Chapter Twenty-One

Hunter dove onto Alice, taking her to the ground and covering her with his body. Reynolds threw his head back and howled—a deep, wrenching sound that should never have been able to come from a human throat. Then all the werewolves other than Reynolds and Max began to shift to wolf. The process took less time than usual, maybe a minute, so perhaps danger and rage influenced the speed of the shift.

A second later, Bane was calmly issuing mental orders to all the vampires:

GO. NOW. FIND THE SHOOTER OR SHOOTERS BUT BRING THEM BACK ALIVE. WE WILL HAVE ANSWERS.

THEY VIOLATED MY TERRITORY AND ATTACKED MY GUEST. THEIR DEATHS ARE MINE.

Luke, Edge, and Meara raced out of the yard, several of the vampires from the Vampire Motorcycle Club behind them, at such a high speed that all Hunter saw was a stream of blurring movement.

When Alice squirmed under him, he tightened his grip. “You are the most vulnerable person here. Stay down until we’re sure the shooters are gone.”

She quit fighting him but shoved hard. “Let me breathe, please. And I need to check on Max.”

“I could use the help,” Ryan said, in full doctor mode next to where Max lay on the ground, a dome of silvery light covering both of them.

Hunter didn’t know if Bane or Ryan held the protective magical barrier in place, and he didn’t care. He just liked the idea that Alice would be inside it, too, so he rolled off her. She immediately scrambled across the ground to help Ryan with Max.

“Tell me what to do,” she said breathlessly.

Ryan ripped off her sweatshirt and wadded it up. “Hold this over the wound. We have to get pressure on it, or she’ll bleed out right here on the ground.”

Carter, whose face promised a very slow and painful death to whoever had shot his beta, put a hand on Ryan’s shoulder. “It’s okay, doc. She won’t bleed out, actually. Wolves, remember?”

It took a moment for the words to penetrate, and then Ryan’s frantic movements slowed. “It’s a neck wound, though,” she protested.

The alpha raised an eyebrow at her. “Kind of like the one you gave the wolf who attacked you when he was under the warlock’s control?”

Hunter had heard that story. The doctor, very new to the world of supernatural creatures at the time, had defended herself with a scalpel strike to the attacker’s carotid artery and been shocked when he’d healed almost instantly and come back after her.

Ryan, evidently remembering the incident, slowly sat back on her heels. “Max?”

Max opened her eyes and put a hand over Alice’s where it still held the now-blood-soaked shirt to her neck, and then she tried to smile.

“You are all guts, woman,” Hunter said admiringly. Shot in the neck and already smiling. That took guts—or at least a hell of a lot of bravado.

Max grinned at him and then patted Alice’s hand. “It’s okay, human. I’m good.”

But then she tried to sit up and flinched. When she peeled the shirt away from her neck, they could all see that the wound was still pumping out blood.

“Silver,” Bane growled.

The alpha wolf snarled his agreement. “Someone is going to pay for this.”

Max glanced up at Carter and winced. “Help me? I hate this part.”

This part? Did people regularly shoot at the wolves? Now wasn’t the time to ask, and, anyway, Hunter was sure he wasn’t going to like the answer.

The big wolf dropped to his knees next to her, and she tilted her head away from him, baring her injured neck. He put his fingers, which now ended in sharp claws, to her neck and, before Ryan could protest, dug into the wound.

That’s when the doctor started yelling. “What are you doing? How is that sanitary? I know you heal fast, but this is ridiculous! I—”

Carter said nothing, just showed her his bloodied fingers, which now held a bullet.

A silver bullet.

Ryan suddenly smacked herself on the forehead. “For heaven’s sake—literally—I can do this.” She leaned past Reynolds and put her hand on Max’s neck, and a pure white light shone between her fingers and Max’s skin.

Angel power.

Between Ryan activating her Nephilim healing gift and Max’s natural healing abilities, the wound closed up in less than a minute. Hunter blew out a sigh of relief and then looked around, suddenly aware that the ghosts were gone.

But so was Charlie.

Alice must have realized it at the same time. She stood and whirled around. “Where is he? Charlie?”

