Through the Ether (Force of Nature Book 5) - Amber Lynn Natusch Page 0,41
increasing threat.
“Who’s first?” Knox called out, his voice rife with boredom, as though he weren’t at all concerned about the wolves champing at the bit to take his place. Like this was shit he did every day—and maybe there had been a time when he had. Visions of Knox fighting to retain his position in NYC before he bailed assaulted my mind. Was this part of why his mental state had faltered? The torment of constantly battling his own to maintain his hold over the group? How exhausting that would have been for him.
No wonder he became so paranoid.
A particularly burly and brutish male stepped forward, unbuttoning his plaid flannel. Poorly-timed humor ran through my mind—jokes about Paul Bunyan and assorted other lumberjack analogies—until the crowd stepped back, making room for the two of them to fight.
Then my morbidly humorous train of thought came to a halt.
“I’m assuming the rules haven’t changed since I left?” Knox asked as he circled the interior perimeter of the circle. The big guy shook his head. “And you know them?”
“I know the fucking rules,” the lumberjack replied. His jacked physique made me nervous, but it was the crazed look in his eyes that had me stepping forward absentmindedly. I knew that look. It was the glaze of corrupt power that Kingston had worn when he’d come for us in Alaska; the unstable stare of someone convinced they were about to win. And given how Knox had shredded Mack, there was no sane reason for this asshole—or any of the others—to think they had this in the bag.
“As the current alpha, I’m changing one before this starts.”
Lumberjack hesitated. “What?”
“When I win, I’m not killing anyone. You’ll agree to stand down,” he said, surveying the crowd.
“Fucking pussy,” the big guy replied. “This shouldn’t even make me break a sweat.”
“Do you agree?”
“Doesn’t make a difference to me.” Claws jutted forth from his fingertips, and his eyes glowed yellow. Knox’s followed suit. “I don’t plan on losing.”
“So they would have fought to the death?” I asked, gulping back my fear.
“Knox still is,” Foust replied. “He only changed the terms for himself—not his opponent.”
Maybe if I hadn’t been so dazed, I would have caught that fine point earlier. Instead, it crashed into me as the two werewolves slammed into each other, their bodies colliding with a sickening smack.
The pack roared and howled and cheered on the lumberjack, who was apparently named Keegan, while my crew just looked on. Kat appeared to be in a trance, lost to some traumatic memory of her old pack, while Jagger, Brunton, and Foust were rigid with an understanding that I desperately wanted and ardently feared.
The shredding sound of claws tearing through flesh snapped my attention back to the fight, and I saw that Keegan had a gnarly gash through his massive pecs. Blood spilled down his chest, but he seemed utterly unfazed. He shot at Knox’s waist to take him down, but the alpha sprawled and caught him around the neck. Veins bulged as Knox squeezed hard enough to have snapped me in half, but still, the juggernaut kept clawing. Gashes appeared in Knox’s sides, and I launched forward out of Jagger’s grip, wanting to heal him. But Brunton caught my arm and held me in place.
“No interfering,” was all he said, and I immediately regretted the deal I’d made with Knox before coming. I wondered how much trouble I’d be in for breaking that promise. Then Kat’s warning glance, and the words that followed, stopped me short.
“If you step foot in that circle, Piper, Knox’s position—his life—will be forfeit.”
My head turned slowly to face her. “I can’t intervene…even if he’s dying?”
Cold blue eyes met my stare. “Even if he’s dying.”
Helpless as the day Knox had found me in the woods, I looked on and watched him battle a male nearly as big as Grizz. And though the lumberjack was losing steam as Knox choked him out, the move had cost my mate. The gouges in his sides were deep and, for a human, deadly—maybe even for an average wolf.
Thankfully, Knox was neither.
Keegan’s arms went limp and drooped to the floor, and his body dropped in Knox’s hold. True to his word, Knox lowered him to the ground, unconscious but still breathing, then looked to the mob of angry wolves on a mission to dethrone him.
“Who’s next?” he asked without skipping a beat. Showing no weakness.
Another massive male dove right in with a Superman punch that would have blown through a brick wall.