Her Wild Hero

“They’re hybrids!” Kendra shouted, aiming her M4 straight into a creature’s chest and emptying the entire magazine into it.

Declan and the other men took down another, but that still left one hybrid, and it was running straight at her. With her weapon empty and no time to reload, she knew she was done for. The thing’s glowing red eyes filled her vision.

Then a roar so loud that it literally shook the trees around her filled the air and Declan charged in front of her, wrapping the hybrid in a crushing bear hug. Declan had known bullets weren’t going to put this thing down in time to save her, she realized, so he’d shifted right there in front of everyone.

Kendra’s eyes widened as the normally gentle shifter squeezed the hybrid so hard she heard the creature’s ribs snap over its growls and snarls. Declan roared again and slammed the hybrid into the trunk of a tree so hard that everything else in the hybrid snapped.

Declan turned to face them, his elongated canine teeth visible to everyone. “More are coming.”

Tate, Brent, and Gavin took the scene in stride, but it proved too much for most of the others. They freaked out and lost it, babbling about not signing up for this crap. Kendra couldn’t blame them. It wasn’t every day that a person realized everything they thought they knew was a lie—that monsters really did exist.

Tate did his best to keep everyone moving again, but it was hard. The hybrids hit them three more times as they ran for the landing zone. And taking them out went through what little ammo they had left at an alarming rate. Kendra quickly reloaded her last magazine in her carbine. They were all short on ammo.

Worse, there were more injured men than healthy ones to carry them, and Gavin and Brent were forced to help keep everyone moving at the cost of defending the group. If it wasn’t for Declan and his shifter strength, they would have all been wiped out. Of course, now many of the men, especially the locals, were just as frightened of Declan as they were of the hybrids.

She wasn’t sure how, but they made it to the landing zone to find the two navy helicopters waiting, their rotors thumping at half speed, ready to take off. Kendra and Declan ended up on one of the Seahawks with a wounded DEA agent, two local cops, and two wounded marines. The marines were in bad shape—the hybrids had torn into them with claws and fangs, causing far more damage than any bullet would. Both were slipping in and out of unconsciousness. If they didn’t get them to a hospital soon, they weren’t going to make it.

“Get us the hell out here!” Declan shouted to the pilot. “They’re coming back!”

The crew chief of their evac bird didn’t have a clue who Declan was talking about, but he obviously recognized a serious situation when he saw it. He strapped the two local cops having trouble with their lap restraints into their seats, then ordered the pilot to lift off.

Bullets hit the helicopter the second it left the ground.

The navy pilot knew his stuff, though. He dipped the Seahawk in a sideways tilt, slipping them across the landing zone away from the direction of the incoming fire, all while flying no more than five feet off the ground. Once out of immediate danger, the pilot leveled off and started to climb. Kendra could already see the other helicopter clearing the treetops. She let out the breath she’d been holding. They hadn’t started to gain altitude themselves yet, but they would be any second. They were all going to make it.

“What the hell…?” the crew chief shouted from his position at the open side door.

Kendra didn’t have to wonder what he was talking about, not when the crew chief drew his pistol from a chest holster and started shooting out the open door. A moment later, a snarling hybrid jumped onto the helicopter. Crap! The pilot had kept them too low for too long.

Seeing a ravaging monster with red eyes, fangs, and claws was just too much to take for the pilot and copilot. Kendra was shocked the helicopter didn’t go down on the spot. Luckily, the pilot got himself back together and steadied the Seahawk. The crew chief hit the hybrid at least three times in the chest and abdomen, but as Kendra knew from experience, the damn things were slow to react to even life-ending injuries.

Declan launched himself at the hybrid, yanking the creature off the crew chief and slamming the thing against the side door frame, smashing its head repeatedly against the metal supports there.

Kendra tried to get out of her seat to help, but the helicopter was spinning around so wildly she couldn’t get her seat belt undone. Even if she could, there were so many flying arms, legs, and claws, she knew she’d be risking her life just getting near them.