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Glancing over my shoulder to look at them, I saw she was right. Both men were putting up a good fight, but neither looked great. For shifter healing to work, you needed to rest and let your body work at getting itself mended.
“We stay the course,” Kira said. “Stay on this path and try to find something. As long as we don’t get turned around and walk in circles, we’ll find something eventually.”
As terrifying as the situation was, I loved having Kira by my side. Her clipped, no-nonsense, and professional demeanor was exactly what we needed right now. We were in a survival situation, and having a trained partner gave me hope that we might have a chance at getting out alive.
It was all the better that my partner was the woman I was in love with. I’d do whatever I could to keep her safe, and she’d have my back as well.
We managed to get another hundred yards before we were accosted. A gnarled, decrepit vampire came stumbling out of the jungle. It held a squirrel creature to its mouth, sucking the blood from it. Kira grabbed the others, stopping them before the creature saw us. Two more bloodsuckers appeared behind the first one. It was a full coven.
The things fought over the squirrel’s body, hissing and snapping at each other. They could survive on the blood of animals, but they preferred the lifeblood of sentient creatures. They’d be on us in a moment once they noticed us. With a few hand signals, I told Kira to get the two injured men and Chelsey behind a tree.
I leaned toward Gavin. “Can you fight?” I whispered.
He nodded as Kira returned. “I’m good.”
“Okay. You take the one on the right. I’ll go for the biggest one on the left. Kira, you take the middle. Do it fast before—”
A shriek pierced through the roar of the storm. I’d been about to say “before they see us,” but it was too late. The middle vampire leveled a finger in our direction and screeched again.
We rushed forward. I kicked out, my foot catching the vampire in the shoulder. The blow made it spin and fall, bashing its face against the ground. I jumped on its back, grabbed it under the chin, and snapped the neck. It popped like a dry twig under my hands. That would keep it down for at least ten minutes. Maybe longer, given its weak and emaciated state.
Done with mine, I turned to find Kira shoving her target face-first into a tree. A branch took the monster in the chest. Beside her, Gavin was plunging a stick into the monster he fought. I breathed a sigh of relief. We’d done it.
Gavin looked over at me and gave a thumbs-up. I saw it before he did. A fourth vampire ran at a dead sprint.
“Gavin, behind you!”
Before he had time to look, the monster leaped onto his back, shoving him directly onto the same stick he’d killed the other one with. It slammed into Gavin’s body.
Kira dashed forward. The last vampire reared its head back, fangs exposed, and drove its mouth toward Gavin’s exposed neck. Instead of making contact with flesh and blood, it met Kira’s boot. Blood and sharp fangs flew into the air, and the creature tumbled aside. I rammed a branch into its ribcage, ending the fucker there and then.
“Oh, gods. Oh no,” Kira muttered as I joined her.
She was above Gavin, staring at his back where he lay like a lover on the rapidly decomposing body of the vampire he’d killed a few seconds earlier. There was only one way to know how bad it was. I grabbed his shoulder and rolled him over. The stick slid out of his body. He’d been stabbed high in the chest, right below the collarbone. It was a nasty wound, but it didn’t look fatal. Blood still oozed from the injury, but it didn’t pulse out like an artery had been struck.
He blinked at us through the rain and coughed before wincing in pain. “What the fuck was that?”
“Can you stand?” I asked.
He nodded, blood oozing from his puncture. “I can make it, yeah.”
I reached out and took his hand, helping him to his feet.
He grunted and put a hand to his wound. “That fucking hurt.”
Watching him try to hide his pain as we went to get the others, I had to admit to myself that this Fell brother was different from Jayson. Gavin was able to keep his head and shrug off the pain. Jayson would have screamed about how unfair all of this was, how he was a special boy and deserved better. The injury alone would have sent him into screaming hysterics like a toddler. I still held no love for Gavin, but after everything he’d done tonight, I had to give him my grudging respect.
Once our group was together again, we moved on. The next twenty minutes were hell on earth. We stayed on the path Kira had pointed out, but it led up a steep incline. With three injured people in tow, it was awful. The rain had turned the ground into mud that was inches deep. We trudged up, sludge trying to suck up our shoes with every step. I was soaked through to the bone, and even in the tropical location and warmth, the blasting wind of the storm made me shiver from the cold.
As we neared the hill’s apex, Kira fired two quick shots into the darkness. I staggered back, then saw the feral bear shifter stumble and fall dead at her feet. The thing had come out of nowhere.
“Good shot,” I said.
Kira was still looking into the darkness. She turned and locked eyes with me, nodding in the direction the bear had just come.
I furrowed my brow in confusion but followed, keeping my gun up. I looked at the others as we went. “Stay with us, but keep back until we find out what she’s looking for.”
Chelsey and the others quickly agreed. All of them looked too tired and drained to argue. Creeping along behind Kira, I saw why she’d led us here. A gaping black hole yawned open, almost hidden by the branches and palm fronds. How Kira had noticed it, I had no clue.
