Shifter's Strength (Wolf Pack Special Ops Elite Book 3) Read online

  “TREV! Trev, can you hear me?”

  It was one of the twins…Zeus I think. Their voices sounded so much alike that with my eyes closed, it was impossible to be sure.

  Why aren’t they identical twins? They should be identical.

  The thought was inane and useless but so were so many of my thoughts at that moment.

  “Nod your head if you can hear me.”

  I tried to nod and pry my eyelids apart again to indicate that I was still with them, but I felt paralyzed.

  Is there such a thing as a paralyzed shifter? I’ve never seen one.

  My mind’s eye began to float away again, images swimming in my head like a scene out of The Wizard of Oz.

  “Dammit. He needs a medic,” the other twin grunted. “We can’t leave the team.”

  From somewhere, a stab of guilt found me, but it was gone as more agony sliced through me.

  “Watch it, Dare! Dammit, he’s hurt badly enough without you running him into a tree!”

  “I don’t have eyes in the back of my head!”

  “Just shut up and keep going. We need to get back.”

  “The others have the town under control. Mason rounded up the Lost Boys and has them under lock. Let’s get him back to the plane. We’ll deal with those kids when we get back. Just give me five minutes with those little assholes.”

  “They’re just scared kids.”

  Once again their voices faded away, and I heard a whistling. I couldn’t be sure if it was in my head or not. I wasn’t sure of anything in that moment.

  “We’re still going to be down a man,” Darric sighed.

  “We’ll be fine,” Zeus growled.

  I wanted to protest, to tell them that I was fine, that I could get back into it in just a minute, but it wasn’t so. Something was terribly wrong, and even if I could have denied it, it was a lie. I wouldn’t be fine in a minute or even an hour.

  What had happened? What was in those arrows that had immobilized me?

  I floated through the air, but I knew I wasn’t flying. The twins were carrying me, their slight grunts permeating my ears every so often until I heard the sound of a voice which finally forced my eyes opened and sent chills of apprehension throughout me.

  “What the hell happened to him?” Slater growled.

  Through a red-veiled fog, I made out the shape of the general, his face twisted in angry concern as Darric led my feet up the tail.

  “He was shot by a bunch of kids trying to get away.”

  “Kids?” Slater echoed, the disapproval in his voice thick. “What do you mean?”

  “It was an ambush, sir. He walked right into it.”

  “Alone?” Slater demanded. Neither twin responded, or at least I didn’t hear them if they did. I moaned something incoherent as my body was laid inside the plane, more agony wracking across my broken frame. I didn’t even know what hurt the most, which injury was most brutal.

  “Where the hell were you?” Slater snarled at them.

  “If we hadn’t come, sir, he’d be dead right now,” Darric said firmly. “They wanted to kill him. I think they thought they did kill him, which is the only reason he’s still alive.”

  “Jesus Christ. What did they get him with?”

  “Arrows, sir, but they must have been laced with something. We’ll know more after we get back.”

  “Did you get them? The kids?” Slater wanted to know. My eyes were open, but Slater’s face was nothing more than a non-descript blob, floating in and out of my vision. I could tell from his tone that he was incensed, but I couldn’t tell if his anger was aimed at me or the attack.

  It was probably better if I didn’t know.

  “Yes, sir.” Zeus this time. “Rowland and Cobb rounded them up while we brought Washington to safety.”

  “Good. Get back out there. The rest of the team needs you. I’ll be along as soon as this one is squared away.”

  My eyes fell closed again, and I struggled to move with every fiber of my being, but the effort was futile. I was brutalized, half conscious.

  “What are you going to do with him?”

  Slater was silent for a moment, clearly weighing the question.

  Don’t do anything! I just need a minute, and I’ll get back out there! I wanted to scream, but I wasn’t naïve. I was a liability now. Keeping me anywhere near the field was a very bad idea.

  “He needs a medic,” one of the twins said, as if that was not obvious.

