14
Jaxson
I spun, ripped the cue out of Savannah’s hands, and rammed it into the biker’s open mouth.
His head cracked back, and I sprang forward and jammed my heel into his leg, dropping him to his knees. As soon as he was down, I grabbed him by the hair and slammed his mouth straight into the countertop, shattering his jaw and teeth.
It was over in a second. I let him drop to the floor in a bloody, moaning mess. I’d been in control until he’d opened his dirty mouth. Now it was shut.
A moment of stunned silence followed, and then the whole bar exploded.
The other three Arrowheads charged. Fists flew into us from all angles, and a set of claws ripped across my face.
Savannah was at my side, fighting tooth and claw, her eyes filled with a black rage.
One of the bastards grabbed her, while another knocked me against the counter, sending a burst of agony up my spine. I ignored the pain. The only thing that mattered was keeping them off her.
I shoved my attacker away and pulled Savy out of the other biker’s grasp. His claws tore into her arms, and my vision went pure red as I saw her blood well up. I grabbed the half-shifted asshole by the arm, pinned it behind his back, and rammed his head down onto the countertop. Then, without letting go, I charged backward and hurled him across the room toward the entrance of the bar. The front door shattered as he flew halfway though.
One of the bastards immediately leapt on my back, but Sam and Savy pulled him off. I turned to see him backhand Sam across the jaw. Unfazed, she grabbed his vest and kneed him in the groin. As he bent double, I dropped my forearm like a sledgehammer on his exposed neck, driving him to the ground, and finished him with a kick to the face.
Three out cold.
But the Arrowheads weren’t our only problem. The whole bar was against us now.
Razors of pain ripped through my skull as something shattered across the back of my head. Glass tinkled to the ground, and I spun. A random biker—human, with a broken bottle in hand. “Die, you freaks!” he bellowed.
I grabbed him by the shirt and punched him three times in the face. When I let go, he collapsed to the ground.
Humans were so much easier to deal with.
Unfortunately, we were overwhelmed. They were all around us, trying to bring us down. For one second, I saw the last standing, orange-bearded Arrowhead through the crowd. He glared at me, then bolted down the back hallway.
“Don’t let him escape!” I shouted.
Savy leapt over the bar and charged after him.
I shoved a stool into the crowd to clear them off Sam, who was on the ground, but pain lanced through my side.
I twisted to face a human biker brandishing a broken pool cue, its end dripping with blood—my blood.
“Go to hell, you yellow-eyed monster!” he screamed as he rammed the shattered cue straight into my gut.
But he was human, and I was a wolf, and I had reflexes and strength ten times those of his. I grabbed the cue by the point before it dug into my flesh again.
The wound in my side and the sharpened stick brought forth memories of peasants with pitchforks hunting members of our pack—not my memories but those passed down through the magic of our lore master. Yet those echoes of our kind’s hellish last days in France were almost as real as if they’d happened to me. For a second, he wasn’t an asshole biker but a screaming villager, whipped into a bloodthirsty frenzy by the zealots of the Church.
I’d show him a yellow-eyed monster.
With a savage motion, I ripped the pool cue from his hand and grabbed him by his jacket. I lifted him, screaming, above my head with both hands, then slammed him down on the pool table.
The table shattered and collapsed around his limp body.
Fuck him.
All three Arrowheads inside were down. Sam was tangled with a couple of patrons, but I knew she could handle a dozen humans on her own. I had to get to Savannah.
But before I could move, the broken door burst open, and two people, a man and a woman, rushed in with badges held high. “State police! Everyone get down on the ground!”
Some idiot hurled a chair at the female cop. “Get the fuck out, fucking pigs!”
She staggered back into the doorway as two bikers jumped on her and her partner.
Fuck.
The female cop wrenched one of the assailants up by the arm, twisted it behind his back, and brought him to his knees. Not my problem. I didn’t have time for this. I had to get to Savy and the last of the Arrowheads.
Pushing the cowering bartender out of my way, I leapt over the end of the bar top and charged toward the back.
Something slammed against the wall ahead of me in a cloud of smoke. A shockwave of magic raced through my body. My muscles seized in agony, and I crashed onto the floor.
Bikers and patrons collapsed around the bar.
Potion bomb. Stunner.
The male cop rose and hurled a second bomb to the other side of the room. Sam and the two bikers assailing her dropped to the ground.
These weren’t state police. This was the Order. Fuck them.
I forced my neck to turn toward the back door. I strained with every muscle I had, but I couldn’t move. But then a burst of pain shot through me. Not my pain—Savannah’s.
No.
Fire poured through my veins as I fought against the power of the potion. I wouldn’t let it hold me. My mate was in danger.
I pushed all my strength into my arm. Glacially, inch by inch, I pushed myself onto my knees. I turned my mind to my leg, and my muscles screamed as I forced them to my will. Slowly, I brought my leg forward and heaved myself up unsteadily against the wall.
With a roar, I shook off the chains of magic and hurled myself toward the back door.
Nothing would stop me. Not bikers. Not cops. Not sorcery itself.
* * *