This was motherfucking war.
Darnell began to lob fireballs just as Teddy rose on her hind legs and Dennis barreled toward her. Smoke filled the room, the plastic curtain melted, sending up a rancid stench. Darnell caught Dennis in the hide, but it was as if he was unaware his fur was burning because Dennis kept coming at her.
Matching his growl, Teddy charged, falling to all fours, rooting her paws into the ground with each stride.
She headed straight for him—everything else around her blurred. The bullets, the screams of fear, pain. The scent of blood. All of it faded and it was just she and Dennis.
They crashed into each other, the power of his bulky body pounding into hers, stealing the breath from her lungs.
They fell to the ground, hundreds of pounds slamming to the floor, and then she was on top of him, victorious, heady with her coup.
He struggled, bellowing his surprise and outrage, twisting his bulk to attempt to escape.
But Teddy lifted her front paw high in the air, ready to swipe at his throat, prepared to wipe his useless ass from the face of the planet—and then she heard Stas, far off and almost distant, leaving her surprised he hadn’t shifted, too. His voice clear, his words succinct and deadly.
“Kill them!” Stas hollered the order to the two men left standing. But Wanda went for them, with Darnell hot on her heels. Wanda’s jaws opened wide as she made a dive for Bogdan, flattening him against the wall before they both crashed to the ground.
From out of nowhere, Andre charged her Teddy, his fierce growl ringing out, reverberating in the fiery bar as he knocked her from Dennis, leaving Teddy crumpled in the corner.
The pictures on the wall fell, cracking her on the head, splintered wood frames, aglow with flames, falling in her eyes.
While Teddy fought to clear her vision and regain her bearings, a howl from Marty sang out as she leapt from one end of the bar, aimed right for Andre.
So many things happened at once then. Just as Teddy was regaining her footing, Stas appeared beside Andre, gun in hand as Marty in wolf form flew in a graceful arc, slicing the air.
Teddy glimpsed Nina at the smashed window, snow blowing around her dark beauty, her eyes assessing what was about to happen in less than a second.
Stas had the gun pointed at Marty; he was going to shoot.
Nina’s long limbs and dark hair flashed in Teddy’s line of vision, her body launching forward from the gaping hole in the window directly in front of Stas.
She bellowed in an anguished cry of battle, “Not on my watch, motherfucker!”
Just before Stas fired his gun—the blast ripping through the sounds of grunts and howls.
In that split-second, that horrible, terrifying second, Teddy saw Nina’s face. Beautiful, full of anguish, fear riddling her deep dark eyes, before she went limp from the impact of the bullet.
Marty was in danger, and Nina had protected her. Just like always. Just like all the stories she’d listen to them laugh over while they’d made dinner and played board games. Not heeding the words of her friends, throwing herself without thought into the line of fire. Because Marty was her friend.
Nina crumpled to the ground, an ugly crimson splotch spreading where her heart beat.
Marty’s head reared back, her mournful cry filled with sorrow.
And that was when Teddy recovered her mojo.
No one was supposed to die. These people weren’t supposed to sacrifice themselves in her stead. The plan had been so simple. Get in. Get Stas’s confession on record, call the cops. Go home.
But nothing had gone as planned, and even if it meant doing life, Teddy wanted someone to die. She wanted everyone who’d hurt Cormac and these people she admired to die.
She wanted it to hurt. Hurt so bad they prayed for death.
With that one mission in mind, Teddy saw red, a red haze of an agonizing death, washing over Stas and the last of his still-standing goons and Dennis.
That was when she reared up and ran, head down, eyes glazed, straight at Dennis and Stas.
She heard nothing, saw nothing but the end goal.
Yet, even as she launched herself at them, Dennis was gearing up, too, and he sprang into action alongside Stas, who shifted where he stood. Powerful and wicked with rage, Stas rocketed into an all-out assault.
The pair of them coming at her, all thick muscle and fur, didn’t daunt her even a little. The moment had come to wipe the earth of their scourge.
Teddy roared one last time, her final wail of fury, before she set her sights on ramming into them.
Stas’s teeth were barred, ready to sink into her flesh. Dennis, too, had widened his mouth, his yellowed chops dripping his special brand of angry venom.
And then she stumbled, lost her footing on someone’s gun.
A fireball screamed through the air, disorienting her, and Stas and Dennis took that opportunity to pounce.