The Wolf in His Arms (The Runes Trilogy) Read online

  “Inappropriate humor,” Jared joked. “She doesn’t have one. She isn’t one of us,” Jared pointed from himself to Maxwell and to Alec.

  “But she has the eyes,” Maxwell countered.

  “I do,” Lucy acknowledged. “But I got them by accident.” She looked to Jared for help.

  “You said ‘they’ want to harness our gifts. Who are they?”

  “Like the guy who attacked you.”

  “How do you know about that?” Sue asked.

  “A little thing called the Internet,” Alec said.

  Jared shot Alec a look to silence him. “We were looking Maxwell up and found the story online.”

  “So who are they, and what is this experiment?” Maxwell asked.

  “To be honest,” Lucy cut in, “we wish we knew more than we do. We’re not sure what the experiment is, exactly, but—”

  “For Christ’s sake, they’re werewolves,” Jared snapped. “If you think we’re crazy, then think it.”

  “Finally,” Haley sighed. “I thought you’d never just say it.” She looked at Maxwell and shifted her weight petulantly. “I told you that was a fucking werewolf that attacked us.”

  “Are you guys serious?” Sue scoffed. She looked at Haley.

  Haley nodded.

  “So you guys know?” Alec asked. “You could’ve let us off the hook.”

  “We had to make sure you’re for real,” Maxwell said. “Besides, you two are kinda cute when you squirm.”

  Jared rolled his eyes and Alec flushed a slight pink in the cheeks. “How long have you known?” Jared asked.

  “Since you two walked in,” Maxwell deadpanned. He smiled. “Since the attack last night. He basically changed in front of us. Well, we didn’t actually see it.”

  “But it wasn’t hard to put two and two together,” Haley sneered.

  “I need a beer,” Sue moaned.

  “Oh! Me too!” Haley trilled.

  Maxwell leaned toward Sue and smiled. “Please?”

  “I’ll bring the case,” Sue grumbled good-naturedly.

  Maxwell watched her leave the room and said, “So, we’re really putting her in danger, aren’t we?”

  “And her.” Jared nodded to Haley.

  “Who? Me?” Haley sneered. “I’m from Chi-ca-go. The city. Not the suburbs. I use bitches like you for bowling pins.”

  “All the attitude and head rolling in the world will not stop a werewolf,” Jared retorted. He turned to Maxwell. “You’re putting her in danger.”

  “And you are from the suburbs,” Maxwell reminded her.

  Haley cut in again. “We’ve been through everything together for the last three years. He’s going nowhere without me.” She clutched to Maxwell’s arm as if to prove their inseparability.

  “I’m actually almost out of beer,” Sue announced, walking back in with a nearly empty case. “I can run down to the corner market.”

  “I’ll go,” Lucy offered. “Haley, why don’t you come with me? We can talk.”

  Haley eyed Lucy suspiciously and then slid off the stool. She turned her eyes to Sue. “Don’t let them take him anywhere?”

  “Did I miss something?” Sue asked.

  Maxwell rested his hand on her shoulder. “It’s cool.”

  Jared pulled his jacket off and draped it on the couch. “See? We’re not going anywhere.” He flashed Haley a smile, and she rolled her eyes.

  On the street, Lucy turned to Haley and rested her hand on her back. “It’s touching that you care about him so much.”

  Haley shrugged. “We’re all each other’s got.” Bitterness hung under the words. “I can take care of myself. I know I look all cute and shit, but I’m tough.”

  “Have you ever killed anyone?”

  Haley’s face puckered in disbelief. “Have you?”

  “Yes,” Lucy said evenly. “Last year. A man—Darius was his name—attacked my parents and Alec and Jared, and I cut his fucking head off with a fucking scythe.”

  “Are you serious?”

  “Yes.”

  “What’s a scythe?”

  “The thing the grim reaper carries.”

  “Shit. Lucy, The Reaper.” They entered the store and grabbed a case of beer from the cooler. Lucy paid, and they began their walk back to the apartment. Haley asked, “So, um, are you lesbian?”

  Lucy chuckled. “No. Do I seem it?”

  Haley shrugged. “We’re in the Midwest. Most of the straight women are butcher than me.” With a smirk, she added, “You have a bit of a badass vibe. But, nerdy too. It’s a weird combo.”

