Mate Bond(60)

Turner dropped, but the next moment, Kenzie was flying through the air,  the beast batting her aside. The thing grabbed Bowman as well, tossing  him the other way, its tail sending him sliding across the floor to slam  into the cement wall. Bowman lay still a moment before he climbed  unsteadily to his wolf feet, shook himself, and stumbled back toward  Kenzie.

The beast had Turner. Its claws ripped into him, spilling out blood,  guts, bile. Turner screamed and screamed, alive and in agony. The sound  burst into Kenzie's skull, and even with all the horrible things Turner  had done, Kenzie started to crawl to him, to help.

Bowman reached him first. He shifted to human, got behind Turner, seized his head in his strong arms, and broke his neck.

Turner fell dead at his feet. Bowman's throat was lit up with his  Collar, and the beast, deprived of its victim, attacked Bowman instead.


* * *

Bowman heard Kenzie shouting, but he was too busy to call out to  reassure her. Giant arms came down to crush him, claws bigger than any  Shifter grizzly's raked across his stomach.

Speaking of grizzlies, one filled the hall, Cade's roar a match for the  beast's. Cade jumped onto the creature's back, teeth and claws deadly,  but he barely slowed the thing down.

But there was Jamie, leaping with his cheetah's speed. Cristian was  darting in and out as wolf, Pierce came in with his sword, and Reid was  fighting with twin iron-bladed knives. Brigid had retrieved Turner's  dirk and fought alongside Cristian, stabbing and dodging with incredible  speed.

Kenzie was hurt. Her body was covered with blood and mud, her face  streaked with cuts. Her stomach was a mess of black blood, and the way  she staggered told Bowman she wasn't doing well.

He wasn't either. The beast came at him again, and Bowman fought with  madness that kept him on his feet. The charm on the necklace Gil had  given him flopped uselessly against his chest, below his crackling  Collar.

Where was Gil? Bowman distractedly saw that the man wasn't fighting with  them, but he was battling too hard to see what he was doing.

No, there he was, supporting Kenzie, taking her out of the way of the  fight. Kenzie leaned against the wall, her face paper white, too much  blood on her skin.

Bowman saw Gil stop a little way from the beast, hold up both hands, and start shouting in a strange, phlegm-clogged language.

The beast stopped. Turned. Cade and Jamie fell from its back, as did the  huge wolf that was Graham. The beast swung all the way around, its  bizarre face moving as it sought Gil.

Gil didn't look happy to be skewered by that gaze, but he kept chanting,  hands held high. The beast began swaying back and forth, following  Gil's voice as though mesmerized by it.

Pierce took the opportunity to shove the Sword of the Guardian into the  creature. Deep into it. Pierce's hands remained around the hilt as he  struggled to pull the blade out again.

The beast blinked. It shook itself away from Gil, turned and caught  Pierce with one giant fist, sending him flying, then fixed on Bowman  again.

Rage lit its eyes. It pulled the sword out of its side, raised it in  clumsy paws, and plunged it toward Bowman. Bowman rolled to keep the  sword from hitting his heart, but he felt the blade go into his abdomen  and all the way through him, down into the floor.

He lay there like an insect pinned to a board, blood running from his  torn body. The beast roared and raised its fists to strike him again.

Kenzie leapt up the monster's arms as they came down, climbing it as  though it were a giant, animated tree. She slammed onto its back, her  strong legs clamping its sides.

"Mom!" Ryan shouted to her from below, and tossed her the rebar she'd dropped.

Kenzie raised the iron bar, her other hand locked around the creature's head.

"Stay the fuck away from my mate!" she yelled, and drove the bar straight through its throat.

The beast roared. It thrashed, gurgled, sprayed blood, caught the others  with its tail as they tried to get out of the way. Ryan sprinted back  inside the lab, disappearing from the hall.

Walls cracked. The steel door the beast had come out of bent from its hinges and fell to the floor with a loud clang.

Kenzie was thrown off of the monster, landing on her back on the hard  floor. Cristian grabbed her and hauled her out of the way. Bowman, stuck  to the floor by the sword, could only thrust his arms over his face as  the beast fell.

It struck the ground with a wet slap, like a giant water balloon. Blood  sprayed everywhere with a stink that made Bowman start to fade into  unconsciousness.                       
       
