Alpha (Shifters #6)(29)

“Good.” My father looked at each of us individually, me last of all. “This time we fight.”
Anticipation buzzed in my stomach like angry wasps, fear and bloodlust combining to spin my head and steel my spine. “I confiscated three guns, but there are two more in use, plus the five Malone still has locked up. Assuming he hasn’t already distributed them. Colin Dean has one of those two, but anyone could have the last. So some of us should Shift, but we also need a few in human form, to disarm those last couple of ‘task force’ members.” I pulled my shirt over my head, hopefully emphasizing the urgency.
“Agreed.” My father glanced around at the room full of toms, all waiting for his orders. “Lucas, Jace, Vic, and I will stay human. The rest of you Shift. Quickly. We’ll do our best to get rid of the guns, but stay out of the line of fire just in case.”
Marc already had his shirt off and his pants unbuckled when I grabbed his arm and pointed toward the bedroom, where we’d be shielded from the initial onslaught. “In there.” Because we were more vulnerable in mid-Shift than at any other time in our lives. At least, since infancy.Marc headed for the bedroom and grabbed Di Carlo’s other enforcer on the way.
“How many are coming?” I asked, unbuttoning my jeans in the bedroom doorway.
My father’s frown deepened as his gaze settled on mine. “I couldn’t tell. But more than came for you the first time, I’m betting.”
I nodded and ducked into the bedroom, leaving the door open a crack so we could get out without hands to twist the knob. I shoved my jeans and underwear to the floor, listening to my father as I dropped to my knees on the hardwood, still fumbling with the latch on my bra.
“Okay, our primary objective is to disarm and disable,” our Alpha called from the front room, as the first jarring bolts of pain emanated from deep within my joints. “But because we may be facing men with guns, if it’s kill or be killed, opt for the former.”
On my left, Marc was in mid-Shift between the two twin beds, and suddenly I wished I’d thought to put at least one mattress between me and the door, thus between me and any potential bullets. But it was too late to move. Once my Shift began, I could only ride the waves of pain. Or let them ride me.
“Once this first group is subdued—” they were coming to rearrest me, hopefully not expecting us to actually attack “—we’ll have to move quickly. We’ll tape up the survivors and regroup, then head out through the woods to Malone’s cabin. He’s our primary target, but obviously we’ll have to deal with anyone else who gets in the way. As quietly as possible, to keep from tipping him off.”
My knees popped, and I groaned. Pain echoed the length of my legs, radiating outward from the center of my bones. My ribs ached fiercely as they and the accompanying muscles were reshaped to accommodate a feline layout of organs. As I stared at my hands, splayed on the floor, my palms began to plump beneath me. My fingers creaked as they shortened and thickened, growing pads suited to rough terrain.
“But above all, don’t let any of them leave.” My father’s boots scraped the floor in the living room, and it became hard for me to simultaneously concentrate on his words and force my Shift to come faster than it would on its own. “If they warn the rest of Malone’s men, we’ll lose the element of surprise and be outnumbered. Got it?”
There were mumbles of assent from the men still in human form, but I couldn’t help wondering if we actually had the element of surprise in the first place. Surely they weren’t expecting me to just turn myself in and be hauled off quietly. Again.
“I hear them,” Vic said, his voice low enough to avoid detection by the toms headed our way, but loud enough to be heard in the adjoining rooms, over the grunts and heavy breathing of so many simultaneous Shifts. 
My heart rate doubled. Moments away. My pulse echoed in my ears, a fanfare to announce the coming attraction. We were on the brink of actual war—the first American inter-Pride brawl in decades—and I wasn’t ready.
I dumped the extra adrenaline my nerves spawned into my Shift, forcing my body through the paces faster and faster. My entire head ached with pressure so severe it felt like my skull would squeeze my brain out my ears.
Instead, my face lengthened and pain exploded along the new length of my jaw. My cheekbones stretched with an odd screeching sound heard only in my head, as my ears traveled forward and all outward sound was temporarily suspended. My nose flattened and darkened, and a long, bare muzzle now took up most of the bottom half of my field of vision.
