| |
They’d been walking for hours. Callum glanced up at the full moon and tilted his head back to stretch the kinking muscles in his neck.
He and Sophie had fallen into a comfortable silence a bit ago. She trudged alongside him. Her shoes clapped against the ground from where they fell off and slipped back on due to their size. If she was tired or sore, she didn’t complain.
Caught up with his thoughts he didn’t notice it when she stopped. He turned, realizing she was no longer next to him.
Sophie stood, gazing up at the sky.
“What is it?” he asked, coming to stand next to her while try to fixate on whatever had caught her attention.
She pointed. “A shooting star.” Her eyes shut and she shook her head, but smiled. “Sorry. It was silly of me to stop. When I was a kid I used to look through a telescope with my dad. It’s one of the few things I remember in detail from when I was a child.”
“Did you make a wish?” he asked, not finding her silly at all. It was holding onto the things that were most dear that kept them sane.
Her beautiful blue eyes opened, meeting his. “Yeah.”
“Let me know if it comes true,” he said with a grin.
“I will.”
“Are you tired?” he asked.
“We have to keep moving,” she said with a sigh.
He nodded. They shouldn’t stop if they could help it. “There are lights ahead. We’re close to a town. It shouldn’t take us too much longer to get there.” They’d been walking all day. It was well past midnight now, judging by the position of the moon. He didn’t want to stop while they were so far out in the open. The hunters wouldn’t just give up on finding them. Their goal was to hunt all shifters to extinction. The city would give them some cover, and it would cover their unique scent. Hopefully it was a big city, that’d be even better. The more people, the easier it would be for them to disappear.
Maybe they could find a place to eat there, too. His stomach growled in agreement. He was starving. When was the last time he ate?
An icy gust drew him from his thoughts, and he shoved his hands deeper into the pockets of his borrowed jacket. Sophie inhaled, then gasped. Reaching out, she clasped his arm and pulled him backwards.
“What is it?” he asked concerned.
“Do you smell that?” she asked quietly, her voice dropping to a whisper.
Callum drew in a deep breath. The air did smell bad... like rot. He assumed it was from a dead animal nearby.
Sophie’s hand shook as she held onto him tighter. “We have to go back. I know where we are.” Sophie’s voice was low and panicked.
“What?” he asked with a frown. How could she possibly know where they were if she’d been in captivity her whole life? Unless... “Where are we?”
“It’s their headquarters.” She put her free hand over her face, pinching her nostrils. “I was here when they first brought me to the US. Serena and I lived here for a few years and then again for a few more years after being transferred around a few times.” She tugged him hard enough to move him backward. “We have to go. Right now.”
“Are you sure?” he asked, looking around. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary, aside from the smell that was exceptionally strong due to the slight breeze.
“I could never forget this smell.” She pointed towards the lights in the distance. “I don’t think that is an ordinary city, Callum. It’s their headquarters.”
Callum followed her finger and squinted. It looked like a small town to him. His vision wasn’t exemplary in either of his forms, but there was no denying that something had Sophie spooked. The woman probably knew the hunters better than anyone else he’d ever met.
“We always assumed they had a central headquarters somewhere. You think that town is it?” he asked.
She bobbed her head up and down, her eyes wide. “You don’t ever forget the smell of burning bodies. Trust me, we have to turn around right now.”
He gagged at the thought. “Is that what that smell is?” His hand went to his mouth and nose, covering them to block out the smell.
“Inside the town smells worse. The shifters they capture alive, they bring here to experiment on or kill. I’m sure this is the place. It was large. So large that Serena and I were allowed to go outside. They had houses and different facilities. Then there was the hospital...” She tugged on him again, forcing him to move backwards with her. “We have to leave here as soon as possible. Patrols are everywhere. We could have already set off some sort of alarm.”
Callum looked around. They’d stayed semi-close to the road, using it as a guide. Clearly they’d gone the wrong direction and had nearly walked right into their captors’ hands.
He let her pull him along for a few paces before he fell in step with her.
“How can they be out here without anyone knowing it?” he asked as he fell in step with her. Surely the government or somebody would have found out about this place.
“You don’t understand, there are thousands of them. They’ve infiltrated the government, I’m sure of it. I’ve heard things, seen things when Lou didn’t think I was looking. They are everywhere,” Sophie said.
He picked up the pace, falling into a steady jog next to her. Lights flashed behind them, sending a glow of white light around and in front of them. They hadn’t left the area quick enough. Someone had spotted them.