           



       

The great tail hit him, dislodging the sword and a good chunk of  Bowman's flesh with it. Bowman rolled, every movement torture, and  rescued the sword before several thousand pounds of dead animal could  smash into it.

Bowman staggered to his feet, covered in his own blood and the beast's, struggling to stay upright.

"Here," he said to Pierce, shoving the sword at him. "Go for the heart."

Pierce, his face so pale freckles Bowman never knew he had stood out on  his skin, closed his hand around the hilt and moved to do his job.

Bowman limped to Kenzie. Cristian held her in his lap, and Kenzie fought  to breathe, blood trickling from her mouth. Ryan was with her, his  small hands squeezing hers. "Mom," he whispered.

Bowman took her gently from Cristian, cradling the mate he'd loved from  the first moment he'd looked at her. Kenzie's eyes, the ones that had  arrested him from across the crowded, cold gym, opened, warming when she  saw him.

"Did we get it?"

"You nailed it, baby," Bowman said. "We kicked its sorry ass."

"Good." Kenzie smiled, the sexy, sly smile he adored. She touched her  chest, over her heart, then put her hand on the center of his chest. "I  feel it," she whispered. "Do you?"

A burning sensation seared him where she touched. Bowman went utterly  still as wild hope flooded him. "Yeah." He pressed his hand, covered  with blood, over hers. "I feel it, right here."

"Good." Kenzie smiled again, looking so happy that Bowman's whole body  hurt. She reached out her other hand and pulled Ryan to them. "Good,"  she repeated, then her grasp went slack, and she fell, limp, against  Bowman's chest.





CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE




Kenzie peeled open her eyes. She took a breath . . . and spent a long  moment calming herself down from pain. Her body pounded, her side  burned, and her legs felt as though someone had broken them and glued  them back together.

A quick downward check showed her lying in bed in a hospital gown, her  bare legs free of any kind of splints, though bandages tightly wrapped  her middle.

She opened her mouth to call out. Ryan-was he all right? And Bowman?  What had happened to everyone? Her last memory was falling against  Bowman, safe and content in his arms, but he'd looked as bad as she  felt.

The only thing that came out of her throat was a groan. This was bad.

Something rattled. "Kenz?"

Her heart raced, which hurt, then settled into warmth. Bowman. She turned her head.

Bowman was in the hospital bed next to hers, the two of them separated  by a few feet of space. Above each of them were machines that beeped,  and tubes snaked from bags on stands into their arms.

The moment she saw Bowman and his stormy gray eyes, the quiet warmth  behind her breastbone flamed into white-hot heat. It cleansed rather  than hurt, humming like an electric current, filling the air with a  clean scent like a breeze after a grueling storm. Kenzie gasped for  breath, but found it flowing sweetly into her lungs, erasing the aches  of the fight.

Along with those hurts went the despair of long years of watching, wondering if she and Bowman would ever be complete.

"Bowman," she whispered.

Bowman gazed back at her, the quiet joy in his eyes matching her own.

She swallowed. "Ryan?"

Bowman nodded, answering in a low voice. "Is fine." He grinned, which  turned up the warmth, the corners of his eyes crinkling. "He looked  after us while we lay on the floor in pools of blood. They cleaned him  up, checked him out, and let him go home with Afina."

Kenzie sank back in relief, ready to bask in the new feeling of  contentedness. And yet it was more than contentment. A vibration deep in  her body promised good things to come.

Bowman was here, whole. They were together. She thought about the way  the two of them had shared thoughts during the danger in Turner's lab,  and excitement blossomed inside her.

Then she blinked, as Bowman's words clicked, one by one, into place. "Let Ryan go home? Who did? Where the heck are we?"

Bowman's smile grew. "Hospital. After you passed out, campus police and  town police were all over us, but they were nice and brought us to the  hospital instead of taking us to jail."

"Jail?" Kenzie asked in alarm. "They wanted to arrest us?"

"They did arrest us." Bowman lifted his left wrist, which was attached  by a handcuff to his bed. That explained the rattling noise. "You were  so far gone the doctors wouldn't allow them to cuff you. They were  afraid of circulation problems." The look in his eyes showed her the  worry that had caused him.