“He flew off after Max got shot,” Bane told her in a voice filled with ice. “If we discover that he was part of this plot, I will kill him.”

“He isn’t,” Alice said hotly. “He escaped those monsters. He wouldn’t have anything to do with this.”

Hunter said nothing but silently agreed with Bane. That gunshot could have killed Alice. If Charlie had been any part of the scheme, he was about to be a dead demon, no matter how much Hunter had begun to like the little guy.

They moved inside at Bane’s insistence and convened a war council of sorts in the huge kitchen. Mrs. C bustled around, giving everyone huge plates piled high with food, which was her go-to solution for every stressful situation. In this case, it was perfect. Werewolves needed to eat a lot on normal days, since their metabolisms ran so hot and fast. When wounded, it was an important part of their healing process to consume enormous quantities of food.

Alice, dangerously pale, as if she were in shock, stared blankly into the distance, ignoring both the conversation going on around her and the untouched food in front of her. Hunter held her cold hand, but it lay limp in his, her fingers not moving.

“Alice,” he murmured. “I think Ryan should have a look at you.”

“Why? Why is all this happening? I don’t understand what reason this Chamber you’re all so worried about would have to try to kill Max. And where is Charlie? If somebody hurts him—” She broke off and covered her face with her hand. “I promised him he’d be safe now. I promised him.”

Bane started to speak, but Ryan nudged him, shaking her head, which Hunter appreciated. The last thing Alice needed to hear right now was another threat about the dragon and his possible involvement with a plot against the wolves.

Mr. Cassidy walked in, a shotgun cradled in his arms, his face grim, followed by Bram Stoker, who bounded over to Ryan for pets and ear scratches. “Nothing on or near the grounds. I think it’s past time we invested in security cameras, though. This can’t happen again.”

Mrs. C rushed over and hugged her husband. “Don’t you go running off like that again without telling me where you’re going, you old fool. I was afraid they got you, too.”

“But who?” Hunter looked at everyone around the table. “Who is it that attacked us? And why? It doesn’t make sense. This volleyball game idea was spur of the moment, right? I mean, Ryan only cooked it up a few days ago. It’s not like the news would have made it to Chamber HQ in England in time to set up something so dire, unless you have traitors in the wolves.”

“Not a chance,” Reynolds growled.

Bane shook his head before Hunter could even ask about the VMC. “I’d know.”

“Then how?” Part of him found it unbelievable that he was spending a Saturday night discussing death threats by a shadowy cabal of warlocks and necromancers in England, when just a month ago his Saturday nights had usually involved darts and beer at his local bar with his friends.

Reynolds nodded. “I was wondering the same thing, to be honest. If they wanted to go after me or Max, it would have been a lot easier to find us in our daily routine and safer for them than attacking us when we were surrounded by wolves and vampires.”

Max paused, her fork suspended in midair. “You think they were after you, not me?”

The alpha scowled and threw his hands in the air in frustration. “I don’t have a single fucking clue. It makes sense that I’ve pissed more people off than you have, since I’m the one in charge. If another wolf pack is trying to move in on our territory, they’d go after me, not you.”

“Not necessarily,” Ryan said, drinking a cup of hot tea. “Anyone who sees the two of you together can tell that you care about Max. Hurting or killing her would harm you and perhaps make you more vulnerable.”

A weighted silence descended on the group. Hunter knew that Bane had no more idea of how to respond to that than he did, and Reynolds looked like he was going to swallow his tongue. Max, who’d been caught off guard in the middle of a large mouthful of burger, choked and forced herself to swallow.

“No, that’s not—” Reynolds began.

“We don’t—” Max began.

“I care about every member of my pack,” Reynolds finished firmly.

Ryan shrugged. “Okay. I was just suggesting another possibility.”

Bane shot up out of his chair. “We’re about to find out. Edge just communicated that they’ve caught the warlock and his shooters and they’re bringing them back here.”

…

Alice tried to tunnel her way out of the mental fog that had wrapped around her at the sight of Max’s blood spraying out of her body. She glanced down at herself and realized she had blood on her shirt. Max’s blood. She’d already washed her hands—twice—but they still felt dirty. Bloody. She wanted to wash them again, but she wasn’t going to turn into Lady Macbeth right there in the vampires’ kitchen.

