Kalina ~ Book Four

Sylvie didn't drop speed as she hurtled towards the fence. Instead, she shot each guard through the shoulder and ripped the gates apart with a giant cactus she had grown on the roadside.

It tore the gate from its posts and created an opening for her bike as the shifters fell and clawed at the wounds that now burst pure light through them. She didn't look back to see if demon sludge left their bodies and continued down the open road.

He would hear her coming long before she crested the slope to the hospital, which was good. It was what she wanted. The more bullets she could lodge in the shifters, the better.

There wouldn't be enough for everyone, but it would have to do. The second a demon vacated to escape her killing bullets, Kian’s wards would expel it.

A win-win.

She steeled her resolve, letting the numbness stain her body like Amira’s blood.

Amira’s blood. Blood. Blood. Blood-

She snarled and slammed her clenched fist into her thigh with enough force to deaden the leg. Her mind would not betray her now. Not with retribution so close.

As she crested the hill on her bike, the hospital loomed over her, its dark windows keeping watchful eyes on her. A cold chill swept across her nape, and she leaned forward, accelerating and casting aside any thoughts of ghosts.

With demons in her path, she could not let a few unexplained bumps startle her. No. Ghosts couldn't harm her. It was the people— if you could even call them that- in that house who were the danger.

Monstrosity.

She expected more. As her bike pulled up beside the water feature at the front of the house, the only face that greeted her was the confused, if not concerned, face of Alpha- fucking- Fraser. She climbed off, dropping her hands to the guns on her thighs and paused. Not yet. Even if he was possessed, she might still want to kill him.

“Kalina?”

She almost hissed but instead yanked off her helmet and placed it on the seat. She clenched her jaw, sizing him up as if she were a beast stalking her prey. His eyes narrowed.

"That’s it. It's time to give up the act. "

His voice became guarded, and his posture slanted side-on as if he were preparing to run. But no, that was wrong because behind him was exactly who she needed to see.

“What are you-”

Without letting him finish, she ripped the guns from both thighs and fired a shot from each, one slightly staggered after the other. The first bullet shredded through the shoulder of Claudine, and the other, only just missing the heart, ripped through her mate, Will.

Pain and then rage took over Fraser's body, his face a mask of venom as his brother and mate fell to the ground out of sight.

Sylvie didn’t need to see the result. The sound of them gagging on the demon sludge was music to her ears.

“What have you done?” His voice took on a guttural quality, far bassier than she expected, even from a partial shift. His beast, it seemed, was not the forlorn, melancholy type.

“They’re fine,” Sylvie said, clicking her tongue and fingering the triggers lightly. “It’s you that should be worried.”

His eyes shot to the weapons in her hands as he turned and yanked the door shut, cutting off the groans.

“What is wrong with you.” With each word, he descended the stairs, eyes blazing.

She smiled. He stopped.

With an exhale that bordered on a laugh, she holstered her weapons, uncliped the holster and returned to her bike, laying them atop the seat beside her helmet.

“I always hated guns,” she said lightly, straightening the buckles. “I prefer hand-to-hand combat. Submission through grappling.”

She faced him then, a painful fire weaving through her. She didn't even recognise herself, the words pouring forth spoken as if she were someone else. Her marks wavered.

“There’s nothing like feeling a person's heart stop under your fingers.”

His features darkened. There he was. Shuffles behind him drew her ear but not her eyes, and she curled her hands into fists. She could rip that shitty fucking packhouse to shreds and bury them in the rubble.

She wanted to hurt them all as much as she was hurting, but it wasn’t really them. The true evil would only get what they wanted.

Division.

Never again.

The true evil in front of her.

She lunged, and faster than he could react, she slammed her fist into his liver, then his kidney, then his face, revelling in the give under each punch. He dropped, and she drove her knee into his nose.

He twisted at the last second, grasping a handful of sand and hurling it in her eyes, the act almost making her laugh. Maybe Claudine had taught him a few things after all. She spun just in time for a few particles to touch her face, blinking away the dust as the rest plumed around her back. In her hair.

She was a mess anyway. What did it matter?

With a smirk, she circled him as he stood. His chest heaved, fingers clenched into tight fists as he watched her with molten eyes.

“I heard you like to fight dirty. Is that the demon or you, Alpha?” She spat towards him, a glob flecked with dust. “One and the same, I suppose.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Fighting the urge to mimic him, she darted in again, aiming a punch at his throat. He dodged, grabbing her wrist and twisting until she was rolling away from him across the ground, her body tense enough to stop her from getting winded.