  “I know that,” Slater barked, not liking to be told what to do. “And I’m trying to think of the closest one.”

  “I can get in touch with Donovan—”

  “You’ll get back to your team as you were ordered!” Slater’s voice was like whiplash. “The last thing I need is another man down—or to be given commands.”

  “Yes, sir.” Both twins spoke in unison as my heart sank lower into my chest.

  Why am I not healing? The pain is getting worse, not better.

  I heard the retreat of steel-toed army boots from the fuselage as I continued to fight for breath.

  “Washington, can you hear me?”

  Somehow, I managed to open my eyes again, but Slater’s face was in and out as it had been before.

  “You’re going to be all right, soldier. Do you hear me?”

  I bobbed my head, and I realized that I had finally moved, but what I saw in Slater’s face was anything but comforting. He was furious with me.

  Slater disappeared from view, and a moment later, I felt a rush of wind as the tail closed and I was secured in full darkness. The pain overcame me again, and despite my best attempts to the contrary, my lids dropped closed. There was no point in struggling against the inevitable blackness. The next thing I knew, the plane was moving and we were airborne.

  When my eyes opened again, things made a lot more sense. I recognized shapes, and there was no longer a haze interfering with my vision. Everything was clear, and I was fully aware of my surroundings.

  What I saw filled me with an apprehension almost as deep as when I’d seen Slater’s face in the plane.

  The sterile, white walls of the hospital room, the IV bags towering over my head, the pained expression of the nurse reading my vital signs. It was clear that Slater had set me up in a medical facility, but despite all this, the first words out of my mouth were, “Where am I?”

  I felt stupid as soon as I asked the question. The medical worker looked startled at the sound of my voice and blinked twice before giving me a double take and lowering her tablet to the table at the end of my bed.

  “You’re awake!” She declared as unnecessarily as my query. “Let me get the doctor.”

  I didn’t want her to leave without answering me, and I tried to catch her attention before she retreated.

  “Wait!” I croaked, my throat felt like sandpaper, but she was gone without a backward glance, almost as if she wanted to get as far away from me as possible. A moment later, a stern-faced woman entered, her dark brows knit into a vee as she eyed me. The white lab coat and stethoscope around her neck told me she was the physician in charge, even before I read the name tag.

  Dr. L. Haver

  “Hello, Lieutenant Washington,” she said stiffly and without meeting my eyes. “How are you feeling?”

  I pondered her query for a moment, realizing that I didn’t feel as bad as I had the last time I’d regained consciousness. Abruptly, what had happened flooded me in a torrent. I couldn’t believe I’d forgotten what had landed me there until that second.

  “Dammit!” I cursed, coughing as I spoke. The dryness in my throat was proving to be more than just a tickle. The doctor turned away to find me a cup of water, and I didn’t stop hacking until the cool liquid placated my raspy windpipe.

  “Take it easy,” Dr. Haver sighed.

  “Where am I?” I asked again, but I had a terrible feeling I knew the answer. Everything about the air told me I was back in Georgia, but I had no recollection of the plane ride that had brought me home.


  “Savannah Medical,” she replied crisply. “But I don’t know what I’m expected to do for you here.”

  Suddenly, I understood her demeanor, and I scowled slightly, struggling to sit up.

  She hates shifters. That’s why she’s acting so tense.

  It wasn’t the first time I’d encountered animus by humans, but it still shocked me for some reason.

  She made no effort to help me, and I managed to right myself without her assistance.

  “Where is my team? Are they back yet?”

  “I need you to take it easy,” Dr. Haver said firmly, still not answering any of my questions.

  “Where’s General Slater?” I demanded. “I need to speak with him.”

  “He’s not here.”

  “Yes, I can see that,” I retorted. “Can you call him? Tell him that I’m awake. Tell him…”

  I paused, knowing that I couldn’t disclose any of the details of our mission, but I wanted to make it known that I could get back out in the field.

  “Will you please just get a hold of him?” I insisted. “It’s important. It’s a security issue.”

