Page 34 of Ruthless Alpha Beast
“Let’s try to get back before the storm becomes too violent. There’s nothing here, we should go.”
We’ll go back straight this time instead of taking the long way around so it shouldn’t take too long.
They move without question, racing back along the direct path through the woods with each of their paws plummetinginto the earth. Some have appointed themselves to stay in their human forms so that they can carry the body of the dead shifter.
I watch them for a moment beneath the rain as their bodies move in near-perfect unison.
Despite all the crap, I feel something positive.
My pack is doing a good job—I’m proud.
***
It shouldn’t be too long now. We’re almost home, and I can practically smell the familiar scent of our territory.
For the most part, my thoughts have synced up with the constant rhythm at which I’m moving. I’m not in my mind, but in my body, laser-focused on the path ahead.
Dylan calls me from behind. “I hear something!” He yells.
I stop, and all those around me do too.
“What is it?” I call.
My men are exhausted, even in their wolf forms; they seem out of breath. I look sharply at the trees and the forest that lies both behind us and ahead.
I don’t see anything.
“I don’t know,” he says. “I thought I heard some weird sound, maybe I was wrong. Could be the wind, it just seemed strange.”
It’s possible he’s heard something, but it’s also likely that his mind is playing tricks on him, and it’s just the wind. Either way, it’s better we press forward. The rain that’s pouring all around us doesn’t help things.
“We should go,” I begin to say, but my voice trails off. My head snaps behind me, scanning.
The wind dies.
Something is definitely wrong.
“Everyone stay sharp,” I say, my voice low but loud enough to cut through the sounds of the rain. “Dylan, what exactly was that sound like? A screech?”
He’s about to respond, but it’s too late. A familiar, deafening scream echoes through the air. I look up, but I don’t see anything because where I need to be looking is behind.
Suddenly, a blur of white shadow slams into one of my wolves from the side. He tumbles across the forest floor.
Three of them pounce, colliding with the shadow monster mid-air, one manages to sink its jaws in before he’s hurtled into a closest tree. His whimpers echo through the air.
More and more of my wolves try to jump and dig their claws into the shadow monsters that are hitting them from all sides.
“Run!” I roar, “Get the body back to our pack.”
The rain falls harder, blurring my vision, and before I know it, a monster tackles me to the ground. Just as it aims for my neck, I shift, slinking out of its grasp.
Most of my men have listened to me and are racing down the path that leads back home. Not all. Dylan is in his wolf, snarling, twisting on his paws as two shadow monsters circle him.
Another one is headed in his direction, sweeping down from the clouds to hit him from behind, and I lurch.
I waste no time.
Growling, I throw myself at it, jaws wide, crashing into its center. It’s like biting into fire and smoke.
