Free Black Wolf's Revenge by Tera Shanley

them.”
    Marissa led Lana to the front door where Rachel waited outside.
    Brent jogged to his side and draped an arm over his shoulder. “Sorry, man. I ran every red light to get here, but I was in Uptown.”
    The light from the entryway dimmed and the hallway lengthened and swayed. Words slurred and got caught in his throat. “They took her.”
    “And we’ll get her back.” Brent pulled him through the doorway and waved off help from Dean. “They won’t hurt her. Morgan is too valuable.”
    He couldn’t tell if the sick feeling in his stomach was from dread, injury, or the tranquilizer pumping through his veins, but he closed his eyes against the urge to retch.
    The back seats in Dean’s SUV had been pushed forward and a tarp stretched across the floor. A plastic bin of medical supplies anchored one corner, and Wade kneeled there with a headlamp and sterile gloves as he threaded a curved needle that glistened under the artificial light.
    The world tilted dangerously and the numbness pulled at him as he stumbled into the back.
    “Can you fix me?” Grey asked as Wade studied the injury on his stomach with puckered brows.
    “I don’t know.” Honest notes hit every word and Grey closed his eyes against the burn of another needle.
    “You have to try…so I can find…Morgan.” The final black tendrils of unconsciousness covered him and pulled him under with her name the last word on his lips.
    * * * *
    The dark was so deep Grey couldn’t tell if his eyes were open or closed. Turning his head slowly, he blinked and waited for his night vision to adjust. Towering metal bars loomed over him. Gripping the sides of the soft mattress beneath him, he searched for the cage door. The subtle sound of steady breathing was slightly louder than the rattling air conditioning unit currently blasting cold air into his face. He sniffed the air and found a familiar and comforting scent. “Marissa?”
    She sat up quickly. “Hey. Are you okay? Do you need a drink or anything?”
    “Yeah, water would be great. Why am I in the cage?”
    “We thought it was safest. You were up in one of the bedrooms while Wade and I finished stitching you up, but you kept trying to Change, and we had to keep giving you drugs so you would stay under. You burned them off really fast and it was pretty scary there for a while. We moved you down here so we could all get sleep and, you know, not worry about you killing us all in our beds.”
    He cleared his dry throat. “Sorry.”
    “Not your fault. I’ll be right back.” She returned with a giant plastic cup of water and handed it to him. He drank deeply while she jogged to the wall and hit the lights. “Watch your eyes.”
    “How is Lana? Is she okay?”
    “Yeah, I mean other than being traumatized, she is all right. I’d be traumatized too if I watched you kill those wolves. One of those guy’s face was missing. Like you crushed his entire kisser. I thought Jason was going to puke. It was awesome. Lana has a bruised tailbone so she is sitting pretty carefully, but Wade went and picked her up one of those hemorrhoid pillows, a pink one, and she totes that around like it is cooler than a Barbie.”
    Grey nodded. “Have they found Morgan?”
    “No, but they are tracking her. Jason is a police officer, did you know that? That is why he is our pack body stasher. He knows all the tricks. Anyway, he looked up the license plate you gave us and it was a rental like you said. A guy named Robert Mendoza rented it, but he is one of the guys you killed and the car has already been turned back in, so who knows what they are driving now. Brent recognized one of the bodies from one of the Summits we went to, but he said the guy was a problem wolf who was being transferred last he heard, and he didn’t know where to. Dean called around and found out he is a member of the Southern Montana pack. He called them to see if it was a few wolves acting on their own, but no one picked up. Their alpha most likely