  She sighed again and finally met my eyes.

  “He left instructions that you are to remain on bedrest until he returns,” she answered, turning away.

  “What?” I demanded. “When did he say that?”

  “When you were sent here,” she snapped, losing her patience with me. Her face softened when she caught the stricken look on my face.

  “In the meantime, I suggest you try to regain your strength,” she offered by way of advice.

  “Returns from where?” I insisted. “Is he…”

  I hesitated, not sure how much she knew about my rank and position. We were a covert team, special op. I wasn’t at liberty to discuss our assignments, even if Dr. Haver was a physician in an army hospital.

  “Where did he go?” I finished. She grunted lightly and glanced over her shoulder at me as though I was keeping her from something much more important. I probably was. She had real patients to treat, not monsters like me who are supposed to be self-healing.

  Supposed to be.

  “He mentioned something about a mission,” she admitted. “He’ll return in a day or two. If there’s anything you need, ring for the nurse. I have rounds.”

  With that, she disappeared, leaving me to stare after her with dread forming in my gut.

  He brought me back to Savannah before returning to the others, I realized, sickness filling my gut. I left my team in a lurch.

  Humiliation and upset rocked through me, overtaking any remnants of pain that lingered after my attack. I had no one to blame but myself for the situation I was in. I shouldn’t have gone off by myself. I had been too cocky, too aggressive.

  Then again, when had I ever been knocked down so severely?

  I tried to piece together what had happened, how I’d come to be in the hospital bed, waiting for word from my team about what damage I’d done, how I’d left them in a lurch. The suspense was only fueling my disappointment.

  Slowly, I stripped the blanket away from my body, cringing at the sensation as I peered down at my wounds. To my utter disbelief, I was still bleeding slightly beneath the gauze bandages. The final arrow had pierced my shin, and the sight of it made me shudder. It was unnerving seeing such an ugly wound on my body.

  Was there something in those arrows or am I growing weaker?

  Both thoughts were equally disturbing, but I had no answer. Asking the doctor would be useless. Humans did their best to separate themselves from us—even the ones who swore an oath to do no harm. They didn’t understand the intricacies of our shifter physiology, and for the most part, they didn’t try to either. There had been doctors who tried to breach the secrets of our DNA over the years, but when we healed so quickly, there was only so much science could explain.

  I pressed my mouth together, ignoring the flashes of heat surging through me as I swung my legs over the side of the bed. My head was cloudy, but I was thinking more clearly than I had since I’d first been shot. Gingerly, I made my way to the bathroom and paused to rest my hands on the sink. My body was trembling with the effort, but my legs were otherwise unharmed. My right arm was weaker, wrapped from the bicep up, and there was an unmistakable piercing in my lower back.

  My usually bright green eyes looked dull and listless when I peered at my own reflection. The auburn scruff on my face was indicative of not having shaved in two or more days, and I realized that I must have been unconscious much longer than I realized. I wished I’d thought to ask Dr. Haver that at least—not that the knowledge would help my cause in any way.

  I ran a hand through my short, cropped hair and sighed heavily, waiting for my breaths to even as I decided what to do. I had blown the mission and was stuck in a hospital room until Slater returned with my orders. I would go crazy if I had to stay there, under the watchful eyes of the reproving doctor. She was right—there was nothing for me at the hospital. Whatever could be done had already been administered. Anything I could do here, I could do at home and without the scorn.

  At least if I went back to the base, I could talk to Donovan and see how the mission was going—assuming I hadn’t been denied clearance of information.

  My gut fluttered at the thought. I knew I was in trouble. I just didn’t know how much.

  Making my choice, I wandered back into the room and looked for my clothes. I found them in the tiny, cubby-style closet and hastily dressed before anyone could come looking for me again. I didn’t know for sure if I was forbidden to leave, but I didn’t want to wait around and find out.

  In my uniform, I inched my broken body out of the room and made my way out into the hallway, careful not to catch the attention or eye of anyone as I found the elevator.