“Is everybody ready?” This time my father’s voice was low, steady with a false calm.
I could only whine in answer, and I was acutely aware of Marc standing next to me now, fully Shifted. He stood between me and the door, obviously intent on protecting me until my Shift was over.
My entire body began to itch as fur sprouted over my skin, beginning along my spine, and flowing to cover every inch of me, except for my paw pads. My teeth grew so quickly they forced my mouth open, and I nearly bit off the end of my own tongue, as backward-facing barbs suddenly sprouted all over it.
Whiskers shot out of the sides of my muzzle, stark white against the dark blur of my own fur. They twitched as I sniffed the room. Almost there. Just waiting on… My claws.
Even as I pictured them, my finger- and toenails grew hard and sharp, lengthening to deadly points. I sheathed them, then unsheathed them again and dug into the floor, picturing them piercing vulnerable human flesh.
And just as my tail began to swish, fully formed and twitching angrily, my father gave the “get ready!” signal from the front room: he went completely still and totally silent.
Marc and I padded silently to opposite sides of the bedroom door, where we were least likely to be shot and most likely to surprise any intruders.
Soft footsteps climbed the front steps. Malone’s men were in stealth mode, too. Did they think we didn’t know they were coming?
I peeked into the living room to see my father standing to one side of the front door, his back against the wall, Lucas on his left. Jace and Vic mirrored them on the other side.
The footsteps stopped. They must have realized something was wrong. How could they not, with the lights on, but no one in sight through the windows? With no voices carrying from inside.
The first man paused in front of the door. His dark silhouette spanned the entire width of the small window cut into it. His shadow turned, and I heard the faintest of whispers as he spoke to the toms behind him. I couldn’t make out his words, but the message was clear: we were up to something. Or else we’d left. Run away.
My heart thumped in my ears, and suddenly I wondered if we should have. Were we making a fool’s mistake, taking on men with guns while we were armed with nothing but anger, shielded by nothing but courage?
Either way, it was too late for a change of plans. The silhouette canted to one side and kicked the front door open.
I knew several of the faces, but had no names to go with them, and at a glance they all seemed to be carrying guns. Brian was too late to get rid of them. Malone’s men stared into the apparently empty living room, and our men in human form held their breath. They couldn’t disguise their heartbeats, but if the intruders’ pulses were rushing as loudly as my own they’d never hear heartbeats, anyway.
“They ran.” The first tom lowered his gun. “Bunch of cowards fucking ran away.” He stepped over the threshold, and two more followed before the first one turned around.
Jace seized the nearest man’s gun arm and pulled the tom in front of him, shielding himself from gunfire. Vic did the same with the second man to turn.My father lunged with a speed I’d seldom seen from him. He grabbed the lead man’s hand and forced the gun to one side, then pulled the tom to the left, out of sight from the doorway and out of the line of fire. It happened so fast I didn’t even have time to worry, beyond the wordless adrenaline-laced terror already surging through me.
The tom tried to jerk free. My father squeezed his hand so hard I heard the bones crack from fifteen feet away. The tom howled and dropped his gun. Lucas bent to snatch it.
“Toss your guns inside and step forward with your hands on your heads.” My father’s voice carried absolute authority, a fact I’d recognized long before I took my first steps. But the three men still standing on the porch were completely unfazed.
“Not gonna happen, Councilman.”
My father was seconds from losing his temper. “Drop your guns, now!”
“She’s in here.” The first tom craned his neck in my father’s grip to glance around the cabin. “I can smell her. But the rest of them are Shifted. Call for backup.”
Footsteps pounded on the porch as the last three toms turned and ran, two of them armed.
My father roared. His face flushed with fury, and his fist smashed into the side of the tom’s head. The tom collapsed to the floor with a thud. “Get them!” my dad yelled, his throat half-Shifted, his words barely understandable.
But his meaning was clear.
I leaped into the living room and was on the porch two bounds later. I hit the grass running, frozen blades crunching beneath my paws, frigid air burning in my lungs. Marc was on my tail, and I could hear two others behind us.