An engine roared to life. Callum turned in time to see an ATV racing toward them. He tightened his grip on Sophie and set off into a sprint. She kept pace with him, but the vehicle was too fast for them. They were going to have to find a way to fight.
He dove, pulling Sophie with him behind a tree. The ATV slowed. Callum waited until it was mere feet away before lunging out of the trees. He tackled the driver to the ground and jabbed his elbow into the hunter’s face.
Blood coated the man’s lips as he struggled to get away from him. The great thing about being a bear shifter was even hunters weren’t as strong as him. He moved his arm down, shoving it against the man’s throat and effectively cutting off his air supply.
The man thrashed, clawing at Callum’s face but he refused to let up. Finally the man’s hand fell limply to the ground. His eyes darkened and his breathing stopped.
Callum jumped to his feet and hopped onto the ATV. “Get on,” he said to Sophie, who stood staring in the direction the man had come from. There were no alarms sounding, but that didn’t mean the deceased hunter hadn’t alerted others somehow. The sooner they got out of here, the better.
She climbed on behind him, slipping her arms around his waist. Her warm breath puffed against his bare neck, sending warmth through him. He shifted on the seat, surprised by his body’s reaction to her closeness.
“Hold tight.”
She hugged him harder, pressing herself against his back like her life depended on it. He hit the gas and the vehicle lurched forward. There was no need for shifters to have vehicles like this, and he hadn’t really ever driven one before. Deciding it was safer to take the road, he shoved the gas down and took them there, driving them away from the hunters’ compound.
He looked around at the scenery as best he could in the night, taking everything in and committing it to memory to tell the council at Sanctuary. If this was their main headquarters, the other shifters would want to know. Maybe they could finally take action against their oppressors. First they had to get away. He gunned it faster, gritting his teeth as the icy air blasted against his face.
Sophie buried her face against his shoulder. They just needed to get far enough away from here to have a shot at escaping.
He guided the ATV up and down the winding hills of the road until they finally reached a fork. Reading the street signs, he made a mental note of the fork then took off to the right.
By the time they saw signs of a town, the first rays of sunlight were dotting the horizon. Callum pulled the ATV over to the edge. He left it on but got off, helping Sophie off in the process. Then he lifted the vehicle, grunting from the weight, he tossed it over the railing, sending it toppling against the rocky wall until it hit solid ground where it burst into flames.
“Now what?” Sophie asked. She wrapped her arms around herself, visibly shaking – he assumed from the chill of the ride.
“We’re going to have to walk,” he said. “Are you warm enough?” He already knew the answer. Her teeth chattered loudly and her whole body trembled. The entire ride, he’d felt her shiver as she tried to get closer to him to warm herself. He was chilled, too. The ride was too far in the icy late fall weather.
“I’ll be okay once we start walking,” she said, forcing a smile.
“It doesn’t look like we have too far into town. A few miles at most.” He rubbed his hands together for warmth before shoving them back into his pockets.
“You’re sure this is really a town, right?” Sophie looked down at the houses that dotted the land below.
“We’ve been on the road for miles. They can’t have places like that everywhere.” At least he hoped they couldn’t.
“What will we do when we get there?” she asked.
Callum patted the pockets of his borrowed pants until he found what he was looking for. He plucked a black leather wallet from his pants and thumbed through it, counting a few twenties. Sophie felt her pants too, also producing a wallet. She pulled a few bills from it and handed them to him.
“We’ve got eighty-seven dollars. That should be enough to get a hotel room. I see a couple credit cards. We can use those to try and book us tickets on an airplane, train, or a bus. With any luck, we’ll be able to get transportation out quickly and it won’t matter that we’ve used their credit cards.” He had no idea where they were, but hoped that they were close to a city that had one of those methods of transportation.
“Okay,” Sophie said as they continued to trudge down the road.
“Once we get to a hotel, I’ll call my friends at Sanctuary,” Callum said. “They can wire us money so we can get back there, hopefully without any other incidents.” If they were really lucky, Nate or another group from the safe haven would be in the area to help ensure their safety. If there was one thing he liked most about working on a team, it was the safety in numbers. Hunters traveled together; so should shifters.
“They’ll help just like that?” Sophie asked, looking at him.
“That’s what we do. We help each other. A few decades ago, the different shifter species lived separately, each fending for themselves. Hunters picked them off one by one. Our numbers as a whole community are half of what they used to be. There is strength in unity.” Callum hoped she would understand.
