Unstable by Lacey Carter Andersen
20
Drake
I feellike I’m being ripped apart from the inside out. It isn’t just the fact that these asshole berserkers seemed to awaken both my old injuries and give birth to new ones, all in one terrible battle. It’s that Cole took Kiera. I keep replaying that moment in my mind. Princess told us to trust him, but how can we trust a man with our mate who has showed us nothing but his treacherous soul?
The cat was wise, but even he couldn’t be sure of that bastard’s motivations.
A berserker kicks me in the arm, and because my hands are bound, and I’m barely able to sit, I fall over onto my side in the back of that dark van.
“Leave him alone!” Emory shouts.
One of the berserkers gives him a dark look and punches him in the nose. Emory’s head snaps back, and blood pours from a nose that has to be broken. But pride swells my aching chest at the scathing look he gives them. It’s the first time I’ve ever thought he could be the berserker king of legend.
I’ll take out the driver. You all be ready. Princess’s words come into my mind, and I see the other guys tense too.
Eyeing the cat hidden behind a pile of bags behind the driver’s seat, I almost tell him not to do anything. He might have a lion’s soul, but he has a cat’s body, and something inside of me churns at the thought of him putting himself at risk.
Damn it.Kiera and this group of misfits have stolen my heart. Even the scruffy one.
Still, I focus on sitting back up while Adam frowns across from me. I have no doubt he’s saying all the things to Princess that I wanted to say but couldn’t. Hissing against the pain, I manage to get back into a sitting position and fall back against the side of the van. If that cat could take out the driver, I swore I would do my part.
No matter what it cost me.
There are three berserker guards in the back with us, the driver, and the berserker in the passenger seat up front. They don’t have weapons. Probably figured they didn’t need them with us all a mess and with our hands bound behind us. Unfortunately for them, they aren’t the first people to count us out.
Ready?
I feel Emory shift a little, and suddenly his hands are fighting with the ropes around my wrists. It hits me that he somehow got free. Again, I find myself oddly impressed with him. Before this group, I would’ve said impressing me was a hard thing to do. But I guess I never met people like these ones before. People who seemed driven to fight against a world that was always ready to knock them down.
Twisting my wrists around, I realize he somehow got me free.
Perfect. I stay sagged against the side of the van, trying to look as broken as I feel. But I’m ready. Ready for whatever chance Princess might give us.
The passenger in the front grabs a bottle of water and starts playing with the radio. One of our guards yawns and glances out the window. I tense. If it was up to me, this is the moment I’d attack, but if I sprang forward right now, these berserkers would have me flat on my back in seconds.
So, I guess our fate is definitely dependent on one confident cat.
And then the world goes crazy! Princess leaps from behind all the bags and onto the back of the chair and the driver’s shoulder. The driver turns, and then Princess jumps onto his face, digging his nails into his skin. The huge berserker lets out a shrieking scream, and we all attack. I barely managed to slam into one of the berserkers when the van swerves, and then the van is rolling. I’m yanked back, and then I realize Emory and I are in Adam’s shield. We bounce around the purple shield, but we don’t feel any pain. The berserkers, on the other hand, are smashing around like dolls. The windshield shatters, and the berserker passenger goes flying out, to who the hell knows where.
Our rolling stops as we smash into something, and then I see Princess go flying out the broken window.
My heart lurches, but there’s no time. The second we stop rolling. Adam’s shield disappears, and I leap out at one of the half-conscious berserkers, my claws elongating as I move. Without thinking, I slit his throat. Emory is beside me, snapping the neck of one of the berserkers. I go for the driver, and end his life without a thought.
Adam punches the last berserker, again and again, and there’s panic in his face. I push past my pain and kill his opponent too. He doesn’t need to be like Emory and I. Hell, I don’t want him to be like us.
“Thanks,” he nods, then his gaze snaps around the van. “Princess?”
My heart sinks. “I saw him fly out the broken windshield.”
Adam’s hands lift toward the van doors and they fly off, slamming out into the woods and striking trees. He storms out of the open doors, and Emory and I follow wordlessly behind. Emory goes for the berserker who’s lying bloody against a tree. I follow Adam, breathing in deeply. I smell blood, filth, and sweat. I smell the woods, and a stream nearby. But… and then I scent Princess.
“That way!” I say.
Adam glances back, his eyes narrowed, and follows the direction of my finger.
My heart races. I limp along behind him, my wounds awakening. Screaming to life as my adrenaline fails. And yet, pain like this I can handle. What we’re about to find… that’s something I’m not prepared for. Princess is a cat. A cat with a lion’s soul, but still a cat. And I keep replaying the moment I saw him fly out that windshield.
He’s got to be dead.
And it’s a shock how much that idea steals the breath from my lungs. Princess was annoying, arrogant, and thought he was a human. Hell, he thought he was better than humans and supernaturals alike.
I might never say it aloud, but I’m pretty sure he’s right.
As I spot his mixed brown and grey coloring, peeking out of the tall green grass, I know Adam has seen him too. He runs like a boy who’s heart is dying, and he’s at Princess’s side in an instant. He crumbles to his knees, tears already in his eyes. And I will myself to keep it together, for him. For Adam. He’s lived such a long life and only had Princess to lean on, so I’d allow him to lean on me now.
“Princess?” he whispers.
His hands reach for the fur, but they hesitate just above the cat.
“Princess?”
And as I draw closer, I see the blood that spatters his fur. Fuck, please let that be the guard’s blood. Please let this ridiculous animal be miraculously okay.
I reach down and don’t hesitate when I grab Adam’s shoulder tightly.
He doesn’t even react. “Say something.”
My ears strain, only hearing the wind and Emory’s heavy steps coming toward us. But no Princess.
And then, I hear the cat give a wheezing breath that’s not so different from my own. “He’s alive,” I say, hesitate and continue, “but hurt.”
Adam carefully picks him up as if he’s the most fragile, precious thing in this world. The cat looks tiny in his arms. And to my surprise, old rather than scruffy. How old is Princess? He’d been with Adam since he was imprisoned as a boy. Was he given a supernatural length of life? Or has he lived well beyond his years already?
“You’re okay now,” Adam tells him, and there are tears in his voice. “I’m going to get you help, and you’re going to be okay.”
Adam’s only answer is the wind and more of the cat’s ragged breaths.
“Let’s go!” Adam says, looking at me through determined eyes filled with tears. “We’ll find him a vet, and we’ll save Kiera.”
No vet. I… hate… vet.
I don’t think I’ve ever been so happy to hear his annoying voice in my ear. “Buddy, you’re not in good shape.”
I’ll be… fine. Always am. Save Kiera.
Hell, I don’t know what to do. I’m not a vet, but even I know he looks bad. But then again, the clock is ticking.
“What do you want to do?” Emory asks Adam, and his voice is husky, as if filled with too many emotions.
Adam squares his shoulders. “Princess always knows what to do. Let’s get Kiera.”
So, we follow our mutant with a golden heart and the cat that had saved all our lives. I’m limping and rasping, almost in tune with the cat. Emory and Adam look like hell.
It feels like we’re on a death march.
The only thing that keeps me going is the thought of Kiera. We have no idea if Cole is bringing her to the demons or to Maxen. But regardless, we’ll save her.
Because she’s our everything.
