Icould neither smell nor see Hunter, but I got the distinct impression that he was out there four-legged, watching and waiting as my pack and I moved into position. His presence was akin to a tingle at the base of my spine, the same sensation that I'd experienced over and over again during the last twenty-four hours of jittery anticipation. I'd kept looking over my shoulder all day long, in fact, expecting Hunter to return for his clothes, wallet, and SUV. But instead the uber-alpha appeared to have turned wolf and disappeared from our lives as quickly and as thoroughly as he'd come into them. And yet, if my overactive nerve endings were any indication, Hunter hadn't really abandoned us at all—just taken a step back until we couldn't quite see him out of the corners of our eyes. Whether the sensation was the work of the pack bond or just wishful thinking on my part, though, didn't really matter. Either Hunter really was my mate and we were in good shape—with five able-bodied shifters and a recovering getaway driver toeing off against two SSS members—or the uber-alpha was merely waiting to turn the tide of the battle in the opposite direction and ensure that we all perished. Regardless, I couldn't do anything about it now. In fact, as soon as I set eyes on my youngest pack mate, I immediately forgot everything except the urge to rush closer to the girl as quickly as possible.
Lia had already been pulled out of one of the cars by the time I caught sight of her and she was now being dragged over to where the other outpack male waited with his hand firmly clamped onto the shoulder of a second prisoner. Our youngest pack mate had every right to be cowed after days of confinement, but Lia was instead holding her shit together with a strength of will that would have made her cousins proud. The girl's cheeks were tear-stained, but her chin jutted skyward as she dug her heels into the dirt and roundly refused to give in to her captor's attempts to move her along.
Savannah, on the other hand, looked nearly comatose. Or at least I assumed the other girl was Savannah. I wouldn't have recognized the teenager from her photo, smiles and youthful charm having been completely obliterated by dirt and bruises. And unlike Lia, Savannah was hunched over as if her kidneys hurt. Her wolf was clearly too quiescent to give the girl the boost she needed to survive any further ordeal.
I wanted to swear and then tear into the two males who were manhandling the kidnapped girls with such disregard for their captives' humanity. But that wasn't the plan. Instead, Quill and I paced forward, purposefully coming upon the group aslant and from downwind, so the enemy wouldn't notice us until we were almost close enough to touch.
The night before, the pack and I had gone back and forth over the issue of Quill's presence on the front line of the upcoming showdown. Would the outpack males who we were hoping to ambush have been in the bar Tuesday night, meaning they would have seen the cowboy shifter leave with us? Or could he pass as just another SSS member that Lia's captors didn't happen to know personally?
"I'll make them believe," Quill had promised, raising one eyebrow at me as if asking my future permission to knock his new pack leader around. Now he made good on that past promise, loudly rebuking me for my supposed dilly- dallying, then shoving me so hard that I nearly fell to the earth at his feet. The abrupt greeting appeared to have worked. I couldn't actually see the SSS males' faces since my bound hands prevented me from catching myself before I slammed into the side of the nearest car. But the strangers' voices were congratulatory as they greeted what they assumed was another halfie-hunting shifter showing up with his catch at the usual Friday night watering hole.
And even though I'd banged myself up good during our introduction to the scene, I was glad that Quill's quick thinking had kept my face averted from the SSS crew. Unlike the cowboy shifter with his impressive acting skills, I has having a hard time maintaining a disheartened demeanor. Instead, I felt triumphant as I realized that our plan was actually going off without a hitch.
This was it. We'd edged ourselves close enough to Lia and Savannah so we could now pull the girls out of harm's way before the rest of our pack mates joined in the fight. Soon, both kids would be tucked away in bed with soup and hot chocolate and whatever else we could think of to lull them back into a very real sense of security. Soon, our entire pack would once again be fully united.
But then the shifter holding Lia burst my bubble with a single word. "Nice work, Talon," he said. "I didn't really think you could do it, but you managed after all. A halfie alpha!"
Talon! Absurdly, I wasted a split second thinking I must have been mistaken. Quill was a nice guy, a thoughtful member of our crew. He was here to help Lia escape.
To help Lia who had formed a supposedly irrational dislike of our newest member as soon as he entered our lives? No, Quill/Talon was present for one purpose and one purpose alone. To increase the SSS's weekly haul, bringing in not only two weak girls but also a third half-blood shifter whose wolf was equally lily-livered but who had been granted an unusual power by a friendly pack leader.
If, as I suspected, the SSS was somehow stealing their prey's lupine capabilities each time they murdered a half-blood, then I was the holy grail. A halfie weak enough to easily sacrifice on the altar, but with a hidden strength that would boost the outpack males' own wolves far more effectively than the spirits of the other two girls currently in their grasp.
"Glen, Ginger, attack!" I screamed, struggling against my captor's grasp and hoping my pack mates would be able to descend upon the enemy quickly enough to wrest the two teenagers out of the outpack males' control. But instead I heard Lia's shriek of rage becoming muffled as a car door slammed and shut her away from the outside world. Then I felt the prick of a needle invading my bicep as the world turned fuzzy around me.
"You were so easy to manipulate," Quill whispered in my ear. "So easy to catch."
And then the world went black.