CHAPTER 20

Darius stared at us, his chest heaving. We turned and looked at the vampire. She was dead. Or at least it appeared to be so. The bullet had eaten a hole in her head the size of a small dinner plate and it was still smoking. The nitrate bullets. Seems like they worked just as well on Vampires as they did on wolves. The body was already showing signs of decay, as if it had been out in the sun for a few days instead of dead for mere moments.

I could still feel the fang marks in the back of our neck. A thread of fear wound around me. Was I a vampire now? Could wolves even turn vampire?

*I don't feel any different*, my wolf noted. *Well, except what was already different.* She flexed her muscles. Yes, we were definitely bigger and stronger than before.

Maybe a vampire bite had no real affect at all and the movies were wrong.

"Raven?" Darius ventured.

We looked back at him. A burst of gunfire shot out from around the stack of crates and we both dodged away farther into the facility toward the stairs.

"What...what happened, how is this..." he gestured to my form as we tore around a set of metal shelving. "...possible?"

It wasn't as if I could answer, but even if I could I didn't know. It was like scenting that wolf had unlocked something within me...within us and released my wolf from her confines. The thought had us slowing down and turning. That wolf was still out there, alive.

"Raven," Darius growled, "There are more coming in the tunnel. We've got to go now."

We couldn't. This was our chance, maybe our only chance for vengeance. A gunman whipped out from around the corner, this one faster than the others, I couldn't tell because of the jumble of scents and decay, but I didn't think he was quite wolf. Not jaguar either.

He shot, not even bothering to aim.

I wasn't fast enough to dodge it completely, the bullet sliced through my hip, the boiling silver nitrate exploding inside muscle instantly burning like the fire of a thousand suns. My wolf screamed in pain and we made it around the next row of crates before the fire spread enough that we collapsed.

Christ it hurt. Like being on fire from the inside out.

Darius skidded to a stop next to us, his face hard and furious.

"Get up, we've got to go," he demanded.

I tried but I couldn't. The smell of my own flesh burning and searing heaved my stomach.

"Raven, we've got to move," he yelled. Casting a glance over his shoulder where several men were shouting our location.

I just couldn't.

"Change back," he knelt next to me.

I blinked at him, my vision blurry.

"I can't carry you like this. You're too big. Change back so I can get you out of here." The last part of the sentence was a plea.

I felt my wolf receding, making the decision for me, and within moments I was scooped up, naked against his own naked flesh and we were running for the stairs. Bullets flew at us from behind and Darius made a leap for the stairwell, we crashed against the wall on the other side, but the bullets were blocked from hitting us. I screamed as my hip hit the wall, the gaping burnt wound ripping open again.

"Just a bit more, baby, hold on." He murmured to me as he took the stairs three at a time.

I blinked when we emerged into bright sunlight. The building I had entered the facility from was gone, bulldozed over by an enormous tanker truck that looked to have also ran the gate. It sat, with the remains of the electricity shed several yards away piled against a tree.

"Have you tried anger management?" I asked him through gritted teeth as he took off around the truck and down the hill toward the road. A familiar car sat there waiting.

The civic started as soon as the men inside saw us, the engine revving as it pulled toward us, the doors flew open. I'd never been so glad to see two wolves in my entire life.

"What the hell happened?" Chase snarled as Darius tossed me across the back seat. I screamed again at the pressure against my leg, a wash of blood staining the car's seat. He leapt in after me.

"Go. Go. Go!" he demanded as a rain of bullets hit the bumper. The smell of burning metal filled the air.

Micheal didn't waste any time gunning it back down the road, burning rubber taking us out of range.

"What happened? What the hell were you doing tonight, Raven, are you stupid?"

I groaned and shifted so that my hip wasn't against anything. God damned it hurt.

"Anthony is going to kill us," Chase told Micheal. "We should drop them at the manse and run."

"Why should he be pissed at us?" Micheal shot back, "we didn't even know she was in there, we just took a chance trailing him, since he seemed to have an agenda."

I felt a little bad for Chase and Micheal.

"He won't be pissed at you, I'll talk to him," I managed to grind out through clenched teeth. Micheal took a sharp corner and I stiffened, trying to keep movement to a minimum.

The two men in the front shared a disbelieving look.

"Boyfriend?" Darius asked. He was sitting beside me, wearing a brooding, thunderous look.

"No," I told him just as both Micheal and Chase answered affirmative, I glared at them. "Not yet, anyway."

A muscle jumped in Darius' cheek. "Is that why you left the valley?"

I blinked at him. It was so long ago, but the memory of that night was still fresh. An even worse betrayal because of what had come after it.

"I left because my parents were murdered," I told him. "And because it was clear there was no other reason to stay."

I must have imagined the flash of pain that crossed his face, because I sure the fuck hadn't imagined what his goonies had said that night when they didn't know I was listening.

The rest of the thirty minute ride was awkwardly silent. I alternated between trying to relieve the pain that was my wound and freaking out because I'd gone through all of that and I still didn't know anything about what had happened to my parents. That, and at least one murderer was walking free this night.

I cursed.

"What is it?" Darius asked quietly.

I shook my head, I hadn't meant my thoughts to leave my head. "One of the men there was at my house the night of my parents' murder. I didn't kill him. And I didn't find anything there that linked to their deaths either. All of that for nothing."

He considered me for a moment.

"Not entirely for nothing," he said, watching me. "There were crates destined for Thostchild in the facility. They contained some kind of medical looking equipment."
I frowned. Medical equipment? That didn't make any sense. Also...

"How do you know about Thostchild?"

"Because whoever killed your parents came back, and they slaughtered everyone in their way."