  “I started taking self-defense classes after this all happened.”

  “Can you keep him safe?”

  “We’ll try. We can’t make any promises.”

  Haley considered her honesty for a moment. “I’m not going anywhere.”

  “As long as you know the danger.”

  “I know.”

  “Where you pretty ladies heading tonight?” The voice came from a darkened doorway.

  “Fuck off,” Haley snapped automatically. Griffin stepped forward from the shadow into their path. “Shit. It’s him,” Haley whispered to Lucy.

  “Lucy Rune,” he sneered as he approached. “A pleasure.”

  “You know my name, but I don’t know yours,” Lucy replied.

  “Griffin,” he growled his name, his lips working it like poison. “You’re supposed to be dead.” He looked from Lucy to Haley. “Both of you.”

  Lucy looked around the crowded street. Too many cars and pedestrians bore witness. She wagered he wouldn’t do anything in so visible a location. “I’m not sorry to disappoint you.” She hated the fear she could hear in her own voice.

  “Why don’t we take a walk?” He pointed toward a darkened alley.

  “Are you fucking smoking crack?” Haley spat.

  “Do you really want all these nice people on the street to die too?” He flashed his teeth as the canines grew before their eyes.

  Lucy struck out with a quick kick to his knee, buckling him. She swung with the case of beer, hitting him in the head as he fell, increasing the impact. Suddenly aware that violence erupted in their midst, pedestrians scattered like flies on a slammed screen door. “Run!” Lucy urged.

  Griffin grabbed Haley’s leg as she ran past him, and she tumbled face first into the sidewalk. Lucy saw him bare his fangs, ready to bite Haley. She delivered the hardest kick she could muster to the side of his head. His head jerked aside with a satisfying snap. Haley clambered to her feet and sprinted toward the building. She reached the locked vestibule before Lucy. She pressed the button for Sue’s loft. “Let us in! Let us in!” She cried into the intercom.

  Her frantic cry set Jared, Alec, Maxwell, and Sue into action. Sue darted across the room, pressing the button to unlock the door. Jared and Alec ran to the door, and bolted down the hallway. Maxwell hesitated at the door. “Wait here. Lock the door,” he commanded Sue. Maxwell thundered down the stairs behind Alec and Jared.

  In the vestibule, Haley yanked the inner door open when she heard it click. “Run, Lucy!” She yelled as Lucy raced toward her with Griffin close behind. Lucy pushed through the inner door. As Haley pulled it shut, Griffin grabbed the handle. He yanked the door from her hands. Lucy launched a flying kick square in his chest, knocking him across the sidewalk and into two passersby who were also knocked to the sidewalk.

  Griffin lunged to his feet, shoving the passersby out of his way. “I’m gonna fuck you up.” He charged Lucy.

  At that moment, Jared bolted through the door, slamming into Griffin at full speed. Griffin howled as his back collided with the side mirror of a parked car. Glass clinked to the sidewalk as the car alarm blared into the night. Jared and Griffin tussled against the car until Griffin grabbed Jared by the shoulders and flung him backward across the sidewalk. Jared tumbled to the sidewalk by the door. Griffin prepared to leap as Alec and Maxwell arrived at Jared’s side. Pedestrians gathered on the sidewalk, watching the spectacle.
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  Griffin hesitated, watching Jared climb to his feet. Griffin dragged the back of his hand across his nose. He glared down at the smear of his blood. “You think you’re pretty hot shit,” he ranted. “You think you’re the alpha.” Griffin pounded his chest. “I’m the fucking alpha. I am Griffin. I’m the oldest. I’m in charge of this pack.”

  “You don’t own us. None of you do,” Jared countered.

  Griffin nodded. “I thought you’d feel that way. But we do control you.” Griffin stuck his hand in his jacket, and before they could react, he pulled out a handgun. He leveled it on Jared. “You’re no longer a part of this experiment.”

  Griffin fired.

  Alec’s mind fell behind reality as the impact flung Jared backward. In a blink, Jared lay sprawled on the sidewalk, his head lulling like a discarded doll. His lips drew back in pain to reveal blood-tinted teeth. His eyelids fluttered over glazed eyes. Crimson seeped through the fabric of his shirt in an ever-growing melanoma.