She jumped to her feet and lowered her stance, flashing Fraser a warning sneer.

“It was a wraith that did it, you know—made it seem like I wanted you. That's what they do: open you up for anything to get in. Malevolence, evil, demons and the possessed. That’s why you targeted me. You always knew who I was.”

She wiped more dust from her cheeks with the back of her hand, the bloodstained appendage steady despite the rage that loosened in her chest. “Hell,” she breathed, “you probably sent that fae to drug me.”

Fraser just rolled his shoulders and worked his jaw. “I don’t know anything about you beyond what you told me.”

His tongue probed his teeth before he spat blood by his feet. “I don’t know what you’re talking about now.”

Bullshit. Bullshit!

“What about him?” she shouted, pointing at the closed door behind him. She had no doubt Claudine and Will were hovering at the door, waiting for their Alpha’s order. “Are you saying you didn't know he entered my home and spread your scent?” Even as she said it, the tiniest, most irritating flicker of doubt entered her mind.

What if- No. No.

“I thought, who could have gotten there in the time frame we had, and I remembered how they were in ‘town’. Partying right? He could have easily snuck away.” She raised her voice so the eavesdroppers could hear loud and clear.

“Did you help him, Claudine? Did you let him pass through our wards? Hmm?”

Fraser hadn’t moved, just watched her with unreadable intent.

Claudine didn’t offer a sound behind the door, but the dozens of eyes peering down at her through the windows were the perfect audience.

“Yeah? Well, thanks to you, Amira is dead,” she screamed. Her skin crawled under the blood of her healer, and she shook her hands as if the action could get the blood off. Before it had been a punishment for herself, for anyone who was to blame, but now it only served as a hideous reminder, and she wanted it off.

Needed it off.

The sun had risen, and a shudder ran through her. The funeral. She turned her gaze back to Fraser, forcing the tears down as her last bit of damning evidence poured from her mouth. “And that stupid fucking rock. I only clicked when I left your office. It was a calling card from my packlands, that obsidian.”

Wait…

She switched thoughts suddenly, snapping her head to the still-closed door as Fraser lunged at her. With a growl, she dodged his blows and let the thought die as she rolled away from his lengthening claws.

It didn't matter if she was only half right; his attack proved her belief. He was every bit as guilty as anyone else and a demon if her initial attraction to him after the wraith was proof enough.

His claws aimed for her stomach, but he was so far out of reach that she hardly moved. Instead, she dropped onto her back and kicked her legs into his hard abdomen, sending him flying towards the Harley.

She jumped up as he twisted in the air and landed on his feet like a perfect feline.

She realised her mistake only as his attention turned to the weapon on her bike. He picked up a gun and aimed it at her with a fluid grace.

She could dodge a bullet if she had to, and the five paces between them wouldn't be too far if her Vīs took over, but if he managed to hit her, it would burn like a bitch, and she wasn’t sure she wanted to know how Wren’s prototype would work on someone that wasn’t possessed.

“That’s it. Kill me,” she drawled, taking a cautionary step towards him. “It’s what you’ve wanted all along.”

“No,” Fraser growled. “It isn’t.”

“So you’re just an errand boy then, huh? Who’s your higher-up? Who is pulling your strings, you fucking puppet?”

His eyes flashed as his fingers quivered on the trigger, but to her shock, he shoved it back into its holster and closed the gap between them, grabbing for her shoulders.

She stepped back, but his hands made contact, and her feet slid in the dust, taking her down with him on top of her. A pressure in her pocket burned a mark into her thighs, and she screamed, shoving her fists into his gut until he circled her wrists and pulled them over her head.

“Stop, Kalina.”

“Don’t call me that!”

teeth bared, and the burning in her pocket set her soul aflame. She was going, splicing without intention, and this time, someone was coming with her.

In a flash of light, the world spun, and Fraser only gripped her wrists tighter, his eyes not leaving hers even as the desert under her back turned to snow.

He was going to suffer, she promised. He deserved worse than death for what he had done. For what harm he had caused. A child died at her hand because of him and his brother, and once she was finished punishing Fraser, Will would be next.

If Claudine chose to stop her, mate or not, Sylvie would add her to the list.

For the shifters. For Bea. For Amira.