Pride (Shifters #3)(19)

What he wanted was clear. It was also not going to happen.
“Uh-uh!” I shook my head. “No way in hell am I going to wander off through the woods with the first tom who rubs up against me.”
The stray growled fiercely, and my pulse thundered in my ears. My nose picked up a sudden surge of the stray’s scent in the air. He was pissed, and likely scared, and his body was releasing extra pheromones to warn everyone near him. Which would be me. Only me. All by myself.
However, even if he was trying to help me, I couldn’t leave Marc and Jace behind, especially when one or both of them might be injured.
He pulled my sleeve again, hard this time. “You can’t just grab strange girls and start dragging—”
But apparently I was wrong, because he planted his rear feet firmly in the ground and gave my jacket a mighty yank. I had to brace a hand on his shoulder, curling my fingers in thick, unfamiliar fur to remain standing. The next tug moved us several feet, me hunched over and tripping in the meager moonlight, him stepping quickly and confidently, even moving backward.
“Stop it!” I shouted on purpose this time, hoping Marc and Jace were close enough to hear me. But my words gave the stray no pause. The time had come for more offensive measures. Damn it.
I drew the knife from behind my back, slamming one finger down on the button. The blade popped out with a satisfying metallic thunk. “You’re not giving me many options here,” I warned as his eyes lit on the blade, gleaming in a stray beam of moonlight.
He growled again, and for a moment, neither of us moved. Then he braced his front paws on the ground and jerked me to his right by my arm. I stumbled, off balance, and only remembered to swing the knife up at the last second. But that was a second too late.
His left paw arced toward me and slapped at my hand. Even with his claws retracted, the powerful shot knocked the knife from my fist and left my whole arm numb and tingling.
The knife flew off to my right and clattered against a tree trunk, then disappeared, buried within a pile of leaves. Now I was alone with an unknown stray, in the dark, in unfamiliar woods—and completely unarmed. If I remained stuck in human form much longer, I was clearly going to need some serious training with a blade.
Until then, all I had was anger and instinct, now singeing every nerve ending in my body. I was one big live wire, buzzing with fear and indignation. But my indecision was gone. “Let me go!” My arm flew along with my last word, and my fist slammed into the side of his skull before the cry had faded from my mouth.
Stunned for a moment, the stray swayed on his feet—all four of them. He blinked, then his mouth opened, and I was free.I raced down the dark hillside in the direction I’d come from. Hopefully. At my back, the stray roared in fury, and thundered after me. “Marc!” I yelled as the running pant closed in on me from behind. “Jace!”
“Faythe!”
My head whipped around in search of Marc’s voice. He was at least okay enough to yell, and he wasn’t too far away now. I veered toward him, confident he would never have revealed his location if the cat who’d snarled was still a threat.
From behind me came a harsh crunch-sliding sound and the pant of labored breathing as the stray made a sharp turn to follow me. His next huff was too close for comfort—too close for survival—so I shot forward to gain a little distance, then skidded to a halt, spinning on a bed of leaves before I’d even stopped sliding. I grabbed a bare branch overhead with both hands. The stray lunged for me. Grunting, I swung myself forward. Bark cut into my palms. My legs arced into a beam of moonlight, knees bent.
I didn’t make it into the tree—a world-class gymnast I am not—but my legs swung high enough that the stray passed right under me. By the time he skidded to a halt, I was racing in the opposite direction, away from both friends and foe.
I couldn’t outrun the cat, much less outclimb him, and I could only avoid him until he tired of the chase. Or until I grew too exhausted to continue—which would be any moment. Already my lungs burned, and my side felt like it was being ripped open with each deep breath.
Out of options now, I slowed to first a jog, then a walk, one hand pressed to my left side. Then I stopped entirely. Behind me, the cat’s steps slowed too, which I took as further proof he was trying to catch me, not kill me. Unfortunately, that knowledge wasn’t very reassuring. If he got close enough, he could knock me out with the swipe of one sheathed claw, then drag me anywhere he wanted.
I turned to face the stray, leaning against the nearest tree trunk, and immediately held my palm out in the universal signal for “stop.”
The stray threw his head back and roared, and his fury echoed throughout the trees. It was pretty impressive. But it didn’t change my mind. I was not going with him.
