Page 49 of Savage

His body tensed. Every muscle practically quivered. “Enough! She dies.”

He stepped toward the bed, arm extended with his weapon pointed in front of him. Before I even knew what I was doing, I leapt over the corner of the bed and picked him up with shifter strength. No, more than shifter strength. It was shifter with an endangered mate strength. The power coursing through my limbs went beyond what I knew I was capable of. When I threw him, he flew across the room and crashed through the bedroom window.

Glass shattered as he fell through and onto the snow-covered ground outside.

“Stay inside, Becky. Don’t come out,” I warned and dived out the window after him. He would be on his feet quickly. I needed Becky inside with Donald out. Bullets wouldn’t go through the log walls.

I tucked and rolled, bumping and scraping over rocks and fallen branches, coming back to my feet. Glass probably cut me, but I couldn’t feel it. I was solely focused on Donald.

The wind whipped around us, my feet sunk deep in snow up to my ankles. Headlights cut across the trees as several vehicles sped in and skidded to stop at the cabin. My pack had my back.

Thank fuck. I didn’t know how they knew to come, but thank fuck. One of them would protect Becky while I finished this shit.

A shot rang out. It went wide, but chips of wood flew from the bullet hitting a tree to my right, nicking my skin.

“Can’t even shoot a gun,” I taunted. “Can you even shift?”

I wanted him in wolf form. I wasn’t an alpha, but I’d been made an enforcer for a reason. Threats like him had to be ended. The battle was to the death. I was prepared for it every time I’d gone out and hunted a rogue shifter. This time, it was different. This time, I was protecting my mate. My unborn child.

I couldn’t save them in human form. I had to get him to shift.

He did. Angry as he was, his wolf had pushed forward, taken over. He probably couldn’t even resist the pull. He crouched and the sounds of shifting, of bone and muscle rearranging, then the renting of fabric filled the air. The gun fell uselessly into the snow.

His wolf was tan. While big, he wasn’t as large an animal as I was.

I stalked toward him, shifting at the same time. By the time I was on four paws, he was turning tail and running away. Going after him, I herded him to the far side of the cabin to the open clearing. I wanted room to fight, room for others to arrive, to witness the elimination of the threat to my mate.

I had no idea if the council had passed judgement on Donald or only sent an enforcer to keep an eye on him. It didn’t matter now. He’d admitted to killing Todd. That was enough to have him finished.

I wasn’t an enforcer here and now. I was a male whose mate had been threatened. We protected what was ours fiercely, and I was within my rights as mate alone to end Donald’s life.

Any male shifter would do the same.

I leaped on him, rolling us several times until he was beneath me. I bit his flank, and his wolf pushed me off. We circled, snarled. I tasted his blood on my tongue. It dripped from my teeth.

As we moved, I saw Rob walk out of the darkness to stand in the periphery. Rand did as well. Then Colton and a male I’d never seen before. I assumed he was the enforcer. They stood sentinel, arms crossed, legs spread. Doing nothing but watching. No one would take this from me.

This was my fight. My battle.

Out of the corner of my eye, I caught a glimpse of Becky. Shit! I didn’t want her out here, seeing this. She stood with Boyd—his arm around her shoulders—in the cabin’s doorway. She was wrapped in the blanket from the bed and had her boots on her feet.

Donald launched at me, his fangs sinking into my leg. The pain of his sharp bite shot through me, but I rolled, got free. Put my body between my mate and the vengeful wolf.

“Clint.” Her wobbling voice cut through the darkness, straight into my chest.

Goddammit. I didn’t want Becky watching. Didn’t want her to find out about us this way. To see what I was about to do.

Fuck—why did Boyd let her witness this? She was safe with him, with the others in a large circle around us. But Becky wouldn’t understand.

I was not human.

I was a shifter. A black wolf. I was a killer in both forms. Now she knew it all from the words Donald and I had shared and again in action. And I had to kill again. In front of her.

I had to see it done. She and the baby would be safe. Even if she never forgave me for what I am and what I’ve done.

It was over for Donald. He just didn’t know it yet.

As for me, it was over, too. I knew it all too well.