  In less than two minutes, I stood outside the hospital, inhaling the sweet, humid Georgia air. Normally, I relished the feeling of being home after a mission, but that night, the scent filled me with a sense of deep disappointment.

  I had let my team down with my arrogance, and I wondered if they would ever look at me the same way again.

  Chapter Three

  Jane

  I used to like bartending. When I first started, it had been fun, amusing, a way to meet new people. Maybe I’d been at it too long or maybe it was just the Raven itself that made my job unbearable some nights, but that Friday, my nerves were raw.

  “Are you going to have another one?” I asked Holly, who had been nursing a beer for the better part of an hour as my eyes took in the scene around me. As always, the bar, attached to a tattoo parlor, was filled with an eclectic mix of beings. There was no rhyme or reason to the men and women who entered the dusky, dim establishment, as if all of Savannah sent its misfits there when they had nowhere else to put them.

  At the pool tables, three bikers stood around with a pair of hipsters, chattering as though they had known each other for years. Directly in front of the bar was a group of college girls, giggling and looking around in awe. Typically speaking, we didn’t see a lot of women at the Raven, except Holly. I pretended not to notice the gangly werewolves near the kitchen, but they were giving me a bad vibe for some reason.

  “I probably shouldn’t,” Holly sighed in answer to my question. “But what else am I going to do? I hate it when Mason’s gone.”

  I reached behind the bar into the fridge for a bottle to set in front of her, only half listening as I studied the four wolves at the back table covertly. The hairs on my neck rose, like I could sense something was about to happen.

  “Are you even listening to me?”

  I turned my azure eyes toward her and gave her a wry smile.

  “Of course,” I lied. I half-heard what she was saying about Mason and missing him when he was gone, but my focus was more on the tables than her complaints. I would never admit it to her but sometimes listening to her talk about Mason irked me. It wasn’t that I didn’t feel happy for Holly, but at the same time, I didn’t necessarily want
to only talk about her werewolf, military boyfriend. Perhaps a part of me was still surprised that she and Mason had hooked up. He was a nice enough guy, but given Holly’s history and bias with the wolves, it was startling.

  Or maybe I’m just thinking of my own bias, I thought. The notion troubled me. I had lived in Savannah my whole life. Shifters and magic were commonplace, especially as a bartender at the Raven. I knew of the existence of things that would make most people mock me, but I had long since learned to keep my mouth shut and my eyes open.

  That didn’t mean I approved, despite my outward disposition. I didn’t like to think of myself as prejudiced against the shifters, but some of them made it so difficult to trust when they were clearly out to cause trouble.

  Ones like those at that back table who were itching to do something. I could feel it in my bones.

  “Am I bothering you by talking about Mason?” Holly pressed, leaning across the bar to stare at me with an astute look that I didn’t like.

  “No,” I insisted. “I’m just a bit distracted.”

  Holly swiveled her head to look at the table where my eyes were focused and she grunted, turning back.

  “They aren’t doing anything,” she informed me.

  “Yet,” I replied, spinning to tend to a customer at the far end of the bar. As I moved, I felt wisps of blonde hair fall from my loose bun, but I didn’t bother to fix it. My fine, straight hair was the bane of my existence, never wanting to stay in any updo but getting into everything if I left it down.

  “What’ll it be, Steve?” I asked the regular who ordered a round for his table. I busied myself with his drinks, almost forgetting about the wolves for a moment.

  For the first time that night, the din of the bar met my ears, and I realized how loud it had gotten. Beneath all the chatter and laughter, a song was playing on the jukebox, but I couldn’t make out what it was.

  “Holy crap,” I muttered, sliding the drinks toward Steve, “Folks are getting rowdy up in here.”

  Steve grinned patiently at me and shrugged.

  “All in a typical Friday night,” he teased, handing me a bill and waving the change away as he reached for the bottles in front of him. “But I’m gonna have to do something about this music.”