He started forward, determination written in each firm step, and I backed away slowly. I was trapped again, and too exhausted to run. But I was my father’s daughter, and I would not go down without a fight.
My right hand curled into a fist, and I took my “ready” stance, showing the stray my intent. Then a deep growl rumbled over me, humming in my very bones. It was aggressive and angry—a very fine threat. With a very familiar feel…
Jace.
The stray’s head flew up, his focus fixed on the branches above me. I followed his gaze—briefly—and there was Jace, hunched on a thick limb to my right, canines bared, fur gleaming in a broad beam of silver moonlight. 
The stray’s tail twitched once, drawing my eye. Then he pounced.
I screamed as his huge front paws slammed into my chest. The forest pitched wildly. My back hit the ground. My head thumped against an exposed root. Massive weight drove the air from my body, cutting off my cry of terror.
The stray glared down at me, teeth inches from my neck, breath hot against my chin. Panicked, I shoved at thick, fur-covered ribs, my mouth open and gasping for air my lungs had no room to accept, thanks to the hundred-and-seventy-plus-pound cat on my chest.
Jace growled above us, wordlessly warning the stray to release me or suffer the consequences. But he couldn’t pounce on the cat without squishing me, too.
That’s when I realized I was a hostage. The stray was threatening to kill me if Jace didn’t back off. And if one of them didn’t make a decision soon, the point would be moot, because I was suffocating.
Terror clawed at my chest, scorching my throat. My arms flapped helplessly, beating ineffectively against the stray’s sides.
“What good is a dead captive? She can’t breathe!”
My vision was already going gray when Marc’s voice cut through the buzzing in my ears. It was the sound of mercy. The sound of salvation.
It was likely the last sound I’d ever hear.
But then the stray removed one paw from my chest, settling some of his weight on the ground between me and Marc, and suddenly I could breathe again. Not well, but good enough.
I swallowed air in huge mouthfuls, spitting it out as fast as I pulled it in, and only a concerted effort on my part stopped me from hyperventilating. When I could see clearly again, I turned my head, pressing my cheek into soft, cold, fragrant dirt as I peered around the stray’s leg. Marc stood fifteen feet away. He had a gash on his forehead, blood smeared across the left side of his face, and a bloody rip in the corresponding sleeve of his coat. But he was alive and upright, and everything else would come in time.
“Let her go,” Marc ordered, in near-flawless imitation of my father’s obey-or-die voice.
The stray growled and dropped his muzzle to my neck. Stiff fur brushed my skin, and I whimpered before I could stop myself.
Marc jerked into motion, snatching a long, thick branch from the ground near his feet. He swung his club up and took two steps forward.
Four shards of pain pricked my chest, above my left breast, and I screamed, more shocked than really hurt. Startled by Marc’s sudden movement, the stray had unsheathed his claws, which pierced my leather jacket, shirt, then my flesh.
The cat resheathed his claws immediately, reinforcing my theory that he didn’t want to kill me—unless he had to. And when my eyes found Marc again, I saw something flicker in the dark behind him, in the hand he held behind his thigh. A flashlight? How was that supposed to help me? Was he planning to blind the damn stray?
Marc’s hand moved again, and the light flashed brighter this time. Only it wasn’t really a light. It was more like a glint—moonlight flashing off something…metal? Had he found my knife? No, it was too thin. More like a…
Syringe. He had the tranquilizer.
Wonderful. Unfortunately, Marc would never get close enough to use it without startling the stray into killing me. But evidently he didn’t plan to.
Marc glanced up at Jace, and gave him a tiny nod—a signal for something.
Jace roared—an impressive display of anger and dominance, I must admit—and the stray hissed, his head whipping toward the sound instinctively. While the cat was distracted, Marc tossed the syringe toward me. It thumped onto the ground near my hip.
The stray turned toward the sound, hissing, and one heavy paw landed on my stomach.“Do it!” Marc whispered urgently to me, and my hand flew to my side, fingers scrambling in a mound of moss for the syringe—almost literally looking for a needle in a haystack.
My sudden movement startled the cat—or maybe angered him—and four pinpoints of agony sank into my stomach, deeper than they’d gone into my breast. I screamed, and my hand clenched around a clump of moss. The scent of my blood saturated the air. Each breath I dragged in pulled at my torn stomach, sending new waves of pain through me. Yet some distant part of me wondered if he’d accidently ripped out my belly-button ring.