She starts to push herself up.
I drop the shotgun. I grab her arm and slam her back down. It’s too hard—I hear her breath leave her lungs in awhoosh—but I don't care.
"You ain't moving," I snarl, hovering over her. "You stay on this floor."
"He’ll kill the Pack, Jax! He’ll kill you!"
"Let him try."
"Five seconds!" Gregor screams.
I gaze at the door. I can smell them now. Not just the exhaust of the trucks, but the men. Dozens of them. They smell like cheap tobacco, gun oil, and fear sweat masked by high-grade repellent. They are surrounding the pylons.
"Time’s up," Gregor announces. "Slaughter the dogs."
The world erupts.
It starts with the sound of glass shattering behind the plywood. Then the wood splinters.
Thwack. Thwack. Thwack.
Bullets tear through the walls.
They aren't lead. I can smell the difference instantly. Lead smells dull. This smells sharp, metallic, and poisonous.
Silver.
Chunks of wood explode inward. A bullet punches through the wall six inches above my head, embedding itself in the opposite log. Smoke curls from the hole—not wood smoke, but the acrid scent of silver burning organic matter.
"Stay down!" I cover Miranda’s body with mine, tucking her head under my chest.
Outside, the screaming starts.
It’s not human screaming. It’s the wet, gurgling yelps of wolves taking hits.
"Remy," I choke out.
I hear a roar—a massive, defiant howl that shakes the floorboards. Then another. And another.
The Pack.
They didn't run. They didn't retreat when the lights hit. They charged.
I hear the wetcrunchof jaws snapping bone. The scream of a man terrified out of his mind. The rapid-firepop-pop-popof semi-automatic rifles.
"They’re dying," Miranda sobs into my shirt. "Jax, they’re dying for me."
"They’re fighting for their Alpha," I grate out. "And their Queen."
I roll off her.
"Jax, no?—"
"Stay here," I order. "If they breach the door, you use the knife. Or the gun. You aim for the throat. Or the head."
I stand up. The air in the cabin is hazy with dust and pulverized wood. Bullets are still chewing through the walls, but they’re aiming high, trying to suppress us.
I can't fight this with a shotgun. A gun runs out of ammo. A gun jams.