She wouldn’t have even thought vampires needed a kitchen before she’d met Hunter and the rest of them. If she’d ever imagined that they existed, she would have thought they only drank blood and slept in coffins, but that was clearly not the case. Meara was demonstrating a fondness for pecan pie, and they’d taken her out to dinner, for Pete’s sake.

She bit her lip, realizing her brain was scurrying around like a hamster on a wheel, probably to protect her from the full realization that, for whatever reason, she was in danger again. People she’d begun to consider friends were in danger.

Taking in the details of the vampires’ enormous kitchen, from quartz countertops to hanging copper pots—from the fresh herbs in little pots to the huge picture window that she never would have expected—she thought it was very like a picture in an expensive magazine.

Lifestyles of the Rich and Dangerous, maybe.

“And Charlie?” she finally dared to ask. “Is he with them?”

Bane focused his gaze on something she couldn’t see and then nodded. “Yes. He helped Luke and Edge find and catch the warlock.”

“I told you he was innocent. I told you.”

Hunter squeezed her hand. “I’m glad he’s okay.”

She noticed but didn’t comment on the fact that he hadn’t chimed in with his belief in Charlie’s innocence. No matter. They’d all find out exactly what was going on very soon.

“Well, you’re not bringing those villains into my kitchen,” Mrs. Cassidy said, her cheeks flushing a hot pink. “I don’t want to be offering food to someone who could hurt one of our guests.” The little housekeeper put a hand on Max’s shoulder. “Another piece of pie, dear? I have apple, too.”

Max grinned up at her. “You are a jewel, Mrs. C, but I think four pieces is my limit, even healing from a gunshot wound. Thank you.” Max looked at Ryan, then. “And thanks to you, too, angel girl.”

“You would have healed on your own,” Ryan said. “I’m just sorry it took me so long to remember I had access to more tools than just putting pressure on the wound. I’m still fairly new to practicing Nephilim healing in a war zone.” The doctor’s voice trembled on those last words, and Bane pulled her up out of her chair and into his arms.

“You were great,” Max said firmly before turning to Alice. “You too, ghost girl. Thanks for stepping up.”

Alice nodded, still feeling far removed from everything and everyone. “I’m just glad you’re okay.”

“The basement of the club,” Bane said, his expression dark. “We can’t let them in the house or deal with them outside, where anybody might come along.”

Hunter nodded. “I’ll stay here with Alice and Ryan to protect them.”

Ryan started to protest, Bane immediately arguing with her.

Alice cut them both off. “I’ll be going with you. I need to know why they’re sending demons to my home.”

“No,” Hunter and Bane said at the same time.

Alice gave them a long, steady look. “You’ll let me come and hear what they have to say, or you’ll never see me again. I won’t be locked away again, not even by someone with good intentions.”

Hunter actually growled with frustration but then nodded. “Fine. But you’ll do what I say, especially if it comes to any danger. Ghost whisperer or not, you’re still the most fragile of us.”

Alice nodded. She either would or she wouldn’t when the time came; there was no point arguing about it now.

Bane started to speak, but Ryan shook her head. “I’m going.”

Max started laughing when Reynolds looked at her. “Hey, I’m the one they shot. I’m damn sure going. And I’m also the beta wolf of this pack, not some helpless human. No offense, Alice.”

“None taken,” Alice said automatically, wondering if it were true.

No, actually. She did feel offended.

She leaned forward and stared down a werewolf. “But don’t ever call me helpless again. I’ve survived more than you could possibly imagine.”

Max’s brown eyes flared a hot amber, and then she inclined her head toward Alice. “Noted.”

As they left the house to meet Meara, Edge, Luke, several vampires, a pack of werewolves, a dragon, and the bad guys, Hunter put his arm around Alice’s shoulders and leaned down to murmur in her ear. “I really, really want to hear your story. And, for the record?”

When he paused, she glanced up at him and met his fierce gaze.

“I never once thought you were helpless.”