Lacey’s eyes widened even more, and when she opened her mouth again, he was pretty sure it was in preparation for a scream that would likely be heard over a good portion of North America. Alex clamped his hand over her mouth, sweeping her off her feet and into his arms.
She kicked and struggled to get free, but he ignored it as he ran through the junkyard as fast as his legs would carry them. Lacey was so light in his arms that he barely felt her weight at all. He sure as hell could feel her panic, though. He heard shouting behind him, but he didn’t have time to risk a glance over his shoulder. He didn’t have to look to know the other guards were coming fast.
A moment later, Alex reached the end of the row and the T-intersection there. Lacey still struggled in his arms, but he didn’t bother to slow. He couldn’t. The itching between his shoulder blades warned him that he was close to running out of time. A werewolf had to trust his instincts—that was the first thing Gage had taught him when he’d brought him into the Pack.
He didn’t try to turn left or right at the intersection but instead jumped as high as he could. Lacey went completely stiff in his arms as his feet left the ground. He hated scaring her like this, but what other choice did he have? Damn, he was using that excuse a lot tonight.
While his leap got them to the top of a heavy-duty metal rack, it made more noise than he would have liked, though not the spectacular crash he’d been worried about. The metal under him creaked a few times as he quickly moved along it, but it didn’t collapse or fall over. When he finally got his balance, he crouched down and waited a few moments to see if anyone had heard him.
Twenty seconds later, a man came running down the aisle where Alex had been mere moments before. Even if Alex hadn’t been able to see in the dark, he would have still been able to identify the man. The guy’s pale skin glowed in the darkness, making him seem like a frigging ghost running through the stacks of car parts.
Bensen’s personal security goon stopped just beneath the storage rack Alex was on, swinging his automatic back and forth and cocking his head to the side as if he sensed Alex and Lacey somewhere nearby. Lacey had been struggling since Alex scooped her up, but the moment she saw Pendergraff, she went completely still. She was terrified but smart enough to recognize an even greater threat when she saw it.
The albino man stood unmoving below them for nearly a minute. The whole time he stood there, lights started coming on all across the junkyard, and at least a dozen men began to sound off from all around them, announcing they hadn’t found anything.
Alex was thinking he might have to jump down and make a run for it, even if that meant getting shot at all the way across the junkyard. He didn’t like that idea, but if he kept Lacey tucked against his chest, he should be able to keep her from being hit. He, on the other hand, wouldn’t get off so lightly.
But just as that was beginning to look like Alex’s only option, Pendergraff turned and walked off.
Alex breathed a sigh of relief, then looked down at Lacey. Her eyes widened again from seeing his shifted features up close and personal, and he swore silently. He didn’t bother taking his hand away from her mouth as he jumped down to the far side of the storage rack and ran for the perimeter fence. He jumped over it at a dead run, freaking Lacey out so badly that she ended up biting his hand. Crap, she was going to be so furious with him.
He kept running until he got back to the building the surveillance van was hidden behind, only to discover it wasn’t there any longer. No surprise there. After the shitstorm he’d started in the junkyard, Remy and Vaughn would have known they had to pull out of the area. If not, the whole operation could have been compromised. They’d probably grabbed up all the cameras and moved the van to an alternate location a couple of blocks away. Alex would call and find them soon enough. Right now, he had a more pressing task to handle.
Lacey was so eager to get away from him that she stumbled and almost fell on her butt the moment he put her feet on the ground. She backed up until she was nearly ten feet away, and still she looked like she wanted to bolt.
The expression on her face—a combination of fear, confusion, and downright revulsion—twisted like a knife in Alex’s gut. That, and knowing how badly he’d scared her, finally shook him out of his shift. He felt his claws retract and his canines slide back in. The way the night became a little darker let him know his eyes probably weren’t glowing any longer, either. Not that it seemed to help. If anything, seeing him shift back had freaked Lacey out all over again.
“What are you?” she asked, taking another small step away from him.
The urge to follow after her was intense, but Alex forced himself to stay where he was. Moving toward her would only make it worse.
“I can explain everything.” He held up his hands in a placating gesture, trying to make himself appear as nonthreatening as possible. Not that he expected it to work. He’d just sprouted claws and fangs and run around a junkyard with her like she was a rag doll. “I just need you to trust me. Whatever you think right now, I promise I’m not a monster.”
He thought for a moment that she might listen to him, but then she backed up further. He couldn’t keep from following this time.
She threw up her hands as if to ward him off. “Stop! Don’t come near me. I don’t know what the hell I just saw, but I know it wasn’t normal. You…you had fangs, Alex!”
“I didn’t have a choice. I had to do it to save you.” He took a breath. “I can explain, if you’d just listen.”
She shook her head, backing away even faster. “I don’t want to listen. I don’t want to talk. I just want to go home and process this. I need to think—alone.”
Alex nodded. “Okay, I get that. Let me take you back to your car, at least. You shouldn’t be out here alone, not with Bensen’s men running around.”
She shook her head again, tears starting to run down her face. “I can get to my own car. Don’t come any closer. If you do, I’ll scream, and I don’t care who comes running.”
With a sob, she spun around and took off down the street, heading away from the junkyard. Alex followed, hanging back far enough that he wouldn’t panic her but staying close enough to keep an eye on her. Three blocks up, she turned into a used car parking lot and jumped into her car. Tires squealed as she sped away.
He stood there on the side of the road. A few minutes later, Remy came up to stand beside him. His teammate looked almost as bummed as Alex felt.
“That could have gone a whole hell of a lot better,” Remy said.
Understatement there. “She saw everything.”
“I know. I heard.”
“What the hell am I going to do?”
Remy shrugged. “There’s not much you can do. You just have to give her some time to get her head wrapped around everything she saw and trust that she’ll do the right thing.”
