The woman fell silent.
The man said, “Come on out, Omega. There’s nowhere else for you to go. I’m doing you a favor here. Don’t you want it all to stop? I’m told that turning Omega is like losing your mind. I can help you. I can—”
“Boss,” the woman said, her voice shaking. “There’s something in the woods. I swear it. Can’t you hear that? Can’t you—”
“Did you hear what I fucking said?” the man snarled. “Bitch, I’m going to shove my fist down your throat if you—”
From the woods came the snarl of a furious wolf.
And I recognized it.
“No,” I whispered as the hunters outside the house began to shout.
Gunfire erupted again, but it wasn’t coming toward the house.
I rose from behind the table.
I saw the bright lick of fire erupting in the dark from the guns the hunters carried. I vaulted over the table and ran toward the door, my clothes tearing as I let the shift come over me.
I burst through the doorway, knocking the beams from the porch out onto the hunters. One of the men glanced back at me over his shoulder, his eyes so wide it was like they were pure white. He started to swing his gun toward me, but I landed on top of him, roaring down at his face. I was still half-shifted, and he screamed at me, a high and pitiful sound. He tried to raise his gun, but I bit down on his arm, feeling his bones crunch between my fangs. I twisted my head sharply, and blood spilled out onto my tongue.
He took in a gurgling breath before his eyes closed and didn’t reopen.
I looked up to see the others still firing into the woods. I thought I saw a flash of movement in the shadows between the trees, and I wanted to howl, wanted to sing because it was familiar, it was—
A timber wolf burst from the trees, eyes violet and blazing. His massive head swung back and forth, taking in everyone standing in front of him. There was a pause in the gunfire, as if all sound had been sucked from around the house.
The timber wolf’s gaze landed on me.
His eyes narrowed.
And then he moved.
He was quick, quicker than the humans could follow. They fired their guns, but the bullets only hit empty ground, dirt and gravel spraying upward. One of the men stumbled backward, trying to get away, but the wolf was on him, claws tearing into soft flesh. The man cried out wetly before it cut off as his neck broke in a savage twist.
I tried to shout in warning as one of the women swung a shotgun in his direction, but the words came as a snarl. He jumped up, the body of the dead hunter jerking as silver pellets struck his stomach and side, blood arcing onto the side of the house.
I went for the others as the woman screamed, her shotgun cleaved in half as the timber wolf bit down. I slammed a man into the side of one of their trucks, the windows blowing out, shards of glass falling around us.
He raised his hands and said, “Please.”
And I said, “No.”
He never got another chance to speak.
I whirled around and was about to yell for the wolf again when I heard a gun being cocked, the barrel pressing against the side of my head.
I looked over.
The man with the white hair, the one who’d said he was going to blow my head off, nodded at me with a grim smile. “Two of you. Didn’t expect that.” Then he raised his voice. “You move and I’ll kill him right here, right now.”
I looked beyond the truck.
It was a horrific scene. The clouds above parted slightly, allowing the moon to shine through. Shadows melted away, and I could see the ground covered in blood and gore. Three men still stood, and one woman, though she was bloodied and her right arm hung uselessly at her side, obviously broken.
The timber wolf raised his head. The hair on his face and around his mouth was red. It dripped off him as he took a step toward us, lips pulled back over his fangs. His eyes glowed violet in the dark, and I wanted to tell him to run, to get out of here while he still could, to save himself.
I opened my mouth, and the hunter smashed his gun on the side of my head. I stumbled forward, dazed, as I fell to my knees. My vision blurred, and I wanted to kill. I wanted this man dead.