God of Monsters (Juniper Unraveling #4) - Keri Lake Page 0,127

then crawl toward the fallen Alpha. The apparatus appears to be latched to clips driving into his cheek, and I unclasp them on either side of his mouth.

A bullet whizzes past me, the buzz of it flinching my muscles as I hustle to remove the object from the Alpha’s face.

When I tug on the apparatus, a long tube follows, which must’ve extended down into his lungs, and just as I remove the last of it, his eyes flip open.

Hands fly up from either side of me, gripping tight to my shoulders, and he snarls, turning me beneath him. Gravelly bits of glass press into my back while he holds me down, and I let out an involuntary scream.

I’ve grown to care very deeply about an Alpha, but this one is foreign to me and every muscle in my body shivers with fear, as I stare up at him.

“Atticus! She’s with me!” Titus shoots the last of his bullets, and he tosses the gun to the floor as he dives toward us and pushes the Alpha off of me.

My body is hoisted up off the floor, and Titus throws me over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes and carries me toward another capsule. Atticus hobbles behind us, keeping his eyes on me as he takes cover behind the capsule across from ours.

The tandem fire of two Legion officers is all that blocks us from the entrance.

Titus sets me to my feet and dives for the gun of a fallen soldier on the floor.

Gunfire sends him flying backward, into my legs.

He reaches again, sliding the strap toward him, before another shot hits his shoulder. With a groan, he raises the retrieved weapon and fires at the offender. Three shots take him, and the soldier slumps to the ground. Stepping out of his hiding spot, Titus aims his gun at the last Legion officer, who manages two shots that ping off the walls.

One single fire marks a hole in the officer’s head, where blood oozes out, and the man drops to the floor.

Once the gunfire quietens, the sound of coughing draws my attention back to Atticus rubbing his throat. The band that Titus wore shines between his fingers, as he crouches, chest heaving for breath.

“Can you walk?” Titus strides toward the Alpha, offering him a hand, and Atticus’s eyes are on me again.

“She. She was … the one … who sent me here.” Though his voice is broken by coughing and wheezing, the malice in his tone is clear.

“She’s also the one who helped rescue you.” Muscles flexing, Titus helps lift his friend from the floor, and wraps the Alpha’s arm around his neck for support. He straps the gun over his body and flicks his fingers toward me. When I arrive at his side, he wraps his arms around my waist, keeping me close to him, and the three of us hobble toward the entrance.

The sounds of choking bring me to a halt before the capsule where the boy was suspended. Water trickles out of a gunshot hole, and the boy gags and gasps around the apparatus still attached to his face.

“Wait.” I step toward the capsule, examining the boy whose eyes are rolled back, his body twitching as it sinks with the water. “We have to get him out of there.”

“We can’t take a child with us,” Titus argues.

“We can’t let him die here, either.”

Groaning, Titus aims the gun toward the lower part of the capsule, and I step back as he shoots the glass, just as he did with Atticus. The capsule shatters and rains down.

Just before the boy hits the floor, Titus reaches out, catching his fall, abandoning his grip of Atticus, who stumbles into the capsule behind him.

He lays the boy carefully onto the floor, and I kneel beside them, disconnecting the tubing from his throat.

Coughing and floundering on the floor, the boy opens his eyes on a gasp and kicks back from us.

“It’s all right. We’re here to help you. To set you free.” I hold out my arms to him, flicking my fingers. Urgency beats against my spine, as it’s only a matter of time before more Legion officers will arrive. “Come with us.”

Frowning, the boy’s eyes flit to Titus, then Atticus, and back to me. He continues to cough, heaving for breath, and when I reach for him, he bears his teeth and growls.

“Leave him, then. We have to go.”

I flick my fingers, making one more effort. “Please. I promise I won’t hurt you.