  Alec fell to his knees. He became vaguely aware of screaming, people moving around him. He did not notice the blood sprayed across his own face. He did not notice as Griffin tucked the gun back in his pocket and began to stroll down the street.

  Alec pressed his hands to Jared’s chest in a futile attempt to stop the blood as it gushed from the wound. The wound, in fact, was larger than Alec’s hand, and he was afraid his hand would sink into the pulpy mess that had been Jared’s chest.

  “Lucy, do something,” Alec finally cried. Blood bubbled up between his fingers. Blood flowed out from under Jared, and the words exit wound fluttered through Alec’s mind like a raven’s wings.

  He noticed, then, that Maxwell was on his cell phone, demanding for an ambulance; Haley had yanked her scarf off, wadded it, and fell beside him to stop the bleeding; Lucy dropped to her knees beside him, tears streaming down her face. Alec looked at Jared and knew, without a doubt, that he was dying. His breath came in short, choked breaths. His lips turned ashen, his eyes grew glassy and distant. Jared sputtered blood, and it trickled across his lips into his beard.

  Alec clutched Jared’s hand. “Please, Jared, stay with me,” he whispered, though it sounded like a roar in his ears. “Please.” He knew it made no sense to plead; if Jared could, he would stay. Jared’s eyes did not close, but Alec knew that he had taken his last breath.

  Alec lunged to his feet. He turned his gaze down the sidewalk where Griffin had walked just seconds before. “Griffin!” His voice shattered the night, high above the din of traffic and sirens and voices. The anguished cry was laced with madness, hatred, rage.

  He spotted Griffin, still walking, about a block away.

  Alec ran toward Griffin. He shoved pedestrians aside as he raced down the sidewalk, like a great white shark preparing to split the surface. Lucy chased him, yelling for him to stop, but he did not hear her. Rage filled his mind; he could feel it pushing through his skin like angry fists.

  Alec morphed instantaneously.

  Like a chemical change as a liquid is suddenly a crystal, Alec suddenly lumbered down the sidewalk as a werewolf. Lucy’s mind did not comprehend the change immediately. Her only point of reference was Darius, and her sketchy memories of her own changing, which took time as the beast seemed to literally claw its way out of her. But Alec did not miss a stride. He did not stumble or pause. He simply shifted.

  Lucy skidded to a stop as her mind became crippled by a Medusa-knot of emotions and thoughts snaking over each other. Not sure what to do, she took a few protracted steps after Alec as she watched the streets turn to chaos.

  The sidewalk cleared in front of the werewolf as he charged down the street. People were shouting and scattering; some ducked into doorways, others fled into the street. Avoiding pedestrians, cars skidded to a stop. Motorists, once they saw the beast, sped off, yet others opened their doors to gawk. The werewolf passed by a number of pedestrians with earphones who shrieked as they saw the beast in their peripheral vision. Some people, and Lucy thought, how stupid, stopped to film the monster charging down the sidewalk. The werewolf seemed not to notice them in his single-minded tracking of Griffin.

  Griffin seemed to finally notice the tumult behind him. He turned to see the beast rushing him. He tossed his head up and laughed into the night.

  The werewolf tackled Griffin to the ground. Those who had convinced themselves that the werewolf was a publicity stunt realized, in that instant that the creature was real.

  Pandemonium broke out on the streets.

  Screaming, pedestrians scattered in all directions like ants from a smashed hill. As the streets flooded with fleeing pedestrians, cars hit their brakes, causing a chain reaction of crashes. Cars veered off into parked cars, others collided with cars in front of them. A motorcycle zipping between vehicles collided with an open door, and the driver was flung onto the street.

  Inside busy coffeehouses and restaurants, inside apartments, stunned witnesses watched as the werewolf plowed over his single victim, tearing his throat from his body. Blood jettisoned from Griffin’s neck, splattering the sidewalk and cars and buildings and the lamppost. The werewolf spit the chunk of flesh onto the sidewalk and lumbered away.

  Screams and sirens deafened the night as Griffin stared into the dark sky. The urban glare painted the sky a starless gray. As he sucked his last breath through the gaping wound in his neck, a faint smile parted his blood-stained lips.

