Page 102 of Bad Wolf's Nanny
“Felix!” Dane shouted, dodging a swipe from a brute with broken teeth. He countered, slammed the alpha’s head into the debris, and kept moving. “Felix! The women made it out!”
Felix, in his massive russet wolf form, turned mid-fight. His flank was bleeding. He snarled loud, “What?”
“They’re here. They’re unhurt. Lola—” Dane’s voice cracked, “she must have got them out.”
Felix’s expression faltered, a rare, momentary flicker of heartbreak, but he didn’t pause. He launched himself back into the fray, taking down two alphas in one bone-jarring leap.
The air changed.
Dane didn’t need to turn to know who had arrived.
The scent hit him first. Bitter, metallic, and wrong.
Red Teeth stepped from the smoke like a figure carved from nightmares. Blood slicked his chest; his scars gleamed like firelight across his jaw. His bone mask was cracked at the brow, half hanging loose from one temple. The raw ruin of his face beneath it was barely human. But it was his eyes that chilled Dane the most, not fury, not even bloodlust.
Amusement.
He looked amused.
Red Teeth was flanked by two remaining alphas, both limping but upright. One held a blade. The other had a makeshift torch. They looked at Dane like he was already dead.
Dane growled low, guttural. His claws flexed.
“Where is she?” he snarled.
Red Teeth tilted his head. “So she is your little bitch,” he rasped. “Brave girl. Couldn’t keep her mouth shut.”
Dane surged forward, but Rick's hand snapped out, stopping him.
“Wait,” Rick said. His voice was deathly calm. “He’s baiting you. Think.”
Dane wrenched his arm free, chest heaving. “I don’t care.”
Rick didn’t argue. He just stepped back, eyes flat. “Then end it.”
That was all Dane needed.
He moved, low, fast, and dangerous, and the battlefield responded. Around them, the fight thinned. Even Felix turned, watching as Dane stalked toward the man who had nearly destroyed them all.
Red Teeth ripped off the remains of his bone mask and tossed it to the ground. His smile was all broken teeth and blood.
“Come on, then,” he said.
Dane didn’t answer. He just shifted, huge and terrifying, claws extended, eyes gold-bright and blazing. He stepped between the fires, the blood, the bodies.
“Where is she?” his voice cracked like lightning.
Red Teeth sneered, “You never did have any discipline, did you? A shame your father didn’t succeed in beating all that sentiment out of you.”
Dane snarled, “Where is she?”
Red Teeth shifted, hulking and scarred, more beast than wolf. He was a figure who had haunted Dane’s nightmares. A dark mirror to what Dane could become.
It ended here.
Red Teeth didn’t waste time on posturing. He lunged. Dane dodged left, barely avoiding claws that would’ve gutted him. They collided like titans, fang to fang, bone against fury.
Red Teeth was bigger, older, and brutal in a way that spoke of decades of war. But Dane fought with something more. Not just rage. Not just grief. He fought for Lola. For Sam. For the entire damn pack.
