Jono didn’t mind stripping down to his underwear. He wouldn’t have cared if he needed to be naked. Most werecreatures didn’t, and Marek had learned not to be over the years after joining the Tempest pack.
He passed his clothes to one of the assistants, nostrils flaring slightly at the brief hint of attraction seeping through a couple of harsher scents. Better than fear, but that wasn’t saying much. Jono knew people were attracted to his body until they saw his eyes. Few people wanted him after that realization.
Patrick had never been scared of him, and that had been as much an attention-getter as his cocky smirk had been across the bar counter. Their first meeting last year had been an unmitigated disaster in the face of a soultaker attack, but they’d sorted themselves out. These days, Jono couldn’t imagine his life without Patrick in it. Soulbond aside, they were never going to walk away from each other, and helping out with Sage and Marek’s wedding had got him thinking about his own future with Patrick. They were already bound to each other, having promised to never leave, but Jono wouldn’t mind seeing Patrick wearing a wedding band.
Maybe it could happen someday in an unknown future where Patrick’s soul debt was paid and the war dogging their heels was over.
Jono’s mouth quirked a bit as he stepped into the trousers an assistant handed him.Should probably look at rings first.
The thought was an idle one, but nothing would come of it right now. Jono let it fade, focusing instead on being moved about by the designer to check the fit of the suit he finally had on. The charcoal-gray color was paired with a natural green tie and handkerchief tucked into the breast pocket to match the wedding colors. The style was sleek and classic, with little embellishments. The material was luxurious and didn’t itch his skin, the tailoring masterful, and the overall fit pretty much perfect for a wedding.
Just not a fight.
The private fitting room was located on the third floor, in a space designed to cater to rich clientele. The stairs leading up to their level had been roped off from the general public on the first floor. Multiple work areas and several private fitting rooms filled the space, and the door to theirs cracked open, the heartbeats behind it calm. Jono didn’t think anything of it until the aconite hit his nose, burning his eyes as he snapped his head around.
“Get down!” he snarled.
Jono didn’t wait for people to listen, knowing most people’s reactions were delayed if they didn’t outright panic immediately. He grabbed the two assistants nearest him and yanked them to the ground, lashing out with his leg to knock the designer’s feet out from under him with as gentle a blow as he could. Marek had already dropped to the floor while Leon had body tackled the people closest to him.
Silver bullets dipped in aconite cut through the air where everyone had been standing. Jono rolled off the dais, already shifting, his brand-new designer suit tearing open at every seam. The flash of agony disappeared as the werevirus turned off pain receptors in his nerves for the shift. That didn’t stop his brain from processing the pressure of bones breaking and skin splitting as Jono shifted from human to wolf in seconds.
He’d gotten faster in the last year, but he almost wasn’t fast enough. Two Krossed Knight hunters shoved their way into the private fitting room, dressed like upscale shoppers. Except they weren’t carrying money, but weapons, the pistols in their hands aimed unerringly at Jono.
He didn’t hesitate to attack, charging forward with a snarl that made fear spike in the air around him. The hunters tightened their fingers on the triggers, but Jono was on them both before the silver bullets left the gun chambers. He clamped his jaws on one hunter’s right arm, teeth ripping through skin and shattering bone, swinging the man to the side to knock over his partner.
The hunter screamed, a sound that was choked off by something else. The taste of sulfur exploded on Jono’s tongue, blood tainted with hints of hell, the same way the hunter’s soul was. The demon the man carried in his soul looked out of human eyes, black veins pulsing in his face.
“You won’t win,” the demon hissed.
Jono gutted the hunter from throat to navel with one deep swipe of his left forepaw even as he twisted his head to snap the hunter’s arm off at the elbow. This time the hunter broke through the demon’s control to scream in agony as Jono spat out his arm. Blood poured from the hunter’s ruined elbow even as his guts slipped through the ragged holes in his torso. He fell to his knees, blood trickling out of his mouth as the demon fled the dying body with a thunderous flash of negative light.
Leon had engaged the second hunter, who had gotten back to his feet with supernatural speed. Leon’s wolf form was smaller than Jono’s but no less lethal in a fight. He’d bitten off the other hunter’s hand holding the gun, but the demon riding the hunter’s soul had pulled a silver-and-aconite-coated knife from his belt.
Jono leaped on the man before the knife could find its target in Leon’s neck. His weight drove the hunter to the floor with a loud crash. The hunter swung his arm around, looking to sink the knife into Jono’s side, but Jono twisted around out of range. He kept one paw on the hunter’s head, pressing his weight onto the man’s skull in a threatening manner. He wouldn’t mind killing the bloke, but Jono had listened to Patrick whinge about leaving someone alive to question plenty of times.
Another flash of negative light meant the demon riding that hunter’s soul chose to flee rather than attempt to fight. The smell of sulfur dissipated, fear and pain replacing it in Jono’s senses. He eased up on the pressure on the hunter’s skull, listening to him breathe wetly. The stump of his arm dragged through the spreading pool of blood beneath the bitten-off wrist. They’d need to tie the limb off so he didn’t bleed out.
Jono tilted his head to the side, dialing up his hearing. He didn’t hear any calm heartbeats, only the frantic ones of people on lower and higher levels of the building panicking from the sound of gunshots. He didn’t take his eyes off the entrance to the private dressing room, the door riddled with bullet holes. The air smelled like blood and aconite, but not sulfur. The two hunters appeared to be the only threat.
Leon knelt in front of Jono, back in human form, skin streaked with blood that thankfully wasn’t his. “I’ll deal with him. Shift back. The cops have been called. We don’t want them to shoot you on sight.”
Jono moved off the hunter, and Leon took his place, keeping the man on the ground. Without a demon riding his soul, he was swearing and crying from the pain of losing a hand, shock most likely settling in.
Jono shifted back to human, body twisting and breaking from four legs back to two. He shook his head to clear it, vision settling into normal human parameters. He crouched there for a moment between the two hunters, one dead and the other bleeding out, and tried to choke back the fury.
“They tracked us,” Jono said.
Leon nodded grimly. “Yeah. I need a belt if you want this one to live.”
“Rather he didn’t.”
“You know what your other half would say about that.” Leon paused. “Well. You know what he’d say if he wasn’t advocating murder.”
“Fine. I’ll get you a bloody belt.” Jono craned his head around. “Marek? Are you all right?”
The seer had knocked over the chaise lounge he’d been sitting on and had dragged two people behind it with him. He raised his head over the top, hazel eyes wide. “We’re fine. Are there any more hunters?”
Jono got to his feet. “Not that I can hear or smell.”
