She had no idea where she was…or whose arms were currently wrapped around her.
The body behind her snuggled closer and purred. In that instant, her head cleared and she knew Mace held her. She smiled. What a night. In all her years as a Marine and a cop, she never went through anything like that before. And the fact that she survived…well, she felt pretty impressed with herself. But the night didn’t end there.
Once away from the club, they took Shaw to a Midtown hospital. Apparently owned and operated by shifters, it was the only place that could truly care for the badly wounded man…or…whatever. The Pack and Mace were all ready to drop Shaw off at the emergency room and be done with him, but Dez couldn’t do that, and for some unknown reason Sissy wouldn’t allow it.
“We just can’t leave him,” Dez had argued. Not after his little heroic turn in the bowels of the Chapel. Of course, her sudden sentiment garnered an annoyed sniff from Mace and blank stares from the Pack. But eventually they saw her side of things. So they sat around the waiting room, chatting, eating, and…well…waiting. She even got her wrist x-rayed and bandaged. Only a sprain. No major damage.
Dez found herself liking Smitty and Sissy Mae’s Pack more and more as she got to know them. They were sweet and charming as only Southerners knew how. And they seemed to tolerate Mace well enough. Even after he roared at Smitty when he found Dez scratching his happy spot.
Eventually Mace’s cousin, Elise, blew into the waiting room. It turned out she would be the only Llewellyn Pride female there that cold, rainy night. Sissy Mae and Smitty seemed dumbfounded by the lack of caring from the other females, but Mace wasn’t surprised at all. Eventually the doctor told them that Shaw would survive. Elise disappeared after that, and the rest of them headed back to the Pack’s uptown hotel.
That’s about the time the drinking started. She really shouldn’t drink. Dez knew better. Hence the Marine tattoo on her ass she had removed a few years back. Of course, now that area had a big ol’ lion bite in it.
At least this time around, Mace made sure she didn’t do anything too painfully stupid. He simply didn’t let anyone near her.
Now it was the morning after. She still had on her bustier. Her body still ached from the beating it took the night before. Her wrist freakin’ screamed “cut me off” at her. But she had Mace. She really couldn’t ask for a better Christmas present than that. Hell, who could?