Sergei only interrupted me twice to give Lonnie directions. The longer my friend drove, the more his bronze skin took on an ashen pallor. By the time we swerved onto a dirt road leading through dense woods, rivulets of sweat trailed from his temples.
Amber lay slumped against the passenger door, her forehead pressed to the glass, neck arched in a way that couldn't have been comfortable.
"Just a little farther," Sergei said, his voice overly cheerful.
I fisted Gunnar's fur, the feel of his warm body my only anchor to the present. My wolf felt each of his contractions, my core tensing in sympathy."Soon,"his wolf said."Must seek shelter."
"We're here," Sergei said. "Park there."
The Humvee skidded on the thick bed of leaves, bumping into a moss-covered fallen log that came up to the bumper.
"Close enough." Sergei was the first out of the vehicle, and I followed him out his door, not wanting to disturb Gunnar more than necessary. He crawled out after me, and I shifted back to my wolf so he could lean against me.
Lonnie stepped down and almost fell into a patch of leaves. Sergei caught him with his claws extended. I growled, but it was too late. He'd already sliced theback of Lonnie's forearm open, leaving a jagged cut in his flesh.
"What the fuck, man?" Lonnie sank against the vehicle's oversized tire. Blood pooled along the wound, but it dried up before a single drop fell to the forest floor. He wiped at it with his other hand, but the wound had already scarred over.
"You're one of us now," Sergei called over his shoulder. "You're already showing signs of radiation sickness. It's the only way to give you a chance."
The passenger door clicked open and then banged shut. When Sergei returned with Amber in his arms, she also sported a new scar on top of her left hand.
"Just like that?" Lonnie asked. "We'll be able to shift into wolves?"
"Now, we wait and see. You could still die."
I didn't appreciate Sergei's flippant tone, but Gunnar held my immediate attention. He hunkered down on the leaves beside me and whimpered.
"Come on. Let's get inside." Sergei handed the still unconscious Amber to Lonnie and led the way around the fallen log. I nudged Gunnar back to his feet, and we followed.
The area smelled strongly of wolf shifters, but I had yet to see anything resembling a building. When Sergei pulled aside a curtain of moss and unlocked yet another giant door with a metal crank, I wondered if we'd made the right decision to follow his directions. He was a wolf, and he hated my father, but was that enough to make him our friend?
Inside, the space was worlds apart from Ivan's underground lab. Natural stone caves branched off intodens filled with deer skins, bear pelts, and other bedding. We followed the main path from the door to a large cavern with seats like an amphitheater. In the middle was a circular stairway leading down to another level. Instead of dank rooms, we found brightly lit offices and high-tech equipment. The Paskal Industries labels raised my hackles until I saw a familiar face. Bettina and her grandfather stood in a pastel blue exam room beside a low table.
"I'm so glad you're alive!" Bettina, never one for grand gestures, clasped her hands to her chest before motioning Gunnar to the table. "There are doctors here for you and your human friends."
"We'd almost finished the tunnel when your friends arrived," Nor Bertholf said. "Good thing, too. It would have been a bitch to collapse before the authorities arrived. We heard you left a huge mess in there."
"We'll clean it up," Sergei said. "The pups are the main concern." Sergei ran his hand down Gunnar's side. "You're safe, now, Tato. It's time to push."
I shifted back to my human form to better fit in the small space at the head of the table. Clasping Gunnar's paws, I rested my forehead against his as he strained. Hot breath washed over my chest with each agonizing howl. Just when I thought I couldn't take another moment of feeling the intense pain through our bond, the dam broke, the first pup eased from his body, and a tiny wail answered Gunnar's harsh pants.
"It's a girl," Sergei said. "What do you want to name her?"
Sunflower was probably too on-the-nose. "Blossom?" I whispered to Gunnar.
"It's perfect."
Sergei handed her to me, still a wriggling little wolf pup, and I held her for Gunnar to sniff. He licked her cheek, and she shifted into a squirming human baby in my arms, her wrinkled pink skin bunching around her elbows and wrists. She was absolutely perfect, just like her name. "Blossom."
"I'll take her," a woman who smelled like wolf beneath the antiseptic reached for Blossom, but I instinctively clutched her to my chest. "It's for your United States birth certificate. I will return her to her tato for nursing as soon as I'm done."
I handed her over, but my arms felt cold the moment she left them. I wanted to trust these strange wolves, but my paranoia lingered.
"They've been kinder than your father ever was to us,"Gunnar reminded me."We will trust them until they prove untrustworthy. Right now, we need them."
My mate had a point, but Sergei and the nurse spoke to each other in their foreign language, while I couldn't tell the difference between Ukrainian and Russian. "What does that word mean?" I asked Sergei. "Tato."
"How you say …" he snapped his fingers. "Daddy."