  Ignoring the tumult, Lucy ran down the street after Alec. Lucy stumbled her last three steps as she approached Griffin’s shuddering body. His blood puddled on the sidewalk under the street light, and poured into the gutter like wine. She faced the alley where Alec had vanished, and with a short, defeated cry, she turned and ran back toward Sue’s loft. She felt that she was trapped inside a church tower as the calamity of the city banged around her. Her head vibrated with the sirens, screams, honking—and all of it echoing, echoing.

  She skidded to a stop outside Sue’s loft. Maxwell and Haley kneeled by Jared’s body. Someone had covered his face with a jacket, and Lucy felt a breath catch in her throat, sharp like a dagger, at the finality of it. Sue enclosed Haley and Maxwell in her arms, trying to comfort them. Police gathered and taped off the area. An ambulance waited nearby. Lucy could see people looking out the windows of the condominiums above.

  Lucy looked down at the blood spreading out from under the jacket. “Oh, Jared,” she sobbed. Maxwell stood and looked at her, unsure, with his arms at his side. His face fluttered like the wings of a small white moth, and then he threw his arms around her. “I don’t know what to do,” Lucy sobbed.

  “Can you call someone?” Maxwell asked through his own tears.

  “My mom,” Lucy sobbed.

  “Call her,” Maxwell said.

  Lucy dug in her pocket, wanting so fiercely to hear her mother’s voice. The need wrestled with her guilt over the distance she had spread between them and over the guilt of delivering yet more devastating news.

  Ilene answered. “Lucy? Lucy, is everything okay?”

  “Mom, we’re in Chicago. Someone shot Jared.” Lucy felt her lips form the words but could not believe that they were true. “He’s dead.”

  “Oh, God. Alec?” Ilene shot her son’s name with a dire urgency.

  “We need you and Dad. He’s lost it, Mom. Alec’s totally lost it.” Lucy didn’t know what else to say.

  “We’re on our way. Now,” Ilene promised. “Get up, Jason,” she ordered, holding the phone to her chest. She brought the phone to her mouth. “I’ll keep my phone on me. Take care of Alec until we get there.”

  “I’ll try,” Lucy wept. She hung up. Lucy looked around at the police. How will I answer them?

  “What do we do? What do we do about Alec?” Maxwell asked.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Should we go after him?”

  “I don’t know.” Lucy threw her hand up to stop the questions. She walked over to an officer. “Where will you be taking him?” She tipped her head towa
rd Jared.

  “Are you family?”

  Lucy paused. “Yes.”

  “He’ll be going to the morgue for an autopsy. Did you get a look at the shooter?”

  They don’t know he’s dead. “He’s dead. About three blocks that way,” she hooked her thumb over her shoulder. “A monster ripped his throat out.” The officer blinked at her blankly. “I need to sit down,” Lucy stammered, and she crouched against the brick wall of the building.

  Shreds of familiar cloth lay on the sidewalk. Alec’s clothes, she thought. He’ll need clothes. She turned to Maxwell. “I have to find Alec.”

  The officer stepped closer to them. “I spoke with the three of you. Were there any other witnesses? The others I spoke to indicated that another man had been with you?”

  Lucy read the dubiousness on his face. What did the bystanders say they saw? A man chased after the shooter—only to turn into a werewolf mid-stride, in a blink? She wondered “No, it was just us,” Lucy said.

  “Just us,” Maxwell echoed. Haley nodded.

  “I was inside,” Sue said flatly.

  The officers dispersed after Jared was wheeled away on a gurney. Back inside Sue’s apartment, Lucy stared out the window at the city so alien to her. The city lights blinked, uncaring, into the night sky, as she pondered where Alec was—whatever form he was in—alone, heartbroken. She turned into the apartment. She noticed Jared’s coat on the couch. Lucy rushed across the room and lifted his coat. His car keys were inside. “I’m going to go look for Alec.”

  “I’ll go with you,” Maxwell said.

  Lucy shook her head. “I don’t know what Alec’s going to be like. He’s never—” Lucy leaned against the couch, feeling the monumental weight of the night pushing against her.

  “He’s never changed before?” Haley asked.

  “No.”

  “Did—” Maxwell searched for the right words—“The shooting cause it?”

  Lucy looked away from Maxwell, knowing he meant Did Jared’s dying cause it? Fresh tears rolled over her cheeks. “A man told us there was a trigger. But we didn’t know what the trigger would be.”

  “Why would he kill Jared?” Haley blurted out.