Obsession Untamed (Feral Warriors #2)(4)

A chill slithered down her spine. “Hands in the air, or I shoot!”

He moved so suddenly, so quickly, she barely got a shot off before he was on her, knocking her to the ground. Her head slammed against the cement as her gun went flying, jagged lights streaking her vision.

She’d hit him in the chest. Point-blank. He should be going down, dammit. She tried to fight him, but he was as strong as a bear as he pinned her to the floor.

His head dipped. As she felt his cold mouth open on her neck and the press of his teeth into her skin, she struggled against her immovable assailant, a scream of fury filling her mind.

Too soon. Too soon. She’d left too many killers walking the streets.

She didn’t have time to die.

Chapter Two

Still deep in the vision, beneath the harsh, bright lights of the public laundry room, the sound of footsteps had Tighe looking up from the body of the dead blonde into the face of a stunning, dark-haired beauty. Dressed in a no-nonsense navy blue suit, the brunette was tall and leggy, her hair pulled into a casual knot at the back of her head, the gun in her hands pointed at his heart.

A strange sensation pummeled the inside of his chest as he stared into her fierce, determined face. A feeling of connection gripped him. Almost a recognition.

“Freeze. FBI!” she shouted at him. “Hands in the air!”

He leaped at her as he had the other one. The gun fired, but if she hit him, he couldn’t tell. He couldn’t feel anything, could only hear the sound of her thudding heart and the slam of her head against the cement floor as he took her to the ground.

Their gazes met, and in the brown depths of her dazed eyes he saw not fear, but fury, and recognized the soul of a fellow warrior. Then he dipped his head to rip out her throat.

Tighe? Tighe!

He came back to the night in a rush, desperately swallowing the bile that tried to rise in his throat. Even as the stunning, dark-eyed beauty chiseled herself into his mind.

She can’t die.

Tighe! Wulfe’s voice echoed in his head at the exact moment fire slashed through his flesh like a thousand tiny knives ripping him out of his vision and back to his dark reality.

The horde of draden had found him.

Instinctively, he lifted his knives and began attacking the creatures, little more than floating gas beneath heads shaped like hideously melted human faces. They would steal his life if they got the chance. Beside him, his jaguar and wolf companions leaped and snapped at the attacking fiends.

Sweat rolled down his temples as the woman’s face, those eyes, swam in his memory. Mistake. His gut fisted with horror over what he was destined to do even as the draden tore at his flesh. He fought them off, the blood running in small rivulets down his neck and back.

What would drive him to attack a human woman? Two women?

But he knew. That chaos he’d seen swimming at the edges of his consciousness would overtake him before they found his clone, just as it had Wulfe before they’d destroyed his clone. Like Wulfe before him, he was destined to become locked in a feral rage, lost to the violence that would transform him into an unthinking, unreasoning killing machine.

At least Wulfe had never gotten free of the Ferals’ prison. He’d never harmed anyone in that state.

“Wulfe, whatever you do, don’t let me go feral and escape.”

Not going to let it happen, buddy, Wulfe said mentally from his wolf form. Shift, Stripes. I’m taking over as bait.

It’s too soon.

The huge wolf turned into a man in a shower of sparkling lights. His friend looked at him grimly. “Do it.”

“Damn,” Tighe muttered. He must look as bad as he felt. In a harsh rush of power, he pulled on the energy and magic deep in his body and shifted into his animal form, his vision a quick flash of light. Raw, primitive joy surged through him as he shifted into a fifteen-foot Bengal tiger.

The draden released him with a high-pitched squawk. Tighe went on the attack, scattering and destroying the little fiends alongside the jaguar. Wulfe, standing naked in the moonlight, came under attack from the ungodly throng, digging out their hearts as fast as he could, before they sucked the life force out of him or ripped him to shreds.

“You okay?” Wulfe asked. Tighe didn’t have to ask who he was talking to.

An answering growl was his only response.

I see the sire. The jaguar leaped, snapping his jaws around the largest of the draden, swallowing its beating heart to destroy it, dissolving the creature in a puff of smoky energy. The sire, or leader of the swarm, was the one who directed their flight. Kill the sire, and the rest would remain right where they were, lost and leaderless, making them easy marks for the animals, whom they couldn’t feed from and wouldn’t attack.

Wulfe shifted back into his animal and joined the slaughter of the disordered swarm.

Tighe caught one after another of the little demons in his massive jaws. Neither the hearts nor the creatures themselves had any real taste, for they weren’t flesh and blood but made almost entirely of energy.

We’ve got company. Jag’s voice sounded in his head.

Tighe swung his massive tiger’s head in the direction Jag was facing. Sure enough, two teenaged boys stood in the woods not twenty yards away, watching a sight that must be unbelievable to them. Humans couldn’t see the draden, but they could sure as hell see the huge tiger, wolf, and jaguar.

Tighe gave a mental groan of frustration. Damn humans, always getting in the way. Fortunately for them, draden only attacked humans if there were no Therians for miles around. Still, the humans were a problem.