“I suppose that makes sense,” she said as they finished rounding the corner.
A car horn beeped loudly behind them. Callum whirled around in surprise. He was more tired than he’d thought. I should have heard that.
The driver flashed their headlights at them as the car slowed. Callum narrowed his eyes, flexing his fists in case they needed to fight, though he doubted this was a hunter. Every hunter he’d ever come across enjoyed the thrill of the chase. This man was waving and smiling. He didn’t look sadistic and ready to run them off the road.
“Morning, you two need a lift?” the man asked as he rolled down the car window.
Callum looked to Sophie as he inhaled a deep breath, confirming his earlier suspicion. Not a hunter. “Yeah, sure. We’re heading into town. Our car ran out of gas. We’re vacationing and got a little turned around out here.”
“Hop in. That’s easy to do with these roads. Did you get lost out by Huntersville?” he asked.
Callum frowned as he opened the back door for Sophie. Huntersville, how original. Surely the hunters could’ve come up with something a little bit better than that. Sophie shrugged before sliding into the backseat. He climbed in after her and let the warmth of the car heater ebb the chill from his bones.
“It’s the tiny village off the dead-end road back there. I don’t know what those people do there, but man, the wind blows a certain way and the stink damn near kills you.” The guy eased the car back down the road.
“Yeah, we noticed that too,” Callum said.
“Strange folk too. They get real antsy anytime someone shows up there. Best to leave them be,” the guy said.
“Makes me glad we turned around when we did,” Callum said.
“Where you two from?” the guy asked, glancing at them in the rearview mirror.
“Tennessee,” Callum said.
“Never been. I hear it’s nice, though.”
“It is,” Callum said, sitting up straighter as they drove into town. He eyed the shops and people as they went about their business. It appeared to be a small town, but folks were out and about – on their way to work, he assumed.
“Where do you want me to drop you?” the guy asked.
“That diner looks nice,” he said, spotting a small restaurant on the corner.
“You’ll love Maggie’s. She makes the best banana nut muffins.” The driver stopped the car. “You two take care now.”
“Thanks for the ride,” Callum said. He got out, followed by Sophie.
“Thanks,” she said before shutting the door.
His stomach growled and he inhaled the scent of bacon and eggs. “What do you say we eat and then get transportation out of here?”
“That’d be great. I’m starved,” she said, rubbing her belly.
He knew the first thing they should do was flee, but he was running on empty, and if he didn’t eat soon, there was no way he’d be able to shift even if he needed to. His body needed sustenance. Then he needed to sleep, but that could wait until they were someplace safer.
They walked into the diner. The delicious smells made his stomach rumble again. It was crowded with only a few small booths open in the back.
Callum led the way until he reached an empty table. He collapsed onto the cushions and let his head fall back against the high padded seat. Fatigue and hunger were starting to wear on him. When was the last time he’d slept or eaten? It had been over twenty-four hours ago.
He sat up and glanced over at Sophie. Her raven hair was a tangled mess and dark circles hung under her eyes. Despite the hardship she’d been through, there was softness about her face, a beauty like none he’d ever seen before. She smiled at him as she picked up the menu, and he couldn’t help but return it. There was something beautiful about her grin that made him want to see it again.
“Morning,” a woman said as she stopped at their table. “Can I get you two started with something?”
Callum motioned to Sophie. She glanced at the menu quickly, then looked up. “Can I get a water, three pancakes, a side of bacon, scrambled eggs, and mush?”
The woman’s eyes widened at the large order but she didn’t say anything. Callum chuckled under his breath. Shifters could eat double the amount a human could without issue. Considering they’d shifted recently, they were even more famished than normal.
“And you, sir?”
“I’ll have the same as her,” he said. He folded his menu and then handed it back over to the waitress.
His eyes roamed around the diner until he stopped at a tourist stand by the bathrooms. He stood and grabbed a few pamphlets before rejoining Sophie at the table to look over them.
“We’re in New York,” he said after a moment.
“New York?”
He opened one of the pamphlets that also had a map and tourist attractions in the Big Apple. “According to this, New York City is only a two-hour drive. There’s a bus that can get us there.” He looked around for a clock and grinned when he saw one. “We have enough time to eat, grab some new clothes from one of the shops, and then make the ten o’clock bus into the city. Then we just disappear into the crowd.”
“It sounds so easy,” she said, her eyes lighting up.
“Let’s hope it is.”