Page 18 of Wed Or Dead

His head swung back toward her. That jerk with her was aiming his gun. The muzzle pointed right at Gage. Was that supposed to scare him? His hind legs shoved down, and he leapt into the air. Gage wasn’t faster than a bullet, so he’d take the hit, but then he’d take out the fool who?—

“No!”Kayla shoved the hunter’s weapon away.

Choose your side.It looked like she just had.

“Kayla, what the hell—” The human began, but that was all he had the chance to say. Gage’s paws drove onto his chest as he took the hunter down. They hit the floor, and the human tried to jerk away.

Gage wasn’t letting him go. The leader was the one he wanted. The one that he’d use to break the group targeting his pack. Gage brought his mouth to the hunter’s throat. He could rip the man wide open in less time than it took to breathe.

“Don’t!”But, suddenly, Kayla was there. Coming right up next to the beast. “Don’t hurt him. Please.” A ragged breath slipped from her. “He’s my brother.”

Gage felt an ice-cold pain in his chest. So cold. But since when did the cold burn?

As the cold spread through him, the wolf slumped away from the hunter on the ground, and he knew he’d made a fatal mistake. He’d been distracted. He’d heard Kayla’s cry, and his attention had slipped away from the hunter for a dangerous moment.

Second weapon.He should have known the prick would have one. All damn hunters did.

The asshole in the ski mask still had his gun up. When he’d fired, the weapon hadn’t made a sound, but its bullet had torn straight into Gage’s chest.

Kayla’s presence should have distracted her team.

Not me.

Gage’s form convulsed, and he shuddered as pain lanced through him. The pain—that was coming from the shift. His body was transforming rapidly—too rapidly—back into the body of a man. Gage stared down at his chest. That wasn’t a normal bullet.

Something was hanging out of the back of that bullet. Like a—feather?

Then he knew.Fuck me.

He’d been hit by a tranq.

“Bastard,” Gage managed to wheeze the word. Speech was near damn impossible. He couldn’t control his body. Couldn’t stop the shift. Couldn’t do anything but hit the floor as the tranquilizer poured through his veins.

“What have you done?” Kayla’s voice came from a distance. She sounded afraid. Angry. Then she was crouching over him. Touching him. Holding him. “Gage?”

He couldn’t speak.

The hunter could. “So it’s true. The others told me, they said you were getting too close to him.” Disgust flowed through the man’s words.

Why couldn’t he feel Kayla’s fingers against his skin?

“I didn’t want to believe it.” The floor creaked as the hunter came closer to her. “Notyou.You couldn’t be working with a dirty animal like him.”

Things were starting to dim. Just how much of a dose had the SOB emptied into him?

“Help us, Jonah,” Kayla said. She was pleading with the man. “Help me get him out of here before the others?—”

Too late.

More footsteps raced from outside. More humans coming in, when the wolves should have been there to have his back. Understanding hit him even as he fought to hold on to consciousness. Kayla had been telling him the truth.

No tracker.Even through the daze, he realized the significance of what was happening. Kayla hadn’t led anyone to them but?—

Betrayed.

The wolves who should have been there to protect him…one or both of those assholes had turned on him. His top two enforcers. His betrayers?

“I can’t help you,” Jonah said. “I’m sorry.”

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